Gun controll?

[jimbob]

Architect,

Borneo, 1966

 

[Rolfe]

One thing that many forigen posters fail to realize is that the US is a much different country from yours. We have a horribly broken criminal justice system, the worst income equality of any first world nation, draconian drug laws, and more land to govern than two European Unions. Things that will work for you probably aren't going to work for us.

Uh, yes, what Lothian said.

And according to G'Kar, a horrendously expensive yet utterly useless public healthcare system, and politicians who are so utterly incompetent that he wouldn't trust them to run the proverbial whelk stall never mind improve healthcare delivery.

And according to quite a few other people a health insurance system that leaves many sick people lacking cover, imposes a serious burden on the businesses which are expected to fund this insurance for their employees, and locks people into jobs they hate because the job is their only access route to healthcare.

You know, it's quite amazing what you learn on the internet. There was I, hearing Americans boast about their wonderful country, and being a trusting little soul I mostly believed it.

How wrong can you get?

Rolfe.

 

[Rufo]

Hi

You don't need firearms to start a revolution.

Better have some lined up. It's the only way you're going to get the tanks, planes, artillery, ammunition, better guns, land mines and all the other stuff people say a modern revolution would have to face.

Revolutions are born of ideas, but they don't START until someone takes a stand.

You can take a stand without firearms. You can take a stand without weapons, if you like.

And if there is any reason to fear your government is going to become totalitarian and undemocratic, I really think there are more urgent things to take care of than getting a gun and learning to use it.

This....“Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

So I guess you're not one of those who are worried about fascists?

 

[Lothian]

Hi



Ummm... Ok. you guys have about 50 gun murders per year. Where are you getting the accidental gun death information?

I have not given any current accidental figures I have not been able to find any. 50 is the total gun murders in the UK annually

Going from 50 to 216 sounds more like a total population multiplier of your 60, maybe 61 million to out 303 million.

50 to 216 is simply taking the 50 deliberate murders in the UK and adding 166 which is the number you get by applying your 1 out of 366,000 accidental gun death rate to the UK.

Ok - again - is the 50 number accidental, intentional or total?

Intentional only

Passing a law taking away 65 million handguns and requiring licensing and imposing storage and inspection requirements on another 202 million or so firearms would royally piss off a fifth to a third of the voting public.

I think it SHOULD piss of any Americans interested in things like freedom, liberty and stuff like that, but yeah - that's just me.

...and if the police get to come into the house without warning (that's why I asked), then that's WORSE than we treat convicted criminals! Even parolees, who are still officially serving prison sentences, get search warrants, and thus assumptions of innocence and requirements of probable cause, before the police come through the door.

How would you sell that to the American Public to save 800 (actual accidental, rounded up) deaths per year?

I have no interest whatsoever in changing the gun laws in the USA. While I have opinions I do not know enough to try to persuade any American that they should either carry or give up their weapons.

When it comes to the UK it is a different story I don't want more liberal gun laws here and I will defend my corner (but not with a gun).

 

[Architect]

Indeed, I hear that voting is usually the best way.

 

[littlehulkster]

To be fair I think a lot of us foreigner do realise that. I think the problem is that many US posters fail to realize is that the US is a much different country from ours. You have a horribly broken criminal justice system, the worst income equality of any first world nation, draconian drug laws, and more land to govern than two European Unions. Things that work for you probably aren't going to work for us.

Except I'm not the one suggesting that you make enormous, far reaching legal reforms which would require modifying the supreme document of law in your country.

Uh, yes, what Lothian said.

And according to G'Kar, a horrendously expensive yet utterly useless public healthcare system, and politicians who are so utterly incompetent that he wouldn't trust them to run the proverbial whelk stall never mind inprove healthcare delivery.

And according to quite a few other people a health insurance system that leaves many sick people lacking cover, imposes a serious burden on the businesses which are expected to fund this insurance for their employees, and locks people into jobs they hate because the job is their only access route to healthcare.

You know, it's quite amazing what you learn on the internet. There was I, hearing Americans boast about their wonderful country, and being a trusting little soul I mostly believed it.

How wrong can you get?

Rolfe.

