Michael New. Skar?

[Entsuropi]

What's up with **this** anyway. There is a bold function you know.

[Master Xaio]

Because I often write it in OpenOffice before actually putting it in here.  And if you make something bold in OpenOffice, then copy it across... its no longer bold.  So I just do that.  Cause I'm lazy and can't be bothered changing it.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

Uh..... no.  Tell me SE, have you ever fought with a knife? Or against someone with a knife?  It is a lot easier to inflict damage with a gun.  All you have to do is point it, and pull the trigger.   To be dangerous with a knife, you have to be fairly proficient with it.  You also need to have speed and strength.  A knife is a lot less dangerous.

Yes, I have. Against trained and untrained opponents. True, it was a sparring match, so my life and limbs weren't in danger, but the practice is the same.
You conveniently ignore that a gun has to hit certain parts to be fatal. A shot to the gut is usually no more fatal than a knife to the gun. Untreated, they'll both kill you eventually, but you can ket the aid you need if you're in an area that has the facilities. Shots to the legs and arms are also non-fatal unless you're an idiot and refuse care so it gets infected.

True, a bullet to the head or chest is more likely to penetrate than a knife, but unless you're really good (most aren't, even here where apparently you peopel think everyone on the street is carrying a double-barrelled shotgun and/or machine gun) you have to be very close to the target to have much of a chance of it hitting fatally. Close enough to disarm the perpetrator.

Now, you ARE still ignoring one key fact. Australian homicides increased by 20% in a year when gun violence DROPPED 25%. It seems to me that guns aren't the problems. In the light of that, increased death by guns seems irrelevant, since death over all is going UP when there are no guns. How do you explain that as safer? I'd rather be shot quickly than clubbed or strangled. It's irrelevant, in the light of this statistic, that the US has more deaths by gun than Australia per capita. Because it doesn't look at the whole picture. There are likely many other factors going into it. Factors you like to dismiss but are extremely pertinent. It seems to me that stopping gun violence has made your country a MORE brutal place.

[House of Mustard]

I don't think I agree with most of what has been said here, and I'm not really arguing the points of any of you, so I won't try to refute anything either.  But I want to lay out my position on gun control -- it's different from most people's.

First of all, just so you know, I'm not a wacko member of the John Birch society, and I'm not a member of a Northern Idaho militia.  Just to get that out of the way.

I don't hunt, and I don't shoot for sport very often (although I enjoy it).  I don't own a gun personally, and I've promised my wife that I would never keep one in the house, should I ever own one.  So, if I don't hunt, and I don't keep a Glock in the end table to stop intruders, why am I against gun control?

Simple: because gun ownership ensures liberty.

How many times have you heard someone say that automatic weapons should be banned because you have no need of an M-16 to kill a deer?  But the truth is that the Second Amendment was NOT designed to allow hunting.  It was designed to allow the citizens to defend their freedoms.  The Bill of Rights was written shortly after the Revolution, and the people knew quite well how important an armed population is.

Now: I'm not condoning complete freedom of gun ownership.  Obviously, children, convicted criminals, and the mentally ill should have no access to guns.  

But general gun control is, in my opinion, one of the first steps toward dictatorship.  The old adage: "if guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns" is wrong.  The truth is: "If guns are outlawed, only outlaws, the military, and the police will have guns."  It seems awfully one sided to me -- the Government vs. the People.

Now obviously, Australia is not currently a dictatorship.  But, with guns under strict control, how much easier is it for the country to BECOME a dictatorship?  I know that Americans wouldn't go down without a fight.  How would the Australians fight back if the government changed?  Use boomerangs?

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I don't think we disagree all that much.  I don't hunt. I don't own. I've only even shot once (but that was fun). But we'd be fools to think that governments will remain stable forever. The historical reason for preventing private ownership of weapons (going at least 1000 years back) is to prevent rebellion. That's the reason we have the rights.

