“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed one.”
—Cesare Beccaria, recorded by Thomas Jefferson in his Legal Commonplace Book1
The topic of gun rights/control is one I assumed pretty much everyone in the anti-tyranny/pro-freedom movement would be in agreement on. A lively comment exchange at a recent el gato malo post proved otherwise, however.
Every story they present serves a narrative. Every fact that threatens those narratives is suppressed. Every journalist of integrity knows this as a certainty.
Ethics in journalism is extinct in the mainstream media. It is an absolute impossibility to publish a story that violates the iron-clad laws to serve their corporate sponsors and government masters. They are unadulterated propagandists. That is why old-school reporters who care about ethics, facts, and balance like Sharyl Attkinson, Rebecca Strong, and Sally Beck leave.
Two+ years of COVID propagandizing have made this obvious to the hypnosis-resistant. The media flood the public consciousness with fear smut by constantly reporting death and case counts based on fraudulent data from cooked PCR tests; deaths “with” not “of” COVID; and fatalities caused by lethal protocols (not COVID). Simultaneously, they hide the millions of injuries and tens of thousands of deaths proven by the Bradford Hill criteria to have been caused by the experimental injections.
This is how they control a narrative. It is absolutely no different when it comes to gun rights.
Just like with COVID, the media only reports gun crimes. It never shows the staggering numbers of instances in which victims have defended their lives from criminals, saved others’ lives by stopping mass shooters in their tracks, and defended citizens from tyranny throughout history. They also scarcely report the massive numbers of knife crimes and homicides committed by other means such as vehicles.
2) The media pushes gun control—another wedge issue created to divide us—through emotionally manipulative, triggering reporting engineered to manufacture consent for gun restrictions.
When people are bombarded with tragedy, their higher reasoning faculties shut down. Anyone who tries to calmly discuss the topic of gun rights in this atmosphere is likely to be perceived as callous. It is during this emotionally charged window that the politicians and propagandists push hardest for gun control laws. This is Problem Reaction Solution in action.
Case in point—Tyrant Trudeau has already leapt into action, right on cue, saying, “It will no longer be possible to buy, sell, transfer, or import handguns anywhere in Canada.”
The possibility that some of these lightning-rod events are LIHOP or MIHOP false-flag alphabet operations is irrelevant when it comes to the argument for gun rights, and veering off into what is considered conspiratorial territory by normies will cause people on the other side of the debate to tune out and shut down. That doesn’t mean these are invalid lines of inquiry, just that it will derail the conversation and give them an excuse to dismiss you as a “conspiracy theorist.”
Even those who have bought the narrative, however, can probably agree the media is primarily responsible for creating the psychological conditions in which tragedies such as mass murders occur and seeding the lust for notoriety among the mentally deranged.
3) Organizations like the NRA profit from the threats to take away gun rights, so they can’t be trusted, either, and are guilty of their own form of fear smut.
The Yankee Marshal provides a fairly balanced perspective on proposed gun legislation and which bills constitute genuine threats. That doesn’t mean I agree with everything he says. He’s wrong about his faith in the injection, for example, but he is against mandates, which is consistent with his views on the Second Amendment.
4) Every totalitarian, genocidal regime in modern history has first disarmed its citizens. It is a prerequisite to accomplishing tyranny.
5) Gun laws do not stop criminals from acquiring them. Gun laws do not stop mass murders from occurring. They only stop law-abiding citizens from being able to defend themselves. This is precisely what tyrannical governments desire.
6) The constitutional framers understood these precepts so deeply, they enshrined them in the Second Amendment as a means of preserving the First.
7) Over the past two years, the countries that ratcheted up the tyranny most rapidly were those that had predominantly disarmed its citizens.
8) Gun restrictions serve despotic regimes, not the people. If you care about defending yourself, your loved ones, your freedom, and your autonomy, preserving gun rights is a matter of life or death.
I didn’t always hold these views. Like most people, I was once carried along by the propaganda and mistakenly thought more guns = more bloodshed. It wasn’t until I woke up to the framing that I realized this was yet another lie, researched it, and discovered the data tells a very different story from what the media presents.
To further elucidate my position, I will share excerpts from an exchange I had with a reader at the original el gato thread. I don’t want to call unwanted attention to her so have only listed her initials here, but this is a person whom I’ve enjoyed positive encounters with on other occasions and who’s on my mailing list (props to her for not unsubbing over this).
She has seen through the lies about COVID, but she believes the media and government are telling the truth in this case. She took my arguments as personal attacks against her rather than her position. I understand that when one of your deeply held beliefs is being challenged, it feels like an attack on you personally; apparently, I failed to make that distinction clear. If she is still willing to re-evaluate her position, perhaps she and others like her will read this discussion thread with an open mind and heart.
One of my hopes is that, in this little sanctuary of the Internet, we can enjoy civil exchanges about points of disagreement without it devolving into defensiveness and ad hominem attacks. This discussion thread is intended to offer a space for exploring this issue in a thoughtful and respectful manner.
Dialogue with a Gun Control Advocate
MAA: The logic required to connect cause with effect is nearing extinction in the human species, and those of us who still possess that capacity risk ostracization, incarceration, and ultimately elimination for threatening the collective psychosis. A risk well-worth taking, I might add.
NE: Come on. Guns don’t cause mass shootings but they’d be less of them if guns weren’t around
MAA: And a lot more knife stabbings and truck massacres.
libertate [also responding to NE]: And?
There would be less automotive fatalities if cars weren’t around.
Perhaps “we” should ban them.
OS: Cars are not specifically made to kill people.
MAA: Neither are tools of defense.
OS: Eh?
MAA: Just clarifying that guns aren’t made to kill people. They are a tool, just like a knife or anything else that can be wielded by evil people or anyone else, and they can be used to defend the vulnerable from the psychopathic, the weak from the strong, the citizen from the tyrant. The only reason tyranny hasn’t gotten further along in America is 2A, and every people that has ever given up that right to its government has come to regret that decision bitterly.
OS: That’s a fancy way of saying that guns are made to kill only the right people, the people we don’t like. And I can assure you that in countries with better gun control we don’t walk around “bitterly regretting” it at all. Definitely is not at all the reason tyranny hasn’t gotten further in the States. How many shootouts have you had with your government lately? What you have are good constitution and laws and courts willing to enforce those laws, and you all should very well be thankful for that.
MAA: No, you’re misunderstanding my point. Guns are neutral. They aren’t “made to kill only the right people.” Mentally ill, psychopathic people will find whatever ways to kill they can, and guns help vulnerable people defend themselves against criminals. There are far more knife stabbings than gun murders. Taking away guns doesn’t prevent evil people from doing evil things, but it prevents innocent people from being able to defend themselves from criminals and tyrannical governments.
The shootouts aren’t what stop tyranny—the tyrants’ *awareness* that so many good citizens are armed and willing to defend the Constitution and our freedoms against tyranny is what stops them from overstepping their bounds into outright totalitarianism.
We do have a good constitution, thankfully, but we can no longer rely on the increasingly corrupted courts to defend our laws against those who are pushing to violate them. 2A provides a bulwark against the most egregious forms of tyranny, and that is precisely why the constitutional framers included it.
OS: Yup I know and I’ve heard it all before. This is exactly why you’ll keep getting these mass murders in the States.
MAA: History has proven it again and again and again. Every genocide requires the disarmament of the designated enemy.
“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? After all, you knew ahead of time that those bluecaps were out at night for no good purpose. And you could be sure ahead of time that you’d be cracking the skull of a cutthroat. Or what about the Black Maria sitting out there on the street with one lonely chauffeur—what if it had been driven off or its tires spiked? The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt!
“If . . . if . . . We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more—we had no awareness of the real situation. We spent ourselves in one unrestrained outburst in 1917, and then we hurried to submit. We submitted with pleasure!”
OS: This, in your style, is a grand piece of rhetoric which deals with none of the actual problems you have in the States, and ignores the countries which have gun control and no genocides.
MAA: “and ignores the countries which have gun control and no genocides”—YET.
How would you defend yourself if the guards come to take you to the gulag?
You are aware of the democide that’s been underway for the past two+ years. You are aware of the escalating totalitarian laws enveloping the globe. You are aware of the countries that have already incarcerated dissenters in isolation camps. You are aware of the rights and freedoms that have been stripped in the name of “public health,” “safety,” and the “good of society.”
And yet you naively trust these governments never to overstep their bounds, as the citizens of every past totalitarian genocidal regime have done throughout history.
It’s time to flee the cult of safety and stop swallowing the propaganda you’ve been fed about guns by the tyrannical governments whose limits are inscribed by their presence:
OS: I should add, I’m not sure who you’re talking to who “naively trusts the government” and belongs to a “cult of safety”. I think you may be arguing with someone you’re imagining, but it’s not me 😆
MAA: That’s what I thought and why I am so bewildered that you have bought the anti-gun propaganda, which only serves criminals and tyrants!
I used to share your position years ago. And then I researched it and realized I was mistaken. And the past two years have solidified the absolute necessity of being able to defend ourselves against tyranny.
JP Sears went through a similar re-evaluation of his views on this subject:
OS: Because I have a different view, I must have swallowed propaganda? Interesting. I can’t have come to this position by reason? The past two years did indeed cause me to reconsider this position; I in the end remain unconvinced.
MAA: Having a different view isn’t the issue at all. Different views are fine! I am simply saying this particular position aligns with government propaganda, which serves to protect the interests of the powerful over the people.
OS: You view it as propaganda because it contradicts your point of view. I think you can’t imagine that someone might have thoughtful reasons for having a different perspective.
MAA: I view it as propaganda because it is propaganda, not because I disagree with it. Time and again, it has been proven that the media has sensationalized gun violence for political gain—all while ignoring the daily flood of stories about people successfully defending their lives against criminals and good guys stopping shooters in the act.
“German General Jürgen Stroop arrived in Warsaw ready to wipe out all opposition within a single day as a birthday gift to his Führer. Stroop had 2,100 soldiers with 13 heavy machine guns, 69 handheld machine guns, 135 submachine guns, several howitzers, and 1,358 rifles. The approximately 750 Jewish resisters had two submachine guns, a handful of rifles, and homemade explosives. But the resisters were able to fight off Stroop’s soldiers for the first few days, and they were able to hold out under siege for four weeks.
“Simcha Rotem, a survivor, later told filmmaker Claude Lanzmann: ’During the first three days of fighting, the Jews had the upper hand. The Germans retreated at once to the ghetto entrance, carrying dozens of wounded with them.’”
Imagine how the story would have ended had everyone in the ghetto been armed. Oh, I know, they wouldn’t have been there to begin with.
OS: No one is arguing that guns have never been used in self-defence. Your argument is that unorganized, scattered, private gun owners with weapons that do not come to the level of government arms, are somehow holding off tyranny in the US. Forgive me, but that seems like a fantasy. You think I’ve come to my position by swallowing government propaganda; frankly, that’s a little insulting. You may not be able to admit that people might have good reasons for having a different perspective from yours, as that would be to admit it’s a valid viewpoint.
MAA: Perhaps it’s because you don’t live in America that you fail to realize the 2A community is an enormous, highly cohesive group passionately committed to defending our rights against tyrannical encroachment. It is the size and commitment of that segment of the population that keeps the government in check. Hired goons are not going to be willing to come seize people’s guns and subsequently rights and lives when there are so many people willing to defend those rights with their lives.
OS: That might be true, but again, you’re trying to prove a negative. You have a belief that this is keeping the government from imposing tyranny, but you still haven’t provided one example of that happening. The actual way tyranny has been kept in check in the States is through the courts upholding the Constitution and the laws. This is also a massive distraction from the problem under discussion: why does the US have so many mass shootings and gun deaths?
MAA: You are suggesting that the American people gamble their lives, rights, and freedoms on the premise that it is not the large sector of highly armed individuals willing to defend us that is preventing the government from escalating to full-blown totalitarianism? You seem to be unaware of history and that the progression from democracy to tyranny doesn’t happen in an eye-blink but over time.
“‘To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it—please try to believe me—unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop. Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, ‘regretted,’ that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these ‘little measures’ that no ‘patriotic German’ could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing. One day it is over his head.
“‘How is this to be avoided, among ordinary men, even highly educated ordinary men? Frankly, I do not know. I do not see, even now. Many, many times since it all happened I have pondered that pair of great maxims, Principiis obsta and Finem respice—‘Resist the beginnings’ and ‘Consider the end.’ But one must foresee the end in order to resist, or even see, the beginnings. One must foresee the end clearly and certainly and how is this to be done, by ordinary men or even by extraordinary men? Things might have changed here before they went as far as they did; they didn’t, but they might have. And everyone counts on that might.’”
As to your question, “why does the US have so many mass shootings and gun deaths?” Perhaps you should ask why doesn’t Switzerland, where nearly every citizen is armed, have scarcely *any* mass shootings? Why do the majority of mass shootings happen in areas with stronger gun control laws? Why does crime go down in areas where more citizens are responsibly armed? You’re only asking the “why” the media wants you to ask, not the ones that reveal the truth that they are trying to disarm us to strengthen their power over We the People.
“They have the guns and therefore we are for peace and for reformation through the ballot. When we have the guns then it will be through the bullet.”
OS: I don’t have time to properly answer this right now, but I will briefly say: again, you’re trying to prove a negative. “We have guns in the States and no genocides, you have no guns and no genocides BUT YOU MIGHT SOMEDAY” is not an argument. Secondly, what you are dealing with in this century is not armed warfare; you are dealing with totalitarian nanny statism which for the most part does not resort to violence to achieve its ends. Thirdly, please name me one recent example where someone or a group of people went up against the US government with guns and achieved its aims and did not end up either dead or in jail? What you *actually* have are mass shootings, high rates of gun homicides, suicides, and accidents. The rhetoric may be great on the other side, but that’s what your gun rights look like in actuality.
MAA: “which for the most part does not resort to violence to achieve its ends”—UNTIL IT DOES.
You’re locked in a cell with a psychopath. The psychopath is armed, and you are not. He hasn’t done anything to you yet, so nothing to worry about, right?
The argument is every genocide in history. Disarming the populace is a necessary step to achieve it. It cannot be accomplished overtly without that step.
You evidently fail to understand the concept of mutually assured destruction. Having a large sector of the populace armed *prevents* the necessity of using guns to defend the citizens against tyranny. As Solzhenitsyn reminds us, officers are not going to be eager to come arrest you en masse and cart you off to the gulag if they know you have the ability to defend yourself.
The mass shootings, high rates of homicides, and suicides happen predominantly in states and cities with draconian gun laws (California, New York, Chicago, etc.). Criminals can get guns no problem; it is the innocent law-abiding citizens who cannot defend themselves because their right to self-defense has been taken away.
OS: Yeah I know; like I said, I’ve heard all the arguments before. And the fact that it simply doesn’t look like that in countries without armed citizenry totally escapes the American mind. As does the fact that the idea of an armed citizenry prevailing against the government comes literally from the 18th century. I suppose all the actual deaths are the price you have to pay for that idea.
MAA: Canada. Australia. New Zealand.
I suppose the loss of freedoms and rights is the price you have to pay for your idea. Not to mention the lives of whomever a democidal government targets for elimination.
Gun laws don’t stop criminals from getting guns. Gun laws don’t stop governments from using force against you. Gun laws don’t stop “actual deaths” from occurring.
All they do is stop law-abiding citizens from having the ability to defend themselves against criminals and tyranny.
OS: No one uses this argument about any other crime - “laws don’t stop this crime from occurring entirely, therefore we shouldn’t do anything to make it more difficult to commit, or allow us to enforce those laws.” And again, you have no actual proof that guns in the States prevent “tyranny”. You do, as I mentioned previously, have evidence that your laws and courts do. Which is something we are lacking in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Forgive me if I don’t believe that the idea of a shootout with a few zealots keeps the government on its toes, sans evidence.
MAA: I can forgive you for not believing that because I have repeatedly said that your straw man argument of “a shootout with a few zealots” is not what stops tyranny. It is a broadly armed populace that is willing to defend its rights that stops tyranny.
I’m really surprised someone who sees through the lies about the injections cannot recognize that the same people are lying to them for the same reasons. Why is the media suddenly trustworthy in this one instance? Why is the government suddenly trustworthy in this one instance?
OS: Do you think the government and media are the only sources of information or the only ways anyone forms their opinions?
MAA: There are those whose opinions are formed by the media, and there are those who form their own opinions. If one’s opinion aligns with the media, the government, the politicians, and the corporations, then one’s opinion has been formed on their behalf.
OS: Well, I guess I’ll have to leave this discussion by thanking you for assuming I’m incapable of independent thought. That’s a conversation killer right there; you might want to rethink that strategy.
MAA: It’s because I know you are capable of independent thought that I have bothered to engage in this discussion to begin with. I know you are capable of seeing through the lies, so it surprises me that you are not doing so here.
OS: You believe they’re lies. You seem incapable of seeing another point of view, or understanding that any intelligent person could think differently, which is pretty par for the course for any discussions I’ve had with Americans on this issue. However, thank you for engaging.
MAA: You keep retreating into self-defensiveness and ad hominem attacks. I am providing historical evidence and the rationale for the propagandists to lie to you.
If two+ years of COVID tyranny hasn’t convinced you that you should be skeptical of the MSM’s and politicians’ drum-banging lies, then I’m sorry you are unable to see that you have fallen for a self-defeating talking point.
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This quote is often misattributed to Thomas Jefferson, but it turns out it is a quotation by Cesare Beccaria that Jefferson recorded in his Legal Commonplace Book. The original is in Italian, and the quote above is believed to be from a 1963 translation by Henry Palolucci. (h/t The Good Citizen for introducing me to this quote)
On researching this quote further, I discovered it is actually Alinksy’s synopsis of Lenin’s speeches (which I suspect he advocates but don’t want to buy Rules for Radicals to confirm, although it would probably be a good idea to read under know-thy-enemy and all that):
“The essence of Lenin’s speeches during this period was, ‘They have the guns and therefore we are for peace and for reformation through the ballot. When we have the guns then it will be through the bullet.’ And it was.”
This is my first time publishing a discussion thread, and I ran into some technical glitches with publishing. The e-newsletter was missing a bunch of text and had disembodied links in some email apps, so I apologize to those who were confused by this oddity. Thanks to everyone for your patience, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this matter!
A large person, whom is violent of nature, will always dominate a smaller, weaker person. it has always been such and always will be, but a poem written many years ago, speaks to that issue,
Be not afraid of any man
No matter what his size
If danger threatens, call on me
And I will equalize.
Or, to shorten it,
"God made man, but Sam Colt made them equal."
And before someone falls back on the Freud "Quote",,,, please go and look that he never said it, in fact, what he did write, was the opposite,
Freud associates retarded sexual and emotional development not with gun ownership, but with fear and loathing of weapons.
I lived in Europe for many years and when I moved to the US it was mind boggling to me that so many people had guns. The past 3 years led me to understand better this debate and I lean much more in favor of the 2nd Amendment now. America was never meant to be like the rest of the world, we have our unique ways both good and bad but we are about the last country on this planet where citizens are mostly armed and that gives our government, whichever party it is, some pause before enacting policies to which the people don’t agree.
And yes, I have to mention Australia because it was utopian what happened there that it cannot be ignored.
It would so much easier to just strengthen security at schools. So many private schools have security guards and checkpoints of entrance and exiting, why can’t public schools?
It has been proven over the long haul that simply training adult staff at the schools who volunteer to serve in this way, in various aspects of defending the schools and students where they work, then allowing those who train and volunteer to carry their own defensive weapons as they perform their duties at the school, armed with their own weapons, , the very ones they alread carry everywhere else BUT school, Look into the FASTER Saves LIves programme in Ohio. It was developed as a response to the Sandy Hook incident. All volunteer, absolutely NO COST to government or taxpayers, and the best part: in the ten plus years the programme has been in place there has not yet been even ONE incident invoving misuse of guns at any school in any district that have adipted the programme. So far it has been 100% effective. WHY? Because the perps out there who wOULD do harm know that in those districts at least SOME skilled, armed, trained, dedicated, adult WILL have a gun and more importanly will NOT hesitate to use it to stop any threat that comes long to harm. In refresher drills and simulations, these armed ordinary teachers constantly best the trained lw enforcement attempting to breach the "school" (in the make believe drills) and defeat the cop trrainers more often than the trainers get the drop on the teachers.
'd say that's perfect solution: PROVEN 100% effective and successful, cost the taxpayer nothing, no one knows who has their gun on them at any given time, so no issues with "kids being scared of guns".In reality, thekids are far more seure and relaxed because they know SOME of the adult staff are armed and trained, and any of evil intent will NOT get past them to harm the kids.
I never heard of that program, that is a good approach and it should be more publicized. I think many people have this idealist view of school as s place where no doors need to be locked and all staff and people who enter the school is trustworthy. Sadly, this is not Switzerland (even they have their problems), and we would be better off admitting that increased security in schools with armed personal is an advantage to students and teachers. Wealthy parents, value this and pay for it in their kids private schools, and yet, they shout from their ivory tower that public schools should be completely gun-free. There is no consonance and often it seems like it comes down to a class argument.
I learned of the FASTER Saves LIves programme as soon as the concept was floated, shortly after Scammy Crooks. I followed the development through to its establishment.
Wanna hear a crazy? The Browsrd County school board had asked folks from the FASTER programme to come tell them about it, which they graciously did. that was a fwe weeks before the crazed punk, violating a court order to not ever be at that schoool, passed a backgorund chek he should not have been able to pass (county officials had REFUSED to file charges against the eventual killer for any of the four felony level crimes he had committed) entered the campus carrying his new rifle and a big pile of tEN rund magazines (they fit better in the new gun case he had also bought0 and begankilling.
