[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article2886422.ece
Like the rest of the country, I am absolutely shocked by this. The latest is that it was a 13 year-old that did it, unloading his pistol as he rode by on his bike. Words fail me.
[/quote]
Welcome to Detroit!
j/k
(Detroit is famous for this sort of thing and I grew up there.)
[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
You’re allowed to have assault rifles in case of an armed revolt? That is an awesome law! I wanna put in a bid for a Eurofighter so I can have parity with the military when the country goes to pot. Honestly, I had NO idea that was the reason. When was the last armed revolt in the US?
[/quote]
Bloody hell. A law that is little silly and outdated no?
More guns = more problems. It just wouldn’t work here.
[quote]AdamC wrote:
1-packlondoner wrote:
You’re allowed to have assault rifles in case of an armed revolt? That is an awesome law! I wanna put in a bid for a Eurofighter so I can have parity with the military when the country goes to pot. Honestly, I had NO idea that was the reason. When was the last armed revolt in the US?
Bloody hell. A law that is little silly and outdated no?
More guns = more problems. It just wouldn’t work here.
[/quote]
Yeah, I suppose the right to self-preservation is a little silly. At precisely what point in time in history was it outdated? Was it outdated during the civil war? Dictator Lincoln was throwing congressmen in jail for disagreeing with him. He was also suspending habeus corpus. Was the right to bear arms outdated in the 1940’s when King FDR was rounding up Japanese-Americans to be placed in internment camps? How much better would it have been for the jews if they could have organized an armed resistence of the Nazi war machine? Was the right to bear arms outdated in 1993 when ATF stormtroopers were murdering the Branch Davidians in Texas? A man and his rifle is a formidable thing. Unarmed citizens are subject to the whims of the strongman of the day.
We were talking cultural issues earlier and perhaps this is another one. This isn’t a smart assed anti Brit remark but perhaps it truly is cultural. You guys still allow for a queen. You guys are still technically subjects. Even if it is only allowed for tradition, it still speaks of the culture. As an American, I would be embarrassed to still be a subject. I don’t mean it is a jab, just an illustration of how different we are culturally.
mike
[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
Haha,
Well with all the CCTV cameras here it already feels like 1984 sometimes.
[/quote]
Yes, I certainly hope for the best for you guys, but there’s no way I’d live in England. You are rapidly approaching 1984, even in your art.[quote]
You’re allowed to have assault rifles in case of an armed revolt? That is an awesome law! I wanna put in a bid for a Eurofighter so I can have parity with the military when the country goes to pot. Honestly, I had NO idea that was the reason. When was the last armed revolt in the US?
[/quote]
The last technical armed revolt was the civil war, though there have been multiple skirmishes in the past. Some, myself included, believe few we’re but 3-4 decades away from another. We are on the verge of another skirmish in New Hampshire I believe within the next year.
[quote]
In other news - another guns amnesty has just been declared. Hardly going to be solving gun crime overnight, but the last one in 2003 led to 44,000 illegal firearms being handed in. [/quote]
That didn’t take long. I think that in part your gun bans add to the problem. By making them illegal, they become sexier to the nastier elements of society. It’s like when I was a kid and they put the explicit stickers on CD’s so that only adults could buy the CD’s. Instead their sales rocketed because the explicit tag made them cooler than they were by their own merit.
Just for my own curiosity, what are the knife laws in England? Aren’t they illegal to carry as well?
mike
Yep strong anti knife laws here.
Fact is, we both know that if some arsehole wants to obtain a weapon they will. Guns being illegal just means less guns available.
You can’t buy a knife unless you are over 18 (but of course you can steal one from your kitchen). Its a scant protection but at least adds another tiny layer to it.
For the record, I’ve stated this before but our gun laws are not the equivilent of you guys suddenly having your guns taken away. We have simply NEVER had that type of culture over here where it would be acceptable for joe bloggs to own a handgun for ‘defence’ purposes. That is the environment I grew up in and there was never a hint of those sort of gun crime problems when I was a kid.
