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[Nikov]

I think amending the Bill of Rights is, dare I say, blasphemous. I mean, those are rights given to you by the government. If one of those rights gets taken away, and remember this right is the one that protects all the others, a government might decide other rights should get taken away. Maybe a civil war breaks out and so oh, quartering troops in your home is now acceptable. Or they decide the legal system would be much easier without the fifth amendment. I believe the founders laid down the first ten amendments with the intention they be pretty well set in stone because they amount to rights given to the populace, and changing what citizens are free to do is the first step to controlling them. I also feel the country still consists of the same sort of human beings and can still be governed with the same sort of laws. Do you think there were never accidental shootings with muzzleloaders? Do you think people never crashed wagons into eachother and quarrel while armed?

And with regards to 'what sort of weapons should still be protected', a bunch of hillbillies won the Battle of King's Mountain armed with the equivelant of AK clones and hunting rifles, and there are numerous Class 3 liscensed people gleefully owning MP40 submachine guns and MG42's. I actually saw one, tripod and everything, at a reinactment a few months back. Also keep in mind there are no laws regarding ownership of a tank. In the event of shit hitting fans, I intend on rushing down to Knox and converting its beautiful little Panzer III into a flamethrower tank. (trollish statement removed -tt)

Oh. If you can't tell, Chicago's gun ban getting struck down fills me with glee. I predict a drop in crime rate over ten years.

[andrea]

wow, you people on the other side of the Atlantic really distrust the government...

I thought that people governing my country were bad, but not even them would start civil wars or stomp on every human right ever invented at the first chance. ( passing laws to avoid trials, they do. trying to stop media, they do. But it still seem way better than what some americans fear will happen as soon as any kind of public authority tries to regulate anything).

[Strife26]

American political culture is individual rights-based, adversarial, and VERY paranoid about giving up rights.

It's important to remember that when talking politics. 

[andrea]

yes, I know. Crazy, crazy America.

I will probably move there after university, so I suppose it is good to learn the culture early.

keep the debate going: did Chicago break constitution? is said document outdated? should people be allowed to own tanks and artillery? can a militia defeat a proper modern army?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

All areas of the government are open to alteration. This includes the Bill of Rights, but if you will recall, amending any area of The Constitution requres a heavy majority of the states in support of said alteration.

As for Fort Knox: They would shoot you on site if shit hit the fan. Sneaking into Fort Knox with the intention of stealing a tank is a plan doomed to failure. Convincing them to let you in and add a flamethrower system to an old tank is even more doomed to faliure.

Why would you threaten peaceful protestors? Is the Freedom of Assembly not a right given to all citizens of the USA by the very Bill of Rights you hold so dear? By threating liberal protest groups with mass burning if they don't shut up, are you not also violating their Freedom of Speech?

[andrea]

by the way, if it is true that I am actually allowed to own a tank, I am totally going to buy one if I ever go living in USA and have enough money.

not a modern one however, I would probably go for old WWII

[Leafsnail]

I suppose the slippery slope fallacy is pretty big over there too...

[Astramancer]

The slippery slope is incredibly popular over here in America.  I think it's because we are extremely adversarial in our political debates, and it's just so much easier to make the other side look like demons if you take things to it's logical (and extreme) conclusion.  There's a reason why quite a few companies that strongly suggest that their employees don't talk politics (or religion) in the workplace.

I think the largest reason why gun bans always strike us americans the wrong way is that america has a very, very strong history of gun ownership.  Compared to some other countries (*coughENGLANDcough*), america is very young, and founded after guns became useful.  We won our own country partially due to the fact that we had guns (let's just ignore the whole "let's fight until england gets bored" aspect, okay?).  We expanded our country thanks, in large part, to guns.  We defended our land and livelihoods with guns.  For a fairly significant portion of our history, in large parts of our country, the Law was something for the cities, and a large percentage of the population didn't live in cities, so the Law became "I have a gun!".

Are times different now than from the founding of the country?  Yeah.
Are time different now than our periods of expansion?  Yeah.
Is america's relationship with guns older than the country itself?  Well... yeah.

----------------

If you were forming a militia to protect your city, wouldn't you want people who already knew how to shoot?  Since a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state, I think that the founding fathers would agree that the right to keep and bear arms probably shouldn't be infringed...