Had FASTER been in place at the Douglas High School on that day, the perp would have been taken out before he ever got to the first classroom. And Aaron Feiss woud still be alive, haveing been able to shoot back at the perp instead of wrapping his body arund two of his students, taking their bullets and letting them live.
I read recently that that school district has no repented of their folly of rejecting the programme, and are now taking steps to implement it in that district. Four years and twenty six deaths late, but they are doing it. COlorado have also recently taken up that programme and are implementing it.
There are a number of factors that ALL these mass shootings have in common.
ALL males, (one exception had a militant warrior female sidekick)
ALL known to authorities as problems, local state federal
ALL got their weapon passing BGC or stole them avoiding BGC
ALL carefully selected venues that were "gun free" zones...... they'd have the only guns
Taking all these common factors together I see only one simple cheap effective solution to these events. ALLOW we who already carry our personal defensive weapons with us everywhere we go to ALSO carry them into those types of places. I carry mine everywhere, have for fifteen years. Never came close to NEEDING it. There are some places I am prohibited to carry it legally. I simply do not go there. Sports venues, nightclubs/bars in my state (next one south tell me I can be armed inside there as long as I don't drink. At the price of their booze I dont drink in those places anyway). Courthouses have secure gun safes where I can put my gun, take thekey, and retrieve it when I leave. But the copers are thick and armed, so it is NOT a gun free zone. Im fine wiht that. Most "no guns" zones i my stateare not properly signed, thus no violation occurs if "made". The only thing they can do is tell me to take my gun out. I can come back, but the gun can't. So I leave.
I avoid Certified Defenseless Victim Zones s the danger zones and plagues they are. WHY can't we simply do the same with the schoolsour kids attend? (my kids will never attend gummit skewlz, one main reason being they are death traps. The other being what they pour into their heads all day long inside those places.
There IS a simple free answer that will END these school massacres. FASTER is only one version of it. I underatand that in the State of Texas each district can decide whether adult staff in that district are able to go about their daily tasks armed. The district that includes Uvalde had decided AGAINST allowing that. Perhaps surviving parents might want to rethink that vote? Had that teacher whose classroomwas first invaded been armed and triained that school shooting may have had two victims.. the first child shot, then the perp himself who got terminated by that teacher whose room he chose to invade. And WE would all be doing something more profitable with out time instead of reading this stuff here.
I saw the number of armed police in Ottawa during the Freedom Convoy. The week after I was there they and many other armed police and military came and violently pushed back defenseless people because of a group of peaceful protesters who were looking for a dialogue with the government. The government who now is banning all hand guns ownership. These are the incremental steps that only get worse, these governments don't one day say, "oh, thats enough, we don't need to continue to take away peoples rights anymore we have done enough."
There is a breakdown in rule of law certainly in the states and more and more in Canada. Enact 'The Emergency Act' so that peoples rights can be taken away for no reason. So, laws are not going to protect us when the government ignores them when they chose.
I would like to see a much stronger gun lobby in Canada, as Canadians I think we will just roll over, as we did for Covid, as so many did to criticize 'freedom', as we are doing by spending our money in Ukraine where it is very apparent that it is necessary to spend it here. Roll over because of what the government says. When a government stops serving its people and starts telling them what they need to do, we are in trouble.
And there won't be anything we can do if we cannot defend ourselves when it becomes necessary.
Excellent bullet points, MAA! And you're right - Naomi Wolf's piece a few hours earlier was exquisite. I cannot improve on your points because I share all of them. TBH, I've not read the antagonist thread. I can't deal with any more irrationality at the moment. The leftist wife responded to my email yesterday (apparently she didn't think her husband's caustic response was enough) and I've refused to read it so far. Think I'll have my husband go through it first.
There are over 370 "mental disorders" listed in the latest version of the DSM 5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.) The list includes "Tobacco Addiction Disorder" among other equally mundane and ridiculous so-called "mental illnesses." If the DSM is the standard by which politicians wishes to remove our rights to own guns, then I'd guess 90% of the American people could probably be classified with a mental disorder of one kind or another. BEWARE.....
Great point, Rick, and we have already seen how neuropsych evaluations have been weaponized against physicians of conscience like Dr. Meryl Nass for daring to prescribe life-saving early treatment protocols and failing to subjugate their conscience to comply with tyrannical and democidal edicts.
We know that when the world is in a state of mass hypnosis, those of us resistant to that hypnosis are deemed “insane,” so we must remain weary of any such gaslighting measures used to disarm and discredit the sane.
There are four key components needed for an environment to experience a mass formation psychosis: lack of social bonds or decoupling of societal connections, lack of sense-making (things don’t make sense), free-floating anxiety, and free-floating psychological discontent. Free-floating anxiety is a general sense of uneasiness that is not tied to any particular object or specific situation.
When followers start to participate in a strategy to deal with the object of anxiety, new social bonds typically emerge and people change from a highly aversive negative mental state and isolation, to the exact opposite to the extremely high-level of connectedness that exists.
YES ITS A THEORY.. but the truth is that its all propaganda, guess work thrown out to also FOOL the masses.. people are lied to by most in power or even out of power now.. I HAVE A COUPLE OF FRIENDS THAT KNOW THIS!
Prove yourself spot on, go and find a copy of DSM three or earlier. I remember when verion five came out, how radically different it was. Yo see right through their smoke screen. Well done
It seems obvious to me that the repeal of the original Smith Mundt Act opened the floodgates for propaganda from every angle. I do not think it is a happy circumstance that our ‘News’ went south right about when the government passed a law making it legal for the government to propagandize the public. Great article!
....in light of the massive vote fraud of the 2020 elections, which will only become more pervasive and cemented into place, the only thing that now stands in the way of totalitarianism
is gun ownership.
I have a dream.
That Chuck Schumer will personally supervise attempts to go door-to-door in the mountains of Arkansas, Western Montana, the rural South, the Deer Hunter area of western Pennsylvania, West Texas, and other parts of real America, including the inner city "hood", to announce that "I'm from the government and I'm here to confiscate your firearms".
Thanks for sharing this discussion thread. I am for private ownership of guns, and switched to this view about 7 years ago when I recognized the US government no longer represented the people.
I think you began with a weak argument that may have affected the rest of the interaction. Guns ARE made to kill people, and arguing otherwise seems like nonsense, seems like you're not arguing honestly. Guns were invented to kill, and then have been used either for defense (whether you fire your gun or not), and/or to injure or kill in defense or aggression. A counter-argument about knives is also weak, because there's no comparison between the effort and ability needed to kill on a mass scale with knives vs guns. Admitting guns are made to be lethal bolsters what I found was the strongest sentence in your argument, "It is a broadly armed populace that is willing to defend its rights that stops tyranny." This is directly related to the fact that guns can easily kill as they are designed to do, so people, police forces and governments think twice before violating the space of gun owners.
The downside of widely available gun ownership is that some people will use it to injure and kill innocent people. This is a heartbreaking and heart-wrenching downside, and weighs heavily on every caring person. People need to realize that since guns are widely available, we are experiencing the downside of this situation, vs not experiencing the downside of guns not being available to the citizenry. For example, if guns were not widely available, we would be experiencing less mass shootings, but could also be experiencing the downside of that situation; mass harm to our citizenry due to our government and police force overrunning and killing the citizens that interfere with their agenda (as you pointed out).
Thank you for sharing your journey, Nova123. I see your point about the intention behind manufacturing guns and your conclusion makes sense.
What I perhaps failed to make clear is that I meant the object itself is simply a neutral tool that can be used for a variety of purposes (defense, sport, hunting, etc.). Only a minuscule number of the guns owned by law-abiding citizens have actually been used to kill humans, and in the cases where they have been used in self-defense, it has saved the lives of the innocent.
I also see your point about widely available gun ownership, although according to criminologist John Lott (author of “More Guns Less Crime: Understanding Crime & Gun Control Laws”), a higher rate of gun ownership correlates with lower levels of crime (as one reviewer says, ”I wanted to disagree with this book, but the data speaks for itself”).
I appreciate your sensitive approach to this topic and agree there are complexities. I would certainly like to see greater emphasis on addressing the root causes. If we could eradicate mainstream media, for example, that would eliminate the primary cause of mental illnesses. Short of that, getting people to stop paying attention to the MSM is probably the biggest step we could make toward restoring mental health/balance/perspective on reality and saving lives.
Brilliant on two counts: 1) calling them “news readers” (since none are actual journalists or reporters these days) and 2) requiring disclosure of political affiliations—although, honestly, if they’re in media, I think we can guess in 99% of the cases :-)
Thanks. I agree that "we" can guess the reader's affiliation but the people who rely on and trust the TV news personalities need to be told. Otherwise, they will continue to believe the "news" is agenda/politically neutral.
Some will when they finally put it together that the "news" is not only biased but is lying to them either directly or by ommission. My Mom passed away a few years ago at 88 but I vividly remember watching the local news with her. She believed everything they said. She trusted Walter Cronkite because he sold the news as the truth and her generation (mostly) took it that way ever since.
BTW, very much appreciate your writing, even in the rare occurrences that we disagree. You help me think clearer. Thank you.
Thanks for your reply. I so agree with you, that mainstream media is a primary cause of mental illness and division amongst people in this country. People would do well to turn it off! I always wonder about violent video games and violent movies having an impact too. I haven't looked into the studies about video games so I don't know how rigorous they are. And on top of that, I'm aware of possible mind control operations that may be contributing.
I think it surprises some people that crime has gone down with the availability of guns. It makes sense. Guns do save lives, and some of those stories have real emotional impact. The mass murder of people, and especially children, is so emotionally upsetting that it's hard to counter with stories of guns saving lives. It's interesting too, that there are two mass shootings that I know of where "good guys with guns" were on site, and did nothing out of fear for their lives. Uvalde is one example, and the other was in Southern California in an office building years ago where a person outside with a gun did not go in. That really weakens the argument that the answer to bad guys with guns are good guys with guns. That seems to apply to personal situations but not to mass shootings.
I don't consider guns a neutral tool. Maybe that's a cultural perception I have. Or maybe its objective that they're not neutral. Human-created objects are made for their usefulness, they're not neutral. Candles are made to burn, chairs are made to sit on, art is created to look at. And guns were created to kill, and then are sometimes used to shoot at flying discs or targets.
I think many people don't consider guns a neutral tool. You site one example of their neutrality in sport, but in hunting and defense they are used for their ability to kill. And then there's the military, either organized military or militias of different kinds around the world, where guns are used because they were created to kill. But perhaps what you mean by neutral is that a tiny number of guns out of all the guns available are used to kill people. In which case we're not using the word neutral in the same way. On a side note but related, I was surprised that a vast majority of police officers have not fired their guns ever in their career.
I was just reading Dr Robert Malone's latest post and comments, but I can't comment there because I'm not a paid subscriber. I'm sorry that people unsubscribed because of your post on guns. You are always thoughtful and honest, and it's so good for people to practice disagreeing well without walking away. (Unless there are attacks that aren't worth engaging in). I appreciate you! 💕
Thank you for your thoughtful comment, Nova123! I have heard that blaming video games for violence was contradicted by the research, but I haven’t had a chance to investigate it thoroughly. My feeling is they are unlikely to be a direct instigator as millions of kids play video games without issues. It is the ones with mental illness who are subjected to other destructive influences (e.g., abuse, addiction, bullying, etc.) and who lack a creative outlet and purpose in their lives who tend to enact these brutal crimes.
That said, Nature Deficit Disorder has a damaging impact on kids’ mental health, and urban at-risk youth who participate in nature programs experience radical transformations. If kids and teens spent time in nature instead of playing video games, watching television, surfing the Internet, texting on their phones, etc., they would be both physically and psychologically healthier and far less likely to commit such heinous acts.
“That really weakens the argument that the answer to bad guys with guns are good guys with guns.”
I would argue that they weren’t really good guys if they were too cowardly to act when the need arose. There are numerous instances where good guys have stopped tragedy in its tracks by acting quickly. The YouTube channel Active Self Protection (https://www.youtube.com/c/ActiveSelfProtection) has thousands of security camera videos showing criminal acts, many demonstrating acts of self-defense and courage.
Regarding your comment about cops not firing their guns in their careers, there is actually a serious problem with many cops not getting adequate training and regular practice with their weapons, so in an emergency situation, they do not always have the muscle memory to respond as quickly as needed.
Thank you for your closing note, Nova123. I am grateful to those who are willing to engage in respectful dialogue about matters of disagreement. I try to encourage open-minded debate and discourage personal attacks, and for the most part, I think everyone here has been very well-behaved :-) I’m sorry some people felt so strongly about the issue that they left as they missed out on an opportunity to engage in meaningful dialogue about a difficult topic.
Great point about violent video games possibly only affecting those who already have mental problems. Makes a lot of sense. And thanks for letting me know about that channel active self-protection. I watched a lot of the videos, so good to be aware. Take good care. 💕
There have been mass killings with cars and trucks. So are they deadly weapons? Yes. When a car and human body come into contact they are deadly. However, when used with care they are not, but merely have that potential. Some people don’t own cars and some don’t own guns. Both are licensed and it’s one’s individual choice.
I think it's a weak argument to compare cars, which are not made to kill people, and guns which are. Yes, they can both be used to kill people, but they are made for fundamentally different purposes.
Maybe so, but both can be used as weapons, as can knives. I'm sure most gun owners have never used their weapons to kill and some that I know have not even fired a weapon. They are only collectors. The human behind any device has the potential to kill, including the Covid technocrats. They are killing a different form, as are abortionists.
Go and study how things went down in Australia as the government there stood firm and declared "Mr. and Mrs Austalia, turn them ALL in". Read how crime began to climb once "everyone' was disarmed. Then read about the INCREASE in gun use in crimes. No not everyone turned them all in s commanded. There were a number of incidents where guns were still used defensivley. Of course, the gun got dropped and left as the intended victim was simply on about surviving, and did not tarry to chat up the gendarmerie. Housebreakings increased, as I recall some thirty five ercent in the fist year after the massive takeup. The louts KNEW the residents would not be armed, as everyone had turned them all in as commanded.
Of course, THIS sort of important news never was seen in OUR lamestream media. Why? Because THIS side the Big Puddle there were "certain factions" lready bent upon disarming THIS nation.
Yeah, I already know that gun availability reduces crime. I learned that years ago, but it was a surprise to me when I learned it. And I think it's a surprise to a gun control advocates because they equate guns with crime, and think lower guns means lower crime.
Don't get me wrong, I'm very pro private gun ownership. I just want to help sharpen the arguments so they are more effective. 👍🏽
Isn't it interesting that the government would enforce their tyranny with the exact tools that they want to take away from law abiding citizens who want to be left alone and live free?
As far as these idiots who claim a citizenry can't fight the government cause "tanks and airplanes".... how would you explain Vietnam and Afghanistan (both places I've been). Smaller, less educated and greatly out classed in weaponry, these third world backwaters defeated the most well equipped military in the history of mankind. Now the big question is...does the American public have the same commitment as the Vietcong or the Taliban? I think that's a solid no.
For OS to write "Your argument is that unorganized, scattered, private gun owners with weapons that do not come to the level of government arms, are somehow holding off tyranny in the US. Forgive me, but that seems like a fantasy." is itself a fantasy IN REAL TIME.
See: Australia, New Zealand, Canada to name but three countries being swallowed by government tyranny TODAY, and with their People mostly unarmed. No connection? THAT is fantasy.
In a way these debates are so very odd. Before the late 1950's mass killings were quite rare. We certainly had the tools, even machine guns for a time before they were banned. But semi-automatics have been around since the early 1900's. Now it is true that the current AR type rifles are quite easy to use but semi-auto pistols are also quite easy to use particularly in the smaller calibers of the AR type rifles. And we do see that most mass killings are usually by pistol. Magazine capacity seems to also be an issue but several of whatever size can easily be carried.
A lot of social changes erupted in the late 50's that seem most appropriate to debate - the degree in which we tolerate immorality. We ought to all agree that killing another human is something that is quite wrong except under dire circumstance. We can agree that anger toward others is OK except when it results in violence, or do we?
We have always had some deranged people including down and out addicts who have given up hope. In the past we would try to help the deranged and the addicts but most of that has devolved from groups trying to make a difference to assigning that task to government who cannot help at all. At best the government can remove people from society and place them in uncaring institutions. But only communities can really help by caring individuals trying. We once did have community helpers, sponsored within the communities but in the main we now count on an ineffective government and try in ignore the issues. Any dependency on government to resolve human failures is likely to disappoint.
While religion and religious institutions are rejected by many, in the past they served a powerful purpose of organizing the community. Believers affected even non-believers by their charity. As a society we generally were tolerant of the bible thumpers thinking them well intended. In the rejection of that entire segment of society by mockery and other tools created to instill doubt we have thrown the baby out so to speak. Being anti-religious became cool. After all who is to tell you how to live? But in the process we have been net losers.
If you watch documentaries like “Century of the Self,” you see that television is used to induce states of desire, envy, greed, lust, fear, anxiety, and every shade of mental illness to manipulate us to consume and obey.
I think a very strong argument could be made for a direct correlation between television and other mechanisms of mass control (MSM, Big Tech) and the increase in violent crimes and mass shootings. If we want to reduce violence, increase societal cohesion, and strengthen individual ethics/morality, the best thing we could do is get everyone to turn off their hypnosis machines.
The early days of television included shows representing ideal families and an idealization of the mundane common to all. That seemed to change over time maybe because few ever were able to match those ideals and perhaps we desired conflict and drama to draw viewers. I suppose the social scientists set about research in how to acquire more viewers for those ads and tricks to manipulate thought much as we had 'nudge' theory to drive us into the covid delusions.
Education has long departed from an effort to teach ways of thinking into ways to think. Those hypnosis machines won't be turned off but we can teach skills to avoid being manipulated. Once you become aware of the tools, you become somewhat less susceptible to being controlled. Just as we now must ignore all those frightfully annoying ads on web pages in order to read the content, so must we ignore what we are fed by much media.
Great points, HardeeHo. If I recall from “Century of the Self,” public-opinion engineering was definitely present in television programming from the outset, but the focus was more on driving consumption and sales. There was also an underlying aim to mold morality, but it emphasized positive, constructive values rather than destructive ones. Once the programmers shifted to a more debased POV, society degenerated accordingly.
It is definitely one of my aims to equip people with the skills and knowledge to detect and deflect propaganda (as in https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/letter-to-the-menticided-a-12-step). I do think the people who are awakening are starting to turn off their television and live life instead, and I hope that could become a widespread trend the more people become aware of the manipulation.
The revolution can't happen fast enough but entrenched interests are not going to give up easily. Much current programming has been engineered around certain social issues that are intended to nudge behaviors. The only way to counter such influence is a more aware public and forces exist in media to ensure that doesn't happen. I am pleased that the public is much more aware of the destructive nature of "The Trusted News Initiative". I do hope the thinking people are enough to help others see through what is forced upon us.
Thank-you for that link. I enjoyed the story immensely. I read most of it to my husband and he found it enjoyable also. Knowing many, many Tennesseans really helped see and hear this in our minds. Thanks again for the smiles and laughs. 🤗
Civics have been taken out of school curriculums decades ago, but my impression is that in families, where children learn how to shoot at an early age, the Constitution is well and alive.
Even psychopaths and criminals are more reserved under such circumstances.
Kentucky, where I live, is about the fifth poorest state in the Union, when it comes to personal income, but it has the 5th lowest crime rate. When I moved here eight years ago, somebody explained it to me: "People are nice here, because everyone is armed to the teeth." :)
In the current process of mass murder, I don't think that disarming the populace will come before martial law is introduced. Once the food riots start, the monsters will be watching with glee as looters will roam the land and the previously law-abiding citizens murder each other for a bowl of thin soup... People will do the favor for the tyrants...
The only chance people have is that the enforcers realize that their money will not be worth a penny a few years from now and their very survival will depend on complete compliance until they wear out their usefulness and will be lined up on the roads to the death camps.
Anyone working under the premise that these school shootings are somehow organic and not part of a continuing PYSOP to garner support for the elimination of self-defense via guns is likely to come to a different conclusion. How many times does one of the alphabet agencies have to be "familiar" with a perpetrator before the public realizes these events are "Made to Happen" or "Allowed to Happen." The idea that the only government agencies should be the only people allowed to have weapons is a non-starter. We all have a natural right to self-defense, whether that be from individual or government action. That is particularly so when the latest "school shooting" clearly indicates that the law enforcement won't protect you. And anyone depending upon the Criminal Injustice System to combat tyranny or markedly reduce crime is going to be greatly disappointed.
The point of being armed isn't even about winning against the government; it is the idea that they are walking into a nightmare - one that they really don't won't to face as we are really led by cowards. That is why they spend so much time on propaganda and deception. So, yeah, start using nuclear weapons against the public. Watch what happens next when it is made clear that people have nothing more to lose.
"Allowed to have weapons" is a big signifier that the person doesn't understand natural rights. No 2A advocate is arguing that they be "allowed" anything. A right does not spell out what you are "allowed" to do. It spells out what a government may not infringe upon.
First you could have answered their question - why does America have so many mass shootings?
0) There are more people in the USA so there are more shootings. France had an extremely deadly shooting (Bataclan), New Zealand had Christ Church, etc. Many countries with much stricter laws have a higher rate per capita than the here- the US makes up about 1.15% of the world's mass shootings while having almost 5% of the world's population.
A better question is "why does the US seem to have a problem with young men who become psychological messes and want to kill classmates:"
1) America has higher rates of single parent households than any other country
2) America has higher rates of prescription psychological medication of children than any other
Mass shootings weren't common before those two, even though guns were (arguably even more) common.
Second, i usually ask them to expand their argument and see where it breaks down. "Pretend that the deaths of innocents actually could have been prevented if the government were to take away the 2nd amendment from everyone just to stop psychopaths from being able to kill children with rifles. If that's OK, then which other rights should we give away to save other innocent lives?"
