• Sheriffs are forming "2nd Amendment sanctuaries" refusing to enforce gun control
    285 replies, posted
For it to be clearly "BS" means that you do require it being used to throw out a government. So, because it's not being used to oust Trump, this is proof it's bullshit to say it's a protection from Tyranny? He's not weaseling out of anything. These are literally the terms being argued and the outcomes required for this frankly insane line of reasoning to be justified.
What I mean is he's not advocating it be done, just holding them to their own logic.
Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it isn't happening though. A lot of gun advocacy groups openly condemn the administration's actions. Additionally I haven't personally been involved in any armed anti government action but I was part of an armed group that blocked neo-Nazis from setting up a rally in my town. Not all gun owners are afraid to act if it comes down to it.
So you can essentially declare a moral victory over "progun" advocates regardless of which way political events go? Apathy from the right "2nd ammendment is bullshit!", or violence from gun owners "GUNS ARE DANGEROUS"? Like this is a "win win" situation almost like the inverse of a false dichotomy. If the country continues to descend further, and further, into authoritarian tropes, I fully expect to see guns used to respond to that. At this current time, even with the oversteps the government has taken to step on rights, it would be beyond preemtive to expect violence to be ousting Trump and his cronies right now.
How far would it need to go for it to be called for?
That would be the point at which all legal options have been exhausted and no-one inside the administration is working to steer things back on track. You also have groups like Redneck Revolt which are definitely not playing around. They are anarcho syndicalist leftist rednecks with guns.
Hey how's it feel to know that you aren't reading my posts https://reel.geel.tf/324md9bdbpcnvfbohfmr.png
How about a position when there are literally no legal avenues forward? Or do you think, that at this current time, that the best course of action for the future of the United States, would be violent insurrection against a reviled, yet still supported administration? There are still legal avenues forward, and you're saying "Because 2nd ammendment people haven't already killed him, it's all a bullshit excuse". This to me is patently fucking absurd.
He's holding them to a fucking strawman he's constructed where our position is "WE GOTS TO KILL PEOPLE" And you're defending that.
I'm not demanding anyone do anything, I'm not implying anything. I'm trying to find out, as an intellectual exercise What does it mean to be a safeguard against a tyrannical government The NRA is as far as I know silent with no public statement on the unconstitutional treatment of southern border immigrants. No Gun Rights Advocacy group I know of (I checked GOA and SAF as far as I could) has anything to say on the treatment of southern border immigrants. So can you just for a second imagine my confusion? The 2nd amendment is supposed to be a force against government tyranny, yet even the 2A advocacy groups are silent when the government seems to be acting in a way that would make the founding fathers and authors of the 2A vomit? So why are we in this situation where no-one knows what "tyrannical government" means, and no-one knows what "a response to a tyrannical government" means, or any of the implications of anything those points can lead to. And yes, if your definition of the 2A means that you will raise an armed revolution against a "tyrannical government" then I'm asking you directly what your definition of a "tyrannical government" is. I am not trying to say that if you haven't shot a fucking police officer you're demonstrating the failure of the 2A as a preventative measure... Here's a great screencap from the Three Arrows video on gun control: https://i.imgur.com/VJGjqvT.png At what point during the timeline above would you have taken your gun and moved to save Jews, or if you were a gun owning Jew, at what point would you have done so? Remember your 2020 hindsight response, whatever it may be, and now remember that almost no-one did. Jewish and German armed resistance groups did exist, but were completely ineffectual. Obviously their sacrifices in the face of sure death should be remembered as valiant. Estonia had its own guerilla resistance fighters we love too, but as an actual tool, not really useful. It's basically proof positive that an armed populace does not stop tyranny if most of the populace agrees with the government, as is happening in the US right now.
So if this is true, your response is... to remove any opportunity to stop tyranny because in one set of circumstances we'd fail? "Well look if it fails, you'd fail. So we might as well just not let you have the guns to even try. Because if you failed, you see... you'd fail."
What's this about strawmen you said?
Sure, let me quote it for you. Hard to find these things.
Calm
How do you define a legal avenue then? As an Estonian with family who lived during deep soviet times, I know that you could still send letters and talk to your supposed representatives directly. You could literally become the member of the ruling party and 'take part in' politics. You started off early as a member of the Red Youth, various programs dedicated to such things. Is that a legal avenue? If not, how do you tell? It sure seemed real enough at the time, despite nothing actually leading anywhere. In fact there were many people during Soviet occupation who supported it because they thought they could change it from the inside through its system. Those people were, of course, stupid.
