What do the Americans think of my right NOT to be armed?

I know what you mean starla, American's just don't get it do they?

I am English (sorry) and I feel as uncomfortable as you do visiting a country were even only the police carry guns.

Imagine , in the USA there is more than 200 million legally owned firearms!

I think the problem is a kind of mass national paranoia that in America you need to protect yourself from some other gun owner (like yourself) in case they open fire.

They don't seem to understand that if there were no guns in circulation that the gun crime rate (from illegal guns) would be 96 % less than the annual 30,000 gun crime fatalities in the US every year.

There is also a question of National Identity and the right to bear arms being engrained in the national psyche.

It seems that Americans are unwilling to review the constitution and would find it difficult to separate the evils of gun ownership with the virtues of freedom and justice.

It is a kind of brainwashing that has prevailed for too many generations.

I do not thingk that America will be close enough to ending its addiction with firearms until it has sunk low enough and (very sadly several millions more good people will have lost their lives to this peculiarly American form of insanity).

What do they think of your right not to be armed - think that you mean your right to live in a country where no common person can legally own a weapon and/or potentially threaten you with it. They think you are stupid, un-American and jealous of them (jealous of anything).

The Americans think that the prosperous civilised world is somehow stupid (anyhow, un-American) for not having the right to own guns..

It is a mad person who thinks that the rest of the world is wrong and that he alone is right. I think that applies to national conciousness as well.

They live a belief structure borne out of ignorance and an outdated constitution and fuelled by the powerfull and rich gun lobby which has a responsibility to maximise profits from the gun trade.

On this basis it is impossible to expect them to stop selling their weapons to pre-pubescent kids in 3rd world countries in an attempt to support/overthrow governments.

You of all people know that it was American money and weapons that fuelled the war in N. Ireland in its recent history.

I don't think somehow that the people would have felt quite so terrorised by baseball bats rather than guns and bombs.

Sadly it is still a backward society that fuels the supply of blood money with the death of thousands of its own civilians, with more US deaths (as a result of gun ownership) than the sum of all American soldiers killed in all wars, a tragedy.

Who on this Earth would envy them?

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I think a lot of it is paranoia. Im not saying all so don't everyone get their panties in a bunch. Reminds me of after 911, my neighbor actually 2 of them came to my house telling me to get as much gas as possible because it would be 7 dollars a gallon by tomorrow. I commuted 100 miles at the time. I saw all kinds of boneheads filling up cans everything out of paranoia. And low and behold 2 days later when I needed gas the price was the same. I personally do not care if a person owns 1 million guns. The truly scary part is if something did break out, how many would actually have the balls to use them, or how many paranoid people would wind up shooting an innocent neighbor or family member. Im not saying you Yakrider as you seem like an intelligent person and responsible gun owner. Im more worried about those who are not or would shoot anything that moves for no reason. And I think you understand what Im saying. You are right about the smokes they ar 6.20 a pack here and Im a smoker. It sucks but you know what? I SHOULD QUIT! lol But i also look at it this way. I could live in a third world country, no toilet, in a shack,eating dirt sandwiches. I got it pretty good actually.

My dear, you misunderstand. Most of us do not believe that having a gun will protect us. Goodness, way too many folk don't know how to use the darn things anyway.

Most folk in the USA do not own or carry a weapon. Most of those who do are well trained in its use and are licensed to have it with them.

As you have said, Yes criminals carry guns, which they get illegally! This is the same here in the USA.

Owning a weapon and having a license to carry it, is a privilege not enjoyed by everyone here.

The fact that criminals are able to carry a gun illegally, should be reason enough for an honest person to carry one legally.

IMHO, if someone at the tech school shooting was able to carry a licensed weapon, maybe, just maybe, 30 or more lives could (might) have been saved. Maybe just one life - but it would have been worth it, me thinks!

I do not have a gun in my possession and I have never needed to have one - Thank God! But in such a position as above, I would dearly hope and pray that one sane person nearby does have one in their possession - and knows how to properly use it.