The UK has it's own share of problems too, my friend. Your government is just a little better at hiding them behind the public perception of quaint cottages, venerable monarchs and bad teeth. The only time I've honestly feared for my life was when I took a wrong turn into a seedy part of London, and my travels have taken me to some pretty rough countries.

 

[Gagglegnash]

Hi

... snip ...
I have no interest whatsoever in changing the gun laws in the USA. While I have opinions I do not know enough to try to persuade any American that they should either carry or give up their weapons.

When it comes to the UK it is a different story I don't want more liberal gun laws here and I will defend my corner (but not with a gun).

The we are in accord! Hands off each other's gun laws.

 

[Rolfe]

You see these all as good things "minimum holidays" are you kidding? WOW. Do you get off for the 4th of July?

Why would we want off on the 4th of July? Should we? (There's some talk about the 6th of April I believe....)

What Architect said and more. The going rate these days is actually 5 weeks paid holiday (25 days), plus 8 public holidays on top. And there is pressure to increase the number of public holidays because we have the lowest of all the EU.

This is holiday. It is quite distinct from sick leave, which you get over and above that if you are sick. (And maternity leave and paternity leave and adoption leave and special dispensations for flexible working if you're a carer of a young child, an elderly person or a disabled person.)

One of the several things I learned about the US which shocked me was that 2 weeks "PTA" seems to be standard. I had to ask what "PTA" was. "Paid time away", apparently. One must fit not only one's holidays into that, but any illnesses one plans (or doesn't plan) on suffering from. Oh, and one is not expected to take the entire two weeks as a single block.

No wonder most US citizens don't have passports! What the hell would the poor souls do with them?

Let's hear it for the work ethic and all that, but isn't that taking it a bit far? You guys really need to set aside some of that PTA to see how it is outside the gulag.

When I said going into the future, I didn't mean socialism. I meant technologically.

You'll be moving to Japan, then?

Rolfe.

 

[The Painter]

You've deftly ignored the healthcare, the welfare systems, and so on. And incidentally, typically in the UK paid holiday entitlement is 4 weeks plus statutory holidays, so at least 27 all round - the legal minimum is a bit less - which knocks the States into a hat. The French take an extra fortnight on top of that. Want to hear about statutory sick pay? Statutory maternity pay?

I didn’t deftly ignore anything. Here’s a new word for you…Socialism. Some of the things you mention…got it, got it, need it, got it. Here’s the difference, you take pride in the number of days off from work you get. We take pride in what we have accomplished. You won’t understand, but I try anyway.

Name some technology we don't have in Western Europe

Sewage treatment. It stinks over there.

 

[Lothian]

Except I'm not the one suggesting that you make enormous, far reaching legal reforms which would require modifying the supreme document of law in your country.

Neither am I.

 

[The Painter]

One of the several things I learned about the US which shocked me was that 2 weeks "PTA" seems to be standard. I had to ask what "PTA" was. "Paid time away", apparently. One must fit not only one's holidays into that, but any illnesses one plans (or doesn't plan) on suffering from. Oh, and one is not expected to take the entire two weeks as a single block.

I don't know where you get your info, but you are a bit off base. PTA means "parent teachers association" it's a school and kids thing. 2 weeks vacation ( you call it holiday) does not include sick time., and 2 weeks is a starting point and goes up every year

one is not expected to take the entire two weeks as a single block

People take a month off at a clip. Your view is very distorted.

 

[Rolfe]

Except I'm not the one suggesting that you make enormous, far reaching legal reforms which would require modifying the supreme document of law in your country.

This thread is/was about the false implication that there was some gun control issue here similar to the insanity that seems to rule in the US, and from which the US might learn.

Most of the thread has been devoted to explaining to you that this is not the case, and in fact the situation in Britain is something you guys don't seem to understand at all.

We've had posters then trying to persuade us that we should be paranoid, scared and armed to the teeth, though I think most of us decided to pass on that.

I'm not sure I noticed anyone suggesting that you guys should "make enormous, far reaching legal reforms which would require modifying the supreme document of law in your country" anywhere at all, actually. Why do you have to turn this discussion into an accusation that people want you to change?

The UK has it's own share of problems too, my friend. Your government is just a little better at hiding them behind the public perception of quaint cottages, venerable monarchs and bad teeth. The only time I've honestly feared for my life was when I took a wrong turn into a seedy part of London, and my travels have taken me to some pretty rough countries.