That’s why I am stressing the cultural influences as being such a factor over the fact that a few sportsmen can now no longer own pistols.
I do think playing with toy guns as a kid played a part in the learning process and subsequent respect for me but in our lovely PC world kids don’t get that opportunity any more and so they become objects of fascination. Then add in all the other factors I have mentioned before and THAT is where it comes from - not legislation.
Sorry to sound ignorant but you think there will be an armed uprising in New Hampshire? WTF??? Why? I have no idea about any of this and am genuinely interested.
I beg to differ. Responsible gun distribution is not going to happen with a “guy who knows a guy”.
Therefore, when a kid wants a mac-10, all he needs to do is get one from a guy who knows a guy.
Turning over the control of distribution of weapons to the black market is not a good idea, which is kinda what the government did there.
[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
Sorry to sound ignorant but you think there will be an armed uprising in New Hampshire? WTF??? Why? I have no idea about any of this and am genuinely interested.[/quote]
An armed uprising is a bit extreme, but I would expect something a little larger than the Ruby Ridge siege against some tax protesters there that are holed up. They claim to have already been shot at by the feds. How much of this is true I couldn’t begin to tell you. Unfortunately, misinformation is rampant in events such as this.
http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070426/REPOSITORY/704260408/1043/NEWS01
I can’t say if I support him or not. I’m still undecided. He comes across a little too extreme for me. Whatever the case may be, the 2nd is in existence for guys like him. Jefferson would be proud.
mike
[quote]SkyzykS wrote:
I beg to differ. Responsible gun distribution is not going to happen with a “guy who knows a guy”.
Therefore, when a kid wants a mac-10, all he needs to do is get one from a guy who knows a guy.
Turning over the control of distribution of weapons to the black market is not a good idea, which is kinda what the government did there.
[/quote]
Erm…
I’m afraid that is utter bollocks. Again, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, the UK has never had that ‘guns legal for defence purposes’ thing you guys have. The gun market has always been illegal here, but the rise in gun crime is not a result of that. We are simply not a ‘gun’ nation. The rise in gun crime stems from so many other factors.
It seems that the change in our laws for gun ownership (about a decade ago?) was reported over there as being something it never was. If you are saying that from out of nowhere we should all be given the right to own handguns (and assault weapons) then that is a wholly different argument and one I would vehemently oppose on the grounds that we simply couldn’t be trusted with them, but it is not a case of us simply having that right restored to us.
Oh and in response to the ealier post about our monarchy - I am not the Queen’s subject! Grr…
She can quite royally go fuck herself for all I care. Oh shit… I think we still have the death penalty for treason… Bugger 
Wow! That guy has some balls. He might well be crazy but I loved that ‘show me the law and I’ll write you a cheque’.
1-packlondoner your people aren’t originally from England are they?. I say that because you keep saying we never had gun ownership over here and I know that is just not so.
Back when my parents were kids(during WW2)everyone in England owned a gun. My parents used to find them just laying in the streets. My dad had a whole collection of discarded guns. There were soldiers bringing them back as war trophies.
Back in the forties and fifties when the country was awash in guns there was very little crime. Despite an econmy that was devestated by the war.
You are just wrong about gun ownership in Britain. There is a book you should read. To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right http://www.amazon.com/Keep-Bear-Arms-Origins-Anglo-American/dp/0674893077
Book Description
Joyce Malcolm illuminates the historical facts underlying the current passionate debate about gun-related violence, the Brady Bill, and the NRA, revealing the original meaning and intentions behind the individual right to “bear arms.” few on either side of the Atlantic realize that this extraordinary, controversial, and least understood liberty was a direct legacy of English law. This book explains how the Englishmen’s hazardous duty evolved into a right, and how it was transferred to America and transformed into the Second Amendment.
