Two different views on Concealed Carry, one British, one American ...

[spin]

Why shouldn’t we have the right to pack heat?
Christopher White Wednesday 4 August 2010


It’s almost blasphemy to say this, but it needs to be said: Britain’s gun laws should be massively relaxed.


After a summer in which not one but two armed men caused chaos in northern England, it would have been easy for the Lib-Con coalition to react to the media attention by announcing some new restriction on guns. Derrick Bird, the Cumbrian taxi driver who shot 12 people in a killing spree on 2 June, has long since slipped from the media’s attention. But Monday’s funeral of Raoul Moat, who in July shot three people and then went on the run for a week before shooting himself, was a big story in this week’s papers.

***snip***

Any further tightening of the UK’s already corset-like gun laws is looking increasingly unlikely as the two inquiries into recent shooting events near completion, and a planned debate on the subject was not considered important enough to squeeze in, as promised, before the start of the parliamentary recess. And with good reason: extending what are already amongst the strictest laws in the world would take aim unfairly at 200,000 perfectly peaceable firearm owners, and more than half-a-million shotgun certificate holders, on the basis of one individual snapping perhaps once a decade. Our new prime minister quite correctly said that you can’t legislate for a switch going off in someone’s head.

***snip***

The evidence used to argue this case is invariably specious. The Gun Control Network puts itself in the line of fire with a particularly deceptive example. Its website has a graph claiming to show a strong link between gun ownership and gun deaths across several countries. A clue to why it is misleading can be found in that word ‘deaths’, for it includes suicides as well as murders. To add insult to gunshot wound, it overlooks other types of homicide. Murders specifically from firearms are bound to go up where they are readily available, but may well be nothing more than a substitute for the stabbings, poisonings and bludgeonings that might otherwise have occurred.

***snip***

Even evidence taken solely from the US shows gun bans could be counterproductive as well as illiberal. Take Florida, one of the most gun-totin’ states in the union and a ‘shall issue’ jurisdiction: this means that the granting of permits to carry a concealed weapon is subject only to meeting a set of minimum requirements, including a background check and training on handgun safety. It changed the law on concealed carry in 1987, allowing its citizens to carry a weapon in public as long as it was out of sight, four years before the peak in crime rates that saw American civilians increasingly reaching for guns so that they could demand that evil-doers reach for the skies.

By the time taxi driver Derrick Bird had wreaked havoc upon sleepy English villages, Florida had issued more than 1.8million permits to carry a firearm. In the 23 years since first allowing its residents to pack heat in public, the Sunshine State has revoked only 167 licences on the grounds of gun violence: legally carried weapons are overwhelmingly not used to commit crimes. The same can be said of firearms that remain in the home, or on the firing range or hunting ground: estimates of gun-related crimes in which the weapons involved are legally owned are around one to two per cent.

There’s more. Of the top 70 most crime-ridden US cities, Miami also has one of the lowest per capita rates of rape. This may be simply a coincidence, or it may substantiate a saying popular around those parts: God made man and woman, but Samuel Colt made them equal. Figures from 50 freedom-of-information requests on the incidence of violent crime and numbers of concealed-carry permits for the biggest US cities reveal that, when unemployment rate, population density and public spending are accounted for, the crime rate stays more or less flat with increasing numbers of permits, suggesting a feedback between the two and a small deterrent effect. emphasis added

Christopher White is a London-based writer and journalist.
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/9385/

Let's dump the Second Amendment
August 2, 2010

When the Second Amendment was added to the Constitution back in the 1700s, this country consisted of a few states along the Eastern Seaboard.

All of the country west of that area was heavy forest inhabited by wild animals, savage Indians and numerous bandits. Food was obtained by growing it yourself and hunting for animals for meat.

Them days is gone forever.

The actual purpose of the Second Amendment was to create a state militia or National Guard. This we have done with excellent results.

It's time our legislators woke up to this fact. If no one had guns, no one would need guns.

I have made a study of this situation. Here is one example, out of many, that proves my point:

Sometime back in the 1990s I contacted the Japanese Embassy in Washington because I had heard that Japanese civilians were not permitted to own firearms. As a result, there were about 97 murders with firearms.

That same year, we suffered some 16,700 murders. This situation is true for the several other countries who boast of the same limitation.

What we need to do is void the Second Amendment and start collecting guns from all the residents of this country. No one but the military and peace officers should be permitted to carry them. All those weapons should be melted down and made into railroad track. It is not possible to make this happen in a year to two, but the longest journey begins with but a single step in the right direction.

One of the first acts will be to wipe out the NRA, or as I have always referred to it, "Murder Inc."

Come on, USA, let's join the world of intelligent, life-valuing people and dump that Second Amendment. Now!

BERNARD ASH

Concord
http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/lets-dump-the-second-amendment

[damntexdem]

1. Both stupid.

As to the 'American' view, I understood it to be parody and overkill, to highlight the excesses of gunnuttery. But it is still wrongheaded and counterproductive. There certainly are valid reasons for gun ownership. And in any case, prohibition does not work -- as demonstrated by a prohibition amendment that was repealed less than two decades later.

[cleanhippie]

3. Both Stupid? Really?

The first article uses facts, data and evidence to support its conclusions (not stupid) while the second is nothing more than ignorant, emotional rhetoric (stupid).

[TPaine7]

4. When faced with extreme postitions, the correct course is always to split the difference.

That is how one arrives at the moderate, sensible position.

