I stumble upon commentary from time to time that has nothing good to say about the U.S. and its Constitution.
First, everyone can say what they want and until foreigners pay our bills or clean up their own countries, the opinions expressed mean nothing.
I will express displeasure with actions of other countries when those actions directly affect our own, but how people run their own countries is none of my business otherwise.
It’s clear to me that there’s an information campaign worldwide to diminish positive regard for the U.S. Also, it’s clear, that other countries, in general, are fed more misinformation than we are. (But not much more than we have these days.)
Other countries couldn’t possibly understand or embrace our culture as it developed according to our history. Maybe they ought to stop staring out of the window at the neighbors and clean their own houses?
Even when I agree with some of the negative points made, my underlying, “How dare you?” reaction is still there. {They would be lucky to have a constitution like ours. The fact that our current government doesn’t follow it any more is our own problem.}
Many times, those less free countrymen abroad suggest that their own righteous viewpoint is unquestionable. Most recently, a post dwelled on the ‘evil’ of our 2nd Amendment. To them I say, “Good for you disarming your citizens. Don’t call us if you find yourself in a bind.”
It’s absolutely true that the U.S. has stuck its nose where it doesn’t belong way too many times. But those are actions of a military complex that has increasingly gone mad. Those people don’t represent us.
So, why do citizens of other countries feel compelled to critique our country?
It seems to me that those who do that are behaving like high school ‘mean girls’ looking for attention and their own validation at the expense of others. It’s not a good look fellas. 😉
I’m not angry about it but I am clearly irritated. Just so you know, I don’t define the fellow countrymen of those bloviating about running a ‘good’ country according to those dingbats either.
{Note to other countries: If anyone from the U.S. comes to your door suggesting you need to go Woke, please know that they are acting according to their own agenda and were not sent by “We the People”.}
Sillyfrog's Blog 
Right on! As my one grandmother used to say: “Don’t go sweeping your neighbor’s porch when your own porch needs swept.” Good advice to all nosey-body countries telling others what to do.
Got to love those ‘old-fashioned’ witticisms! Thanks, Steve!
It is the same for the UK, although I don’t think my country has much to be proud of at the moment. We have our elections in May, but I’m not sure I want to vote, because there isn’t much to vote for. All our parties are only out for themselves, rather than the people who vote for them.
I suggest that you do vote. Get others to vote too. Even if they ‘cheat’ or mislead the public, to ‘not vote’ plays into their hands. Your media may be working against your interests, as is ours. Deep down you must know your discouragement isn’t an outlier and more people feel as you do than you know. It’s all you have to work with, at the moment. God bless!
I think all viewpoints have validity. I also agree that you shouldn’t throw stones when your glass house is shattered rubble. But sometimes, even the most absurd butting-in makes valid points that are worthy of addressing.
Countries who disarm their population and haven’t had a school shooting are doing something right. Kids are surviving school. Everything else about their country could be detrimental to their citizens, but their suggestions on school shootings might be valid.
On a side note, entire governments who have issues are not going to ring up Sally Mae Jones and ask her and her guns to come save them. They will contact our military. So suggesting that to clean up their messes they would need to call America because guns are legal is not accurate.
On the flip side, America has her faults. They may be astronomical in breadth, but there are some things that we do right. There’s no reason for other countries to ignore us as a whole because they don’t agree that women should work outside of the home.
I think everyone should listen more, shut down less, and lecture even less. My personal opinion.
Very nice to hear from you on this.
As the point of my post, seems to have you in agreement except for the ‘all points are valid’, they aren’t. They aren’t forbidden though.
I’m willing to take on your points one by one. I hope we don’t conflate them because this is a many layered topic.
We might start with the 2nd Amendment. We’ve had it for a long time and our current situation, therefore, has no direct causation to it. Mass shootings would have gone on since its inception if the Amendment were the problem.
Secondly, your understanding of the 2nd Amendment is lacking. It isn’t primarily a right so we can protect the government, it’s a right to protect yourself from the government if it becomes corrupted and totalitarian. Our founders knew how easily things can get ugly. May I point you to Venezuela and Brazil and Canada?
There’s more… my stupid computer decided to post what I was writing. Stay tuned a bit while I finish, please.
I apologize. I was not saying there is anything wrong with the second amendment. My understanding of it is also not lacking. My point was very specifically to the idea that other countries may have suggestions to limit *school* shootings. For example, many countries do not forbid guns completely, and that is us not understanding their laws. They just take a different approach with licenses, safety classes, and storage being paramount. They also have limits on the types of guns that can be purchased, and the number of guns. These do not trample anyone’s second amendment. There is no reason for certain types of high powered rifles that we claim are protected. No one unloads fifty rounds into a deer. And our founders were not talking about guns as we know them. There’s a significant difference between muskets and guns with armor piercing rounds that unload multiple rounds a second. At no point we’re our forefathers even dreaming of that when they gave us the second amendment. Not to mention, the second amendment was an amendment to the constitution, ratified 3 years after-the-fact, which most people don’t seem to realize (not saying you, just saying it seems to be a common misunderstanding of when it was created). The fact that other countries emphasize safety for gun ownership is a major deal in limiting random acts of violence. Not keeping a weapon stored properly, cleaned properly, unloaded, and locked out of the reach of children means that there are fewer toddlers shooting their mother in the back of the head on a Zoom call, or 6-year olds being able to bring weapons to class to shoot his teacher. Trigger locks are not enough – babies can break out of baby gates before they can even walk; putting it high up is not enough – kids have OD’d on family drugs no matter how high they were. If gun ownership is something you feel is necessary, unloaded and in a lockbox is the only real way to go.