Malcolm’s story begins in turbulent seventeenth-century England. She shows why English subjects, led by the governing classes, decided that such a dangerous public freedom as bearing arms was necessary Entangled in the narrative are shifting notions of the connections between individual ownership of weapons and limited government, private weapons and social status, the citizen army and the professional army, and obedience and resistance, as well as ideas about civilian control of the sword and self-defense. The results add to our knowledge of English life, politics, and constitutional development, and present a historical analysis of a controversial Anglo-American legacy, a legacy that resonates loudly in America today.
It is interesting that you say that if the law was changed in England that a blood bath would result. In Michigan seven years ago all the gun control fanatics were saying the same thing, in response to a voter based initiative to change the gun laws to allow people to obtain concealed carry permits. When the law changed none of the dire predictions panned out, the bloodbath they predicted did not occur.
When there is a black market that can readily provide guns to anyone who wants them, restricting legal ownership in a futile effort to keep guns out of the wrong hands makes no sense.
Even without legal ownership, the black market is able to provide them. You have admitted this yourself. Yet despite this you think it is worthwhile to deny citizens the ability to defend themselves as a means of keeping guns out of the hands of criminals. I don’t mean to be a jerk, but I think this tends to support my earlier suggestion that you have been brainwashed by the BBC. Especially when you say that you don’t believe that you can be trusted by the government.
Obviously you don’t realize this but you see problems that need to be dealt with, but come up with solutions that exacerbate the problems. For example young gang bangers deriving a sense of power from owning a gun. Has it ever occured to you that the sense of power that they derive is enhanced by the fact that all of the adults and most of the police in the community are disarmed?
[quote]1-packlondoner wrote:
Haha,
When was the last armed revolt in the US?
[/quote]
Shortly after the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Boston. Just google Boston Massacre and you can read all about it.
While you are at it you might as well look up another similar incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protestors (who were British subjects) in Derry.
Lets also not forget another incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Amristar.
You probably should also read up on when the British police shot an unarmed civilian on the subway two years ago.
BBC NEWS | UK | Police shot Brazilian eight times
Is it just me or does anyone else see a worrying trend with the British army/police and unarmed civilians?
[quote]Sifu wrote:
1-packlondoner wrote:
Haha,
When was the last armed revolt in the US?
Shortly after the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Boston. Just google Boston Massacre and you can read all about it.
While you are at it you might as well look up another similar incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protestors (who were British subjects) in Derry.
Lets also not forget another incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Amristar.
You probably should also read up on when the British police shot an unarmed civilian on the subway two years ago.
BBC NEWS | UK | Police shot Brazilian eight times
Is it just me or does anyone else see a worrying trend with the British army/police and unarmed civilians?[/quote]
I don’t see how the civilians having guns would have helped. The army would have shot them anyway. Maybe it would have just created a bigger blood bath. Who knows?
The reason i said that law is outdated (in America) is simply because, in America I don’t realistically see an armed revolt happening. I don’t mean to offend but the pro-gun people always come across as a bit paranoid (illustrated by your post sifu - i dont see a worrying trend at all).
If the only good reason to allow an assault rifle to be legally owned by a member of the public is because of the possibility of an armed revolt, then I think that the law needs looking at because it is causing more problems than solving them.
[quote]AdamC wrote:
Sifu wrote:
1-packlondoner wrote:
Haha,
When was the last armed revolt in the US?
Shortly after the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Boston. Just google Boston Massacre and you can read all about it.
While you are at it you might as well look up another similar incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protestors (who were British subjects) in Derry.
Lets also not forget another incident where the British army opened fire on a crowd of unarmed protesters (who were British subjects) in Amristar.
You probably should also read up on when the British police shot an unarmed civilian on the subway two years ago.
BBC NEWS | UK | Police shot Brazilian eight times
Is it just me or does anyone else see a worrying trend with the British army/police and unarmed civilians?
