Do You Believe in Guns?

[PeacefulWarrior]

A gun is a tool, just like a knife, an axe, a sword, a screw driver.  Of ocurse many guns are designed for one purpose and one purpose only: to kill people.  Others are made for target shooting, clay pigeon shooting, hunting, etc.  When you buy a vehicle, for example, you must decide what you are going to do with it: travel, race, off road, or armed personnel carrier, etc.  Some of us live in places which are dangerous and therefore we feel the need to protect our lives and our interests from those who would willfully try to violate our rights.

I live in California and here we can own handguns, rifles etc as long as we follow certain rules.  I recently purchased a Glock auto-pistol (model 21, .45 ACP) to protect my wife and I.  Here is what I had to do:
1.) Take a course to prove my knowledge of firearms and firearms saftey.
2.)  Wait 10 days while they did my background check (one cannot legally own or purchase a firearm if they have any felon or even misdemeanors that are drug related or assault.

I feel that technology should not be kept from individuals.  Of course we can't have people owning fighter jets and nukes, but a tool to protect in the hands of a law abiding citizen is a positive thing.

Another story:
Intruder killed by homeowner
Man shot him after dialing 911 for police
By Jennifer Dobner and Brady Snyder
dobner@desnews.com and bsnyder@desnews.com.

Deseret News staff writers
Monday, May 22, 2000
Originally published at: http://www.desnews.com
WEST CENTRAL CITY -- A man trying to break into a West Central City home was shot and killed by the male resident of the home.
The intruder, who remained unidentified Monday morning, used his fists to break through the sliding glass door of the residence, in the 200 South block of 1300 West, about 2:40 a.m. and enter the house, Salt Lake Police Lt. Jim Jensen said.
The residents, a 57-year-old man and his 63-year-old wife, who were awakened by their barking dog, spotted the man outside and shouted at him to leave, but he responded by shouting at the couple in Spanish, the couple's daughter said Sunday night. After dialing 911 for police, the husband retrieved a handgun kept in the home and loaded it, police said.
When the intruder entered the home, he followed the woman down a hallway and was confronted by the husband, who fired at least two shots at point-blank range, Jensen said. The intruder was hit by one bullet and pronounced dead at LDS Hospital, Jensen said.
The dead man had been tentatively identified by police Monday morning, but his name was not being released pending that verification, Lt. Jim Hill said. The homeowners told police they did not recognize the man.
Sunday's shooting, which is classified as a homicide, will be screened with the district attorney, who will ultimately decide if the action was self-defense or warrants criminal charges, Hill said.
"From the standpoint of the police, at this point, it looks like a justifiable situation," he said. "The Utah Code is pretty specific."
Police are unsure if the dead man broke into the home in order to rob it or with the intent to harm the residents. It is possible the man was in the wrong place or may have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol, Hill said. The State Medical Examiner's Office was to perform an autopsy on the man's body Monday.
The couple's family, who wish to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, said Sunday they believe their parents would have been killed if not for the gun. "If they were unarmed, they wouldn't be here today. I don't think (the intruder) was there to steal anything, but he was there to hurt them," their daughter said. "Unfortunately, the elderly are the ones that often get victimized. I don't think they should be forced to put bars on their windows, but that's how older people have to live nowadays. We are definitely pro-gun rights. I'm going to go get one tomorrow."

Another Thug Done Gone
by Robert Waters

On November 17, 1998, at 3:00 a.m., Adrian Rodricka Cathey jimmied open the back door of an apartment near the University of North Carolina-Charlotte. He made his way through the house until he reached the bedroom where the co-ed he'd been stalking was asleep. But as Cathey attempted to rape her, the woman reached into a nightstand, retrieved a handgun, and blasted her assailant dead. DNA tests revealed he was the serial rapist who had terrorized the university community for nearly a year.

Police quickly ruled the shooting justified, and a spokesman for UNCC stated the university was glad "the menace is relieved."

Cathey, who had a history of arrests for sexual violence as well as attempted murder, had raped at least four other UNCC co-eds. Because serial rapists are notoriously difficult to capture, they average committing more than twenty rapes before being caught. The co-ed, whose name was never reported, undoubtedly saved not only herself but many others from the humiliation of sexual assault.

While no law enforcement agency keeps records on self-defenses with firearms, numerous studies have determined that large numbers of Americans use guns each year for that purpose. Thirteen surveys conducted between 1976 and 1994 estimated anywhere from 770,000 to 3.6 million self-defense cases each year involving the use of a firearm.

In every investigation into the issue, self-defense with firearms out-numbered deaths with firearms by wide margins.

Other studies have shown that many criminal attacks are never committed because the assailant suspects that an intended victim might be armed. In a 1985 study by the National Institute for Justice, seventy-four percent of felons reported that "one reason burglars avoid houses when people are home is that they fear being shot by the victim."

Yet those who would ban or severely restrict access to firearms will never address the subject of armed self-defense.

When several victims who had successfully defended their own lives with firearms testified at a Congressional hearing in 1997, Rep. Charles Schumer, New York, dismissed their stories as "anecdotes."

When Dr. Gary Kleck, criminologist at Florida State University, published the results of more than twenty years of research indicating two-and-a-half-million self-defenses with firearms each year, anti-gunners claimed his figures were "exaggerated."

When University of Chicago professor Dr. John Lott, Jr. presented the most detailed study ever done on the effects of concealed carry laws in America, his work was dismissed as "flawed." Why? Because his research concluded that when citizens are allowed to carry concealed weapons, it helped reduce violent crime.

Why are the anti-gunners quick to try to deflect the subject of armed self-defense?

Because they know the issue is a loser for them. If Americans knew the number of lives that are saved with guns, they would overwhelmingly reject the arguments of the gun-banners.

But the following questions beg to be answered about the UNCC case, and, by extension, every other case in which a citizen uses a gun in self-defense.

Would the UNCC co-ed who killed the serial rapist have been better off without a firearm?

Would society have benefited had she not had a weapon with which to defend herself?

Should she have waited on the police to come to her aid, as most anti-gunners claim is the proper procedure when threatened?

Would she have been able to defend herself if she'd been required to keep a trigger lock on her gun?

How many future victims were saved by the armed co-ed?

Is self-protection an inalienable, unalterable right, or is it a privilege granted by government?

The last question is what dooms the gun-banners. Millions of citizens believe self-defense is a God-granted right and will not voluntarily give up the best defense available to them. Indeed, they consider it criminal to demand that they do so.

The co-ed at UNCC may have sat through political science seminars in which liberal professors weighed in on the dangers of guns. She may have watched with interest as President Clinton pontificated on his resolve to ultimately ban handguns. Had they known about the evil weapon lurking in the co-ed's drawer, anti-gun feminists on the UNCC campus may have attempted to brainwash her into getting rid of it.

But, in the end, the co-ed made a decision to protect herself.

Will anyone argue that she made the wrong decision? That her personal safety was less important than the politically correct opinion of the day?

That is the question Charles Schumer and President Clinton and the gun-banners refuse to answer.

Why?

Because to answer it would affirm the right and wisdom of Americans to keep and bear arms.
A Massacre We Didn't Hear About
by J. Neil Schulman
Author, Stopping Power: Why 70 Million Americans Own Guns & Self Control Not Gun Control
Webmaster, The World Wide Web Gun Defense Clock
The following article appeared in the January 1, 1992 Los Angeles Times.
This is the story you saw on the evening news:
At lunch hour on Wednesday, Oct. 16, George Jo Hennard of Belton, Tex. smashed his Ford pickup through the plate glass doors of Luby's cafeteria in Killeen, injuring some patrons immediately. While other patrons rushed toward the truck believing the driver was a heart-attack victim, Hennard calmly climbed out of his pickup, took out two 9-millimeter semi-automatic pistols, and started shooting people in the cafeteria's serving line.
 
