How likely is civil discussion to occur here on THR with anti-gunners?

[happygeek]

Other than the fact they are a HOOT to shoot, I see no reason that the armed citizen needs a fully automatic weapon.

I don't really need an auto, but then again I have yet to need any firearm and know many people who went their whole life without ever needing a gun.

Somebody said on here awhile back that he was afraid that if the registry was re-opened that his neighbor might AD with a M2 .50 BMG. What everyone seems to forget is that even ignoring the 1934 NFA and the 86 Hughes Amendment, a .50 BMG costs something like $14,000 (http://www.hk94.com/purple.html). The thing also weighs 84 lbs and is over 5 feet long. Good luck finding a range that'll let you shoot up their berm with a M2; you'd most likely have to own a good deal of land and have your own range with an impact area to shoot your M2. Of course the ammo for it is $3 or more a round. These things tend to exert a sort of control on who'll own one all on their own.

In all seriousness, how many people were being murdered a year with legal automatics between 1934 and 1986?

 

[Carl N. Brown]

Well, my answer to the question:

"If you feel you could be in danger in their home, why go there?"

would be this:
Two friends of my brother were carjacked on the way to band practice, and were killed. The story I heard was the carjacker was insulted because they only had $11 on them. Thinking about it, I wish that one of them had carried, not because they were in danger in band practice, but because they were in danger of being waylaid on the way there and back.

I look at carry to and from a place as, not because the place or the people there are dangerous, but because the way there and back may be dangerous, and unholstering a gun and leaving it in a car leaves it vulnerable to theft.

I hope I have addressed that issue civilly as an example.

 

[Ole Coot]

Interesting thread but I read the same pros & cons. I will gladly give my reasons for owning, carrying and collecting firearms, among other weapons. Simple enjoyment and self defense I used to help ensure your right to any opinion you wish. If you have never been in a combat situation I can't describe the will to live & protect your friends. I was simply drafted in the mid '60s and my previous experiences with firearms hunting and shooting served me well as I am here to write this. The choice is yours, I am glad I did my small part to give you that choice. I would never attempt to convince anyone to own a firearm yet I feel I have no need to justify my position. I enjoy any discussion based on logic not on pure emotion or belief in a utopia where violence never happens and self defense is not necessary.

 

[BeerSleeper]

Carl hit the nail on the head, right there.

 

[Justin]

FWIW, my friends are more than welcome to carry, openly or concealed, any firearm they please while at my home.



Frankly, I find the notion of demanding that my friends disarm while in my house to be utterly bizarre and more than a bit of an affront to their judgement and character.

 

[Old krow]

My answer to the OP would be; it's likely to have a civil discussion, albeit, it might be less likely than NOT having a civil discussion sometimes too. The gun community is polarized just like the political one. I don't think that it as drastic as the political climate at the moment. This forum is possibly less polarized than others that encourage/allow heated arguments.

We have people that want to have a nuke and people that think we should only own long guns and everyone calls themselves a supporter of the RBKA. However, if you look past that you'll find the common denominator in pro-gun is generally freedom (or liberty). We value it, more to the point, we do not want ours taken away. That seems to be where the proverbial line is drawn in most cases.

The real problem is that people who oppose RKBA generally do not have the same concept of freedom or liberty as its supporters. For the most part this seems true, at the end of the day, it doesn't bother me if YOU have a gun, my only concern is that I have a gun. The same could not be said for an anti. The gun that they are concerned with is your gun. It's two very conflicting and opposite points of view in many cases. In the cases where an anti can confront a pro-gun without offensively trying to make their decisions for them, and the pro-gun can not be offended when the anti doesn't, we have civilized conversation.

 

[Larry Ashcraft]

Other than the fact they are a HOOT to shoot, I see no reason that the armed citizen needs a fully automatic weapon.

As somebody here said in just the last day or two, this is not needs based society. We don't need Corvettes, or filet mignon, or any of the other niceties that freedom allows us to pursue. If you are more comfortable in a society that is based on only what you need, Cuba is a nice alternative.

As far as disarming to visit a friend's home, I'm with Justin. That's the most bizarre concept I've heard in a long time. My mom is an 81 year old widow, and if she saw me without my CCW in her home, she would ask what the problem was.

