KCKev wrote:
When you have nothing, then you have nothing to lose. We so called Americans (or most of us)are a bunch of spoiled rotten brats that respect nothing.
That's what the problem is, isn't it? Why arm those with nothing to lose, you actually create a criminal where one did not exists before. Ever think about killing someone with a knife? Or even robbing someone with a knife? It's pretty personal and the chances are that you'd end up the victim of your intended victim. Killing someone with a gun is pretty easy though. There is little personal risk and you don't have to feel the knife cutting through the vital organs or severing arterties of the victim. The bullet does that for you in a very remote and non-personal fashion. Even if somebody is armed, as the criminal you always have the element of surprise which in most cases renders the self defense purpose of having a gun as pretty worthless. In fact, owners of guns are much more likely to kill a friend or family member than they are a criminal. If you were to advertise the fact that you owned a gun, your house would probably be targeted by thieves bent on stealing them rather than avoided due to the risk.
Instead of preventing crime, guns create crime and criminals. The road rage incident is much more likely to turn deadly because of the presence of hot tempers mixed with guns as is a altercation in a bar, a family fight and so forth. A gun might embolden a person to hold up a liquor store where they otherwise would have been content to shoplift or even take on menial work.
In any event, we lose 10,000 people a year to guns...that is the fact I am concerned with. Many of those contributed to their own demise, many did not. As a person who is intent on changing the status quo, I would think this issue would be first and foremost on your list of things to change....afterall, how can one be more surpressed or oppressed than by pre-mature death at the hands of another.
I do not think we are going to arm ourselves out of this problem. Personally, I don't shoot that well so I am against the OK Corral approach to controlling gun crime.
