We're not going to agree
Gun nuts and I are never ever going to see eye to eye, because they're basically spoiled little children who love this dangerous toy of theirs, and when somebody suggests maybe they get rid of it because it's so dangerous, they whine and cry and scream and raise a ruckus. No argument I've ever seen them use has been anything remotely resembling intelligent, logical, or based in anything close to reality. Everything out of their mouths is nonsense, and almost all of it sounds just fucking batshit insane.
They sound paranoid, too. They think a gun will protect them from the boogey men that they fear around every corner. They fail to notice or accept that their guns are far more dangerous to them than the boogey men they fear. They ignore the thousands of cases where guns not only didn't protect them in bad situations, but made the bad situations worse, like when a mugger - unafraid of your gun - steals it out of your hand and kills you with it. They fail to realize that a gun is not a magic wand that gets you your way.
One of their paranoid delusions is this whole "the gubmint gonna take our guns!" bologna. Personally, I'd be in favor of that, but I'm in the minority; most people on the side of more gun control just want better background checks, and to make guns harder to get; which I support, too, in the absence of anyone agreeing with my more hard line opinions. But I don't think their plans go far enough; guns should require car-like licensing, including yearly fees and license renewal fees, and insurance the way cars have; misusing your gun in a way that kills some bystander, or to murder someone, would get you your gun privileges taken away. I also think the number of guns should be severely limited. Nobody who isn't a cop or soldier needs more than two guns - a hunting rifle and a pistol. If your aims really are just hunting and/or self defense, you do not need anything else. (I'm actually being reasonable here; if it was up to me, nobody would be able to own any kind of gun, but unless we can be absolutely sure we've rounded up and destroyed every gun there is, then that idealistic fantasy of mine is, sadly, just an idealistic fantasy.)
Honestly, gun nuts going "they're gonna take our guns!" No. Just no. That's never going to happen without repealing the 2nd amendment, and as much as I support that idea in theory, in practice it would just end up used as an excuse to repeal or modify other amendments, which would be very bad.
I also find it amusing that these people fear our country becoming fascist and some overlord taking their guns away, especially since the US is already fascist, and has been for DECADES, without any attempts at all being made to take away these idiots' pweshus guns.
Another reason we will never see eye to eye is because they think of guns as mere tools. And sure, if you needed to hunt for your food, or you're in the military, that is true. But A. Guns are death machines, good for nothing else. B. None of the gun nut dipshits that I get whined at by are in the military, and none of them hunt for food. Some claim they do, but come on, this is the 21st century. If you're on the Internet, you clearly do not need to hunt for food. You are not a fucking hunter-gatherer, you are not an African bushman or a frontiersman surviving on your wits. You are probably some dumb shit sitting in an office eating Funions and bemoaning the tiny size of your genitals. And even if you aren't, there isn't a soul alive in this country with any genuine need to hunt for food. After all, we have these things called "grocery stores" now, where you can use something called "money" to purchase your food. If you claim to hunt for food, you are a liar; you hunt because you enjoy killing things. If you happen to also eat your kill (something I have never witnessed anyone do, despite having been born and raised in the rural Midwest), well good on you for recycling; but you still have no NEED to hunt for food, so stop lying.
Also, even if you did need to hunt for food, you do NOT need an AK-47 to do so.
Then they claim to need guns to defend themselves. Riiiighhhht. Sure you do. Even disregarding the fact that, statistically, owning a gun is pretty much a 100% guarantee you will die from a gun (probably that very one), you still don't need an AK-47 for that, and you don't need more than one gun.
In fact, you don't need a gun at all for self defense. There are tazers, there's mace, pepper spray, and other non-lethal ways of putting down an attacker. And while I do agree with the fact that, sometimes in the heat of defending one's own life or the lives of others that an accidental killing of the attacker is justified, owning a gun just shouts to the world that you value human life so little that using lethal force is literally the first thing coming to your mind; it says that you aren't even CONSIDERING a non-lethal option. Which just makes you, in my opinion, utterly without morals or ethics at all. Which is, above all, why we're never going to see eye to eye.