 

[jlrhiner]

I'm kind of singular in my view on this, so here goes. I don't allow any one else to make my decision for me as to when I carry. Not someone who owns property, rents property or who has a place of business. I carry my weapon to protect myself and my family, I carry it concealed unless I'm afield. Anyone who is close to me knows this. If someone is afraid to have me to their home because their children are unruly and might overpower me and go on a shooting rampage, well, I probably wouldn't go there anyway. I don't go around looking for trouble, and so far It's only found me a couple of times. I would hate to get killed because I couldn't shoot back. Just my opinion.

 

[happygeek]

We have people that want to have a nuke

Seriously, how much does a nuclear bomb cost? Even ignoring arms treaties and such, assuming a country that owned the facilities to produce an atomic bomb was willing to sell you one, well I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess it's in the tens of thousands $$$ wise, probably closer to being in the hundred thousands at least. I wasn't able to find a good answer in a few minutes of googling, but the estimates being thrown around on answers.yahoo.com were in the couple of million dollars per warhead.

I don't think there's very many people in the U.S. who could afford to own a nuclear weapon, and even less people who can afford and would want one.

Not that I'm advocating one way or the other for private ownership of nukes, just saying that average joe next door won't be owning one simply due to price.

 

[merlinfire]

Considering that even conversations among pro-gunners often gets personal on things like caliber choice....

Besides, have you seen how quickly threads go overboard when there has been an anti-gunner? I've played devil's advocate a few times and it wasn't pretty. Pro-gun and anti-gun both can lack civility.

 

[Vector]

Seriously, how much does a nuclear bomb cost? Even ignoring arms treaties and such, assuming a country that owned the facilities to produce an atomic bomb was willing to sell you one, well I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess it's in the tens of thousands $$$ wise, probably closer to being in the hundred thousands at least. I wasn't able to find a good answer in a few minutes of googling, but the estimates being thrown around on answers.yahoo.com were in the couple of million dollars per warhead.

I don't think there's very many people in the U.S. who could afford to own a nuclear weapon, and even less people who can afford and would want one.

Not that I'm advocating one way or the other for private ownership of nukes, just saying that average joe next door won't be owning one simply due to price.

Well briefly, you would be surprised how many here think private citizens should be able to own WMD's. Remember not all WMD's mean nuclear warheads or small size nuclear explosive devices. It could be a dirty bomb, chemical bomb, or even a bio WMD.

You can check this thread/poll out (that was locked for so called "thread necromancy", not in the written rules by the way)

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=324356

Now back to the discussion at hand.

 

[JTW Jr.]

In your poll , there was a choice for :
* I believe any weapons, including WMD's should be owned "by private citizens"

but not one for

I believe any weapons, Excluding WMD's should be owned "by private citizens"

so the only option that had no restrictions was the one including WMD's ... I am not surprised that 37 folks choose that... ( me I went with option : I believe any conventional firearm including machine guns should be owned ).

In you When to carry thread , you asked about the birth of a child , CoRoMo answered you , yet you still failed to accept his answer. Looking of answers is fine , discussion is fine , but to fail to even accept someone's explanation of why they carry shows you are not looking for info , or discussion , only debate and attention.

Just my opinion of course.

And I feel the mods are pretty darn fair here , they are much more even minded than many other places for sure !

 

[happygeek]

I remember that thread, Ed Ames actually made some pretty good points:

I agree there are affordable high grade weapons that can be made.

That brings us right around to one of the main arguments against gun control though.

Criminals don't obey laws. That runs right up to the edge of circular but it's true. If someone has decided to to accept the risks involved in commiting crime X, then crime x2, x3, x4, Y, and Z are basically free. They've already shifted from very low risk to very high risk and a little more won't stop them.

So... for people who are a threat... people who have decided to do harm... they've already decided to commit crime X. That means they've weighed the perceived outcome against the perceived punishment and decided that the risk of punishment is acceptable. If you've decided that the risk of life in prison, or execution, for murder is acceptable the rest of the alphabet, which means maybe a few months or years for possession of bomb making components or something, isn't such a big deal.

How realistic is that? Let's say they are a suicide bomber. If they are caught with bomb making supplies they'll face a few years in prison. If they are caught planning to blow up their bomb in a public place they'll get something longer. If they aren't caught they'll die.

How would that change if you got rid of the laws against making bombs?

If they are caught with bomb making supplies they'll walk, right? So farmer Smith with his supplies to make a bomb fit to blow up several federal buildings gets off.... unless he is caught loading those supplies into a rented van with a map to the nearest federal building of course. Then he'll get the longer sentence and his 'possession' is just evidence of the seriousness of his intent. He is punished. Justice is served.