Also, I was commenting on your one section which stated, “To them I say, “Good for you disarming your citizens. Don’t call us if you find yourself in a bind.” “ which implied that the act of making guns more difficult to obtain would somehow require them to call the US to solve it, which made the inference that us being able to horde guns as everyday citizens would fix their uprisings.
In another section, you also commented that other countries are “less free.” In some countries, this is very much the truth; absolutely not in all. It’s a common misconception that America is “the most free,” we are not. We are equivalent to other countries though.
So I wasn’t trying to debate the finer points of the second amendment; simply responding to the post that you had written and the specific points that you had brought up. The debate on the second amendment is very much a “many layered topic,” and every single layer has a thousand layers on its own.
As far as the all points being valid idea, the reality is that they are. One has the ability to disregard that which does not apply and apply that which makes sense.
If a foreigner suggests that due to September 11, airport security should be tightened world-wide and all luggage scanned for bombs, you can’t say that is not a valid thought. Even if it’s in a country where terrorist attacks carried out in the sky have never happened, or even in a country with no international airport. Even if the suggestions they offer make little sense, their original point is still valid. The person making the suggestion or comment does not have to live in your country, state, town and house to make a valid point. That’s the issue I think the whole world is falling into more and more, actually. People are too quick to throw away other people’s points because a single detail is not exactly a direct correlation. The reality is that the point can very much be valid, the argument is not irretrievably flawed and useless because of a single detail, that’s precisely one of the issues.
In America, our laws take into consideration the overarching topic, and the specifics are left to the Court to determine. People making points are the same.
Do I agree we should abolish the second amendment, or at least that part of it? Yes and no. Mostly, the answer is no, it should stand as it is and be interpreted and carried out more responsibly than it currently is. In the immediate aftermath of a shooting, I want it to be abolished and all guns immediately illegal and anyone who has one should go to jail forever and ever and ever. Did I say the latter one is a *good* opinion? No. It’s an emotional one. But the point that guns are too easy to come by, to easy to use, do not have a positive purpose (they don’t grow flowers, they kill. That’s their purpose), and responsible, educated owners should be more common is not an invalid point because I personally do not own a firearm. My point is just as valid as the person who owns a gun. Either of us dismissing the other’s point because the one could “never understand” leads to nothing but stagnation. On certain topics, that’s the worst possible outcome.
I hope that makes sense… sorry it got long! 💜
I’m going to take your thoughtful response in pieces. Hope you don’t mind.
You had me until you said, “what people need”. Free countries fall off the map once someone, anyone, expresses that. That’s no one’s call.
The Founders were not dumbells. They easily could project that weapons would progress since muskets were obviously a vast improvement upon spears. Just so ya know, there was an inventor of repeating rifles petitioning the Constitutional Convention to be heard. The musket argument seriously insults the Founders and is an unfortunate repeated falsehood.
I’m enjoying this but I’ll I have to finish later… life happens. lol
I’m sorry, I’m confused. I reread my comment three times and have missed where I said what people need. The closest I came was when I said that people don’t hunt deer by shooting them 50 times. So, I am not certain what your response is responding to.
Obviously, our forefathers were intelligent and able to see that technology would progress. However, anyone who claims that they would be able to know that in less than 200 years guns could shoot 500-2,000 yards (from 100 yards max) or that they could unload many rounds a second as opposed to 1 shot every 15-20 seconds.
Also, they could not have predicted that people would be arguing to keep assault rifles in their homes. These are not required for home security, they cannot be used for hunting as they would obliterate the target, and there is no every day use for them. Literally none. They are weapons of war. They are designed to inflict maximum damage in a war torn environment. Sitting on the corner of Spruce Rd and Pine Cone Lane is not the appropriate location for these weapons. It would be like asking ADT to come out to your house and set up a tank in the front yard. It’s unnecessarily aggressive for no reason. You have a better chance of accidentally killing your neighbor across the street with your tank than you do stopping a break in.
I too am enjoying this conversation, although having gone back and rereading my comment again I do not see where I said anything about what people need to do in relation to guns (or at all). In a different comment I did say something along the lines of people need to know children are safe in school, but I truly do not think you’d disagree with that point. If I missed it, please tell me where I wrote it so I can reply more accurately to your comments. Thank you 💜
They don’t unload many rounds a second. That’s what I meant about misinformation. Hunting isn’t the reason for the 2nd Amendment. That’s what I meant about the poor educational system. And school shootings are up close. Has nothing to do with distsnce. As for high capacity magazines, if a magazine can be changed in a couple seconds and the victims are unarmed, having 5 magazines with 10 rounds each isn’t any different from one with 50 rounds. Let’s protect the schools from crazies with out in the open armed guards. Criminals prefer unarmed victims universally.
