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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
SECOND AMENDMENT BABY GUNS FOR EVERYONE AMERICA FUCK YEAH HOORAW
USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!
We're the only country in the world in which the terrorists don't have to smuggle in guns. Exceptionalism, of a sort.
edited 3rd Nov '16 5:18:39 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"... Someone needs to nuke this Second Amendment out of the US Constitution. Seriously, what good does it actually give?
edited 3rd Nov '16 6:51:19 AM by MarqFJA
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.The problem with it, like many historical laws, is that it can't keep up with how things are currently. Back then, it was intended to allow farmers and citizens to be able to keep their own rifles in order to both defend themselves and be able to take up arms against the government if it turned tyrannical. The Founding Fathers never anticipated that we would be getting guns that could fire as fast as you could pull the trigger, could hold more ammo, and have people go in and decide to start shooting children or co-workers.
Nowadays, because of the vague wording and how it hasn't been adjusted, the Second Amendment is used as a crutch by right-wingers because "OMG THEY'RE TRYIN' TO TAKE OUR GUNS!"
Nothing that couldn't be achieved by normal legislation. In Canada, if I wanted to, I could get a gun. I would have to go through a training course for a license and take a test to renew it every so often, and I would have to prove I need it.
If I can't prove that I need a gun, then I don't need it.
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The Constitution is considered near sacred. Editing it is extremely difficult,it require approval of 2/3rd's of the states. Worse still the second amendment is part of the first ten amendments, the bill of rights, added immediately after the Constitution was put in place. They get rid of the second amendment and many will wonder if they won't toss say the first amendment, in favor of more "modern" European speech laws.
edited 3rd Nov '16 7:11:27 AM by JackOLantern1337
I Bring Doom,and a bit of gloom, but mostly gloom.In Finland you need a licence for each gun that you own. We have almost the most guns per person of any country, mostly because hunting is very popular here and hunters tend have to several different weapons for different game.
Usually you keep the gun in a locked locker (so that kids can't access them) and disassembled. Alternatively, you might keep your guns somewhere else than your home - at a shooting range, say, or a hunting lodge. (It'll still be disassembled when it's not in use.)
I know a couple of people who have guns for something else than hunting. They're all hunters, and most of their guns are for hunting, but they might have a pistol or two that they take to shooting ranges for sport. Typically, a hunter will have a couple of shotguns and a rifle or two.
Hunters usually have another job, and hunting is just a hobby. They don't tend to sell the meat; they use it or share it with family and friends.
(This is to answer the question of what constitutes a reason to have a gun in other countries. I think Finland is probably a representative example.)
Just for the record, I don't think anyone in Finland has a licence for a gun for self defence. For professional use, it would only be cops and maybe some sort of security personnel, though I can't really think of any place where you'd need them to carry actual guns. I assume the President's bodyguards carry guns, but Finland is really relaxed about this stuff. (Our previous President famously used to go to the local swimming pool and swim with the general public, with the bodyguards waiting in the lobby. Killing a Finnish President would be easy, at least if you didn't care about getting away with it.)
I could just about imagine that someone who has in the past been attacked by some sort of organised crime syndicate (multiple times) just might get a licence to own a gun for defence, but to be honest I'd assume they'd be under some other type of protection.
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.Removing the amendment is the simple solution but given the wording I don't think it should be strictly necessary. It states that the reason they're allowing gun ownership is because the nation needs a well-regulated militia. I think that could be interpreted to mean that 1. Regulations on who owns guns are perfectly valid and 2. Owners should be registered with the government.
I'm in favor of regulations, but outright removing the 2nd Amendment? Maybe it's just my bias as an American, but I think that's a bridge too far, personally.
Of course, that's not going to happen in the foreseeable future.
Oh God! Natural light!Historical note: The wording does come from the era where being in the local militia literally meant "bring your own firearm".
edited 3rd Nov '16 7:44:29 AM by Elle
The Constitution is supposed the be amended. We have a procedure to do that. It was never meant to be an eternal stone tablet of inviolable laws. Heck, it even has parts of it that were originally written to expire after certain dates. Now, logistically speaking, it's absolutely impossible to get a 2/3 majority of the states to agree on anything, let alone getting rid of the 2nd Amendment, but there's no reason to hold it sacred. And I would argue that anyone who does is being disrespectful of the people who wrote it.
Edit: It's called an Amendment because it was added after-the-fact. Its mutability is in the name.
edited 3rd Nov '16 7:44:07 AM by Clarste
I've always found Second Amendment worship more than anything else. If it weren't for all the mass shootings and general gun violence I'd probably just find it a bit quirky for the most part. Nothing inherently wrong with gun-ownership, just the way we do it here.
But what I really don't get is the people who legitimately believe that without it the government would just turn into a tyrannical dictatorship overnight.
edited 3rd Nov '16 7:46:17 AM by LSBK
For the sake of argument, let's take a hypothetical worst case scenario (that hopefully won't happen). President Trump or an ideological successor has been voted in. You live in a neighborhood where the cops are markedly racist and now you've got a spree of hate crimes directed at you and your neighbors. Your attempts at peaceful protests have been shut down and the federal government isn't stepping in.
Who ya gonna call? *
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Ya march and ya die. You're screwed either way, and "moar guns" won't solve the problem even if you had them.
edited 3rd Nov '16 7:59:32 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Well what are we supposed to do? We can't afford to fight a civil war and an insurgency.
Oh really when?