@gunfighter - you arguement is only really valid if you can show me one example of anyone ever changing a government policy because they shot someone or threatened to shoot someone. You complain on here that Obama is circumventing the constitution but have any of the gun owners of America stood up and shot him? (If they have, the news hasn't yet reached the UK)

In the UK the Belfast City Council decided to change their policy on flying flags - we've had nearly two months of nightly riots, water cannon, petrol bombs, shootings etc, do you think for one minute it will change a tiny government decision. Not in a million years, why? because as soon as any government moves an millimetre in the face of violence, violence will become the norm. You know it, and everybody knows it.

”you arguement is only really valid if you can show me one example of anyone ever changing a government policy because they shot someone or threatened to shoot someone."

There are plenty examples. The JFK assassination helped the space program. The MLK Jr assassination helped civil rights. The Lincoln assassination helped White Power in the South.

See? Shooting people helps 2 out of 3 times.


M'erica!

@ Maniac - your one example is the American Revolution. Citizen militias proved, in the long run, to be woefully inadequate in the line of battle, but they were sufficient to move things along until the Continental army was better trained and reinforced by foreign professionals. I think that makes gunfighter's example valid, eh?

@ Obi - I think most gun owners think that the right to defend one's person and property is a fundamental human right. Guns are the great equalizer. A 5 foot 2, 95 pound woman with a pistol is on equal or more powerful footing than a 6 foot 6, 280 pound man with a crowbar.

Also, interesting that Maniac mentioned Ireland. I'm no expert on Irish history, but I'm betting the British didn't allow the Irish to keep and bear arms for a couple of hundred years. Now why was that?

Does anyone now dispute the right of the Irish to have their own free and independent state?

@Flem

It's not really comparable. During the Revolution, British and American weapons were essentially the same. What's the best weapon a citizen could get their hands on now? An M16? You know what the Military has? Drones and Carriers. Good luck.

Also, we already know that violent revolutions don't work in America anymore. I'd like to draw your attention to the Civil War.

The one I'm not buying?

"Guns are necessary for defense/Guns protect me from the government" or any permutation of that commonly repeated trope.

I don't buy it NOT because it isn't a valid point, but rather because the extent to which guns are worshiped and placed upon such a pedestal doesn't mesh with those rationales.

To put it quite simply--in principle, as someone who can't imagine ever owning a gun, YES, I AGREE WITH YOU, guns theoretically can help you defend yourself and yes, gun ownership to a certain extent protects civilians...I don't think it's a "We must all own rifles or the President will become King George III" situation, but I agree in theory that it's probably good in principle at least that gun ownership in a free society not be banned.

THAT BEING SAID:

You do NOT need an AK-47 or AR-15 for defense.
I'm sorry.
You do not.
Period.

I will buy that carrying a handgun might help protect you...there's data out there to suggest that's dangerous as well, but at least there are also stories of handguns being used in actual self-defense as well, so yes, I'll buy that, within reason.

Tell me, when was the last time you heard of a civilian walking around downtown LA or NYC toting an AR-15 for "defensive" purposes?

So I'm sorry, I don't buy that you need those for defense...and to answer the point that will surely come up, YES, more handguns kill than automatics, but the point is to put a DENT in gun violence, not eliminate it altogether...gun violence will never go away, but that doesn't mean we can't take action to limit the amount who suffer by it--

If X amount die by handguns and Y amount die by automatics, and Y's figures go down, then the total sum of X + Y = Dead goes down (at least in theory.)

Some gun owner friends bring up the tired cliche "Well, people use steak-knives/cars/fertilizer to kill, why don't we ban those as well, HMMM?"

To which I say:

Steak-knives, cars, and fertilizer kill when MIS-used, killing is, well, a primary function of a gun.

That's an Argument from the Absurd, it's below your abilities, please stop using it, it makes you and your position look all the weaker and more ill-thought out for it.

Anyway...

My point stands--I'll buy that certain handguns under certain regulations CAN protect you...so what's with the AR-15s and AK-47s? Do you NEED weapons that are approaching a military-grade capability to defend yourselves against muggers?

Which is when Point #2 kicks in...ie, "We need protection from the government," to which I say...

First of all, don't you think that makes you sound just a teeny bit paranoid...and before someone drags this thread down with another "Hitler did ___!" diatribe, please realize that you cannot compare every single last thing or person on earth you disagree with to Hitler...I dislike Roland Emmerich for that idiocy known as "Anonymous," but I don't go around comparing his ludicrous movies to Third Reich propaganda.

