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The 2nd Amendment needs to go

MaӾiej

Huge Kida Fan
88
Posts
6
Years
Like I've said earlier, I believe in gun rights. I don't believe just any kind of gun should be available to the general public. I personally believe semi-auto and fully automatic machine guns and other weapons with a high rate of fire should be limited to law enforcement and the military. You can defend yourself with a pistol or a shotgun just the same.

Although if I'm going to defend myself/ my home with something, I'll stick to a baseball bat or the nearest heavy enough object I can grab. I'm not really a big fan of guns myself. I just stand by our 2nd Amendment. The only thing I feel needs to be changed is that we need to use common sense with what people are allowed to have and carry. You don't need an AR 14, 18, or whatever they're called to defend yourself.
 

Arsenic

[div=font-size: 18px; font-family: 'Kaushan script
3,201
Posts
12
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Come on, man! ShineyUmbreon is the kind of person who's going to get guns taken away for everyone!

Shooting someone is always plan Z, unless they display immediate intent to harm you, then pop dat foo' and don't miss!

See what you want to do is open your bio-metric safe (which are pretty cheap, and only take 1-4 seconds to unlock on average) that contains your loaded pistol (Because clearing a house with a rifle length weapon is way harder and more dangerous than it needs to be.) When you find the intruder who probably doesnt want to get shot over your 500 dollar Walmart TV, you force/shout them to the ground and keep guard till the police arrive to arrest the man.

Of course there's a lot of variables that could change the situation but I think this is the most realistic outcome. Just because you defend your home with a gun, doesn't mean you have to shoot someone.

I haven't had to enact this situation luckily. Especially since we only have rifles.. Well actually I guess the Tar-21 we have is made for CQC so that wouldnt be too bad to clear with, but still.
 
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Who would have a gun UNLOADED in a safe in the first place?

Beats me, people do weird things.
Like owning a gun they don't need.

So its okay for a criminal to have a firearm or a weapon of choice during a robbery while the victim whom is the homeowner can't?

At what point did I say it's okay for the criminal to have a gun? What point did I say it's okay for them to even be in your house? Of course they shouldn't. Their faults do not justify yours. Besides, the person breaking into your house is a lot less likely to have a gun if there's good gun control because it becomes harder to obtain a legal gun and the price of illegal guns goes up.

My IQ just dropped.

Explains the continued decline in the already poor quality of your arguments.

The burglar shouldn't have been inside the home in the first place, or are you on the criminals side? Break into someones home and they happen to be home and have a gun, you put yourself in that mess and should suffer the consequences.

I like how you equate me wanting gun control with me thinking home invaders shouldn't suffer consequences. If you break the law, you should absolutely face repercussions. Those repercussions should be proportional to the crime committed though, and theft does not warrant a death sentence.

what are you even saying? So the homeowner should do nothing and get shot or stabbed if the burglar is armed because the criminal can do what he wants when he wants and just break into people homes and get away with it?

1. Most home invaders do not end with the homeowner sustaining serious injuries or dying.
2. If you walk into a potentially volatile situation with a weapon, you're going to increase your chances of getting shot.
3. There is an entire organisation who are trained to track down and apprehend criminals effectively and safely. There is also a judicial branch whose job it is, is to determine guilt and hand down an appropriate punishment. For someone very hung up on your constitutional rights, you sure seem happy to ignore the right to due process.

Makes sense to me, damn now I'm losing brain cells.

Again, I appreciate you explaining why your grasp on this topic is so poor. I completely understand.

Jesus man, at that point it's self defense but I guess you dont' see the logic in this.

You're right, I don't see any logic in your stance at all. Almost like there is none. Isn't that weird? If a person breaks into your house to steal your TV, with no intention of harming anyone, and you panic and in an fuelled state of poor judgement, shoot them, that isn't self defence. It's not self defence unless you have to defend yourself, which would involve you actually being attacked. A home invader might not even be armed, but you're implying you're defending yourself from them by shooting them on sight, just in case of the statistical improbability that they want to murder you.

This is irrelevant.. Don't break into a home that's not yours.

Ah good, more casual dismissal of a point you can't rebut. It's relevant because you're violating the right to due process and because you're giving out a punishment completely disproportionate to the crime. Here's a scenario. An impoverished man breaks into your house, he's there to steal something valuable he saw through your window so he can sell it and feed his kids that week. He's not armed, he doesn't even know you're home. You burst into the room, shoot him in the head and pat yourself on the back for a job well-done. In your eyes, that guy deserved to die.