Hennard continued shooting for 10 minutes, reloading five times. One of his pistols jammed repeatedly, causing him to discard it. There would have been plenty of opportunity for any of the cafeteria's customers or employees to return fire. None did because none of them were armed. Texas law forbids private citizens from carrying firearms out of their home or business. Luby's employee's manual forbids employees from carrying firearms.
 
Police officers were inside Luby's within minutes. But before they were able to corner Hennard in the cafeteria's restroom, where he turned his gun fatally on himself, Hennard had killed 15 women and 8 men, wounded 19 and caused at least five more to be injured attempting to flee.
 
The Killeen massacre was ready-made excitement for the media: a madman with a gun, lots of gruesome pictures. CBS News devoted an entire "48 Hours" Dan Rather report to it. Sarah Brady of Handgun Control Inc. capitalized on it in a nationally published column to call Congress cowardly for voting down more stringent gun laws the next day.
Now here's a story you probably didn't see:
Late at night on Tuesday, December 17, two men armed with recently-stolen pistols herded 20 customers and employees of a Shoney's restaurant in Anniston, Ala., into the walk-in refrigerator, and locked it. Continuing to hold the manager at gunpoint, the men began robbing the restaurant.
 
Then one of the robbers found a customer who had hidden under a table and pulled a gun on him. The customer, Thomas Glenn Terry, legally armed with a .45 semi-automatic pistol, fired five shots into that robber's chest and abdomen, killing him instantly.
The other robber, who was holding the manager at gunpoint, opened fire on Terry and grazed him. Terry returned fire, hitting the second robber several times and wounding him critically.
 
The robbery attempt was over. The Shoney's customers and employees were freed. No one else was hurt.
Because Terry was armed, and used his gun to stop two armed robbers who had taken a restaurant full of people hostage, there was no drawn-out crisis, no massacre, no victims' families for Dan Rather to interview. Consequently, the story hasn't received much coverage.
 
Among those who rely on national news media for their view of the country, the bloody image of Luby's Cafeteria is available to lend the unchallenged impression that guns in private hands serve only to kill innocent people. The picture of 20 hostages walking out of Shoney's refrigerator unharmed, because a private citizen was armed that night, is not.
 
As we celebrate the bicentennial of the Bill of Rights, it's worth noting that the Framers wrote the Second Amendment so the people's defense would be in our own hands, and we wouldn't have to rely on a "standing army" or "select militia" for our security. Though no police departments existed in America then, there's no historical doubt that the Framers had considered centralized public defense, and considered it not merely ineffective, but itself dangerous to public safety. Recent vigilante-type police attacks, such as the beating of Rodney King, lend credence.
 
Yet, it's fashionable to relegate constitutional protections to the dustbin of history. Judges sworn to defend the Constitution ignore its clear provisions, as do legislators. Virtually every major organ of society - both political parties, the media, the American Bar Assn., the ACLU - urges them to do so.
 
Today's "consensus reality" asserts that private firearms play no effective role in the civic defense, and that firearms must be restricted to reduce crime. The media repeat these assertions as a catechism, and treat those who challenge them as heretics.
Yet, we have before us an experiment showing us alternative outcomes. In one case, we have a restaurant full of unarmed people who rely on the police to save them. The result is 23 innocent lives lost, and an equivalent number wounded. In the second case, we have one armed citizen on the scene and not one innocent life lost.
How can the choice our society needs to make be any clearer?
 
It's time to rid ourselves of the misbegotten idea that public safety can be achieved by unilateral disarmament of the honest citizen, and realize that the price of public safety is, like liberty, eternal vigilance. We can tire ourselves in futile debates on how to keep guns out of the wrong hands. Or we can decide that innocent lives deserve better than to be cut short, if only we, as a society, will take upon ourselves the civic responsibility of defending our fellow citizens, as Thomas Glenn Terry did in Alabama.
My account of Thomas Glenn Terry's actions in this article was based on an Alabama newspaper account. I later interviewed Terry for a weekly radio program I was hosting and discovered that the account was mistaken on several points.
Postal clerk Terry was finishing a late-night dinner with his wife when the robbers came in and took over the restaurant. Terry hid his .45 Colt Government Model under his sweater, not seeing any immediate opportunity to use it. Terry's wife was captured with the other customers and herded off to the cooler, where one of the robbers proceeded to collect wallets and jewelry.
Terry did not hide under a table; he had separated himself from the other customers and managed to get to a back door in the Shoney's to see if it was open so he could escape and call the police. The door was chained shut. At that point one of the robbers discovered him and when the robber drew on him, Terry pulled his own handgun from under his sweater and returned fire, incapacitating this robber, who ultimately survived. The second robber heard the exchange of gunfire and also drew on Terry; it was the gun fight between Terry and this second robber which resulted in the robber running out to the parking lot, where he died from his wounds. It was at this point that Terry told the store manager to phone the police, informing them that an armed customer was present; Terry then proceeded to the cooler and released his wife and the other customers.
Both robbers whom Terry shot had previous armed robberies on their record, and one had murdered a motel clerk just a few days earlier. A third robber escaped as soon as Terry exchanged gunfire with the first robber.
The only national media outlet to cover this incident as news, just two months after the Killeen restaurant massacre, was the Christian Science Monitor. -JNS
Store clerk handed over cash, was shot
Mother of 2 was talking on phone to husband when wounded
By Patricia Lynch Kimbro and Sarah Webster
HERALD-LEADER STAFF WRITERS
Joseph Hewitt was talking to his wife, Carolee, on the telephone at her second job Wednesday night when a masked gunman robbed and shot her. The senselessness of the crime shocked police because the 23-year-old mother of two gave the robber the money he demanded.
``That's what I can't understand. Why did he have to shoot her after she'd given him the money?'' a stricken Hewitt sobbed yesterday at the University of Kentucky Hospital where his wife was clinging to life. She was in critical condition last night.
Police already had beefed up patrols in the area around the Pantry Fresh Market at 460 Squires Road in southeastern Fayette County because of the number of robberies there in the last few weeks.
It was the second time she'd been robbed. The first was six months ago when she was working as a cashier at a Dairy Mart on Walton Avenue near downtown.
``She knows how to act during a robbery,'' her husband said.
Hewitt, a parts specialist at Kentucky Motors, was at home with the couple's two young daughters, Ashley, 5, and Caithlyn, 3, when his wife was shot at 8:20 p.m.
``We were talking on the phone. I was telling her that I was going Christmas shopping to buy her presents when the man came into the store,'' he recalled.
Hewitt heard his wife scream, then the gunshot.
``In the background I could hear someone say it was a firecracker, then they hung up the phone,'' he said.
Hewitt jumped in his truck and rushed to the store. He arrived before the ambulance and talked to his wife.
``She said she had been shot in the stomach and that she was scared,'' he said.
By noon yesterday, his wife had received 23 units of blood and was being rushed back into surgery.
``They're having a hard time getting her liver to stop bleeding,'' Hewitt explained.
His mother-in-law, Carol Hufstedler, is keeping the children, who don't know their mother has been shot.
``I haven't told them, and I'm not going to tell them that she was shot. I need to tell them she's sick though. I guess I'll do that today,'' Hewitt said as he brushed away tears. ``All I want now is to bring her home for Christmas.''
Carolee's boss, Steve Ramsey said he's as bewildered as Hewitt.
``God only knows why he shot her ... He got what he wanted. Why? He must have been on drugs or something,'' Ramsey said.
Ramsey was in the store's back room and his wife was in the restroom during the robbery. ``I haven't slept a wink thinking about this ... worrying about Carolee,'' Ramsey said.
Late yesterday she was listed in critical condition as Lexington police urged anyone with information to come forward.


fides quaerens intellectum

[James S]

Hmm...your arguments to allow handguns to be carried as a form of self defence seem as emotional as those who argue against it.

