Thats way too general statement. Are you saying specifically in USA people should have guns to overthrow the government? Do you see any possibility of that happening? Or you are talking about all countries? Or?

How often do you think the guns are used negatively, destroying lives, creating fear and so on, compared to how often they served for a beneficial revolution? Again, which revolution exactly are you talking about? Could the revolution not have been achieved in another way?



I agree with a lot of what you say before but regarding this: Ahm, what? got any evidence to back that up?

AFAIK places with more guns have noticeably higher rates of gun related fatalities and crimes, so.... (just look at the stats of USA compared to other "developed" countries in the western world. Of course there are other variables but at least to me its clearly no coincidence that the country with biggest gun industry + culturally accepted owning of guns by normal people also has absurdly high stats of gun-related problems)

i don't agree with that statement, either. (more guns, less crime). it is often the argument of avid gun owners. i live in the south and people are really gun friendly down here. good ole boys and what not. they all apply this logic. they always talk about how there are studies that show that if you take a community (or city or whatever) and start to arm the population, as the gun owner percentage increases, crime level decreases because criminals are less likely to target owners.

i ended my last post with sarcasm. that's why i started my post by stating that i grew up in an "at risk" or "dangerous" environment (even more so than the avid gun owners around me) so as to point out that you can make it through everyday life (even in a dangerous place) without a gun. gun ownership is perpetuated by the same mechanism that government control is: fear. everyone thinks they need a gun to protect themselves. i made it through a rougher life than most people will ever see and never needed a gun. i've had a gun pulled on me. seen people shooting. yeah. violence happens and sometimes random violence occurs but overall, the average person will never need a gun. they only need a good head.

people base so much of their lives upon fear. statistically speaking, nothing more significant than a bad car wreck will ever happen to the average person, yet, the average person spends all day long thinking of how to avoid violent calamity. the rapists aren't after YOU, specifically. the pedophiles don't want your child, specifically. chances are, you'll never have a meth crazed maniac attacking you that you'll need to shoot. your house will probably never be broken into by someone with a gun when you're home and even if so, you probably won't shot the burglar or even if you try, most people will miss or have the gun used on them. common sense can save more lives than weapons or special trainings. chances are, the most dangerous thing you'll ever face is yourself. well...or some kind of disease. cars kill more people than guns but people don't open up threads about car ownership (and that's not a stab at the OP...i think this is a good topic. just showing the interest that gets put into certain fears vs more realistic fears).

i've always found it funny what each of us base our fears off of. facts? statistics? feelings? advice? experience? insecurities? news stories? i bet that if most people actually sat down and thought about the things they were afraid of and what aspects of their lives that fear affected, they would feel pretty weak and timid. even i fall victim to pointless fears.

Yep, good post, completely agree. Same here regarding coming from a very violent place and yet never having needed a gun, in fact not having a gun and keeping my head cool has saved me out of plenty of nasty situations

Sorry for misunderstanding your sarcasm before

wasn't your fault for misunderstanding sarcasm. i didn't word it in a way that it would be picked up on. i oft forget that sarcasm can't be felt through reading.

i mean come on people...if the government decided to take over, do you really think your 2 glocks and 1 semi-auto rifle will stop them? nope. they have friggin nukes. not like they will nuke your house, specifically. they have ways, though. hell....they can cripple an entire country with embargoes and boycotts. what do you think they can and will do with you? they want us to stay armed so we think we can fight them. they fighting us in other ways. not weaponry. food. information (misinformation more like it). it's all misdirection. make the people think that they need to fight "THIS" when they really need to fight "THAT" but don't even know it. i think the government's smart enough to fight in the shadows. if, in fact, this gun control issue that people play up is in fact, true. me, personally, i can't vote or carry guns so my hands are a little tied.

use your heads...not your muscles...

The statement: more guns=less crime is actually often amde by NRA people.

Anybody who would take a moment to think about this for more than a picosecond, would have to agree that rather the opposite is the case.

