Subject:
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Re: Swift was Right! (He just named the wrong people...)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Thu, 19 Jun 2003 10:22:22 GMT
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Viewed:
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2659 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Richard Marchetti wrote:
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Okay, fine -- if your point is that the purpose of a gun is to kill or
destroy a thing, then that’s basically an undisputed fact.
That it is the only utility of the gun is a separate matter.
I still think that the gun’s power for destruction is the very reason some
people are eating venison burritos while still others are quietly sitting
peacefully in their homes. If you want to dispute that, go right ahead. But
you will have to prove to me that a revolution can be fought without
expressly lethal arms.
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Again with the “Jeffersonian” speak. I would point out that Jefferson livd 200+
years ago and some of the ideas from that time may not be valid today. Again
(and again and again) it is your national forces that’s protecting your ‘freedom
and liberty’, not that gun locked up in a closet in your house. Your gun in
your house isn’t protecting anyone. It’s giving you a false sense of security
and giving a real object for those that steal to take, put on the black market,
and, in the end, kill one of your fellow citizens.
“Revolution fought without espressley leathal arms”? Well, in tin-pot dictator
type countries, sure, arm the citizens and have your revolution. But we’re not
talking about some backward country where the military is corrupt (and usually
has approximately the same armament as the citizens). We’re talking about us
here. And in the in the 21st century, there are those countries that have risen
to the point where guns in the hands of the citizen is becoming irrelevant and
not needed. It’s the ‘evolution’ of society, and there will be those that cling
to antiquated ideas because they don’t want to, or cannot see that times have
changed. The power of law, the power of education, the ‘power of the people’
are now far superior to the power of the gun.
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Powell is over there talking about tank technologies, refusing to address the
issue of whether a tank encased person must at some point leave the tank and
therefore be susceptible to a bullet to the head. Maybe the tank can be
attacked en masse, forcibly opened, and the persons inside killed. And, I am
not myself opposed to the private ownership of some pretty nasty stuff --
stuff that could pierce armor. The invincible military and armaments argument
is Powell’s straw man. I don’t buy it for one second. And sure, Canada is a
great place and all -- but if things were to go south on y’all, I hope Powell
would be the first to recall my warning about not giving up the guns. Gun use
is a right and a duty -- talk to the Swiss.
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For the regulated armed forces. For the ‘properly trained’. For those that are
duty sworn to ‘protect and defend’. None of which encompasses your gun in your
house. If things start ‘going south’ on any of us, again it’s not the gun in
your house, it’s the USS Abraham Lincoln, and the Nimtz, and whatever satellites
are circling the globe that are going to get our heinies out of trouble.
You talk of rights, you talk of duty, what of your duty to your fellow citizen
who just got shot by a gun stolen from your house? What happened to his rights?
Your duty is to your country and your fellow citizen. Keeping a gun in your
house does not help either.
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As Mike has pointed out, where people have lost their right to arms they can
be herded like sheep and put on the train to the death camps. How can such
people resist their armed masters?
And because you don’t have an answer to that, for me that ends the
conversation -- I’m not saying that I won’t participate in it,I am just
saying that I have never heard the point properly disputed.
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And when it was found that the most poerful person in the *world* was facing
charges, he stepped down from office without one shot being fired, without one
gun to be seen. The power of law is what he followed. He didn’t need someone
weilding a gun to make him walk out of that office.
So Nazi Germany before and during WW2 is not the same as, say, the US today.
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And as I have said before, I am living in the U.S. -- where things are
looking pretty weird to me right now. Not terrible, but weird (with special
emphasis).
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On this at least we agree. Be vigilant. Be pro-active. Be wary. There are
tools at your disposal in todays age which are far superior to the gun. Start
using them.
Your gun in your house will not take the weirdness out of your country. Ever.
I was going to sign off with that but just that line gots me ta thinkin’ (which
is never a good thing...) That’s one of the bigger problems right there--“Oh I
have my gun, so if things ‘go south’ I can rise up and join ‘the ol revolution’.
Failing to consider that by participating in and helping society ‘before it goes
south’ is a much better, and ‘more civilized’ option. Then again, I forget who
I’m talking with--the US has always been more ‘reactive’ than ‘proactive’--like
the kid, who, when sleighted, just lashes out at any convenient target.
Which always brings me back to the other idea--when you grow up, we’ll be here,
waiting for you.
Dave K
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