Will legalising the general use or ownership of handguns for self defence help the situation, or increase the problem by an order of magnitude?

My wife has attended a few self defence courses that are designed to teach every-day people how to use every-day items to easily disable an attacker. She is now capable of deflecting a knife attack. But even the multi- black belted, several times national martial arts tournament winning instructor wouldn't be able to stop a bullet.

So now the pro-gun lobbyists get there way, and my wife is allowed to carry a hand gun for self defence. A would be attacker knows that this is the norm, so he is now armed with a gun instead of a knife. If he has that gun trained on her when he approaches there is no way that she could possibly get her gun out of her bag without him firing first.

So where does it end?


James S

- You don't choose the belief, the belief chooses you!

[koshka]

Many of us posted information about this debate at PeacefulWarrior's "THIS MAKES ME SAD" thread.  I posted a website about Virgin, Utah and Kennesaw, Georgia there: two communities who enacted local ordinances REQUIRING citizens to have guns in each household.  Virgin's URL is www.virginutah.com .  If you go to search "Kennesaw, Georgia," you'll encounter PAGES of business sites; the issue of "the ordinance' is just not a big deal.  (Try www.boogieonline.com/revolution/firearms .)  The fact that since 1983 when the ordinance was inacted as a counter to an OPPOSITE ordinance in Indiana, I believe (no one in Kennesaw enforces the "requirement" to own arms, by the way), businesses and real estate buyers from nearby Atlanta have swelled the census and economic base of Kennesaw steadily, and the violent crime rate is still very nearly nil.

TLC aired a program about martial arts the other night.  One commentator observed that most people who practice these arts will die peacefully in their beds without ever having to call upon their fighting facilities once.  Why develope them, therefore?  Many reasons.  One departed master had stated that he studies fighting in order that he would not have to fight.

"Empty handed" martial arts was developed because peasants in feudal societies were forbidden ownership of swords, specifically.  Every sword-carrying samurai in feudal Japan had the "007" licence to kill.  If a peasant even smelled as if they would be defiant, the head was severed by one of those heavy, razor sharp wonders of bladecraft.  The peasants had to become transcendently effective with bare hands, feet, or with farm tools -- not that they could be realistically effective against the consummate swordsman -- yet it kept alive the sovereign, God-given communion of immortal spirit.

The Warsaw Ghetto Rebellion made use of the few revolvers they found hidden away.  Hitler, as EVERY mass-murdering dictator, was BIG on gun confiscation.  It's just a fact.  

I think that it is a reasonable proposition to assert that the personal firearm IS the modern equivalent of the sword.  William Holden once appeared on the Johnny Carson TV talk show.  He related that he had travelled all over Africa without a gun, but walking the streets of New York, he carried.  No one could actually SEE the pistol, but the subtle message of carriage and presence "carried" to would-be predators.

This is a language of personal commitment.  The "longshoreman philosopher" Eric Hoffer commented about the politically correct and stylish message that one should be "non-violent."  To the ordinaryJoe, such "correct" behavior is an abstraction, and INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM COWARDICE.  Cowardice is contagious: it has a way of spreading like a clammy fog.

We're talking HERE about a collective moral effect.  There are those who fear the recoil of a magnum firearm, for example.  It is reported that hefty, male 45-year-olds are dismayed by the report of, say, a .44 magnum; while little 6-year-old girls are delighted with the target shooting experience.

Gandhi said that he would shoot a rapist attacking a woman, for example.  Jesus said (Matthew 10): "I did not come to bring peace but a sword."  Jesus said (Luke 22): "If you do not have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one."

OF COURSE the "double-edged sword" is PROVERBIAL.  DUALITY.  MORAL CHOICE -- not really a piece of technology such as a sword or gun -- but in the soul.  It cannot be deferred to another.  

Thoreau speculated in WALDEN about the derivation of the English word "community."  Did it come from Latin "co - munitio" (forgive spelling), meaning armed together, etc.; or did it derive from "communion," shared meal...sharing in common...?  Duality.

Gun manufacturers are under attack by government to record and track all purchasers -- to install remote control disabling technology, etc.  Lawful gun dealers are being hounded out of business.  THIS is the trend.  Why?

[Frank]

Please continue, Dan, the debate is getting very interesting.

Yours,
Frank

[Mobius]

Hi all

The funny thing is we all want the same thing, freedom to live our lives without the fear of someone trying to take it from us & since this is an OBE forum, you would think we could use our minds to solve these issues & not physical force to support it's duration on this planet. On the astral, you might as well shoot yourself for all the good it will do & if you get into any of the situations that are talked about in PPSD, it is your thoughts that will free you, not any weapons. I suspect that is why most religous leaders are peaceful, thinking people & not the yosemite sam types (although in the past & to a lesser extent the present, they got others to do the killings e.g the crusades, the jewish extermination).

This is all stuff off the top of my head, that came naturally after having a good think, not just regurgitated propaganda straight off the NRA web site & forums. You must stop for a moment & listen to another side of the story besides ones that support your lifestyle & beliefs e.g guns & christianity.

I could jump on any anti-gun site & reprint all their arguements one by one, as well as "selected" news stories that favour my position, but that is a circular debate & has as many people on opposite sides as religion does, it could go on indefinately. As James said, when it comes down to that moment, it's a matter of who is the quickest draw, kind of like going back to the wild west over there in U.S. The thing is, America has come a long way since then & hopefully they will join the rest of the civilised world in keeping guns out of the hands of civilians. You can't expect overnight results in the gun figures of countries that have banned them, of course there is going to be some residual delay.

America is the largest manufacturer & exporter of weapons in the world, ahead of Russia & China, so you wouldn't expect that people over there would see it any other way than what big buisness wants it to be seen. I'm sure every major shareholder in these arms factories wouldn't want guns to be banned & see their investments disappear, nor would the many gun shop owners, shooting ranges, brass & steel suppliers, & gunpowder producers. All these people stand to lose a lot & "buy" their support by the NRA, who in turn feed the people with paranoic views of society.

The issue of self defence is a valid one, but not one that needs to be sorted out with guns. Man if they had stun guns over here & legaly accesable, I'd probably buy one, I could see it now : *Knock, knock, on the door*, Me : "who is it?" * hears a muffled reply on the other side of the door & sounds dubious* Me quickly opens the door with the latest "shockmaster 2002 model" & *ZZZZZZZZZZZZZttttttt*, *ZZZZZtt*, *ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZtt* & then the Mrs :" Oh, you bastard, you KNEW it was AMWAY, you just played dumb", then Me: "Shhhh, just help me drag them across the road, at least I didn't kill them". DISCLAIMER (that was a joke, although it could be fun).

I don't support either the NRA or the Anti-gunners, you guys are amongst a few I have discussed this with, & since the debate has had examples from the NRA thrown in, I think it's only fair that the other side gets heard. So read if you dare.
http://www.redshift.com/~jamesm2/2nda2.htm

Good journeys guys, talk soon.

Mobius

[James S]

Mobius, you brought up a good point that I had been thinking about.
Why does self defence weaponry have to be lethal? Yes this issue can be equated to a modern day feudal system. But does that mean we haven't learned anything since then?

