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Gun controll?

Architect said:
Nope. Stop playing around with semantics.
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Wasn't semantics, just trying to get a handle on it.

But it seems to me the default position of the government is you are not allowed to have a gun. Once you demonstrate a need, as defined by the government, then you are allowed one. Is this correct?

BTW, what's the point of blowing a grouse to pieces? Use smaller shot and you have something left to eat...
 
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WildCat said:
But it seems to me the default position of the government is you are not allowed to have a gun. Once you demonstrate a need, as defined by the government, then you are allowed one. Is this correct?
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I think that's basically right, yes. Edit: Fairer to say that you're not allowed to have a gun unless you have a certificate from the government to say you can have one. To get one of those it's not particularly "need" that's important so much as your perceived suitability.

BTW, what's the point of blowing a grouse to pieces? Use smaller shot and you have something left to eat...
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Glasgow Poacher's mix: 50-50 mix of birdseed and dynamite. Any leftover dynamite is good bait for salmon fishing.
 
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Architect said:
Indeed. In fact, our Highland economy relies on it.
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Not just the Highlands. So far as I know, the grouse are all genuinely wild, but other species (predominantly pheasants and partridges) are captive-bred then released so they can be shot at.

I had a game-bird cove turn up a few months ago bearing some dead pheasant chicks, looking for a diagnosis. (Personally I think they just suicided rather than be shot at....) When filling in the necessary paperwork, I asked him how many birds he had in total on the premises.

Answer, about 10,000.

And that was just one guy. Plenty more like him. No wonder adult pheasants are a serious road hazard in the autumn round here.

Rolfe.
 
Hi

fagin said:
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A permit is also fairly easy for a target pistol, but I think gear has to be kept at the gun club.
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Oh, those silly Olympic shooters! All they had to do was get a handgun permit!
 
WildCat said:
Wasn't semantics, just trying to get a handle on it.

But it seems to me the default position of the government is you are not allowed to have a gun. Once you demonstrate a need, as defined by the government, then you are allowed one. Is this correct?
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I guess it depends on how you want to present the argument. As someone said earlier.

The default position of the government is you are allowed to have a gun unless the government can show you are not fit.
 
Lothian said:
Not in the UK.
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Absolutely not.

Legitimate purposes for a gun include shooting at targets and murdering wildlife. They do not include shooting at people or intending to shoot at people, for any reason. Unless you are a member of the police or the armed forces. And even the police are not routinely armed, and not all police officers are trained or authorised to carry firearms.

What the US posters have to get their brains around is that we're happy about this. We do not want everyone, including the nutters, the disaffected teenagers and the boyfriend of the woman I asked to stop shouting outside my house at midnight last night to have guns. We consider the desire to keep a gun in the home or on the person for "self-defence" to be bordering on the psychopathic.

Whenever there is a shooting incident, the overwhelming outcry from the public is for even more gun control. If anyone suggests that perhaps legislation might be going a bit too far (Olympic target shooting teams for example), the retort is, you don't want this country to become like the USA, do you? And everyone shudders and backs off.

Rolfe.
 
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Rasmus55 said:
Is it not fine to own a gun for purposes of home self-defense in your opinion?
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As a matter of interest, even when I lived in South Africa, with rampant crime, self defence was not an acceptable reason to grant a gun licence.
The cop told me to lie and say shooting was a hobby. Duly granted. On a .38 special.
 
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Rasmus55 said:
Is it not fine to own a gun for purposes of home self-defense in your opinion?
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No, not in my opinion.

Before you ask, however, the law allows me to take reasonable steps to protect myself whether attacked or in the house. This is generally taken to mean walloping the person back, rather than gunning them down.
 
Rolfe said:
We do not want everyone, including the nutters, the disaffected teenagers and the boyfriend of the woman I asked to stop shouting outside my house at midnight last night to have guns. We consider the desire to keep a gun in the home or on the person for "self-defence" to be bordering on the psychopathic.
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We have laws against carrying knives too, albeit less successfully applied for obvious reasons of practicality. Just a quick nod to our CT chums when I say that Stanley Knives are your average ned's weapon of choice, or "chib" as I believe they call 'em.
 