IMHO,

Regards,

The Ol' Sasquatch Ü

Its not just violence towards other people:

Nearly twice as many people commit suicide in the 15 US states with the highest rates of gun ownership than in the six states with the lowest rates of gun ownership, although the population of the two groups is about the same. This information is the result of research led by Matthew Miller at the Harvard School of Public Health

It should be noted that guns are used in 5 per cent of suicide attempts, but more than 90 per cent of those attempts are fatal. Drugs account for nearly 75 per cent of attempts but the fatality rate is less than 3 per cent.

Cho Seung-Hui, had been carrying a 9mm Glock pistol and a .22 Walther semi-automatic. One of those handguns was used in both crime scenes on the campus. Receipts in his backpack suggested he had bought them legally earlier this month.

The law on gun control in the US is looser now than it was 10 years ago when the Clinton administration banned specific models of semi-automatic assault rifles; in 2004 the Republicans allowed the ban to expire.

As for the people who feel safer in the uk, what about the fact almost weekly, another teenage boy is stabbed to death by another teenage boy. It happens in South London, North London, Bradford and numerous other places in the UK. People get mugged and killled at knifepoint. But no, guns are still a worse problem. I don't go anywhere at night in London because it's illegal to carry a knife which doesn't stop muggers, but I refuse to break the law. The truth is this, people will always kill each other reagrdless of what weapon they use. You can't only blame gun ownership.

I don't really care about your right not to arm yourself because you don't live in my country.

And if you did live in my country, good for you. We love visitors (Provided you actually obey our immigration laws.)

We have a very large country with very large shorelines and many ports. So trying to ban guns to prevent people from getting weapons is an exercize in futility because what would happen is that only the criminals would be armed. Also, since this is a very large country, policework has to be heavily localized and not nationalized, as to provide the quickest response as possible. Even that's not quick enough and when you have a burglar or an armed robber attacking you, resorting on your cell phone to try to get the police to arrive quickly takes too much time. You can be burglarized and be cleaned out within 5 minutes and you will never see your stuff again. Or you can have your throat slit within 4 seconds. Policemen cannot arrive that quickly.

That's where the issue of personal protection comes in.

The police cannot be guaranteed to show up and save you at that moment.

Think about it this way. If you were a thief, would you rather steal from somebody that was packing heat or steal from somebody that only had a cell phone?

And as a note, almost all of our gun crimes that are committed by armed persons are committed by people who cannot own a gun legally. They either steal one or buy them off the black market fairly easily. (Black market weapons are ridiculously easy to obtain)

And as for the suicide comment, people slit their wrists and attempt suicide.

Should we ban all knives as well or issue "knife control" or should we simply allow knives in our society as something that is very useful but can also be abused?

And by the way, if you don't like getting stereotypes from other people, there's a simple thing to do.

Don't stereotype our nation.

One of our Midwestern states is at least as large as your entire country. Your country is different from Britain and my state is different than another state, simply because we're 2 different areas and we have very distinct cultures.

You won't find any gun toting cowboys in Maine and you won't find any surfer dudes in Idaho and you won't find any gun toting gangbanger hoodrats in Wyoming. It's hard and futile to stereotype us because we're simply too big and too diverse to stereotype.

I think this is a very good statement. Having lived in both the States and the UK for a considerable amount of time I definitely feel in Europe they understand what they are speaking about in terms of gun control. It is really difficult to take Americans seriously esp after Bush has been elected. This shows the psyche of Americans minds. Apart from guns, most Americans also show indifference to violent films, violent TV shows, gangster rap, worship of money, other cultures. There are good points about the US but mainly these fundamental values is driving the US culture downhill.