If American laws can accommodate the use of handguns for self defence, would it not be in even more accommodating to allow people to carry Tasers or similar non lethal but known disabling projectile devices? Or is Mobius right? Are the gun manufacturers controlling the argument?

Dan, as part of your argument you cited the case of the uni student who rid the area of an unwanted element by shooting a rapist. All well and good. He won't do that again. But what of the student? As Mobius pointed out earlier people who are trained to kill suffer deep emotional scarring from it. Was there anything in the story of the student about how she felt afterwards? Was there any mention that she might now need extensive councelling and therapy to overcome the fact that she had just killed someone.

Ok, so someone breaks into your home. You have a family to defend - powerful motivation. You grab your newly aquired gun, confront the invader, he makes a motion, its dark and you're so wired you mightn't be able to  properly determine if its a gesture of surrender or aggression, after all, you haven't had years of combat training and experience needed to accurately make such decisions in an instant. You react and shoot him. The training you have had taught you to aim for the largest area of the target, a good chance the shot will be fatal. As a peace loving christian you now have to deal with the concequences, probably for the rest of your life, along with the constant question of was he attacking? Did I really need to shoot him?

This is the kind of anguish Police officers have to go through in the sad event that they feel it neccessary to shoot someone in the line of duty. I bet they've had a lot more training to deal with the situation than the average homeowner, and it can often break them spiritually and psychologically.

How much more beneficial would a non-lethal approach be? Maybe this is what people, concerned with their own defence, should be campaining for. Some form of readily available non-lethal, yet totally incapacitating device such as stun guns.

James S

- You don't choose the belief, the belief chooses you!

[Mobius]

Hi every.... body

Another strange anomaly of our debate here is, my Mrs thought that I would be an avid gun supporter, as per my fascination with guns, action movies, war movies etc. & my general attitude about people that are vermin, such as murderers, rapists, & generally agressive people. But thinking more on it, I feel it is my desire to see good triumph over evil & see people PAY for their insane robbery of others lives.

It's just that when I hear an arguement/point of view about something, I know now, that there is ALWAYS another side to the story, which is often obscured by whoever has the most money.

What I said about the things our cops & soldiers go through comes from personal experiences with them & it's sad that they feel they are guilty for killing someone, but they do & re-live it daily. If we don't sort out our world problems soon, we might not even get the chance to use ANY weapons, let alone talk about why we had them in the first place.

I guess by weight of numbers so far, & how they stack up, you could say that the pro-gunners have won this debate, so I will be quiet now, besides, I've had a life changing day today & need some time to recover & think about the future.

Hey James, is that what they are called "Tasers" = stun guns? Sounds like a lot of fun to me either way,then we could get Yasser & Ariel (spelling?) in a room together & they can blast away! Ariels fat would go into spasms & Yassers eyes would bulge even more,& maybe the Zap will make them realize "An eye for an eye..................leaves everybody blind!"

May your journeys through life, be good ones.

Mobius

[clandestino]

Hi everyone, Mobius, I hope that the pro-gunners haven't won the debate just yet !!! From where I stand, they are currently losing it - there are not many governments that permit their citizens to carry handguns.

Koshka - "This is a language of personal commitment. The "longshoreman philosopher" Eric Hoffer commented about the politically correct and stylish message that one should be "non-violent." To the ordinaryJoe, such "correct" behavior is an abstraction, and INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM COWARDICE. Cowardice is contagious: it has a way of spreading like a clammy fog."

Hmmmm...I've never heard of Eric Hoffer myself ; but from the content of the commentary he makes, I reckon "philosopher" is a bit generous !!!

Politically correct and stylish to be non - violent ? Perhaps Mr. Hoffer should start thinking about real life issues, e.g. oppression in South east Asia, Africa and Latin America where violence makes hundreds of thousands of lives unhappy.

Cowardice is contagious ? well, you can call me a coward any time.

[koshka]

Just for the record, I regard the NRA as a shill organization -- an extra hynotic for sleepy gun rights pedestrians.  The "powerful" NRA lobby has presided over the sure and incremental erosion of gun rights over the decades.  

I am deeply ashamed about many of the things "my" government and its corporate masters have and ARE doing in this density.  As one example, American manufacturers sell thousands (and the government GIVES thousands) of electric "cattle prod" devices to regimes they KNOW employ these things for torture.  This and other regimes (I'd call them all that instead of gracing them with the title of "governments").  The UK regime is no exception.  

Drop back about 800 years.  England's regime then did a very risky and patently bone-headed thing, in the opinion of the other crime bosses on the Continent: England PERMITTED and PROMOTED the unrestricted implement manufacture, and manditory weekly practice of longbow shooting.  This gave English armies quite a military advantage.  Of course it fostered along with it a Robin Hood and Magna Carta-like vision of individual liberty.  England evolved differently than the other nations, with a uniquely robust passion for justice, trial by jury, codified common law, a Constituion of rights, etc.  Now the UK seems to be well on its way toward rolling up this ancient and brilliant legacy.  BUT SO IS THE U.S. --  Australia and Canada too!

Clandestino --

"...There are not many governments that permit their citizens to carry handguns."

It would perhaps be more correct to use the term "subjects" instead of "citizens" in the sense of that sentence -- "THEIR citizens."  Ah but if the "government" is a democracy....  It has been said that a pure democracy is two wolves and a sheep VOTING on what's for dinner.  The Nazis held pretty honest plebiscites that yielded 99.5% majorities for...the Nazis.  A constutional republic has safeguards built in for the express protection of the minority and individual.          

The late Eric Hoffer (author of THE TRUE BELIEVER and THE ORDEAL OF CHANGE -- used as texts in universities everywhere) did not mean that folks who advocate (and perhaps practice) non-violence are indeed cowards.  His point was that the unsophisticated person in the street could hardly tell the PRACTICAL difference between the two, operationally.  The campaigns by Mohandas Gandhi and Martin (Michael) L. King were organized and informed by military principles.  When Gandhi's supporters urged him to tell Indians NOT to carry arms for the British Empire during WWII, he rejected the idea passionately, saying that it would be a dirty, unfair trick.  In fact, Gandhi admitted with some humor that he was Britain's biggest recruiting sergeant.

Gandhi was for "non-cooperation" -- a distinction from "non-violence."  He would choose, as a sovereign soul, NOT to help his oppressors by playing any of their games -- including the use of violence.

The WTO protestors were non-violent, but provocateurs were inserted into the scenes -- recorded by TV.  Police made mass arrests (not the provacateurs, however).  This is how it's done now in the Brave New World.

I RESPECT GANDHI'S WAY.  HE WAS GRATEFUL THAT THE SITUATION OF THE JEWS UNDER THE NAZIS WAS NOT HIS DIRECT RESPONSBILITY.  What Gandhi asked of his warriors was a far harder and more comprhensive means of campaigning than armed revolt.  Britain ate India like an elephant, one piece at a time.  Gandhi had to unite it to take it back.  For this he had to resurrect an over-arching vision and morality.  In fact, he selected the ancient Buddhist king Asoka as a model.

I understand and accept that even righteous shootings ARE scarring and traumatic.  The military knows this too.  It was estimated that the infantry in WWII contained only about 30% of personnel willing to actually kill another human being.  Programs of training and conditioning were designed to increase that score.  Drugs, etc. were tried in Vietnam.  By the 90's virtual video trainers and such were introduced (yes, exactly the same programs as in the violent role-playing games).  Kill capable soldiers were now well over 80% in the ranks.  

