Quote Originally Posted by TomOfSweden View Post
This discussion again. It's bound to be heated so I'm going to make some popcorn and lean back.
...

Ozme: So don't act like I started the chariot conversation. I was making a point that there are things in our lives far more dangerous than guns. You wanted to bring the intention of the thing into play... so I pointed out cars were once pure weapons.
You bloody-well did start the chariot conversation, by deliberately misinterpreting my use of the word "car", as you yourself admitted when you said: "I actually said wheeled vehicles... specifically thinking of chariots, which in ancient texts such as the Iliad, are translated (by some) into English as cars. Yeah, I know it wasn't the context you meant the question but I couldn't resist" (emphasis supplied).

I'm not here to knock anyone (as you seem so fond of doing) but if the US acted like Sweden during WWII, would you be speaking German? Russian? Hell man, would the Swedes be speaking those languages?
As a matter of fact, Swedes are a linguistically gifted people and almost all of them speak English better than you or I do. In addition, many also speak German, and, of course can be understood in Norwegian and Danish too. They are not to be blamed for their neutrality during the War any more than Switzerland, Spain, Portugal or Ireland are. <Sigh> I suppose I'm knocking you again, but, as you've brought it up, I feel bound to point out that during WW2, right up to the moment USA was dragged into the war, we in Britain were shitting bricks that you'd join in on the other side! And it was a close call too: Pearl Harbour was, for the Allies, a blessing, because it meant that Germany would declare war on USA in support of the Japanese, and USA would no longer have a choice about which side it was going to fight on. (Oh yes: FD Roosevelt regarded the British Empire as an obstacle to US trade and knew that a Eurpoean war would cripple it, so that America could then move in on the former colonies like carrion crows and take over as primary trading partner.) So, if things had turned out differently, and the only way FDR could see to ruin the British Empire was to fight on the other side, we might very well have been speaking German.

But what we already speak is akin to Frisian because Britons are Germans - Anglo Saxons - and that's where our desire to dominate the world must have come from. And America is also predominently of Anglo Saxon descent ... So now you know where America gets it from. (From your previous postings, Ozme, I guess you're not of Anglo Saxon origin, for which, no doubt, you give much thanks.)

How lovely it must be to be so insular to think you would even have the right to have this conversation if (pick one)

Communism,
Nazi Germany,
The Triple Alliance, or
Napolean Bonaparte had been more successful. (I get hazy thereafter.)
I don't think gun-control was ever an issue regarding any of the above. Certainly, I don't owe my freedom to speak my mind to the right to keep a semi-automatic under my bed and a handgun under my pillow.


But all that is way off point

Gun control isn't. I have no compunction about saying that possession of weapons ought to be subject to tight controls, even if it does affect a freedom you cherish, because I believe that no-one can possibly own a gun without contemplating killing someone, and I think killing is wrong. If I think your reasons against gun-control are stupid, I shall say so, knowing perfectly well that you can, and probably will, defend your position just as vigorously. I have had this debate in other threads and as a result, I have modified my views to the extent that, while I think the gun lobby is still wrong, I understand the opposing views are sincerely held - which is something I couldn't comprehend before. Sincerely held ... but wrong.

If you feel there is no further point in arguing the question, I'm sorry that we'll lose your input. It's been fun.

But, before you go, I would mention that I would ban any offensive weapon - gun, knife or club - and punish people who break that law severely if I could. However, guns are much worse than any other weapon because they can cause so much more carnage in seconds than the others could in a much greater time span, and so they deserve to be made a special case.

J-go: yes we have our lunatics - we have had people shoot kids in school playgrounds in the past. As a result, we did something about it: we tightened our already strict gun controls to make it almost impossible to get hold of a gun legally. Possession of an illegal firearm will, of course, land you in gaol.

There are plenty of illegal firearms around, admittedly. Some are held by teenage "rebels" and most of the rest seem to be held by drug dealers from Jamaica. Fortunately, gunfights and gun deaths are relatively few, and seem to be confined to the circles in which those people move. Generally speaking, they are not the kind of people who would go mad in a university or college.

TYWD