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Originally posted by Sundered Angel:
Pufer, I can point to a society in which only the criminals and the government have guns. It's called New Zealand. You can own a shotgun or rifle, but military-style semi-automatics and handguns are banned. And do you know what? The result is neither anarchy or dictatorship. New Zealand has some of the lowest crime rates in the western world, combined with one of the most democratic governments in the world - about 80% of Kiwis vote in every election, as opposed to 40% of Americans - and the political spectrum is far more diverse. I could make similar statements about Australia, or most of the countries in the European Union, though I don't have personal experience in that part of the world.[/B
While NZ isn't a civil-rights crushing dictatorship right now, there may come a point in the future where a corrupt and invalid regime takes hold and the New Zealanders will have nothing to fight back with. NZ might not be the best example of this as Australia or the US could step in and defeat such a despotic regime if the need arised, but if it was the US that had slipped into such a situation there wouldn't be too many countries out there standing up for the defenseless American people (due, mainly, to the prospect of millitary destruction at the hands of the invalid US government).
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Originally posted by Sundered Angel:
One point gun advocates are fond of raising is the "people will find other ways to kill argument". This holds absolutely no water. Murder rates in all countries which have banned pistols are vastly lower than the States - of course, that's not hard, given the exorbitant levels of gun-related murder in the States. Sure, you can kill someone with a knife. But it's far easier to kill them with a gun, and so far more people get killed when guns are involved.
Us pro-gunners would respond pointing to the fact that in the period after the banning of handguns, handgun-related violent crime has actually increased in countries adopting such a policy (such as in Britain).
We can both see that comparing gun-crime rates between the US and anywhere is comparable to comparing apples and oranges (as the old saying goes) and certainly wouldn't stand up in any valid argument (even though what you say is true). Likewise, my argument is based on a pure statistical correlation and, while it may fare slightly better than just pointing out two unrelated statistics (and is also true), it also has no place in a solid argument. This is why I try to stay away from this kind of argument except when its counter is brought up.
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Originally posted by Sundered Angel:
The self-defence argument holds up just a little bit better. After all, theoretically you /could/ force a criminal to back off with a gun. The problem is that in any situation you might need it, a gun won't be handy. If you're mugged in an alley, your attacker has their gun out and beaded - there's no way to outdraw a beaded gun. If you're at home, you have to retrieve your gun from its gun safe and load it to defend yourself - that takes time, and that's often time you don't have. And don't even think of telling me that you'd keep a gun out of its safe and loaded.
I can have a loaded gun in my hand within around 5 seconds upon being awakened at night, it would take far longer than that to get to my room, from the front door, for someone unfamiliar with my place, in the pitch dark (if you're really worried about such things you have an unloaded gun very handy at night (but locked up during the day), it doesn't take much to snap a mag in and chamber a round). If I am mugged in an alley I probably won't be armed anyway and will give up my money without any resistance.
T
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Originally posted by Sundered Angel:
arget shooting and collecting... both entirely possible under a gun ban. You don't need a Colt .45 to shoot targets; a target pistol is just fine, and is unlikely to be used in crime as well. There are gun collectors Down Under too; the guns they collect are either entirely legal (rifles, shotguns, etc) or have their firing pins removed so that they're not functional. Either way, they retain their value as a collector's item.
Target pistols are illegal in Britain, as are all long guns. Sen. Dianne Feinstein has traditionally targeted all target guns (pistols and rifles) and hunting rifles in her gun ban legislation as she thinks that they are sniper weapons. They would be the first to go over here. Also, what do I use if I want to shoot targets a mile away, get a single-shot .22?
If a collectable firearm has been tampered with at all (for example: having the firing pin or reciever removed) it loses a huge amount of value. The most valuable weapons are those still in original packaging, if they are disturbed to become "legal" they, likewise, become common, uncollectable weapons.
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Originally posted by Sundered Angel:
[b]However, I will concede that there is a definite problem with trying to ban handguns in America, and it's not that the NRA won't let it happen. The problem is that the country is already awash with guns, so it would be impossible to see the kind of results that countries with a long history of gun control have achieved. It's quite likely that crime would increase in the short term if any ban were instituted. How big that surge would be... who knows? And how long would it last... with the vast oversupply of handguns in America, it could be a very, very long time.
Indeed. I'm very glad that you have always acknowledged this point, so many others cannot see that this would be the effect as they have been lost in the propoganda. It makes it very hard to have any kind of debate if they cannot see any possible bad in the immediate destruction of all of the legal guns in the US.
-Pufer
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If a tree falls in the forest and then springs back upright as a joke, do the squirrels freak out?
"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense." -The Buddha
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