If you REALLY feel the government has it in for you in such a way...
1. Please realize the egotism inherent in your statement and
2. Please realize you sound like a tin foil-wearing conspiracy nut

I love Orwell as much as anyone, but claiming the Western World is akin to his Oceania is, well, rather sad, and claiming a slippery slope is, well, self-defeating, you can do that for anything and in any capacity for any argument.

The government is not out to get you.
Quite frankly, the government and the corporate system it's connected into in the Western world have a pretty sweet deal going, and it'd be rather foolish of them to mess it up...and besides all that, believe it or not, you're NOT that important, and Barack Obama isn't going to show up at your doorstep demanding you pay an extra tax on your sugar and tea.

I make this allusion again as if I were to guess, this is part of the problem:

America was founded on a rebellion, and as the pen and sword (or musket) went hand in hand in the Revolution we had, not to mention on the frontier, it's been deified in American culture ever since.

To which I have to reiterate--guns are a tool, NOT a virtue, and every year ISN'T 1776 again...you're not Minutemen. That conflict is over. The impetus and social order which motivated that conflict is over.

Please move on, and please move past that defense of military-grade weapons for civilian use--

"A well-regulated militia being necessary for the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

There's the 2nd Amendment, so deified it approaches the level of 2nd Commandment for some, it seems...

If you ARE intent on owning a military-grade weapon, answer me this--

ARE you forming "a well-regulated militia?"
OR are you holing up with a cache in your tool shed?

The 2nd allows you arms for a militia-style use...not for vigilantism.

To give a scene from not Shakespeare, not Shaw, not Milton but (gasp!) POP CULTURE...

This is rather like the opening of "The Dark Knight" with all the fake, vigilante, hockey-pad-wearing "Batmans" carrying guns and acting out justice in place of the genuine Batty article.

So, to paraphrase that movie...

Why should the military be allowed such weapons and not you?
They're not wearing hockey pads...nor are the holed up in a tool shed thinking President Obama's coming after them.



Why?
Why do you value guns so MUCH?
I value Shakespeare, opera, poetry, free inquiry, empiricism, The Enlightenment...
But none of these things have the potential to KILL anyone, let alone many thousands.

Thousands in America do NOT die of wounds inflicted from paper-cuts reading Hamlet...

There might be some mental anguish amongst those trying desperately to fathom why their teachers are making them read a story written 400 years ago about a dude who talks funny, treats his girlfriend like shit, and probably is just a tad too close to his mommy and too in love with his daddy...but that's their problem. ;)

I'll even reach across the aisle here--
I don't think it's any secret I'm not a fan of the Bible...or the Abrahamic Religions...
Or that I find the Bible sexist, racist, endorsing authoritarianism and laughably wrong scientifically...
Or that I I take D.H. Lawrence's assessment of Shakespeare (great phrases but terrible people) and apply it as my own stance on much of the Bible's literary merits...

But while I'm obviously strongly opposed to most of the ideas expressed in the Bible in some form or another and chafe at their influencing public policy--ie, being used as justification to keep gays from marrying or mandating "Creation Science" be taught alongside, well, real science in schools--AT LEAST I *GET* where the whole passion for the matter comes from...

I disagree vehemently, but I GET why so many people take so much value from the Bible and thus want to defend it and draw from it.

I GET IT.

I DO *NOT* get why there's the same level of deification and indeed glorification for guns.
I DO NOT get why they are clutched to with that same level of devotion as one would the Bible or their most intimate, preciously valued secular readings and values.

I can get someone wanting to celebrate a Jesus figure...
I can get someone wanting to celebrate (for irony's sake) John Lennon...

I DO NOT get why you want to celebrate a cold killing machine.

AT LEAST Jesus was (mostly-kinda-sorta) a pacifist, peaceful man...I can understand valuing a peaceful man, albeit a flawed peaceful man.

WHY celebrate, defend, romanticize or glorify what is the very antithesis of such a man or such an ideal, namely, a cold, uncaring, inhuman killing machine?

(And first one to give the old "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" shtick gets a smack in the face...when they announce the cause of death for a shooting, they DON'T say "people," do they? Further, if people kill people and not guns...why do you need your guns to protect you from others...surely if people are the cause of death and not guns you don't need the gun? Surely if guns don't kill people but people kill people King Obama III won't be touting guns when he comes to perform that government takeover of all of America from freedom to baseball to apple pie so many have been droning on about since we dared elect a black man to the White House...)

Just a simple question--

Why? ;)

"f the government takes our guns, what's to stop them from taking away our other rights? What's to stop Obama from declaring himself dictator? There's a correlation between gun-grabbing and bad things (see: Hitler and Stalin) happening."