Certainly freedom of press has to go. If the press were not allowed to share manifestos and glorify the killers, it's proven repeatedly that that would curtail future acts. So if the 2nd is guilty and must be axed, the first is at least as guilty and must be disposed of as well.
The fourth amendment as well must go - quite obviously, if police could search homes and vehicles of every known drug dealer and suspected criminal, they would be able to protect at least some innocent lives that will otherwise be brutally victimized in the future.
The fifth is extremely problematic and should be curtailed too - the vast majority of shootings are never solved because individuals refuse to talk to the police, which leads to more innocents being shot. If police could force criminals to confess, surely it would save childrens lives.
Jury trials? probably not worth it anymore, since juries can let killers go even if the experts in government know the killers are guilty.
Due process and bail are absolutely responsible for the murder of many many innocent people. So those must be given up as well.
Remember, it's for the children. Or are you a monster?
People put on sanctimonious airs, making sweeping claims about mass shootings being "only in America".
This reflects the bad state of journalism.
Looking at the data for the US, Canada and Europe from 2009 to 2015, America was ranked 11th in "Average annual Death Rate per Million People from Mass Public Shootings"
Whilst arguments on both sides have some merit it might be worth considering the nature of the society at large. For example, in UK gun control is extreme and yet we have few shootings but do have a constant drip of mainly knife attacks.
The UK, Australia, Japan and Germany have all taken measures to reduce gun homicides. Can the US learn anything from them? America's gun homicide rate is 25 times higher than other high-income countries, according to a recent study. In USA many people see the ownership of guns as a crucial check on government tyranny. The country’s highest court has ruled that outright bans on civilian ownership of handguns are unconstitutional. But civilised enforcement and culture may also play important roles in preventing violence.
As long as America retains a militarised police force and a predatory government engaging in global violence around the world using black propaganda to justify regime change and a weaponised dollar - the people with respond accordingly. QED these mass shootings events are the result of a tyrannical government invoking fear of the government in the people who feel they need to defend themselves against these dark internal forces.
This zeitgeist is not present in UK - yet, but we are getting there as the recent illegal lockdowns illustrate. However, public petitions, most notably by the Snowdrop Campaign, founded by friends of the bereaved families, called for a total ban on the private ownership and use of handguns in the UK. Signed by 750,000 people it was symbolic of the weight of public opinion in the aftermath of the Dunblane school massacre.
Nine years before Dunblane, there had been Hungerford, where Michael Ryan went on a rampage through the Berkshire town, killing 16 people in a series of random shootings before turning the gun on himself. He had been carrying a handgun and two semi automatic rifles, for which he had firearms certificates.
The aftermath of Hungerford brought to an end the right to own semi-automatic firearms in Britain; they were banned along with pump action weapons, and registration became mandatory for shotgun owners. But it was the weight of public opinion that energised this response - you don't have this in USA.
I don't think USA will ever resolve this dilemma. The state is rotten to the core and Americans know it and fear their own government. Only destruction of the Deep State and putrid swamp of corruption and graft will allow America to rise again as its former shining example of true freedom and liberty.
Thank you for this nuanced perspective and historical background, Peter, and what an amazing feat that would be to achieve your concluding sentence.
Interestingly, according to this source (https://safeatlast.co/blog/gun-self-defense-statistics/), there are 466 violent crimes per 100k Americans versus 2,034 per 100k Brits, so more than quadruple the number of violent crimes in the UK. And as you noted, knife crimes are high in the UK, as are attacks with other weapons such as acid.
WOW, that's an amazing stat Margaret. I will need to do some research on this one as a quick Google doesn't yield meaningful results. But no mass shooting events in UK since 2010, so that is a positive.
A good reason to keep your guns against the Feds' attack is on ZH today:
I believe that as our economies gradually fail the trend will be towards localisation and in the case of America this could mean the avoidance of the Fed interventions which I read somewhere recently as States take more control. Perhaps this is a realistic reason for hope? Secession?
There are immense cultural differences between nations that can account for radical differences in the public. In the UK the police can enter your house when they are justified. While the UK police have powers well beyond the US police, they are remarkably restrained in use of those powers. Still, there are estate areas in the UK where the police do not enter without an armed team. Armed police teams in the UK are quite a big deal. And regardless of the laws, criminals in the UK do have weapons. They are rarely used on citizens because the effort to find them reaches extremes.
The UK social mores are quite different than the US mores expressing a different culture. Similarly other nations differ as well. Some conduct accepted in the US would be considered bonkers elsewhere. And other nations often worry a lot about retaining their traditional values as the Yank culture arrives.
Good observations thanks, and I do agree. But the pressing issue is random mass shootings which haven't happened in UK since 2010. As the US government violently threatens their own people, the patriots have every reason to retain their defences regardless of the individual acts of homicide.
I think it's all about fear levels which seem to be high in the US whereas most Brits don't feel as threatened by their government - well not yet anyway but that could change.
There is something to be said about trust in local councils even in the largest cities where government attempts to be closer to it's citizens. In my work with the UK police I felt they were quite well trained compared to my work with US police. And I felt a respect for the force part of law enforcement in the UK police. The level of frustration with government seems to be quite different between the two nations although the effort at polarization seems about the same. I'm not able to judge differences in how troubled youth are managed between the two nations. But I did observe that UK teens can access beer readily and few adults seem overly concerned as long as the kids behave. Don't know how far that tolerance really goes.
Thank you for your valuable insights into the two police forces. It seems that they are both attempting to do a good job of keeping the peace in their own way. Yes, teens tend to be unruly wherever they are and the drinking culture in UK doesn't seem to impact society any more here than elsewhere - most of them in my experience generally behave well.
I spend time on this American website where I post my weekly 'Letter from Great Britain' and the comments give me good feedback especially about the way the Feds are viewed as opposed to state or county governance:
My view on gun control is that everybody should have one and know how to use it. As collapse intensifies it will become more obvious that police and others are not going to protect us. I think most of the shootings that are highlighted by the media and used to push the wedge issue of gun control were in some way facilitated or helped along to further the narrative, whether the person was groomed by the FBI, police were asked to stand down, or it was all a made for media production. https://sukwan.substack.com/p/did-police-in-the-uvalde-texas-school?s=w
This entire gun argument is really so simple. “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
SHALL
NOT
BE
INFRINGED
And yes you could buy a cannon back in the time of our founding fathers. And the fact that I cannot by an M1 tank is an infringement on my 2A rights. George Washington said, “they should have arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, which would include their own government”.
If you don’t like the foundational laws of this country as it pertains to firearms then you can move to literally almost any other country on Earth and not live around people who have guns, I mean there are just so many other options. But for the rest of us, this IS our option.
Margaret, Thank you for sharing this stomach churning mis-adventure. The "footedness" and staunch defense by the uninformed never ceases to astound me. I hope that it is not a violation of some unwritten internet protocol to use the my response to Naomi Wolf for you as well:
Naomi, great work and thank you for sticking it out! You are the modern day version of John in the woods wrapped in skins and eating wild berries and insects, screaming....REPENT FOR THE LORD IS COMING! Like you he persevered. God worked it out early that it is up to the individual to gain the knowledge and make the decision. You are blessed for being one who brings knowledge. Now we wait.
In addition I would like to share with you the following:
If they can't be trusted to protect our free speech,
If they can't be trusted to protect the lives of our unborn children,
If they can't be trusted to protect our right to freely assemble,
If they can't be trusted to protect our boarder from illegal aliens,
If they can't be trusted to tell us the truth about our current financial situation,
If they can't be trusted to protect our energy independence so we are not dependent upon nations that despise us for the energy resources needed to maintain our jobs and homes,
Then why would we trust them for our personal protection?
It's illogical at best and dangerous at worst.
-Pastor Allen Jackson, World Outreach Church, Murfreesboro, Tennessee
"NE: Come on. Guns don’t cause mass shootings but they’d be less of them if guns weren’t around"
I remember asking her, "Wait - if you get rid of guns, then why would there only be "less" of mass shootings? Why would there be any mass shootings at all? I mean, you just got rid of guns, didn't you?"
Or words to that effect.
What she doesn't contemplate is that which cannot be known but can be deduced: what would unopposed bad guys do, and what would an unopposed government do, if they all knew that the People were unarmed and defenseless?
I mean, just look at what they do KNOWING that there are 300 millions guns out there. Imagine if NONE of the People were armed ... well, you don't have to imagine.
You only have to open a history book. (Or pay attention to what's happening in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, among others, these days.)
Margaret, living in Australia, I never felt disadvantaged by the strict gun laws here. America had just as many tyrannical edicts imposed on the populace during Covid as we did despite all the weaponry. I thought to myself, where is the armed uprising? Even more so, during the January 6 “insurrection”; where were the guns? Nowhere, except in the hands of a Capital officer.
The fact is Australia is not America. Their histories are totally different. You have inner city poverty and crime on a level that we don’t have in Australia. You also have so many illegally owned weapons that even with a gun ban the criminals would not be deterred. Also, you can perform mass carnage with cars and trucks as has occurred both in the U.S. and other countries.
I remember America of the 1950s and 60s; there were nowhere near as many mass killings as today; still many gun. Of course then you didn’t have the destruction of family and religious institutions; nor did you have the internet or the level of pharmaceutical pollution of children that exists today.
I appreciate your perspective as an Australian, Ely. From my POV, Australian tyranny did escalate to a far greater extreme than it did in America (quarantine camps, police brutality, etc. as depicted in the Down Under edition of my Recommendations Roundup: https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/recommendations-roundup-2-down-under-41b). I don’t think we’re likely to see any kind of armed uprising aside from isolated instances—unless the Second Amendment is infringed and enforcers try to start coming for people’s means of self-defense and/or people start getting carted off to gulags.
There is a degree of truth in what you say Margaret. I do recall though a hairdresser arrested in Texas because she defied a mandate and kept her business open, and a gym owner in New Jersey also arrested for keeping his business open.
While I heard about so-called quarantined camps, In my state, West Australia there were no quarantine camps, just hotel or home isolation. Thankfully, schools were only closed for three weeks. What shocked me was the degree of Aussie compliance. Where was the larrikan spirit; the rebelling against authority?
I have an interesting perspective, having lived in Canada, America and Australia. Many similarities but also differences. I was most shocked by Canada, where I did my schooling, though I wasn’t born there. It went full-on CPP. Also Israel (British Palestine), where I was born, went fascist on its populace. I have been to every U.S. state except for three, so I have a pretty good read on the U.S. psyche. Currently, I have investments in Texas, so am in touch regularly with my American friends. I think we all agree how disturbing things have been the past couple of years, in the Western world. Hence, why it was all coordinated with the same memes.
Haha, I can’t condone only sleeping five hours a night given how vital sleep is to maintaining health, but I also can’t chide you since I have such poor sleep habits myself ;-)
I started watching the video, portions of which I have seen before. It just shows how we are one step away from a totalitarian regime. When I see what is going on in the show trial in D.C., it’s like the ex Soviet Union. I really worry about the disintegration of America as I once knew it. Innocent people carted away in leg irons or arrested without cause. What happened?
"America had just as many tyrannical edicts imposed on the populace during Covid as we did despite all the weaponry"
I'd hazard a guess that most of the tyrannical edicts were imposed in Blue states, and Blue states are where 2A rights are most infringed upon. *Where* the tyranny was most pronounced was where gun rights were LEAST exercised or even available. I mean, in NYS you apparently need to take a class and provide FOUR references, and even then, NYS is a "may issue", not a "shall issue", state.
"I remember America of the 1950s and 60s; there were nowhere near as many mass killings as today"
Y'know what else we didn't have in the 1950s and 60s? Gun-free zones. Where something like 98% of mass shootings take place. Gun-free zones are the byproduct of Democrat Party (and GOP squish) governance. Which states are Democrat-run? Blue states. The tyrannical states.
Apologies for not reading every one of the 100+ comments if I am restating something. But one of NE's common replies, of which I've arguing against, is the statement suggesting in "countries without guns", there are no mass casualty tragedies, and that the argument is trying to prove a negative. This is easily refutable. All of the so called "gunless societies" have had their high casualty incidents, numerous times.
Mexico: private gun ownership is illegal, and yet it has one of the highest homicide rates globally.
California: some if the most restrictive gun prohibitions anywhere and yet homicides are at an all time high. New York, almost identical.
Most of the EU has had numerous mass casualty events, some involving firearms, and some not, which didn't fit the establishment narratives, and have been memory holed for the public good, but which still happened and records exist, subjective truths be damned.
Thank you for arguing rationally for the right to self preservation. The opponents of which always seem to rely on the false premise of government benevolence, to the point of absurdity.
Those are excellent contributions to the discussion, John! Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Your last sentence should be enough to convince anyone who’s alert to the COVID tyranny.
MAA: You are courageous to take this issue on. Well done. I saw Dr. Naomi Wolf's post and thought it was fantastic the way she shared her journey to understand the real 2A issues.
“I have never believed that additional gun control or federal registration of guns would reduce crime. I am convinced that a criminal who wants a firearm can get one through illegal, nontraceable, unregistered sources, with or without gun control.”
That was Joe Biden in July 1985.
It is in this article. Enough of the lies Joe! What part of "Shall not be infringed" does Biden not understand?
Thank you, Dennis, and I agree about Naomi’s piece and was glad she published it in time for me to reference in this thread!
Wow, that quote is quite a find. If only we could have 1985 Joe take on 2022 Joe, 2019 Fauci take on 2020+ Fauci, and so on. They would make formidable opponents of themselves ;-)
I used to engage on these topics, but the opposition isn’t acting in good faith, at best. At this point, I feel the same way about this topic as I do all of our natural rights: I don’t give a shit if anyone doesn’t like them. Tough. Too bad. Suck it.
That is one reason I’m surprised this is a contentious issue in this particular community because pretty much everyone here agrees tyranny is a genuine threat and generally supports individual rights.
Only the greatest fool doesn’t support individual rights, because even the greatest of fools is also an individual. To not support such rights is the same thing as saying “I am a slave, and I wish everyone else were.”
And now I know how to get a record number of unsubs 😆 I guess I shot myself in the foot there (ouch, sorry about that—must be the migraine impairing my judgment).
As a famous Tim said in a movie, "Never back down, never Surrender" , I followed this stack due to the name, as I have been telling people for years I feel we have "gone though the looking glass" and are living in stupidlandia now, I stay for the well written thoughts. Thank you for sticking to your "guns" and not just deleting this stack to save subs
Haha, thank you, T C, and I am delighted you followed the trail through the looking glass and became a part of this community of brave and brilliant souls!
Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
Psychotropic drugs are big business: in 2009, roughly 300,000,000 prescriptions were written for these agents. Psychotropic drugs are big business: in 2009, roughly 300,000,000 prescriptions were written for these agents. Duff Wilson of The New York Times recently reported that the newer generation of antipsychotics has become the country’s best selling medications. (would you disarm them all!)
--A few years ago i sat with many PTSD veterans at a Patriot Meeting and the Obama Regime was pushing for gun control if diagnosed with PTSD, many who have owned their guns for decades!! THE NRA WAS BACKING THE OBAMA REGIME!!!
Mental health as a weapon against the people is communist in origin.. Lawful gun ownership is not a disease. It is a constitutionally protected, individual right.… State-controlled psychiatry is a terrifying weapon, especially when it is used to determine who has rights. Every individual should be able to be eccentric, different, and even self-destructive. As long as the behavior harms no one else, it is no business of authority. To screen people for potentially dangerous behavior is a form of pre-crime diligence that gives government an almost unlimited power over anyone it targets. It is a tool of social control, not safety.
Thanks for sharing the thread. It's always interesting to see the exchange between two people/groups that have diametrically opposing views on a subject. While I agree 100% with you, I think O.S. had a point when she said, it sounded like she was being accused of having an opposing view based in propaganda and brainwashing and not her own conclusions and reasons., for her own reasons. If she (for whatever reason) sided with gun control or even gun abolition, she must be deluded in some way (forgive the paraphrasing of your position and comments).
I understand (from reading your inputs) that your intention was not to label or accuse her, but to point out the agenda driven political/media machinations, that influence countless, intelligent people worldwide.
I had a similar discussion with a coworker years back, when high capacity magazines were being debated and voted on in Colorado. He vehemently advocated for the banning/abolishment of them and said there could be NO GOOD reason for them. Anyone who advocated for them was foolish, uniformed, intentionally muckraking, didn't care about mass shootings and lives lost or a psychopath. I simply could have no good reason, for advocating for high capacity magazines.
When he took a breath and said he would entertain a reply from me, I said the following:
As a military veteran (Gulf War) I have loaded and unloaded countless 5.56 and 9mm rounds in magazines. With stripper clips it's a breeze (5.56). However, when each round is loose (like most bought in the civilian world) it is laborious and after a while a little painful on the finger tips (I'm talking hundreds of rounds here). I'm also lazy. I would rather sit and load 20 or 30 - 30 round magazines all at once, then go to the range and shoot to my hearts content. The prospect of load 10 round, shoot, stop, reload, shoot, stop, reload...is ridiculous to me. I also said, I am not wrong for my reasoned position, as we were in America and I have the right to my own decision making, so long as no one else is harmed by it. To his credit, he said "that's actually a valid reason, I see your point". It didn't change his overall stance, but we were able to sit on opposing sides of the fence, with mutually granted space.
Another thought I have always had, is that people with strong views on long held polarizing topics, almost never abandon them, until they are affected by them. I would love to see results of a survey asking anti-gun women, who had been raped, if they'd have wanted a gun (that they had trained to use for self defense) when their rapist attacked them.
When you strip away the fantasy of "that will never happen to me", then positions and long held beliefs change quickly.
Case in point are the liberal and dem parent pushing back against the in school grooming of their children, where racism and sexualization is concerned.
The irony is human beings have centuries of hind sight, on both individual and societal levels, but almost always have to repeat mistakes and suffer the consequences to learn lessons previous learned and paid for by countless others.
Thanks for your observations, opinions and spectacular writing abilities. I always feel smarter after reading your work!
What an awesome comment, hzcct, and I wish I had time to do it justice! Suffice it to say, you make many excellent points, and I appreciate your real-life example.
It is difficult to find a way to make people realize many of their opinions have been engineered without engaging their self-defense mechanisms. Edward Bernays wrote the instruction manuals in “Propaganda” and “Crystallizing Public Opinion,” and the public-opinion engineers have been following these playbooks ever since. It’s all out in the open, and yet few are able to see it as it would require them to admit they have been suckered, thus keeping them stuck in the loop of being engineered.
OS surprised me because she can see through the propaganda mechanism for other issues but not this one. In any case, I appreciate your thoughtful analysis.
dear margaret anna alice there is another thing that must be considered if tyranny is to occur in this country, is will our military be used to attack their fellow countryman? for the most part i think not. other than a few treasonous officers like general milley, the government would have to bring in foreign soldiers (united nation's troops). this military force would not be generally too enthusiastic with fighting heavily armed Americans! we would have what is referred to in sports as the home field advantage!
Great additions, j.s., and I hope you are right about the military. I think the split we saw between those who complied with the mandate and those who didn’t reveals the ones who are willing to succumb to tyranny and those who aren’t. The ones who aren’t are now on the side of the civilians, regardless, so they’ve swelled the ranks of the Resistance with highly qualified defenders.
true. i think this was part of what the government intended-eliminate as many non compliant, therefore freedom loving, soldiers as possible. however i am sure many took the shot as a matter of duty, not understanding the harm it does to their bodies-after all, when you go into the military you take many vaccines-to them this was just another one. this is a truly EVIL government we currently have, to poison their own military for profit and power!
dear margaret anna alice this person that you were debating with clearly doesn't know history, particularly American history! this country has been in two MAJOR wars with an adversary far superior to our young nation. England's army was very much greater in man power and equipment than ours in the American revolution, and obviously we prevailed in this one! then in the war of 1812, England had a far superior navy than young America with several hundred ships. the british empire was considered as having the greatest navy in the world at that time, and the British still lost to upstart America! perhaps Britain should have confiscated America's arms, then things would have been vary different! thank God they were unable to do this!
Firstly, I agree with ALL of your views on guns. As to what is stirring us to have this conversation it is young men shooting up our children in schools. They have been between 16 - 20 years old. I don't know about the last two mass shootings (Buffalo included), but I can bet they are on some type of pharmaceutical anti-depressant. After the Sandy Hook shooting I just knew that shooter would be found to be on meds that altered his brain chemistry in some way. While I'm not as skilled at investigating and gathering as you are, my high-level theory is that pharma is behind this "blame the guns" story. Their deep pockets has kept us on this topic for years now when in my realty is more likely due to their dangerous drugs. Chris Masterson (of Peak Prosperity) recently posted videos on the topic of "demoralization" vs. depression and the dangers of misdiagnosing as depression then drugging up our young during the period when their brains are still being developed. His videos can be long but they're quite good. Here is one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0051hkjB9po
For schools, my concern with arming the teachers is that students do steal from their teachers. They'll find a way... I don't have a better argument about it than that--this is just the aspect that makes me hesitant about arming teachers. It would be more helpful for schools if the local law enforcement would act as Sheriff Grady Judd of Polk County did. “If you come to a school in this county, armed, we’re going to do our best through either our guardians, our school resource officers, or our school resource deputy sheriffs to eliminate the threat outside of the school before they ever get to the children. We’re trained to do that.” “This is the last thing you’ll see before we put a bullet through your head if you’re trying to hurt our children,” Judd said this while holding a picture of two police officers carrying firearms. “We are going to shoot you graveyard dead if you come onto a campus, with a gun, threatening our children or shooting at us.”
That is certainly a compelling theory, Susan, and I am beginning to believe BigPharma is behind EVERY societal ill we face today—seriously! Even the push to cause confusion about gender in children yields profits for hormone blockers and a lifetime of pharmaceutical support for mental health issues.
