[Ledgem]

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

I'll stop you right there.
I've been in a similar situation, as I already mentioned and my instinct was to flee when I was not armed, and to fight when I was, so yes I would fight in that situation.
What others would do is known only to them.

I bolded that last part because I'd like to encourage that line of thought. That's intellectual honesty - you're able to say things about yourself, and you recognize that it doesn't necessarily apply to everyone else.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

That's because if you had to argue based on the effects of gun control on crime you would have to admit your argument is lost.

Hey guy, how about instead of telling me about how arguments that I'm not making are bad, you stick to discussing the arguments that I am making?

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

I don't think you know what you're arguing.
You come off like a hoplophobe because you want to restrict/ban firearms but not due to crime?
See, that's how I know you're not thinking logically about this.

No, it shows how badly you want to talk about the crime argument.

Let me try and explain this one to you. Crime is crime, and it occurs regardless of what weapons are available. Even if people had nothing but their fists, there would be crime. Agree? In some crimes it's simply a matter of property being stolen; in other crimes, people get hurt. Put a powerful weapon into people's hands, and what do you think will happen when those crimes take place? The magnitude of damage inflicted is increased. The ease with which a life can be taken is increased. This is pure logic.

Your argument against it is that allowing for force to be equalized is a method to guard against that. I have not argued that it isn't (although I take issue with the unrealistic manner with which you claim it protects you). However, the other argument is that we can guard against it by keeping these weapons out of people's hands. Now don't get too excited: this isn't stretching to say that firearms should be entirely banned from society. What it is saying is that if we reduce their numbers, the chances of their being used in crimes (but not the number of crimes) will decrease. This is also pure logic.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

You just stepped on a landmine Legem.
The founders of this country owned cannons, and in some cases merchant-marine warships, so don't go into what kinds of weapons they owned.

Cannons were pretty powerful, but standard infantry could overrun them. And yeah, those warships were great on land, weren't they? Real terrors. No, the balance of military power between then and now can't even be compared, and as someone who knows about weapons, I'm surprised you even want to argue it.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

I'm not the one worried about somebody jumping out at me and gunning me down.
That paranoia belongs to people who are afraid of firearms and thus calling for gun control.
Secure persons aren't afraid of inanimate objects, they are only concerned with things that can actually hurt them--you know, other people.

Hold on a second. You said that you moved to Colorado specifically after your encounter with the armed shooter in Massachusetts, so that you could own a gun and "never be a victim again." And now you're saying that you're not the one worried about somebody jumping out and gunning you down? And somehow you're implying that I am afraid and insecure, even though I head out each day without a gun and without ever thinking that I'll be a victim?

I'd laugh at how absurd that is, but I'm more concerned because you don't seem to understand how disconnected your thoughts are. A bit of paranoia is good and healthy, and I'm not making fun of you for it, but let's call it for what it is, OK?

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

Truth hurts doesn't it?
I've been comparing your arguments to those on BradyCampaign, GunPolicyCenter, and other sources of hoplophobic propaganda. Funny how your posts mirror what is on those sites.

I'm not familiar with those sites that you've listed... however, that probably explains why you've had such a damn hard time letting go of the "guns = crime" argument that I never made. You're on autopilot, responding to those sites instead of to me.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

You labeled yourself a collectivist, so you only have yourself to blame for that.
Collectivism is not compatible with the US constitution nor the Declaration as it protects "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
(taken from John Locke).
So yes, collectivism by its very nature is anti-American.

Um, dude? America is a country. Do you know what a country is? It's a society made up of people who live together to make life easier (or even possible). That I am a collectivist just means that I care about the people around me and am occasionally willing to put their needs above my own - that you seem to pride yourself on being self-centered and selfish doesn't make you any less a part of this society, as much as you might rail against it. You need society to live. It's a crazy world where the selfish who don't give a rat's rear about anyone but themselves can call their fellow countrymen who care deeply for the society "anti-American."

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

600 get's you all weepy huh?
Gee, how many lives have been terminated by abortion?

Nice distractor. Two points:

1) The abortion argument is totally separate from this, and hinges on your personal belief as to when life begins. No human can truly say when life begins, but many arrogant fools like to proclaim a certain time and then act as if their view is the ultimate truth. I clearly do not view life as beginning at the same time as you do, therefore I do not recognize your claim about "lives being terminated."

2) You've tried these types of distractors before, such as bringing up deaths related to automobile accidents. I know you're not stupid, so why are you acting like we can only focus on one thing at a time? If you want to discuss ways to reduce auto-related deaths, start a thread for it and we can discuss it there. We're talking about guns in this thread. A preventable death due to a gun is just as tragic as a preventable death due to some other cause, and I think we can all agree that we should always strive to eliminate those deaths as much as we possibly can.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

The fact is, using that fuzzy logic of yours, we should ban everything from cars, to fatty foods, to unprotected sex, anal sex, anything that can cause death.
And you call me paranoid, that's funny.

Nope, it's about reducing to avoid preventable deaths. Should we ban cars? No, but we can set lower speed limits in areas with high incidences of accidents. Should we ban fatty foods? No, but we can encourage businesses to avoid using them, and we can encourage people to reduce their intake. Ban unprotected sex? No, but we can try to reduce its occurrence by teaching people about protection.

Ban guns? No, but we can reduce their numbers, and in doing so we might be able to knock out some of those preventable deaths that are related to them.

If anyone besides GundamFan0083 and LostCause thinks the line of reasoning I've prevented above represents "fuzzy logic" please say so. kyp275, I would appreciate your input and reasoning.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

No I said you were a hoplophobe, there's a difference.
And I would never call you a communist, they at least know the value of guns.

Ah geez, the "c" word. For some reason, I hear that term when I know that Americans have stopped thinking. The term I used was "socialist." Let's see where we're at now: "Anti-American" and "freedom-hating" have made an appearance, and now it seems we're on the verge of being called communists... slow down, GundamFan0083, slow down.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

Who appointed you dictator for life?

You didn't hear? The inauguration was yesterday. I would have invited you to the party, but you know... the guest list was pretty big, and the venue was only medium-sized, we could barely fit everyone in there, and I wouldn't have wanted a dear friend of mine to be seated outside...

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

Because of Richard Nixon's fucking drug war, that's why.
It turned the gangs in this country into millionaires overnight and allowed them the money to arm themselves to the teeth with military weapons.
You want to reduce deaths from firearms, end the drug war.

Yes, that's one possible way. I agree with you here.

Originally Posted by GundamFan0083

So now you're talking about homicides again?
See, this is why I told you you lost the argument.
You can't even follow your own line of thinking.

Nah, I actually misread what you wrote and thought that you were trying to claim that there were only 600 firearm-related deaths per year. It would have fit along nicely with your narrative about how "more lives are saved by guns than taken by guns," backed by the gunssavelives.net website count of 500+ (speaking of which, I can't find their counter anymore - what happened?). This was my mistake, although I still think you're a bit of a callous jerk for thinking that 600 lives isn't a big deal, especially since those are deaths that we could really do something about and we don't have to ban or reduce guns to put a dent in them. Yet instead you're waving that number away completely, instead of coming up with ideas.

I didn't reply to a number of your paragraphs because I'm trying to keep my post length down. Rest assured, I didn't leave things out because I had no retort. If you felt that I bypassed a winning argument, let me know and I'll respond specifically to it.