So you've conveniently forgotten the posts one (female) London-based poster made in another thread where she described her complete lack of concern about walking around such areas alone at night? Did anything actually happen to you in this "seedy" part of London, or were you just pissing your pants about nothing?

I spent ages 11 to 28 travelling into Glasgow alone on public transport to school and university. I often stayed late after classes to visit the theatre, involving hanging around some pretty dingy dives in the interim. Never once did I see or hear anything of any concern, beyond a bunch of football fans once jumping down on to the railway tracks in a station.

I lived in south-east England for 25 years, near London, and again travelled alone into London in the evenings by public transport frequently. Taken a few wrong turns in my time too. Tracked down innumerable cheap pub rooms and similar in creepy suburbs, the latest place we'd decided maybe we could afford for our political meetings. Once saw one guy push another into a plate-glass window in the red light district near King's Cross. Walked on, completely unmolested. That's it.

So who knows the reality behind the "public perception" better, you or me?

Remember, this thread is actually about a false, lying and generally fictitious representation of the situation in Britain being peddled to your gullible and vulnerable countrymen. I think you've been watching too much YouTube yourself.

Rolfe.

 

[Gagglegnash]

Hi

You can take a stand without firearms. You can take a stand without weapons, if you like.

Yes, you ABSOLUTELY can take a stand with out weapons!

I quite prefer the tiny little ones we have here every few years, though.

And if there is any reason to fear your government is going to become totalitarian and undemocratic, I really think there are more urgent things to take care of than getting a gun and learning to use it.

So I guess you're not one of those who are worried about fascists?

Actually, it isn't me that's worried about the government misusing it's powers to the detriment of the people. It was the people who wrote this country's Constitution that were.

Great whopping batches of it were specifically designed to limit future government's ability to do so, and that whole Second Amendment thing was sometimes referred to as, "the palladium of all other rights."

(I'm pretty sure that they meant palladium as the thing that defends, preserves and protects stuff rather than the somewhat newer movie-theatrical meaning, but I could be wrong.)

oh - and - I'm not worried about much of anyone.

I've got GUNS!

 

[Rolfe]

I don't know where you get your info, but you are a bit off base. PTA means "parent teachers association" it's a school and kids thing. 2 weeks vacation ( you call it holiday) does not include sick time., and 2 weeks is a starting point and goes up every year

People take a month off at a clip. Your view is very distorted.

I got it from the friend I was staying with in Tennessee, who was explaining her employment conditions to me. She works as a technologist in a large hospital. She was trying to get two weeks off in one block to visit Europe, and managed to do that, but it was her whole allocation for the year.

She then had to cancel the holiday when she suffered a flare-up of her chronic lupus, and was told she must have two weeks rest. She spent the two weeks in bed, and that was her holiday gone. No more time off.

I thought "PTA" meant "parent teacher association" too, which is why I asked her what she was on about.

I'll gladly learn better. Is Tennessee some sort of sweat-shop ghetto or something?

Rolfe.

 

[Rolfe]

Actually, it isn't me that's worried about the government misusing it's powers to the detriment of the people. It was the people who wrote this country's Constitution that were.

Great whopping batches of it were specifically designed to limit future government's ability to do so, and that whole Second Amendment thing was sometimes referred to as, "the palladium of all other rights."

Why are you so hung up on the hang-ups of a bunch of 19th century politicians (or was it 18th century? - it's past my bedtime here).

Progress, you know. Moving on. Finding the right solutions for present concerns rather than hanging grimly on to someone else's perceived solutions to 200-years-in-the-past problems.

I thought progress was what you guys were about, but I guess that's another illusion shattered.

Rolfe.

 

[Gagglegnash]

Hi

Why are you so hung up on the hang-ups of a bunch of 19th century politicians (or was it 18th century? - it's past my bedtime here).

Progress, you know. Moving on. Finding the right solutions for present concerns rather than hanging grimly on to someone else's perceived solutions to 200-years-in-the-past problems.

I thought progress was what you guys were about, but I guess that's another illusion shattered.

Rolfe.

