A firearm question for you LeftiesFollow

I haven't won EVERY abortion thread, you give me too much credit.

The only thing that happens in threads you "contribute" to is that everybody loses.

They do as they're paid to do

They make the bad calls to make the real mods look good. Conspiracy scam liberal etc etc.

Given that ownership of the deadly physical object *is* an enfranchised right of citizenship (enumerated even!), aren't you making my case for me?

No. Do you really not see why? Hard to believe you'd even pretend to be that rock fucking stupid, but if you insist, I guess we'll go with it.

I wouldn't worry about it. He's just trying to find multiple ways to work enumerated into his posts. I don't believe he even knows what it means.

No. I honestly do not. Could you please spell out for me how owning a firearm (which is an enumerated right) and voting (which you call an "enfranchised right of citizenship") are not similar at the very least by the fact that both are rights? That one consists of "ownership of a deadly physical object" is irrelevant since that's precisely what the 2nd amendment right is about.

I'll note (again) that I did not say they were identical, or even "nearly identical". I said that they were similar in one specific way and have restricted my comparison of the two to that aspect.

Edited, Feb 25th 2013 3:32pm by gbaji

Ok, so they're both rights (I'd not give that kind of power to the second amendment but just lets say). Now what?

It would seem we made the case for using the vote as our tool to govern rather than the gun way back when we started the country. I think that was a wise choice. Do you want to change the system now?

Seems to me under the current constitution a vote has far more 'right' than a gun - even weighing in the silly 2nd amendment. You can't really believe that we're allowed to own guns so we can defend ourselves from our tyrannical government? Our vote is what stands between us and a non democratic way of life - not guns. There's no equality when one person has a gun and the other doesn't. Guns (as weapons) provide power that is antithetical to the vote.

Besides as you so stubbornly refuse to acknowledge you're talking in metaphor. A gun is a tangible thing - a dangerous thing - unlike a vote. We restrict and track dangerous things. That makes the two 'rights' different enough to be incomparable in any useful sense.

Of course not. I'm suggesting that absent an armed populace which *could* choose to vote with their guns rather than by writing on scraps of paper, the power of writing on scraps of paper can be eliminated without any means to prevent it (except for writing on yet more scraps of paper, which I hope you can see might be problematic in this scenario).



Quick aside: This kind of language is why pro-gun rights folks don't believe when people insist that they have no intention to eliminate/weaken the 2nd amendment, they just want to <insert regulation of the moment>. Just saying.



Sigh. That's precisely why the 2nd amendment exists.




How can your vote stand between you and a non democratic way of life? Seriously. Stop and think about that. Voting is an outgrowth of a democratic system of government, but voting does not cause democracy to exist, nor does it prevent it from failing to exist. You can't vote your way out of dictatorship, nor will voting prevent a dictator from taking power. You're foolish to think so.



In a democracy, there's no equality when one person has a vote and the other doesn't. Funny how that works.



Guns empower those who own them. In a free society, where everyone is allowed to own them, then that power is spread evenly. In a society where only some are allowed to own them (like say the police or military), then that power is spread unevenly. Similarly, in a society where everyone is allowed to vote, the power of voting is spread evenly, while one in which only some are allowed to vote, it is not. Do I need to continue with the analogy, or is this sufficient to make my point?

As long as you and I are both free to own guns then we're both equal. That you may choose not to while I do is no different than me choosing to vote while you choose not to.



Yes. Which means a gun is still useful and dangerous and powerful even if the government should choose to ignore the results of a vote. They are different in that way. Um... But that's part of the point here, guns still work as a means of the people keeping their government honest in cases where votes do not. Think of it as a safety net for democracy. We don't want to have to use it, but if we should find ourselves in a situation where our votes cease to matter, we've not put all our eggs in that one ineffectual basket.

No.

I'm a little surprised that people continue to think this is a good counter argument. Me owning a gun? No. 50 million people owning guns? Yes.



Where exactly are they going to be firing those nuclear weapons and unarmed drones? Let's remember to assume that this is some kind of coup in which the dictator to be actually wants to have a country to rule when all is done. I'm honestly curious why kind of scenario you think is going to go down in which the kinds of arms currently owned by private citizens all over the US would not create a massive hindrance to some would be dictator attempting to take complete control. There are far more scenarios where current privately owned firearms would make this nearly impossible for him to succeed than there are where those weapons would have no effect at all.