From: EWyatt794@aol.com Date sent: Thu, 27 May 1999 16:15:03 EDT Subject: Re: Guns [was Re: property Rights] To: extropians@extropy.com Send reply to: extropians@extropy.com
> In a message dated 5/27/99 3:58:21 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
> joedees@bellsouth.net writes:
>
> << > The problem with banning guns is, ultimately, that one's life is one's
> > responsibility to support and defend. Just as one ought to be free to make
> a
> > living ( a basically libertarian premise) one also ought to be free to
> > *protect* that life. And so long as there exists a threat of a forceful
> > attack on oneself, it is quite prudent to have the means to protect your
> > life.
> >
> And both removing guns from the hands of the irresponsible (violent
> criminals, the mentally deficient and/or deranged, children, spouse
> and/or child abusers) and preventing them from arriving there is a
> reasonable, rational and prudent life-protection measure to take.>>
>
> My point was made from an individualistic standpoint. An individual takes
> action for an individual's life. Laws are not individual action, they are
> systematic violence (as I thinkwas pointed out previously). I do agree that
> it is bad when the category of people you write get guns....but I definitely
> disagree with your methods (law).
>
It needs to be done for the good of all of us and there ain't no other
way.
> <<
> > Finally, besides personal responsibility and central inefficiency, I think
> > that thinking that one can legislate virtue in a populace is incorrect. A
> > society emerges from a group of people, and a virtuous society emerges
> from a
> > group of virtuous citizens. Its a "bottom-up" phenomenon, not a "top-down"
> > one.
> >
> Not to indulge in ad populum too much, but the restrictions I have
> advocated would be law if we had a direct vote on them, since the
> majority of voters support them. Next, although I wasn't the one
> who brought the "people" up, I expect to hear all about the tyranny
> of the majority, while hearing not a peep about the danger of one's
> future being erased by a crazed minority of one. >>
>
> Voting is not an example of an emergent phenomenon. Voting is the tyranny
> that you mention. what I was trying to say was that virtue is what people
> choose to do. One can only have a virtuous society when the people choose to
> be virtuous.
>
> The danger of "one's future being erased by a crazed minority of one" is
> something I am *deeply* concerned about. In fact, I try to be concerned about
> my future being erased by *anything*. I think the best way to protect my life
> is to *protect* my life. I think that finding good ivestments to avoid my
> savings from being eaten away by inflation protects my life. I think exercise
> and good nutrition protects my life. And I think owning a gun protects my
> life.
>
> I am sypathetic to your concerns about danger from guns; they are very
> dangerous things. I happen to think guns are very scary (though I expect this
> will lessen considerably once I learn how to use them). But ( to be cliched)
> I find being unarmed in the face of armed assailants *much* more scary. And I
> wish to avoid that situation.
>
I avoid it in two ways; 1) by being a trained and responsible gun
owner (I won a sharpshooting badge in the military), and 2) by
trying to keep them out of the hands of those who are unlikely to
show as much respect for them as I do, and especially those with
a pronounced propensity to abuse them.
>
> William
>