And your concern about stealing is worth considering. If you see Tio Nico’s comments about the FASTER Saves Lives program, that sounds like a viable alternative to arming teachers and has been 100% effective according to Tio.
you are not far from the truth susan! my wife who has passed some time ago, due to big pharma's vikodin destroying her liver, was at one time taking anti depressant prozac, until she heard voices telling her to kill me! these chemicals are very dangerous and contrary to our nature, and should be avoided if at all possible!
I'm very sorry about your wife and what you both had to deal with. May she truly rest in peace--she sure deserves it after some nasty company ruined her life with unfound promises.
I come at this from a strictly technical point of view.
1. The right to self defense is a natural human right, one that predates any compact or government.
2. The government is not the source of rights; it may not lawfully take them away.
3. The 2nd Amendment is a further restriction on government, not individuals. It is not a back door way for the government, at least the federal version, to regulate firearms ownership and possession.
4. Two recent SCOTUS decisions have ruled that the 2nd Amendment enshrines an individual right to keep and bear arms. The Cruikshank decision (1876) said that the right to keep and bear arms is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent on that instrument for its existence.
5. There is no positive grant of power in the Constitution for the federal government to regulate firearms ownership or possession. If the 2nd Amendment disappeared, there would still be no positive grant of power to regulate firearms ownership or possession in the Constitution.
6. Our federal government and state governments have delegated powers. Since no individual or group, no matter how large, has the power to infringe on the right to keep and bear arms, it logically follows that no one can delegate a power to any government that they, themselves, do not possess. This applies to laws about waiting periods, background checks, "red flag" laws, magazine restrictions, ammunition restrictions, restrictions on numbers of weapons that can be purchased per month, and just about every proposed restriction of which I am aware.
7. Our founders made it painfully obvious that the people and the State militias were to be better armed than any army the federal government, on any pretense, could raise.
If I tended to trust my government, I might be amenable to some restrictions. Since I don't trust my government, I regard every proposal with the greatest of suspicion. I tend to see every proposal as being very liable to be misinterpreted or misapplied, so much so as to regulate the right out of existence. This is especially true with "red flag" proposals and such. As someone else has written, the very flexible definitions of mental illness, or incapacity, could make "red flag" laws the weapon of choice for ruling most people unqualified to possess firearms.
I am afraid that the only realistic proposal to limit or stop these kinds of massacres is to encourage everyone to be armed, in all venues, except where prohibited by the actual owner of the venue. I view the most reasonable mindset is to accept that the world is a very dangerous place, and no amount of laws can make the world safe. If many of the recent shooting sprees have taught us anything, it is that the police and the government can't protect you, in fact, won't protect you, when you really need them to.
In fact, they have shown by their cowardice in the face of clear and present threats that they do not deserve their offices of honor or respect. Their offices and jobs should be terminated immediately, and other provisions for ensuring the public safety should be proposed.
There are probably points I have missed, but this should start the discussion.
as a brit i have always been anti gun (although i have fired a few bb guns and thoroughly enjoyed target shooting). i thought that seeing the stats of deaths by guns and how bad it looks in the states that they were a bad idea. someone with anger issues goes bonkers with them or a depressed person blows their own brains out, i have been through depression and i expect if i had had easy access to a gun i might not be here now.
however having spent the last two years watching Australia Canada and New Zealand fall under corporate fascism and reading Solzhenitsyn and others like Naomi Wolfs piece above (i never thought about women being more vulnerable (hangs head in shame)) that i have re-evaluated my position and regret our countries gun laws, we are in a precarious position and i dont like it
Sort of suitable for the discussion is a quote from Louis L'Amour (at least that's where I read it). Relevant in its clear-sighted wisdom and downright humorous, in the right context. It goes something like this: "There's nothing more dangerous than an unloaded gun when you need one." —Although I don't keep one chambered. The pronounced ratcheting warning of doing so might afford me a startled split-second advantage... or it might get me killed, but I feel it prudent.
Woohoo! I just read Malone’s Sunday Strip. I LOVE the shout out to you MAA. You’re doing amazing work and we are grateful to be part of this experience with such brave and courageous people.
Aww, thank you, Jessica! I was really surprised and moved by that. You are doing spectacular work, yourself, and I am so thankful you are part of this community!
Thanks so much for this MAA. And... "The topic of gun rights/control is one I assumed pretty much everyone in the anti-tyranny/pro-freedom movement would be in agreement on. A lively comment exchange at a recent el gato malo post proved otherwise, however."
Yes! I was utterly shocked that people who I've seen screaming liberty and freedom regarding so-called medicine/shots and other issues where violations of rights and body exist did a complete about face when it came to protecting one's creator/God given right to protect one's body with a firearm. A criminal with a hypodermic is no different than a criminal with a firearm. They both need to be arrested. And, at this point in history, criminals with hypodermics have killed and maimed countless numbers more people than a madman with a firearm has. That's an indisputable fact.
Keep on pressing on MAA. Thanks for your incredible work.
Excellent points, Rob, and I’m glad I’m not the only one who was naïve in thinking those opposing tyranny and democide would recognize the obvious connection!
One of my subscribers alerted me to this book, which sheds light on the connection between gun rights and genocide:
• “Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and ‘Enemies of the State’” by Stephen Halbrook
Thanks, I'll check out the book. And yes, to me, we either have God given rights or we don't. We should never pick and choose what rights a people have based on what we think the "right rights" are at the time. If we do that we eventually end up with no rights at all. And that's the slippery road we are on right now. We must stay ever vigilant.
That was good to read. It is interesting that some things could be seen through by the debater but not this issue. Not yet anyway. I was a full on progressive and I attempted this debate with an uncle twenty years ago. I didn't admit it in the debate, but it left me in doubt about my position, which I realized I had zero historical context informing it. (Why would I need that?, I read the NYT's) Of course eventually I realized it wasn't even 'my' position at all. It's uncomfortable - as we know - to learn how easily we've been manipulated, especially when the cause it 'righteous' like saving the lives of kids. Identity is play and that's always unsettling. Thanks, MAA.
Thank you for honestly sharing your own courageous journey, Kathleen, and hearing how your uncle planted a seed that later blossomed gives me hope that all of my efforts in these failed exchanges may not be for naught!
"If we just get rid of these rifles that shoot 100 bullets a second, and have the shoulder thing that goes up, there would never be another killing, this never happened before the weapon of war AK15 was around, or violent video games",,,,,,,Heard this for years, but I beg to differ, https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/05/24/bath-consolidated-school-massacre-uvalde/
I tried to create a space for respectful dialogue on the topic from both sides while still honestly presenting my own views. I guess there were some on the other side of the debate who weren’t ready for that discussion.
Sigh. I had a feeling this might happen, based on our dear hostess' history of republishing her exchanges with people she disagrees with. In case anyone's interested, I am the "OS" she's quoting (and would have appreciated a request to post this exchange here, although as it's in the public domain I suppose that's moot). I am NOT going to get into the gun control issue again here, as the previous exchange was kind of a waste of time as disagreements about hot-button issues usually are. I will make only one point about that exchange: it got shut down at the point where our hostess accused me of being "brainwashed" and having not formed my opinions by independent thought, but as a result of government and media propaganda. At that point, the conversation is dead. Whatever you're talking about, you've killed it. No one is going to be receptive to your ideas when you basically tell them, "You are so unintelligent and gullible, and your position so without merit, that you cannot possibly have formed it by reason. I, on the other hand, am wise, smart. I am above it all. I see through propaganda and lies. My thinking is not influenced by any type of propaganda or manipulation; I am too intelligent for that. Let me guide and enlighten you, oh foolish one. Listen to my wisdom."
MAA sent several comments after that exchange, which frankly, I didn't read, as they were "walls of text" and the basic premise of the conversation, respect for your conversation partner, was obviously not present.
I have no doubt our dear hostess feels great about having fully explained her position in our comment exchange, and here in this post. But what she didn't have was a dialogue, at least not a successful one in any sense of the term.
And no, I'm not going to get drawn into rehashing the original discussion. It did, however, get me thinking about successful and not successful tactics for discussions where two people disagree on a topic. Maybe one day I'll write something on that...then again, maybe not.
Hi, Oh Susanna, and thank you for your constructive feedback. Obviously, I suck at this given my consistent track record of failing to convince my debate opponents 😆
I appreciate your willingness to participate in dialogue about this and apologize if my approach came across as an attack on you personally rather than your position. You mentioned that you didn’t read all of my comments, so perhaps you missed the part where I said it is because I know you are capable of independent thought that I am engaging in this discussion to begin with.
I look forward to your suggestions on tactics for discussions like this, so please let me know if you do decide to publish a piece on it :-)
I'm not sure how I would feel if my comments were turned into a post, but I believe I can understand your thinking.
I also had a comment conversation with you about this topic and dropped it when I saw you were fully engaged with others. No need for me to pile on.
I don't hope to change your mind about your choice to have weapons and use them, But I do hope to persuade you not to limit my freedoms in this matter. The 2nd Amendment is a right, not a permission, no different than a right to speech, religion, press, etc. It can't be taken away. The rationale for it is not only delineated in the Constitution, it is founded in the Declaration of Independence. It can't legitimately be taken away, though governments will certainly try to.
Still, every time there's an incident, the debate renews. One thing I'd love to see as a part of the debate is a study that compares the continual homicide rate over time, say from the end of WW2 until now, in America, in locations that have eliminated gun rights (think Chicago, NY, Washington DC, etc) to areas that have strong citizen gun rights protections. Do you think that eliminating guns in those areas resulted in fewer homicides or lower homicide rates? I've never seen such a study, but I'd be keen to.
Lastly, I'm just going to dismiss any idea that countries outside of the US can be fairly compared, socially or culturally. Even still, the percentage of gun owners in most countries is far lower than in the US, but the homicide rate is often much higher, including the percentage killed by guns (which are obviously much harder to get.)
In your conversations with MAA and others, I do not challenge your beliefs or ideas. But I will always challenge your insistence that you infringe on my rights, my ability to protect myself and my family, and my right to reserve the ability to fight back against a tyrannical government. That issue, in and of itself, is reason enough, and no one can dismiss it as unlikely to occur. It ALWAYS occurs when the state has the monopoly on violence.
I saw a twitter post that ranked the US against other nations. In the world rankings the US murder rate is quite good when you remove five cities from the numbers. I have not attempted to verify the numbers. That we tolerate the lawlessness in those five cities is another issue but the citizens there continue to elect the same people expecting change that never happens. I have no idea how that can be true but it is.
Looking at https://infocopse.com/top-10-most-dangerous-cities/ one thinks the folk down South are in bad shape, likely because of the US drug issue. IMHO, want to reduce crime? Let pharmacies fill scripts for all drugs; make script access possible. Help those who want to be helped.
If 2A is USED as originally intended to prevent a tyrannical government, that would be fantastic. Today, we have a tyrannical, nuclear-armed government, proving that 2A was not only an abject failure but is also obsolete.
Today 2A is solely ABUSED to profit gun makers while killing children. Time to take 2A out.
Thank you for weighing in, Vinu. Don’t you think America would have ratcheted up its tyranny to the same (or worse) levels seen in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, China, and every dictatorship throughout history if we didn’t have 2A and 40% of households didn’t own guns?
And if, as you propose, we “take 2A out,” what would you suggest as an alternative way for law-abiding individuals to protect themselves against criminals and totalitarianism?
I encourage you to read Naomi Wolf’s piece to see how her thinking has evolved on this issue and specifically how it relates to tyranny:
Margaret, Rosa Parks stopped a tyranny of the majority, without a gun. Now the keyboard is mightier than the gun. Truckers and tradies stopped tyranny in Canada and Australia. If everybody had a gun and used that to settle differences, that would make us Afghanistan. Do we want to go there?
Do we want to live in a world where grandmoms need to come prepared for gunfights at grocery stores?
"Truckers and tradies stopped tyranny in Canada and Australia." No, they didn't, Trudeau and his gang, and Dan Andrews and his gang are both still very much in power...
Trucker in Canada had their bank accounts frozen and stolen, their protest was crushed by a girly-man tyrant, and their medical mandates are still being enforced, by a authoritarian state. You're absolutely wrong, and your arguments are ridiculous.
If you claim it would have been worse in the US without 2A then similarly it could be argued that it would have been worse in Canada, Australia without truckers and tradies.
You think the nuclear armed US government is afraid of your AR-15s?
They can shut down ammo sales like they did for HCQ/ivermectin. What are you going to do?
US government tyranny is growing everyday. When does 2A come into play?
It's much too late for a revolt. We the People of the U.S. should have revolted a long time ago. And repeated it thereafter as it became necessary; which it did, time and time again (but we didn't revolt, or didn't do so sufficiently). At least one of the U.S. founders, Jefferson, and probably more if not many of them, said so. Today, most "Americans" believe revolution is "treason", and don't believe it's ever justified. They're brainwashed. Now the U.S. government calls freedom fighters "terrorists" and "'unprivileged' [supposedly having zero 'unalienable' (cannot legally be taken away, withheld and/or violated) rights] 'enemy' 'belligerents'".
I'm probably already called such, or soon will be, and will likely be accused of such when they come to take me away to the gulag---concentration camps all over the U.S., including in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico, with some in Canada, and probably in the U.K. and the other NATO and "Five Eyes" countries as well, all interconnected by an extensive rail network in the U.S., with detainment cars (with shackle hookups in the walls and floors) and flatbed rail cars with guillotines (all witnessed)---they're already prepared for mass-detainment, particularly in a revolution, a revolution (or series of revolutions) that they brought on themselves a long time ago but very-successfully brainwashed most of us to never carry out, and to falsely believe is never justified and is "treason".
Now we live in an increasingly-totalitarian police state, aka the "Fourth Reich" (including all of the U.S. allies, especially the main ones), run entirely by the largest tyrannical government in the entire history of the world, getting worse and worse decade by decade, incrementally, slowly but surely---now they're in their endgame, or the beginning of their endgame (and, thus, we ain't seen nothin' yet).
It is an interesting thought-experiment to consider how the course of history would have changed if the people had revolted as soon as the government became corrupt each time it occurred, so the government would have a proper fear of the people and be kept in check over time.
You really have no idea where this is heading do you? Rosa Parks would do zip today (if the overlords were opposed to black rights) because anything she did wouldn't even make page 20 on any newspaper. And where Trudoo is going the Truckers won't get a convoy of two put together before the digital currency will not allow them to buy anything outside of their hometown. And maybe if their digital ID shows that they have left their neighborhood they will be flagged and a UN/WEF team (unaccountable to Canadian law) will lock them up, likely as mentally unbalanced and put on force-fed pharmaceuticals that turn them into zombies. Note all of the above has already happened in Canada. The future awaits.
No you won't. But if things reach a tipping point and no democratic outlet exists, shots will be fired, people will die, police and armed forces will revolt, a chain reaction will occur, hopefully the people will win. If things get that bad, fight and lose, may still work out better for us than giving up for the sake of a few years of "not as bad as that".
"We depend on regulated professionals for everything in a civil society. Why is protection against criminals an exception?"
Because of this: Police have no legal duty to protect individuals. “The US Supreme Court has made it clear that law enforcement agencies are not required to provide protection to the citizens who are forced to pay the police for their "services." In the cases DeShaney vs. Winnebago, 489 U.S. 189 (1989) and Town of Castle Rock vs. Gonzales [see https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/04-278], the Supreme Court has ruled that police agencies are not obligated to provide protection of citizens. In other words, police are well within their rights to pick and choose when to intervene to protect the lives and property of others — even when a threat is apparent. In both of these court cases, clear and repeated threats were made against the safety of children — but government agencies chose to take no action.” https://mises.org/power-market/police-have-no-duty-protect-you-federal-court-affirms-yet-again. And this failure to act in a timely fashion - or at all - has been seen in this most recent shooting: “Cops waited outside while shooter killed students. Video and witness accounts from outside Uvalde's Robb Elementary School suggest local police officers not only failed to try and stop the shooter for an unconscionably long time but also actively prevented parents from trying to save their kids. The shooter—Salvador Ramos—was inside the school for 40 minutes or more while police stood around outside, the Associated Press reports. "Frustrated onlookers urged police officers to charge into the Texas elementary school," but the officers reportedly waited outside until a SWAT team was ready. How many lives could have been saved if the cops had acted sooner? If they had bravely put their lives on the line instead of letting elementary school children and teachers fend for themselves against an armed madman for nearly an hour?
Instead, witnesses say the cops stood guard outside the school, preventing parents from rushing in to try and stop the shooter themselves: Javier Cazares, whose fourth grade daughter, Jacklyn Cazares, was killed in the attack, said he raced to the school when he heard about the shooting, arriving while police were still gathered outside the building. Upset that police were not moving in, he raised the idea of charging into the school with several other bystanders. "Let's just rush in because the cops aren't doing anything like they are supposed to," he said. "More could have been done." Video taken by Hugo Cervantes shows cops corralling parents outside the school, even pinning one man down.” https://reason.com/2022/05/26/witnesses-video-suggest-stunning-inaction-from-uvalde-cops-during-school-shooting/
Frankly, that community would be a lot better off having no police at all - with citizens taking on the full responsibility for their safety and that of their families and community - a responsibility which they already have by very settled case law - and a responsibility which law enforcement does not have and has never had. And Russell Brand - and others, including the Biden Administration and numerous Republican and Democratic politicians, seek to deny the people the most effective means of carrying out that duty, leaving them defenseless in the face of lethal threats, against which their governments and police forces have no duty to defend them - and that’s simply unconscionable.
"Warren v. District of Columbia is one of the leading cases of this type. Two women were upstairs in a townhouse when they heard their roommate, a third woman, being attacked downstairs by intruders. They phoned the police several times and were assured that officers were on the way. After about 30 minutes, when their roommate's screams had stopped, they assumed the police had finally arrived. When the two women went downstairs they saw that in fact the police never came, but the intruders were still there. As the Warren court graphically states in the opinion: "For the next fourteen hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced to commit sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual demands of their attackers."
The three women sued the District of Columbia for failing to protect them, but D.C.'s highest court exonerated the District and its police, saying that it is a "fundamental principle of American law that a government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any individual citizen." Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1 (D.C. Ct. of Ap., 1981).
Here's a law review on the topic, it's known as the Public Duty Doctrine - simply put - "a governmental entity is not liable for injury to a citizen where liability is alleged on the ground that the governmental entity owes a duty to the public in general, as in the case of police or fire protection." https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2592&context=vlr
Elect people who will rewrite such garbage laws. That's the solution. The solution is not to go back to living in caves, where the guy with the bigger gun wins. They want our tax dollars, they have to work for it.
We have an illusory system of a republic shadow run by an unelected and unaccountable Security State that has a budget greater than the next 10-nations combined.
And these are the same people who are organizing and serving as Mall Cop for the Great Reset. They do not believe in democracy or freedom and much like they do in nations all over the world, they are poised to finally turn inwards towards its own citizens.
Vinu, as you note, I liked one of your comments. I think you are making some good points on this issue, frankly.
But not this one. And I'll explain why.
We are long past the point where we can elect our way out of anything in America.
The people who run America are not elected, but do so behind the scenes. These are the same people, the Military Industrial Complex, the Security State, the Intelligence Community, The Blob...who run the world. Who engineer all over the world, who create alliances such as "Five Eyes", or NATO, or Council for Foreign Relations, who coup and topple govt's. who wreck Libya, Syria, Yemen, who wanted to invade Venezuela, who spy on our own Congress, who Chuck Schumer advised Trump, an elected President, like him or no, not to cross as they have "six ways to Sunday" to get back at you.
The same people who lie to Congress about WMD, or surveillance, who themselves cannot be investigated.
I assume that you are not American and this may also be why you had a difficult time with the reality that the US is creating bioweapons and unleashing them and also creating "self spreading vaccines" in conjunction with Johns Hopkins and UNC and etc.
And exp. on our own military as lab rats.
I would have shared your point of view on about two years ago.
I understand that if the gov't. wants to move big, they will, but it will be more difficult if the citizens are armed, and also if the police and military split.
Your points about hacking and digital tyranny are very well formed.
It's not a statutory law, it's well-settled case law. See this law review on the topic, it's known as the Public Duty Doctrine - simply put - "a governmental entity is not liable for injury to a citizen where liability is alleged on the ground that the governmental entity owes a duty to the public in general, as in the case of police or fire protection." https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2592&context=vlr
False choice. If the criminal had a knife and the police had guns, they would not be waiting outside. You arm criminals with assault weapons, Uvalde is what you get.
I did criminal defense law for 20 years. If criminals carry guns, they're going to be semi-auto pistols which are easily concealable, available on the street for maybe $150 each - a lot less than the legal price, because they come up with the drug cartels - or full-auto AK47s, also imported and sold by the drug cartels, street price about half that of a legal AR-15. A criminal with a knife is within lethal range at 20 feet distance, they can attack within a second at that distance and kill you, and knife wounds are often lethal where bullet wounds are not. And knives go right through Kevlar. An AR-15 is not a military assault weapon, it's not selective fire, that requires a special sear and modifications to the lower receiver that very, very few could do at home. Current M-16s have three modes - safe, single shot, and three round burst - full auto is a waste of ammunition - that's an assault weapon. So criminals just get their weapons on the street, it will be a throwaway charge anyhow, it goes away in plea negotiations - ask me how I know.
And the original legislative intent of the Second Amendment was that the people would have military assault weapons - in British North America - which is what the United States were before the Revolution - there was not only a right to keep and bear arms - military arms - but also a duty to do so, and that duty existed for all free males between the ages of 16 and 60. Younger males, from ages 10 to 15 could, with their parents' permission, also be a part of the "training band", as the local territorial militias were known as, and adults, 61 and over, could retain their membership. The youngest Rebel at Lexington Green was Jonathan Harrington, 15 years old, the oldest, Samuel Whittemore, aged 79 years old, both of whom survived the day. These territorial militias elected their own officers, those who could not afford their own weapons were supplied with them by the local government, the cost of which was to be paid back in installments. Free training in the proper use and maintenance of weapons was provided, and target practice was mandated, up to three times a week until proficiency was attained, then once per month. Shootings were uncommon, murderers met their end at the end of a rope. And enforcement of the laws was the right and duty of the citizenry.
