Really??? Do you have visions of tumbleweeds blowing across dirt roads while women in bonnets sew quilts waiting for their men to return from the saloons with spittoons too?

The fact that we can bear arms has nothing to do with our gun crime problem. As stated in earlier posts, it is not usually the person that legally owns a gun that does the shooting in a crime. It is the thug that illegally bought it on the street. This has NOTHING to do with our 2nd Amendment. Obviously. Your country has shown that. Please correct me if I am wrong, but there is a ban in the UK for arms, correct? Has your gun crime ceased? No. It is MUCH lower than ours, granted, but the fact still remains that you have a BAN on firearms yet people still get shot.

I am not obsessed with guns. I enjoy shooting things from time to time...like cans, bales of hay, targets...to call it an American obsession is a bit ignorant and stereotypical, IMO. There are plenty of people that are against the 2nd Amendment...that would love to see it changed or even abolished but while it is still one of our rights, there are other people that will defend it tooth and nail.

The invading nation would be miles away shooting missiles at you though.

I have so far kp out of this debate as it is not something I can constuctively comment on being from the UK. I think the british attitude is much the same as DLs, all we seem to hear about is gun crime in the US because it is legal to have guns. Here there is a lot less gun crime because it isn't.


Someone said that it is not the law abiding gun owners that commit these crimes but flip it the other way and think if there were no legal handguns there would be no illegal handguns. That's the theory anyway as we have seen in recent months in the UK that is not the case but there are far, far fewer gun related crimes in the UK as a consequence.


I like shooting and have been to gun clubs where we shoot rifles and shotguns, there seems to be some sort of stigma attached to handguns for the reasons given above ( guns for shooting people as opposed to other things).

T1000, I am curious as to why you bought your gun? do you shoot at clubs or is it for protection? If it's the latter have you ever been in a situation before where you have a gun? I'm not denying anyones right to have one I'm just curious.


One other thing, if you (american people in general) have a gun, where do you shoot it? In the UK even an air rifle can only be used on private land a certain distance from built up areas etc.

I pick Miss CL Scott to be on my team.

Holy crap, I forgot to tell you that. I've got plenty of stories about that town. I work for a furniture retailer in Houston that does deliver all the way out to Beaumont, Orange, and Vidor occasionally. Someone told me once a team was out that way, they happened to be black, and they were waiting for a train to pass. When the train passed they noticed that there was a parade going down the street. Then the rather large guy driving the truck damn near got all the way down on the floorboard when he saw that it was a KKK parade.

Errr, ok. It's obviously real important to you guys or why would you get so up in arms (excuse the pun) about it.

Yes we have gun crime here but as you say, no where near the scale of you guys.

I just don't see why bits of metal that shoot out smaller bits of metal mean that much to a lot (not all, generally, widely, stereotypically, from what I've seen etc, etc) of Americans.

They aren't a necessity, we seem to get on pretty well without them over here. I feel pretty safe, I feel like I live in a democratic country, I don't foresee a time I'll need to pop a cap in someones ass to defend my right to democracy.

I was expressing my view of the American gun culture from my perspective.

I've only handled a shotgun and rifles before for the sake of hunting, (and one illegally obtained handgun, long story, but it actually came from your side of the pond funnily enough) so my thoughts on the issue were based on my viewpoint and knowledge. I wasn't having a personally dig at you but rather the laws of the country you live in.

For every thousand hacking at the leaves of evil, there is one striking at the root.

A high level of gun-related crimes in the US has nothing to do with the availability of guns.

It has to do with the fact that people today are typically far less mature than their forefathers. It's because people choose to resort to violence to sort out their differences, rather than handling them like adults. So take away the guns, and you won't have accomplished a damn thing.

Want to radically reduce the number of gun-related deaths? Think proactively. Teach your kids self-control, and to respect each other. Teach them that there is always a non-violent solution for every problem. I can personally guarantee you that if every parent did this, there would be no future need for any kind of firearm restriction at all.