...ummm... so we don't wind up under a Nanny Government?

Oh - and - yeah - Britain is held up by the anti-gun people as the Bright and Shining Crime-Free Promised land because they gave up their guns, and the by the NRA as the Grasping, Ravenous, Liberty-Reducing, Freedom-Eliminating Beast that...

Oh...

My...

GOD!

Rolfe! You were RIGHT!

IT IS ALL ABOUT YOU!

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Hi




...ummm... so we don't wind up under a Nanny Government?

Oh - and - yeah - Britain is held up by the anti-gun people as the Bright and Shining Crime-Free Promised land because they gave up their guns, and the by the NRA as the Grasping, Ravenous, Liberty-Reducing, Freedom-Eliminating Beast that...

Oh...

My...

GOD!

Rolfe! You were RIGHT!

IT IS ALL ABOUT YOU!

You're raving and not making much sense I'm afraid.

Of course you probably think you're "winning" this argument, and even if I stated you aren't, you would still think you were getting one over on the Brits.

You're a real oddity.

 

[Rolfe]

Yeah, I want to do all those things. Fortunately, I've recovered from zeitgeist for the most part. And I'm going to do those things when I get my Grade 12 and I figure out exactly what it is I want to be doing with my life.

Also, I'm planning on dissecting zeitgeist later this year.

I only watched that NRA lying garbage you mentioned in your OP. If you want anyone to watch anything else, linky? Not saying I will, but giving me something to click increases the chances.

ARE YOU SAYING YOUR ONE OF THE "ONE-DAY" HERETICS?! BLASPHEMY! TIME CUBE IS THE ONLY TRUTH!

I suddenly feel quite a lot better about you! Just lighten up and realise that not all nutters with an agenda are quite as obvious as that guy.

Rolfe.

 

[littlehulkster]

This thread is/was about the false implication that there was some gun control issue here similar to the insanity that seems to rule in the US, and from which the US might learn.

Most of the thread has been devoted to explaining to you that this is not the case, and in fact the situation in Britain is something you guys don't seem to understand at all.

We've had posters then trying to persuade us that we should be paranoid, scared and armed to the teeth, though I think most of us decided to pass on that.

Actually, I've been trying to dispel the misconception that we are paranoid, scared and armed to the teeth.

So you've conveniently forgotten the posts one (female) London-based poster made in another thread where she described her complete lack of concern about walking around such areas alone at night? Did anything actually happen to you in this "seedy" part of London, or were you just pissing your pants about nothing?

I was mugged at knifepoint by a young man, actually. He was unsatisfied with the amount of money I had in my wallet (I make it a habit of not carrying anything of great value in there when travelling) and began making threats.

It was unfortunate for him that I am well trained in the handling of knife armed men (Such is the consequence of working in prisons for years) and I was a rather talented boxer as a young man. I later called the police, but nothing much ever came of it.

I've travelled to places such as Vietnam, Russia, Lithuania, Botswana and Brazil. London is the only place I've ever had a crime more serious than pickpocketing committed on my person.

I spent ages 11 to 28 travelling into Glasgow alone on public transport to school and university. I often stayed late after classes to visit the theatre, involving hanging around some pretty dingy dives in the interim. Never once did I see or hear anything of any concern, beyond a bunch of football fans once jumping down on to the railway tracks in a station.

I lived in south-east England for 25 years, near London, and again travelled alone into London in the evenings by public transport frequently. Taken a few wrong turns in my time too. Tracked down innumerable cheap pub rooms and similar in creepy suburbs, the latest place we'd decided maybe we could afford for our political meetings. Once saw one guy push another into a plate-glass window in the red light district near King's Cross. Walked on, completely unmolested. That's it.

So who knows the reality behind the "public perception" better, you or me?

Remember, this thread is actually about a false, lying and generally fictitious representation of the situation in Britain being peddled to your gullible and vulnerable countrymen. I think you've been watching too much YouTube yourself.

Rolfe.

I could tell you a similar story about my time in America.

Perhaps you've been watching too many cowboy movies?

 

[The Painter]

I got it from the friend I was staying with in Tennessee, who was explaining her employment conditions to me.

So you take the conditions of one person and extrapolate it to a population of over 300 million people. Are you insane?