Guys like you, you think you know everything, but you're just clueless.
"So criminals just get their weapons on the street,"
In Uvalde, he bought it online, delivered by a sporting good store.
"Weapons on the street" are the product of corrupt politicians and failed law enforcement. The solution is not to arm everyone and turn the country into Afghanistan.
I'm not sure how that "proves" the 2nd Amendment is an abject failure. It only proves that a tyrannical government will absolutely use weapons against its own citizens. If one was to follow your (il)logic, eliminating the 2nd Amendment would somehow solve that?
We have a tyrannical government that has way better weapons than you can ever dream of owning. It is quixotic to think that your weapons are going to deter them. Waco, Ruby ridge demonstrated who the losers were. Today 2A only supplies childkillers with weapons while gun makers profit.
There is no shortage of examples throughout history of insurgents and lesser civilians overcoming tyranny. To dismiss that is ignorant. Then to buttress it with "childkiller" as an argument is just mindless.
Your contention that the government has much better weapons AND IS WILLING TO USE THEM ON ITS OWN PEOPLE is the best argument I can think of for not ever limiting my ability to have weapons.
You would just give in, roll over and accept it. I will not, and your idea that we should give up our rights is sheer lunacy. I rarely call out someone in my comments, but this time I will; you're a slave.
I highly recommend reading (or rereading) “The Gulag Archipelago.”
Having the ability to defend yourself may not stop governments from using WMDs against its citizens (the polls do that), but it stops the colluders from showing up at your door to implement the tyrants’ orders:
If an armed uprising happens, there will be a split within armed forces, local, state, federal police and state national guard corps. Armed citizens will play an important role, especially during the early stages of the revolt. Hopefully this can all be avoided through the ballot box but they have severely corrupted the election process in many countries, especially the United States, where elections are some of the most corrupt on Earth.
so they can kill them with autoimmune-disorder causing vaccines instead? doesn't really add up does it?
So long as you keep repeating "you're killing children for profit!" argument to try to shame people, we will take you as seriously as those who shouted "grandma killers!" at us to prove they were right about mask mandates.
An AR costs $500, and the manufacturer probably made $75 of that.
i suggest you stop trying to tell others what to think about topics with which you clearly are not familiar. we aren't going to buy NYT level "facts" at this point.
how much do pharmaceuticals make on the SSRIs prescribed to these children? has a lot more zeros at the end than even your wildly inflated profit numbers...
i'm going to respectfully reiterate that you need to rethink your stance, this is not about profit for manufacturers
Private entities can do as they please, because they can also take whatever steps they choose to ensure that no one gets in with a gun. To wit: how many mass shootings have there been at NRA annual meetings? QED
I know you think your comment was pithy and clever, but it was neither. What it was was ill-conceived.
Schools, by contrast, are gun-free zones by government edict. Government mandated that they be gun-free, then failed to provide the funds necessary for schools to make sure - as the NRA apparently does - that NO ONE gets in with a gun. Yet another unfunded government mandate...that has led *directly* to mass killings at schools, unlike at NRA annual meetings.
The NRA should eat their own dog food. Why was it a gun-free zone? Why can they not walk their talk? Are the gun-crazed attendees afraid they may be outgunned?
Well, this hasn't happened since 30 December 2021(I just checked), but FB just semi-censored another of my posts, this time this one by Mercola and Wolf (see above).
This is what FB said [followed by my response(s)]:
"False information
Checked by independent fact-checkers"
(according to lying, false-propagandizing, and censoring in violation of the First Amendment and free speech Facebook)
The following is my response to FB:
What FB is saying is the false information. Dr. Wolf is a highly professional and reputable researcher and writer. What she's saying will prove to be true, you watch....
This is my first time publishing a discussion thread, and I ran into some technical glitches with publishing. The e-newsletter was missing a bunch of text and had disembodied links in some email apps, so I apologize to those who were confused by this oddity. Thanks to everyone for your patience, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this matter!
when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns
A large person, whom is violent of nature, will always dominate a smaller, weaker person. it has always been such and always will be, but a poem written many years ago, speaks to that issue,
Be not afraid of any man
No matter what his size
If danger threatens, call on me
And I will equalize.
Or, to shorten it,
"God made man, but Sam Colt made them equal."
And before someone falls back on the Freud "Quote",,,, please go and look that he never said it, in fact, what he did write, was the opposite,
Freud associates retarded sexual and emotional development not with gun ownership, but with fear and loathing of weapons.
Source: https://quotepark.com/quotes/2058932-sigmund-freud-a-fear-of-weapons-is-a-sign-of-retarded-sexual-and/
Well-summarized, nymusicdaily!
There is also an old adage from ancient China:
"When laws multiply, crime will abound."
Agreed.
Whatever anyone says either way on this subject won’t sway my mind. Nobody is taking my means to defend myself without killing me first. End of story.
A hill to die on, if one needs one.
My preference would be to live out my life peacefully and I hope our government doesn’t screw that up.
🙌
I lived in Europe for many years and when I moved to the US it was mind boggling to me that so many people had guns. The past 3 years led me to understand better this debate and I lean much more in favor of the 2nd Amendment now. America was never meant to be like the rest of the world, we have our unique ways both good and bad but we are about the last country on this planet where citizens are mostly armed and that gives our government, whichever party it is, some pause before enacting policies to which the people don’t agree.
And yes, I have to mention Australia because it was utopian what happened there that it cannot be ignored.
It would so much easier to just strengthen security at schools. So many private schools have security guards and checkpoints of entrance and exiting, why can’t public schools?
Thank you for sharing your nuanced views on this topic, Laura!
It has been proven over the long haul that simply training adult staff at the schools who volunteer to serve in this way, in various aspects of defending the schools and students where they work, then allowing those who train and volunteer to carry their own defensive weapons as they perform their duties at the school, armed with their own weapons, , the very ones they alread carry everywhere else BUT school, Look into the FASTER Saves LIves programme in Ohio. It was developed as a response to the Sandy Hook incident. All volunteer, absolutely NO COST to government or taxpayers, and the best part: in the ten plus years the programme has been in place there has not yet been even ONE incident invoving misuse of guns at any school in any district that have adipted the programme. So far it has been 100% effective. WHY? Because the perps out there who wOULD do harm know that in those districts at least SOME skilled, armed, trained, dedicated, adult WILL have a gun and more importanly will NOT hesitate to use it to stop any threat that comes long to harm. In refresher drills and simulations, these armed ordinary teachers constantly best the trained lw enforcement attempting to breach the "school" (in the make believe drills) and defeat the cop trrainers more often than the trainers get the drop on the teachers.
'd say that's perfect solution: PROVEN 100% effective and successful, cost the taxpayer nothing, no one knows who has their gun on them at any given time, so no issues with "kids being scared of guns".In reality, thekids are far more seure and relaxed because they know SOME of the adult staff are armed and trained, and any of evil intent will NOT get past them to harm the kids.
I never heard of that program, that is a good approach and it should be more publicized. I think many people have this idealist view of school as s place where no doors need to be locked and all staff and people who enter the school is trustworthy. Sadly, this is not Switzerland (even they have their problems), and we would be better off admitting that increased security in schools with armed personal is an advantage to students and teachers. Wealthy parents, value this and pay for it in their kids private schools, and yet, they shout from their ivory tower that public schools should be completely gun-free. There is no consonance and often it seems like it comes down to a class argument.
I learned of the FASTER Saves LIves programme as soon as the concept was floated, shortly after Scammy Crooks. I followed the development through to its establishment.
Wanna hear a crazy? The Browsrd County school board had asked folks from the FASTER programme to come tell them about it, which they graciously did. that was a fwe weeks before the crazed punk, violating a court order to not ever be at that schoool, passed a backgorund chek he should not have been able to pass (county officials had REFUSED to file charges against the eventual killer for any of the four felony level crimes he had committed) entered the campus carrying his new rifle and a big pile of tEN rund magazines (they fit better in the new gun case he had also bought0 and begankilling.
Had FASTER been in place at the Douglas High School on that day, the perp would have been taken out before he ever got to the first classroom. And Aaron Feiss woud still be alive, haveing been able to shoot back at the perp instead of wrapping his body arund two of his students, taking their bullets and letting them live.
I read recently that that school district has no repented of their folly of rejecting the programme, and are now taking steps to implement it in that district. Four years and twenty six deaths late, but they are doing it. COlorado have also recently taken up that programme and are implementing it.
There are a number of factors that ALL these mass shootings have in common.
ALL males, (one exception had a militant warrior female sidekick)
ALL known to authorities as problems, local state federal
ALL got their weapon passing BGC or stole them avoiding BGC
ALL carefully selected venues that were "gun free" zones...... they'd have the only guns
Taking all these common factors together I see only one simple cheap effective solution to these events. ALLOW we who already carry our personal defensive weapons with us everywhere we go to ALSO carry them into those types of places. I carry mine everywhere, have for fifteen years. Never came close to NEEDING it. There are some places I am prohibited to carry it legally. I simply do not go there. Sports venues, nightclubs/bars in my state (next one south tell me I can be armed inside there as long as I don't drink. At the price of their booze I dont drink in those places anyway). Courthouses have secure gun safes where I can put my gun, take thekey, and retrieve it when I leave. But the copers are thick and armed, so it is NOT a gun free zone. Im fine wiht that. Most "no guns" zones i my stateare not properly signed, thus no violation occurs if "made". The only thing they can do is tell me to take my gun out. I can come back, but the gun can't. So I leave.
I avoid Certified Defenseless Victim Zones s the danger zones and plagues they are. WHY can't we simply do the same with the schoolsour kids attend? (my kids will never attend gummit skewlz, one main reason being they are death traps. The other being what they pour into their heads all day long inside those places.
There IS a simple free answer that will END these school massacres. FASTER is only one version of it. I underatand that in the State of Texas each district can decide whether adult staff in that district are able to go about their daily tasks armed. The district that includes Uvalde had decided AGAINST allowing that. Perhaps surviving parents might want to rethink that vote? Had that teacher whose classroomwas first invaded been armed and triained that school shooting may have had two victims.. the first child shot, then the perp himself who got terminated by that teacher whose room he chose to invade. And WE would all be doing something more profitable with out time instead of reading this stuff here.
I saw the number of armed police in Ottawa during the Freedom Convoy. The week after I was there they and many other armed police and military came and violently pushed back defenseless people because of a group of peaceful protesters who were looking for a dialogue with the government. The government who now is banning all hand guns ownership. These are the incremental steps that only get worse, these governments don't one day say, "oh, thats enough, we don't need to continue to take away peoples rights anymore we have done enough."
There is a breakdown in rule of law certainly in the states and more and more in Canada. Enact 'The Emergency Act' so that peoples rights can be taken away for no reason. So, laws are not going to protect us when the government ignores them when they chose.
I would like to see a much stronger gun lobby in Canada, as Canadians I think we will just roll over, as we did for Covid, as so many did to criticize 'freedom', as we are doing by spending our money in Ukraine where it is very apparent that it is necessary to spend it here. Roll over because of what the government says. When a government stops serving its people and starts telling them what they need to do, we are in trouble.
And there won't be anything we can do if we cannot defend ourselves when it becomes necessary.
Excellent bullet points, MAA! And you're right - Naomi Wolf's piece a few hours earlier was exquisite. I cannot improve on your points because I share all of them. TBH, I've not read the antagonist thread. I can't deal with any more irrationality at the moment. The leftist wife responded to my email yesterday (apparently she didn't think her husband's caustic response was enough) and I've refused to read it so far. Think I'll have my husband go through it first.
This is a link to a Federalist article from years ago about what is used in other countries to kill people instead of guns. http://thefederalist.com/2018/02/21/gun-control-across-world-leads-acid-knifings-bombings/
P.S. JP has a recent video about banning all guns that is good, but his "How to Think Like a Leftist" flow chart is superb! https://rumble.com/v174pyj-why-guns-must-be-banned-now.html
https://rumble.com/v16vykx-how-to-think-like-a-leftist.html
Thank you, Birdingmom, and I’m sorry you’re being cannonaded for simply trying to share eye-opening information.
Those links look valuable—thank you! I haven’t seen JP’s latest yet.
There are over 370 "mental disorders" listed in the latest version of the DSM 5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.) The list includes "Tobacco Addiction Disorder" among other equally mundane and ridiculous so-called "mental illnesses." If the DSM is the standard by which politicians wishes to remove our rights to own guns, then I'd guess 90% of the American people could probably be classified with a mental disorder of one kind or another. BEWARE.....
Great point, Rick, and we have already seen how neuropsych evaluations have been weaponized against physicians of conscience like Dr. Meryl Nass for daring to prescribe life-saving early treatment protocols and failing to subjugate their conscience to comply with tyrannical and democidal edicts.
We know that when the world is in a state of mass hypnosis, those of us resistant to that hypnosis are deemed “insane,” so we must remain weary of any such gaslighting measures used to disarm and discredit the sane.
as many have said "evil plans murder weeks or months in advance" as do most of these ghouls.. btw - define sane!
Haha, sane = still in possession of one’s mental faculties and not menticided by mass formation
A THEORY! ----that can be used against anyone??
There are four key components needed for an environment to experience a mass formation psychosis: lack of social bonds or decoupling of societal connections, lack of sense-making (things don’t make sense), free-floating anxiety, and free-floating psychological discontent. Free-floating anxiety is a general sense of uneasiness that is not tied to any particular object or specific situation.
When followers start to participate in a strategy to deal with the object of anxiety, new social bonds typically emerge and people change from a highly aversive negative mental state and isolation, to the exact opposite to the extremely high-level of connectedness that exists.
Mass formation is the theory; mass media is the weapon of implementation. And yes, it can be and is used against everyone, but not everyone succumbs, especially if they’re cognizant of the mechanisms of menticide (https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/letter-to-the-menticided-a-12-step).
YES ITS A THEORY.. but the truth is that its all propaganda, guess work thrown out to also FOOL the masses.. people are lied to by most in power or even out of power now.. I HAVE A COUPLE OF FRIENDS THAT KNOW THIS!
Prove yourself spot on, go and find a copy of DSM three or earlier. I remember when verion five came out, how radically different it was. Yo see right through their smoke screen. Well done
It seems obvious to me that the repeal of the original Smith Mundt Act opened the floodgates for propaganda from every angle. I do not think it is a happy circumstance that our ‘News’ went south right about when the government passed a law making it legal for the government to propagandize the public. Great article!
Thank you, Trace, and excellent point re: the Smith-Mundt Act!
From Thomas DiLorenzo 5/31/22:
"Now that voting no longer matters:
....in light of the massive vote fraud of the 2020 elections, which will only become more pervasive and cemented into place, the only thing that now stands in the way of totalitarianism
is gun ownership.
I have a dream.
That Chuck Schumer will personally supervise attempts to go door-to-door in the mountains of Arkansas, Western Montana, the rural South, the Deer Hunter area of western Pennsylvania, West Texas, and other parts of real America, including the inner city "hood", to announce that "I'm from the government and I'm here to confiscate your firearms".
😂👏
Thanks for sharing this discussion thread. I am for private ownership of guns, and switched to this view about 7 years ago when I recognized the US government no longer represented the people.
I think you began with a weak argument that may have affected the rest of the interaction. Guns ARE made to kill people, and arguing otherwise seems like nonsense, seems like you're not arguing honestly. Guns were invented to kill, and then have been used either for defense (whether you fire your gun or not), and/or to injure or kill in defense or aggression. A counter-argument about knives is also weak, because there's no comparison between the effort and ability needed to kill on a mass scale with knives vs guns. Admitting guns are made to be lethal bolsters what I found was the strongest sentence in your argument, "It is a broadly armed populace that is willing to defend its rights that stops tyranny." This is directly related to the fact that guns can easily kill as they are designed to do, so people, police forces and governments think twice before violating the space of gun owners.
The downside of widely available gun ownership is that some people will use it to injure and kill innocent people. This is a heartbreaking and heart-wrenching downside, and weighs heavily on every caring person. People need to realize that since guns are widely available, we are experiencing the downside of this situation, vs not experiencing the downside of guns not being available to the citizenry. For example, if guns were not widely available, we would be experiencing less mass shootings, but could also be experiencing the downside of that situation; mass harm to our citizenry due to our government and police force overrunning and killing the citizens that interfere with their agenda (as you pointed out).
Thank you for sharing your journey, Nova123. I see your point about the intention behind manufacturing guns and your conclusion makes sense.
What I perhaps failed to make clear is that I meant the object itself is simply a neutral tool that can be used for a variety of purposes (defense, sport, hunting, etc.). Only a minuscule number of the guns owned by law-abiding citizens have actually been used to kill humans, and in the cases where they have been used in self-defense, it has saved the lives of the innocent.
I also see your point about widely available gun ownership, although according to criminologist John Lott (author of “More Guns Less Crime: Understanding Crime & Gun Control Laws”), a higher rate of gun ownership correlates with lower levels of crime (as one reviewer says, ”I wanted to disagree with this book, but the data speaks for itself”).
I appreciate your sensitive approach to this topic and agree there are complexities. I would certainly like to see greater emphasis on addressing the root causes. If we could eradicate mainstream media, for example, that would eliminate the primary cause of mental illnesses. Short of that, getting people to stop paying attention to the MSM is probably the biggest step we could make toward restoring mental health/balance/perspective on reality and saving lives.
"News" readers should be mandated to disclose their political affiliations when reading about political topics.
"News" readers should be mandated to state their personal stance on whatever topic they happen to be reading about on air.
Otherwise I could just read it myself.
Brilliant on two counts: 1) calling them “news readers” (since none are actual journalists or reporters these days) and 2) requiring disclosure of political affiliations—although, honestly, if they’re in media, I think we can guess in 99% of the cases :-)
Thanks. I agree that "we" can guess the reader's affiliation but the people who rely on and trust the TV news personalities need to be told. Otherwise, they will continue to believe the "news" is agenda/politically neutral.
True. Even better if they stop watching altogether.
Some will when they finally put it together that the "news" is not only biased but is lying to them either directly or by ommission. My Mom passed away a few years ago at 88 but I vividly remember watching the local news with her. She believed everything they said. She trusted Walter Cronkite because he sold the news as the truth and her generation (mostly) took it that way ever since.
BTW, very much appreciate your writing, even in the rare occurrences that we disagree. You help me think clearer. Thank you.
Thanks for your reply. I so agree with you, that mainstream media is a primary cause of mental illness and division amongst people in this country. People would do well to turn it off! I always wonder about violent video games and violent movies having an impact too. I haven't looked into the studies about video games so I don't know how rigorous they are. And on top of that, I'm aware of possible mind control operations that may be contributing.
I think it surprises some people that crime has gone down with the availability of guns. It makes sense. Guns do save lives, and some of those stories have real emotional impact. The mass murder of people, and especially children, is so emotionally upsetting that it's hard to counter with stories of guns saving lives. It's interesting too, that there are two mass shootings that I know of where "good guys with guns" were on site, and did nothing out of fear for their lives. Uvalde is one example, and the other was in Southern California in an office building years ago where a person outside with a gun did not go in. That really weakens the argument that the answer to bad guys with guns are good guys with guns. That seems to apply to personal situations but not to mass shootings.
I don't consider guns a neutral tool. Maybe that's a cultural perception I have. Or maybe its objective that they're not neutral. Human-created objects are made for their usefulness, they're not neutral. Candles are made to burn, chairs are made to sit on, art is created to look at. And guns were created to kill, and then are sometimes used to shoot at flying discs or targets.
I think many people don't consider guns a neutral tool. You site one example of their neutrality in sport, but in hunting and defense they are used for their ability to kill. And then there's the military, either organized military or militias of different kinds around the world, where guns are used because they were created to kill. But perhaps what you mean by neutral is that a tiny number of guns out of all the guns available are used to kill people. In which case we're not using the word neutral in the same way. On a side note but related, I was surprised that a vast majority of police officers have not fired their guns ever in their career.
I was just reading Dr Robert Malone's latest post and comments, but I can't comment there because I'm not a paid subscriber. I'm sorry that people unsubscribed because of your post on guns. You are always thoughtful and honest, and it's so good for people to practice disagreeing well without walking away. (Unless there are attacks that aren't worth engaging in). I appreciate you! 💕
Thank you for your thoughtful comment, Nova123! I have heard that blaming video games for violence was contradicted by the research, but I haven’t had a chance to investigate it thoroughly. My feeling is they are unlikely to be a direct instigator as millions of kids play video games without issues. It is the ones with mental illness who are subjected to other destructive influences (e.g., abuse, addiction, bullying, etc.) and who lack a creative outlet and purpose in their lives who tend to enact these brutal crimes.
That said, Nature Deficit Disorder has a damaging impact on kids’ mental health, and urban at-risk youth who participate in nature programs experience radical transformations. If kids and teens spent time in nature instead of playing video games, watching television, surfing the Internet, texting on their phones, etc., they would be both physically and psychologically healthier and far less likely to commit such heinous acts.
“That really weakens the argument that the answer to bad guys with guns are good guys with guns.”
I would argue that they weren’t really good guys if they were too cowardly to act when the need arose. There are numerous instances where good guys have stopped tragedy in its tracks by acting quickly. The YouTube channel Active Self Protection (https://www.youtube.com/c/ActiveSelfProtection) has thousands of security camera videos showing criminal acts, many demonstrating acts of self-defense and courage.
Regarding your comment about cops not firing their guns in their careers, there is actually a serious problem with many cops not getting adequate training and regular practice with their weapons, so in an emergency situation, they do not always have the muscle memory to respond as quickly as needed.
