[quote]clip11 wrote:
[quote]batman730 wrote:
Gun laws obviously don’t prevent bad guys from carrying. They do however provide grounds to arrest/violate parole of said bad guys, which is sometimes useful. For law abiding citizens who wish to carry, I’m not sure that requiring that they have a background check, attend a course in safe handling, and demonstrate basic competency before issuing them a CCW is really all that ridiculous. It’s no different from driving a car, except a gun is intended to harm/kill while a car does so by accident. I realize the current system is flawed, but I really don’t see how the idea having some basic criteria for who carries and how is out of line.
Regarding the weapons charge, sounds reasonable to me. Dude absolutely has the right to defend himself but shouldn’t have been carrying in the first place. Had he not been out trying to diddle little girls he wouldn’t have had a problem anyway, so I guess I don’t feel all that bad for him. [/quote]
The 2nd amendment gives the right to bear and own arms w/o infringement. A few states have constitutional carry Arizona, Alaska, Wyoming, and Vermont. In those states there is no more gun crime or accidents with guns than anywhere else. We can’t go against the constitution in the name of safety. That’s kind of the problem with this whole TSA thing.
Furthermore, CCW laws turn a right into a privilege. A privilege the government can revoke at any time. If im carrying a gun (or any other weapon for that matter) and have to use it in self defense, I or anyone else shouldn’t have to worry about going to prison for having a tool to defend myself.
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Alright, here goes… I’m not going to argue the points of law, only the points of common sense which, for me, supersedes legislation. I am fundamentally in support of an armed citizenry, however I believe that in order for this to be a net benefit to the public good, that citizenry must also be trained. At one time a normal upbringing would have provided this training, passed down from father to son as a sacred trust, along with the grave sense of discipline and responsibility that must attend proper firearms training. There was no need to impose a standard as it was self regulating. That is no longer the case. To vehemently protect someone’s right to carry without making provisions for this training (both the technical skill and the disciplined mindset) does both the person and those around them a disservice.
I grew up with guns and so a deep respect a seriousness when handling them is second nature to me. Watching the casual manner in which people who did not have the benefit of such an upbringing or any subsequent training tend to handle firearms is often disconcerting, to say the least. I’ll wager that the majority of intelligent, responsible trainers would not advocate simply slapping a gun into the hand of an untrained child or adult because it is their right. One way to ensure that everyone receives this training would be to introduce mandatory military service, but I doubt it will catch on.
Regardless of what the 2nd says, the carrying of a weapon has ever been a privilege and a duty as opposed to a right, and one that is earned through discipline, competence and meritorious conduct. The state is perhaps not the best body to regulate this, I agree, but the family has failed to do so, so who else is left?