USA - The 2nd Amendment

[Kernacktur]

This is the right place for this correct? well....
What's everyone view on the 2nd Amendment? I've noticed it's one of the most controversial and (mis)interpreted Amendments in the Constitution due to the loose wording and terms. I think it should and does guarentee American citizens the right to own any weapon, well almost any tanks and nukes are a bit too much, and for both citizens and states to have militias. I believe the fore fathers saw how hard it was to fight an oppressive government and wanted American citizens to be ready to fight the next revolution if and when they had to. Luckily for us there hasn't been a need to but I think it goes along with the idea that governments should fear their citizens so that the people actually get what they want. I doubt some of the recent bills and laws taking away rights would've passed if Congress fear retribution other than protests for their actions. But that's just me. Discussion anyone?

[Nagognog2]

Where I live (a state in the Untied Snakes) we have no weapons laws. You can walk down Main Street with a rocket launcher. But there are laws against brandishing such in a threatening manner. Call it Common Sense.

Works for us. Of course, when one of our Senators said "Good morning, Mister Vice-President." to Dick Cheney, Cheney's response was (captured on film and tape): "Go fuck yourself!"

Then he realized the recording gear was up and running....Poor Dick....head.

[Kernacktur]

ahh Dick Cheney, he's so zany. My state has fairly lax gun laws, conceal and carry is legal along with "assault" type weapons and high capacity clips but fully automatic arms are illegal without a special collector's permit. I remember a few years ago some guy's house got raided and they found at least 10 AKs and an AA gun amongst other things. Needless to say he went to jail for a very long time. I think anything short of, pardon the acronym, WMDs should be legal for the defense of our rights and liberties.

[old hippie 56]

But there new attacks on the 2nd amendment, dealing with the gang violence issue, also any veterans who has PTSD(shell shock) or anybody who had ADD as a kid. Some info below:

With every passing year, the American people see more and more legislation that would place further limitations on our right to "keep and bear arms." Among other pieces of legislation that have been introduced in the 110th Congress thus far, the Gang Abatement and Prevention Act is of notable concern.

This bill (S. 456), introduced by Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA), and its companion bill (H.R. 1582), introduced by Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA), would further federalize the police system by creating a number of federal criminal offenses, including offenses categorized as "gang crimes." The bill would also authorize over $1 billion to create or expand federal programs. Though violent crimes are an issue in many states, especially in states with a larger population, they have traditionally been dealt with on a local and/or state level. The federal government should not usurp local authority by placing a new host of crimes under federal jurisdiction.

Aside from federalizing our police system, the Gang Abatement Act would also pose a threat to the Constitution, and more directly, the Second Amendment. For instance, Section 215 of S. 456 would deny the right of gun ownership to two categories of people:

* Any person convicted in any court of a misdemeanor "gang related offense"
* Any person found to be in contempt of a "gang injunction order"

Vet disarmament bill:

Anti-gun legislation that has already passed the House is set to be rammed through the Senate, paving the way for the disarmament of combat veterans and bar anyone who is deemed to be "a danger to themselves" from owning firearms.

HR 2640, which has been dubbed the "veterans disarmament act" by gun owners, would place any veteran who has ever been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) on the federal gun ban list.

The bill passed in the House in June and was later passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee both times without a recorded vote. Gun owners have been trying to raise awareness and beat down the legislation ever since.

The bill, sponsored by outspoken anti-second amendment representatives Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), also applies to anyone who has been diagnosed with ADHD as a child and to anyone who develops Alzheimer's. Gun owners fear that in time the diagnosis of any kind of mental affliction could end with rights being stripped.

[FuBai]

The second amendment is understandable in the context of the 1790's, when it was formed, as allowing citizens to protect themselves from dictatorship and to give them the tools to foot a popular rebellion. This is the same reason why state militias were required, so that the state governments had the ability to unite against an over-powered federal government. However the ability for these weapons to do this in a modern day context is dubious de jure and laughable de facto. This seems to render the initial motive for the formulation of that amendment void, and thus the amendment in those terms.

It is a long and wide ranging topic for debate, but I tend to side against guns. As I live in Britain I really don't have to worry too much about criminals threatening me with guns, or the police using guns and causing an escalation of criminality. Now the UK government shoots one person by accident (Jean Charles de Menezes) and there is a country wide scandal almost leading to the end of the career of the national Head of Police, people get shot every day in America by over-zealous law enforcement and no one seems to give a damn. This is not something I like. Guns give people instant access to physical and violent power, which means that, should an argument get out of hand, a gun is a worrying thing to have about the place simply because of its nature. Knives are different and, unless you throw them, you can't kill someone by sticking one in their back as they are running away. In America I have personally seen mall security guards with pistols and I want to ask them "If I stole a jumper and started running would you shoot me dead for it?" You can expand that to any minor crime you can name - is shooting the person who committed a minor crime as they run away the act of a compassionate society? Just because they are resisting arrest shouldn't give someone the right to shoot them unless they pose an actual risk. Coming into an American airport is like walking into an armed camp. Everyone has guns, even the guys who check your passport to see if it matches your face. It's hard to say just how disconcerting that is to a European. The American infatuation with guns and warfare is one of the reasons it has such a negative international image, and it's something that America should consider reigning in.