And we get the Hitler defense in THE VERY FIRST PARAGRAPH OF THE VERY FIRST RESPONSE!

Wow!

Didn't waste ANY time there Godwinning your argument into fallacious mockery, there, did you?

(I like you, Gunfighter, but seriously...? First paragraph? Straight to Hitler?) xD

Guns are cool... AK-47s are useless in civilian areas. More fun to hunt with a bow and arrow anyway if you ask me.

"Even you, obiwan, HAVE to have some sort of issue with Obama misusing executive orders to all but circumvent the Second Amendment. That sets a very, very bad precedent for future presidents."

Nope.
Why?

1. As he himself said, his Executive Orders here are essentially weak and worthless without Congressional action,
2. He's acting on a bad precedent ALREADY SET BEFORE HE TOOK OFFICE, blame every President post-War Powers Act for this one (including good old Mr. Reagan),
3. Selfishly, I'd be for what he's proposing...so in a selfish sense, if by some miracle it did work that way even without Congressional support...hey, he just used the crooked, Constitution-circumventing tool his predecessors bequeathed him, he didn't pull any new dirty tricks out of the play book, and *I* get what *I* want for a change with such an act, so...

Machiavelli says enjoy an ill-gotten break that goes your way...especially when you can't really fix the political ill behind it?

;)

As FlemGem pointed out, it's about the rights of human beings. Defending yourself, your family, and your property is a fundamental right. Society breaks down from time to time, in the event of natural disasters or outbreaks of societal disorder. The police are not there to protect you, they are there to enforce the laws and capture lawbreakers. It is up to each person and family to protect themselves when push comes to shove. We aren't living on the frontier anymore, but nonetheless the world is a tumultuous and dangerous place. My right to defend myself is as important as my right to speak my mind, to worship how I choose, or to not be in bondage. When free people are told "you don't need to be able to protect yourself", what we hear is "you aren't grownups who are responsible for yourselves--you are children and the state is your guardian." Well, that's bullshit, that's a lie, and that's insulting.

"I think most gun owners think that the right to defend one's person and property is a fundamental human right. Guns are the great equalizer. A 5 foot 2, 95 pound woman with a pistol is on equal or more powerful footing than a 6 foot 6, 280 pound man with a crowbar."

Which is why, as I state, I don't have a problem with guns.
You should be allowed certain handguns, sure.
No problem.
They ARE an equalizer, and I'll admit handguns CAN help defend you...I'd point out that statistically they also CAUSE a great amount of crime, but AT LEAST I can seem SOME redemptive value in them and in their ownership.

A military-grade weapon?

Why do you need that? That's not an equalizer, that's someone getting a one-up, to play with your metaphor...

Unless you actually think the government is going to invade your front porch tomorrow, in which case, I refer you to my previous statements on that matter. :)

As for defense being a fundamental right, as that's the closest I've gotten to an answer so far (as again, I'm asking why you VALUE these things seemingly above or on par with anything else) I agree you have a fundamental right to defense...

But an assault rifle is NOT, in the context of domestic ownership, a defensive weapon.
It's an offensive weapon.
A handgun is a defensive weapon, I'll buy that.
A machine gun?

Not so much.

Anyway, calm down about executive orders... each President does it hundreds of times; it's nothing new. Just so happens that this one is an issue that more people care about than budget balance within the cabinet was...

Obi, have you ever fired any guns? Do you understand the differences between different kinds of guns? What do you think a "machine gun" is?

We need guns because Hitler and tomatoes.

Defending yourself, your family, and your property is a fundamental right. Society breaks down from time to time, in the event of natural disasters or outbreaks of societal disorder. The police are not there to protect you, they are there to enforce the laws and capture lawbreakers. It is up to each person and family to protect themselves when push comes to shove. We aren't living on the frontier anymore, but nonetheless the world is a tumultuous and dangerous place."

Let me take just that for a second, and play with Mr. Hobbes' State of Nature allegory--
Hobbes says (and he's pretty dead on) that you give up that sort of vigilante right to self-imposed justice and defense when you join a state as, well, that's the first purpose of a state for Hobbes, protection and a cessation of an anarchical State of Nature.

I'd therefore say that since you're in a State, while you have the right to defend yourself, the extent to which you describe would now fall on the shoulders of said State and thus policemen and soldiers, not you in your backyard with an AK-57.

