Summations Only

This is what always happens when any kind of conversation about guns takes place, you tend to take it as someone's taking all your rights away. I was even called Hitler!I'm just talking about handguns because of their concealment ability. I love hunting (wish I could do it more often, it's been years). I love rifles, bows, crossbows, shotguns (every type), and the big boys too (50 cal, etc.) There are plenty of ways to bear arms. I'm just talking about one.- Oni

First of all, you better have celebrated that Miami Heat win, dude. No, not at all. I'm just saying get rid of handguns. That was an aside argument I was having with crash about my own personal take, not that it should be the law. Don't misunderstand or not read the whole argument.All I was calling for was making handguns (manufacturing, distribution, and sales) illegal. I have throughout the thread said, rifles and shotguns are fine. My concern is in the ability to conceal. You're a Hitler. You don't need handguns for all that rising up stuff, employee of the government. You're the first one's these hillbillies with guns are coming after. I think it's quite possible to easily get rid of handguns or at the very least stop the manufacturing and distribution, and legal sales.You can arm up with rifles, and shotguns, crossbows and assault rifles and go get them yanks at Capitol Hill. Should be easy to shoot, they're all 90 years old.- Oni

What a terrible idea!I live in Queens, I take the subway everyday with hundreds of thousands of maniac New Yorkers. You want to arm us all? By the time we got to our stop everyone would be dead.- Oni

Actually, read what I write.No where did I say anything about arming everyone.What I said was that I prefer open carry, having any firearms out where everyone can see them.

I did read what you write.You said unlimited open carry everywhere in the US. New York city is not a good place to allow that, that is way it is currently illegal to do so. You'd like to see that different.That's what you said.- Oni

I see that YOU think it is not a good idea.I disagree.Unlimited Open Carry does not mean that there must be no limitation, but it does mean that if someone carries it should be open, displayed.

Have you seen the subways? Have you seen the amount of people in those things daily? Can you not see how maybe in this particular case, unlimited open carry (like in a holster) is a terrible idea? Hmmm... Again, that's a terrible idea where I live. You're being stubborn about it, that's all.- Oni

I just disagree with you.I see someone openly carrying a firearm as less a threat than someone carrying a concealed firearm.

It came to power by guerilla warfare and that was made possible because the citizenry was allowed to have weapons. It is not always possible to become armed should the need arise. That is next to impossible in a strongly armed police state like the former soviet union. Any suspicion of revolt would have millions executed on the spot. A great portion of the people of China DID want to overthrow their government early on when they found out how repressive it was. As time wore on and as the state systematically brainwashed its people , sometimes by force in reeducation camps, the desire to overthrow the state became less and less but many people there would love to have something other than totalitarian communism as a form of government.

A willing weapons salesman will not get very far in a very strong and repressive police state. Millions will get executed in the process. As for the people of China not wanting to overthrow their
government, read my comments to Ringo. Like I said before, persuading and coercing inspectors or circumventing legitimate import channels in a state like the former Soviet Union would be snuffed out before it got started. A strong police state is good at preventing rebellion. For example, it would be impossible to smuggle weapons into China or conduct secret air drops. The government would find out quickly and snuff it out even quicker.

I am aware of that history. The non violent protest worked because the british colonial government was not a repressive police state like the former soviet union. Regardless of popular opinion on the subject, not all colonialists were vile,evil people. The british colonial rulers could be affected by such tactics as gandhi applied. Edi Amin or Stalin would have annihilated Chandi and anyone who spoke even positively about him. How non violent is filling truck tires with gasoline and putting them on government sympathizers and lighting them on fire- a procedure known as necklacing? Its amazing what a huge media spotlight that puts your every move under a microscope and broadcasts it to every media outlet in the world can do isn't it? I cant think of a single president or administration during that time that even remotely resembled a police state like the former soviet union or China. Again, the United States is not a brutal police force. Its funny watching a bunch of smelly, college graduates with worthless degrees who have never worked a day in their lives try to take away money from productive individuals, isn't it? They may get their way with the obama administration but it will only serve to limit the financial freedom people currently have within the banking system and make it more expensive to do so. Governments already use guns on the populace without justification, so your point is moot. I agree, but it is foolish to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Yes it is, but it is not possible to live in freedom in a totalitarian police state without guns.Unarmed non-violent protest creates change by evolution of government rather than by revolution.[/qs]

Yes, but note the word "former" in there. On a point of fact, China is about as communist as my ass.

If it was that, rather than all the non-violent protest, that overthrew apartheid, then please bear in mind that we are talking about gun control; even if the government was to deprive you of your guns, you would still have trucks tires and the secret of fire. ... most of whom, back in the real world, had jobs. And I don't believe you've ever sniffed a statistically significant sample of them. However, if you want to be wrong about the Occupy Movement, I'm sure there are already threads on which you could do so. Well, which is baby and which is bathwater? Has anyone been keeping score? How often have guns been used to overthrow a tyranny, and how often a democracy? Does anyone know? In the US, as I pointed out in a previous post, they could only presently be used to overthrow a democratic republic, since that is in fact what we have.As you yourself say: (I think you meant the last word to be "state".) So we couldn't use guns to overthrow such an institution, 'cos of it not existing. But if it is possible to overthrow the government using guns, then it would be possible to institute a brutal police state by such means.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

You cannot overthrow a brutal police state without guns. I agree that you can overthrow a democracy with guns and institute a police state. You can also prevent a democracy from turning into a police state with guns. A democracy that is morphing into a police state won't get very far at removing undesirables from their property and home when they get blown away by 45 calibers when they attempt to do so.

So it would be a good idea for repressive police states to allow their citizens to have easy access to guns, the better to overthrow them.Will you tell them, or shall I?Really, if we're going to daydream about rewriting the Chinese constitution, we could skip over the Second Amendment and go straight for Article I. Instead of fantasizing about them having enough guns to institute a representative democracy, we could just fantasize about them having a representative democracy: it's quicker, and no more futile.