America and the love for guns

[hakerdefo]

Never understood why America (Americans) love the guns so much? The disasters keep happening again and again?
"Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows
That too many people have died?"
Many in the forums are americans and I would love to get their views on this topic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umpqua_Community_College_shooting

[airtime]

while crime is everywhere. These mass shootings are mostly occurring in the suburban areas. Places where they raise their kids up with guns and take them hunting at 9 years old.

[seppalta]

"Never understood why America (Americans) love the guns so much?"
It is called STUPIDITY.  Similar to Indians letting people starve while cattle thrive to the extent of being a nuissance, or the English worshiping royalty, the greatest symbol of class inequality in history, or everyone in the world hating Jews, or Moslems thinking something great awaits them if they do a suicide bombing, etc, etc.    No shortage of stupidity anywhere!

[zephyr]

An armed population is difficult to over throw, a measure against tyranny. Europe, Asia, South America, Africa, Middle East, and Baltic nations have all seen their fair share of tyrants. They were all unarmed. Disarming is first step to slavery.

[jedi]

Yes you knew if I said something it would turn into a novella!  And, I was raised in the country (i.e. suburb) and got my first gun around the age of six, and was hunting with supervision almost immediately.  This has not made me more likely to commit an atrocity...

OK, I'll jump in.  This is a loaded thread, no pun intended.  I am an American, and I believe every one of us have the right to own a gun.  I will state my case below;

Americans love guns because the "Founding Fathers" of our Nation saw gun ownership as a way of repelling tyranny and guaranteeing our liberty.  In over 200 years as a Nation, we've never had to worry about someone overthrowing the government, or taking away our liberties.  (though currently that is questionable)  The 2nd Amendment to the Constitution guarantee's this.  Yes some will claim that the 2nd Amendment was aimed (again, no pun intended) at keeping an armed militia.  This is untrue.  It specifically states, "the individual right to bear arms".

Laws aimed at taking away your guns only effect the rights of the law abiding citizen.  Criminals are never going to be without their guns, no matter how many "gun control" laws are passed.  Passing a law does not magically make all the guns disappear.  Thank God.  Unfortunately, in our free society, this means that occasionally a "crazy" person is going to get hold of a weapon.  Be it a gun, or a knife, a club, a car, an ice-pick or a hammer, a machete, etc.  We are not the only nation on earth that has mass shootings and killings, or, for that matter, murder.  (Take a look at what is happening just south of the American border in Mexico!)

Almost (I said, ALMOST) every time you hear of something like what tragically happened in Umpqua Oregon, you are talking about a "gun free zone".  The crazies and the criminals know these places are a "gun free zone".  Had there been just one armed citizen at Umpqua that day, there would not have been nearly so many deaths.  The guns in this instance were all legally obtained firearms.  The shooter however, was a known "odd fellow" with "mental illness issues" by family members and others around him.  Sadly, another mentally ill person with access to guns.  When you find a shooter, or mass killer of any kind for that matter, that has survived one of these atrocities they will always tell authorities they chose the spot because they KNEW no one would try to stop them.  They knew no one would be able to defend themselves.  (The Aurora Colorado theater shooter, as well as the Fort Hood shooter both stated this.  Yes, even on a military base, as stupid as that is, the soldiers were not allowed to carry their sidearms.  This is also true of the Norfolk Navy Yard shooter.  They all intentionally chose "gun free zones")

In every state in the U.S., and every Nation on Earth that has banned the citizens from being able to own firearms, the rate of crime, and especially "violent crime" rises.  In every community in America where the citizens are armed and able to carry a weapon, the crime rate is lower.  Statistically, this should speak for itself.  If a criminal or a crazy person knows that a place has armed citizens, they will purposefully avoid that area.  This has been proven all over America.  In my state, Maine, we can carry a concealed weapon as long as we are not a felon, and have no history of mental illness. (a convicted criminal that has been found guilty of a felony, or known mentally ill individual)  In Maine, we have a very low crime rate, and an even lower "violent" crime rate.  Another example would be the police chief of Detroit, Michigan encouraging the public to buy GUNS.  The crime rate has dropped over 50%!

In a society where citizens are not permitted to own guns, it is guaranteed that the only person with a gun will be a criminal!  This is not a society I would want to live in.  In an America with guns, we are guaranteed the right to defend ourselves, and our liberty.  Our Constitution guarantees these "inalienable rights".  An "inalienable right" is something that EVERY man, woman, and child on this planet are born with, not granted nor given.  Born with!  As I mentioned before, the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution GUARANTEE'S that to EVERY American.  This is part of the reason why more people migrate/immigrate to America than any other Nation on the planet.  Because of these "inalienable rights".  Having guns means no one can take those "inalienable rights" away from me.  EVERY person in the World has these "inalienable rights", no matter what their government says.

From Google:
"Inalienable. Not subject to sale or transfer; inseparable. That which is inalienable cannot be bought, sold, or transferred from one individual to another. The personal rights to life and liberty guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States are inalienable."