[ChairmanPoo]

Perhaps we should reinstate the old tradition of electing the poorest man in the kingdom as leader for a year, then at the end of the year, we ritually kill him.

F*** YEAH!!! LETS DO THAT!

[Strife26]

yes, I know. Crazy, crazy America.

I will probably move there after university, so I suppose it is good to learn the culture early.

keep the debate going: did Chicago break constitution? is said document outdated? should people be allowed to own tanks and artillery? can a militia defeat a proper modern army?

No, at the time of the laws origin, the 2nd was not incorporated.
No, there's an amendment process for a reason.
Sure, no one can really afford enough to compete with a nation state, especially when one considers the lack of suppliers. Obviously, some kind of regulation would be nice.
Depends on the definition of "defeat"

[sneakey pete]

Dunno why you don't just make it compulsary to join the national gard to own a weapon. Its a win win win. NG gets more people, people get actual training on how to use their guns, and a third win which for some reason i can't remember 30 seconds after thinking of it. But i'm sure it was good.

[Phmcw]

This whole discussion is insane.
What happen when you ban gun? Well, less death by gunwound. How do I know? Because it's ALWAYS LIKE THAT.
Doesn't anyone of the guns activist realise that there are countries where guns are forbidden?
That here police respect us and don't storm our homes in the middle of the night for a few gramms of pot?
Are you mathematically challenged? Can't you watch data's from other countries?
And Nikov, your statement about burning non violent liberals is downright outragous, and completly crossed the line.

[Kogan Loloklam]

Dunno why you don't just make it compulsary to join the national gard to own a weapon. Its a win win win. NG gets more people, people get actual training on how to use their guns, and a third win which for some reason i can't remember 30 seconds after thinking of it. But i'm sure it was good.

That sounds like it works in theory, but believe me when I say an all-volunteer force is better. Sure it's nice if everyone has military training, but the lack of military training also creates a tactical flexibility that cannot be beat. For example, colonials adopted the Native American hit-and-run while the trained British stood in lines firing. If we were to fight like they fought, our revolution wouldn't have been successful. We would have fought like that if everyone was trained. Now look at how wars are fought. See, untrained can be of great benefit, especially if backed up by trained groups.

...Or they decide the legal system would be much easier without the fifth amendment...

And instead it will be replaced by a system of agreeing to things you didn't commit at the threat of being tossed in jail for a much longer time if you don't agree... wait a second...

This whole discussion is insane.
What happen when you ban gun? Well, less death by gunwound. How do I know? Because it's ALWAYS LIKE THAT.
Doesn't anyone of the guns activist realise that there are countries where guns are forbidden?
That here police respect us and don't storm our homes in the middle of the night for a few gramms of pot?
Are you mathematically challenged? Can't you watch data's from other countries?
And Nikov, your statement about burning non violent liberals is downright outragous, and completly crossed the line.

Hear that Finland! Take that! You are WRONG!
Now let's amend that pesky 1st out of there so Phmcw can execute Nikov by firing squad!

[Heron TSG]

This whole discussion is insane.
What happen when you ban gun? Well, less death by gunwound.

All gun bans do is make owning a gun illegal. If a criminal is committing a crime, why not also bring a gun anyway?

[Jreengus]

This whole discussion is insane.
What happen when you ban gun? Well, less death by gunwound.

All gun bans do is make owning a gun illegal. If a criminal is committing a crime, why not also bring a gun anyway?

I find this argument annoying, I'm not saying I agree with Phmcw's post but if you're going to commit a crime why not rape someone anyway? After all you're already committing a crime, it's not like adding extra crimes on top will in anyway be worse for you if you're caught. Hell you might as well kidnap and kill them too.

Criminals break crimes by definition, but they don't break all crimes. Just those that pay off in a risk/benefit analysis and in a country where guns are illegal they don't need guns to do the majority of crimes because they aren't likely to get shot, so why risk carrying one? Now I'm not saying they wont use other weapons or use guns in some cases but the argument of "Criminals break laws therefore they will all carry guns anyway." is flawed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh damn, I just got pulled into a gun debate, and it's not like they ever get anywhere. It's just like a religious debate only instead of holy books you have horribly biased surveys and studies which are always funded by either an anti or pro gun group.