I guess we can have Charlton Heston's gun now...

[Adam]

Looking at the wider issue of gun ownership, I think the right to bear arms is taken too literally in the USA.  As an example, my father in law is a deputy sherriff in Wyoming.  He has a very extensive collection of guns that he does keep locked up securely, and when we're over there, he takes us out shooting in the desert - which is good fun.  

He personally agrees that it's daft he's allowed to have so many weapons and won't have a sub machine gun, but of course over there, it's not an issue to use a gun to stop someone breaking into your house.

Here, we have the saying an Englishman's home is his castle but no way of enforcing it, for fear (percived or otherwise) of infinging the criminal's human rights.

I can see where you're coming from with your comment Charlotte but that would only work if the citizens as a whole respected other people and their property more.   Social responsibility needs to be made a core part of education.

[Charlotte]

Given just how litigious the yanks are, gun ownership can be a surprisingly simple matter.  But if a legally armed citizen actually has to draw his or her weapon, let alone use it, you can bet that a lawsuit will almost certainly result.

Before being issued with a concealed carry permit, most states insist that you complete and pass a course, during which, amongst other things, it's impressed upon potential permit holders that drawing their weapon in public without lawful excuse and proper control is going to get them either bankrupted, imprisoned, shot or worse.  It's not the sort of thing that anyone takes lightly.

I'm as frightened of untrained people waving unlicensed guns around as the next cyclist.  But you still haven't persuaded me that legal and responsible gun ownership isn't a Good Thing.

And bear in mind, I'm talking gun ownership expressly for the purpose of self defense here - something that's not been allowed in Great Britain since WWII.  Any argument to deny responsible sporting gun ownership is even dafter IMHO.

[border-rider]

I'm as frightened of untrained people waving unlicensed guns around as the next cyclist

I'd be more frightened of trained people who've temporarily lost it waving licensed guns around, because there'll be an awful lot more of them.

We have a society of random violence and selfishness in this country.  Throw guns into the mix and it'd be just terrifying.

[Adam]

We have a society of random violence and selfishness in this country.  Throw guns into the mix and it'd be just terrifying.

Sadly, I agree.  If a licenced gun carrier gets cut up, what's to say he doesn't decide to wave his weapon around, or even just flash the holder, if he thinks he can get away with it without being spotted by anyone else.

[pcolbeck]

But you still haven't persuaded me that legal and responsible gun ownership isn't a Good Thing.

I think the issue is that people aren't always responsible. Someone can be responsible 99% of the time, certainly enough to get a license for a gun, but occasionally get drunk and irascible. Now you have an angry drunk with a gun. Things escalate they always do. If you have a lot of people with guns no matter how well intentioned there will be times when what would have been a punch will be a shot instead.

I am however with you on sporting guns in gun clubs. Banning them was just silly. Especially as almost anyone can can get a shotgun license.
 

[Charlotte]

I know I'm sounding like the devil's advocate here Pat, but hear me out because it's a matter of personal freedom and responsibility.

By your logic, we should prevent people owning cars because they might get drunk and drive them?

[PhilO]

Yep, we occasionally get police armed response units getting carried away and shooting the wrong person, now. 

I can't see how any system will ensure that gun owning members of the public are level-headed enough to carry in public, when we can't even ensure that it's foolproof with the police.

I'm going to wheel out my favourite quote on the subject, again:

Have you ever been in a pub where everyone goes armed? Oh, things are a little polite at first, ... then some twerp drinks out of the wrong mug or picks up someone else's change by mistake and five minutes later you're picking noses out of the beer nuts...

Commander Vimes, "Jingo", Terry Pratchett

[Adam]

because it's a matter of personal freedom and responsibility.

That's the key thing.  I don't disagree with the principle.  However the sad fact is we don't have a society able to act responsibly. 

"The needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few or the one" to quote Spock & Kirk (Star Trek II)

Too many people think they have a right to do what they want.

[andygates]

we should prevent people owning cars because they might get drunk and drive them?

Ah but that's an old chestnut - cars' primary purpose is to move people and stuff, and injury results only from errors or villainy.  Guns are weapons, and their primary purpose is to make people dead at a distance.

Convince us that people can be responsible - that's the challenge.  Unfortunately you've got a tough crowd here, because every day we see the humpties on the road who, despite training, exams, and a massive safety-design infrastructure, still manage to bollocks it up enough to justify the existence of organisations like Roadpeace.   

If there was a need to be armed, then this may be acceptable - just as there is a need to travel, so society finds the cost in lives acceptable.  But there isn't that need: no bandits or bears on my commute.

[Charlotte]

But Andy - you've no need to drive an eight litre Chevvy 4x4 pick up with bullbars and snow tyres either.  Such a vehicle could be argued to have no place on your daily commute.

But if there a freak snowfall and your life is in danger, with the appropriate skills and training, that vehicle could save yours or someone else's life, no?

I'm not talking about your right to own a firearm as a stand alone "this is my inalienable right" thing here (although it works for the yanks).  I'm saying that if I'm trained, responsible and accountable in the use of what is only a tool for making my life safer, why should my government deny me the protection that it affords?

I carry a resuscitation mask on the strap of my courier bag.  I've never had to use it and I hope I never will.  But I am trained to use it and one day, it may just save my life or the life of someone else.  That's a good enough reason for me.

[border-rider]

But Andy - you've no need to drive an eight litre Chevvy 4x4 pick up with bullbars and snow tyres either.  Such a vehicle could be argued to have no place on your daily commute.

That's the equivalent argument to carrying a small pistol vs an AK47. Not gun/not.

I'm saying that if I'm trained, responsible and accountable in the use of what is only a tool for making my life safer, why should my government deny me the protection that it affords?

Because most people don't want that to happen, and what governments are meant to do is to implement the social contract that binds us all. Same as why nanny state governments make me pay income tax. 

[Ian H]

I'd prefer to know that people around me were not armed. I'd be especially unhappy at the thought of anyone having a weapon that works at more than arm's length. Can you imagine the sort of carnage that could result when someone loses a wallet in a crowded street and tries to shoot the mugger who's running away?

[andygates]

I'm saying that if I'm trained, responsible and accountable in the use of what is only a tool for making my life safer, why should my government deny me the protection that it affords?

I disagree with the premise that a sidearm is a tool for making your life safer. 

If I agreed with it, I'd have to agree with your argument, but I don't - I think that the presence of weapons simply ups the ante on everything from deliberate confrontation all the way to jiggly-pannier cockup. 

FWIW, if I moved to the USA, I would probably play with guns, but only at the range or huntin', and just because they rock.  I would absolutely not daily-carry.

[PhilO]

I'm not talking about your right to own a firearm as a stand alone "this is my inalienable right" thing here (although it works for the yanks). 

Really? 

I have to say if that's a system that you think is 'working', then you've got to work even harder to convince me that people can be trusted with guns than you did before. 

[pcolbeck]

Carrying a weapon can also give people a false sense of security and so they get into arguments where unarmed they would back off. Then it escalates and bang someone's dead.