That things break down in a State from time to time does NOT mean you should then revert back to a State of Nature mentality...if anything, that's the sort of harmful thinking that leads to looting and violence.
Now, should you be completely placid?
No, that's a losing strategy too.
But there's a world of difference between defending your turf or yourself in such a situation or exerting your will with an over-powered weapon at the expense of others who, but for a freak disaster which WILL be corrected in time, are your countrymen and thus people you wouldn't do this to normally.

"My right to defend myself is as important as my right to speak my mind, to worship how I choose, or to not be in bondage."

I have to disagree on a very basic, semantic level--
Your right to defense is important, but NOT as important as your right to freedom.
They do NOT come together, but rather are two rights that complement one another.
That being said, if you had to pick ONE...
Be a free human being or an enslaved individual with a gun (and remain enslaved despite your gun, you're not shooting your way to freedom, let's say you're in a mine with a gun, a pickax, and 1,000 uzi-toting guards outside...you may have the gun and thus the right to defend yourself, but let's be honest here, in this situation you are NOT shooting yourself to freedom, are you?) people would have to choose freedom first.

Granted this is like choosing between food and water, that is, you need both but will die faster in the absence of water than in the absence of food so water HAS to be the first priority with food an immediate second; likewise, freedom has to be the first priority and defense an immediate second.

But no, your right to bear arms is not as important as your right to freedom of speech...

They come #1 and #2, and for a good reason, but there IS a reason why one is #1 and the other #2.

"When free people are told "you don't need to be able to protect yourself", what we hear is "you aren't grownups who are responsible for yourselves--you are children and the state is your guardian." Well, that's bullshit, that's a lie, and that's insulting."

1. I'm sorry if it deflates your ego or makes you feel like a child and less of a man not to have the opportunity to tote a weapon that's potentially dangerous to those around you when we have the best trained police and military in the world to do that...really, we spend SO MUCH on the military...SO...MUCH...and

...and that sent before it was supposed to so oh well, point made there mostly anyway, I suppose. :p

Obi, two things:

1. I'm not sure why guns specifically became such a big deal, although I'd guess it's something along the lines of associations of guns with individualism, self-protection, etc etc. I am surprised that you are surprised -- things became totems or fetishes in political culture, mostly just because they are. Think about the Sandra Fluke birth control fight: getting birth control covered by insurance isn't a big practical deal (given that most forms of birth control are very very inexpensive, are available for free in many places from various non-profits, and are only as minimally expensive as they are because of unnecessary and probably in the long run harmful prescription requirements) but because of what it says about larger issues of the place of women in society.

2. I think you're mistaken to so casually dismiss concerns about government overreach. In many parts of this country the police force is something like an occupying army. The overprosecution of Aaron Swartz should give us all pause. And, perhaps most importantly, these things are still defined by class and race: a poor black guy in a gun-hostile polity is basically out of luck, while a wealthy person can afford/has the connections to get around such regulations. Practically speaking, stronger gun regulations really means stronger regulations for those outside the top of the economic pyramid, while the elite and powerful still have access to all the protection they need.

Obi also, to something you said while I was typing:

"when we have the best trained police"

Are you talking about America? The USA? Because this is laughably, obviously wrong.

@ckroberts ... would you trade out our police for the KGB?

You're a naive scion of a decadent civilization. How can you be so immersed in the great books and so ignorant of human nature?

There a plenty of examples for why one might need arms to protect themselves, even in our over-policed modern state. What about the rancher who lives out on the Arizona border and has (highly-armed) drug runners crossing his land? What about the inner-city Korean whose convenience store is under attack during a riot? What about the average citizen who wants to protect her home or her business from looting when a hurricane takes out a city? What about any damn one of us when the shit really hits the fan, due to foreign attack or domestic breakdown? You don't think that can happen, do you?

If I cannot stand and defend myself from attack, I am not free. I am not an adult. I am a child. I am reliant on the protection of others.

And, if I have to protect myself, I want access to the longest range, the most ammunition, and the most intimidating weapon I can have.

bo_sox: No, I wouldn't trade them for the KGB. Or for Hitler!

Then you should be content with it....

"Obi, have you ever fired any guns? Do you understand the differences between different kinds of guns? What do you think a "machine gun" is?"

To take those in order:
1. No, and happily no, I don't ever intend to, either...if I become some famous author someday maybe for sport somewhere safe far, far away from people I could hurt...but then, I'm not AT ALL a Hemingway-esque Man Among Men, now, am I? ;) (And experiencing it wouldn't change my view of it...much the same way I don't need contract herpes or abuse women in any way before realizing I don't like or endorse those things or acts either. Put another way--much the way I'm sure statistically some or even most of you don't like Shakespeare, and at that most if not all of you probably don't like or know as much about him and his works as myself, but you can see the appeal of Shakespeare all the same, I don't care for guns, but I can see their appeal for sportsmen and their appeal for defense all the same, and just as you can respect my love of Shakespeare while arching an eyebrow, I can do the same with you and guns...it's just that I'm not willing to allow that respect to extend so far as to put others at risk for your hobby, sport, or personal ideal.)