OK, they don't walk... but maybe the guys who actually succeed in blowing up their makeshift bomb will walk... except if they weren't blown up with the bomb they've probably got a long list of capital murder charges or similar. So a few possession charges are probably not even going to be mentioned.

So what exactly does the law against these effective weapons do?

A few things. They increase the odds that non-outlaws will be punished for technical (vs. intentional) violations of the law. They reduce the liberty of people in areas where what you think of as WMDs are useful. I know people who have personally made large bombs... hundreds of pounds of the various ingredients. They did so legally (at the time) and (more or less) safely, on private property, for legitimate reasons (they wanted to dig a pond and that was more fun than renting earth moving equipment). They allow authorities to arrest potential bad people before they actually commit a major crime.

Hey... that last one seems pretty good, right? Except you take someone who was planning to commit a major crime, put him in prison for a few months/years so he can plan without having to work and isn't subject to normalizing social influences, you give him a chance to meet confederates, you give him one more reason to attack by branding him an 'outsider' and permenantly stripping him of civil rights and any real chance of positive reintegration into society as a productive member... and then you release him to go back and try again, this time with fewer penalties because you've already ruined his life and there isn't a lot more you can do to him except give him free room and board for a while.

If we start including inconvenience weapons suddenly anything becomes a WMD and virtually everyone is at jeopardy of prosecution in one way or another. If you own both bleach and ammonia, and know why you shouldn't mix them, you are in fact in constructive possession of chemical weapons. Same as having a semi-auto rifle, the parts to make it full auto, and the knowledge that you have both, put you in constructive possession of a machine gun. If you are aware of the results and own both chemicals you can be prosecuted for possession. If you weren't aware... well, you are now. You are, as of the moment you gained that knowledge, no longer legally allowed to own both bleach and ammonia at the same time.

"You're just being silly, nobody has ever been charged with that."

Yeah, and 60 years ago nobody had ever been charged for owning marijuana. 25 years ago nobody was charged as terrorists for mixing baking soda in vinegar in a soda bottle. The screws have been tightened.

I'm not arguing for the ownership of private WMDs. Far from it... I'd rather nobody had them. I'm arguing against a nonsensical law.

Again, I'm not advocating one way or another. It's just that I see these "what if my neighbor ADs with a M2" or "what if my neighbor has a nuclear meltdown" when the cost of such things simply puts them out of average joes reach, even if average joe wanted one and there was no law against it.

 

[Justin]

Well briefly, you would be surprised how many here think private citizens should be able to own WMD's. Remember not all WMD's mean nuclear warheads or small size nuclear explosive devices. It could be a dirty bomb, chemical bomb, or even a bio WMD.

Wow.

So, in a poll conducted three years ago, on a forum that, at last count has almost 112,000 members, you're all hot and bothered that 37 people on this board are totally cool with ownership of WMDs?

Admittedly, it is an extreme stance to take, but I hardly understand how .033% of the membership advocating that position is so shocking that it causes your monocle to drop from your eye in surprise three years later.

 

[Vector]

FWIW, my friends are more than welcome to carry, openly or concealed, any firearm they please while at my home.



Frankly, I find the notion of demanding that my friends disarm while in my house to be utterly bizarre and more than a bit of an affront to their judgement and character.

I can see where people would have a problem with others bringing firearms into their home. All it takes is one irresponsible mistake to cause an irrevocable tragedy.

For instance a recent event involving a relative who carries with her most of the time. She had her gun in her purse and placed in on the kitchen counter. A friends child asked for a stick of gum from her mother and was told to get it out of her purse. The child went into the wrong purse and asked aloud what was this gun in her purse. Of course the relative ignored her own irresponsible actions and berated the 5 year old for having "touched her purse". The bottom line is that her friends little girl could have become another statistic because she brought a gun into her home without her knowledge.

 

[awgrizzly]

I'm of the mind that the 2a exists and has been verified by the SC, so there is no argument. If some folks don't like guns and don't think we should have them, they have a right to their opinion. But it's only an opinion, so what's there to argue about?

This place should be about guns and the use of same, no place to argue the 21a.

 

[Justin]

I can see where people would have a problem with others bringing firearms into their home. All it takes is one irresponsible mistake to cause an irrevocable tragedy.

I don't make a habit of hanging around with irresponsible people. Contrary to your belief that guns are somehow more inherently dangerous when in your house as opposed to not in your house, no one has yet had an AD, nor have any children been deliberately or inadvertently perforated.

