Rifleman Archive

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PyscoJuggalo wrote:

Bah I live in Chicago Illinois the Murder Capitol of the US(Sometimes it's DC, sometimes it's us)! Every Fellon, Drug addict, and Luniticis carrying a gun. Hand Guns are illegal in Chicago(You can't own em) and you have to register the few firearms that are legal(pain in the ass and a heafty fee), Chicago is not safer for it's strict gun laws.

If they want to make Chicago Safer they should learn how to treat the drug addicts, the main cause of senseless homicides.

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Exactly. Look at those cities in the US with the highest gun crime rate and they pretty much all share very strict gun control laws. DC has banned firearms for decades and how often has it been the murder capital of the US?

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Barb-Wire wrote:

an armedpopulace is a polite and safe one when governed by the rule of law...

when a country is no longer ruled by law then that is where trouble lies. recently in the last election history and facts got turned upside down when a good portion of the press saw al gores attempt to gain the presidency by way of the judicial bench and not through the electorate and the constitutions of Florida and the United States. it turned amazingly into bush some how "stealing" the election when in fact just the opposite happend...

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Interesting point! I never thought of it that way.

Waste93 is my hero! Not only is he pro-gun, but he's also well read it would seem. Props to you, man.

Sorry, but I despise the anti-gun mindset. It's most often childish in it's thinking (read: "guns are bad because they kill people"...okay bleeding heart, then I guess knives, cigarettes, alcohol, cars, baseball bats, golf clubs, red meat, clorox bleach, human hands and a million other things are evil too..so why not ban all of those things too?). I'm a far cry from a Republican, but I loathe Liberals/Democrats(some are "hawks" though, so they aren't all bad. ) because of their anti-gun views. As a few people stated above, guns are not responsible for crime and violent death; these things would occur, have occured, and still do occur without firearms. A baseball bat, screw driver, hell, even a thick Bible...these are all weapons if someone wants them to be; two of the bludgeoning variety, and one piercing. A gun cannot possibly kill someone unless another person willfully picks up the weapon, preps it to fire, aims, and pulls the trigger. The shooter is in the wrong, not the gun. A gun is an inanimate object, and it is no more capable of evil than the rock that was supposedly used by Cain to bash in the skull of his brother, Abel.

When you can prove to me that gun is an independently-thinking, conscientious, intelligent entity that is capable of deciding who it wants to kill...then maybe I'll become anti-gun. Until then, I'll continue to run magazine after magazine through my pistols, which I use strictly for recreational shooting. I've never killed anyone with a gun, nor have I ever pulled it on someone. Having been raised by a police officer, I was taught to respect firearms...and that's the key...respect and knowledge of firearms.

Pro-Gun...till the day I die...and if that happens to be by a gun...then so be it. I'll still ask to be buried with my 1911


P.S. As for the Al Gore thing and the media; I'll bite. I'm an up-and-coming (hopeful) journalist. Having worked in at least one newsroom, I can tell you that there definitely is a liberal bias in the media; at least within the venue that I worked. Just some food for thought...look at how much coverage John Kerry receives in the news, even though the only real platform he's been able to run under is "We Hate Bush"...disgusting politics in my opinion, and mind you, I'm not a big fan of Dubya either. Kerry disgusts me. Rather than making any attempt at real politics, all he talks about is how much Bush and the tax cuts suck; then he rallies behind celebrities and other "freedom fighters" to rally an already brainwashed mass (/wave at Michael Moore...Oh, and something about that fat@$$...if our country is such a horrible police state, then HOW DID ANY OF YOUR MOCKUMENTARIES EVER MAKE IT TO SCREEN, YOU WINDBAG? Wouldn't Bush's Gestapo have censored them and had you dragged into an alley and shot?). Maybe Bush did lie about Iraq, but I still supported the military intervention, and as far as Kerry goes, I don't see him as being any better than Bush; he strikes me as being just as distasteful. And that's just my two hollowpoints on the issue

Sorry for the rant but, it felt good to spit it out all the same.

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FearlessBob wrote:

All this is a segway into my own personal Social Theory:

As societies advance and become more industrialized/urbanized and then suburbanized, the citizenry in general becomes more and more dependant upon it's government. They expect the government to keep them safe from toxic water, dirty air, drunk drivers, pedophiles, rabid dogs, asteroids, things that go bump in the night, the monster in the closet, fattening foods and carbohydrates. The general expectation is that making something illegal and/or regulating it will eliminate it's danger.

Interesting theory. My own is along those lines however I take a slightly different view. Mine is that Government takes more and more power and the people become complacent to a degree. The Government always does this "for the common good". This continues until a critical point is reached. At which point the Government will either become a tyranny or the people rebel and roll back the government or both.

However in the modern society there is so much information and misinformationit causes general confussion. Resulting in a more paralysis in the populance.

