quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic Just curious to see what your views are on the following subjects: -Abortion -Gay marriage -Gun rights -Affirmative action/Racial preferences in jobs/university entrances -Separation of church and state (For example, leaving the word "God" out of the US pledge of allegiance, or banning the world "Christmas" in "Merry Christmas" and instead saying "Happy Holidays").

Please, spare us the pain. Cut to the quick and teach him how to pull a trigger on himself.


[[[smoke]]]

Smokeape, why do you bother posting here? What do you get out of it?

___________________

So...

Extremely efficient surveillance, in combination with extensive gun control, renders the general population virtually helpless and easy to control.

Anybody disagree? Why?

Oh nevermind, government is to be fully trusted and not questioned, after all, they know what they're doing right! Its not like any governments have stepped way out of line with their extensive powers in history

quote:

Originally posted by Sushipunk Smokeape, why do you bother posting here? What do you get out of it?

About as much as you do.

What's in it for you?


[[[smoke]]]

quote:

Originally posted by smokeape About as much as you do. What's in it for you? [[[smoke]]]

I enjoy chilling out with a bunch of (mostly) funny people, and having a laugh. The occasional decent conversation pops up quite a bit, which is also cool. And, of course, the musical side of the site, which is an interest of mine.

This doesn't sound much like your endevours around here, though, does it?

So, again - What do you get out of it?

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by Elec ... Its not like any governments have stepped way out of line with their extensive powers in history

That is kind of my point. I always find it interesting that the same people who don't trust their government ALSO don't trust their own neighbors to be armed, so that they might prevent these Orwellian doomsday scenarios.

MJBJ is worried about the "slippery slope" of human I.D.-ing, whereas I'm trying to point out to him that I think he's willing to engage in selective loss of rights on certain issues (like the right to bear arms, which is the only REAL thing that ensures his other rights when all are ignored or abolished in am Orwellian world), while worrying about the loss of other privacy rights to excess by comparison.

I don't see how one can be willing to say; "I'm ok with the government knowing that I have a fully automatic weapon at home, but I'm not ok with them knowing who I am"?

Makes no sense, both logistically and theoretically.

___________________
The thing about money? It makes you do things that you don't want to do

quote:

Originally posted by donnybrasco Our own Revolution is a pretty good place to start.

um, yeah. because your average joe was what beat back great britian don't kid yourself.

i only got as far as this:

quote:

Simply put, if not for gun control, Hitler would not have been able to murder 21 million people. Nor would Mugabe be able to carry out his current terror program.

which is just the stupidest load of crap ive read this week. if that's what your gun lobby thinks then im not surprised there are retards with guns all over your country. i mean, do you REALLY subscribe to such a stupid idea?

as for the warsaw uprisings, you tell me what influence they would have had on the mightiest military in the world had it not actually been fighting other great powers? im gonna guess kind've how the branch davidians did.

are you REALLY telling me you think the citizenry is your country is a real balance against the mightiest military power the world has ever known? give me a break. its ridiculous.

so, again. i ask you to provide me with an example of a citizen militia that has resisted the power of the liberal democratic state with their guns. at best, those fighting the state get butchered, at worst there's a protracted civil war and loads of civilians get killed.

either way, there's absolutely no reason to believe that the right to bear arms in the US has ANY notable effects on the powers and behaviours of your government(s) and the idea is only popular amongst people like trancer x

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic Just curious to see what your views are on the following subjects: -Abortion

for.

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic -Gay marriage

for.

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic -Gun rights

against, outside what is necessary for pest control or those that use firearms in gun clubs.

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic -Affirmative action/Racial preferences in jobs/university entrances

that's a tricky one. i'll abstain coz i can see both sides, i dont bother arguing unless there's a specific test case and the merits can be judged on their own.

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic -Separation of church and state

people's unprovable beliefs have no place in the public sphere, let alone politics and the state.

quote:

Originally posted by Nostalgic (For example, leaving the word "God" out of the US pledge of allegiance, or banning the world "Christmas" in "Merry Christmas" and instead saying "Happy Holidays").

FYI those ^^ really are meaningless and irrelevant to the real discussions concerning church and state.