Police are recruiting cadets from the ranks of young military vets.  These people have never been adult civilians.  Basic training impresses upon them that civilians are all soft, degenerate, criminal -- disposable.  U. S. courts have decreed that police shooters are above the laws applicable to ordinary citizens (subjects).  American and non-American military are being used in police activities in the U. S.  In 1994, criminal law majors were asked whether they would indeed fire on American civilians if ordered.  70% responded negatively.  Promotions and high advancements have only been given to the 30% who answered "yes."

Americans are seeing the extinction of their republic.  The fact that the elephant-eaters who are doing this REALLY don't like the Second Ammendment in particular is enough for me to acquire a weapon or two while I still can.  Global feudalism is the goal of these guys.  "Useless eaters" is the term they have for us.        

[PeacefulWarrior]

I see every side of the issue.  The following is a book review that I feel uncovers a lot of information that is very convincing regarding the anti-gun sentiment:

BOOK REVIEWS

The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies?
by David B. Kopel Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1992. Pp.470 pages. ISBN 0-87975-756-6.

"When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns,"
"God made man and Colt made him equal,"
"They'll get my gun when they pry my cold dead fingers from around it."

The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy communicates a message similar to these bumper-sticker slogans, but does so by way of a painstakingly researched, thoroughly indexed and evenly argued piece of scholarship. This reviewer ordered The Samurai... from a catalog, not having seen it on bookstore shelves. The book is an important work in light of the recently passed crime bill and the seeming change in American public attitudes regarding gun control legislation. It is a shame that the calibre of careful explanation and advocacy shown in The Samurai... is not more broadly available to the reading public. As it stands, argumentation in the American gun debate tends to fall into sloganeering and the misleading presentation of aggregate crime statistics. Some persons who favor the adoption of stricter gun control measures will consider this book a danger. Others might have their opinions changed by it. None will take it as a sloppy or deceptive effort. The introduction alone--two pages of text supported by four pages of references--provides the student of the gun control debate, whatever his or her leanings on the subject, with an invaluable set of citations. If you have a friend who likes to read and likes to debate gun control, this book is the right gift.

Author David Kopel begins by stating a piece of reasoning adopted by virtually every advocate for strong American gun control laws.

The United States is the only modern democracy that does not impose strict gun controls.
The United States suffers a much higher crime rate than those democracies that impose strict gun controls.
Therefore, adopting strict gun controls like other democracies would lower the American crime rate.

Kopel describes selected foreign gun cultures (Japan, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Switzerland) and analyzes aspects of America's gun history to describe how the American experience compares to that of other nations. Throughout his comparisons, Kopel argues against the suitability and practicability of gun control legislation in the United States. A few representative passages from the international comparisons--

"America experienced falling crime and homicide rates in the 1940s, 1950s, and early 1980s, all periods during which per capita gun ownership, especially handgun ownership, rose."
..."Japan's gun control does play an important role in low Japanese crime rate, but not because of some simple relation between numbers of guns and levels of crime. Japan's gun control is one inseparable part of a vast mosaic of social control. Gun control underscores the pervasive cultural theme that the individual is subordinate to society and to the government. The same theme is reflected in the absence of protection against searches and prosecutions. The Japanese police are the most powerful on earth, partly because of the lack of legal restraints and particularly because of their social authority."

..."America's non-gun crime rate is over seventy times Japan's, an indication that something more significant than gun policy is involved in the differing crime rates between our two nations."

"British gun controls are strict, and British violent crime rates are low. Many Americans assume that these two facts are causally linked; however, there is little evidence that they are. British gun control has historically been concerned with political subversion, not with ordinary crime. Britain's years of lowest gun crime came during an era when gun controls were nonexistent. Increasingly stringent gun controls have been followed by increasing gun crime (although again there is no strong proof of a causal effect)."

"Regarding handguns, the contrast between America and Canada is profound. The RCMP estimated the pre-1978 pool of illegal handguns in Canada to be about 50,000; even if this figure is too low by a factor of ten, it is minuscule compared with America's illegal gun stock. In New York City alone, conservative estimates put the number of illegal handguns at over 700,000."


Beyond the comparisons between the histories of gun control legislation and their effectiveness in other countries, the author considers the American gun culture in depth. Subjects touched on include, among many others--the militia, race and ethnic relations, migration, urbanization, and the differences between gun-control and broader social controls. Kopel's style is not emotionless. The reader leaves the book with no doubt about how the author feels about the issue.

"America places more faith in its citizens than do other countries. The first words of America's national existence, the Declaration of Independence, assert a natural right to overthrow a tyrant by force. In the rest of the world the armed masses symbolize lawlessness; in America the armed masses are the law."

Kopel concludes, after arguing exhaustively that the gun control strategies of other countries are culturally unsuitable in America (and that they anyway could not be implemented given the vast numbers of guns and deep feeling about ownership) that America's only reasonable gun strategy is the promotion of responsible gun ownership.

To the readers of Low Intensity and Law Enforcement, David Kopel's The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy poses a broader question. The topic of gun control is rarely considered in the international military context. The issue is not debated in professional military literature as a military or foreign policy concern. It should be. Success in pacification, in restoring order to places where a military intervention and occupation has been deemed necessary, may at times depend not on securing weapons from the citizens, but on empowering citizens to achieve security by managing the use of weapons themselves. The Samurai provides a discussion of foreign experiences with gun control that suggests important answers about the relationship of gun control measures to overall social control and to internal violence. The most impressive possibility is that responsible gun ownership may be a more important ingredient than the restriction of private gun ownership in achieving social peace or the promotion of liberty.
Reviewed by LTC Geoffrey Demarest
US Army


fides quaerens intellectum

[PeacefulWarrior]

170 Million Reasons to Own a Gun



The following table is from page 7 of the September 11th, 1999 issue of The Economist magazine, and is titled A League of Evil. It shows that in the twentieth century, 170 Million citizens were executed by their own governments, presumably for political reasons, while only 37 Million were killed in warfare. The next time you hear someone say that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution refers only to the National Guard or that guns should be possessed only for ''sporting purposes'', remember this chart. The citizens of these countries did not have a Second Amendment.
 
 Now my response to my last post:

Civilians killed by governments in the 20th century, excluding war.
Deaths Excluding War Millions  Era
Soviet Union 62 1917-1991
China (Communist) 35 1949-Present
Germany 21 1933-45
China (Kuomintang)) 10 1928-49
Japan 6 1936-45
 
Total deaths directly caused by governments Excluding War 170  

 
 
 Deaths in War Millions
International 30
Civil 7
 
Total deaths in War 37

 
 
 Sources: ''Statistics of Democide'' by Rudy J. Rummel
(With The Economist additions for recent wars)



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A little humor to lighten the debate...
The Aesthetics of the Gun Debate
Marcus J. Ranum
 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What is Going On?
For the last 14 years, since I first became a gun owner, I have been watching the Great Gun Debate play itself out in the American mind. I have a lot of mixed feelings on the topic since I:

- Only shoot targets
- Don't hunt
- Like serious military weaponry
- Used to live in a high crime area
- Now live in a low crime area
- Have been held at gunpoint 3 times in my life

I am libertarian enough to believe that people should be allowed to make their own mistakes, and conservative enough to believe that they should suffer for them. In short, politically, I am a radical righto-leftist.

Americans refuse to make up their minds about broad issues of national policy. Is it a fundamental human right, for example, to poison oneself with cigarette smoke? If so, then it's absurd that people are suing the tobacco industry. If not, then ban tobacco outright. Our lawmakers, since they are basically cowards who serve at the whim of an ignorant people manipulated by television, attempt to back their way into a position that makes sense by a process of stepwise legislation. It's OK to poison your lungs if you're over 18, and you pay a lot of taxes on the poison. It's NOT OK to consume LSD but it's legal to drink so much alcohol you fry every neuron in your head, etc, etc, ad nauseam.