[stoneinfocus]

I don´t think that the amendment or the reason it was made for was laughable and as bongo stated, common sense applies to many more things than just not shovin a gun into another-ones arse, for him telling you, you were an asshole, or shoting you to death for a stolen lollipop...

The nature of arms is what protecs everyone from physical violence and non-violent crimes, that both can be done without consequences by the criminals by abusing legal justice and/or outnumbering your victim, and if I (´ve) had a gun, my enemies wouldn´t have gone that far, ruining my life until my 32. year of live, as any sane person would have shot them to a bloody lump for just 20% of what they did to me over nearly two deacdes (own family involved).

I had friends, I had a job, I had an own family, I had a degreee, I wouldn´t have been ambushed and slaughtered; I would for sure not have been raped, by some guys, that were surely payed for doing it by my millionaire uncle, who hates faggots, I wouldn´t have been sent to psychiatry 2x (once for a few days, second time for 6 weeks because they short-cut the story to a relapse of a psychosis) by lies of my parents, because then I really would have gotten beserk and killing everyone, myself included.

Looking at this bilance, I´d take a gun shot of a gangshooting, with a hero´s grin and would be proud of being able to care and defense myself, as this would for sure have been the exception of an overall gun-use.

I don´t think that a tyrranic government would be able to overrun a whole country, without serious resistance and at least a partial failure in doing so, when people are armed.

[Nagognog2]

When the government of the USA no longer eats our children by sending them off to war for the profits of fascist corporations - I'll gladly melt my gun collection.

[stoneinfocus]

Originally Posted by Nagognog2

When the government of the USA no longer eats our children by sending them off to war for the profits of fascist corporations - I'll gladly melt my gun collection.

Well, there still might be your fascist neighbour with his fellows eating your children, so I wouldn´t count this as an argument against the right to carry weapons.

[old hippie 56]

^^That the whole point, the gov. figures if they disarm trained vets, their job gets a little bit easier. Really don't see their point on denying guns to adults with ADHD, unless they are nervous about a bunch of hyperactive adults with guns.

[stoneinfocus]

^^this is quite discriminating i think, too, they are lest of a thread than maybe paranoid psychotics, as some of those in the ministry of defense.*g*...by the way is there a way to become an american, without immediately recieving a green card?

[Nagognog2]

A friend of mine was a sniper in Vietnam. He was trained to blow people's brains out from a mile away. And he did. But when he got back to the USA, he was denied a permit to buy and own a rifle and/or shotgun. The police chief told him he was not a fit person to have a firearm. He sued on the basis that if this police chief gave a permit to anyone - he had to give one to ANYONE.

He won the case. The police chief was ordered by the court to give him a permit to carry ANY weapon he wanted. Including a machine gun. The police chief signed the paperwork and handed it over to my friend.

The police chief retired the next day and moved out of town.

[Kernacktur]

It's sad vets have one of the rights they fought to protect taken away from them. Gangs and criminals usually have bigger worries than a gun charge. They don't obey any other laws why would they care about gun laws? SWIM knows of single person who has acquired a Tech-9, AK-47 and AR-15, that's all to SWIM's knowledge. All at different times and places but, all illegally. SWIM's seen first hand how gun laws don't work.

[old hippie 56]

^^Same here, a person can buy weapons off the street cheaper and faster.

[FuBai]

1) No longer could a popular rebellion be footed with only conventional fire arms. The only way to foot a rebellion in the here and now is to get the army on side and, once you've done that, your guns become irrelevant anyway

2) The idea that guns protect is a fallacy, all it does is create a criminal/cop arms race. The police have guns? I guess we better get some too then. How exactly does arming a nation which is about 50% composed of totalitarian bigots make the world a safer place?

3) Violent crimes involving guns are far, far less common in Britain than they are in the US because criminals don't feel the need to carry guns as much.

4) They are military instruments whose sole purpose and aim is to kill and cause harm to OTHERS. That's why you have a gun - whether it be to force people to do what you want or to protect yourself against other people with guns, you have it because you want to shoot something.

5) In America gun saturation is massive, unregulated, un-licenced guns permeate every state so that each citizen has an unquantified amount of fire power. Would you not prefer a world in which you didn't have to worry so much about people toting guns? To a European there is little difference between gun control in America and Saudi Arabia.

6) The Gun and the Drugs trade are two very different things - drugs cause harm only to the person that uses them - it's a voluntary acceptance of that harm. Guns kill OTHER people who don't usually get a choice in the matter.