Kindly, please stop implying that because we don’t agree, there is something lacking in my education. A difference of opinion based on facts, as we are engaging in, is based on facts, not guess work or what someone else said. I am taking the time to not only explain my position, but I am cross checking the information to ensure accuracy, and choosing only the facts and statistics that gun manufacturers explicitly report in their sites. I am not finding information from Joe GunsAreBad as I have never accepted his opinion on anything else, I’m not about to start now. I have always taken great pains to ensure my education has been fair and balanced. I do not come to my conclusions or beliefs based on what other people say, or based solely on the dog whistles that either side puts out. Their opinions do not create my world view. I take the facts, which I extensively educate myself on, and apply them to what I believe.
As far as my previous comment: many is the proper word for what I said. An unassisted AR 15 can shoot 30 rounds every 2 seconds, or fifteen rounds a second. I am not talking about the illegal ones that can shoot hundreds of bullets in a minute, I mean the one you can pop over to the store and purchase legally. Fifteen is the very definition of MANY.
The terrifying part is that teenagers can legally obtain these in some places, but can’t obtain a hand gun. Because that makes tons of sense.
The thing is, I don’t follow one news outlet. I don’t follow one political opinion and not the other. I do my homework and I learn as much as I can.
Also, I know the purpose of the second amendment. My education is actually pretty good, despite what others may think. No, it was not for hunting, it was for protection of We The People. Unfortunately, these high powered weapons are used for hunting. Not the deer in the woods, or any other licensable animal, they’re now used to hunt PEOPLE. That is certainly not what the founding fathers had in mind.
The world is also a very different place than what they dealt with or could imagine. Diseases become a worldwide pandemic, people are angrier, separated, and yet closer together. Everywhere is overpopulated. Anxiety is at an all time high per capita, patience and tolerance at an all time low. News cycles are 24/7, Facebook and Instagram have become the primary method of receiving information. Nuclear wars are a possibility, families are torn apart because the entire culture is designed to make work-life paramount to family life. These are all breeding grounds for discontent and violence.
No, no matter what you say about what our forefathers could have possibly foreseen, the world we live in was not on their radar.
Distance does play a role as well. School shootings may be more up close, but sitting on top of a clock tower picking people off, or going into a hotel and shooting into a concert are NOT close range. Mass shooting happen outside of school as well. Also, the segment for protection is nonsense based on your own point. One does not need a long distance gun for self-protection either. You can’t shoot someone who has not approached you to do you harm. It’s illegal. They must be an imminent threat to you, such as climbing in your window are running at you to attack. This is close quarters as well. You don’t need a magazine with 50 bullets to stop the attack, nor do you need a gun that can shoot hundreds of yards. It is unnecessary overkill, which is an apt word in so many ways.
Also there is a difference between 5 magazines with ten shots each and one with 50 rounds.
Let’s assume for a second that the gun is able to fire one round per second (the reason for this assumption is for simple math). One magazine of 50 can be shot in 50 seconds at this rate. Taking your statement, where a magazine can be changed in “a couple of seconds,” having five magazines means that ten seconds have just been added. That ten seconds could be the difference between life and death for a person. It DOES make a difference.
And being armed doesn’t miraculously protect you. It makes you just as dead as the unarmed person next to you when you are shot.
Criminals out to engage in a mass shooting actually don’t care if your armed or not. They tend to walk in with a suicide wish. More than enough have killed themselves at the end of their attack. Armed guards, armed police, armed citizens have not deterred these shooters. Neither will armed teachers. They want to die and they want to take others with them. That’s their goal, their purpose, their calling in that moment.
“Crazies” will not be deterred by Joey-Armed-Guard. They will not be deterred. Hell, in Columbine, they set explosives to take out first responders and even set off a decoy explosion across town so that the police would be diverted.
Psychology is intertwined with all of this as well. A well thought out plan with no fear of death will always be more effective than an armed person terrified to die.
If you worked in a bank and someone came in and pointed a gun in your face, even if you were armed, you wouldn’t make a move and they could take your gun from you. Why? Because NO ONE wants to take a chance of never seeing their family again for a job. If your child was there, you’d go out a blazin’, but you’re not going to go in shooting when you can run. Not to mention, when you hear a gun going off, your natural response isn’t to stand still, take careful aim and fire; you’re going to run like the wind. There is danger and you run. That’s what happens. Military personnel are different, but even they have PTSD and take cover. It’s how it works. Being placed in mortal danger does not elicit a response of “it’s a good day to die,” your brain screams “run.”
So, no. More guns do not increase the safety in schools. To assume it does is a gross oversimplification of the dynamics involved which results in just as much faulty thinking and insane suggestions as overhauling our second amendment rights with a red pen.
Instead, it’s incumbent upon us to find a way that gun control can work for both sides so that mass shootings can stop. Already, we have had more mass shootings than days in the year. No gun restrictions have remained in place. No safety classes, no common sense laws. Nothing. Everyone can be armed. The result is that mass shootings have increased, not decreased.
