I own a gun!

DaN K. StAnLeY said:
With conditions in the world being as they are, I seriously don't see how anyone could believe its safer to not own a gun. It's like an episode of Survivorman I saw. Les didn't want to take a rifle with him into the Arctic wild, but he sure was glad he brought it when he woke up and saw polar bear tracks 30 feet from his camp site. Sure, nobody wants to have to kill someone, but isn't it irresponsible of someone not to want to defend themselves or their family?
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but somethimes a gun can let a situation escalate.

someone breaks into your house and steals your stuff. But doesnt want to kill or hurt you. But you hear him take your gun and go downstairs. he now fells threathed by your gun, just hope your quicker than he is and aim better than he does.
would you just stayed in your bed, he wuld have gone, and the insurance pays for your loses. police will try to catch him.

so i can also say a gun is creating a bigger danger for you and your family.
(nonthe less i can see your point, and it is a valid point in some situations i guess)
 
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but when guns make you so much saver, im sure the USA have alot less Burglary cases than countrys with less gun owners. or not?
 
RoboTimbo said:
Shall we get into the anecdote and what-if comparisons? Sometimes a gun can stop a situation from escalating. I win.
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sometimes it does yes. but sometimes the opposite.

i just try to find an oppinion :D

because i can see and understand somehow both sides. and im not sure to wath side i belong to :D
 
Oliver said:
Hunting

Sport Shooting: Yes, but there is no need to keep those guns at home, is there?
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Yes there is. Most of the gun owners locally have some kind of range behind or next to their houses (This is a rural area). Apart from convenience of taking the firearm from the closet or wherever and walking out the backdoor to do some target shooting, where else would these firearms be kept? There are no local police here (which supports the self-defense argument) so there's no place to store firearms "off site".

But there's an even more compelling reason: If you are a serious target shooter you will want to do a LOT of "dry firing" in between actual live fire shooting. Most of us in this category will dry fire if not every day, certainly several times a week. It involves hanging a target on an inside wall and practice shooting with your competition firearm with no round in the chamber. Not very easy to do if your rifle or pistol is somewhere other than your home.
 
RoboTimbo said:
I can respect that. I'd rather have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
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mmhh.
indeed.

On the other hand, if bad boys know most people have a gun at home. they will prepare for that, cause it seems not to stop em anyway from trying to break in your house. so they will come with guns for sure. and they are prolly prepare to pull the triger pretty quickly.
 
Rolfe said:
I've had this argument often enough to know that there's no changing the Merikans' minds. And besides, Drudgewire and Gagglenash are nice, and funny, and I want to cuddle them.
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Yeah, that's one of the things I love about this place. I used to get really passionate about this sort of debate but I have so much respect for the people at JREF (who can get pissed at anyone like Rolfe with such a cool cat avatar?) it's really taken the vitriol out of it and given me pause to respect the opposite side and take their views into consideration. :)
 
Dictator Cheney said:
mmhh.
indeed.

On the other hand, if bad boys know most people have a gun at home. they will prepare for that, cause it seems not to stop em anyway from trying to break in your house. so they will come with guns for sure. and they are prolly prepare to pull the triger pretty quickly.
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Quite the contrary. The criminals are the other group who would most like for honest citizens not to be armed. Guess who the first group is?
 
DaN K. StAnLeY said:
I'm not sure but you've got at least one example in this thread already.
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I can add a second example. When I was a teenager I had a handgun as well as a couple of hunting firearms. That handgun saved my Mother during a home invasion one day while I was in school. No need to go into details here, but not a shot was fired, and the police (who finally showed up half an hour after she had chased off the two druggies who had entered the house) told her having a handgun had saved her from rape, serious injury or possibly death.
 
but somethimes a gun can let a situation escalate.

someone breaks into your house and steals your stuff. But doesnt want to kill or hurt you. But you hear him take your gun and go downstairs. he now fells threathed by your gun, just hope your quicker than he is and aim better than he does.
would you just stayed in your bed, he wuld have gone, and the insurance pays for your loses. police will try to catch him.

so i can also say a gun is creating a bigger danger for you and your family.
(nonthe less i can see your point, and it is a valid point in some situations i guess)
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That's when you have to rely on what you've learned and try and put yourself in the safest situation you can. There is really no guarantee that you'll even hear the low-life breaking into your house, but my point is that it's irresponsible not, at least, to give yourself the ability to protect yourself.
 