The Soviet political system was a sham from the ground-up, especially when it came to the participation of member/satellite states. The US political system, flawed, compromised, and broken as it may be, is not. There are still in-tact courts, agencies and true Americans at work in the system. We must exhaust all peaceful options before turning to blood, because that bell cannot be un-rung. This country was born out of armed insurrection, split in half by armed insurrection, and regularly hobbled by armed insurrection throughout the intervening years. We cannot risk further fraying our social bonds when it may not yet be necessary.
I asked because I didn't say anything of the sort. I believe the best way to avoid tyranny is to set up extensive checks and balances, with maximum transparency at every level. A system that easily lets you oust unconstitutional systems if you can prove them to be as such. If that doesn't work then you look for external support. European countries have constitutions too, with much the same points as the US one. Ideally a system like that would never even let you get to tyranny provided your constitution is clear and accountability is easy to enforce. The fact that I don't think guns are an effective deterrent does not mean I think there is no deterrent or that we should give up as a whole. THAT'S the strawman I was referring to........
Being a little sensationalist there. Not a tyranny. Mueller's investigation would not occur in a tyranny. The ruling party would not be losing seats in the government in a tyranny. People would not be allowed to sue the gov, and president under a tyranny. People generally war as a last resort. As numerous people in this thread have told you, legal avenues are still working.
It doesn't seem, or sound that way from the actual words you've used, but okay, we can just give you the benefit of the doubt while you do the usual thing you do in these threads, every fucking time. The NRA isn't what most gun supporters call "reasonable". Their membership has been shrinking for years, they're not representative the way you're using them to be. I could throw a few terms at you about what this is called, but you do it so often, I don't know if it matters. You're taking an example you think is accurate and generalizing based on that. This is assumptive reasoning and it's pretty flimsy my dude! So, I can imagine your confusion. Secondly, the "Tyranny" we see from the Trump government, as bad as it is, is still something preventable through legal means, through checks and balances, and through other avenues available to the public. Your argument, and lets not mince fucking words here, when boiled down is "I think the US govenrment is currently tyrannical. Because I think this, and 2nd ammendment people haven't acted upon my thoughts about this, the second amendment is bullshit". This is an extremely stupid argument. It ignores the reality of other possibilities to remove Trump from power, it ignores the costs of violent insurrection, and it completely fails to understand the 2nd ammendment should be viewed as a "last resort". You're acting like it's a fucking first resort. This is the key problem with your understanding of the argument, of your framing about it, and you're total inability to see you have created a "Scenario" that is so contrived, it has no value in this discussion! As bad as they are, they're not dictators, despots, or tyrants. Not yet. You either ignored my other post about "PRE-EMPTIVE" or you just chose to ignore the concept of "too soon". We've done this in prior posts you chose not to read it seems. I didn't say you were. You did make a hollow argument based on bad pre-emptive decisions and a bad definition of tyranny. Wow, a historical "What if" question with no possible answer that can satisfy anyone. YOU SURE GOT ME! Oh wait no this is a bullshit hypothetical "what if" that someone could present you an inversion of, where you'd be equally unable to produce the "satisfactory" answer you seek. Or maybe, just fucking maybe, what you're saying is that before the investigations have even concluded, Trump should have been shot. I'm not taking anything from what you're saying but the literal logical conclusion of the absolute insane shit you are saying. There are legal avenues forward, and you're saying "because the 2nd ammendment hasn't removed him already, it's bullshit". Is there ever going to be a time where you decide to approach these conversations thoughtfully without trying to construct mental scenarios you think we're going to get stuck in?
Oh yeah no I agree entirely, but it was actually surprisingly hard to tell. Even during the worst years of the soviet union you were constantly gaslighted and your neighbours were mostly in favour of the regime. How do you find traction if you're suddenly a person in those times? And believe me, Estonia knows about war as much as the US does. Different scales, but much more devastating socially. Like let's say you zoom back in time to the first day of when the Soviet Union in Estonia was "Tyrannical". You go to your local representative, have a long conversation about your worries about this system, and they share a sympathetic shoulder and mark it down as an official complaint. You don't notice the increased surveillance, your life continues as normal. It's qualitatively not much different from today. Even today I can go write to my rep, go talk to them directly, they give me a shoulder to weep on, and I live the next 10 years without seeing any difference. And yet I don't live under a tyranny. There's so many questions and unknowns and so much vagueness here that I just don't see how it would ever work in practice.