The age old adage of “less is more” is at play now. We tried “go big or go home” for the last 200 years, and all that happened was the body count got higher.
At the end of the day, guns are machines. Every machine is created by man to have a purpose. Guns have no other purpose than causing bodily harm and death, and that’s just the plain truth of it. Literally no one purchases or owns a gun to assist them in gardening or needlepoint. No, they buy them for the purposes of hunting or protection. You don’t protect yourself by shooting kisses at another person. You don’t hunt animals by shooting cuddles at them. You shoot bullets. Little pieces of metal designed to inflict damage or death. That is their purpose. They were created for that purpose because spears weren’t effective enough for humans.
There are many common sense ways to limit the destructive power of these weapons. Don’t sell military grade weapons to civilians. Make sure safety is paramount when purchasing one. Running a real background check to ensure that the person doesn’t have a long history of violence so that the outcome may be different, promote mental health. There is literally NO curbing of any constitutional rights in those suggestions. You can still own guns, you just have to be responsible about it. And if that’s “against” your constitutional right to bare arms, that’s the poor education system at play, because your constitutional right to own a gun is not more important than my constitutional right to live and be free. No state shall deny its citizens equal protection under the law. And that is what is happening now. People’s perception of their second amendment rights are being allowed to trample every other right explicitly mentioned in the constitution.
The reality of the fact is that the second amendment says the right to have guns is not to be infringed or curbed, and I am not suggesting it should be. If you want to own 950 guns, you be very happy with your armory. However, the TYPES of guns CAN and SHOULD be regulated. The steps to obtain said gun should be regulated. The rules of safe gun ownership should be clearly defined for every person purchasing a gun.
Not one right is being trampled in these suggestions. Literally NOT ONE.
The argument that I’ve heard repeatedly is that you should be able to buy whatever you want whenever you want; it’s nonsense. It’s a childish retort designed only to have the last word. If you go into a store, you are limited by the options available. The government has banned certain foods and drugs because of their correlations to danger. There is no other scenario where “I want it so I get it” is a mentality that will serve anyone well. Children have this mindset and throw tantrums, and everyone agrees that is not acceptable in society. Why is it that adults and teenagers should be able to do it? They shouldn’t.
My nephew’s RIGHT TO LIFE is significantly greater than someone’s *lack of desire* to properly store and care for a deadly weapon.
In short, guns fire multiple bullets a second. Forcing there to be multiple magazines in a mass shooting buys time for potential victims to escape. Distance DOES play a part in many mass shootings, limiting the argument to a specific type of mass shooting is not effective as it’s simply selecting a scenario where the argument applies and throwing away the rest as if it doesn’t matter. The right to LIFE exceeds the second amendment as it dates back to the Declaration of Independence, and is not just one sentence in the middle of an amendment, instead it appears in the original constitution as well.
Also, these weapons are not being used for a well organized militia, they are being used for MURDER. The right to bear arms for protection is explicit in the constitution, yes, the right to kill people does not exist.
Wait… your ‘facts’ are wrong. Only fully automatic weapons fire many rounds per second. AR-15s are not fully automatic. You have a right to your own opinion but not to your own ‘facts’. There’s a difference. Research within propaganda doesn’t produce ‘facts’. I can’t respond to falsehoods any other way than saying your basis (education) is flawed. As your arguments are built upon and cling to many falsehoods, we’re talking past each other. Weapons are not the murders, people are. If we know people will murder, IMHO, it makes no sense to create safeguards that can’t be and aren’t enforced. It makes most sense to PROTECT ourselves and discuss the small stuff later. Protection looks like a weapon that deters or kills the murderer. Anything else, is chatter. I didn’t mean to upset you. But the truth isn’t being discussed now…it’s something else. The right to life as does the right to liberty means “if you can keep it.” while pursuing happiness. Not the right ‘not to be killed’ in the process. Murder is already illegal. No one, less so the government, can guarantee safety. It comes down to personal responsibility every time. Sometimes that can’t help either because evil, tyranny, and even guns, aren’t going anywhere. Complaining and legislating doesn’t change those things. IMHO… knowing those things to be true is why I have guns. I know you think you aren’t taking guns away with each step making it harder to own them. (Especially for poor people. Gun regulations make them too expensive for them. Just like regulations on cars is pricing them away from ordinary people.) If you don’t think there are people who want everyone ultimately unarmed and on foot or crowded into urban areas, I hope your future doesn’t fall apart. It’s on a terrible trajectory and from a historical viewpoint, grim. Thanks again but I’m afraid our ‘facts’ are too far apart to continue. ❤
My statement regarding semi automatics came from this source:
https://neckbonearmory.com/how-fast-can-you-fire-an-ar-15-rate-of-fire-by-caliber/
I have not created my own facts at any point in our discussion. I do the research and choose sources that are on the side of keeping guns. Some of the more liberal sources state that semi automatics can shoot missles at 90000 per second, and it’s pure hokum, and I know it. I am selecting sources that are pro gun for all of my comments.