A .22 plinking pistol made to look "bad".  
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Guns are used to kill lots of people in the US every year. They're much more convenient for killing than, say, a knife or a crowbar, and marginally more convenient than, say, a Buick or a gasoline bomb. Clearly, say the lawmakers,
GUNS ARE A PROBLEM and therefore SOMETHING MUST BE DONE ABOUT IT
Conveniently, they neglect the fact that the gun would not do anything if it was just left to sit there. I've had guns sitting unused in my safe for years and they haven't fired at anyone or even loaded themselves.

Anyhow, the lawmakers are on the job, and they're going to solve the problem of those nasty guns. Only, it turns out to be a bit difficult.

There happen to be folks like myself who own guns who appear to be completely harmless. There's also the matter of the second amendment to the constitution, but if the American People get concerned enough about a problem they'll waive their rights by not complaining. There are target shooters, hunters, security guards, instructors, all kinds of people who happen to have legitimate reasons to own guns. So what's left for a lawmaker to do?

Try to identify types of guns that are often associated with criminal activity and ban them.
How brilliant. This is like saying "Volvos are in a lot more accidents than other cars. Therefore let's ban Volvos." It's not the car – it's that people who are lame drivers with no taste in cars prefer Volvos. But, because there's a correlation, if Volvos are banned, there's a dip in accidents while Volvo owners all buy Econowagons, and there are no more Volvo-related incidents.

When a heinous crime is committed with a particular "type" of gun, there's usually a big hue and cry about that type of gun. Some guy uses an AK-47 to open fire on a crowd of schoolkids and there's a big push to ban AK-type "assault rifles" (rather than nutcases or even schoolkids). Now, 7 years later, a couple schoolkids open fire on more schoolkids, using a .30-30 lever action hunting rifle and a bolt action rifle, and USA Today actually ran an article asking whether there should be restrictions on hunting weapons. During my lifetime, I can recall so far bans on "mail order guns," "assault rifles," "Saturday night specials," "assault pistols," and – what's next? Just about everything except "gun toting crazies."

Defining a "gun toting crazy" is a hard problem. Do they wear camouflage? Do they drool on their shirts? Do they mumble? Or twitch? Senator Strom Thurmond does all of the above except wear camouflage – is he a "gun toting crazy?" Defining attributes of people is hard because you can't get into their heads, yet. So you define the properties of "bad guns" so you can separate the "bad guns" from the "legitimate sporting purposes" guns.

Dayglo-green Uzi is better than icky, nasty black Uzi. For some reason, Bill Clinton's bodyguards still prefer the black kind...  
How stupid can you get?

Bad Guns are Mean Looking Guns

Slowly, I realized that the lawmakers are legislating not safety, but aesthetics. There's not really anything that makes a FAL an "assault rifle" while a FAL with a thumbhole stock and no flash suppressor is a "sporter." My Uzi is no more dangerous than anything else that puts a 9mm bullet downrange. It's just a mean looking gun, is all. I think, truly, that the logic here is that Bad People are attracted to Bad-butt-Looking Guns. Nobody has articulated it yet, but that seems to be what's going on.



Sportster AR15 in people-friendly lime-green color scheme.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Clinton administration recently banned importation of the H&K PSG-1 rifle. I don't know if you feel safer knowing that. In case you're not up on these things, the PSG-1 is a semiautomatic sniper rifle; the finest in the world. We certainly don't want crazies running around with things like that! Oh, yeah, they cost $10,000. When was the last time you heard of someone sticking up a 7-11 with a $10,000 sniper rifle? Or, for that matter, with a FAL? My FAL weighs about 14lbs and is about 4 feet long. I suppose I could fit it under my trench coat to look inconspicuous. Yeah, right.

My Uzi'd fit under my trench coat. So would a Ruger 10-22 – a very sedate semiautomatic plinking rifle – with its stock sawed off and a pistol grip installed. Oh, of course, if someone did that, they'd be breaking the law. No self-respecting crazy that shoots up schoolyards is going to have the guts to saw down a rifle stock. So we're safe.

What do the PSG-1 and the FAL have in common? They are both Bad-butt-Looking Guns. Incidentally, those sedate Ruger 10-22s have spawned a huge aftermarket for stocks and bipods and cheap curb feeler crap that makes them look kind of like Bad-butt-Looking Guns if you squint.



Peptobismol-pink AK clone.  
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good Guns are Pretty Guns

So, I have a simple proposal that would have as much effect on gun crime as a lot of the restrictions that have been passed in the last 13 years:
Make All Guns Pink.

That's right: Pink.

We know that psycho schoolkid killers think they are tough. They'd never use a pink gun. Have you ever heard of a psycho crazy using a pink weapon before? Absurd. Therefore, if all the guns are pink, we'll be safe. Safety orange and lime green will be OK, too, I suspect. No self-respecting psycho crazy'd be seen dead with a lime green .44 magnum.

Oh, and make it illegal to repaint them.

Do you feel safe, now?



fides quaerens intellectum

[koshka]

PeacefulWarrior --

I'll check-out the book, but the author's information on the UK may be a bit out of date.  It's most direct to just do an internet search on "britain violent crime" and "australia violent crime."  PLENTY there!

[seekenergyaz]

Yes, guns exist.

[seekenergyaz]

But seriously,while I don't want a gun, I have no grudges against law-abiding people who do.

Gun laws, it seems to me, mainly restrict people who obey the law.  Those who murder other people are problably not very interested in obeying the law, IMHO.

[koshka]

Britain is an island.  The reasoning seems to be that if only firearms could be forbidden within its shores, like fish in a barrel, the supply could be choked out in time.  It seems to me to be the attitude Tolkien described for the "Shire" Hobbits in his tales of Middle Earth.  Adventuring was anti-social to proper Hobbits, but Bilbo equipped himself with "Sting," an Elven dagger, when he found himself on the road.  The Hobbits at home had no conception of the evils and dangers in the larger world bearing down upon them.  It was left then to a small group of Hobbits -- to one, really.  "Show me a hero and I'll show you a tragedy."

[Rob]

James touched upon what I think is the main point of why guns are illigal in Britain - if they were not criminals would start carrying them on the off chance that they have to shoot first, people would buy them because they would feel the need to have the same level of protection as what could be used against you. Then the police start carrying guns and before you know it the world is a much more dangerous place. But as is often the case, sudden large scale changes in the law don't do good things, at least in the short term ie what was said about australia, with firearms crimes up many times. So really there isn't a lot you can do except slowly change for the better, which is my opinion = less guns. Guns are much more dangerous than knives.

peace!

ps magick can be used to shield without harming, for anyone who is worried about being killed.

[Adrian]

Greetings everyone!

First of all let me state my position on this - all guns should be illegal - they are designed for one purpose only ultimately - to maim or destroy life.

Now before some think I am anti-gun fanatic, let me say that while I lived in the UK  - which I did for most of my life, I legally owned a range of handguns, mostly of the magnum and semi-auto variety, and used to manufacture my own ammo - of course I was fully licensed for this. To me it was just a sport - target and combat shooting, and one which I enjoyed.  I was never happy with the fact that they are weapons of destruction, but only saw the sporting side.

Then came that absolutely horrific incident in Dunblane, Scotland, when a person who legally owned handguns burst into the local Primary School and shot dead 16 infants and their teacher and wounded many others. I was absolutely distraught about that tragedy - especially having three young sons myself around the same age as those innocent victims of the tragedy.

It also made me realise what guns can really do, and I gave up my guns in disgust, and will never own hold them again. Handguns are still legal here in the Isle of Man - we are not the UK.