2. I'll be honest as possible and say yes and no...insofar as I know some, but obviously those of you who are into guns likely know plenty more than I do in much the same way as you might know Shakespeare wrote sonnets but couldn't tell me how many he wrote (154) or which "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" is (Sonnet 18) so I'll leave this one open-ended and with a request to clarify your question, or else make it more specific, as I'd have to imagine most anyone could name Shakespeare or name a couple differences between different types of guns, but that knowledge might be superficial in relation to the question you're driving at, so specify or clarify. :)

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_gun

"A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire bullets in quick succession from an ammunition belt or magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute.
Machine guns are generally categorized as submachine guns, machine guns, or autocannons. Submachine guns are hand-held small portable automatic weapons for personal defense or short-range combat firing pistol-caliber rounds. A machine gun is often portable to a certain degree, but is generally used when attached to a mount or fired from the ground on a bipod, and generally fires a rifle cartridge. Light machine guns are small enough to be fired and are hand-held like a rifle, but are more effective when fired from a prone position. The difference between machine guns and autocannons is based on caliber, with autocannons using calibers larger than 16 mm.[1]
Another factor is whether the gun fires conventional rounds or explosive rounds. Guns firing large-caliber explosive rounds are generally considered either autocannons or automatic grenade launchers ("grenade machine guns"). In contrast to submachine guns and autocannons, machine guns (like rifles) tend to share the characteristic of a very high ratio of barrel length to caliber (a long barrel for a small caliber); indeed, a true machine gun is essentially a fully automatic rifle, and often the primary criterion for a machine gun as opposed to an automatic rifle is the presence of a quick-change barrel or other cooling system (see below).
In United States gun law, machine gun is a technical term for any fully automatic firearm, and also for any component or part that will modify an existing firearm such that it functions as a fully automatic firearm.[2]"

^Like most Internet-era people, what the Internet/Google/smart people who know this stuff tell me ;)

So a machine gun is a "fully automatic weapon". Do you not know that those are already severely restricted in US law? So bringing them up has absolutely nothing to do with the current conversation? And that any use of them in a shooting is because the perpetrator (shockingly) violated the law in having such a weapon?

"You're a naive scion of a decadent civilization. How can you be so immersed in the great books and so ignorant of human nature?"

How can you be so quick to respond yet so ill in your response?

Did I SAY that guns are not necessary for defense?
No.
Several times now I've said I buy them being necessary.

I simply (and I think RIGHTLY) say that they are NOT in possession of the #1 slot in terms of priority between guns and freedom.

"But they go hand in hand!"
I'm not saying they don't.
By that same token, food and water go hand in hand...
But water IS the more vital of the two, if just by a little.

Likewise, both defense and freedom ARE immensely important and they go 1/2, but by just a little, that same "little" as my food/water analogy, freedom comes first, if ever so slightly, over defense/guns.

"So a machine gun is a "fully automatic weapon". Do you not know that those are already severely restricted in US law? So bringing them up has absolutely nothing to do with the current conversation? And that any use of them in a shooting is because the perpetrator (shockingly) violated the law in having such a weapon?"

1. In ALL my posts so far I use the term "machine gun" ONCE...I've hardly harped on the matter,
2. Wikipedia lists the AK-47 as being an assault weapon (if you prefer that term, I'll be all means use that one) and goes on to list variants (one being an RPK) AS machine guns.

I'm calling it as I see it. It's not an insult. You live in a safe, ordered society, and you are a secluded, scholarly thinker. Maybe you haven't lived long enough or you've been too protected to see this beyond your analogies.

"freedom comes first, if ever so slightly, over defense/guns. "

That's a category error. That's like saying "free speech comes first before words."

The term "assault weapon" has no real definition, and is also meaningless in this discussion. Now, if you want to talk about calibers, about semi-auto, about handguns v. rifles, or about some of the cosmetic features that make guns look more scary, you'd be talking about issues that are actually germane.

Most liberals come at this from a place of ignorance. They don't understand the workings of guns, the varieties, or what the advantages and disadvantages of different specifications. It's as if they wanted to ban "hard liquor", without giving any thought to actual alcohol levels, the use of wine in religions, or whether you could buy by the drink or by the bottle.