I don’t see how the civilians having guns would have helped. The army would have shot them anyway. Maybe it would have just created a bigger blood bath. Who knows?
The reason i said that law is outdated (in America) is simply because, in America I don’t realistically see an armed revolt happening. I don’t mean to offend but the pro-gun people always come across as a bit paranoid (illustrated by your post sifu - i dont see a worrying trend at all).
If the only good reason to allow an assault rifle to be legally owned by a member of the public is because of the possibility of an armed revolt, then I think that the law needs looking at because it is causing more problems than solving them.[/quote]
When people had had enough of being denied their civil rights, guns became very useful in restoring freedom and liberty to the people. Assault rifles aren’t needed just for an armed revolt, they are also needed to remind the government that there are very real limits on its power and that it should not force the issue.
Just because someone is paranoid it doesn’t mean that they don’t have a very good reason.
Go read the declaration of indepedence sometime. The first sentence reads “When in the course of human events”. The founding fathers based their ideas upon careful observation of thousands of years of recorded human history. What they saw was that all governments over time became more and more tyranical.
The people retaining the means to throw of the shackles of tyrany is a timeless idea. Look at what happened to the Chinese who were peacefully excercising their human rights to freedom of assembly and to petition their government for redress of greivances.
What problems are you talking about? Do you even know what has been happening in America? In recent years several states have repealed gun control laws that prevented people from obtaining concealed carry gun liscences. In those states crime rates have gone down.
So you don’t see anything wrong with the British authorities gunning down unarmed civilians? The BBC really did an effective brainwash job on you.
[quote]AdamC wrote:
I don’t see how the civilians having guns would have helped. The army would have shot them anyway. Maybe it would have just created a bigger blood bath. Who knows?
The reason i said that law is outdated (in America) is simply because, in America I don’t realistically see an armed revolt happening. I don’t mean to offend but the pro-gun people always come across as a bit paranoid (illustrated by your post sifu - i dont see a worrying trend at all).
If the only good reason to allow an assault rifle to be legally owned by a member of the public is because of the possibility of an armed revolt, then I think that the law needs looking at because it is causing more problems than solving them.[/quote]
Spoken like a true subject. Perhaps the gov’t would have shot them anyways. But at least the people would have had a fighting chance.
In the event of any future revolt it will likely be the gov’t vs. the gov’t. Some of the military and police will split and be fighting other military and police. The citizens will then have to pick a side. And it sure would be nice if those citizens were armed.
Necessity is the plea of tyrants and slaves alike–William Pitt.
mike
I smell a rap song in the making…
[quote]Sifu wrote:
1-packlondoner your people aren’t originally from England are they?. I say that because you keep saying we never had gun ownership over here and I know that is just not so.
Back when my parents were kids(during WW2)everyone in England owned a gun. My parents used to find them just laying in the streets. My dad had a whole collection of discarded guns. There were soldiers bringing them back as war trophies.
Back in the forties and fifties when the country was awash in guns there was very little crime. Despite an econmy that was devestated by the war.
You are just wrong about gun ownership in Britain. There is a book you should read. To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right http://www.amazon.com/Keep-Bear-Arms-Origins-Anglo-American/dp/0674893077
Book Description
Joyce Malcolm illuminates the historical facts underlying the current passionate debate about gun-related violence, the Brady Bill, and the NRA, revealing the original meaning and intentions behind the individual right to “bear arms.” few on either side of the Atlantic realize that this extraordinary, controversial, and least understood liberty was a direct legacy of English law. This book explains how the Englishmen’s hazardous duty evolved into a right, and how it was transferred to America and transformed into the Second Amendment.