The most basic flaw in this expectation is readily apperant vis a vis: policing. For nearly 95% of civillian/Law Enforcement interaction, the Police Officer fills the role of a Secretary Wearing a Gun. We show up after the fact, we ask you a bunch of questions, we write it all down, we go away. In general, Policing is NOT a pro-active activity, it is a RE-active activity. Communites dont like what happens during PRO-active policing. We stop lots of people in cars, we rumage around in them, we ask insulting questions, we chase people, we are aggressive and intimidating. Somtimes we make mistakes while we are being pro-active, sometimes we do things wrong. Civillians dont like to see 7 cops piled on top on some guy "subduing" him. It's makes folks uncomfortable. However, when police are soley RE-active, the public complains that we aren't doing enough, crime is out of control, etc etc etc.

Good way of putting it. I've always said that LE has become glorified baby sitters. People refusing to take responsibility for themselves or even raise their children. I couldn't begin to count the number of calls where the parent has called saying their child is disrespecting them and wanting the PD to solve the problem. Or the 911 calls about a loud party/barking dog yet the RP doesn't want to get involved. Though they expect us to fix it for them.

The simple fact is, most people these days are sheep. They want the police/government to protect them 24 hrs a days and they have the mistaken impression that the police/government CAN do this. Having relied so completely on someone else to protect them, society in general is in-capable of defending itself. They see the solution to this in making weapons "illegal". Well, that's all fine and dandy for those of you who obey the law. Sadly, Bad Folks want weapons and they will NEVER cease wanting them, or attempting to obtain them. It's the old cliche' of "When guns are outlawed, only Outlaws will have guns." It's tired, over-used, hackneyed....and true.

Exactly. I usually say it's a cultural difference between the individual and the group. Some cultures emphaize the group over the individual. While other the individual is paramount. Right now the US is in transition from the individual to the group and a struggle between the two is in place.

It the end, personal safey is...well, personal. That means that YOU are responsible for the safety of you and your family. Average police response time can be as fast as 2 minutes to as long as 13 mintues. 2 minutes is plenty of time for someone to beat you to death with an especially heavy Thesaurus. Give them 13 minutes, they can have you hacked up, tossed in a Glad bag and be long gone before the first cruiser rolls into your driveway.

Again, exactly. Also of mention is a US Supreme Court case. Can't remember the name of it but want to say it was from the 60's or 70's. In that case the USSC stated that a police department has no duty to protect any one individual. Nor should you expect them to. The first line of defense for your protection is you. Anything else is an added bonus.

1. When I was still living in Illinois, I lived in a developement that had several large lakes in it. I was out with my two labs, chuking tennis balls in the lake for them to fetch. A younger mother was nearby, reading a book while her toddler was running around. After about 15-20 minutes, I heard her shrieking and screaming, saw her fishing her kid out of the lake. While she was busy reading, kid took a dive. Next weekend, I was back at the lake, tossing a ball for the dogs again, she was standing nearby, with a clipboard, and a petition, demanding that residents sign it to have the lake either completely fenced or drained and filled....while she was doing this, her kid was running around and again, she wasn't paying any attention to him

Sounds about typical. People do not want to take responsibility for their actions or inactions. Reminds me of a story (not sure if its true) about a kid that had a display at a school science fair. He was talking about the dangers of dihydrooxy. He listed how many deaths occured each year from it and the number of harmful chemicals found in it. He had a petition to ban the substance. The last day he revealed that it was H2O (water). His actual science experiment was on the gulibility of people.

If you've seen the Man Show you may have seen the skit they did about "Ending Womens Suffrage". You'd be surprised with the number of people that signed that petition.

2. Recently in China, some fruitcake with a KNIFE stabbed 15 kids and 3 teachers at a school before the local coppers arrived and, I presume ( and hope) beat the ever-living crap out of him. ...A KNIFE! Certainly a knife is a leathal weapon. Before the surge in less-than-lethal technology, I was taught to SHOOT people with knives. Today, if someone had a knife and I had a gun, I would most certainly STILL shoot them. However, were I not to have the luxury of having a firearm close at hand, I would not stand by while they wandered around stabbing children. One wonders how many adults at that school were paralyzed with shock/fear/etc while this nut was sticking kids, waiting for the Police to arrive and DO SOMETHING.

Want to say the same type of thing happened in Japan a couple of years ago. Most common murder weapon in the USSR was the claw hammer. If someone wants to kill someone, the lack of a firearm isn't going to stop them.

The issue at hand is fear. No one knows how to deal with fear anymore. No one is taught what to do, no one has an example to look to. People these days are afraid of everything. Now dont get me wrong, a little fear is a healthy thing. A man who says he's never been afraid is full of crap.

Yep. The fight or flight reflex has been subdued by civilization in many cases. One question they frequently ask a police officer applicant is if they could shoot someone. Of course they want the applicant to say yes. However the real answer is noone knows for sure what they would do until the situation arises. Avowed pacifists have fought fiercely to protect themselves or others. Just as highly trained soldiers with hundred of kills have suddenly been unable to kill another enemy.