Example:

1) Some folks think the earth is flat, others that is a globe. The truth is obviously that the earth is a curved plane.
2) Some folks think gays should have full marriage rights, others that they should be denied such rights. The obvious solution is civil unions.
3) Some folks thought all humans were equal, others that blacks were basically animals with no rights. The solution--which our country tragically missed--was a kind of second-class citizenship for blacks.

The sensible, moderate position is always the position that splits the difference; it has nothing to do with logic or facts or morality. NAMBLA and NAMBLA opponents are both stupid extremists; MADD and drunk drivers are both stupid extremists; NAZIs and civil rights activists are both stupid extremists.

[spin]

6. In most arguments on gun control ...

the side that favors RKBA uses facts, data and evidence and the side that doesn't uses emotion.

[SteveM]

9. Uh, the second statement is rather stupid...

Take a look again at the first one, and tell us what is so stupid about it.

BTW, be careful with the use of "gunnuttery" in this forum.

[RKP5637]

2. I think it would just create a huge black market for guns and those wanting them

for violence would still get them. In one area I lived they were called Saturday Night Specials. Illegally manufactured and sold... It would probably work about as well as the drug wars have worked... or the prohibition era worked...

[armueller2001]

5. lol. "If no one had guns, no one would need guns"

Yeah because the elderly, disabled, or weak should have to fight for their lives. "Sorry lady, you don't need a gun, just get raped anyway!"

[KansasVoter]

7. I am sure the UK is jealous of our murder rate. Wait....Huh?

[spin]

8. While it is true that the U.S. ranks highest on murders caused by firearms ...

The United Kingdom leads in many categories of crime.

In murders per capita we rank #24 while the U.K. comes in at #46

For total crimes (per capita) we rank #8 and the U.K is higher at #6

For assault victims we rank #9 and the U.K is #2

For rape victims we rank #13 and the U.K is #6

But I will grant that when looking a murders committed with firearms we are at #4 with 9369 while Great Britain had only 14 and ranked #39. (Not real surprising when you consider that there are more firearms in the hands of American citizens than in any other country on earth.)

data from: http://www.nationmaster.com/cat/cri-crime

Where is all this data from?
NationMaster compiles statistics from such sources as the CIA World Factbook, United Nations, World Health Organization, World Bank, World Resources Institute, UNESCO, UNICEF and OECD.
http://www.nationmaster.com/faq.php

[Francis Marion]

10. A Disgrace to Concord.

"...What we need to do is void the Second Amendment and start collecting guns from all the residents of this country...

BERNARD ASH

Concord"

Where have I heard this before. Ah yes; April 19, 1775. General Gage, the military ruler of Boston, sent a detachment of redcoats to arrest John Hancock and Sam Adams, and to seize the guns and military stores of Middlesex County, Concord in particular.

Gage, the original Massachusetts gun grabber. What other policies appealed to the original New England gun grabbers?
maritime blockade,
martial law,
dissolution of the Massachusetts assembly,
disbanding of Massachusetts militia,
... and of course, Bernard Ash's recycled idea: gun confiscation!

How'd that end up? Well, after Redcoats killed Americans that morning, once in Lexington and once at Concord's North Bridge, the New Englanders simply shot the Redcoat column to pieces all day long, all the way to Charlestown.

Bernard Ash should respect the dead Patriots of Concord and Middlesex county whose blood won the rights he so casually proposes to shitcan.

No thanks; not for His Royal Majesty and certainly not for BA.

[spin]

11. Good point. I imagine you have heard of the Concord Hymn...

The first stanza of "Concord Hymn" is inscribed at the base of The Minute Man statue by Daniel Chester French

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.

The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set to-day a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

Spirit, that made those heroes dare,
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concord_Hymn

[Ter]

12. The British have no say in this

Fuck them, our Founding Fathers overthrew the government and broke free because of guns.

[cleanhippie]

13. I think you may have confused the two articles...

The Brit actually makes the rational argument, the American wants to confiscate all guns......

[Ter]

15. Wow, I'm an idiot I gotta stop assuming

I read quickly and just figured it must be the Brit wanting to confiscate guns. I apologize.

[cleanhippie]

16. No need to apologize. Glad you saw the correction.

[spin]

14. The ironic fact is that some in the U.K. see the value ...

of RKBA, while some in our country fail to see ANY benefit.

The Brit says ...

Overblown fear of crime creates an irrational fear of guns that leads to grotesque injustices. In June, a Scottish grandmother was jailed for five years for failing to hand in a war trophy inherited from her father, who had served in the Royal Navy. It results in silliness such as the British shooting team for the 2012 Olympic Games being denied public money and forced to train in Switzerland.

But most of all it means that, however welcome the decision not to increase restrictions on gun ownership, this is always a one-way fight. It is practically blasphemy to suggest loosening those legal bonds and freeing the hands of responsible citizens to use these tools for legitimate purposes without excessive interference. That the fear of crime was cynically played upon by the Conservatives before the election, with talk of strengthening rights to use force in self-defence, is therefore doubly ironic: it’s rare that there is any need to do defend ourselves, and we are in any case not to be trusted with the best means available.
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/9385

While the American writer argues ...

What we need to do is void the Second Amendment and start collecting guns from all the residents of this country. No one but the military and peace officers should be permitted to carry them. All those weapons should be melted down and made into railroad track. It is not possible to make this happen in a year to two, but the longest journey begins with but a single step in the right direction.
http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/lets-dump-the-second-amendment

[cleanhippie]

17. I know, its insanity!