Did I just read this correctly?? I'm literally so dumbed down now that I can't even comprehend the stupidity here. It's almost a waste of time even arguing with this. Dogs will kill intruders if they have to to protect their owners, period. Again, he shouldn't have broke into the home, again facing the consequences.

Dogs will instinctively defend their territory yes. That does not change the fact that dogs that kill humans are legally required to be euthanised most places. You should also be smarter than a dog and not bound by such primal instincts, even with your apparently impaired cognitive function.


How many times do I have to say it.. Don't break into a home that's not yours, you may have to face the consequences. Homeowners worked hard for the things they possess in their homes, so it's okay for a criminal to go in and take it because they can?

It really doesn't matter how many times you say it because I've not once said it's okay to invade someone else's home. I have said that you don't get to violate their right to due process and that burglary shouldn't incur the death penalty. At least try and argue against points I'm actually making.

Fun fact.. You can get a gun cheap on the streets, try again. You obviously know shit about American cities. But as I said, if the gun is dirt cheap it's almost guaranteed to have heat on it.

Fun fact, the reason you can get a cheap gun on the streets is because it was really cheap and easy for someone else to obtain it legally. The guy selling the gun on your street corner didn't make it. You obviously don't know shit about supply an demand, or gun manufacturing, or the law, or gun control, or logic... this might take a while if I keep going.


I don't need proof for shit I already know..

Yes. Yes you do.

And I use Chicago as an example because IT'S THE CITY WITH THE STRICTEST GUN LAWS AND HIGHEST MURDER RATE!!

It still has far weaker gun laws than just about every other developed country. You tried.

Explain that one since you seem to have all the answers. Oh wait, you don't. Please don't say because of the "population" because theres cities with a LOT larger population than Chicago yet a lower amount of murders from firearms.

Cities with higher populations having fewer murders helps my point, it doesn't hurt it. Thanks.


Lol. Whether you like it or not, guns will never be banned in America. More than 50% of the population believes in gun rights sooooooo.

That just means there's apparently a lot of people who need educating. It doesn't mean those people are right. More than 50% of the US used to think slavery was okay too.


The problem is that few people actually have the presence of mind, let alone any training, with which to actually manage a situation like that so calmly. It's a lot easier said than done. Shiny above is demonstrating my point quite nicely and he's not actually under any threat right now.

Not to mention this point does nothing to counter the issue raised of mass shootings, gun accidents etc.



For the record, I think we've all (myself included) gone far enough with ad hominum and insults now don't you guys? How about we go back to discussing this like civil people because it's really not fun for anyone to get called an idiot.
 
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ShinyUmbreon189

VLONE coming soon
1,461
Posts
12
Years
Get your home invaded and call the police, see how that works out for you. By the time dispatch gets to the scene of the crime the criminal is already gone, or if armed it could be worse. For some reason people think the Fed's can just spawn at the scene when in fact they cant, it depends on these two major factors. The severity of the crime and the distance the nearest officer is. If an officer is near and busy with another crime they can't just leave so at that point it's up to the next nearest officer that's nearby patrolling and chances are, they're not in that block.
Say the criminal is armed but you're in the other room, you call the police. Many things could happen here.
1. You lose items and chances are you'll never get them back.
2. The intruder gets spooked and runs upon sight.
3. Intruder is armed and possibly dangerous and murders you when you find him, if they're armed and dangerous.
4. You have a family you love dearly and will sacrifice yourself to protect them whether it be a blunt object, knife, or gun. So choose your poison here. Risk your family getting attacked or murdered or attack the intruder.

Also, depending on state if someone breaks into your home and you shoot them, it can most definitely be justified in court. There's actually been cases where people have called 911 when an intruder is trying to break in and officers have gave them permission to shoot if they break in.

Another thing. I don't see anything wrong with a mentally stable person that knows proper gun control and safety having a gun. People like to hunt, it's an actual thing. Or some people just like to set up a target on their land in BFE and just target practice. What's wrong with that? Just because someone has a gun doesn't mean they're intending to use it for a crime. Why should the few dumbass gun owners ruin it for all the other gun owners that are doing nothing wrong with their gun? If it's to stop mass murders then you're barking up the wrong tree. Guns aren't the problem, sick people are the problem and I'm all for making it more difficult to obtain a firearm but they most certainly should not be banned. Bombs are illegal yet they've been used to commit mass murders. But that's none of my business. If you want to eliminate guns, might as well ban anything can be considered a weapon.
 

twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
4,307
Posts
15
Years
Honestly, I find it really ghastly just how easy it can be to obtain firearms and ammunition in States apparently.
The feeling's mutual, but I'm not making threads telling Finland to open up its gun laws.