Thank you for your closing note, Nova123. I am grateful to those who are willing to engage in respectful dialogue about matters of disagreement. I try to encourage open-minded debate and discourage personal attacks, and for the most part, I think everyone here has been very well-behaved :-) I’m sorry some people felt so strongly about the issue that they left as they missed out on an opportunity to engage in meaningful dialogue about a difficult topic.
Great point about violent video games possibly only affecting those who already have mental problems. Makes a lot of sense. And thanks for letting me know about that channel active self-protection. I watched a lot of the videos, so good to be aware. Take good care. 💕
There have been mass killings with cars and trucks. So are they deadly weapons? Yes. When a car and human body come into contact they are deadly. However, when used with care they are not, but merely have that potential. Some people don’t own cars and some don’t own guns. Both are licensed and it’s one’s individual choice.
Guns are only "licensed" where guns are highly restricted by nanny state NONE of mine are, and I hvave every one of them legally.
I think it's a weak argument to compare cars, which are not made to kill people, and guns which are. Yes, they can both be used to kill people, but they are made for fundamentally different purposes.
Maybe so, but both can be used as weapons, as can knives. I'm sure most gun owners have never used their weapons to kill and some that I know have not even fired a weapon. They are only collectors. The human behind any device has the potential to kill, including the Covid technocrats. They are killing a different form, as are abortionists.
Go and study how things went down in Australia as the government there stood firm and declared "Mr. and Mrs Austalia, turn them ALL in". Read how crime began to climb once "everyone' was disarmed. Then read about the INCREASE in gun use in crimes. No not everyone turned them all in s commanded. There were a number of incidents where guns were still used defensivley. Of course, the gun got dropped and left as the intended victim was simply on about surviving, and did not tarry to chat up the gendarmerie. Housebreakings increased, as I recall some thirty five ercent in the fist year after the massive takeup. The louts KNEW the residents would not be armed, as everyone had turned them all in as commanded.
Of course, THIS sort of important news never was seen in OUR lamestream media. Why? Because THIS side the Big Puddle there were "certain factions" lready bent upon disarming THIS nation.
Yeah, I already know that gun availability reduces crime. I learned that years ago, but it was a surprise to me when I learned it. And I think it's a surprise to a gun control advocates because they equate guns with crime, and think lower guns means lower crime.
Don't get me wrong, I'm very pro private gun ownership. I just want to help sharpen the arguments so they are more effective. 👍🏽
Isn't it interesting that the government would enforce their tyranny with the exact tools that they want to take away from law abiding citizens who want to be left alone and live free?
As far as these idiots who claim a citizenry can't fight the government cause "tanks and airplanes".... how would you explain Vietnam and Afghanistan (both places I've been). Smaller, less educated and greatly out classed in weaponry, these third world backwaters defeated the most well equipped military in the history of mankind. Now the big question is...does the American public have the same commitment as the Vietcong or the Taliban? I think that's a solid no.
For OS to write "Your argument is that unorganized, scattered, private gun owners with weapons that do not come to the level of government arms, are somehow holding off tyranny in the US. Forgive me, but that seems like a fantasy." is itself a fantasy IN REAL TIME.
See: Australia, New Zealand, Canada to name but three countries being swallowed by government tyranny TODAY, and with their People mostly unarmed. No connection? THAT is fantasy.
👍
In a way these debates are so very odd. Before the late 1950's mass killings were quite rare. We certainly had the tools, even machine guns for a time before they were banned. But semi-automatics have been around since the early 1900's. Now it is true that the current AR type rifles are quite easy to use but semi-auto pistols are also quite easy to use particularly in the smaller calibers of the AR type rifles. And we do see that most mass killings are usually by pistol. Magazine capacity seems to also be an issue but several of whatever size can easily be carried.
A lot of social changes erupted in the late 50's that seem most appropriate to debate - the degree in which we tolerate immorality. We ought to all agree that killing another human is something that is quite wrong except under dire circumstance. We can agree that anger toward others is OK except when it results in violence, or do we?
We have always had some deranged people including down and out addicts who have given up hope. In the past we would try to help the deranged and the addicts but most of that has devolved from groups trying to make a difference to assigning that task to government who cannot help at all. At best the government can remove people from society and place them in uncaring institutions. But only communities can really help by caring individuals trying. We once did have community helpers, sponsored within the communities but in the main we now count on an ineffective government and try in ignore the issues. Any dependency on government to resolve human failures is likely to disappoint.
While religion and religious institutions are rejected by many, in the past they served a powerful purpose of organizing the community. Believers affected even non-believers by their charity. As a society we generally were tolerant of the bible thumpers thinking them well intended. In the rejection of that entire segment of society by mockery and other tools created to instill doubt we have thrown the baby out so to speak. Being anti-religious became cool. After all who is to tell you how to live? But in the process we have been net losers.
What a thought-provoking and moving analysis, HardeeHo. And you make an excellent point about the historical patterns.
Consider this statistic in light of your statement:
“In 1950 only 9 percent of American households had televisions; by 1959 that figure had increased to 85.9 percent.” (https://www.britannica.com/art/television-in-the-United-States/The-late-Golden-Age)
If you watch documentaries like “Century of the Self,” you see that television is used to induce states of desire, envy, greed, lust, fear, anxiety, and every shade of mental illness to manipulate us to consume and obey.
I think a very strong argument could be made for a direct correlation between television and other mechanisms of mass control (MSM, Big Tech) and the increase in violent crimes and mass shootings. If we want to reduce violence, increase societal cohesion, and strengthen individual ethics/morality, the best thing we could do is get everyone to turn off their hypnosis machines.
The early days of television included shows representing ideal families and an idealization of the mundane common to all. That seemed to change over time maybe because few ever were able to match those ideals and perhaps we desired conflict and drama to draw viewers. I suppose the social scientists set about research in how to acquire more viewers for those ads and tricks to manipulate thought much as we had 'nudge' theory to drive us into the covid delusions.
Education has long departed from an effort to teach ways of thinking into ways to think. Those hypnosis machines won't be turned off but we can teach skills to avoid being manipulated. Once you become aware of the tools, you become somewhat less susceptible to being controlled. Just as we now must ignore all those frightfully annoying ads on web pages in order to read the content, so must we ignore what we are fed by much media.
Great points, HardeeHo. If I recall from “Century of the Self,” public-opinion engineering was definitely present in television programming from the outset, but the focus was more on driving consumption and sales. There was also an underlying aim to mold morality, but it emphasized positive, constructive values rather than destructive ones. Once the programmers shifted to a more debased POV, society degenerated accordingly.
It is definitely one of my aims to equip people with the skills and knowledge to detect and deflect propaganda (as in https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/letter-to-the-menticided-a-12-step). I do think the people who are awakening are starting to turn off their television and live life instead, and I hope that could become a widespread trend the more people become aware of the manipulation.
The revolution can't happen fast enough but entrenched interests are not going to give up easily. Much current programming has been engineered around certain social issues that are intended to nudge behaviors. The only way to counter such influence is a more aware public and forces exist in media to ensure that doesn't happen. I am pleased that the public is much more aware of the destructive nature of "The Trusted News Initiative". I do hope the thinking people are enough to help others see through what is forced upon us.
"Show me were owning guns overcame a tyrannical govt in the US"
here you go,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Athens_(1946)
Wow! What a story that I was not aware of.
Thank-you for that link. I enjoyed the story immensely. I read most of it to my husband and he found it enjoyable also. Knowing many, many Tennesseans really helped see and hear this in our minds. Thanks again for the smiles and laughs. 🤗
The incremental steps started with the muzzle...
Civics have been taken out of school curriculums decades ago, but my impression is that in families, where children learn how to shoot at an early age, the Constitution is well and alive.
Even psychopaths and criminals are more reserved under such circumstances.
Kentucky, where I live, is about the fifth poorest state in the Union, when it comes to personal income, but it has the 5th lowest crime rate. When I moved here eight years ago, somebody explained it to me: "People are nice here, because everyone is armed to the teeth." :)
In the current process of mass murder, I don't think that disarming the populace will come before martial law is introduced. Once the food riots start, the monsters will be watching with glee as looters will roam the land and the previously law-abiding citizens murder each other for a bowl of thin soup... People will do the favor for the tyrants...
The only chance people have is that the enforcers realize that their money will not be worth a penny a few years from now and their very survival will depend on complete compliance until they wear out their usefulness and will be lined up on the roads to the death camps.
Anyone working under the premise that these school shootings are somehow organic and not part of a continuing PYSOP to garner support for the elimination of self-defense via guns is likely to come to a different conclusion. How many times does one of the alphabet agencies have to be "familiar" with a perpetrator before the public realizes these events are "Made to Happen" or "Allowed to Happen." The idea that the only government agencies should be the only people allowed to have weapons is a non-starter. We all have a natural right to self-defense, whether that be from individual or government action. That is particularly so when the latest "school shooting" clearly indicates that the law enforcement won't protect you. And anyone depending upon the Criminal Injustice System to combat tyranny or markedly reduce crime is going to be greatly disappointed.
The point of being armed isn't even about winning against the government; it is the idea that they are walking into a nightmare - one that they really don't won't to face as we are really led by cowards. That is why they spend so much time on propaganda and deception. So, yeah, start using nuclear weapons against the public. Watch what happens next when it is made clear that people have nothing more to lose.
"Allowed to have weapons" is a big signifier that the person doesn't understand natural rights. No 2A advocate is arguing that they be "allowed" anything. A right does not spell out what you are "allowed" to do. It spells out what a government may not infringe upon.
That is a crucial point, James—thank you for that significant contribution!
💯
First you could have answered their question - why does America have so many mass shootings?
0) There are more people in the USA so there are more shootings. France had an extremely deadly shooting (Bataclan), New Zealand had Christ Church, etc. Many countries with much stricter laws have a higher rate per capita than the here- the US makes up about 1.15% of the world's mass shootings while having almost 5% of the world's population.
A better question is "why does the US seem to have a problem with young men who become psychological messes and want to kill classmates:"
1) America has higher rates of single parent households than any other country
2) America has higher rates of prescription psychological medication of children than any other
Mass shootings weren't common before those two, even though guns were (arguably even more) common.
Second, i usually ask them to expand their argument and see where it breaks down. "Pretend that the deaths of innocents actually could have been prevented if the government were to take away the 2nd amendment from everyone just to stop psychopaths from being able to kill children with rifles. If that's OK, then which other rights should we give away to save other innocent lives?"
Certainly freedom of press has to go. If the press were not allowed to share manifestos and glorify the killers, it's proven repeatedly that that would curtail future acts. So if the 2nd is guilty and must be axed, the first is at least as guilty and must be disposed of as well.
The fourth amendment as well must go - quite obviously, if police could search homes and vehicles of every known drug dealer and suspected criminal, they would be able to protect at least some innocent lives that will otherwise be brutally victimized in the future.
The fifth is extremely problematic and should be curtailed too - the vast majority of shootings are never solved because individuals refuse to talk to the police, which leads to more innocents being shot. If police could force criminals to confess, surely it would save childrens lives.
Jury trials? probably not worth it anymore, since juries can let killers go even if the experts in government know the killers are guilty.
Due process and bail are absolutely responsible for the murder of many many innocent people. So those must be given up as well.
Remember, it's for the children. Or are you a monster?
Damn, andrew, you are on fire!! 🔥
People put on sanctimonious airs, making sweeping claims about mass shootings being "only in America".
This reflects the bad state of journalism.
Looking at the data for the US, Canada and Europe from 2009 to 2015, America was ranked 11th in "Average annual Death Rate per Million People from Mass Public Shootings"
at 0.089.
Norway (1.888),
Serbia ( 0.381) and
France (0.347) TOPPED THE LIST.
Thank you for the illuminating data, Anna!
Whilst arguments on both sides have some merit it might be worth considering the nature of the society at large. For example, in UK gun control is extreme and yet we have few shootings but do have a constant drip of mainly knife attacks.
The UK, Australia, Japan and Germany have all taken measures to reduce gun homicides. Can the US learn anything from them? America's gun homicide rate is 25 times higher than other high-income countries, according to a recent study. In USA many people see the ownership of guns as a crucial check on government tyranny. The country’s highest court has ruled that outright bans on civilian ownership of handguns are unconstitutional. But civilised enforcement and culture may also play important roles in preventing violence.
As long as America retains a militarised police force and a predatory government engaging in global violence around the world using black propaganda to justify regime change and a weaponised dollar - the people with respond accordingly. QED these mass shootings events are the result of a tyrannical government invoking fear of the government in the people who feel they need to defend themselves against these dark internal forces.
This zeitgeist is not present in UK - yet, but we are getting there as the recent illegal lockdowns illustrate. However, public petitions, most notably by the Snowdrop Campaign, founded by friends of the bereaved families, called for a total ban on the private ownership and use of handguns in the UK. Signed by 750,000 people it was symbolic of the weight of public opinion in the aftermath of the Dunblane school massacre.
Nine years before Dunblane, there had been Hungerford, where Michael Ryan went on a rampage through the Berkshire town, killing 16 people in a series of random shootings before turning the gun on himself. He had been carrying a handgun and two semi automatic rifles, for which he had firearms certificates.
The aftermath of Hungerford brought to an end the right to own semi-automatic firearms in Britain; they were banned along with pump action weapons, and registration became mandatory for shotgun owners. But it was the weight of public opinion that energised this response - you don't have this in USA.
I don't think USA will ever resolve this dilemma. The state is rotten to the core and Americans know it and fear their own government. Only destruction of the Deep State and putrid swamp of corruption and graft will allow America to rise again as its former shining example of true freedom and liberty.
Thank you for this nuanced perspective and historical background, Peter, and what an amazing feat that would be to achieve your concluding sentence.
Interestingly, according to this source (https://safeatlast.co/blog/gun-self-defense-statistics/), there are 466 violent crimes per 100k Americans versus 2,034 per 100k Brits, so more than quadruple the number of violent crimes in the UK. And as you noted, knife crimes are high in the UK, as are attacks with other weapons such as acid.
WOW, that's an amazing stat Margaret. I will need to do some research on this one as a quick Google doesn't yield meaningful results. But no mass shooting events in UK since 2010, so that is a positive.
A good reason to keep your guns against the Feds' attack is on ZH today:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/watch-enraged-peter-navarro-describes-being-arrested-and-shackled-over-misdemeanor-j6
I believe that as our economies gradually fail the trend will be towards localisation and in the case of America this could mean the avoidance of the Fed interventions which I read somewhere recently as States take more control. Perhaps this is a realistic reason for hope? Secession?
There are immense cultural differences between nations that can account for radical differences in the public. In the UK the police can enter your house when they are justified. While the UK police have powers well beyond the US police, they are remarkably restrained in use of those powers. Still, there are estate areas in the UK where the police do not enter without an armed team. Armed police teams in the UK are quite a big deal. And regardless of the laws, criminals in the UK do have weapons. They are rarely used on citizens because the effort to find them reaches extremes.
The UK social mores are quite different than the US mores expressing a different culture. Similarly other nations differ as well. Some conduct accepted in the US would be considered bonkers elsewhere. And other nations often worry a lot about retaining their traditional values as the Yank culture arrives.
Good observations thanks, and I do agree. But the pressing issue is random mass shootings which haven't happened in UK since 2010. As the US government violently threatens their own people, the patriots have every reason to retain their defences regardless of the individual acts of homicide.
I think it's all about fear levels which seem to be high in the US whereas most Brits don't feel as threatened by their government - well not yet anyway but that could change.
There is something to be said about trust in local councils even in the largest cities where government attempts to be closer to it's citizens. In my work with the UK police I felt they were quite well trained compared to my work with US police. And I felt a respect for the force part of law enforcement in the UK police. The level of frustration with government seems to be quite different between the two nations although the effort at polarization seems about the same. I'm not able to judge differences in how troubled youth are managed between the two nations. But I did observe that UK teens can access beer readily and few adults seem overly concerned as long as the kids behave. Don't know how far that tolerance really goes.
Thank you for your valuable insights into the two police forces. It seems that they are both attempting to do a good job of keeping the peace in their own way. Yes, teens tend to be unruly wherever they are and the drinking culture in UK doesn't seem to impact society any more here than elsewhere - most of them in my experience generally behave well.
I spend time on this American website where I post my weekly 'Letter from Great Britain' and the comments give me good feedback especially about the way the Feds are viewed as opposed to state or county governance:
https://www.theburningplatform.com/author/austrian-peter/
My view on gun control is that everybody should have one and know how to use it. As collapse intensifies it will become more obvious that police and others are not going to protect us. I think most of the shootings that are highlighted by the media and used to push the wedge issue of gun control were in some way facilitated or helped along to further the narrative, whether the person was groomed by the FBI, police were asked to stand down, or it was all a made for media production. https://sukwan.substack.com/p/did-police-in-the-uvalde-texas-school?s=w
Thank you for this compelling synopsis, Amy!
This entire gun argument is really so simple. “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
SHALL
NOT
BE
INFRINGED
And yes you could buy a cannon back in the time of our founding fathers. And the fact that I cannot by an M1 tank is an infringement on my 2A rights. George Washington said, “they should have arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, which would include their own government”.
If you don’t like the foundational laws of this country as it pertains to firearms then you can move to literally almost any other country on Earth and not live around people who have guns, I mean there are just so many other options. But for the rest of us, this IS our option.
Margaret, Thank you for sharing this stomach churning mis-adventure. The "footedness" and staunch defense by the uninformed never ceases to astound me. I hope that it is not a violation of some unwritten internet protocol to use the my response to Naomi Wolf for you as well:
Naomi, great work and thank you for sticking it out! You are the modern day version of John in the woods wrapped in skins and eating wild berries and insects, screaming....REPENT FOR THE LORD IS COMING! Like you he persevered. God worked it out early that it is up to the individual to gain the knowledge and make the decision. You are blessed for being one who brings knowledge. Now we wait.
In addition I would like to share with you the following:
If they can't be trusted to protect our free speech,
If they can't be trusted to protect the lives of our unborn children,
If they can't be trusted to protect our right to freely assemble,
If they can't be trusted to protect our boarder from illegal aliens,
If they can't be trusted to tell us the truth about our current financial situation,
If they can't be trusted to protect our energy independence so we are not dependent upon nations that despise us for the energy resources needed to maintain our jobs and homes,
Then why would we trust them for our personal protection?
It's illogical at best and dangerous at worst.
-Pastor Allen Jackson, World Outreach Church, Murfreesboro, Tennessee
Haha, I am honored to share a comment with Naomi Wolf—and such a powerful one at that! Thank you, Mike!
"NE: Come on. Guns don’t cause mass shootings but they’d be less of them if guns weren’t around"
I remember asking her, "Wait - if you get rid of guns, then why would there only be "less" of mass shootings? Why would there be any mass shootings at all? I mean, you just got rid of guns, didn't you?"
Or words to that effect.
What she doesn't contemplate is that which cannot be known but can be deduced: what would unopposed bad guys do, and what would an unopposed government do, if they all knew that the People were unarmed and defenseless?
I mean, just look at what they do KNOWING that there are 300 millions guns out there. Imagine if NONE of the People were armed ... well, you don't have to imagine.
You only have to open a history book. (Or pay attention to what's happening in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, among others, these days.)
Great followup, ¡Andrew the Great!
I always thought Naked Emperor was a “he”—did I get that wrong?
With you again MAA! Well done.
🙏
Margaret, living in Australia, I never felt disadvantaged by the strict gun laws here. America had just as many tyrannical edicts imposed on the populace during Covid as we did despite all the weaponry. I thought to myself, where is the armed uprising? Even more so, during the January 6 “insurrection”; where were the guns? Nowhere, except in the hands of a Capital officer.
The fact is Australia is not America. Their histories are totally different. You have inner city poverty and crime on a level that we don’t have in Australia. You also have so many illegally owned weapons that even with a gun ban the criminals would not be deterred. Also, you can perform mass carnage with cars and trucks as has occurred both in the U.S. and other countries.
I remember America of the 1950s and 60s; there were nowhere near as many mass killings as today; still many gun. Of course then you didn’t have the destruction of family and religious institutions; nor did you have the internet or the level of pharmaceutical pollution of children that exists today.
I appreciate your perspective as an Australian, Ely. From my POV, Australian tyranny did escalate to a far greater extreme than it did in America (quarantine camps, police brutality, etc. as depicted in the Down Under edition of my Recommendations Roundup: https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/recommendations-roundup-2-down-under-41b). I don’t think we’re likely to see any kind of armed uprising aside from isolated instances—unless the Second Amendment is infringed and enforcers try to start coming for people’s means of self-defense and/or people start getting carted off to gulags.
Your remaining points are all compelling ones.
There is a degree of truth in what you say Margaret. I do recall though a hairdresser arrested in Texas because she defied a mandate and kept her business open, and a gym owner in New Jersey also arrested for keeping his business open.
While I heard about so-called quarantined camps, In my state, West Australia there were no quarantine camps, just hotel or home isolation. Thankfully, schools were only closed for three weeks. What shocked me was the degree of Aussie compliance. Where was the larrikan spirit; the rebelling against authority?
I have an interesting perspective, having lived in Canada, America and Australia. Many similarities but also differences. I was most shocked by Canada, where I did my schooling, though I wasn’t born there. It went full-on CPP. Also Israel (British Palestine), where I was born, went fascist on its populace. I have been to every U.S. state except for three, so I have a pretty good read on the U.S. psyche. Currently, I have investments in Texas, so am in touch regularly with my American friends. I think we all agree how disturbing things have been the past couple of years, in the Western world. Hence, why it was all coordinated with the same memes.
You do bring a fascinating international, well-traveled perspective to these issues, Ely!
