Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Father Terrence who wrote (42182)	6/27/1999 8:21:00 PM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 108807

If almost all Americans were armed and carried concealed weapons and knew how to use them effectively, criminals would think twice, thrice, and more before a mugging, rape, etc. Possibly true. But Saturday night at the pool hall would probably be an interesting place as well. And we probably would see a marked rise in Smith & Wesson divorces. I'm a gun owner and generally pro-gun, but we do have to acknowledge, no matter how "conservatively-politically-incorrect" it may be, that the problem of people getting drunk or pissed off and blowing away their friends, relatives, and the occasional bystander is a very real aspect of an armed society.

To: Father Terrence who wrote (42182)	6/27/1999 10:49:00 PM
From: Grainne	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 108807

Terrence, we live in by far the most violent "civilized" society in the world. We also have the greatest proliferation of handguns. I have watched television in Europe, and read European newspapers, and I can tell you that we are perceived as a wonderfully beautiful and affluent place with a very violent society coming apart at the hinges. You refuse for some reason to even consider my point about how the Florida crime figures are polluted and made irrelevant by larger numbers of Americans in prison, a smaller number of men in their prime criminal years in the population, and a huge per capita rate of gun injuries and deaths, so I think we should just stop talking about it. Obviously you are fixated only on weapons as part of your right to protect yourself, and have no interest at all in considering the larger social costs, so why don't we just drop it. I should have said that most Americans live in urban areas--cities and the suburbs just around them. It would certainly be unfair to take New York out of the mix to prove your belief that most Americans live in rural areas, so I don't understand why you would bother. If you would like to argue that the supporting papers of the Founding Fathers prove that they believed in private gun ownership, you could cite some here. Even if you argue that, however, you also have to consider that the weapons they had then, which were pretty ineffective and could not kill several people at a time, were not the ones we have now. Perhaps you could discuss why it is that no Court has interpreted it that way? And it would certainly be impossible for you to prove that, given our current circumstances, the Founding Fathers would think weapons in private hands were a good idea at all. Many of our national beliefs and federal laws have changed substantially since the Revolution. It is anachronistic that this one should necessarily stay the same.