We here in Finland do just fine without this so called right to 'keep and bear arms'.
Your country's culture and legal tradition is completely different from ours, so what works for you doesn't have any bearing on what will work for us.

If we can do it, USA can as well.
"Can" and "should" are entirely different questions. You haven't really made any substantial case as to why we should do away with one of the principles that was so fundamental to our very way of life that it was enshrined in our very first and highest-ranking legal document.

There is a culture surrounding firearms in the US that you as a foreigner don't really understand. For many of us, they are a substantial part of our lives: we keep them for protection (of ourselves and our loved ones), for recreation, and sometimes for sport. There is a history of firearm possession in the US dating back even before our founding; firearms are part of our national heritage and history. They also serve as a substantial deterrent to land invasions: an armed and especially a trained citizenry is much more capable of defending itself against outside threats than an unarmed one.

And while there are certainly valid reasons to restrict certain varieties of firearms and there may even be valid reasons to ban them altogether (none of which you have brought up), and while there are occasionally abuses that end in tragedy, we and those who came before us have not yet seen fit to overturn their status as a protected right here in the US. Generally speaking, Second Amendment supporters like myself believe that the benefits of it outweigh the associated risks, much as they do with allowing "dangerous" kinds of free speech, or allowing "dangerous criminals" the right to a fair hearing and the right to not be compelled to incriminate themselves.

Now, there are a lot of people here in the US who are opposed to the right to possess firearms, either in part or in whole. I'm happy to have a discussion with those people; as US citizens, their concerns are important because they live here too. They are directly affected by the outcome of the debate on this issue, and while I disagree with their position, I understand their concerns and respect their position. I don't like all the brinksmanship that goes on in this and other debates and honestly, I hope we can come together and come up with sensible restrictions that satisfy most people on both sides. That's why despite my status as a Second Amendment supporter, I support policies like closing the gun show loophole; the system at its core works fine, but things like this let people circumvent it and that's frequently how it fails.

But, and I mean no disrespect, I really don't care what you as an outsider think we should do. You aren't a US citizen, and to be frank, you have no business telling us how to do things. I don't upturn my nose and sneer at Finnish culture and customs, so I'd be so very delighted if you could return the favor. Our business is our business; if you have something insightful to add to the conversation that maybe someone here hadn't considered, then I'd be willing to hear you out, but if you're just going to tell us how to live our lives and not really offer any kind of insight, then I think we can do without your input. You mentioned Finland has done just fine for itself; well, so have we. The United States leads the world in medical research and scientific invention and by many other metrics, and even in the metrics we don't lead, we're usually near the top. We're doing quite fine for ourselves, thanks.

But the point that I want to stress is that private ownership of guns should always be a PRIVILEGE and not a right.

Why? "Because that's what we do" is not a valid reason.
 
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Twocows: Now, I do consider each country's culture and whatnot to be important. Something that needs to be protected. But again, the point I want to stress is that the right to private ownership of weapons like what Americans are doing right now is something that has no place in today's world. Yes, I'm saying this as an european and a finn but still. You can go ahead and read what other posters have said on this matter before making any judgments.
 
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twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
4,307
Posts
15
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the right to private ownership of weapons like what Americans are doing right now is something that has no place in today's world

Right, and I'm asking why. You haven't really established a case as to why such a thing needs to happen other than you think it's the right thing to do.

You can go ahead and read what other posters have said on this matter before making any judgments.
I'm not asking what other people think is the reason, I'm asking why you think we need to do this.
 
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I absolutely think it's unnecessary to have this ammendment. It might have been relevant back in the 1700s but it isn't now, the world has changed and so should the gun laws.
Other countries with stricter gun laws don't have nearly the issues the US does with them.
 
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Can we not pretend that armed citizens are deterring anyone from invading the US? Nobody in their right mind is going to try and do that, armed citizens or not.
 

twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
4,307
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15
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I absolutely think it's unnecessary to have this ammendment. It might have been relevant back in the 1700s but it isn't now, the world has changed and so should the gun laws.
Other countries with stricter gun laws don't have nearly the issues the US does with them.
Do you also believe we should do away with free speech rights and the right to due process? "The world has changed" is not an argument, it's an observation and it's not a particularly relevant one on its own.

