Hello, I'm an American Gun owner.

[Deleted]

I wonder if people think that United States is a small country. You hear about shootings and psychotic rampages on the news because it makes the ratings. Not to say it's not news or tragic, but it's a small price to pay for freedom when you look at the bigger, responsible nation.


I go outside everyday and there is some risk involved. I could get killed by a car accident, a plane crash, or a gun. If gun crimes were happening all around us in personal vicinity everyday, then it would be something to be alarmed about, but the average American has never seen a gun crime outside of news or television and therefore it is only a small price to pay for freedom.

But the US still has the most gunrelated deaths of any industrialized/civilized country.. About 12k a year vs Japans 12.

[pouca]

The situation is easy to understand.
- It's impossible, politicaly and technicaly to prohibit gun owning in the US.
- The murder rate in the US is far above what we have in western Europe, it's more similar to third world countries.
- Gun diffusion is the reason why your muder rate is so hight (for the most part).

You will have to live (die) with it for a long time

[Deleted]

ITT: We need guns to protect ourselves from the guns that the bad guys stole from us.


As a dane I will never understand that concept. We don't own guns, as a general rule, the bad guys have very limited access to guns as well, and the guns they do have they rarely use, or use only against other "bad guys" as pretty much any illigal gun in Denmark belongs to some gang.

I also don't understand the reasoning that you need guns to protect yourself against your own nation/military. As far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong, you're are still a democracy. Meaning you elect whoever gets in there, and they have limited power with which to start killing off its own citizens. Frankly I just don't see that happening, ever.
If you can't trust a democratically elected government to protect you, then why do we even bother with that system?


Mihalik made a great post that was for the most part ignored, I think it deserves to be posted again, would really love it if the untouched points in his post could be addressed, specifically, why do you have to own that gun, if no body else have a gun as well?

OP good for you.

Now I'm a European coming from a place where you literally never see firearms unless it's a military parade or the police are wearing it. Today I live in another European country where the situation is pretty much the same. Altought there is one difference. This country has a strong hunting culture. (Hey the King's 10 year old grandkid shot himself in the foot while hunting under parental supervision!) Regardless. You literally never EVER see firearms. Criminals don't have acces to it. Usually when police raids go down there are no shoot outs. Ever. Even the local terrorist organization is largely unarmed. They resort mostly to the use of home made bombs or hunting rifles. You don't ever see them running around with assault rifle's, submachine guns etc. So whenever anything goes down the police completly outgun the shit out of anyone, usually completly avoiding the use a violence, thanks to the intimidation factor, you are not likely to go up against a police fireteam in kevlar with assault rifles if all you have is a really long knife a replica katana and a piece of crap buckshot.

The point is this.

What is a firearm?

It is a tool designed to kill or wound. It is not useful for anything else. You can't build houses with it, can't work your land with it, can't cook food with it etc. etc.

It is designed to kill and main. Animals or other people. If we would have to go out and hunt for our lunch every day like our ancestors have, I would get the reason for needing to own one. But we don't. We get our food from farms and ranches and we hunt them in our local supermarket.

In our day and age could you have a gun? Sure why not? I can think of a good couple of reasons.

You are a sports shooter.
You are a collector.
You hunt for a sport (I think this is stupid, but who am I to judge.)

None of the above justify you owning functional and loaded automatic, semi automatic or such pistols, rifles, submachine guns etc. etc.
None of the above justify you being able to transport a loaded firearm.

The fact is guns are bad. There are no "good" uses for a gun. Even when the police is forced to use a gun, it is a horrible situation. It happens because there is no other option, because they often need to take lives to save others. It's a no win situation. Everytime a person is shot, innocent or criminal a life is taken, without due process (if you are a fan of the death sentence). And death is always final. You can't repent, change your mind or anything. And also mistakes happen.

You can't argue that living in a unarmed society is more unsafe then living in a armed one. Most European countries have very strict gun control laws and much higher public safety then most of the United States.

I studied for 2 years in the States. And I have to tell you I have been in many more violent situations or borderline violent situations then during my 2 years of studies in London. (And believe me London is not a shining star of public safety by European standards.)

Now there is one final fact.

I don't think the US will ever be a gun free society. For cultural and practical reasons.

When you have so many guns in a society like in the US, once you try to implement gun control only the honest folk would give up their guns. So on the short term public safety would drop. It would be a decades long period untill law enforcement would be able to bring illegal guns under control.

[Mihalik]

ITT: We need guns to protect ourselves from the guns that the bad guys stole from us.


As a dane I will never understand that concept. We don't own guns, as a general rule, the bad guys have very limited access to guns as well, and the guns they do have they rarely use, or use only against other "bad guys" as pretty much any illigal gun in Denmark belongs to some gang.

