Anti-Semitism Czar Attacks Israel -- Wierd Choice

[Michael Tee]

<<if someone illegally enters my home I want the God given right to shoot his head off>>

Me too, but what if the guy is just some Japanese exchange student trick-or-treating?  What if, as actually happened here in Toronto, it's your wife who you thought was still asleep beside you and you shot in panic? 

What I meant was the correlation between one of the most liberal gun-control regimes in the industrialized world and one of the highest national homicide rates.

My "God-given right" to shoot the intruder's head off comes at the price of a lot of other homicides which kind of outweigh the pleasures of shooting intruders' heads off.  Real life isn't some kind of video game.  For every guy who is allowed by relaxed gun controls to blow away a home intruder, there are probably five or six other homicides of a much less gratifying nature.

[Kramer]

<<if someone illegally enters my home I want the God given right to shoot his head off>>

Me too, but what if the guy is just some Japanese exchange student trick-or-treating?  What if, as actually happened here in Toronto, it's your wife who you thought was still asleep beside you and you shot in panic? 

What I meant was the correlation between one of the most liberal gun-control regimes in the industrialized world and one of the highest national homicide rates.

My "God-given right" to shoot the intruder's head off comes at the price of a lot of other homicides which kind of outweigh the pleasures of shooting intruders' heads off.  Real life isn't some kind of video game.  For every guy who is allowed by relaxed gun controls to blow away a home intruder, there are probably five or six other homicides of a much less gratifying nature.

living has it's risks -- liberals tend to forget that

[Michael Tee]

<<living has it's risks -- liberals tend to forget that>>

Classic example of an oversimplification - - "Living has its risks."  NOBODY tends to forget that.  The point is that risks can be evaluated, classified, sorted by degree of probablility.

When you buy life insurance, do you just tell them your name and where to send the death benefit?  Before they sell you the policy, they want to know a whole shitload of things about you, Kramer.  Pages and pages.  Medical exams even.  They don't just say, "well, it's Kramer, and "living has its risks, so fuck it, let's give him the policy."   And guess what?  They're not liberals.  They're a fucking insurance company, but they organize their business around an approach to risk that is a little more sophisticated than your "living has its risks" bullshit.

Yeah, living has its risks, for the innocent shot down by a guy who never should have been able to even dream about owning a gun and also for the homeowner confronting an armed intruder.  And the intelligent approach is not, "What the hell, let them all have guns, because after all, "living has its risks."  The intelligent approach is to figure out how much mayhem we can anticipate if everyone can get a gun and how much mayhem we can anticipate if gun ownership is pretty tightly restricted.  Because we DO have the statistical tools to enable us to study and analyze the situation.  And what I suggested is that a country (the U.S.A.) with virtually no restrictions on gun ownership also has one of the highest national homicide rates in the world.  Which in turn suggests that maybe the gun ownership laws need to be radically revised.

[Amianthus]

a country (the U.S.A.) with virtually no restrictions on gun ownership

ROFLMAO

You really believe that propaganda, don't you?

[Rich]

>>It's ridiculous to feel that way?   You mean if you saw a six-foot-four, 250-lb. adult beating and kicking an 8-year-old child, you wouldn't want to step in and beat the shit out of the guy?  Or at least STOP the guy?<<

Of course not.

However, your analogy isn't even remotely similiar to  Israel. A more realistic analogy would be; a gang of thugs beating up a kid on his way home from school over decades of time. Wouldn't that kid have a right to defend humself or at least change it's root home?

[Michael Tee]

<<ROFLMAO

<<You really believe that propaganda, don't you?>>

I was speaking relatively, relative to other developed countries.  Why don't we just say it's a lot easier to acquire a gun in the U.S. than almost anywhere else in the world.  Here in Canada, for example, I have to apply for a Firearms Acquisition Certificate, which IIRC costs about $250, then submit to background police checks, answer questionnaires in writing and jump through some other hoops, before I can get a gun.