I am so glad there are countries like the UK in existence to show we can live in a society where there aren't handguns permitted to citizens. When I've lived in the UK mostly, I've felt less threatened in public places as I knew there wouldn't be a mass shootout. Of course, the UK is not 100 percent safe but no place is esp, if you are a woman. I am just glad to know that guns are not in the wrong hands in the UK. They are only in the hands of specially trained police for specific purpose.

We can see that Cho Seung had no criminal record when he purchased a gun. This just proves that it is difficult to predict the outcome of someone ordinary turning into someone nasty. So guns should be banned full stop criminal record or not in the US.

I think the US use excuses to explain away their 'fetish' for perverted gun culture ie US constitution blah, blah, or protect themselves from another gun owner.

But too many guns in the wrong hands, allowing citizens to take law into their own hands cowboy style. It's not Wild West anymore. If they abolish slavery cos it was against human nature, they should also abolish guns. it's also old, archaic and against human nature of keeping peace. Anyway, I really hope people can protest against this in DC so history doesn't repeat iself on a bigger scale next time.

Lord velos and R M......please do your research....wasn't it in fact US money that was mostly funding the IRA? Kinda blows your theory out of the water doesn't it!

Not too long ago in UK history there was a guy who walked into a nursery and started to blast away with an assault rifle and many kids died that day. The British response was to ban all weapons including handguns.

In the US its almost like an annual killing spree, with US gun lovers saying "well its my right to bear arms, I'm not a mentalist". "I am never going to do that kind of thing, this is solely for protection!"

Well the funny thing about mental illness that it can suddenly happen to anyone, one day your king of the hill with your nice car and 2 kids and great wife. The next you've had a nervous breakdown and not in full control of yourself.

To each his own.

In Texas we had a very tragic massacre where a guy walked through a Luby's resturant and killed a ton of people while they tried to hide under their tables. After that incident Texas passed a law for concealed guns.

Now I live in a area that had a ton of car jackings back in the day with guns used. A lot of times the criminals just shot the people and stole their cars. After the law was passed almost no car jackings. Criminals always have a way of getting guns. Now they do not know if the person they are trying to hurt has one too.

I find your question somewhat amusing. Even in the most enthusiastic concealed-carry states, no one is going to FORCE you to carry a gun. EVERYONE has the right NOT to be armed.

Personally, I strive to protect my US constitutionally guaranteed right to bear arms, so that those of us law-abiding citizens in the US who choose to carry a gun, may carry a gun to defend ourselves. Of course, as always, those who do not wish to carry a gun have every right not to.

My brother is a policeman, and it was he who encouraged me to begin carrying a weapon after he became a cop. There's a common misperception that the police are there to protect you. Of course they will do everything they can to protect you, IF they happen to be right there when someone attacks you. Otherwise (the vast majority of the time), they'll do everything they can to catch the person who attacked you, as soon as they get there, which is usually AFTER an attack has taken place.

doerayme mentioned the Luby's incident, which is a classic example. Dr. Susanna Gratia Hupp is the woman whose parents were killed in front of her at the Luby's massacre. If she had been able to legally carry her gun into the restaurant with her, instead of leaving it locked outside in her car, she could possibly have saved her parents and many others. She became a Texas legislator afterward, and was instrumental in getting the state's concealed carry law passed.

Interestingly, some of the most vocal concealed-carry supporters are former gun-control advocates. They changed their minds after doing research to prove the 'success' of gun control and the 'failure' of concealed-carry laws, and discovered that the fear of an armed populace actually does discourage crime. Paxton Quigley is one who comes to the top of my mind. If you're curious, you can read some of her writings.

The NRA publishes several stories every month on their 'Armed Citizen' page about people who have used their legal firearms to defend themselves and others from attackers. They are powerful stories, but for some reason they don't manage to grab headlines the way successful attacks by criminals against unarmed people do. Perhaps its because empowering stories don't sell the way frightening ones do.

If you don't want to carry a gun, hooray for you. But don't try to prevent me (or any other law-abiding citizen) from carrying one if I want to be able to defend myself and my family.