The reason I'm arguing the way I am is because the fear that the human cost in lives and injuries outweighs the freedom guaranteed by it. This is a legitimate fear, but in the end, I don't think the cost is nearly so high as it is perceived to be. That's why I think these countries that have outlawed firearms are off-base. And, as I argued in my last post, I don't think the fear has shown to have manifested in the real world. Yes, the US has higher firearms deaths than other places. But this isn't just due to the ownership of firearms. Most of the firearms used in these crimes are illegally owned anyway, and taking away the guns does NOT eliminate or in many cases even reduce violence and death. THerefore, I can't see how the death/injury cost comes close to comparing to the liberties ensured.

[House of Mustard]

Then we're pretty much on the same page, SE.

I find it interesting that people think outlawing guns will deter criminals.  Not to over-simplify, but outlawing murder certainly isn't working.  Maybe making more laws isn't the answer.

[Skar]

Injure someone with a knife, yes.  However, its not **that** easy to inflict a fatal wound with a knife.  You can inflict a wound which if left untended, can turn fatal, yes.  You can inflict near fatal wounds.  But...

And thats only really if they're standing still.  Now, I'm not sure about some of you, but somehow I don't really like the idea of being disembowled, so I'd probably move.  

You asked earlier if anyone had ever actually fought anyone with a knife.  Yes.

Your perception that it's easier to inflict an immediately fatal wound with a gun than with a knife at close range is false.  You're are far more likely to bleed out in a matter or seconds from a knife wound than you are a gun wound.  A  bullet to the belly and you take days to die.  Stab or slash a man in the belly with a knife and he'll bleed out in seconds.

"Moving" around while someone is cutting you with a knife will just make the damage worse.

I haven't seen any statistics that support the idea that gun control decreases violent crime.  There are statistics that demonstrate that death-by-gun rates go down in places with stricter gun control laws.  Duh.  This is a meaningless tautology.  Like saying that you are less likely to freeze to death in the mojave desert than in Alaska, therefore it's safer to live in the mojave desert than in Alaska.  

I have seen statistics that demonstrate the opposite.  Relax gun control laws and both the non-violent and violent crime rates go down.  Florida.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

Hrm.. Like I said, I've only been in sparring matches, so I didn't realize how grusome the knife wound really is. I suppose that makes sense though. Bullet wound is smaller, and has a chance that the bullet would cauterize a bit of it as it passes.

Anyway, yeah, a guy with a knife is going to mess you up, too. It's a bad way to go.

[Skar]

HoM makes the salient point.  

In the end, the main effect of rabid gun control laws is to disarm law-abiding citizens.  It makes it more difficult for law-abiding citizens to defend themselves, from either criminals or the government.

When it comes to rebellion my one solace when I read/hear about all the people insisting that it should be illegal for respectable citizens to own guns is an idea well expressed in the movie "We Were Soldiers."  The SGM, after being urged to carry a rifle by his commander, replies that there will be plenty of them lying around on the ground if it gets to the point where he needs one.  

[Entsuropi]

The reason for British gun laws, originally, was to head off a possible Communist uprising. Apparently it was quite a big danger at the time.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

yeah, just like it was a danger in the McCarthy era. It truly was a big fear. The realities behind that fear are quite another problem. I don't know enough of British history to comment on how possible it was there, but a serious uprising that could do anything was unlikely at best in the U.S. Not that it stopped certain senators from raping the Constitution to find anyone they could label communist and ruin their lives.

[JP Dogberry]

Ok, let me get this straight.

You guys put up with School Shootings, Gun accidents, and the like...

..on the off chance that, if your Government, that of the USA (one of the world's greatest examples of Democracy) becomes a dictatorship?

If that is the case, then I fully authorise the Australian Government to make Aluminium Foil Deflector Beanies mandotory, to protect its citizens from harmful alien mind control waves.

[Entsuropi]

This coming from Mr Conspiracy himself, who has, in the past, declared that:
A) The moon landings were faked, including the aquisition of scientists to lie about moon rocks recovered.
B) That reality is consensual.
C) That cyberpunk is not only real but has already happened.


One would think that a cyberpunk fan would appreciate the logic behind the writing of that constitutional clause.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

yeah, you'll excuse me if your mockery sounds awfully hollow, JP.

[JP Dogberry]

a) In case you didn't realise, the moon landing conspiracy bit was a joke. I don't actually believe that.

b) That's philosophy, which is an entirely different matter.

c) It's not my fault you don't understand what Cyberpunk is really about.