Malcolm’s story begins in turbulent seventeenth-century England. She shows why English subjects, led by the governing classes, decided that such a dangerous public freedom as bearing arms was necessary Entangled in the narrative are shifting notions of the connections between individual ownership of weapons and limited government, private weapons and social status, the citizen army and the professional army, and obedience and resistance, as well as ideas about civilian control of the sword and self-defense. The results add to our knowledge of English life, politics, and constitutional development, and present a historical analysis of a controversial Anglo-American legacy, a legacy that resonates loudly in America today.
It is interesting that you say that if the law was changed in England that a blood bath would result. In Michigan seven years ago all the gun control fanatics were saying the same thing, in response to a voter based initiative to change the gun laws to allow people to obtain concealed carry permits. When the law changed none of the dire predictions panned out, the bloodbath they predicted did not occur.
When there is a black market that can readily provide guns to anyone who wants them, restricting legal ownership in a futile effort to keep guns out of the wrong hands makes no sense.
Even without legal ownership, the black market is able to provide them. You have admitted this yourself. Yet despite this you think it is worthwhile to deny citizens the ability to defend themselves as a means of keeping guns out of the hands of criminals. I don’t mean to be a jerk, but I think this tends to support my earlier suggestion that you have been brainwashed by the BBC. Especially when you say that you don’t believe that you can be trusted by the government.
Obviously you don’t realize this but you see problems that need to be dealt with, but come up with solutions that exacerbate the problems. For example young gang bangers deriving a sense of power from owning a gun. Has it ever occured to you that the sense of power that they derive is enhanced by the fact that all of the adults and most of the police in the community are disarmed?
[/quote]
Erm, whether they owned a gun or not it doesn’t mean they owned it legally.
A registration system gun law - the Firearms Act - was first introduced to Great Britain in 1920, spurred on partly due to fears of a surge in crime that might have resulted from the large number of guns available following World War I.
Fully automatic weapons were almost completely banned from private ownership by the 1937 Firearms Act.
1937 Act also consolidated changes to the 1920 Act that controlled shotguns with barrels shorter than 20". This length was later raised by the 1965 Firearms act to 24".
And yes my folks are British, thank you very much.
The analogy you draw with Michigan has absolutely nothing to do with what would be the case here. The fact of the matter is you obviously have quite a limited knowledge of British culture to even suggest that there are parallels between a gun toting country’s desire to have an additional permit, and a non gun-toting country suddenly having gun ownership rights.
As for your absurd comments about worrying trends with regards our Military and unarmed civilians… Three words spring to mind. ‘Pot’, Kettle’ and ‘Black’.
[quote]Sifu wrote:
So you don’t see anything wrong with the British authorities gunning down unarmed civilians? The BBC really did an effective brainwash job on you.
[/quote]
Really not quite as simplistic as that is it, though. We are in a State of Emergancy and this Brazilian guy is running through the tube station wearing a rucksack? The surveillence teams lost track of a target and mistakenly picked up on him. Tragic. What can ya do?
Ok so they got the wrong person. But imagine if they hadn’t.
Ooh and now, following your rather bizarre logic, you want this Bazilian guy to have been allowed to have a handgun cos that would have helped him? Is that what you’re saying? Really?
1-pack I was raised by English immigrants I have a better handle on English culture than you might think. Also Ilford wasn’t that far from Lewisham so I have a fairly good idea of what your neighborhood was like.
As far as gun toting I think you have a misunderstanding of what a Concealed Carry Weapons permit is. Before CCW permits were introduced Michigan residents had to leave their guns at home. Or in other words gun toting was not legally allowed. So the only difference between Michigan and Britain was in the home and certain businesses like party stores (off liscences for you Brits).
I guess it went over your head but the reason why I pointed out the massacres and the Menezes shooting was because you stated that we the people cannot be trusted with firearms but the government can. I had thought that pointing out that the army having a long history of shooting British civilians would cast some doubt on your assertion.
Then there is the Menezes case, which you obviously did not follow. Right after the shooting Sir Ian Blair the head of the metropolitan police told us that Mr Menezes was wearing a bulky jacket that could have concealed explosives, had vaulted over the turnstyle and dashed onto the train. This is why the police had shot him. When I heard that I could understand why they might have been a bit trigger happy.