Tereza Coraggio just reviewed “Battleground Melbourne” in this moving video:
https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/down-under-torn-asunder?s=r
I haven’t seen the documentary yet, but it sounds like required viewing based on her response.
Thank you Margaret, I will check it out. Luckily, I only sleep 5 hours a night. The Covid ecosystem can get overwhelming.
Haha, I can’t condone only sleeping five hours a night given how vital sleep is to maintaining health, but I also can’t chide you since I have such poor sleep habits myself ;-)
I started watching the video, portions of which I have seen before. It just shows how we are one step away from a totalitarian regime. When I see what is going on in the show trial in D.C., it’s like the ex Soviet Union. I really worry about the disintegration of America as I once knew it. Innocent people carted away in leg irons or arrested without cause. What happened?
I have always slept 5 to 6 hours a night. I seem to thrive on that. Since I’m turning 76 this year, it’s appears to have served me.
"America had just as many tyrannical edicts imposed on the populace during Covid as we did despite all the weaponry"
I'd hazard a guess that most of the tyrannical edicts were imposed in Blue states, and Blue states are where 2A rights are most infringed upon. *Where* the tyranny was most pronounced was where gun rights were LEAST exercised or even available. I mean, in NYS you apparently need to take a class and provide FOUR references, and even then, NYS is a "may issue", not a "shall issue", state.
"I remember America of the 1950s and 60s; there were nowhere near as many mass killings as today"
Y'know what else we didn't have in the 1950s and 60s? Gun-free zones. Where something like 98% of mass shootings take place. Gun-free zones are the byproduct of Democrat Party (and GOP squish) governance. Which states are Democrat-run? Blue states. The tyrannical states.
Excellent clarifications, ¡Andrew the Great!
Apologies for not reading every one of the 100+ comments if I am restating something. But one of NE's common replies, of which I've arguing against, is the statement suggesting in "countries without guns", there are no mass casualty tragedies, and that the argument is trying to prove a negative. This is easily refutable. All of the so called "gunless societies" have had their high casualty incidents, numerous times.
Mexico: private gun ownership is illegal, and yet it has one of the highest homicide rates globally.
California: some if the most restrictive gun prohibitions anywhere and yet homicides are at an all time high. New York, almost identical.
Most of the EU has had numerous mass casualty events, some involving firearms, and some not, which didn't fit the establishment narratives, and have been memory holed for the public good, but which still happened and records exist, subjective truths be damned.
Thank you for arguing rationally for the right to self preservation. The opponents of which always seem to rely on the false premise of government benevolence, to the point of absurdity.
Those are excellent contributions to the discussion, John! Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Your last sentence should be enough to convince anyone who’s alert to the COVID tyranny.
MAA: You are courageous to take this issue on. Well done. I saw Dr. Naomi Wolf's post and thought it was fantastic the way she shared her journey to understand the real 2A issues.
“I have never believed that additional gun control or federal registration of guns would reduce crime. I am convinced that a criminal who wants a firearm can get one through illegal, nontraceable, unregistered sources, with or without gun control.”
That was Joe Biden in July 1985.
It is in this article. Enough of the lies Joe! What part of "Shall not be infringed" does Biden not understand?
https://patriotpost.us/articles/88848?mailing_id=6712&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.6712&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body
Thank you, Dennis, and I agree about Naomi’s piece and was glad she published it in time for me to reference in this thread!
Wow, that quote is quite a find. If only we could have 1985 Joe take on 2022 Joe, 2019 Fauci take on 2020+ Fauci, and so on. They would make formidable opponents of themselves ;-)
Except "Fau(x)i" was evil for decades, going back to at least his responses to HIV/AIDS in the 1980s.
Undoubtedly. I was mainly talking about the health recommendations Fauci provided in this 2019 clip vs. what he pivoted to in 2020:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEb37ZywwgM
I used to engage on these topics, but the opposition isn’t acting in good faith, at best. At this point, I feel the same way about this topic as I do all of our natural rights: I don’t give a shit if anyone doesn’t like them. Tough. Too bad. Suck it.
😆
That is one reason I’m surprised this is a contentious issue in this particular community because pretty much everyone here agrees tyranny is a genuine threat and generally supports individual rights.
Only the greatest fool doesn’t support individual rights, because even the greatest of fools is also an individual. To not support such rights is the same thing as saying “I am a slave, and I wish everyone else were.”
You did this on purpose, MAA, just when I was ready for a easy, relaxing, evening...
*lol* Sorry about that, Dana! I woke up with a migraine and agree this was a poor choice of times to publish this 😆
"I woke up with a migraine and thought nothing better for this than to start an argument about guns." There, I fixed that for you. :-)
🤣🤣🤣
And now I know how to get a record number of unsubs 😆 I guess I shot myself in the foot there (ouch, sorry about that—must be the migraine impairing my judgment).
As a famous Tim said in a movie, "Never back down, never Surrender" , I followed this stack due to the name, as I have been telling people for years I feel we have "gone though the looking glass" and are living in stupidlandia now, I stay for the well written thoughts. Thank you for sticking to your "guns" and not just deleting this stack to save subs
Haha, thank you, T C, and I am delighted you followed the trail through the looking glass and became a part of this community of brave and brilliant souls!
And don’t worry, I would never retract my statements for the sake of subs or anything else. That’s what I wrote my poem, “You Can’t Cancel Me” (at the end of this post: https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/with-thanks-to-you-you-magnificent), to deflect against :-)
You handle these discussions so beautifully!!
Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
Psychotropic drugs are big business: in 2009, roughly 300,000,000 prescriptions were written for these agents. Psychotropic drugs are big business: in 2009, roughly 300,000,000 prescriptions were written for these agents. Duff Wilson of The New York Times recently reported that the newer generation of antipsychotics has become the country’s best selling medications. (would you disarm them all!)
--A few years ago i sat with many PTSD veterans at a Patriot Meeting and the Obama Regime was pushing for gun control if diagnosed with PTSD, many who have owned their guns for decades!! THE NRA WAS BACKING THE OBAMA REGIME!!!
Mental health as a weapon against the people is communist in origin.. Lawful gun ownership is not a disease. It is a constitutionally protected, individual right.… State-controlled psychiatry is a terrifying weapon, especially when it is used to determine who has rights. Every individual should be able to be eccentric, different, and even self-destructive. As long as the behavior harms no one else, it is no business of authority. To screen people for potentially dangerous behavior is a form of pre-crime diligence that gives government an almost unlimited power over anyone it targets. It is a tool of social control, not safety.
https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/who-is-mentally-ill/
these butchers are pure evil .. in most cases they planned these attacks for weeks or even months!
(SECURITY IN SCHOOLS IS THE ANSWER)
💯👀 Thank you, MAA.
Thanks for sharing the thread. It's always interesting to see the exchange between two people/groups that have diametrically opposing views on a subject. While I agree 100% with you, I think O.S. had a point when she said, it sounded like she was being accused of having an opposing view based in propaganda and brainwashing and not her own conclusions and reasons., for her own reasons. If she (for whatever reason) sided with gun control or even gun abolition, she must be deluded in some way (forgive the paraphrasing of your position and comments).
I understand (from reading your inputs) that your intention was not to label or accuse her, but to point out the agenda driven political/media machinations, that influence countless, intelligent people worldwide.
I had a similar discussion with a coworker years back, when high capacity magazines were being debated and voted on in Colorado. He vehemently advocated for the banning/abolishment of them and said there could be NO GOOD reason for them. Anyone who advocated for them was foolish, uniformed, intentionally muckraking, didn't care about mass shootings and lives lost or a psychopath. I simply could have no good reason, for advocating for high capacity magazines.
When he took a breath and said he would entertain a reply from me, I said the following:
As a military veteran (Gulf War) I have loaded and unloaded countless 5.56 and 9mm rounds in magazines. With stripper clips it's a breeze (5.56). However, when each round is loose (like most bought in the civilian world) it is laborious and after a while a little painful on the finger tips (I'm talking hundreds of rounds here). I'm also lazy. I would rather sit and load 20 or 30 - 30 round magazines all at once, then go to the range and shoot to my hearts content. The prospect of load 10 round, shoot, stop, reload, shoot, stop, reload...is ridiculous to me. I also said, I am not wrong for my reasoned position, as we were in America and I have the right to my own decision making, so long as no one else is harmed by it. To his credit, he said "that's actually a valid reason, I see your point". It didn't change his overall stance, but we were able to sit on opposing sides of the fence, with mutually granted space.
Another thought I have always had, is that people with strong views on long held polarizing topics, almost never abandon them, until they are affected by them. I would love to see results of a survey asking anti-gun women, who had been raped, if they'd have wanted a gun (that they had trained to use for self defense) when their rapist attacked them.
When you strip away the fantasy of "that will never happen to me", then positions and long held beliefs change quickly.
Case in point are the liberal and dem parent pushing back against the in school grooming of their children, where racism and sexualization is concerned.
The irony is human beings have centuries of hind sight, on both individual and societal levels, but almost always have to repeat mistakes and suffer the consequences to learn lessons previous learned and paid for by countless others.
Thanks for your observations, opinions and spectacular writing abilities. I always feel smarter after reading your work!
What an awesome comment, hzcct, and I wish I had time to do it justice! Suffice it to say, you make many excellent points, and I appreciate your real-life example.
It is difficult to find a way to make people realize many of their opinions have been engineered without engaging their self-defense mechanisms. Edward Bernays wrote the instruction manuals in “Propaganda” and “Crystallizing Public Opinion,” and the public-opinion engineers have been following these playbooks ever since. It’s all out in the open, and yet few are able to see it as it would require them to admit they have been suckered, thus keeping them stuck in the loop of being engineered.
OS surprised me because she can see through the propaganda mechanism for other issues but not this one. In any case, I appreciate your thoughtful analysis.
dear margaret anna alice there is another thing that must be considered if tyranny is to occur in this country, is will our military be used to attack their fellow countryman? for the most part i think not. other than a few treasonous officers like general milley, the government would have to bring in foreign soldiers (united nation's troops). this military force would not be generally too enthusiastic with fighting heavily armed Americans! we would have what is referred to in sports as the home field advantage!
Great additions, j.s., and I hope you are right about the military. I think the split we saw between those who complied with the mandate and those who didn’t reveals the ones who are willing to succumb to tyranny and those who aren’t. The ones who aren’t are now on the side of the civilians, regardless, so they’ve swelled the ranks of the Resistance with highly qualified defenders.
true. i think this was part of what the government intended-eliminate as many non compliant, therefore freedom loving, soldiers as possible. however i am sure many took the shot as a matter of duty, not understanding the harm it does to their bodies-after all, when you go into the military you take many vaccines-to them this was just another one. this is a truly EVIL government we currently have, to poison their own military for profit and power!
dear margaret anna alice this person that you were debating with clearly doesn't know history, particularly American history! this country has been in two MAJOR wars with an adversary far superior to our young nation. England's army was very much greater in man power and equipment than ours in the American revolution, and obviously we prevailed in this one! then in the war of 1812, England had a far superior navy than young America with several hundred ships. the british empire was considered as having the greatest navy in the world at that time, and the British still lost to upstart America! perhaps Britain should have confiscated America's arms, then things would have been vary different! thank God they were unable to do this!
Firstly, I agree with ALL of your views on guns. As to what is stirring us to have this conversation it is young men shooting up our children in schools. They have been between 16 - 20 years old. I don't know about the last two mass shootings (Buffalo included), but I can bet they are on some type of pharmaceutical anti-depressant. After the Sandy Hook shooting I just knew that shooter would be found to be on meds that altered his brain chemistry in some way. While I'm not as skilled at investigating and gathering as you are, my high-level theory is that pharma is behind this "blame the guns" story. Their deep pockets has kept us on this topic for years now when in my realty is more likely due to their dangerous drugs. Chris Masterson (of Peak Prosperity) recently posted videos on the topic of "demoralization" vs. depression and the dangers of misdiagnosing as depression then drugging up our young during the period when their brains are still being developed. His videos can be long but they're quite good. Here is one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0051hkjB9po
For schools, my concern with arming the teachers is that students do steal from their teachers. They'll find a way... I don't have a better argument about it than that--this is just the aspect that makes me hesitant about arming teachers. It would be more helpful for schools if the local law enforcement would act as Sheriff Grady Judd of Polk County did. “If you come to a school in this county, armed, we’re going to do our best through either our guardians, our school resource officers, or our school resource deputy sheriffs to eliminate the threat outside of the school before they ever get to the children. We’re trained to do that.” “This is the last thing you’ll see before we put a bullet through your head if you’re trying to hurt our children,” Judd said this while holding a picture of two police officers carrying firearms. “We are going to shoot you graveyard dead if you come onto a campus, with a gun, threatening our children or shooting at us.”
That is certainly a compelling theory, Susan, and I am beginning to believe BigPharma is behind EVERY societal ill we face today—seriously! Even the push to cause confusion about gender in children yields profits for hormone blockers and a lifetime of pharmaceutical support for mental health issues.
And your concern about stealing is worth considering. If you see Tio Nico’s comments about the FASTER Saves Lives program, that sounds like a viable alternative to arming teachers and has been 100% effective according to Tio.
Ah, yes! I meant to read what Tio Nico referred to but, then, squirrel... Thank you for calling my attention back to it.
you are not far from the truth susan! my wife who has passed some time ago, due to big pharma's vikodin destroying her liver, was at one time taking anti depressant prozac, until she heard voices telling her to kill me! these chemicals are very dangerous and contrary to our nature, and should be avoided if at all possible!
I'm very sorry about your wife and what you both had to deal with. May she truly rest in peace--she sure deserves it after some nasty company ruined her life with unfound promises.
I come at this from a strictly technical point of view.
1. The right to self defense is a natural human right, one that predates any compact or government.
2. The government is not the source of rights; it may not lawfully take them away.
3. The 2nd Amendment is a further restriction on government, not individuals. It is not a back door way for the government, at least the federal version, to regulate firearms ownership and possession.
4. Two recent SCOTUS decisions have ruled that the 2nd Amendment enshrines an individual right to keep and bear arms. The Cruikshank decision (1876) said that the right to keep and bear arms is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent on that instrument for its existence.
5. There is no positive grant of power in the Constitution for the federal government to regulate firearms ownership or possession. If the 2nd Amendment disappeared, there would still be no positive grant of power to regulate firearms ownership or possession in the Constitution.
6. Our federal government and state governments have delegated powers. Since no individual or group, no matter how large, has the power to infringe on the right to keep and bear arms, it logically follows that no one can delegate a power to any government that they, themselves, do not possess. This applies to laws about waiting periods, background checks, "red flag" laws, magazine restrictions, ammunition restrictions, restrictions on numbers of weapons that can be purchased per month, and just about every proposed restriction of which I am aware.
7. Our founders made it painfully obvious that the people and the State militias were to be better armed than any army the federal government, on any pretense, could raise.
If I tended to trust my government, I might be amenable to some restrictions. Since I don't trust my government, I regard every proposal with the greatest of suspicion. I tend to see every proposal as being very liable to be misinterpreted or misapplied, so much so as to regulate the right out of existence. This is especially true with "red flag" proposals and such. As someone else has written, the very flexible definitions of mental illness, or incapacity, could make "red flag" laws the weapon of choice for ruling most people unqualified to possess firearms.
I am afraid that the only realistic proposal to limit or stop these kinds of massacres is to encourage everyone to be armed, in all venues, except where prohibited by the actual owner of the venue. I view the most reasonable mindset is to accept that the world is a very dangerous place, and no amount of laws can make the world safe. If many of the recent shooting sprees have taught us anything, it is that the police and the government can't protect you, in fact, won't protect you, when you really need them to.
In fact, they have shown by their cowardice in the face of clear and present threats that they do not deserve their offices of honor or respect. Their offices and jobs should be terminated immediately, and other provisions for ensuring the public safety should be proposed.
There are probably points I have missed, but this should start the discussion.
👏🙏🎯
Not all. Please, feel free to share it with others.
as a brit i have always been anti gun (although i have fired a few bb guns and thoroughly enjoyed target shooting). i thought that seeing the stats of deaths by guns and how bad it looks in the states that they were a bad idea. someone with anger issues goes bonkers with them or a depressed person blows their own brains out, i have been through depression and i expect if i had had easy access to a gun i might not be here now.
however having spent the last two years watching Australia Canada and New Zealand fall under corporate fascism and reading Solzhenitsyn and others like Naomi Wolfs piece above (i never thought about women being more vulnerable (hangs head in shame)) that i have re-evaluated my position and regret our countries gun laws, we are in a precarious position and i dont like it
I applaud you for having the strength of character to reconsider your position in light of new evidence, information, and experiences, Ray.
Sort of suitable for the discussion is a quote from Louis L'Amour (at least that's where I read it). Relevant in its clear-sighted wisdom and downright humorous, in the right context. It goes something like this: "There's nothing more dangerous than an unloaded gun when you need one." —Although I don't keep one chambered. The pronounced ratcheting warning of doing so might afford me a startled split-second advantage... or it might get me killed, but I feel it prudent.
*lol* That is a great quote, and thanks for lightening the mood, Peter!
Woohoo! I just read Malone’s Sunday Strip. I LOVE the shout out to you MAA. You’re doing amazing work and we are grateful to be part of this experience with such brave and courageous people.
Aww, thank you, Jessica! I was really surprised and moved by that. You are doing spectacular work, yourself, and I am so thankful you are part of this community!
Thanks so much for this MAA. And... "The topic of gun rights/control is one I assumed pretty much everyone in the anti-tyranny/pro-freedom movement would be in agreement on. A lively comment exchange at a recent el gato malo post proved otherwise, however."
Yes! I was utterly shocked that people who I've seen screaming liberty and freedom regarding so-called medicine/shots and other issues where violations of rights and body exist did a complete about face when it came to protecting one's creator/God given right to protect one's body with a firearm. A criminal with a hypodermic is no different than a criminal with a firearm. They both need to be arrested. And, at this point in history, criminals with hypodermics have killed and maimed countless numbers more people than a madman with a firearm has. That's an indisputable fact.
Keep on pressing on MAA. Thanks for your incredible work.
Excellent points, Rob, and I’m glad I’m not the only one who was naïve in thinking those opposing tyranny and democide would recognize the obvious connection!
One of my subscribers alerted me to this book, which sheds light on the connection between gun rights and genocide:
• “Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and ‘Enemies of the State’” by Stephen Halbrook
Thanks, I'll check out the book. And yes, to me, we either have God given rights or we don't. We should never pick and choose what rights a people have based on what we think the "right rights" are at the time. If we do that we eventually end up with no rights at all. And that's the slippery road we are on right now. We must stay ever vigilant.
That was good to read. It is interesting that some things could be seen through by the debater but not this issue. Not yet anyway. I was a full on progressive and I attempted this debate with an uncle twenty years ago. I didn't admit it in the debate, but it left me in doubt about my position, which I realized I had zero historical context informing it. (Why would I need that?, I read the NYT's) Of course eventually I realized it wasn't even 'my' position at all. It's uncomfortable - as we know - to learn how easily we've been manipulated, especially when the cause it 'righteous' like saving the lives of kids. Identity is play and that's always unsettling. Thanks, MAA.
Thank you for honestly sharing your own courageous journey, Kathleen, and hearing how your uncle planted a seed that later blossomed gives me hope that all of my efforts in these failed exchanges may not be for naught!
I feel certain they matter. And you're particularly good at them. So, ya gotta. 😊
Haha, that makes me feel better, thank you 🤗
"If we just get rid of these rifles that shoot 100 bullets a second, and have the shoulder thing that goes up, there would never be another killing, this never happened before the weapon of war AK15 was around, or violent video games",,,,,,,Heard this for years, but I beg to differ, https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/05/24/bath-consolidated-school-massacre-uvalde/
another email, how dare you ?! ;) i forgive you. it's quite good. :)
Haha, bless you, sabalina. That means a lot after the epic number of unsubs I’ve gotten over this thread 🤗
unsubs, really?!
Yep, 50 and counting …
weird. what do they ecpect?
Good question—I was pretty surprised myself 😆
I tried to create a space for respectful dialogue on the topic from both sides while still honestly presenting my own views. I guess there were some on the other side of the debate who weren’t ready for that discussion.
maybe. pity.
Sigh. I had a feeling this might happen, based on our dear hostess' history of republishing her exchanges with people she disagrees with. In case anyone's interested, I am the "OS" she's quoting (and would have appreciated a request to post this exchange here, although as it's in the public domain I suppose that's moot). I am NOT going to get into the gun control issue again here, as the previous exchange was kind of a waste of time as disagreements about hot-button issues usually are. I will make only one point about that exchange: it got shut down at the point where our hostess accused me of being "brainwashed" and having not formed my opinions by independent thought, but as a result of government and media propaganda. At that point, the conversation is dead. Whatever you're talking about, you've killed it. No one is going to be receptive to your ideas when you basically tell them, "You are so unintelligent and gullible, and your position so without merit, that you cannot possibly have formed it by reason. I, on the other hand, am wise, smart. I am above it all. I see through propaganda and lies. My thinking is not influenced by any type of propaganda or manipulation; I am too intelligent for that. Let me guide and enlighten you, oh foolish one. Listen to my wisdom."
MAA sent several comments after that exchange, which frankly, I didn't read, as they were "walls of text" and the basic premise of the conversation, respect for your conversation partner, was obviously not present.
I have no doubt our dear hostess feels great about having fully explained her position in our comment exchange, and here in this post. But what she didn't have was a dialogue, at least not a successful one in any sense of the term.
And no, I'm not going to get drawn into rehashing the original discussion. It did, however, get me thinking about successful and not successful tactics for discussions where two people disagree on a topic. Maybe one day I'll write something on that...then again, maybe not.