I have a disturbing image in my head of a Nearly-Headless teddy with x's for eyes and stuffing everywhere. Noooooo!!!

That's always been my logic. Hunting is great (and tasty), so rifles make sense to me.
What's the point of people-killing guns, though? The only purpose for an assault rifle or a handgun is killing other humans, and... hey, maybe making the rule "you shoot it, you eat it" apply to EVERYTHING would not only stop trophy hunting but handgun crime as well?
I know that pro-restricted firearm people probably don't understand me just as much as I don't understand them.
I'm not for a complete gun ban, but I don't see why people need handguns or assault rifles.

I also don't quite "get" American gun culture, but being a Canuck it's probably just one of those things I'll never quite "get" about our quirky neighbours.

*Sigh* Responsible parents would solve so many of the world's problems.

If only.....

I've handled handguns, rifles, shotguns, and No, I do not own them. There is not one incident of a gun-related accident in a home where the home does not have a gun to begin with. That one simple fact keeps me from owning a gun. I never want my kid to get anywhere near one, I don't want to be cleaning it when it accidentally discharges, I simply do not feel that having one makes me 'safer' than not.

He turns 11 next year, I've been thinking about finding a range that will let me teach him proper use and respect for guns and perhaps it's about time. I don't mind if he learns to shoot one properly, but I don't feel that ownership or 'having one handy' is in his best interest.

And I completely agree that all children need to have respect for others instilled in them. I teach mine that there isn't always a peaceful solution to every problem because not everyone you meet is going to be a rational person to begin with. But between two people who are intelligent and able to listen, there is no problem which needs a solution via firearm.

There is something very 'primative' about owning a gun and power. It's like the idea that fire is cool. We sit in front of one when we camp, we stare into it. There is something quite basic to our psyche that gives us an elation at the control over this piece of controlled explosion. It's a loud bang, a hole appears 50 feet away, dead center. It IS a great feeling having that kind of power in your hand and controlling it to pinpoint accuracy.

I would never trade that kind of power for even a .005% chance that my kid would find it and attempt to use it. Not worth it.

As for Zombie protection, I live on the second floor, with about 2 months worth of ramen noodles, and a very narrow staircase which could be easily blocked off with a bookcase nearby.

You guys fight em. I'll be watching and waiting for the calvary.

Oh and KKK vs. Zombies. Sorry, but the KKK would win. Zombies only attack people with brains.

You do all realise that zombies aren't real right?... right?

While I agree with some of what you said about personal/parental responsibility I don't know how you can say that the availability has nothing to do with the fact that the US has the highest gun crime levels in the developed world.

Why do other countries not have such high levels? Is it because we in the UK and other countries aren't as violent or are better behaved socially? I don't believe that can be it.

If I wanted to get a handgun in this country I'd have to know the right people, be well connected in criminal circles etc. Even then I'd be struggling to get hold of ammunition for it.

I couldn't go into my local Asda (British arm of Walmart) and buy ammunition.

I don't think there's any denying that the availability has a integral part to play in the high levels of gun crime in the US.

Swords are only used to kill people as well, and yet fencing is still an accepted sport. It's about what you do with it, not what it CAN do.

That said , not a huge fan of guns.

Yeah, this line of thought has cropped up a lot.

All I can say I I'd rather take on a guy with a sword, knife, chainsaw, fork, spoon, candlestick, pipe, spatula than a guy with any form of firearm.

Guns are lethal weapons that you can't defend yourself against, pretty much every other weapon is not as totally and irrevocably lethal at both short and long range.

It's okay, I had to stop myself earlier from using one as well.

The actual owning of a gun isn't necessarily what some people may think is most important. There are some that view our amendments as the gospel...never to be changed or altered. There are people that may never own a gun but will argue till they are blue in the face that the right to bear arms is an amendment that should never be altered or abolished.

Right, and that is the point I am trying to make about the right to bear arms having little to no bearing whether there is gun crime.

And I feel the same as you. Just across a big body of water.
I don't fear for my life when I step outside, I don't have leather chaps that have a holster where I keep my Colt .45. People don't walk around asking other people if they would like to make their days. Honestly.