DaN K. StAnLeY said:
That's when you have to rely on what you've learned and try and put yourself in the safest situation you can. There is really no guarantee that you'll even hear the low-life breaking into your house, but my point is that it's irresponsible not, at least, to give yourself the ability to protect yourself.
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And with that ability comes responsibility. We have a legal system which means criminal and civil ramifications are attached to gun usage. Even in what might seem on the surface to be a valid self-defense situation, depending on where you live or who is your local prosecutor it could lead to huge legal bills or even jail time if it's decided you had other options.

Responsible gun owners aren't looking for a reason to turn their gun on anyone. It's simply a last resort we sleep better at night knowing we have.
 
Hamradioguy said:
I can add a second example. When I was a teenager I had a handgun as well as a couple of hunting firearms. That handgun saved my Mother during a home invasion one day while I was in school. No need to go into details here, but not a shot was fired, and the police (who finally showed up half an hour after she had chased off the two druggies who had entered the house) told her having a handgun had saved her from rape, serious injury or possibly death.
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You know, I've noticed that a lot of the people who claim that we don't need legal guns because 'the police can handle it' never really think this thought experiment through. Some of us live in rural areas and it takes the police at least twenty minutes to get here if the drive straight here from the nearest station and aren't on patrol on the opposite end of their route. Some of us live in areas where bears do get rabies and will break through doors to get at the refrigerator.

When they think of guns, all they think of are their own experience with them. They think of the drug dealers, the gangs, the criminals who use them to kill each other and innocents, as if that is the totality of gun experience.

The police aren't always five minutes away. Also, the shooting range isn't always five minutes away. It would suck to have to drive all the way to the shooting range every time I wanted to plink.
 
After the last thread like this, the very idea of going to America spooked me massively. The people who live there were making it out to be a wild, lawless, dangerous place where your chances of having your home "invaded" or being shot by a spooked home-owner were high.

I went to Michigan for just over a week. Had a great time. As far as I know, my hosts had no firearms in the house, which was big and isolated in six acres of land. The subject was never mentioned. I saw no violence and no incidents of any kind. (I was, however, careful about where I went, knowing that the US lacks our "right to roam", and not wanting chased off someone's land by a gun-wielding redneck.)

Mind you. the last time I was in the USA, visiting a different friend, Tennessee, she told us where she kept her gun and also that she always voted Republican because she would never give up the gun, this in the middle of a quiet residential suburb with many nice houses and small gardens.

I have no idea. The idea of wanting a gun in the house would never cross my mind. Nor that of most people in my country. I would really hate to live my life as some Americans seem to, constantly afraid that some armed intruder is going to burst into my house.

Rolfe.
 
Rolfe said:
I have no idea. The idea of wanting a gun in the house would never cross my mind. Nor that of most people in my country. I would really hate to live my life as some Americans seem to, constantly afraid that some armed intruder is going to burst into my house.

Rolfe.
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I'm not constantly afraid, that's what I have the gun for.* :p

Seriously, is that the way you want to frame it? That people only want guns because they're scared? Gun owners are cowards?

One can be perfectly content without a gun, but that doesn't mean you are irrationally afraid if you feel safer with one around. Just like a fire extinguisher. Does having three of those in my house mean that I'm constantly in fear of the place burning down? No, it isn't likely, but I'm still prepared if it started to.

*No, I don't own guns for self defense. I don't own a handgun, just two long arms, and they are both .22. I have them for fun. The sword hung above my bed however...
 
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tyr_13 said:
No, I don't own guns for self defense. I don't own a handgun, just two long arms, and they are both .22. I have them for fun.
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So you have guns for exactly the same reason as I posited before: Because you want to.

And I haven't seen a serious attempt to explain why that's not a good enough reason (I don't consider comparing me to Iran with nuclear weapons to be a serious argument).
 
BPSCG said:
So you have guns for exactly the same reason as I posited before: Because you want to.

And I haven't seen a serious attempt to explain why that's not a good enough reason (I don't consider comparing me to Iran with nuclear weapons to be a serious argument).
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In America, that's a good enough reason.

I try to think globally and make allowances for people from other countries' opinions. As long as they are aware that their opinion should only go as far as their own borders. I don't mean that to sound snide, just that different circumstances dictate different solutions. I don't see people from Arizona on here telling Euros that they should go around armed. I would only ask the same consideration in return from them.
 
tyr_13 said:
Does having three of those in my house mean that I'm constantly in fear of the place burning down? No, it isn't likely, but I'm still prepared if it started to.
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Hehehe, speaking from personal experience that analogy drives 'em nuts. :D
 
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