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Old 05-03-2002, 07:05 PM   #191
Alexander
Drow Warrior
 

Join Date: April 16, 2002
Location: Connecticut
Age: 40
Posts: 259
Quote:
Originally posted by Sir Taliesin:
Noble Wolf (love your name btw), you say that only the military and police should have firearms. What about this. You apparently live in Australia, right? What if the country of Indonsia were to hold legal elections and a government was installed that was extremely hostile to Australia, to the point that they attacked your country.
Let's us suppose that they invaded and captured the terriotory that you lived in. Would you try to fight back? If so, how would you do it? Would you take up a privately held firearm and defend your country or would you stand by and wait on the Australian Army and retake the area?
I would assume that the noble Australians would begin to fashion their own weapons in such an emergency.
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Old 05-03-2002, 07:41 PM   #192
Thoran
Galvatron
 

Join Date: January 10, 2002
Location: Upstate NY
Age: 56
Posts: 2,109
Quote:
Originally posted by Alexander:
Because I was talking about the potential armed Jews in Nazi Germany, and you were talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (in which the side opposing the military has bombs and so forth).
ahh... now I understand. The point was that if the Jews had been armed and resisting, it would have taken a large number of German troops to control them... irregardless of relative training levels. The Isreali example was just to illustrate that it takes a military commitment that is larger than the numbers of resisters to attempt to contain an organized resistance. In the case of Germany, the large numbers of troops required would have been significant (and might have limited other military options). So basically... it's my opinion that armed civilian resistance can have a significant impact on military operations. It's admittedly an aside but it does mean that when a population is armed, those in power who might wish to do them harm for some reason will not just be able collect them up and control them with ease.
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Old 05-03-2002, 09:07 PM   #193
MILAMBER
Lord Soth
 

Join Date: March 5, 2001
Location: Southern California
Posts: 1,948
Quote:
Originally posted by Animal:
Milamber, I am enjoying watching you disecting my posts point by point, so I'll give you another opportunity. I think there is some confusion in my argument, which I probably could have stated a little more clearly. I am not interested in the governments definition of mass destruction. No, a gun cannot kill whole cities at a time, but in the wrong hands in can by extremely devastating. I understand your point about recreational shooting with a gun, but a fail to see what possible use a 9mm fully automatic uzi with armour peicing rounds could be for hunting. Do you have many deer wearing Kevlar vests were you live? Most of the populace of the world is not responsible enough to own a firearm, but who is to determine that. A good portion of the populace shouldn't be driving either, but they still do. You can make all the laws you wish to control firearms, be people will still find ways to acquire them. There is no solution or law that will stop lunatics from going on a killing spree short of wiping the gun from existance. I have a hard time understanding how you perceive nuclear weapons to be a deterant. Give one to Hussein or Bin Laden and see what happens. The only thing that has stopped the use of nuclear weapons is the knowledge of the destruction they create.
I wonder what the world would be like if, instead of spending billions on creating a bigger better gun, we used the money for disease research or EDUCATION! Yes, if you give a chimp a gun and the chimp blows away a lab full of scientists it's not the guns fault, it's the idiot who gave him the gun in the first place. Perhaps spending some time educating people as opposed to killing them would be a good thing. I cannot turn on the news these days without hearing gunfire and explosions. How is this creating a better world?
I agree with you on one point. Remove guns and people will find other ways of killing each other, but that's one step closer to solving the problem. To your previous point, yes I do enjoy my freedom and rights, but I do not need a gun to do so. Owning a gun for defense you say? Defense from what? Another gun. Guns have no place in creating a better society for everyone, and that's the goal we should all be striving for. WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Falkland Islands, Cuba, Serbia, Bosnia...the lists goes on and on. When is enough going to be enough? I thought we were more civilized than 50 years ago, but we insist on killing each other with guns.

Again, not intended to insult I just enjoy the banter.
I wish I felt like spending more time responding to this, but here it goes in a nutshell.

Quote:
“…but a fail to see what possible use a 9mm fully automatic uzi with armour peicing rounds could be for hunting”
I’m not advocating the distribution of fully automatic weapons. I don’t think anybody here is. When hunting, the last thing I would want is an automatic pistol.

Quote:
” Most of the populace of the world is not responsible enough to own a firearm, but who is to determine that. A good portion of the populace shouldn't be driving either, but they still do”
I completely agree with you. Not everybody should have guns. The only people who can decide who should use them are the people who do decide. The government. Likewise, most certainly, not everyone should be able to drive.

Quote:
”There is no solution or law that will stop lunatics from going on a killing spree short of wiping the gun from existence”
Nothing, even wiping the gun from existence would stop lunatics from going on killing sprees. i.e. Atilla the Hun, King George…the list goes on.

Quote:
” You can make all the laws you wish to control firearms, be people will still find ways to acquire them”
Agreed. So why try and ban them when the people you don’t want to have them will get them anyways?

Quote:
” I have a hard time understanding how you perceive nuclear weapons to be a deterant. Give one to Hussein or Bin Laden and see what happens. The only thing that has stopped the use of nuclear weapons is the knowledge of the destruction they create.”
Nuclear weapons are one of the biggest deterrents. Many books have been written on this. You say yourself, “The only thing that has stopped the use of nuclear weapons is the knowledge of the destruction they create.” My point exactly! They are self regulating because of their destructive capacity. They also cost a fortune to maintain, develop and deploy, so financially it is not feasible for smaller terrorist organizations to gain access to a large thermonuclear device, let alone an ICBM. If it wasn’t for the threat of nuclear war, Russia could have just occupied quite a bit of Europe and the Allied forces would not have had the ability to project the power necessary to stop them.