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by donnybrasco That is kind of my point. I always find it interesting that the same people who don't trust their government ALSO don't trust their own neighbors to be armed, so that they might prevent these Orwellian doomsday scenarios. MJBJ is worried about the "slippery slope" of human I.D.-ing, whereas I'm trying to point out to him that I think he's willing to engage in selective loss of rights on certain issues (like the right to bear arms, which is the only REAL thing that ensures his other rights when all are ignored or abolished in am Orwellian world), while worrying about the loss of other privacy rights to excess by comparison. I don't see how one can be willing to say; "I'm ok with the government knowing that I have a fully automatic weapon at home, but I'm not ok with them knowing who I am"? Makes no sense, both logistically and theoretically.

what i find really amusing is someone like you that defends the bush admin's every move, or supports the FBI's database plans, then wants the populace to be armed to protect itself from these authorities. how do you reconcile that?

i would like ANY of you blinded americans to give me an example of the right to bear arms protecting you from the state in the last 100 years. you know, like it did david koresh

___________________

arbiter is the man.

quote:

Originally posted by Arbiter The cherry-picking of the second amendment really irks me. I mean, all it says is arms - that can be anything from a knife to a nuclear warhead. Now it either means we can't infringe upon people's right to bear any of those arms, or it just means we can't infringe upon the right to bear at least one of them. There's no valid middle ground where you can say that if guns are banned but people are still allowed to bear swords, spears, bows and arrows, and the like, then their rights are being denied and yet say that if we then allowed guns, but not nukes, they wouldn't be denied. Not to mention the fact that, if the second amendment were intended to provide an unqualified right to bear arms, then the amendment itself would not have been qualified "A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state..." I'd go so far as to say that anyone claiming that the second amendment grants US citizens the right to own guns is someone that I could never trust with the constitution, since they are either incapable of performing basic tasks of reading and drawing reasonable inferences from what they read, or they are willfully distorting its meaning for whatever nefarious purpose they have in mind. My personal point of view is that people can posit whatever hypothetical scenarios regarding how banning guns might advantage criminals by impairing the ability of people to defend themselves, but the truth is that reality is unsurprisingly out of synch with their harebrained rationalizations, as those countries which have either banned or seriously restricted firearm ownership do not suffer from any of the adverse effects that it is claimed we would necessarily suffer if we were to impose similar restrictions. And I'd say the fact that this particular incident took place in a country with high gun ownership serves to reinforce the apparently hard-to-stomach correlation between people owning guns and people using them to kill other people.

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN um, yeah. because your average joe was what beat back great britian don't kid yourself. i only got as far as this: which is just the stupidest load of crap ive read this week. if that's what your gun lobby thinks then im not surprised there are retards with guns all over your country. i mean, do you REALLY subscribe to such a stupid idea? as for the warsaw uprisings, you tell me what influence they would have had on the mightiest military in the world had it not actually been fighting other great powers? im gonna guess kind've how the branch davidians did. are you REALLY telling me you think the citizenry is your country is a real balance against the mightiest military power the world has ever known? give me a break. its ridiculous. so, again. i ask you to provide me with an example of a citizen militia that has resisted the power of the liberal democratic state with their guns. at best, those fighting the state get butchered, at worst there's a protracted civil war and loads of civilians get killed. either way, there's absolutely no reason to believe that the right to bear arms in the US has ANY notable effects on the powers and behaviours of your government(s) and the idea is only popular amongst people like trancer x

lol@you trying to associate me with the paranoid, Trancer.

Anyway...

That HANDFUL of Jews held off HUNDREDS of Germans for quite awhile. So did the Branch Davidians, now that you mention them. Extremists they were, in my mind, but not in theirs. And to many Government Leaders in this country, what happened at Waco was one of the darkest travesties in our country's history, because it was NOT necessary to go in like that and try to disarm them to make a point...and it was perhaps even a prime example of why we have the right to bear arms; In order to keep the government from trying to squash our freedoms of expression (that's how the Davidian's saw it anyway).

You want examples of how lightly armed peoples can tie down the "world's largest military"? Just look at what's happening to us in Iraq right now.

Are you aware that Switzerland REQUIRES every home to have an Assault Rifle in it? It's how they stay "neutral". It's the "Speak softly, but carry a big stick" adage, and it works! Who would want to invade a country where the populace is armed to the teeth?

Don't you think that if the Jews had all been armed in WW2, that many more of them might have had a different destiny, other than the one Hitler dictated for them...powerless at the hands of their oppressors? How about the defenseless Rwandans who were hacked to death and shot by the millions?

So your answer to your own government possibly one day becoming a Dictatorship and trying to enslave you (why not? It's happened to the best of modern countries throughout history), would be to ban together in a circle and sing songs of peace and love? Good luck with that!! LOL!!

Like I said; I don't care if you want to turn a blind eye to learning about the need for ALL citizens of the world to bear arms, because at least as far as this country goes, you have no voting rights, so converting you doesn't concern me. But you know me well enough to know that I DEPLORE conspiracy theorists, and to at least respect my positions on issues enough to not dismiss them so flippantly.

You are doing a dis-service to yourself, both ethically and morally, when you chose to debate like this. It's your loss, in more ways than one, when you do.

___________________
The thing about money? It makes you do things that you don't want to do

___________________
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.