Hi, Oh Susanna, and thank you for your constructive feedback. Obviously, I suck at this given my consistent track record of failing to convince my debate opponents 😆
I appreciate your willingness to participate in dialogue about this and apologize if my approach came across as an attack on you personally rather than your position. You mentioned that you didn’t read all of my comments, so perhaps you missed the part where I said it is because I know you are capable of independent thought that I am engaging in this discussion to begin with.
I look forward to your suggestions on tactics for discussions like this, so please let me know if you do decide to publish a piece on it :-)
I would be curious to hear what you think of Naomi Wolf’s reflections on this topic (https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/rethinking-the-second-amendment).
I'm not sure how I would feel if my comments were turned into a post, but I believe I can understand your thinking.
I also had a comment conversation with you about this topic and dropped it when I saw you were fully engaged with others. No need for me to pile on.
I don't hope to change your mind about your choice to have weapons and use them, But I do hope to persuade you not to limit my freedoms in this matter. The 2nd Amendment is a right, not a permission, no different than a right to speech, religion, press, etc. It can't be taken away. The rationale for it is not only delineated in the Constitution, it is founded in the Declaration of Independence. It can't legitimately be taken away, though governments will certainly try to.
Still, every time there's an incident, the debate renews. One thing I'd love to see as a part of the debate is a study that compares the continual homicide rate over time, say from the end of WW2 until now, in America, in locations that have eliminated gun rights (think Chicago, NY, Washington DC, etc) to areas that have strong citizen gun rights protections. Do you think that eliminating guns in those areas resulted in fewer homicides or lower homicide rates? I've never seen such a study, but I'd be keen to.
Lastly, I'm just going to dismiss any idea that countries outside of the US can be fairly compared, socially or culturally. Even still, the percentage of gun owners in most countries is far lower than in the US, but the homicide rate is often much higher, including the percentage killed by guns (which are obviously much harder to get.)
In your conversations with MAA and others, I do not challenge your beliefs or ideas. But I will always challenge your insistence that you infringe on my rights, my ability to protect myself and my family, and my right to reserve the ability to fight back against a tyrannical government. That issue, in and of itself, is reason enough, and no one can dismiss it as unlikely to occur. It ALWAYS occurs when the state has the monopoly on violence.
Your last paragraph states the essence of the issue perfectly.
I saw a twitter post that ranked the US against other nations. In the world rankings the US murder rate is quite good when you remove five cities from the numbers. I have not attempted to verify the numbers. That we tolerate the lawlessness in those five cities is another issue but the citizens there continue to elect the same people expecting change that never happens. I have no idea how that can be true but it is.
More great points, HardeeHo.
What are the five cities? Only the obvious?
I only passed on a twitter post that I now can't find. https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-city-rankings/cities-with-most-murders gives a hint. The Twitter post was intended to consent Democratic mayors to the issue. Obviously in the US at large, the murder rate isn't particularly high.
Looking at https://infocopse.com/top-10-most-dangerous-cities/ one thinks the folk down South are in bad shape, likely because of the US drug issue. IMHO, want to reduce crime? Let pharmacies fill scripts for all drugs; make script access possible. Help those who want to be helped.
If 2A is USED as originally intended to prevent a tyrannical government, that would be fantastic. Today, we have a tyrannical, nuclear-armed government, proving that 2A was not only an abject failure but is also obsolete.
Today 2A is solely ABUSED to profit gun makers while killing children. Time to take 2A out.
Thank you for weighing in, Vinu. Don’t you think America would have ratcheted up its tyranny to the same (or worse) levels seen in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, China, and every dictatorship throughout history if we didn’t have 2A and 40% of households didn’t own guns?
And if, as you propose, we “take 2A out,” what would you suggest as an alternative way for law-abiding individuals to protect themselves against criminals and totalitarianism?
I encourage you to read Naomi Wolf’s piece to see how her thinking has evolved on this issue and specifically how it relates to tyranny:
• “Rethinking the Second Amendment” (https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/rethinking-the-second-amendment)
Margaret, Rosa Parks stopped a tyranny of the majority, without a gun. Now the keyboard is mightier than the gun. Truckers and tradies stopped tyranny in Canada and Australia. If everybody had a gun and used that to settle differences, that would make us Afghanistan. Do we want to go there?
Do we want to live in a world where grandmoms need to come prepared for gunfights at grocery stores?
"Truckers and tradies stopped tyranny in Canada and Australia." No, they didn't, Trudeau and his gang, and Dan Andrews and his gang are both still very much in power...
Trucker in Canada had their bank accounts frozen and stolen, their protest was crushed by a girly-man tyrant, and their medical mandates are still being enforced, by a authoritarian state. You're absolutely wrong, and your arguments are ridiculous.
If you claim it would have been worse in the US without 2A then similarly it could be argued that it would have been worse in Canada, Australia without truckers and tradies.
You think the nuclear armed US government is afraid of your AR-15s?
They can shut down ammo sales like they did for HCQ/ivermectin. What are you going to do?
US government tyranny is growing everyday. When does 2A come into play?
It's much too late for a revolt. We the People of the U.S. should have revolted a long time ago. And repeated it thereafter as it became necessary; which it did, time and time again (but we didn't revolt, or didn't do so sufficiently). At least one of the U.S. founders, Jefferson, and probably more if not many of them, said so. Today, most "Americans" believe revolution is "treason", and don't believe it's ever justified. They're brainwashed. Now the U.S. government calls freedom fighters "terrorists" and "'unprivileged' [supposedly having zero 'unalienable' (cannot legally be taken away, withheld and/or violated) rights] 'enemy' 'belligerents'".
I'm probably already called such, or soon will be, and will likely be accused of such when they come to take me away to the gulag---concentration camps all over the U.S., including in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico, with some in Canada, and probably in the U.K. and the other NATO and "Five Eyes" countries as well, all interconnected by an extensive rail network in the U.S., with detainment cars (with shackle hookups in the walls and floors) and flatbed rail cars with guillotines (all witnessed)---they're already prepared for mass-detainment, particularly in a revolution, a revolution (or series of revolutions) that they brought on themselves a long time ago but very-successfully brainwashed most of us to never carry out, and to falsely believe is never justified and is "treason".
Now we live in an increasingly-totalitarian police state, aka the "Fourth Reich" (including all of the U.S. allies, especially the main ones), run entirely by the largest tyrannical government in the entire history of the world, getting worse and worse decade by decade, incrementally, slowly but surely---now they're in their endgame, or the beginning of their endgame (and, thus, we ain't seen nothin' yet).
And I'm usually against violence.
It is an interesting thought-experiment to consider how the course of history would have changed if the people had revolted as soon as the government became corrupt each time it occurred, so the government would have a proper fear of the people and be kept in check over time.
You really have no idea where this is heading do you? Rosa Parks would do zip today (if the overlords were opposed to black rights) because anything she did wouldn't even make page 20 on any newspaper. And where Trudoo is going the Truckers won't get a convoy of two put together before the digital currency will not allow them to buy anything outside of their hometown. And maybe if their digital ID shows that they have left their neighborhood they will be flagged and a UN/WEF team (unaccountable to Canadian law) will lock them up, likely as mentally unbalanced and put on force-fed pharmaceuticals that turn them into zombies. Note all of the above has already happened in Canada. The future awaits.
And you are going to magically stop all that with an AR-15?
No you won't. But if things reach a tipping point and no democratic outlet exists, shots will be fired, people will die, police and armed forces will revolt, a chain reaction will occur, hopefully the people will win. If things get that bad, fight and lose, may still work out better for us than giving up for the sake of a few years of "not as bad as that".
There is no democratic outlet. Both parties are corrupted to the core. 2000 mules, Zuckerbucks. What is the tipping point?
As I wrote, 2A has failed to stop totalitarianism.
We depend on regulated professionals for everything in a civil society. Why is protection against criminals an exception?
If everybody had an AR-15, the criminals will bring RPGs. Where does this arms-race stop?
Since 2A protects "arms", not just guns, should we be able to buy thermonuclear weapons at the sporting goods store?
"We depend on regulated professionals for everything in a civil society. Why is protection against criminals an exception?"
Because of this: Police have no legal duty to protect individuals. “The US Supreme Court has made it clear that law enforcement agencies are not required to provide protection to the citizens who are forced to pay the police for their "services." In the cases DeShaney vs. Winnebago, 489 U.S. 189 (1989) and Town of Castle Rock vs. Gonzales [see https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/04-278], the Supreme Court has ruled that police agencies are not obligated to provide protection of citizens. In other words, police are well within their rights to pick and choose when to intervene to protect the lives and property of others — even when a threat is apparent. In both of these court cases, clear and repeated threats were made against the safety of children — but government agencies chose to take no action.” https://mises.org/power-market/police-have-no-duty-protect-you-federal-court-affirms-yet-again. And this failure to act in a timely fashion - or at all - has been seen in this most recent shooting: “Cops waited outside while shooter killed students. Video and witness accounts from outside Uvalde's Robb Elementary School suggest local police officers not only failed to try and stop the shooter for an unconscionably long time but also actively prevented parents from trying to save their kids. The shooter—Salvador Ramos—was inside the school for 40 minutes or more while police stood around outside, the Associated Press reports. "Frustrated onlookers urged police officers to charge into the Texas elementary school," but the officers reportedly waited outside until a SWAT team was ready. How many lives could have been saved if the cops had acted sooner? If they had bravely put their lives on the line instead of letting elementary school children and teachers fend for themselves against an armed madman for nearly an hour?
Instead, witnesses say the cops stood guard outside the school, preventing parents from rushing in to try and stop the shooter themselves: Javier Cazares, whose fourth grade daughter, Jacklyn Cazares, was killed in the attack, said he raced to the school when he heard about the shooting, arriving while police were still gathered outside the building. Upset that police were not moving in, he raised the idea of charging into the school with several other bystanders. "Let's just rush in because the cops aren't doing anything like they are supposed to," he said. "More could have been done." Video taken by Hugo Cervantes shows cops corralling parents outside the school, even pinning one man down.” https://reason.com/2022/05/26/witnesses-video-suggest-stunning-inaction-from-uvalde-cops-during-school-shooting/
Frankly, that community would be a lot better off having no police at all - with citizens taking on the full responsibility for their safety and that of their families and community - a responsibility which they already have by very settled case law - and a responsibility which law enforcement does not have and has never had. And Russell Brand - and others, including the Biden Administration and numerous Republican and Democratic politicians, seek to deny the people the most effective means of carrying out that duty, leaving them defenseless in the face of lethal threats, against which their governments and police forces have no duty to defend them - and that’s simply unconscionable.
"Warren v. District of Columbia is one of the leading cases of this type. Two women were upstairs in a townhouse when they heard their roommate, a third woman, being attacked downstairs by intruders. They phoned the police several times and were assured that officers were on the way. After about 30 minutes, when their roommate's screams had stopped, they assumed the police had finally arrived. When the two women went downstairs they saw that in fact the police never came, but the intruders were still there. As the Warren court graphically states in the opinion: "For the next fourteen hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced to commit sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual demands of their attackers."
The three women sued the District of Columbia for failing to protect them, but D.C.'s highest court exonerated the District and its police, saying that it is a "fundamental principle of American law that a government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any individual citizen." Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1 (D.C. Ct. of Ap., 1981).
Here's a law review on the topic, it's known as the Public Duty Doctrine - simply put - "a governmental entity is not liable for injury to a citizen where liability is alleged on the ground that the governmental entity owes a duty to the public in general, as in the case of police or fire protection." https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2592&context=vlr
Elect people who will rewrite such garbage laws. That's the solution. The solution is not to go back to living in caves, where the guy with the bigger gun wins. They want our tax dollars, they have to work for it.
TLDR: Our system is captured. Wholly captured.
We have an illusory system of a republic shadow run by an unelected and unaccountable Security State that has a budget greater than the next 10-nations combined.
And these are the same people who are organizing and serving as Mall Cop for the Great Reset. They do not believe in democracy or freedom and much like they do in nations all over the world, they are poised to finally turn inwards towards its own citizens.
Vinu, as you note, I liked one of your comments. I think you are making some good points on this issue, frankly.
But not this one. And I'll explain why.
We are long past the point where we can elect our way out of anything in America.
The people who run America are not elected, but do so behind the scenes. These are the same people, the Military Industrial Complex, the Security State, the Intelligence Community, The Blob...who run the world. Who engineer all over the world, who create alliances such as "Five Eyes", or NATO, or Council for Foreign Relations, who coup and topple govt's. who wreck Libya, Syria, Yemen, who wanted to invade Venezuela, who spy on our own Congress, who Chuck Schumer advised Trump, an elected President, like him or no, not to cross as they have "six ways to Sunday" to get back at you.
The same people who lie to Congress about WMD, or surveillance, who themselves cannot be investigated.
I assume that you are not American and this may also be why you had a difficult time with the reality that the US is creating bioweapons and unleashing them and also creating "self spreading vaccines" in conjunction with Johns Hopkins and UNC and etc.
And exp. on our own military as lab rats.
I would have shared your point of view on about two years ago.
I understand that if the gov't. wants to move big, they will, but it will be more difficult if the citizens are armed, and also if the police and military split.
Your points about hacking and digital tyranny are very well formed.
It's not a statutory law, it's well-settled case law. See this law review on the topic, it's known as the Public Duty Doctrine - simply put - "a governmental entity is not liable for injury to a citizen where liability is alleged on the ground that the governmental entity owes a duty to the public in general, as in the case of police or fire protection." https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2592&context=vlr
False choice. If the criminal had a knife and the police had guns, they would not be waiting outside. You arm criminals with assault weapons, Uvalde is what you get.
I did criminal defense law for 20 years. If criminals carry guns, they're going to be semi-auto pistols which are easily concealable, available on the street for maybe $150 each - a lot less than the legal price, because they come up with the drug cartels - or full-auto AK47s, also imported and sold by the drug cartels, street price about half that of a legal AR-15. A criminal with a knife is within lethal range at 20 feet distance, they can attack within a second at that distance and kill you, and knife wounds are often lethal where bullet wounds are not. And knives go right through Kevlar. An AR-15 is not a military assault weapon, it's not selective fire, that requires a special sear and modifications to the lower receiver that very, very few could do at home. Current M-16s have three modes - safe, single shot, and three round burst - full auto is a waste of ammunition - that's an assault weapon. So criminals just get their weapons on the street, it will be a throwaway charge anyhow, it goes away in plea negotiations - ask me how I know.
And the original legislative intent of the Second Amendment was that the people would have military assault weapons - in British North America - which is what the United States were before the Revolution - there was not only a right to keep and bear arms - military arms - but also a duty to do so, and that duty existed for all free males between the ages of 16 and 60. Younger males, from ages 10 to 15 could, with their parents' permission, also be a part of the "training band", as the local territorial militias were known as, and adults, 61 and over, could retain their membership. The youngest Rebel at Lexington Green was Jonathan Harrington, 15 years old, the oldest, Samuel Whittemore, aged 79 years old, both of whom survived the day. These territorial militias elected their own officers, those who could not afford their own weapons were supplied with them by the local government, the cost of which was to be paid back in installments. Free training in the proper use and maintenance of weapons was provided, and target practice was mandated, up to three times a week until proficiency was attained, then once per month. Shootings were uncommon, murderers met their end at the end of a rope. And enforcement of the laws was the right and duty of the citizenry.
Guys like you, you think you know everything, but you're just clueless.
Part of our problem is the fact that perpetrators no longer hang, or fry, or are injected, for murder in a timely manner. If they even face trial.
"So criminals just get their weapons on the street,"
In Uvalde, he bought it online, delivered by a sporting good store.
"Weapons on the street" are the product of corrupt politicians and failed law enforcement. The solution is not to arm everyone and turn the country into Afghanistan.
I'm not sure how that "proves" the 2nd Amendment is an abject failure. It only proves that a tyrannical government will absolutely use weapons against its own citizens. If one was to follow your (il)logic, eliminating the 2nd Amendment would somehow solve that?
Surely, you're not trolling.
We have a tyrannical government that has way better weapons than you can ever dream of owning. It is quixotic to think that your weapons are going to deter them. Waco, Ruby ridge demonstrated who the losers were. Today 2A only supplies childkillers with weapons while gun makers profit.
There is no shortage of examples throughout history of insurgents and lesser civilians overcoming tyranny. To dismiss that is ignorant. Then to buttress it with "childkiller" as an argument is just mindless.
Your contention that the government has much better weapons AND IS WILLING TO USE THEM ON ITS OWN PEOPLE is the best argument I can think of for not ever limiting my ability to have weapons.
You would just give in, roll over and accept it. I will not, and your idea that we should give up our rights is sheer lunacy. I rarely call out someone in my comments, but this time I will; you're a slave.
Have you installed anti-personnel mines, anti-tank mines in your yard? Do you have AAA installed on your roof? Do you have Stingers?
I highly recommend reading (or rereading) “The Gulag Archipelago.”
Having the ability to defend yourself may not stop governments from using WMDs against its citizens (the polls do that), but it stops the colluders from showing up at your door to implement the tyrants’ orders:
• “Letter to a Colluder: Stop Enabling Tyranny” (https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/letter-to-a-colluder-stop-enabling)
The colluders will take your liberty away by clicking on a keyboard in India. They don't have to show up at your door.
Brings up the question whether 2A protects ethical hacking to defend your liberty ...
Divide and conquer. The strategy of the cabal, the CIA... and Vinu.
That's not how it would go down. Watch this description of the Romanian revolt:
A Naturalized Canadian Woman from Romania Gives a Speech for the Ages:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojp_WNjlEM0
If an armed uprising happens, there will be a split within armed forces, local, state, federal police and state national guard corps. Armed citizens will play an important role, especially during the early stages of the revolt. Hopefully this can all be avoided through the ballot box but they have severely corrupted the election process in many countries, especially the United States, where elections are some of the most corrupt on Earth.
Why does the tyrannical government want it gone if it doesn't matter?
Even they don't want their child shot at school.
so they can kill them with autoimmune-disorder causing vaccines instead? doesn't really add up does it?
So long as you keep repeating "you're killing children for profit!" argument to try to shame people, we will take you as seriously as those who shouted "grandma killers!" at us to prove they were right about mask mandates.
"kill them with autoimmune-disorder causing vaccines instead"
I don't get to decide what parents do to their children. I try to educate them.
Vaccines and Biologics injury table based on mechanistic evidence – Feb 2020 Covering over 125 conditions
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.2582634
"you're killing children for profit!"
19 children were killed, gun makers made at least $4000. Shame or not, that's a fact.
I don't think I said YOU are profiting (unless you own a gun shop or work for a gun maker).
An AR costs $500, and the manufacturer probably made $75 of that.
i suggest you stop trying to tell others what to think about topics with which you clearly are not familiar. we aren't going to buy NYT level "facts" at this point.
how much do pharmaceuticals make on the SSRIs prescribed to these children? has a lot more zeros at the end than even your wildly inflated profit numbers...
i'm going to respectfully reiterate that you need to rethink your stance, this is not about profit for manufacturers
May be Ramos should have checked with you because he seems to have gotten a raw deal.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10853295/Uvalde-school-shooter-Salvador-Ramos-LEGALLY-bought-two-AR-15-rifles-week-18th-birthday.html
Pharmaceuticals are criminals too. It is ALWAYS about the money.
That's the best you got? C'mon, can't you think of ANY other plausible reasons?
Has nothing to do with the advent of gun-free zones...right? Just abuse of 2A. Got it.
The NRA meeting in Houston was a gun-free zone ...
https://www.businessinsider.com/nra-conference-wont-allow-attendees-to-bring-their-guns-2022-5
Private entities can do as they please, because they can also take whatever steps they choose to ensure that no one gets in with a gun. To wit: how many mass shootings have there been at NRA annual meetings? QED
I know you think your comment was pithy and clever, but it was neither. What it was was ill-conceived.
Schools, by contrast, are gun-free zones by government edict. Government mandated that they be gun-free, then failed to provide the funds necessary for schools to make sure - as the NRA apparently does - that NO ONE gets in with a gun. Yet another unfunded government mandate...that has led *directly* to mass killings at schools, unlike at NRA annual meetings.
So...what else ya got?
Vinu’s statement is an example of the tu quoque logical fallacy (a.k.a. “So’s your old man!”).
That said, I personally find it disappointing that the NRA would ban guns as they should be encouraging examples of responsible EDCs.
The NRA should eat their own dog food. Why was it a gun-free zone? Why can they not walk their talk? Are the gun-crazed attendees afraid they may be outgunned?
Could have been a restriction imposed by the venue, not the organization.
Either way, I'm pretty sure that security measures were implemented.
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We’re Now in the Last Stage of a Tyrannical Takeover
By Dr. Joseph Mercola and Dr. Naomi Wolf
Global Research, June 06, 2022
Mercola 5 June 2022
https://www.globalresearch.ca/were-now-last-stage-tyrannical-takeover/5782560
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Well, this hasn't happened since 30 December 2021(I just checked), but FB just semi-censored another of my posts, this time this one by Mercola and Wolf (see above).
This is what FB said [followed by my response(s)]:
"False information
Checked by independent fact-checkers"
(according to lying, false-propagandizing, and censoring in violation of the First Amendment and free speech Facebook)
The following is my response to FB:
What FB is saying is the false information. Dr. Wolf is a highly professional and reputable researcher and writer. What she's saying will prove to be true, you watch....
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Excuse me, it was actually FB's response to the following article by Dr. Wolf, not the foregoing one:
Dear Friends, Sorry to Announce a Genocide: Dr. Naomi Wolf on the Pfizer “Confidential Report”
It's Really True: They Know they are Killing the Babies
By Dr. Naomi Wolf
Global Research, June 04, 2022
Outspoken with Dr. Naomi Wolf 30 May 2022
https://www.globalresearch.ca/dear-friends-sorry-announce-genocide/5782022
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That was a powerful piece. Here is the original version at her Substack, which I encourage people to follow:
• https://naomiwolf.substack.com/p/dear-friends-sorry-to-announce-a