This was cross-posted from http://alex-antonin.dreamwidth.org/247455.html
You can comment either here or there.
They sound paranoid, too. They think a gun will protect them from the boogey men that they fear around every corner. They fail to notice or accept that their guns are far more dangerous to them than the boogey men they fear. They ignore the thousands of cases where guns not only didn't protect them in bad situations, but made the bad situations worse, like when a mugger - unafraid of your gun - steals it out of your hand and kills you with it. They fail to realize that a gun is not a magic wand that gets you your way.
One of their paranoid delusions is this whole "the gubmint gonna take our guns!" bologna. Personally, I'd be in favor of that, but I'm in the minority; most people on the side of more gun control just want better background checks, and to make guns harder to get; which I support, too, in the absence of anyone agreeing with my more hard line opinions. But I don't think their plans go far enough; guns should require car-like licensing, including yearly fees and license renewal fees, and insurance the way cars have; misusing your gun in a way that kills some bystander, or to murder someone, would get you your gun privileges taken away. I also think the number of guns should be severely limited. Nobody who isn't a cop or soldier needs more than two guns - a hunting rifle and a pistol. If your aims really are just hunting and/or self defense, you do not need anything else. (I'm actually being reasonable here; if it was up to me, nobody would be able to own any kind of gun, but unless we can be absolutely sure we've rounded up and destroyed every gun there is, then that idealistic fantasy of mine is, sadly, just an idealistic fantasy.)
Honestly, gun nuts going "they're gonna take our guns!" No. Just no. That's never going to happen without repealing the 2nd amendment, and as much as I support that idea in theory, in practice it would just end up used as an excuse to repeal or modify other amendments, which would be very bad.
I also find it amusing that these people fear our country becoming fascist and some overlord taking their guns away, especially since the US is already fascist, and has been for DECADES, without any attempts at all being made to take away these idiots' pweshus guns.
Another reason we will never see eye to eye is because they think of guns as mere tools. And sure, if you needed to hunt for your food, or you're in the military, that is true. But A. Guns are death machines, good for nothing else. B. None of the gun nut dipshits that I get whined at by are in the military, and none of them hunt for food. Some claim they do, but come on, this is the 21st century. If you're on the Internet, you clearly do not need to hunt for food. You are not a fucking hunter-gatherer, you are not an African bushman or a frontiersman surviving on your wits. You are probably some dumb shit sitting in an office eating Funions and bemoaning the tiny size of your genitals. And even if you aren't, there isn't a soul alive in this country with any genuine need to hunt for food. After all, we have these things called "grocery stores" now, where you can use something called "money" to purchase your food. If you claim to hunt for food, you are a liar; you hunt because you enjoy killing things. If you happen to also eat your kill (something I have never witnessed anyone do, despite having been born and raised in the rural Midwest), well good on you for recycling; but you still have no NEED to hunt for food, so stop lying.
Also, even if you did need to hunt for food, you do NOT need an AK-47 to do so.
Then they claim to need guns to defend themselves. Riiiighhhht. Sure you do. Even disregarding the fact that, statistically, owning a gun is pretty much a 100% guarantee you will die from a gun (probably that very one), you still don't need an AK-47 for that, and you don't need more than one gun.
In fact, you don't need a gun at all for self defense. There are tazers, there's mace, pepper spray, and other non-lethal ways of putting down an attacker. And while I do agree with the fact that, sometimes in the heat of defending one's own life or the lives of others that an accidental killing of the attacker is justified, owning a gun just shouts to the world that you value human life so little that using lethal force is literally the first thing coming to your mind; it says that you aren't even CONSIDERING a non-lethal option. Which just makes you, in my opinion, utterly without morals or ethics at all. Which is, above all, why we're never going to see eye to eye.
This was cross-posted from http://alex-antonin.dreamwidth.org/247455.html
You can comment either here or there.