7) There are some that say that "Them that get shot usually deserve it." That's ridiculous, even in the context of gang wars - just look at Rhys-Jones.

8) Do you really think that arming the bottom of the barrel bobby on the beat is a smart move? Look at all the examples of police corruption, over-zealous police action etc. If America had decent gun control laws then so many lives would be saved just from the police not shooting innocents.

[stoneinfocus]

FuBai, you seem to be an intelligent person, but there seems to be too much black-white painting / polarization and as a consequence a hindered horizont of thinking things to the very end of the chain, like ultimative power abused, corruption and misery created out of these things, probably bevcause you were too much protected against things like these.

As I see it, what might look good on the paper, like lesser gun-related crimes and fewer deaths caused by firearms, is being brought by the silent suffering of the poorest, totally deprived of any rights, even the right of selfe-defense or startimg a riot.

And good luck for living under a regime with troops like the SS(Storm Troops)= or the SA(Security Department), knocking at your door, saying "Oh, fuBai, very smart, we´ve thought it over, nonetheless, please visit on of our infamous camps, with excellent medical care units, to clear up your mind a little(=go to the concentration camp)...Thanks, I´d rather take the chances of getting-or not getting shot in a random gang riot, than facing this scenario, which already happened to me, translated to todays means.

And don´t you think it´s a difference, facing those troops, knocking at your door with the option of an easy suicide or a fight, dying for your freedome with the firearm in your hands, than without this option? We could take about 80mio. of deaths, for the struggle against Hitler and for "freedom", well, not exactly, for capitalism and total control, so we can´t take a few accidents and a littel crime and deaths related to fire-arms in return for these sacrifices?

The will to survive is usually so strong, that in a western civilisation, you could buy someone off for a peacful living, by giving him the most rudimental things, like a room, a TV, and something to eat, so you wont run amok with a gun in your hanbd, if you do, there´s a reason that´s concerned to us all.

[FuBai]

Ok, you know that I can't understand it when you write like that stoneinfocus.

[stoneinfocus]

I think it´s not so much the typos, maybe you´re missing the direction my thinking is pointing at... I always see this even with my german friends who understand and simply ignore the arguments, for they just are not seen and experienced by themselves...

Í´d ascribe this to the fact, that a man learns only from his own history and everyone has some hybris, when he´s achieved something and someone else didn´t.

Even the reason and consequences of misachievement are ascribed to the other person´s failings, not to the failures and fatalities produced by the laws and their consequences.

[Iseethefnords]

I'll go with the unpopular position and say the the 2nd amendment is still valid today. People have the right to efend themselves, and guns are the great equalizer, if you are a criminal and you have no idea who is packing heat and who isn't I would think twice before mugging someone, and places like vermont where people can carry handguns in public without a permit have the lowest homicide rates in the country.

[Kernacktur]

I'm trying to say it's more than just self defense. The 2nd Amendment should but doesn't provide us with a way to protect from a tyrannical government. You don't need an Army with tanks and jets to win a war just look at Iraq and Vietnam. IN both cases they were able to fight the military using mostly small arms. Gun laws don't make any difference at all. They make it more difficult for law abiding citizens to get guns but for people who don't care they can get better guns for cheaper. You have to look at it from their point of view. I do think it does help prevent crime too, just that it wasn't the whole point of the 2nd Amendment. Violent crimes would go down if committing one basically became a game of Russian roulette. Never know when you'll get shot, just that it'll happen eventually.

[Iseethefnords]

I absolutly agree Kernacktur.

[Woodman]

I'm more concerned about putting limits on government officials than restricting law abiding gun owners.

[Iseethefnords]

Amen, police in the US seem to be intent on becoming an army to annihilate their own citizens, why thry do they need mp5's, p90's, m16's and full body armor for traffic stops and domestic disputes? the police are here to protect our rights from criminals not to annihlate the enemy, and SWAT is supposed to be an absolute last resort to be used at bank robberies and shit. We're turning into a police state if we aren't already there.

[FuBai]

Why does the "Land of the Free" that has so eagerly thrown away more important rights still cleave so desperately to this one? What is it about gun ownership that it is more important than Freedom of speech, Habeas Corpus, Self-Determination and all the others that America has discarded?

[Kernacktur]

Gun ownership helps protect those rights.

[El Calico Loco]

I see guns and drugs as the same issue - both involve the possession of a thing which, by itself, does no harm to anyone. Prohibition of either is punishing individuals for harm they *might* cause...whether they ever do or not.

I won't go into the ethics of the debate or the pragmatic arguments against guns - there's plenty of information out there on the Intarweb for those who care to read it. I will say that there are a shitload of guns in the city I call home, and I never fear for my safety when I walk down the street. I know people in New York and England who do.


ECL