I also don't understand the reasoning that you need guns to protect yourself against your own nation/military. As far as I know, correct me if I'm wrong, you're are still a democracy. Meaning you elect whoever gets in there, and they have limited power with which to start killing off its own citizens. Frankly I just don't see that happening, ever.
If you can't trust a democratically elected government to protect you, then why do we even bother with that system?


Mihalik made a great post that was for the most part ignored, I think it deserves to be posted again, would really love it if the untouched points in his post could be addressed, specifically, why do you have to own that gun, if no body else have a gun as well?

I would have loved to have some of the points adressed too by pro gun posters. I honestly think that the main reason for owning guns is psychological. It comforts people's ego and gives them an illusion of power. I try to be a realist when it comes to guns and the United States. And to be honest, it is their house and their rules. As long as it does not directly affects us across the pond, I to some extent don't care.

But I also believe American militarism is the natural extension of their gun culture. And sometimes their militarist foreign policy does affect us too.

[Wulfstan]

"I'd rather have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it"

[GrieverXIII]

I do not keep them in a safe. We do not have children and are thus in no worry of a child getting to them. People might frown on the idea, but a gun in a safe might as well be in another state if the situation calls for it.

And in what world would a situation call for you to use it? If there's someone stealing on your property you're going to shoot him instead of call the cops?

[Karazee]

Anything is bad when used irresponsibly.

There's an argument to be made that guns are bad when used responsibly, too.

[Itisamuh]

And in what world would a situation call for you to use it? If there's someone stealing on your property you're going to shoot him instead of call the cops?

If he's in my house? Damn right I'm going to shoot him. Only a fool would just assume he won't do you any harm.

[Karazee]

I'm from Texas and against civilians owning guns. I have a nice katana if anyone tries to break into my house.

[Kalyyn]

And in what world would a situation call for you to use it? If there's someone stealing on your property you're going to shoot him instead of call the cops?

When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.

Or in my case, over 45 minutes away. I have to wait almost an hour for the police to arrive at my home in an emergency.

[Deleted]

those rose colored glasses you have are beautiful but you should really take them off and why hasnt anyone responded after i showed them you can fire a semi auto faster than full auto when they told me i was crazy and a flat out liar lol

excuse me?wtf does rate of fire between semi and full auto has to do with my reply? or knowledge of such things increase your credibility?...
you're not crazy nor a liar,you've just grown up with certain ideas that are plainly wrong,trying to convince an conservative American that he should put his gun aside is like trying to convince a fanatical Muslim that he should not force his wife to wear a cowl...both are a waste of time really

[Ryme]

I'm of the opinion that the purchasing of guns for civillian use should be steadily made more difficult to do, with tighter restrictions being brought in alongside this. In a similar way to how smoking is slowly being made illegal, so should the ability to own and purchase firearms.

[Auloria]

Keep on the topic of gun violence and quit using hypotheticals to justify yourself.

Isn't the topic the American culture of gun ownership?

Every responsible gun owner believes that gun violence is a bad thing.

[Boomcats]

To be fair in the comparisons of the US to say, Japan in gun violence; yes America has a higher rate due to the availability of guns. When you look at "violent crime" stats, it really wouldn't seem to be much higher. Violent crime however, varies by country in definition.. so it really isn't apples to apples.

This pains me deep to say this (I'm an oreo half white half black), but there is another reason- have you looked at the black or hispanic culture in America vs say Japan again? It's "cool" to have a body, or own an illegal gun. That doesn't say much about America, but you can't label guns as bad when honestly its the culture and people who use them.

[Auloria]

This might be interesting to the discussion.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/20098/gun...e-america.aspx

Male gun owners are more likely than female owners to say they use a gun for hunting (63% to 45%, respectively) or for target shooting (68% to 59%), while female owners are slightly more likely than male gun owners to use a gun for protection (74% to 63%, respectively).

Gun owners aged 18 to 49, are more likely than those aged 50 and older to say they use a gun for hunting (65% to 52%) or for target practice (74% to 58%). There are essentially no differences between younger and older gun owners who use their guns for crime protection (67% among 18- to 49-year-olds and 64% of those aged 50 and older).

Republican and Democratic gun owners are almost equally likely to say they use a gun for protection against crime, 64% to 69%, respectively. However, Republicans are more likely than Democrats to say they use a gun for target shooting (71% to 53%) or for hunting (64% to 53%).

The focus seems to be on guns as protection in this thread, but in trying to understand the culture of gun ownership, it's important to note how big a role hunting and sport play.

[Tarashan]

I hate to be the one to break it to you, but should push come to shove the military would crush any rebellion effortlessly. Tanks and drones beat well-armed civilians.

What makes you think that the military (or more likely a sizable portion thereof) would not refuse to fire on the populace? Or not join said rebellion? Depends on the reasons for the rebellion.