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety and will lose both." Benjamin Franklin

Old Ben's statement has proven true for more than a few Nations.  Thankfully, we as Americans are not there yet.  Our current government is doing their level best to try and take these "inalienable rights". They will loudly lie to the American public, every time one of these atrocities happens for their personal political gains.  Sickening.  There is a reason politicians want to take away your guns.  They know that would GUARANTEE their status in our then, not so free, society.

These are my personal feelings and views on this matter and in no way are they meant to be representative, or reflect, the views of VSIDO or the VSIDO forums!

[zephyr]

@ jedi: Thank you for going right to the core, and to the aspirations and ideas that I also share. We were raised similar with guns, never shot anything for sport or thrill.

"When the government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny."
-- Thomas Jefferson.

"They that would give up essential liberty for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin

Being an American carries responsibilities, stay ever vigilant. 

[PackRat]

The shooter however, was a known "odd fellow" with "mental illness issues" by family members and others around him.

This is usually the common denominator that is not being addressed in the aftermath of these shootings. There were major changes in the way the US deals with the mentally ill in the late 70's early 80's. It doesn't help that we (USA) have -

1. Political parties and their apperatchiks that prefer agitprop to political rhetoric to fire up their base voters
2. A media more than willing to sensationalize the event for socio-political gain

Since the shooter usually stays around until the police shows up, it cannot be dismissed that these shootings are spectacularly melodramitic suicides.

[seppalta]

I will be brief, just want to let the non-Americans among the readers of this forum to know that the viewpoint expressed by Mr. Jedi is an extreme view not held by most Americans (over 70% want more controls on gun ownership and 58% do not have a gun in their home).  I am an American who has never possessed a gun (prefer laptops to guns) and who does not buy into any of Mr. Jedi's concocted arguments about personal ownership of guns
repelling tyranny and guaranteeing liberty.  This is 2015, not 1815, and the population of the country is about 320 million, not 8 million, and the government and police have weapons unimaginably more efficient than guns.  Think about it. 

The problem in my mind is simply one of numbers.  There are too many guns too easily accessed created by the good-old American free enterprise system:  "He who dies with the most toys wins!"  Unfortunately, guns are one of the "toys" pushed on us, and too many people are too stupid to resist accumulating these useless toys, not to mention being brain washed by the National Rifle Association and the gun manufactures to accumulate them.

[VastOne]

I will go one step further seppalta... and I will respond more to this later, I need to get over how angry I am right now about this thread...

Jed is my best friend, he is an incredible human being... BUT, we do not see eye to eye on this at all.  I am so disgusted with the GOP and how they use the death of people to create a revolution and not look at what the fuck is happening to this country

I will never get my best friend to change this view.. it is how powerful it is...

13 guns?  The fucking people who wrote all the shit we still live by also said it was ok to have a fucking slave...

We can and will always stand against anyone who would try to destroy us... It will happen with or without guns...

13 GUNS?

I call bullshit to it all

And now I need to go golf

[jedi]

To be fair to VastOne, we are indeed best friends.  We are also both Americans.  Because of being Americans, we can be best friends and still have totally opposite and opposing views on a myriad of different subjects.
When this thread started, I did voice my opposition to it.  I wanted to delete it.  It is a very charged and politically incorrect subject to talk about.  Discourse on the subject tends to be EXTREME!  I was 'encouraged' to let the thread play itself out.  I commented to VastOne that I'd just ignore it.  He laughed at me!  Friends who, indeed, know each other well!

Actually we should all read the Constitution and the Amendments to it as a duty of being an American.  Not that I ever disagree with VastOne, but the slavery thing -

The following is directly quoted from the Things that aren't in the Constitution website;
Slavery

Originally, the Framers of the Constitution were very careful about avoiding the words "slave" and "slavery" in the text of the Constitution. Instead, they used phrases like "importation of Persons" at Article 1, Section 9 for the slave trade, "other persons" at Article 1, Section 2, and "person held to service or labor" at Article 4, Section 2 for slaves. Not until the 13th Amendment was slavery mentioned specifically in the Constitution. There the term was used to ensure that there was to be no ambiguity as what exactly the words were eliminating. In the 14th Amendment, the euphemism "other persons" (and the three-fifths value given a slave) was eliminated.

Also some claim all the time that "God" was part of that document.  This is entirely false as "He" isn't mentioned once!  The notable exception is found in the Signatory section, where the date is written thusly: "Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven". The use of the word "Lord" here is not a religious reference, however. This was a common way of expressing the date, in both religious and secular contexts.

Anyway, that isn't what this thread is about.  I wanted to specifically respond to seppalta.  The idea that I'm 'extreme' in my views, was frankly a little upsetting to me and got me thinking "Am I Extreme"?  I quickly decided "no"!  ISIS is extreme.  I'm about as far from extreme as one can get!  So here goes...