[Michael Tee]

<<However, your analogy isn't even remotely similiar to  Israel. A more realistic analogy would be; a gang of thugs beating up a kid on his way home from school over decades of time. Wouldn't that kid have a right to defend humself or at least change it's root home?>>

Well, obviously, we're never going to agree on the proper analogy, but leaving that aside, the point I was making was that when you see what  YOU consider to be a gross injustice, it's natural to want to jump in and intervene.  It's natural to sympathize with the victim and to attack the person YOU see as the aggressor.  And that would be the simplest explanation of why "liberals" and others would attack Israel, not some convoluted pop-psychology transference theory bullshit, that Israel represents "the rich" or "the corporations" or their uncaring mother or their ham-fisted father.

[Amianthus]

I was speaking relatively, relative to other developed countries.  Why don't we just say it's a lot easier to acquire a gun in the U.S. than almost anywhere else in the world.  Here in Canada, for example, I have to apply for a Firearms Acquisition Certificate, which IIRC costs about $250, then submit to background police checks, answer questionnaires in writing and jump through some other hoops, before I can get a gun.

That's a very similar procedure to that used in the US.

[Plane]

No correlation between your gun laws and your homicide rates, eh Kramer?

There is , but it is negative.

Citys that have very strict gun laws tend also to have very high violent crime rates.

Why would you expect otherwise?

[Michael Tee]

On a city-by-city basis, I think you've got the cart before the horse.  The cities adopt strict gun-control laws BECAUSE they have high rates of gun violence.  They hope that over time the restrictions will reduce the gun violence.

My thoughts were more on the national level.  The perception is it is very easy to get guns in the U.S. and that national homicide rate is extremely high.

[Plane]

On a city-by-city basis, I think you've got the cart before the horse.  The cities adopt strict gun-control laws BECAUSE they have high rates of gun violence.  They hope that over time the restrictions will reduce the gun violence.

My thoughts were more on the national level.  The perception is it is very easy to get guns in the U.S. and that national homicide rate is extremely high.

You are not being rational unless you include all the factors , not just the ones that appeal to you.
IN what american City were harsher anti gun measures followed by falling crime rates?

 

[Michael Tee]

<<You are not being rational unless you include all the factors , not just the ones that appeal to you.
<<IN what american City were harsher anti gun measures followed by falling crime rates?>>

I never advocated municipal gun control as any sort of solution, so I don't see that I have to explain its failure. 

The problem is national - - if I can buy a gun in Dallas it doesn't matter if I can't in Philadelphia.  That gun from Dallas will find me in Philly or wherever else I live through normal market forces.  Failure of municipal gun control is a red herring - - the issue is national gun control, not municipal gun control.

[BT]

the issue is national gun control, not municipal gun control.

The issue is the people who use guns to resolve problems. It's a cultural issue, not a choice of weapons issue.

[Michael Tee]

<<The issue is the people who use guns to resolve problems. >>

If you CHOOSE to make the people the issue, then that would be a legitimate issue.  But since the people are not easily persuaded out of their habits, if one of those habits is a resort to guns to resolve problems, then you have an issue that you can't resolve.  The people will always be who they are, and as long as they can get guns, they will use them as they have in the past.  Creating unacceptably high national homicide rates.

Or you could choose to make guns and not people the issue.  If the issue were guns, the control of the supply, while not a simple matter, could be achieved a lot easier than modifying the conduct of the people who use guns.   So I would say, faced with one issue you CAN'T control very easily, and one you CAN control, focus on that issue, drying up the gun supply.  My belief is, once that issue is resolved in favour of the public interest, the national homicide rate will go into a dramatic decline.

<<It's a cultural issue, not a choice of weapons issue.>>

So's smoking dope, but the legislature doesn't hestitate to take repressive action against all who follow the culture.  Not very effective, but I bet that's because dope is a lot more fun than guns and attracts many more users.

[BSB]

More gun control legislation is not on the current horizon. That may change, but it will take another turning of the wheel.