Quote:
” Yes, if you give a chimp a gun and the chimp blows away a lab full of scientists it's not the guns fault, it's the idiot who gave him the gun in the first place”
I don’t know how exactly chimps tie into things, but it seems like you are agreeing with one of my earlier points, so I’ll let this go.

Quote:
” I cannot turn on the news these days without hearing gunfire and explosions. How is this creating a better world?”
I agree guns and explosions don’t create a better world. Strategy and change can. Carl Von Clausewitz said that “War is merely a continuation of politics by other means”. War is the ultimate political tool. Governments use war and the military more specifically to enforce their political agenda on others. In American history, we wouldn’t have the country we do now, with the freedoms we have now, were it not for an act of war aimed at winning it/them for us by the revolutionaries. Guns and explosives used correctly as a tool have brought positive change to the world that has changed each of our lives for the better. Like any tool, it can be misused, but the tool itself is neither inherently good nor evil. I say if you choose to blame the tool for the bad, then you also need to give credit to the tool for the good.

Quote:
” I thought we were more civilized than 50 years ago, but we insist on killing each other with guns.”
As Aristotle said thousands of years ago, "For man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all, since armed injustice is the more dangerous, meant to be used by intelligence and virtue, he is the most unholy and savage of all animals, and the worst of full of lust and gluttony." People were the same then as they are now. We aren’t any more civilized. Societies ideals have changed slightly, technology has advanced mightily, but we are still “human animals”. In our world, people are both good and bad. Take the good with the bad, because we aren’t changing anytime in the next few millennia.

I honestly think if we had a conversation in person, we would agree on most of the things we have discussed here. I think that the reason you are disagreeing with me right now is because you haven't taken the time to fully sort through you thoughts on these issues. You haven't logically analyzed your beliefs. You'll come around. I'm sure of it.

Bottom line, aboloshing weapons is not a panacea to the human condition.

[ 05-03-2002, 09:16 PM: Message edited by: MILAMBER ]
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Old 05-03-2002, 09:12 PM   #194
flibulzbuth
Drow Warrior
 

Join Date: April 6, 2002
Location: Canada
Posts: 254
Quote:
How did the resistance movements during WWII do it? Most of them had no military training either. What about in Kosovo? What about the average Viet Cong in Vietnam? How did they do it? How are the FARC in Columbia doing it? Seems to me there are a lot of resistance and revolutionary movements in this world that don't have military training. What about the PLO? A palestian sniper killed 7 Isreali soldiers last month with an old bolt-action rifle. Since the average palestian isn't a soldier, how did he or she do it? Training isn't always necessary, just the will and some common sense.
The french resistance didn't do much direct action. Most of it was heavily punished on civilians. The resistance's contribution came in the way of information to the allies, and sometimes hiding the jews. All the french male had to follow basic training.
Croatia was an independant country when Serbia attacked. They had there own army, although it was not prepared for the invasion.
Vietcongs were trained and armed by the chinese communist regim. In fact, China sent "voluntary" troops there to fight with the viet communists. The vietcongs had already fought an independance war against the French too.
The FARC is a very well trained and disciplined army. "Taxes" on the drug sales allow them to keep a good stock of light weapons and necessary material. They now control almost half of the territory, where they are respected because they bring order (notice i did not say justice). A good number of the founders came from the regular army.
A lot of palestinians fighters are trained in camps in neighbouring countries. They have been fighting almost non-stop with israel for 52 years now, so they have grown in a war environment.

As far as i know, none of the above example could apply to any western europe or north american people.
If there is a need to rise and strike back, people will always be helpless without the support of a part of the army.
Take the Venezuela coup for example: although most of the population was with Chavez, the leader of the country's businessmen took the power with the help and approval of most of the military. Until the day after, where a general made it's way with his division of tanks to the capital.
The contre-coup to put back the twice democratically-elected president into place was NOT founded by democrat countries, was NOT done by the people, but was done by a bright officer protecting the constitution. In fact, people helped a lot (taking back the control of medias etc...), but it would have been meaningless without the military pressure.
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Old 05-03-2002, 11:16 PM   #195
Animal
Gold Dragon
 

Join Date: March 29, 2002
Location: Canada
Age: 51
Posts: 2,534
Milamber,

You seem to quite fond of quoting people long since past, but I am awaiting your response. A 9mm fully automatic pistol is quite readily available. It may be a .22 or .357 or even an m60 but a gun is still a gun. Does it matter if it's a 1 megatonne nuclear warhead or a 60 megatonne? The fact of the matter is that nobody is capable of determing who should and shouldn't own a firearm, NOBODY. I do agree with the reasoning that we should all have the freedom and choices, but unfortunately society as a whole ruins it for those who have the intelligence and education to demonstrate responsivle gun ownership. By the way, why were fully automatic weapons and armour piercing rounds created? Let me guess, recreation! I do believe our "argument" is long since past its oringinal thread.
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Old 05-03-2002, 11:26 PM   #196
Krishach
Drow Warrior
 

Join Date: February 25, 2002
Location: Land of the free... ?
Age: 38
Posts: 260
A few weeks ago on our local news, it was reported a 4 year old had gotten hold of a gun and accidently shot himself in the stomach, killing him. It was due to the grandfather not paying attention, and the grandfather had actually let the kid hold the gun a few weeks earlier, but unloaded. I just thought I'd share this story.

Personally, I don't really have an opinion on gun control and the such. I don't think I'll ever have one in my house for protection. It just has a too much potential for something really bad happening, like the story above. But I don't think they should be outlawed or something. Actually, I've never really thought about it. If they were outlawed, then the general public would just be unable to obtain them, though criminals could probably be able to get them from underground connections or such. I figure, just let people do what they want with it. Doesn't bother me much.
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