Quote Yago:

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Quote MarkyC:

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So hear is the thing, if I’d had a gun I would have taken it with me. The result at so close range would be either the kid would be dead or I would. I’m not sure I want to be a killer or for that matter killed.

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Or another scenario , their gun could have been a replica , then you would have essentially shot an unarmed "man" . (not sure how the law treats replicas)

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Pretty seriously - because even back in the day when you COULD own such a weapon, you couldn't shoot at people. Remember the chap with the shotgun in the shed back in the eighties?

Quote narcoman:

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Ive lived in Austin and LA over various parts of my life..... London is a quiet country village in comparative terms.... and yes - I've lived in Brixton too.

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Apples and Oranges.

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I'm All Ears.

Quote narcoman:

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Quote Yago:

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Quote MarkyC:

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So hear is the thing, if I’d had a gun I would have taken it with me. The result at so close range would be either the kid would be dead or I would. I’m not sure I want to be a killer or for that matter killed.

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Or another scenario , their gun could have been a replica , then you would have essentially shot an unarmed "man" . (not sure how the law treats replicas)

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Pretty seriously - because even back in the day when you COULD own such a weapon, you couldn't shoot at people. Remember the chap with the shotgun in the shed back in the eighties?

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Cheers for clearing that up .
Can't recall that (unsurprisingly due to the 80's).

Quote Steve Hill:

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A pretty cogent and thought provoking article by philosopher/professor A C Grayling .

He would include banning guns for hunting (unnecessary and cruel), and also would ban farmers from owning guns for pest control (apparently they could borrow a gun from the government under strict conditions if necessary). The curiously American notion that private gun ownership keeps the government in line is rightly dismissed as fanciful and irrational nonsense: the government has more and bigger weapons. Elections tend to work better... including throughout the EU and much of the rest of the world.

There's probably more chance of spotting a flying pig than any global ban actually happening, but I am attracted to the idea that gun ownership is, simply, an immoral act and should be condemned as such. Let's start condemning.

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That will put us totally out of the Olympics in various sports then.

There are already several sports where UK athletes have to go abroad to train as it is illegal for them to train in the UK.

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John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

Quote Steve Hill:

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He would include banning guns for hunting (unnecessary and cruel)

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Steve, come over to mine some evening and I'll cook you a venison dinner.
Hunting may ultimately be unnecessary but I would much rather eat some free range organic venison that I went out and got myself than the shitty beef they sell you at the supermarket. You may as well say it's unnecessary to have your own garden.
As for cruelty, you already know what they do to animals in abattoirs. Contrast that with a totally unexpected bullet to the head. Even a body shot is more humane.

And then there's the impending Zombie apocalypse to think about.

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http://soundcloud.com/anthony-wall/sets/audio-reel
http://songsforvoiceandpiano.com/

I quite agree supermarket meat is generally shite, but personally buy from local farmers as far as possible: for instance these guys are just down the road.

None of that requires anything to be shot.

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Dynamite with a laser beam...

Something still has to be killed though.
Deer aren't exactly an endangered species either. Quite the opposite in fact and this comes with all sorts of problems. Not least destruction of crops and lyme disease, instances of which are on the increase exactly because of overpopulation of deer.
Also, hunting is so much fun! And great exercise.

Guns are ridiculously dangerous, I agree. But here in Ireland it's such a rigmarole to actually legally own one (because of our colourful past) that I would hazard the percentage of gun crime committed using a legally held firearm is very very small indeed.
In no way is banning private ownership of guns going to get weapons out of the hands of thugs. Not in the Emerald Isle anyway.

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http://soundcloud.com/anthony-wall/sets/audio-reel
http://songsforvoiceandpiano.com/

Edited by Handlestash (12/08/11 08:46 AM)

Quote crofter:

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I think that makes Steve's point rather elegantly!

That person's poor neighbor has only one line of defense left. The sign on his lawn saying come on in uninvited and meet my psychotic rottweiler. God save America from the NRA!

I was reminded last week just how far a gun license can get you in the USA. A few years ago my thoroughly disreputable, retired ballet super star father in law realised, the day before he was due to visit us in the UK from the States, that he had lost his passport. He was born in Hungary in 1930 and rather famously defected in '53 so he didn't have a birth certificate and nor could he get one. He didn't have a driving license either. Nothing to prove his identity. The passport office was trying to find a document they could issue a replacement passport on when he remembered he still had a gun license from when he ran a ballet camp somewhere in upstate New York in the 60s and 70s. And that was fine. So it seems that in America you are more easily recognised as a full citizen if you have a gun license. True story. I wonder if that would happen in the UK?

The worst of it is I suspect he's still got the shotgun hidden under his bed. He lives on Manhattan Island and frankly can't be trusted with a bottle of gin. Scary! But he thinks the KGB are still after him.

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