[kays]

Most of the people who replied in this thread have no brains. Guns are not the problem, people are the problem. If we took the guns away like mental people want, we would have many more knife killings and things like that. UK has strict gun laws, yes they have very few murders involving firearms but many murders involving knives and other none firearm weapons. Why the US is so much more violent and evil, goes back to the founding of America our country was brought up because of blood and violence we as a country have been in many major wars. Also the media and them glorifying violence and criminals and showing them everyday on the news and things of the such. guns are not the problem people are! its the scum of society the gangsters the people living in the ghettos who have guns and who murder with them and then little kids growing up to be like the dropping out of school to be like them and follow the same path to crime and death. then people glorifying weed as being the best thing ever and drugs being great and drinking young being awesome and if you dont do it you aren't cool. then kids want to be cool and start doing weed and causing trouble, it just goes back to society causing all the problems and turning kids into little gangster.

[Deleted]

The past few years have been marred with a lot of really shocking news reports regarding gun related deaths in the United States. Because of those stories, I do wholeheartedly believe that gun owners in America have gotten a pretty bad rap across the board. From what I've gleamed via forums, facebook, youtube, and anywhere else people can freely comment, the majority of disgust and negative stereotypes seem to come from Canada, the UK, and or other parts of Europe.

As a gun owner I've gotten really depressed by this. While I understand that some peoples opinions will never change, I do feel that there is a responsibility to be had of gun owners to actively reach out, discuss, educate, and listen to non gun owners.

There are a great deal of gun owners in this country who recognize that it is THEIR responsibility to protect their home, family, and self. It is not the responsibility of the police, and as the popular saying goes "When seconds count, the police are only minutes away."

In the United States, the belief is that Firearms are an equalizer and a right held in the ability for protection. It's really difficult even when you want to be realistic, to think of balanced ways to "fix" the system because it isn't a light switch and it isn't easy.

Now, I could waste more time but I'd like to do this. I'm fairly level headed and I do choose things out of principle rather than personal belief, so if you're someone who has an opinion you'd like to express to me or a question, I invite you to do so. I would, for once, like to see someone be proactive in this subject, even if it flops.

Thanks.

Guns have one purpose: To kill.
I hold no illusions about guns.

But you're right, discussion is always the way to go to create insight, understanding and perhaps help change something.
I do feel that the argument that guns are for self-defence is a weak one, seeing as how guns are used for crime 99.99% of the time. I have yet to see a single news report about a valid self-defence situation in which a gun owner protects his home/family or others that are in danger. Infact I've seen news reports that show how BAD people are at the latter, and how it's much more of an added risk to have every day Joe's have a gun, because in most cases they have insufficient training and will panic in a dangerous situation.

[PizzaSHARK]

I hate to be the one to break it to you, but should push come to shove the military would crush any rebellion effortlessly. Tanks and drones beat well-armed civilians.

Tanks are completely irrelevant and in fact counter-productive against people on foot and especially in dense, urban areas. Tanks are designed to fight other tanks and attack convoys in wide, open areas across several miles, not blast buildings twenty feet away in the streets.

And before you say a bunch of amateurs with guns and improvised explosives can't do jack... well, what the fuck do you think we've been fighting against for damned near the entire past decade? Sure, they aren't winning... but they ain't lost, either.

[Deleted]

Most of the people who replied in this thread have no brains. Guns are not the problem, people are the problem. If we took the guns away like mental people want, we would have many more knife killings and things like that. UK has strict gun laws, yes they have very few murders involving firearms but many murders involving knives and other none firearm weapons. Why the US is so much more violent and evil, goes back to the founding of America our country was brought up because of blood and violence we as a country have been in many major wars. Also the media and them glorifying violence and criminals and showing them everyday on the news and things of the such. guns are not the problem people are! its the scum of society the gangsters the people living in the ghettos who have guns and who murder with them and then little kids growing up to be like the dropping out of school to be like them and follow the same path to crime and death. then people glorifying weed as being the best thing ever and drugs being great and drinking young being awesome and if you dont do it you aren't cool. then kids want to be cool and start doing weed and causing trouble, it just goes back to society causing all the problems and turning kids into little gangster.

As an example.
We will always have crime, no matter what we do. It's a matter of making these crimes reduced and or controlled. In countries in which we have strict gun laws, we've a way of controlling and reducing crimes in such gun laws.
Owning a gun, as I've stated to the OP, never solves anything. It creates a world of distrust and suspicion. Foreigners see the US and it's citizens talk about freedoms and the rights of all, but at the same time we see your citizens arm yourselves against one another.
The argument that guns aren't the problem has a lot of holes in it. People are part of the problem, but guns the other part in that problem.