Mexico is suffering at this moment from what's almost a civil war fueled by drugs from south america and guns from north america.
The over-availability of guns is obviously a big problem for the mexican army.

When more guns and more powerfull guns are available then more guns and more powerfull guns will also become available in the criminal world.

The NRA lobby says that criminals will have guns anyway, so the legality of guns will only affect decent law-abiding citizens and will change the ratio of gun ownership between criminals and decent citizens.
In reality though, legally available guns will often sip through to the criminal world eventually and legality will enlarge the availability of guns and very powerfull guns to the criminal world.

When i at the beginning of this thread made the statement that the government should at all times have a monopoly position in the use of violence i was accused of being a brainwashed socialist.

The words used where literally "we need guns to keep the government in check" and eventually more people subsequently used literally these very same combination of words "to keep the government in check".

The odd thing is that they all used the-exact-same-combination-of-words.

If these in would have been their own thoughts, wouldn't it have been more likely that they would have used different words? Wouldn't it be a very unlikely coincidence that people use the exact same words in order to express their exact same thoughts?
In other words, isn't it more likely that THEY are actually the ones being brainwashed? And isn't it cynical that people in america are being brainwashed to such an extent that they've come to believe that everybody who disagrees with the program they've been brainwashed with is being brainwashed?

The point i'm trying to make here is: do people in america realise how incredibly powerfull the gun industry, through their various lobby groups in their country, actually is? Do they realise that their government is basically being owned by the oil and weapon industry?
As well as their media?

If big insurance corporations cannot get rich anymore by taking as much money from ordinary hardworking citizens and paying out as little as possible to people who're entitled to get insurance money and who need it, because of a new healthcare plan, then the big insurance companies will organise a teaparty and make everybody believe that this is a movement from and for the ordinary hardworking people, they will spread lies about death-panels and so on in order to prevent this new healthcare plan to make it.

And the ordinary hardworking american believes it because he has to work so hard to make ends meet (in order to be able to pay for his health care insurance) that he doesn't have the time to check the facts and to properly inform himself.

Everytime you hear on your TV that something is in the interest for the ordinary hardworking man on the street, everytime somebody says he's acting on behalf of joe the plumber, or even everytime somebody says that he IS joe the plumber....
Chances are very high that the opposite is true: that the person is not joe the plumber, that he isn't speaking on behalf of joe the plumber and that he most certainly isn't working for the interest of joe the plumber either.

Chances are even very high that everytime you hear on your TV that something is in the interest of the ordinary man on the street, it is actually very much againts the interest of the ordinary man on the street and that if you hear on your TV that something goes against the interest of the ordinary man on the street, that in fact it would be actually very much in the interest of the ordinary man on the street.

The gun-lobby of wich'machinery the NRA is only a tiny wheel and of wich you don't see or know most of the other operating parts, doesn't care about you or your safety. they would actually like crime rates to go up or they would want to make you believe that this is the case. Because in such an environment they can sell more guns.

Yes another good post polytrip. Regarding the "keeping the government in check" argument some people give:

Yeah right, as if an ordinary citizen having guns is preventing the government from imposing all the different forms of absurd control, brainwashing in education, the amazing amount of misinformation spread, systematic violation of human rights (in or outside the country), corporation lobbies that affect your daily life, social injustices, etc etc etc etc

Unless of course 'keeping them in check' has no relation at all to all these very real concerns which affect every citizen of the country (world) every single day, but rather you only mean for a certain specific fantasy: that one day all the government employees will come together marching down the streets to kill you, and then all the normal citizens will unite as one and make a team that will use the savior guns to fight together to save the country...... ?

Plus let me ask those that think guns protect them from the government: If the DEA comes knocking on your door, you think that pistol is gonna help with anything against the absurd that the government will do to you for using these substances? No it wont.

guns are just like religion: a secrutiy blanket that ended up doing a lot of harm!