But when I heard that some of the CCTV tapes of the station that had been turned over to Scotland yard had mysterioulsy disappeared, I tought allo, allo, allo! What we got 'ere then?
Then we got to hear the true story. That Menezes was not wearing a bulky parka, did not vault over the turnstyle, and did not dash onto the train.
According to documents obtained by ITV News from the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC), which is investigating the shooting, Mr de Menezes was filmed on CCTV cameras entering the station at a normal walking pace and even picking up a free copy of the Metro newspaper. He was wearing a denim jacket.
When the chief of police is going to lie about his men shooting an innocent man in order to protect them, that is a problem. It seriously brings the trustworthiness of the police into question.
The issue here then is not should Mr Menezes have been armed. The issue is that the authorities are not beyond reproach. They never have been, and never will be.
Despite what you think the authorities are not gods, they are only human. Treachery, deceit, corruption of government officials is a part of the human condition that stretches all the way back through recorded human history. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it’s mistakes.
This is why the right to bear arms is as relevant today as it ever was.
There are some things that you are missing about the culture in Britain. One is that not everyone in Britain is originally from Britain. There are large numbers of people in Britain who come from places where gun ownership and use is even more widespread than the US. To the criminally minded amongst those people the British are a bunch of pussies who are complete pushovers.
I remember a few years ago when all the kids were forming Chinese style Triads. So what you are seeing with the gangs over there is not just the importation of American gang culture.
What is going on right now is American gang culture with a British twist. Chief amongst those is unarmed police an unarmed community.
If you came into my neighborhood and told my neighbors that the best way to deal with the Crips and the Bloods was to force all of them to give up their guns so they could not even defend their homes, replace most of the police with police community support officers with no arrest powers and force the remaining eighty three percent of the police to give up their guns, people would ask you if you had lost your mind. Yet that is exactly how Britain is trying to deal with Crips and Bloods wannabe’s.
I hear ya, and I do understand where you are coming from but we are just in a binary opposition about this. It is ingrained in your culture for civilians to own guns. It is not in ours. It is as hard for you to empathise with what that is like for us as it is for me to feel comfortable knowing every Tom, Dick and Harry has a firearm in the US.
I have never once suggested that the authorities are beyond reproach. I said I would prefer that people trusted those trained to protect us rather than got their own firearms. That doesn’t make them infallible. Where I come from they are usually about as welcome as a fart in a spacesuit, but if you lived in this area you would immediately GET why it would be a bad idea for members of the public to own firearms.
[quote]
There are some things that you are missing about the culture in Britain. One is that not everyone in Britain is originally from Britain. There are large numbers of people in Britain who come from places where gun ownership and use is even more widespread than the US. To the criminally minded amongst those people the British are a bunch of pussies who are complete pushovers.[/quote]
Hmm… Well let’s all kowtow to the criminals then and essentially disrupt one of the fundemental aspects of our day to day lives then purely in order to make them think they will have a slightly tougher time of it. You certainly have a way with words, but it is lovely to be enlightened about all the things I am missing about culture in my own country…
Oh, and Ilford might as well be a million miles away from Lewisham for all the similarities. 
[quote]
If you came into my neighborhood and told my neighbors that the best way to deal with the Crips and the Bloods was to force all of them to give up their guns so they could not even defend their homes, replace most of the police with police community support officers with no arrest powers and force the remaining eighty three percent of the police to give up their guns, people would ask you if you had lost your mind.[/quote]
But again, that is because of your pre-existing culture of gun ownership.
Anyway, this could go on forever and it’s a shame the thread has turned into this argument over gun laws, when my reasons for starting it were to discuss the cultural and sociological reasons behind such a tragedy.
And by gun-toting, I meant ‘allowed to have guns at all’.
