Friday, December 14, 2012

Disarm

Nothing good ultimately comes from firearms.
 
Millions of human beings in the global South slaughter each other and innocents because of ready access of weapons and ammunition.

People, ill and 'sane' in the global North kill each other in smaller numbers and intellectualise the debate over the right to own and carry guns.

As if a device designed to kill living things, most often people, really deserves a place in our world.

"Responsible gun owners" are exactly that until the day they aren't. I suggest that any truly responsible gun owner would be campaigning to ban the things.

Hunters? Single shot rifles or shotguns are all you need. Or bow. Because you shouldn't be taking the shot if you think you need more in the magazine. 

Military and armed police? There'd be little use for your weapons in a disarmed world. 

Enough already.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would disagree that absolutely nothing good comes from firearms (if you've been as close as I've been to angry male polar bears you'd see where I'm coming from). Having more than one round one you is always a smart move in situations like that. However, having said that, clearly something needs to change. I think the issue her goes way beyond the gun control debate. This is simply a red herring and distracts from the real issue, which to me is building a more just a compassionate society. When people have their needs met and feel safe and secure I'm betting they'd be a lot less likely to solve their issues or take out their frustrations in violent way.

131220 said...

Compare with headline out of China today, where someone goes to a school and attacks 27 or so kids, but with a knife. "A doctor at Guangshan's hospital of traditional Chinese medicine said that seven students had been admitted, but that none were seriously injured."

Yup, it's about gun control.

Edstock said...

People forget that the US is 350 MILLION people. 350,000,000 — if the crazy that created that horror is 1 in 1,000,000, well, do the math. There's 349 more out there, as I type this.

Simply, with this large a population, there are more possibilities, and some of them are horrific. Add the TV/radio/newspapers/web media frenzy — and this will happen again.

In the US, owning a piece is a right; in Canada, it is a privilege. Since the 1920's owning a hand-gun in Canada has been severely restricted. Those that do get permits to own are not part of the problem: please do not vent your spleen on them, because of rage at the American craziness.

Boris said...

No, Ed, not just handguns. Modern firearms give anyone in possession of one the absolute power of immediate life and death over others. No one should have that power. We're far from immune in Canada as recent shootings show, including one I posted on the other day. And tens of millions have died because of widespread access to small arms around the world. We've never had such weapons in all of human history. They are an anomaly and except where needed for food provision or protection say polar bears, I now believe should be given up and destroyed.

Evil Brad said...

Edstock is exactly right. We already have very stringent firearms laws here in Canada. Far moreso than the US, even had the recently proposed modest changes been adopted. The lack of such laws in the US and the active warzones you refer to makes them completely irrelevant to Canada.
This kind of emotionalism on the part of the anti-gun lobby is exactly what creates so much illwill in this country to any and all firearms regulation, be it reasonable or not.
To insist that this is the time for Americans to discuss gun control is completely legitimate; it is not ghoulish, as some pro-gun fanatics insist. However, I can't say the same about your attempt to implicate Canada's legal firearms owners in these tragedies.