“Weapons are not the murders, people are. If we know people will murder” this is the very mentality that makes background checks extremely important. If the murderous people get their hands on a weapon capable of mass murder, they will murder. If they can’t, they’ll have to figure out a different way.
” It makes most sense to PROTECT ourselves and discuss the small stuff later.” the very thinking that led into the wrong place/wrong time shootings last week. “I feel threatened, shoot, and ask questions later.”
“looks like a weapon that deters or kills the murderer” someone with a psychological imbalance wants to take as many people as possible out and do not care if they survive. There is no deterant there. Asssuming an armed person decides to shoot back, all you have are people getting shot by cross fire, and the murderer didn’t stop to think “their gun is bigger than mine.” Not even a little bit.
“The right to life as does the right to liberty means “if you can keep it.” while pursuing happiness. Not the right ‘not to be killed’ in the process.” Yes, I agree. Children should be able to keep their lives without having to resort to carrying weapons in their book bag just in case. And the second part of that sentence is just baffling to me.
“Thanks again but I’m afraid our ‘facts’ are too far apart to continue. ❤” if that is how you feel, I appreciate your time. My facts were never made up by me, or by some flawed news source. I took multiple sources together that all stated the same information and used that to formulate my arguments.
Have a great day!
The guns btw in circulation are not weapons of war. I know… you’re hearing those words on TV. Nobody on TV lies.
There’s no specific definition for the ‘thing’ being called an assault weapon. ( The last applicant for the ATF couldn’t define one. It’s a made-up media/political weapon.) AR-15s are Armalite Rifles… it’s a brand name. They aren’t in many cases “high powered” and illegal to use in some states for hunting because they don’t kill easily and mercifully. They are light to manage and “scary looking” making them easier to use for sport and effective as protection. Elderly people can use them when other weapons are too cumbersome. (Knife wielding criminals kill more people each year than any with rifles Don’t those people matter?).That’s why AR-15s are a popular weapon. They LOOK cool. But, that’s why the media can make them evil. Pitbulls get the same bad reputation, and most are cupcakes. The people who own them make them dangerous.😉
Thought I’d offer some enlightenment. The media uses our emotions for their own agenda. News Flash… they aren’t working for us. ❤😊
I would like to see your source for your knives being used for more deaths than guns. In 2021, 11,000 murders were due to gun violence wheras only 1,035 were due to the use of a knife. https://www.statista.com/statistics/195325/murder-victims-in-the-us-by-weapon-used/ Please provide where you got your statistics as I am curious about the discrepancy.
As to the point that assault rifle isn’t actually something that means anything, that is also inaccurate. Just typing the term into google garnered tons of results. Every single source has a similar definition: “military firearm that is chambered for ammunition of reduced size or propellant charge and that has the capacity to switch between semiautomatic and fully automatic fire” (https://www.britannica.com/technology/assault-rifle).
I am aware that people on tv lie. That’s not news to me. Scripted and unscripted tv are both lies. The news is equally bad. The biggest liar of them all just got tossed from F&F, finally.
You obviously haven’t caught on to the difficulty presented in long (and rambling) opinions. I signed off on our interesting conversation. You have strong opinions with some merit. Make a blog post on your site with a coherent argument and tell everyone what you think. I simply don’t have the time. Thanks again.
I was responding to your comments before I saw that last one where you signed off. I was going in order of having recieved them. I apologize. A few more will be coming in as I responded to all of them. There are no more on the subject after this as you stated you didn’t want to carry on this conversation anymore. I respect that and didn’t mean to flood you with unwelcome comments as I didn’t know you asked me not to respond until the comment before this. I apoligize for the confusion.
Have a great day, and thank you for the interesting conversation! ❤
You’ve been most gracious. It would be a hoot to have a fireside face to face conversation with you. This format has too many limitations for exploration and debate. ❤
I agree. Maybe not the fireside chat part, but then again it’s spring time and the idea of more heat makes me want to cry. Maybe an igloo chat! 😂😂
Have an amazing day!
I’ve been rereading this comment. You must understand that your thoughts and points are many. You express yourself well. I have another point to make on your long opinion.
No… I don’t believe other countries fully understand our constitution as I see that everyday Americans don’t either.
Not infringing upon gun ownership came second in our protection of our country and survival. It’s important. Did you realize that the Japanese had a moment of insanity and plotted a land invasion along with Pearl Harbor? (Probably you don’t, the institutions of ‘higher’ learning have their own agenda.) Yes, they did. What stopped them was the wide gun ownership of average citizens in America. They couldn’t spare the casualties and feared the armed resistance.
There are bigger threats to us than most even want to consider but our Founders did.
As for personal protection, I take my responsibility to protect our home and family seriously. There’s no doubt that ‘bad guys’ exist. Your comfort of being unarmed is your choice. (free country)
Hopefully, you won’t need protection. But I am a plan for the worst type. You won’t get police protection (people with guns) in time if you find yourself in a life and death scenario. Most people with ‘fire insurance’ never have a fire but those who do, never regret having it. Life is precious and vulnerable. To be armed for the worst is ‘smart’ in my opinion. My family is too precious for gambling. Our country is too precious to gamble on the government being run by ‘all good guys’ … again, look at Venezuela. They gave up their insurance policy. I’d bet they’d like a “do over”. ❤
Actually, yes. I did know abou the land invasion. Assuming that my education is lacking is actually pretty offensive. If there is something that you believe I don’t already know, feel free to express it, but immediately following it with how my education is lacking is not a valid debate style. It is automatically belitting all points I could potentially make before I even make them. Please, kindly respond to my comments with the same level of respect I am using toward you. Thank you.