Can we not pretend that armed citizens are deterring anyone from invading the US? Nobody in their right mind is going to try and do that, armed citizens or not.

It is a deterrent whether you think so or not. It might not be presently acting as a significant deterrent simply because our nuclear weapons and our current military investments do the job far better than an armed citizenry does, but it certainly acted as one in the early 20th century on several occasions. Whether it will become a significant deterrent in the future depends on whether we remain one of the top military powers in the world and whether nuclear weapons remain the end-all be-all of military power. If those two factors change, it will once again serve as an active deterrent to a land invasion.

It's also far from the only reason for the right to bear arms, but it is one.
 
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It is a deterrent whether you think so or not. It might not be presently acting as a significant deterrent simply because our nuclear weapons and our current military investments do the job far better than an armed citizenry does, but it certainly acted as one in the early 20th century on several occasions. Whether it will become a significant deterrent in the future depends on whether we remain one of the top military powers in the world and whether nuclear weapons remain the end-all be-all of military power. If those two factors change, it will once again serve as an active deterrent to a land invasion.

It's also far from the only reason for the right to bear arms, but it is one.

It's not a deterrent because it's totally irrelevant because we don't live in the early 20th century. The US is the most formidable military power on the planet with access to not just nukes but a very great number of other dangerous weapons. It's also at the forefront of military spending and research and development. What deters people from invading the US, is that it's a suicide mission. It has nothing to do with untrained rednecks waving around hunting rifles (obviously I don't think is what all gun owners are like, but you get the idea).

If those factors change, it's not going to help. Enemies with even more destructive and advanced weapons have even less to fear from armed citizens. We already live in age where troops on the ground are becoming progressively less needed on account of missiles that can reach different continents and robotics advancements steadily increasing. Armed citizens are most likely never going to be relevant to the US' defence again. You're making irrelevant hypotheticals based on extremely unlikely scenarios when people are losing their lives now.

So you're right, it's not the only reason. It's one of several equally bad reasons for the US' continued purveyance of an outdated gun culture that's costing the lives of its citizens.
 

twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
4,307
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When exactly did it do this?

Against the Japanese in World War II and against the Russians during the early parts of the Cold War. I believe the Russians even came up with a preliminary plan for an invasion of the mainland United States beginning in Alaska and moving down the coast, but it was eventually scrapped.

That's not to say that either of these aggressors would have likely been fully deterred by the prospect of American gun ownership alone, but it was probably a contributing factor in (for the former case) how they planned their aggression and (for the latter case) scrapping their plans altogether. If either of these powers really wanted to invade us and our military wasn't up to snuff to defend us, they probably would have done so, but any invasion plan would have to consider the armament of the citizenry and their ability to quickly organize effective resistances, something which would be impossible in many other places.

If you want a more definite real life example of how a large and powerful armed force was deterred from a land invasion of a much smaller country due in large part to an armed citizenry, ironically you can look at the reverse situation with the United States and Japan in WW2; the US was successfully deterred from launching a land invasion of Japan primarily because our generals believed such an offensive would be extremely bloody and that they would be fighting every last able-bodied male in the country. In the end, they opted to use a different approach to end the situation without having to invade by land, and while the atomic bombs were certainly destructive and resulted in extreme loss of life, a land offensive would have certainly resulted in more lost lives on both sides.
 
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twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
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It's not a deterrent because it's totally irrelevant because we don't live in the early 20th century.
I'm repeating myself, but It's not presently serving as an active deterrent. Again, that understanding relies on two factors which could very well change. It's also far from the only reason why the Second Amendment is important.

The US is the most formidable military power on the planet with access to not just nukes but a very great number of other dangerous weapons. It's also at the forefront of military spending and research and development. What deters people from invading the US, is that it's a suicide mission.
Yes, and our current military expenditures are one of the assumptions I mentioned. Just because we presently have an extremely strong military does not mean it will always be so. Rome once had one of the strongest armies in the world, but it didn't continue to remain that way.

It has nothing to do with untrained rednecks waving around hunting rifles (obviously I don't think is what all gun owners are like, but you get the idea).
That's incredibly insulting, and your half-hearted attempt to partially retract it just makes it sound like you want to get away with it without being challenged on it. I understand if you disagree with my position, but you don't need to insult an entire segment of our population because of your own personal misgivings about laws and traditions that aren't even your own and have almost zero impact on you personally.