I mean in general. All countries. I believe it because it is part of my country's history (America). I don't think we're in any danger of that happening anytime soon. I believe that if the citizens have weapons, it deters a government from ever even starting to walk down a path to where they are needed.

I know they create absolute havoc in thousands of lives on a regular basis, and yet I still place more importance on the precepts that led my country's founders to create the second amendment. That's just who I am. I believe the end justifies the means.

What comes to mind after reading the last post it that I want gun rights because I in fact don't want anyone having a "monopoly" on guns, neither goverment, nor criminal element of which the live between them is blurred and shadowy. I don't want anyone in my space if they have an agenda that imposes upon my will on ANY level. Pesonally I don't swallow conspiracy therories "hook, line & sinker". Perhaps I am naive in thinking all is well on the Western Front (at least for the moment).
I think we in the US are a little more used to making our own way through life. It is only recently (relatively) that social welfare programs have become considered "rights". We see through the eyes of our media that many peoples throughout world the lean so heavily on entitlements that the function of thier goverments in thier respective countries will not be able to bear the burden (you can only sell your soul so many times before even it loses it's value).
I personally believe the only rights we are born with, is the right to struggle making your way through the maze, the right to become enlightened & perhaps finally the right to "not to be tread upon". I think the right to bear arms only protects the of not being tread upon, whether it be a crack-head, rapist or someone entering my home without a warrant (stealing a line from the Grateful Dead) "but if you gotta warrant I guess you're gunna come in". Those are the rights that are inalienable.
I think the above is what is what is "good for the people". Do we really want to live in a "Nanny State" that takes care of us? That means we are in debt to a much higher degree to "the powers that be". I personally loathe debt. Debt is that anchor we place around our own necks. Debt is always for "stuff", stuff in large part is unneccesary to make a happy life & happy home. Debt is at it's base pride/ego driven.
I understnd I live in a country that has given me the opportunity perhaps to a higher degree than some other places for me to have these limited insights into the desires for my life and what is or is not good for me. I am an artist. I don't really have the tools to work for someone else & never had. Perhaps it is the dreaded ADHD syndrome, but being an quasi artist it has made me dependent on my own skills to wade my way through the stream of humanity. If I were a drone, chained to somekind of machinery, punching a time clock, I may be more inclined to side with our American Unions and thier points of view. Hopefully I wouldn't be so swayed, but so many do have these points of view I am be as wrong as rain at a picnic.
America in particular with it's most guarded Freedom of Speech has allowed many (journalists in particular) to hide behind that freedom and use thier position to launch agendas. The entire spectrum of media today is filled with conspiracy theorists, left wing and right wing lunatics. From Glenn Beck & Sean Hannity to Kieth Oberman & Racheal Maddow to Billy Graham IMO are all enemies of the mind if not the State.
Maybe I've smoked too much grass on Christmas?

Where did you hear this, CBS, NBC? guess who pays them?

Don't think a revolution would ever set you free. If there ever would be a revolutionary movement in the USA, then the gun and oil companies will just hijack or buy the new revolutionary movement.

And this is not anti-american in any way, because this is the way busines is done everywhere.

The only difference with where i live is that we don't have a powerfull gun-industry, my country's government is just being owned by the big petro-industry.

It's my own opinion. I get my news from NPR, NYTimes, the Washington Post and (as a supplement only!) The Daily Show... so I certainly don't get it from there. I know it isn't a popular opinion in this crowd, but it is what I believe.

I couldn't agree more. If our freedom is the Force, those individuals are the Dark Side.

Kartikay, regarding again the 'guns protecting you' argument, would you please tell me what you think of what I said in my last post regarding how you are already not protected and trampled upon on so many other levels and this security being an illusion?

I don't think there is any particular benefit for other countries to America's citizens having guns. So we agree on that.

I'm not talking about a fantasy world of government employees marching against regular citizens... I was referring to the American Revolution as my prime example. I have no idea how such a situation might manifest again, but I'm sure it will one day, somewhere. History is eternal.

