Debate about Gun Control

[Eric the Green]

(09-28-2016, 12:08 AM)Galen Wrote:

(09-27-2016, 12:51 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I am angry about the constant shootings in America. I am grieved for the lives lost and for their families. I am outraged that Americans continue to support permissive gun laws. I am angry that too many police (not all, but some) have no respect for black lives. The shooting of unarmed black men, while white men are not shot, is beyond unjust.

This lady would be dead if she wasn't armed.  This is why people like to keep firearms.  Anyone want to bet these fine upstanding members of the black community are obeying the current gun laws?  Even if they were unarmed I doubt this lady would have lasted very long unarmed against these men.  Truth is, her odds were better with a firearm than they ever would have been without one.  Who knows? Maybe the other two will wise up after seeing the lady plant their buddy in the ground.





You would rather have seen her dead just to feel better and this is why I truly despise you.  Even on the low side of 50,000 defensive uses of firearms means that there are net more people alive because of private firearms ownership.  The numbers are probably much higher since nobody really wants to deal with law enforcement, who are overly militarized, if they can avoid it.  The Hemenway  and the Violence Policy surveys were done by people with an ax to grind and their methodology was a joke.

What I despise is the permissive gun laws that you libertarians foist upon our country, allowing thousands to be shot that otherwise would not have been shot. Criminals and insane people are not the folks who very rarely defend themselves successfully with firearms against intruders. And certainly the myth that people with firearms can protect themselves against the police is unadulterated bullshit. Just ask the Black Panthers after they received the results of their approach. No, the fact is that firearms in this country kill far more people than they protect.

If people who are qualified to have non-military firearms still want them, then folks like me whom you despise are not going to take them from you. We are only going to take them away from folks who are not qualified, until such time as deceived and fearful folks like you can learn that firearms possession is just the rankest form of violation of the "non-aggression" principle that you libertarians tout so loudly. It is up to the people to disarm themselves, and thus protect themselves and be "sane." And that's the trend indeed. More firearms are being owned by fewer and fewer people.

Black lives matter. African Americans need to act to protect themselves from the police. Guns, riots and armed individuals shooting police are not the answer, however. Politics and activism are the answer. The police must be demilitarized, and police must be trained to respect black lives and not react with fear against black people, or any people. Those who don't, should be fired, and city officials who protect them need to be voted out. Police review boards need to be in place, and relations between public and police need to be improved. Racial profiling and stop-and-frisk have no place in the USA. The criminal justice system needs to be reformed so innocent people are not so-frequently arrested and convicted, and those convicted are not given sentences that don't fit the crime. The war on drugs as we have waged it needs to end. Police and the law need to be respected, and police need to respect the law and the people.