But the fact is this - guns are absolutely symbols and weapons of destruction, designed to kill - target shooting does not alter that fact, and killing any life does not justify it either. Self-defense is not an excuse to hold guns, because you simply become a part of the problem - everyone buys guns for "self-defence", and inevitably they get used for aggression.

With the greatest respect to our American friends who quote their constitution - only one law prevails - the Universal one -always.

With kind regards,

Adrian.

[koshka]

Adrian --
Very well put.  I think you have stated your position very clearly.
From your narrative, the event in Scotland was massively pivotal to your present stance on the private ownership of firearms.  Similarly, folks in Australia have been stunned and traumatized by the shooting incident there.  Our son was not shot.  He died of an accident, but we live every day with that trauma of his passing.  That trauma.

Americans' great trauma in recent history (which one?!) is pivotal around the assassination of Jack Kennedy.  The Warren Commission Report is like wallpaper for most Americans' packaging in memory of that event.  It is not believed -- but there it is.

Privately, the actor/director Mel Gibson is said to have much to say about these subjects.  His father, I've heard, is quite a researcher in these "crazy" areas of study.  Mel made a chilling thriller "Conspiracy Theory" discussing the creation of assassins via MK (mind control) Ultra.  Before dismissing the concept, consider the "bible" of hypnotherapy edited by Dr. D. Corydon Hammond, HANDBOOK OF HYPNOTIC SUGGESTIONS AND METAPHORS (available on Amazon for just $70).  And another "bible" by Dr. Daniel Brown (Harvard Medical School), Alan Scheflin (professor of law, Santa Clara University), with Dr. Hammond: MEMORY, TRAUMA TREATMENT, AND THE LAW ($100).  

These shooters in Scotland and Australia FIT a profile for mind-controlled actors.  What would be the aim?  Instilling a revulsion for all guns -- supporting total gun forfeiture (except for the authorities' guns always).  Given that this Scottish event could have such a stunning effect on so many in the Isles, what's so crazy about taking another look -- as many Americans did and do after the shooting of a president?

I respect those such as Englishman David Icke who understand about the Tavistock and CIA MK operations, but nevertheless conscientiously REJECT gun ownership for themselves.  I respect those who would work to change others' consciousness about the "error" of gun ownership, such as the Quakers.  But I think that it is conscientiously in error to COMPELL decent, private citizens to allow their guns to be siezed without their consent.  

What if the "government" itself has fostered crimes against children and civilians?  What dereliction of all judgment would it be to have that government be the sole possessor of real weapons?

Criminals are not macho arms race types.  They are opportunists, clever or stupid.  They are guilty and therefore vulnerable to being intimidated away from the righteous stance.  (This was the concept behind duels and trials by combat at one time.)

[Mobius]

Hi all

Hey Clandestino & James, some unexpected additions to our side of the debate, Inguma & Adrian, looks like we are not on our own here.

I find it interesting that the majority of those in favour of guns are from the U.S.A, why IS that?

As far as I am concerned, guns & their method of firing projectiles is a relic from our past. There are many other weapons that have been invented in the past few years that have superceded guns. Why? Because THEY have thought about the possibility of civil war or any war & don't wish to be out classed, & were thinking about it a long time ago & don't wish to be drawn into a fire fight where the numbers against them are always bigger, & why risk one single billionaires life? when you can convince others to keep buying the old product "guns" & get people like soldiers to do your dirty work for you? I'm not against soldiers, for reasons I'll keep to myself,but they are people too.

As I stated before, MOST civilian murders are by people you allready know,& the means of killing doesn't matter, knife,poison,guns,bombs etc etc Doesn't it make more sense to talk out major problems you have with someone, way before it gets to the stage of them hating you,coveting what you have or disagreeing with your point of view.

Daniel, what sort of situation do you see yourself in where you need an UZI & not a hand gun? Planning on having a lot of people against you? And needing a device to kill as many & as quick as possible? Why not examine the problems up front & way before ever needing a gun? Whether they be the way YOU see things, or the way OTHERS see things, it's better to have loss of pride & ego than loss of life.

Even if it does get to the stage that violence is anticipated, why put yourself in a position where you will shoot & get shot back at? There are many more ways to skin a cat, as most of us know, the pen & paper can be just as efficient in destroying someones life & defences can be employed that don't require you getting up close & personal.

Take care all & promote peace,tolerance & understanding.

Good journeys everyone

Mobius

[James S]

Just a couple of little thoughts (HAH! Me? LITTLE thoughts? no way, you'll get another epic!)here to throw into the ring -

For those who look to the Bible for inspiration and treaching - when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemene with the diciples, as the soldiers came to arrest him, Peter drew his sword IN DEFENCE and chopped of the ear of one of the soldiers. Jesus rebuked peter and told him HE WHO LIVES BY THE SWORD WILL DIE BY THE SWORD. Think he was trying to make a point here?

For those who call themselves christians and wish to live by the example set by Jesus....now think about this....ask yourself,  if Jesus were on the earth in this age would he want to own a gun?

   For those who claim to trust they're lives to God - here's a little story I was told by a Friend who came back from England in 1986 where she was working with the christian outreach organisation calle YWAM (Youth With A Mission). I wish I could remember her name, but she vanished oversees to Mexico again shortly after coming home.

   She picked up some work in an eastside London pub to help pay her way while in the UK. She finished work late at night and had to walk a few blocks to get to the house she was staying at.
   One night on her way home she was confronted by a gang who didn't do anything at first, but made a few suggestive comments and let her go. The following night they got a little worse and crowded around her and started touching her and gettinga bit more aggressive. She got away, but was scared stiff of what would happen the next night.
   The next day she got together with some of her friends from YWAM and prayed - asking Jesus for protection. That night she left the pub, but as a precaution one of her male friends from YWAM walked with her from the pub to home. As expected the gang were in their usual spot, but this time, they just parted and let she and her friend through without even a murmer,
   The following night, feeling a little bolstered by the night before she walked home on her own. Once more this gang just parted and let her through , but with just the odd "Hello", "Nice night". The night after that, she stopped in the middle of them and asked then why all of a sudden they were being nice to her and getting out of her way? Was it because of her friend that walked her home a couple of nights ago. One of the gang said to her "Him, nah. It's those two bleedin' seven foot brutes been walking behind you".
She had no idea.

Nobody, I mean NOBODY is ever willing to mess with angels when they walk on the earth in this form. They have no equal when in the physical world. I believe this as I too have experienced the presence of such beings. This is but one of many accounts I have herd or witnessed where someone has been protected from harm by asking the heavens for help.

Here's the thing - If you believe in God's protection and if you believe in the power of prayer, then believe that such protection is available to you without having to resort to guns or any other weapons to defend yourselves.

Even if you do not necessarily believe in God & Jesus as presented by the christian doctorines, we have seen how the angels or higher entities are eager to help us achieve spiritual growth if we ask them. It is not unreasonable to assume they are also just as capable of protecting us and our families if we ask.

Guns are a dangerous, fallable, human invention that as Adrian so clearly put it, are designed for one thing only - to kill.
If you truly seek a spiritual path, walk that path. Don't seek to own a device who'se sole design is to kill. True they are just a device, but their intended purpose is one of destruction, which puts them at odds with the spiritual goals that you seek.

James S

- You don't choose the belief, the belief chooses you!

[Mobius]

Hehe, James good to see an epic, it seems the norm in this debate, wouldn't expect anything less.

I believe that also about our guides/angels/astral friends helping us out, being there for us & if religous people believe they have God on their side & believe they have faith in their God, why need weapons then?, wouldn't God or his minions be looking after you? Or have an ultimate plan for you?