For some reason, there are many aspects of what happens here that are sensationalized. Don't misunderstand, I am not saying that there isn't a problem with gun and gun control, but we don't have to wear kevlar everyday either. It bothers me that there is such a skewed view of Americans at times.

And I don't know that I took it as a personal dig. The laws would work just fine if people would abide by them and it rubbed me the wrong way how it was immediately assumed that T1000 was going to go on a shooting spree or that people were now going to end up dead because he bought a gun and in as little time as 45 minutes. *gasp*

I still love ya, DL. We are still buddies. Just don't come to my house. I might shoot you...

:P

Pfffttt, your guns don't scare me, Lee's ass on the other hand....

I don't think anyone thought T100000000000000.0 would go on a shooting spree it just seems ridiculous to me at least that a person can walk into a gun show, wait 45 mins and then be the legal owner of a lethal weapon.

It took me 1 and a half hours of waiting around for credit checks etc when I bought my last mobile phone and the most damage I can do with that is spraining my thumb texting.

I think you're all forgetting the old cliche about hand guns...

Guns don't kill people,

I do.

Or something like that...

Yeah, Lee's ass....that is a force to be reckoned with.

The shooting spree was more of an exaggeration. I confess.

I didn't assume this.

I'm just a bit shocked that anyone could purchase a handgun that quickly. Maybe it's because it would take me much longer.

/scurries off to satisfy curiosity about how long it would take for me to purchase a TANK

Now this might take a little more time. Perhaps an hour or so.

Comment above yours. Confesses exaggeration.

Actually, most of the time the check only takes 5-10 minutes...I guess they had slow Internet.

But like TraumaMamma said, people do go hunting with handguns, so it isn't useless for anything but people. I think it's much more of a challenge actually, maybe up there with compound bow hunting.

And it isn't trivial. You have to be 21, have never committed a felony, been in a mental institution, etc, and not to mention, it was over $600! That's some serious greenbacks.

I'd also like to mention that 75% of guns used in crimes are stolen.

Definitely going to get some watermelon this weekend when I go shooting now that you mention it. I'll take pictures.

Entertainment (it's fun!)

Self defense (I don't have any kids, and I actually can't keep my gun on base anyways, but later on I'll have a house, and you never know when the zombie uprising will occur)

Most importantly, to gain proficiency with firearms in my own time. I think the ability to use various weapons is an important skill. I am in the military, but weapons training doesn't happen all that often, especially in the Air Force, and ammo is really expensive right now, as I bet you (TraumaMamma) know.

I'm not in any clubs, and I have not yet been in a situation where a gun would have been nice to have, but you just never know.

No CCW or anything, but if you aren't a state resident (or on orders in the military) and 21, or don't pass the background check, you can't do it. Like I said though, the checks are usually faster. :)

I can't emphasize enough though, everyone who sells guns at any gun show is a federally licensed dealer. It's not just a bunch of Joe Blows off the street lawn-saling their old weapons.

And in my experience, they are all very professional, and wary of firearms. Many dealers secure their guns to the tables, and/or have locks on them. Some won't even let you touch them unless you're seriously interested.

They don't want anything illegal to happen, because they'll lose their license!

I saw one dude who had his buddy with him, and the dealer wouldn't even sell them a knife because his buddy didn't have an ID, and he couldn't know for sure that he was 18.

I've also heard of dealers refusing to sell people guns just because they didn't like their disposition (seemed nervous, squirrelly, angry, or just plain weird, etc).

Man, I would be really proud of myself if I hit a coyote with a handgun. That would be tough I think...

For sure. Right now, my XD is unloaded, in a case, with a cable lock through the magazine well and ejection port.

I'll be taking a class soon to get my CCL, and I'll learn more than I ever wanted to know about gun safety.

And if I ever have kids, I'll have to get a safe.

And I would never mix alcohol and a gun. I rarely drink as it is.

I know, my girlfriend is too.