If those factors change, it's not going to help. Enemies with even more destructive and advanced weapons have even less to fear from armed citizens.
Who says it would have to change to a more dangerous state of affairs? It's easily possible that our missile defense systems, which are already believed to be able to stop most attacks, could be improved upon to be able to definitely stop any ICBM. For all we know, nuclear weapons could become obsolete to major military powers with the right technological advances.

You're making irrelevant hypotheticals based on extremely unlikely scenarios
I disagree

when people are losing their lives now.
People are always losing their lives now because that's part of the cost of living in a free society: there will always be people who abuse their freedom to do harm to others. The only way to prevent this is to take away freedoms from everyone, which is exactly what you're suggesting we do here. What I'm saying is that this particular freedom is important enough to enough of us (for, as I've said, many more reasons than just deterrence) that we've decided to keep it around, and I think that's the right decision because I agree with those reasons.

If you're really worried about saving lives, there are other freedoms that we could also get rid of that would save just as many or even more, such as the freedom to drive a motor vehicle or the freedom to eat food that is bad for you. Heck, we could really cut down on crime by putting cameras in every person's house and on every street corner so that the police could respond to criminal behavior immediately. Do you see what I'm getting at? These are important freedoms to us and their continued existence causes lots of deaths per year, often as many or more than firearms do. Vehicle-related deaths alone accounted for 37,461 American deaths in 2016 alone and yet we allow people to drive them because vehicles so enrich our society that we think it's worth the cost.

Saving lives is important, I don't think anyone's going to argue against that. However, putting aside questions of efficacy of gun bans and usefulness for self-defense versus abuse by criminals, we believe this particular freedom is important enough to keep around, despite its cost, for reasons I've already explained in another post.
 
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twocows: So, you think that banning guns also means banning other freedoms such as driving cars? Again, the very fact that the people in Europe are free without this so called right to own guns is something that I want to emphasize. For the record, I don't take sides but Gimmepie does have a point.
 
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Id be well up for banning aspects of Finnish culture if they were linked to 1000+ mass homicides a year
 

twocows

The not-so-black cat of ill omen
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twocows: So, you think that banning guns also means banning other freedoms such as driving cars?
No, that's not what I said at all. I think I was pretty clear with what I said: there are many rights we guarantee ourselves that inevitably have a high death toll associated with them, but we believe they are important rights to have despite that.

I think I've made a substantial case for why I feel this is an important right to keep around; there are a lot of reasons why the right to bear arms is important to keep. People are free to disagree; they're also free to stay in their own country if the freedoms we guarantee ourselves make them uncomfortable. The rights we guarantee to ourselves aren't reliant upon other countries' acceptance.

Again, the very fact that the people in Europe are free without this so called right to own guns is something that I want to emphasize.
They're not free to own the means to defend themselves, their family, and their property against violent criminals, for one.

That's a nice strawman you've got there twocows.
With respect to what? I did a line-by-line breakdown of what you said; exactly where did I misrepresent what you were arguing?

Id be well up for banning aspects of Finnish culture if they were linked to 1000+ mass homicides a year
One of the points I've been making is that there are a lot of aspects of our society and culture that can be linked to a high death toll that we feel are important enough to keep around despite that.
 
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Nah

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I'ma just gonna take a sec to elaborate on my first post (I need something to do right now lol)

If you don't feel like going back to page 1 to check, all I said was that getting rid of the US Constitution's 2nd amendment is not necessary, the country just needs to pass and enforce actual gun control is all.

The 2nd amendment is a single sentence that reads:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
The vagueness and the odd sentence structure aside, I interpret it as that US citizens are guaranteed the ability to own a firearm....and that's it. There's nothing that really says to me that the government cannot or should not pass any legislation regulating guns, just that there can't be an outright ban on people owning guns, and nothing more. It doesn't seem to me like gun control violates the amendment.

So with that in mind, there's a number of things that could be done, off the top of my head some stuff like this would probably be good to have (not that I'm all that familiar with gun laws in the USA):
  • background/psychological checks every x number of years for anyone who owns a firearm
  • limitations on the number of guns a person/household/whatever can own
  • limitations on the amount and type of ammunition one can buy at a time
  • complete ban on automatic weaponry
  • no more gunshow loophole shit

I would like to think that this would at least be a start towards dealing with US gun issues. There are potentially other things that could/should be done too but that's so not the point.

.....The other thing to keep in mind, and this is important too, is that it'd be a lot easier to enact and enforce gun control than it would be to repeal a constitutional amendment that is one of a set of amendments that a lot of Americans kind of hold sacred.
 
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