These are my personal feelings and views on this matter and in no way are they meant to be representative, or reflect, the views of VSIDO or the VSIDO forums!

the viewpoint expressed by Mr. Jedi is an extreme view not held by most Americans (over 70% want more controls on gun ownership and 58% do not have a gun in their home)

Actually 68% of Americans claim they have no guns. (Gallup)
As to the laughable statistic quoted of 70% wanting more gun control, that number in reality is 47% that say they'd like more strict laws, while up to 52% say less strict or stay the same!  (also Gallup)

However, what is TRUE about gun ownership - Only about 12 percent of civilian weapons are thought to be registered with authorities.  So my thinking is that WAY MORE than 32% of Americans have guns.

and the government and police have weapons unimaginably more efficient than guns.  Think about it.

and per gallup;
Do you think there should or should not be a law that would ban the possession of handguns, except by the police and other authorized persons?
yes should be - 26%
NO SHOULD NOT BE - 73%
(can you imagine living somewhere where only the police, the approved government officials, i.e. agents of said government or military, and finally, CRIMINALS were the only ones with guns?  Now that folks, is very scary indeed!)

and last but certainly far from being least on seppalta's claims;

The problem in my mind is simply one of numbers.  There are too many guns too easily accessed created by the good-old American free enterprise system:  "He who dies with the most toys wins!"  Unfortunately, guns are one of the "toys" pushed on us, and too many people are too stupid to resist accumulating these useless toys, not to mention being brain washed by the National Rifle Association and the gun manufactures to accumulate them.

China dwarfs America in the production of guns. Next is Russia.  The last time I checked on the statistics of where in the world guns are made, America wasn't even in the top 5!

The "TOY" statement is especially offensive.  Any person who considers a gun a TOY has no business owning a gun ever, period!  I've NEVER been around other gun owners who called a gun a toy, and if so, I'd never be around them again.  Guns are definitely not on the list of "TOYS" unless we're classifying squirt-guns in there.  As far as "guns are one of the "'TOYS'" pushed on us" claim?  When was the last time anyone in America saw a commercial about a gun and how you NEED to buy it now!?  Simply false!
I'm not certain, but is it even legal to advertise guns?  Like cigarettes I believe you can not advertise them for sale in most media, and further more, what liberal media outlet would even let a manufacturer of guns advertise them for sell?

As to the final claim about the NRA (National Rifle Association) I am not, nor have ever been a member.  I don't have any particular feelings about the NRA, I'm just not really a joiner.  I know over the last couple of years they've made some ridiculous statements, and offensive ones at that.  As to their "brain washing" abilities, I can't speak to that.  I'm of the opinion that if you can be "brain washed" you probably should be the last person on Earth to have a firearm!

This from the Reuters news service;
The United States has 90 guns for every 100 citizens, easily making it the most heavily armed society in the world.

U.S. citizens own 270 million of the world's 875 million known firearms, according to the Small Arms Survey 2007 by the Geneva-based Graduate Institute of International Studies.

About 4.5 million of the 8 million new guns manufactured worldwide each year are purchased in the United States, it said.

"There is roughly one firearm for every seven people worldwide. Without the United States, though, this drops to about one firearm per 10 people," it said.

The following statement PROVES what gunless societies end up as:
India had the world's second-largest civilian gun arsenal, with an estimated 46 million firearms outside law enforcement and the military, though this represented just four guns per 100 people there. China, ranked third with 40 million privately held guns, had 3 firearms per 100 people.

It gets much worse;
Nigeria, for instance, has just one gun per 100 people.  Anyone immigrating to Nigeria?  I'm not saying that to be offensive, just stating a FACT.  A society without guns is more than 90% more likely to be a society living in fear of their fellow man and/or their own government.

For more NON-American based numbers and statistics, I'd recommend the "Small Arms Survey" site out of Geneva, Switzerland.  It is at http://www.smallarmssurvey.org.

For those of you who are curious, I personally do own guns.  I personally have also lost 5 immediate family members to murder, specifically murdered with guns.  I do not blame the guns.  The people who committed these murders would have done so with or without guns.

[hakerdefo]

On no other website except for Twitter-Facebook I've been as active as VSIDO forums. Other regulars of this forums are like friends to me and it was not my intention to hurt the feelings of anyone. Murders and violent crimes can't be prevented alltogether by any law but fighting against gun crimes by guns doesn't make any sense. Anyways here is something I watched to find some answers,

[hakerdefo]

...I personally have also lost 5 immediate family members to murder, specifically murdered with guns...

I'm really sorry to know this. As I said in my last post it wasn't my intention to hurt any feelings or stir up a hornet's nest. I wanted to know the genuine viewpoints of American's on this sensitive issue. At the end of the day we all are friends (whether we are American or not) and friends agree to disagree.

[PackRat]

@hackerdefo - Michael Moore is a propagandist and Bowling for Columbine uses staged and edited sequences. It's political satire, not a documentary.

[jedi]

@hakerdefoe, no one here is angry at you!    You have offended no one!  What you chose to watch, in "Bowling For Columbine" is a testament to how easy it is to mislead the American public and the world at large.  Please examine the following:  The Truth About "Bowling For Columbine"
"Viewer Beware"
"The Ugly Truth About Bowling For Columbine: The 'Fact Free' Documentary!

[jedi]

Murders and violent crimes can't be prevented alltogether by any law but fighting against gun crimes by guns doesn't make any sense. Anyways here is something I watched to find some answers,

No hornets nests here!  Seriously!
I do have a serious question though.  When the only people committing gun crimes are the only people that have the guns, what then?