Also, armed citizens did not stop the Japanese from making a land invasion. Their goals did not match up with creating a battle right there. It was an invitation to the war since America was sitting it out. The reason they attacked PH was to make it so that our navy could not interfere with their attack on the Phillipines. That was their sole goal. It just so happened to be the engraved invitation we were waiting for, but a few hand guns wouldn’t scare off the Japanese. Read up on some of their war tactics. Joe Blogs and his glock wouldn’t even start to turn them away if that’s what they wanted to do.
Again, I am not, nor have I ever stated that I think guns should be removed from the people. My solutions have nothing to do wiht turning in guns, prohibiting guns, or anything else. The fact that pro-gun people conflate and confuse the two so easily baffles me.
Asking for proper storage of a weapon is NOT the same thing as saying “hand it in or else.”
Asking for a background check that is at LEAST equivalent to the one required to become a cart-pusher at the grocery is NOT the same thing as saying “hand it in or else.”
This is where the apples and oranges come in. The solutions I suggest are not infringing on anyone’s second amendment rights, but the emotional reactions from pro gun people are letting them be sloppier than they usually would be with their weapons. Almost daring the universe to prove guns are weapons (which they are). In my solutions, NO ONE is coming for the guns. Not even a little bit. They’re just making a scenario where the bad actors have a more difficult time obtaining them, and everyone else has no issues.
So, you’d take living in Venezuela in exchange for school shootings? That sounds bizarre and way over simplified.
The next point is asking you to focus on the fact that as our private ownership on guns has increased in “infringements” the school shootings have too. Why aren’t more gun laws not having the desired effect?
Well, maybe blaming the guns and not examining the causes may be the problem after all. Guns have a correlation to those crimes but are far from the cause. Fast food has a correlation to obesity but really isn’t the cause, either.
If guns were the cause of slaughter, we’d have a far bigger problem with about 400 million of them in our country.
Mental illness, medications, cultural loss of the value of human life, not prosecuting gun crimes nearly ever, and sensationalized filtered news reporting play a bigger role than inanimate guns.
We don’t get any news coverage when horrendous crimes happen on those things. The final point is the ridiculous political rhetoric and lies from people who know nothing about guns trying to influence the people who know nothing about them to stay only focused on gun control. Not protections for our innocent children, not investigation into medications young people are widely being prescribed, and not shining a light on the mission to disarm the law-abiding when disarming them would do no good.
More laws infringing on them wouldn’t either. You ever wonder why statistics aren’t kept on the thousands of lives saved because of guns in private hands? That would upset the trending narrative of course.
I’m glad to discuss this further but one point at a time would be better than political generalities. Thanks!
As I said, I agree with you, I simply think that hearing the other side of things from an outside perspective could be beneficial too.
I am personally against guns. I hope to never, ever own one or have one in my home.
However, disarming everyone isn’t the answer either. Putting common sense practicing into place IS a good step though. Lock boxes, keeping them unloaded and properly maintained, and everyone HAS to go through a background check, a psychological fitness test and sit through safety training before they can buy one. That’s not unreasonable. If your a law abiding person, you should have no issue following the law to obtain one. I don’t think disarming the law abiding would be useful. I think it would be better to make it so that it’s slightly harder to obtain one. The law abiding shouldn’t mind, and the people who want to do harm with it will mind. I think it’s a fair choice. You can’t walk into a store and walk out an hour later with a car and the legal right to drive it because it’s a deadly piece of machinery. So are guns. Licenses for both should be required.
I also do not know what kind of protections for our children you are referring to. These kids are being harmed because they are being shot. It seems pretty straight forward: don’t make it where children with incomplete brains can access deadly weapons.
And in most of the cases I’ve read about, it’s the lack of medications that trigger these meltdowns, not the use of them. That goes for children and adults.
Wow… I admire your willingness to express youself. People shouldn’t care if their Constutional rights are infringed? Um… yes they should. The pandemic shutdowns made it ever more clear that they better care.
Just so you know, I bought a rifle 50 years ago by walking into a store, buying it, and walking out. Haven’t ever thought about shooting anyone. Nobody that I know who had the same protected access has either. I could drive around with it in my car and other teenagers had them visibly displayed in their pickup trucks.
People have become more dangerous not guns.
Protecting kids from the modern day dangerous people must be done by armed guards.
With all due respect, hogwash on your lack of medication theory it doesn’t hold any more clout than the musket one.
I’m thankful for our chance to converse… really, thanks.
I learned how terrible our educational system really is too.
❤👍
Oh, I appreciate that last statement. Came off peachy and kind.