I agree you didn't say it literally and I shouldn't have phrased it so unflatteringly but I genuinely do believe that that is the net logic of your arguments. This is extremely important for any government to function and I agree that we can have stronger protections than we do now. I agree, but here's the problem: how do you "oust" an unconstitutional system if it doesn't want to be? The system derives power from the people, but the people need their own source of power. That power comes from the threat of the masses. What if it's financially or politically beneficial for those other countries to not involve themselves? What if their involvement isn't enough? What if they have their own corruption going on and so cannot be counted on as agents of justice? Guns are a deterrent because they turn every neighborhood into a potential warzone, and turning your entire country into a battlefield means that there is nothing left to salvage once it is over. This means the government is incentivized to avoid such a scenario. The government may well win a fight by leveling all the houses such that guerrilla warfare can't be hidden, but at what cost? The government is fighting to maintain control of valuable land, which will be made valueless if the government commits to the fight to the extent necessary to win. You're also ignoring the fact that revolutions have worked many times in the past and are ongoing in the present. How do you explain this?
Can you find me any poll showing that most of the US people agree with the government, our specific "leadership" or our direction right now?
in what possible circumstance would a "tyrannical" government or force take complete, unilateral hold of the US without at least majority public support? a governing force, foreign or not, holding onto all 9.834 million square kilometers of the US is not going to last very long if people don't support it. it's separated into semi-autonomous states, it's physically one of the largest countries on the planet. how does anything get won here if not ideologically? how does anything get done if not from the top down? ultimately this "one set of circumstances" is the only one that makes sense, whether it's the US government or a foreign one or what the hell have you. besides, you don't have to be arguing in favor of removing guns entirely to point out specious reasoning.
https://azdailysun.com/news/opinion/mailbag/gun-ownership-kept-japanese-at-bay/article_234b2654-26c2-57ad-944f-7eef4efb0e29.html
Find the words I've used that imply I want anyone to kill anyone, and I'll apologize, and declare a misspeak. Simple as that. Please don't think me dishonest just because I disagree with you. Indeed it is assumptive, but it's also illustrative. More details to follow. I see. I do have a bunch more questions about legal avenues but I'll accept that answer, thanks. "I think the US govenrment is currently tyrannical. Because I think this, and 2nd ammendment people haven't acted upon my thoughts about this, the second amendment is bullshit" Incorrect. I have no argument here, I only have questions because you're the ones with the argument. Here's what my current stance is: "I think the US Government is currently tyrannical, owing to their clearly unconstitutional practices. What is the point at which the 2A kicks in as an anti-tyrannical measure" And it seems like the answer is heading towards "so long as there are legal avenues" which indeed answers my question, and opens up a few more, but yolo. Gotcha. You posted while I was typing. After I posted there's a shit ton more to sift through so. See above Oh goodie, so what definition of tyranny should I use? Because from your post here: "Secondly, the "Tyranny" we see from the Trump government, as bad as it is, is still something preventable through legal means, through checks and balances, and through other avenues available to the public. " Obviously there's then a difference between "Tyranny" with quotes around it, and Tyranny, without quotes. These historical what-ifs are what 2A proponents use to support gun rights is the point. "If the Jews had guns there would be no holocaust" is a plenty used right wing talking point, uttered by several 2016 republican presidential candidates who made it pretty far even. Ouch, nah I want Trump to go to jail for fraud. If you find a post in which I said "Because the 2nd amendment hasn't removed him already, it's bullshit" I'll apologize, because I didn't. You guys are all plenty smarter than me, so getting people stuck in mental scenarios, whatever those are, is kinda pointless.
If you're interested in this talking point, check out Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership if you can navigate their schizoid webpage. I don't know how to get back to the page where I saw it, but it's a major sticking point for actual Jews as well.
Good point, it's at 29% atm according to Gallup polling. Round it to a third? Obama at this point in his term was at slightly lower numbers
Obama was also a war president and being perceived as responsible for a war makes you notoriously unpopular. Trump has managed to avoid this by playing golf instead of actually running the country.
I'm glad they have their civil rights under control and know what they want, but my question is not "Do people want guns" in this context. My question is "Would having guns be a deterrent". I don't fully know the answer to that, just that historically it doesn't seem to have helped much.
It's a hard thing to source but basically the Japanese Navy decided during WWII that a mainland invasion of the US was suicide because of how many people had rifles and shotguns and knew how to use them.
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