Quote:
Originally posted by Maelakin:
As a gun owner, I have another valid reason I should be allowed to continue owning my firearms.
A gun is a tool. The reason for possession of that tool is irrelevant. Most instances of injury and death due to owning a gun comes not from malicious intent, but from the misuse of the tool. Education would result in less instances where a gun results in bodily injury.
Every year, irresponsible and reckless automobile drivers kill more people than guns even come close to killing. Like a gun, cars are a tool we use. When improperly used the result can often times be tragic. Just as I can decide to take my gun and shoot another, I can take my car and hit another, often having the same effect, death.
Does this mean that we should also have a ban on automobiles?
The bottom line is that removing the right to own firearms does nothing but promote an illusion of pacification. In addition, it removes a personal liberty I should always have, the right to protection. Understand also that a guns protection comes mostly from the threat of its use, not the actual act of using it.
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A gun is a tool.
But what for?
Handguns, submachineguns, MGs or assault rifles are tools,
tools specifically designed for killing people most efficiently.
Killing or hurting people however is by default illegal, so it's just logic to ban something if its sole purpose is something illegal.
This is why we call them arms rather than tools.
The main purpose of an automobile is to move people from one place to another, something perfectly legal and necessary. This is why a car doesn't compare to a gun. If we put a ban on cars, the economy would collapse, if we put a ban on guns there would just be the usual backlash you get when you forbid something.
This is also, why I'm against a ban on hunting rifles, or hunting arms (big calibre handguns, knifes) in general. These are useful items.
A H&K MP5K however does not serve any legal useful purpose.
I understand, that many are concerned with their protection, and that a gun is "used" often as a threat. To serve and protect there's the police. I don't know how that works with you overseas but in my country they're pretty decent folks, and they're pretty fast. Of course you want to protect yourself as well as possible, but in a society you sometimes have to trade your own good for the common good, which in this case is to protect it from gun owners, not as responsible as you.
Then again there's a lot of non-lethal protection equipment out there as I stated, and as I also stated above: If you both have got a gun: start praying!
Maybe I'm a little less concerned about all that because crime here is
really low, especially violent crimes. Maybe I would talk differently if I had been robbed at gunpoint once or at least knew somebody who was. But from my perspective guns are not really necessary and they pose a threat = They pose an unnecessary threat.
Let me add, that while I think it is an important debate - especially in the US - I also second that the causes of the problem have to be addressed rather than "solving" the problem by banning guns.
While a ban might not be extremely efficient, fromm my viewpoint a ban (at least on paramilitaric weaponry) would be logical and do more good than bad.