I never said a constitutional right should be removed. Please tell me where I did say that. Because I was very clear that was not what I was saying at all. Putting something away is not going against the constitution, not in any way. Requiring proper maintenance and storage of weapons is also not infringing on anyone’s rights. Keeping deadly weapons from being easily accessible to individuals too young to legally sign any contract in our country is also not against the constitution.
Armed guards won’t help either. There are plenty of examples of armed guards running the other way. If anything, unarmed teachers have done more to protect children than any armed guard ever has. And the police do standoffs. One armed shooter, fifty armed guards. Police stay outside with a bullhorn and unarmed parents are being arrested because they want to save their babies.
No. More guns isn’t the solution either.
Instead, what is wrong with common sense laws? Put the deadly weapon away where children cannot access it. Maintain it so there is less chance of a misfire or accidental firing. People known to have a history of violence not being able to obtain one (just as people with a history of alcoholism lose their licenses). How is that infringing upon anyone’s constitutional rights? If anything, it is PROTECTING the constitutional rights of the many. The children who just want to go to school and come home alive to play video games. The parents who want to send their kids for an education can expect their kids home, alive. People worshipping their G-d, people shopping at the grocery store, people picking up their kids, making a wrong turn, opening the wrong door, anything.
Why should the rights of those people who pick up guns and choose destruction have more rights than those who pick up a gun and say “hey kid, it’s time you learned how to be safe with one of these” ??
I am not one of those crazy gun control people. I want common sense laws. I want the law abiding gun owners to be allowed to have their guns. They aren’t hurting anyone, they have no intention of hurting anyone, and if they want to wallpaper their bedroom with mismatched uzis, I think it’s a hideous decoration choice, but I’m not the one that has to look at it.
But we aren’t talking about those people. We’re not talking about you. We are talking about you only if you leave a loaded gun on the coffee table while you’re in the kitchen or backyard with kids running around inside your house. I don’t know you, but I truly believe you wouldn’t do that. Not in a million years. If your gun is out around children, it’s also attached to you or always within your eyesight at all times. No child or grandchild would ever have the opportunity to come in and walk out with your gun. I honestly do not think you’d be able to even give that a realistic shot of happening, not for one second.
Now, be honest. If you walked into that store 50 years ago to buy that gun, and as part of the purchase you had to purchase a gun safe and attend safety classes, you would not have hesitated. You would have done both. If you want to buy a dog, you need to buy a collar for the dog. It’s no different. If you want to drive you need to take a test to show you know how to safely handle a vehicle. It’s no different.
Do we outlaw dogs because bites happen? No. That’s insanity.
Do we outlaw cars because car accidents cause fatalities? No. It’s insane to think we should.
Should we outlaw guns because people use them for deadly things? No. That’s a gross oversimplification of the issues and possible solutions.
But if you need license and registration and insurance to own a car, and a license and insurance to own a dog, you should need a license and common sense reforms to try to scale back on the deadly shootings that have been happening.
People are too jumpy these days. They are too easily influenced to believe that everything in the world is bad and horrible and out to hurt them. Guns don’t solve that fear, it enhances the likelihood something really stupid will happen because of that fear. If the dude on his couch had to keep his gun locked up, the kid knocking on his door wouldn’t have been shot twice. If the guy that shot the car full of people that took a wrong turn had to keep it locked up, they would have already been backed out most of the way before he got his gun and she’d be alive. If the dude that shot kids over a basketball in his yard had to keep it locked up, he would have threatened them with a bat instead.
Heat of the moment takes only moments to die away. Flash anger subsides. Anything done after that is a conscious decision. That split second it takes for a gun safe to unlock is enough for a person to say “well, I should probably take my gun but I can also ask why that person is here.”
You have many great points but some are apples and oranges too. Wish we could talk face to face. That would be fun.
I didn’t mean to be rude when I said our educational system is poor. It was the truth.
First thing, cars and dogs are not Constitutional rights. So comparing them with the Right to keep firearms is the apples and oranges.
Secondly, laws only work on the law abiding and the horrendous crimes of school shootings grip our hearts but don’t kill as many children as other evils. The gun laws aren’t even prosecuted in most cases.
Safety isn’t a “right”. It’s something we strive for but no one can guarantee it, ever.
The Constitution is a small basic document. It’s genius in its simplicity and in covering a “plan” to keep a Republic.
You throw the word ‘rights’ around a lot. Most times you’re talking about desires. Sorry. The world, life, and people can be ugly and unfair. You don’t get what you want.
Why are school shootings happening today? Why didn’t they happen when guns were less regulated? (I don’t believe they should be regulated. It’s obvious regulations aren’t foolproof and you seem to expect a foolproof environment.)
It is not apples and oranges, actually. I didn’t say that dogs and cars were rights, I simply said that requiring owners of either requires licenses and insurance. Doing the same for guns is not a gigantic leap that makes no sense.
Actually, gun deaths for children is the number one cause of childhood mortality, surpassing car accidents back in 2020 and not going back down.
As far as your comment on the Constitution, you are correct. It is a small and basic document. The second Amendment was not even a part of it until three years later. However, the preamble of said document is to “establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” Safety is inherent in those words. You can’t maintain a decent republic if the populace is terrified or dead.