Rolfe said:
What the US posters have to get their brains around is that we're happy about this. We do not want everyone, including the nutters, the disaffected teenagers and the boyfriend of the woman I asked to stop shouting outside my house at midnight last night to have guns. We consider the desire to keep a gun in the home or on the person for "self-defence" to be bordering on the psychopathic.

Whenever there is a shooting incident, the overwhelming outcry from the public is for even more gun control. If anyone suggests that perhaps legislation might be going a bit too far (Olympic target shooting teams for example), the retort is, you don't want this country to become like the USA, do you? And everyone shudders and backs off.
.
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That's been my experience with the Canadian ( urban at least ) attitude. We fail to see the wisdom of allowing our citizens to own guns like TEC9s and AR-15s when we all know their sole purpose is to put as many holes in as many people as fast as possible.

You gotta wonder why people feel a need for weapons like this. really if home defense is your thing, then a simple shotgun would do the trick quite nicely and it's my opinion that people who do own assault rifles and pistols are just itching to use them for their intended purpose.

Am I wrong on this ? Do people own offensive anti-personnel weapons with large capacity magazines just because they think they're "cool" ?
 
Stout said:
Am I wrong on this ? Do people own offensive anti-personnel weapons with large capacity magazines just because they think they're "cool" ?
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If they own them to put many holes in people they're failing miserably at the task.
 
richardm said:
Meanwhile, there were over 160,000 handguns handed in during the amnesties after they were banned but within two years of the banning of the final legal category (.22) crimes committed with handguns had risen by 40%.
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Have a a close look at that stat, most of the rise was in criems commited with non leathal items covred by the firearms act (blank guns, replicas and air weapons).
 
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Lothian said:
Not in the UK.
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Actually, I understand that it is not a legal purpose justifying ownership in the UK. What I meant to ask, and excuse more poor wording, was whether, in your opinion, owning a firearm for self-defense is a valid purpose as a matter of general principle. Just your opinion and not what the law says.
 
WildCat said:
If they own them to put many holes in people they're failing miserably at the task.
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They could very well be, I'm not up on the statistics of what type of guns are actually being used to put holes in people. I don't want to use Columbine ( or any other mass shootings as an example because, really, those can happen anywhere regardless of gun control.

It's just that those of who live in relatively unarmed societies don't understand the American passion for 2nd Amendment weapons and when we see articles like this we tend to wonder just what all the fascination with living in an armed society is.

I know both sides of this argument well, but I find the pro-gun attitude to be a very tough sell to those of us who live in countries where we don't feel it's our right to own weapons specifically for self defense.
 
Rasmus

Keep reading. The rest of us answered it.
 
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Rolfe said:
Absolutely not.

Legitimate purposes for a gun include shooting at targets and murdering wildlife. They do not include shooting at people or intending to shoot at people, for any reason. Unless you are a member of the police or the armed forces. And even the police are not routinely armed, and not all police officers are trained or authorised to carry firearms.

What the US posters have to get their brains around is that we're happy about this. We do not want everyone, including the nutters, the disaffected teenagers and the boyfriend of the woman I asked to stop shouting outside my house at midnight last night to have guns. We consider the desire to keep a gun in the home or on the person for "self-defence" to be bordering on the psychopathic.

Whenever there is a shooting incident, the overwhelming outcry from the public is for even more gun control. If anyone suggests that perhaps legislation might be going a bit too far (Olympic target shooting teams for example), the retort is, you don't want this country to become like the USA, do you? And everyone shudders and backs off.

Rolfe.
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Well, are there people in the UK who are not happy with this? I think the "we" really indicates you, some of your friends, and a possible majority but it is unlikely to account for all. Would be interesting to see what the polling on the subject shows; have any? You're right though; the last thing any country would want is to become like the US. In fact, I have no idea how the US could grant any immigrant visas, H1-B visas, student visas, and have such a terrible illegal immigration problem what with the guns and third world conditions. You're right, best to not be like the US.
 
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