In Islam/christianity & Judaism, probably all the others too, there is the most memorable of the commandments "Thou shalt not kill", so is there an exception to this rule somewhere? a hidden sub-clause? Or is it only a suggestion & not a commandment? Because it seems like it's been interpreted as "thou shalt not kill, except people that don't see your point of view or religous interpretation".

I wonder if Jesus, Muhhamed, Buddha & Confucius practiced sword fighting as their past time, that is, honing their skills to be a better taker of life? Or did they go out amongst the poor weak & diseased to try to help them & try to spread the word of compassion & understanding?

Thanks for your "couple of little thoughts", James, you triggered another line of thought I had on this subject.

Good journeys all

Mobiushttp://www.astralpulse.com/forums/images/icon_Smile.gif" border=0>

[Rob]

On the "thou shalt not kill" thing, I don't think it is EVER necessary to kill someone, you can always incapacitate them first. Can't think of any exceptions. Things about weapons and especially guns, they makes it much easier to kill, even if you didn't mean to do so. eg you slash someones arm with a knife, you're probably not going to miss and put in through their head, unlike with a gun.

[Mobius]

Hi Inguma

That "thou shalt not kill" commandment on it's own has been debated even more than our gun topic here & seems to be open to various translations.

I've got a book here at home by the Hare Krishna's who as you might know are vegetarians. There is a couple of chapters worth of debates just on the interpretations of what "Thou shalt not kill" actually means. The debates were between the head Hare Krishna & some spokesperson/ priests representing Christianity. As you can imagine the Hare Krishna interpretation was "thou shalt not kill any living thing", but they somehow didn't regard plants as "living" things. The priests said the way they saw it, it meant only humans as in biblical times they were omnivores & all ate meat.

The commandements were copied off a succesful doctrine by the Egyptians "the book of the dead", which preceded the bible by many a year. Since then it seems to have been interpreted as a token jesture, something you say you believe in & live by, so others will think that makes you "good". History shows that not many leaders of our churches or various faiths don't actually live by ANY of their commandments.

I wanted to talk more on this, but have to go to work now, until later.

Good journeys

Mobius

[koshka]

For what it is worth, I'll give BIG points to the anti-gunners for continuing the "debate" ( though I'm partial to the "discussion" format myself -- Yosemite Sam yahoo that I guess I am).  Eventually the anti-gunners realize that they needn't expend the energy and time arguing for guns being banned from the possession of ordinary citizens/subjects.  Caesar's on your side.  Caesar dearly wishes to see all the slaves and plebs and conquered barbarians utterly without accountable weapons.  All you need do is relax on the couch with a drink and the waltz will soon be at an end: Caesar alone will have the guns -- not even the criminals will be armed because all of their ilk will have been hired into the ranks, carrying arms for the Emperor.  "ALL firearms should be illegal," writes Adrian.  Do you really believe that Caesar's will ever cast away Caesar's arms?

An internet Bible concordance such as www.bible gateway.com still renders that Commandment as "Thou shalt not murder."

I had not purchased any firearms for my immediate family until the last few years because my ancestors and family seniors had collected a stock of interesting guns -- heirlooms.  I do not hunt.  All those generations of Presbyterian folks managed to avoid the bloody accidents and traumatic incidents that have been called inevitable by some posts here.  What motivated me to invest in weapons was, strangely, founded from out of the same sort of recent events which switched Adrian and others FROM guns.  I mentioned professors D. C. Hammond, Daniel Brown, and A. W. Scheflin before.  They are peer review level experts in areas of mind control.  I mentioned the hefty price of their texts to suggest how ordinarily inaccessible an overview of this issue is for lay citizens.  Less expensive sources include TRANCEformation of AMERICA by Cathy O'Brien, also Arizona Wilder, Cisco Wheeler, Srewart Swerdlow, and Brice Taylor (all searchable on the net).

These are Dr. Hammond's words in an interview --

<< What they basically do is they get a child and they start this, in basic forms, it appears, by about two and a half after the child's already dissociative.  They'll make him dissociative not only through abuse, like sexual abuse, but also things like putting a mousetrap on their fingers and teaching the parents, "You do not go in until the child stops crying.  "Only then do you remove it."  They start in rudimentary forms at about two and a half and kick into high gear, it appears, at around six or six and a half, continue through adolescence with periodic reinforcements in adulthood.  Basically in the programing the child will be put in a gurney.  They will have an IV in one hand or arm.  They'll be strapped down, typically naked.  There'll be wires attached to their head to monitor electroencephalograph patterns.  They will see a pulsing light, most often described as red, occasionally white or blue.  They'll be given, most commonly I believe, Demerol.  Sometimes it'll be other drugs as well depending on the kind of programing.  They have it, I think, down to a science where they've learned you give so much every twenty-five minutes until the programming is done.  They then will describe a pain on one ear, their right ear generally, where it appears a needle has been placed, and they hear weird , disorienting sounds in that ear while they see phtic stimulation to drive the brain into a pattern with a pulsing light at a certain frequency not unlike the goggles that are now available through Sharper Image and some of those kinds of stores.  Then, after a suitable period when they're in a certain brainwave state, they will begin programming, programming oriented to SELF-DESTRUCTION and DEBASEMENT [my emphasis] of the person.  In a patient at this point in time about eight years old who has gone through a great deal early programming taking place on a military installation.  That's not uncommon. >>

If the killers at Columbine High School (staging their massacre at the same time as the NRA's convention in nearby Denver, if you'll remember), and the shooters in Scotland and Australia were NOT mind control subjects, the effects they caused could hardly have been bested by such deeply evil mechanisms.

Look up "sword" at biblegateway and observe that angels wield them most often.  The symbology for Jesus' use of "sword" in the NEW TESTAMENT seems to go to " WORD OF GOD."  It divides and decides.  Peter is often described as behind the curve in understanding the Holy importance of events.  When Jesus was transformed in the meeting with Moses and Elisha, Peter begged to build shelters for all these beloved ones, believing that they would dwell forever in this blissfull company.  He did not realize that These were conferring about the Act to come back in the dark density.  Jesus HAD evidently instructed his band to carry swords in the manner of the Patriarchs.  The event at the garden, however, was an IMMENSE MOMENT.  Jesus was becoming the WORD manifest.  An earthly sword was inappropriate at such time.  The sword could not be allowed to dominate over the WORD/SWORD cleaving and defining Destiny at that Holy Moment.  

Bible Gateway reveals how many instances the scriptures say: "FEAR NOT."  Do not be afraid.

What recently convicted me as a believing Christian turned on the words of a simple, believing man: "God has always worked through people and things."  Not abstractions.  Not "movements."  Ordinary, individual souls.  "Caesar" is a "god" -- a corrupting abstaction as such.  Julius, on the other hand, could have been an OK bloke, potentially.  Julius ("Groucho") Marks.

Visit Idaho County, Idaho sometime.  You can see folks pushing baskets at supermarkets with pistols on their hips -- very mellow vibes.        

   

[Anonymous]

Personally, if I could own a weapon for self-defense it would be either an air taser or a sword. I can't believe one is allowed to carry around a gun but not a sword in the U.S. I agree that people kill people, not guns.  But a gun has a much larger range than a sword. Why are swords illegal and guns legal? That's like outlawing alcohol, which kills far more people and in far more ways than marajuana. Swords, if used correctly, could be a very effective weapon, and I think they should be allowed because as a martial artist, I believe that I have the right to defend myself however is necessary. Guns may be more effective than swords, but I think swords have a more spiritual side to them. The sword is a symbol for many things. What is the gun a symbol for?

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