denis bider wrote:
>
> Samantha Atkins wrote:
>
> > > In the end, it all comes to a tradeoff: quality of living
> > > (of which I am quite convinced you have less than we do)
> > > versus the ability to defend oneself. As appealing as your
> > > arguments may be, I still think the ability of
> >
> > There are no statistics or a very strong argument that you
> > have given to justify this assumption.
> >
>
> Perhaps I should retract that argument - I am of course always being
> subjective, but perhaps I was trying to sell my subjective outlook as an
> objective one, which it is not. You are right that they are essentially
> anecdotes, not easily verifiable truth, and I cannot possibly defend such an
> argument on purely objective grounds.
>
> Perhaps I should just try to explain - on a completely personal note,
> without the desire to settle any argument - what I meant when I said that I
> gather America to be more rough than the country I live in. By saying that,
> I didn't mean the residents of the country themselves. Many (most?)
> Americans I've met were more open, more outgoing, more fun to be with than,
> I don't know, Germans. I love that about your country.
>
> What I dislike is the seriousness with which your government approaches its
> citizens. You walk up into a government institution, and the police officers
> in there walk around with shotguns, and the sign says something like "It is
> a federal crime to attack a police officer" (don't remember the exact
> words). Drive too fast, and they put you in jail. And so on.
This is a phenomenon of the last 10 years in most places (though its
been around longer in places like NY, DC, and Chicago). Because the
socialist orientation of much of our government since the Johnson
administration has consistently taken a stance of not trusting people to
be free, those they treat the most that way tend to act the most
irresponsible, so those who come in contact with them the most treat
everyone who is not one of them as 'the enemy'. Its a bunker mentality
that perpetuates the vicious cycle of mistrust that the left feeds off
of. Our nation has been an extremely tough nut for the socialists to
crack because we have traditionally been so free, and many of us resist
being enslaved. As a result, our crime rates and police malpractice of
symptoms of the low level conflict that is going on still in our culture
between classical liberals (and their allies) and socialist liberals
(and their allies). You'll notice that crime has been on the wane, back
toward rates that pre-existed the 'Great Society' experiment, ever since
the GOP took control of congress in 1994 and has been dismantling the
welfare state. The left knows it has suffered a rout, and is now back to
the early conflict level of staging riots and demonstrations, as it did
in the 60's. They remain a force in academia and among the teachers of
our children, in control of labor unions and propaganda bookstores.
>
> What I am talking about pretty much resembles what you and other posters
> mentioned as one of the primary justifications to posess firearms. That may
> be true, you are the sole judge of that.
>
> But I was trying to use the same argument the other way around: I think
> there is possibility that attitude of the citizens reinforces the attitude
> of the government. Which in turn reinforces the attitude of the citizens.
> Until there's a civil war...
>
> If this "reinforcement theory" is true, then your country has already
> drifted way past its European siblings, and is approaching something like
> China. But as said, I cannot defend this on objective grounds. So take it as
> pure speculation.
We do risk such a transition, but I don't think the risk will remain for
more than another two years.
>
> > This is pretty weak. Do you really think there is a direct
> > strong cause and effect between having no right ot have guns
> > and improved quality of life? On what basis?
>
> There are two cases to look at, and you're looking at the other one. If you
> are talking about denying an individual the right to have a gun, then the
> impact on the individual's quality of right is negative. Taking away
> people's rights from the outside is a Bad Thing. I believe in that as much
> as you do.
>
> But the perspective is totally different if everyone decides that, "OK, we
> don't want any of this dangerous stuff in our sight, let's get rid of it -
> and let's make sure the bad guys can't get it, either." The total absence of
> guns in a society *does* improve the quality of life of every participating
> indivudual - you can't be shot if there are no guns.
However, you are forgetting that government still has guns. You are not
getting rid of guns, you are merely agreeing to surrender the individual
participation in the market of political power and force, and institute
a fully monopolized control by the government that is self regulating.
Unless you can institute anti-trust actions in an independent court
system against that monopoly, you are no longer free. You just think you
still are, and the government tells you you still are, but you are not.
It is a popular fiction.
>
> > In a choice of life or death, who wins matters a lot.
>
> <personal-philosophy-mode>
> Eh - win win, lose lose. Whenever there is a conflict, both sides lose.
> There's no way to win a conflict. In the overall scheme of things, long-term
> happiness might matter a little bit. Short term conflicts, and their short
> term results, matter not. I am sure life after death is just as nice as life
> before death. No need to worry too much about it.
> </personal-philosophy-mode>
This is more left wing relativist claptrap, which has projected the
lose-lose strategy of nuclear war into all forms of conflict. This is
standard propaganda programming at its finest. Sun Tsu says that defeat
is an event that occurs in the mind of the enemy. You are already
defeated.
>
> > In a choice of being free or enslaved or easy to enslave,
> > it matters a lot where one is on the spectrum.
>
> See above. [But do note that what I'm saying is just my personal philosophy.
> It's quite extreme, and it does not necessarily have to be yours. Most
> people would probably disagree with me. I let them disagree, no problem with
> that.]
Then don't pass your claptrap off as if it is commonly accepted.
>
> > If I have a fundamental right to self-defense then how is a majority
> > denying that right any more acceptable than a minority?
>
> <personal-philosophy-mode>
>
> But you don't have a fundamental right to anything.
>
> People think they have fundamental rights, and they think some things are
> fundamentally wrong. But that isn't true. Things are the way they are. The
> only thing you really do have is your freedom to do anything that doesn't
> conflict with the laws of physics. That is fundamental, that is universal.
> Other than that, nothing else is fundamental or universal.
>
> Religions and governments that say otherwise are manipulating with people.
> Their manipulations may have good intentions, but they are nevertheless
> manipulations.
>
> Hence, your "fundamental rights" translate to what society lets you. Society
> can be changed, and what you perceive as your "fundamental rights" changes
> with the society.
>
> </personal-philosophy-mode>
Ah, so you have no agreement with the concept of natural rights. That
explains much. You are, however, wrong.
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