I'm not even remotely talking about taking on the DEA with guns.

I respect everyone's opinion, but i did not expect to see that many pro-guns posts in this thread.

On the other side it is kinda (stereo)typical that most of those posts come from Americans (please correct me if i'm wrong).

That some people actualy think they gain freedom by purchasing a gun is very hard to understand for someone who did not grow up in a country like the USA for instance.

A fear driven society where guns are just part of the culture...guns made the USA possible, bang bang bye bye native american, here comes the USA.

So kartikay, you agree that regardless of having the gun, the government is still screwing you over on a bunch of other very very serious areas, and that the only possible security a gun would offer would be on a hypothetical event you call the American Revolution ? And you also agree that in the meanwhile while this hypothetical event doesnt happen, thousands upon thousands of people are killed and injured with the use of these very guns?

I dont know about you but personally I choose to base my actions and ideas on the direct effects and consequences I know they have on reality, and not on (very unlikely imho) hypothetical events.

I know this post wasn't for me, but I have yet another opinion. Endless you are so right that that our rights have been trampled on many other levels. The illusion of security that we have is the illusion brought on by the powers that be. Some that would be the powers that be will you, "you don't need guns, as long as we have them, you don't need them". God did that sound like Nancy Pelosi, or what.
I think we first have to protect what we currently still have before we address those that we don't have. The ones we don't have or won't have are those we relinguish in the name of security and the "better for all" precepts.
It is incumbant on all, that where possible we eliminate those that side with the injustice imposed on the rest of the world, no matter where we live. Except for the most "rogue" leaders who are the enemy of all peace loving people to strip them of thier powers.
I for one am ashamed of our overbearing influence on the world. I don't believe that we have the right to direct the powers and politics of the world. These nations have the right to persue any course and discourse they wish.
In the years to come, we can only hope enlightened individuals rise to take the lead and suppost all peoples in the persuit of thier own pleasures and joys.

The American Revolution happened already. It isn't hypothetical. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolution

I believe that a future unbearably oppressive government is inevitable, not just hypothetical, and I believe it is less likely to happen in America because its citizens have guns.

Other than that, and the obvious negative skew about gun security being an illusion, yes that is what I believe.

I'm not insensitive to the people whose lives are ruined with gun involvement. I think it's fucking terrible. I'm just not willing to have our right to bear arms taken away because of those people. Guns don't kill people. People kill people. People can safely secure a weapon so that their child can't get it. If they don't, they are irresponsible. Gang violence should be combated in other ways.

Most importantly though, no matter what I believe or you believe, there are just too many guns spread throughout America to ever effectively collect or eliminate. There's really nothing we can do at this point. Other countries are different, but in America it is far too late to try to make guns illegal.

On the 'nanny-state'-thing i would like to add that people always tell that they're against nanny-states.

It is true that over here in europe there are big problems because of social programs that have spiralled out of control.

But the basic theory that if the governments doesn't interfere with the economy and just leave you strugling to get by, that that is the very essence of freedom.....Well, let me put it this way: many politicians say that they want no social programs or government interference because that way the hard working ordinary joe the plumber will pay taxes for people who don't work hard.

But in reality, in a world with only 'negative freedom', a government that stays out of the economy, the ordinary hard working man on the street will have to work harder and harder to get by, he will have to work two or three jobs and still hardly have enough, while the rich kids up there get there bonusses AND their tax-cut's that are also being sold as in favor of the hardworking people.
Let's face it: tax-cut's for billionaires...How many of you are billionaires?

Is getting a fair chance in life by having acces to education a luxury? is it a luxury that you don't have to be a millionaire to get acces to good healthcare? is it a luxury not to be exploited by your boss?

That's what the politicians who're campains are financed by those billionaire kids who get their tax-cut's as a celebration of the free market, but who when their banks fall somehow get bailed-out mysteriously and get to keep their bonusses mysteriously..anyway, those politicians tell you.

