Dragon2115
Key Veteran
Location: New England
| UK a benevolent government? Maybe today, but that overlooks about 500 years of history? Has everyone forgotten the British Empire and its' ruthless rule many many foriegn countries? Btw, very nice of you to finally give Scotland its own parliment again. That only took 300 years.
As for your crime statistics, your own home office reports that since the enactment of your latest gun laws crime against a person have gone up every year. What is of particular note is that "hot" entry crimes (crime where the perp eneter the home while the occupant is there) has gone up significantly. That says they know you can't defend yourself and now have less fear of confronting you. I wouldn't judge that as a success. But as you say, if that works for you, go for it.
As for Australia,
| Quote |
| We didnt have to fight for Aus, we just arrived and setup camp, happy days, here we are.
|
Of course not, that's because you didn't 'just arrive'. You were dropped off. Australia was originally a British penal colony, a prison without bars if you will. And btw, since your latest gun laws were enacted your own government statistics show that violent crime has increased.
As for the bs about easy access to guns. This is a simplistic and stupid arguement that only works if you overlook certain key facts. When I was a kid you could buy guns at SEARS and at any number of other general retail stores. You could buy them via mail order no problem. Kids used to carry firearms to school for use after class. If someone owned a gun it was no big deal. Now there are storage laws, back ground checks, registration in some locals, carry licenses, etc. So the truth is that if anything they have become harder to obtain, legally that is.
Kids and violence with guns. (notice I don't use the term gun violence because that is a term used to shift responsibility from the perp to the object) Here's where there has been a significant change. When I was a kid we got into fights all the time (no change there) but NOBODY ever went home and grabbed dads' gun and came back to settle things. It was simply unthinkable to do so. But society has changed. Everywhere we look someone is trying to push the limits and justify it as being ok. Moral and ethical standards have decayed. So as a result the unthinkable is now considered an acceptable alternative. Guns aren't to blame for this, but not according to the anti-gun crowd. Which btw are some of the worst offenders when it comes to moral and ethical decay.
Accidents with guns. According to government statistics accidents with guns are at an all time low since records began being kept back in the 1930's. Education goes a long way here. With regards to kids keeping guns hidden from them is a mistake. It's like the forbidden fruit. The more you try to keep it from them the more they want it. I have guns and an 17 year old son. Whenever we brought a gun into the house my wife and I would take him to the range and let him shoot it until he was bored with it. That took all the mystery out of them. As a matter of fact we reached a point that when given the choice he prefered to use a .22 taget rifle over anything else. The attraction of the others was gone so he chose the one he liked shooting over the one with the biggest bang.
Of course this doesn't change the fact that they are all stored in a safe. But that is more for protection against someone breaking in and stealing them than anything else.
As for crime in the U.S. lets look at where the bulk of the crime is occurring, inner cities. This one of the places that gun control is the strongest yet crime is the worst. Washington DC banned handguns and yet it has one of the worst track records for crime involving guns. What does this track record suggest? Simple, banning guns doesn't work in reducing crime, either with or without guns.
Btw, for those that wish to point out the number of criminal deaths involving firearms, they should also take into account the number of times firearms are used to thwart crime without a shot being fired. I know that's a hard concept to handle. When a crime occurs there is evidence, damage, injury, or a body. When a crime is averted there is no evidence left behind. This is what makes it easy for gun controllers to rave on and on. Because something didn't happen it's easy to argue that it never would have under different circumstances. Unfortunately it's a wrong and sometimes dangerous conclusion to reach.
Here's another item I love. 'Do you really think that you and your little pop guns can stand up to the U.S. military?' This shows a fatal flaw in critical thinking. It assumes that 10,000 gun owners with rifles, shotguns, and pistols are going to line up against an armored tank division on the plains of Nebraska and have it out. Wrong! The simple numbers are this, if such an event were to occur that the general poulous of the U.S. decided to rise up against the Federal Government, it would be a one million man standing army that is deployed all over the world vs. 70 million gun owners (current estimate based on known gun owners) with over 250 million guns. An Abrams tank is a very powerful weapons platform. However, it's a paperweight if you can't get fuel and ammo to it. And that's how you deal with it. You don't go after the tank, you go after its' supply line. And that's just the start of the problems for the government in a conflict like that.
The government would be faced with ordering the killing of its' own citizens on its' own ground. That is going to sway any fence sitters against them. Remember, the Revolutionary War started with only about 15% of the general populace in favor. Most were undecided until the shooting started. Many of the military will refuse to accept orders to kill there own people and will either just sit it out, or will defect. If they defect some will take there weapons with them. Now the opposition has more powerful weapons which may allow them to take on that M1 Abrams tank directly.
Enough of this, back to G2 since it's too cold to go flying. |
and by some freak of evolution you suddenly became good at sports and beat us at most things! (at least rugby has come home!)