Desire and rights are two different things. I never said otherwise. I also never said that I’m looking for anything fool-proof as that does not exist. I also don’t believe in fairness. I’ve posted about it. Fair is a nonsense term that literally means nothing in my opinion. However, your statement about fairness is not to be ignored, by your argument either.
It is not fair that babies are being mowed down in their schools, but we’re supposed to accept it. However, it won’t be fair to put into place certain expectations for gun ownership, and we’re supposed to respect that and accept it? Forget “fair,” that’s downright insane and literally makes no sense.
As for your last comment, no system is foolproof or ever could be. However, if there’s even a chance to rectify some of the issues, it’s incumbent upon us to at least try. As far as the increase in shootings today vs long ago, I’ve noticed a distinct change in gun owner’s behaviors. I know, and am related to many gun owners. As I said, it is not my desire to remove guns at all. Fifty years ago, EVERYONE took pains to keep children safe, and they themselves handled their weapons safely, or as safely as they could. People today are so worried about what they deem fair, they forget to care about what IS actually just, which is keeping people safe to the best of their ability. 30 years ago, gun owners would keep track of their stuff, now they don’t. They have 12 guns and don’t realize if number 7 and 8 are missing until their kid is on the news using them to kill classmates. Ownership has gotten more sloppy over the years, and as a result, more people who shouldn’t have them get ahold of them. The 6 year old who shot his teacher certainly didn’t go buy that gun himself. Neither did the toddler that shot his mother in the head while she was on a Zoom call. The kids in Columbine didn’t buy them or build them (just the bombs). No, not all shootings are done by children not old enough to puchase a gun, but enough are that common sense ways to keep them out of their hands is not an insane or silly ask.
Of the shootings that happened with legally purchased guns by the shooter, a three day wait while a background check was run would not have stopped a sane person from owning a gun, but the shooters would have been barred as they already had records and aggressive tendencies.
You can’t control for everything. No system is foolproof. People that legally obtained their guns could pass a background check and then have some trigger happen twenty years later and start shooting. Yeah, that’s a possibility. But common sense reforms would stop the other two types of shootings, and honestly, that’s the vast majority of them. I remember two or three cases where the shooter was a responsible gun owner for a prolonged period before they lost their minds. Meanwhile, we have already had more shootings than there are days so far in 2023. That’s an awful lot of shootings that could have been blocked if common sense reforms came into play.
And yeah, I use the word rights a lot, because the kicker is, I have rights too, despite not owning a gun. I have the right to go into a store and purchase groceries and not be turned into swiss cheese. I have the right to send my nephew to school in the morning and expect that he comes home alive. Gun rights are no more important than my right to be able to enjoy the guaranteed protection of the Constitution to domestic tranquility and my welfare.
Again, the post button went off before I finished.
I’ll have to add the rest later.
Probably better to respond in short pieces. Yours are too hard to respond to all at once.😊
Hahaha I do tend to write essays lol
I don’t mind it once in a while if the person has other stuff to say I enjoy, but if it’s a constant hateful drumbeat, I will likely quit reading them. I don’t think I’ve ever criticized another country. Probably because I’m too self-centered to give a crap, but still! 😂
Ha! You just know where your business belongs, Paula. I don’t find you self-centered. ❤
Thanks! 🥰
It’s amazing that there are so many people who believe that their own country is so problem-free that they can offer to help other countries fix their problems. And yes, Americans are just as bad sometimes. In fact, Americans are always telling each other how to fix their problems.
That last part is so true. Too much time on people’s hands. It’s clear many of them ought to read a history book for a change. 😉
Mother Teresa one said that if everyone would sweep their own doorstep, the whole world would be clean. I think we all need to get back to that: clean your own problems up first, help out where you can, ask for help when you need it, care about the people around you.
Perfectly phrased. What will all the oppressed Americans have to do, though? They don’t believe they made any messes, and the messes therefore aren’t theirs. Wait… the government will rescue them. Getting frightened yet?😉
The older I get, the more I realize that the government causes more trouble than it solves. We don’t get into war, the government does. If the government stopped “helping” people tomorrow, we’d have to do it, and that scares them, because we’d do a better job, cheaper, and solve the problems permanently, because we actually care whether people get back on their feet and become self-sufficient. I could go on, but you know where I’m going…
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Hiya, Susan.
Irecently said to someone (at Colorado, I think) two things:
First, that just because (currently) I don’t live at the US, that doesn’t mean I cannot have an intimate knowledge of what is going on.
Second, I never have blamed USA for not having sorted out all political, social, financial etc issues.
Countries with 2,500 years of history have not done so, therefore it is simply nonsensical to blame a country of 250 years of history for not reaching that point.
Thanks, Nick. We had a good run correcting a lot of things. My intuition about our future with censorship, out of control government bureaucracy, and rampant corruption, is bleak.
Having survival skills and a level head, seems those things may be real important soon. 😉
I hear ya. Loud & clear.
BTW… our last election was stolen. Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise. 😉❤🇺🇸