 

[Vector]

Wow.

So, in a poll conducted three years ago, on a forum that, at last count has almost 112,000 members, you're all hot and bothered that 37 people on this board are totally cool with ownership of WMDs?

Admittedly, it is an extreme stance to take, but I hardly understand how .033% of the membership advocating such a stance is so shocking that it causes your monocle to drop from your eye in surprise three years later.

You keep emphasizing the three years ago aspect, but people also recently voted in that poll until it was locked. Regardless, the age of the poll is not relevant, just the fact that 37 people voted that way.

Additionally, I would not characterize my reaction as that of "hot and bothered", nor would my monocle have dropped from my eye if I were to be wearing one.

 

[JTW Jr.]

The bottom line is that her friends little girl could have become another statistic because she brought a gun into her home without her knowledge.

no , bottom line there is un-responsible gun ownership , you don't leave a loaded firearm unattended , PERIOD.... that is the bottom line on that scenario.

If you live alone , fine , but when others , especially kids are around , you don't do it.

Judging by the points you choose to debate , I am not so sure you are totally on our side.


and just an FYI , I have friends I visit , that do not know I carry concealed , some are friends that go back to when I got my permit over 20 years ago. . I see no reason to announce I am carrying when I visit anyone. Although like Justin said , I don't make it a habit of hanging around people who are unsafe gun owners or would restrict me from carrying in their homes.

 

[Justin]

You keep emphasizing the three years ago aspect, but people also recently voted in that poll until it was locked. Regardless, the age of the poll is not relevant, just the fact that 37 people voted that way.

Oh. My mistake. Those results didn't accumulate over the course of a week or two, but rather three years.

If 37 people voting in favor of a position (most likely just to mess with you) in a silly poll over the course of three years causes you enough distress to blow your top hat off, I have to wonder how much experience you've had with the wider internet world.

Seriously.

Your poll took 3 years to accumulate a grand total of 37 votes in favor of private ownership of WMDs, and this is somehow casts all of THR in a negative light?

 

[Vector]

no , bottom line there is un-responsible gun ownership , you don't leave a loaded firearm unattended , PERIOD.... that is the bottom line on that scenario.

If you live alone , fine , but when others , especially kids are around , you don't do it.

Judging by the points you choose to debate , I am not so sure you are totally on our side.


and just an FYI , I have friends I visit , that do not know I carry concealed , some are friends that go back to when I got my permit over 20 years ago. . I see no reason to announce I am carrying when I visit anyone. Although like Justin said , I don't make it a habit of hanging around people who are unsafe gun owners or would restrict me from carrying in their homes.

Well I guess that depends on how you define "our side".

My credentials in the OP are all accurate and truthful, yet that does not mean I go along with all the various beliefs of the pro-2nd amendment people who post here. Just like the anti-gun people have extremists, so to do we. If posters believe private citizens need or should be allowed to own WMD's, I can rightly draw a distinction between them and myself.

Me pointing out one scenario of how a person bringing a firearm into the home of an unsuspecting friend might lead to a tragedy does not make me one of them!

 

[Vector]

Oh. My mistake. Those results didn't accumulate over the course of a week or two, but rather three years.

If 37 people voting in favor of a position (most likely just to mess with you) in a silly poll over the course of three years causes you enough distress to blow your top hat off, I have to wonder how much experience you've had with the wider internet world.

Seriously.

Your poll took 3 years to accumulate a grand total of 37 votes in favor of private ownership of WMDs, and this is somehow casts all of THR in a negative light?

No offense, but wrong again. While some of those votes were recent, the vast majority did come from 3 years ago. However when I reposted to the thread recently, more people started to vote in it that had not previously been exposed to the poll.

What I do not understand on your part is why you are trying to characterize my reaction in such an exaggerated way. With comments like "hot and bothered", "monocle falling out", and now "top hat blowing off", you make me sound like an irrational Mr. Peanut.
`

 

[JTW Jr.]

regarding your poll....
why wasn't there an option for :

I believe any weapons, Excluding WMD's should be owned "by private citizens"

perhaps those 37 might have voted differently...

 

[shiftyer1]

erased by me

 

[788Ham]

As has been explained many times on this thread, which you've chosen to ignore, you can't accept what someone else has explained to you, their feelings or freedoms about firearms or carry methods, you have to have the last say. I can now see why you've been locked out of other threads.