You have to work three jobs to get by, you have to compeed on the labour market with illegal immigrants who work in sweatshops for nothing, your job is getting outsourced to slaves in china and you have to work harder and harder everyday for less and less money, only to pay for the bonusses of rich kids who never worked a single day in their lives, while you see on all the TV-shows how being rich is glamourous and good and how rich people are admirable and fantastic, while YOU are actually working for their bonusses. And when their banks fail, YOU are paying to save their banks and the bonusses that they're allowed to keep in spite of how they've failed on that celebrated free-market.

You are being lead to belief that it's good if the government stays out of everything including healthcare.

But in that strugle of yours, the majority of people will loose. You are being blinded by the belief that in america everybody can get rich if they work hard. But fact is that social mobility has decreased over the last decades. If you're born poor, you are likely to die poor and if you're born rich you are likely to die rich.

You can think that all this so-called 'freedom' is in your interest, but how many of you are rich? You can work as hard as you like but the most of you will never get rich.
Do you want to live in a country that only takes care of the winners? well, let's be honest, we aren't those winners. We may not be the biggest losers, but how many of us are millionaires?

In europe you actually have a bigger chance to become a millionaire if you're born poor. In america you have a bigger chance of becoming a billionaire if you're born a millionaire.

I'm not in favor of nanny-states. But when you look at the facts, you have to see that their are european countries that are doing worse than america and that ARE nanny-states in many ways, but there are also european countries that have a healthier economy, a higher average income, bigger exports, higher life-expectancy, lower crime rates, lower teen-pregnancy rates, lower rate of illiteracy, higher average level of education, lower health-car costs, higher life-expectancy at birth and most importantly: biggest overall happyness.
Denmark, sweden, norway and finland are the HAPPIEST nations on earth AND, they have healthier economy's.
And i know many people are told that those are socialist states, but this is absolutely not true. Their economy's are actually doing BETTER then the economy of america or britain, then the countries where the free-market is being hailed as if it's the gospel of st-john itself.
Germany has only a year ago been passed by china as the largest exporter in the world. I mean 80 million germans are producing nearly as much as 1350 million chinese people!! you cannot say that germany is a communist state: everybody all around the world wants to buy mercedeses, BMW's, audi's, volkswagens, porshe's, maybach's and bugatti's..those aren't trabbie's, these people know how to run a profitable business, it's GM that needed government money, not BMW.

If you have SOME government regulations and SOME social programs to prevent people from being exploited and squeezed out like a lemon to work as hard as possible for as little money as possible and to prevent ordinary hardworking citizens to wind-up homeless on the street if they get sick and to make sure that also childeren of ordinary laborers can make it to nobelprize winners if they got the brains for it, you just have a better world to live in.

While negative freedom leaves you free, yes. But it's only a free fight, a free strugle every day where the winners take all and the losers get nothing, where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
Where the people at the top see their salary increase with double digit's percentage growth's while the ordinary people see their job's going to china or seeing their salary stay the same with economic inflation going up, or seeing even their salary diminishing year by year.

You're being blinded by the words 'freedom' or the 'american dream' while it's only the top-dogs who benefit and who want to keep you blind. While the rest of us has to strugle.
While it doesn't have to be that way, it can also fairer.
The danes, the swedes, the norwegians, and the fins have proven it.
They are happier, healthier and richer and they are not in debts that much. As a matter of fact, america and the UK are much, much deeper in depth then those scandinavian nations and even the eurozone as a whole. The eurozone as a whole, is less in depth than america and the UK, even when the average financial position of it is being dragged down by greece and portugal.
Even france´s financial position is better then that of the anglo nations.

Not worshipping the almighty invisible hand, not leaving people to die out on the streets doesn´t make you a nanny/state, it doesn´t make you a communist and it doesn´t leave you in debts.
Stealing from the poor and giving the lute to the rich like america and the UK are doing leaves you in debt.

I agree with polytrip. I don't think much of that has to do with guns, though.