Quite. Perhaps my post wasn't clear enough. Italy allows guns but according to various statistics gun crime and other crimes are less per capita than in the US or UK.

I'm also glad to see that UK citizens are now labelled sheep just because we hold a view that does not agree with those of a minority or non-UK citizens, and that we all like Jordan. I would... but only after a few pints... But I don't drink so that's another stereotype I fail to fit into. It is also disappointing to see democracy via a majority equated to Nazi Germany.

Stern, please dial back your rhetoric because passionate or not you're just starting to insult people that just so happen to hold a different view from you. That their posts lack tact doesn't really excuse anybody responding in kind.

Baaaaah (I would... but only when I'm in my wellies...)

Hood

I will offer one reason why myself and my countrymen are so easily upset about the reaction to fireams ownership by those who are not citizens of the US.

There is a resolution working it's way through the United Nations that in effect would ban private ownership of firearms worldwide, thus abrogating the national soverenity (sorry about spelling, not had my tea yet) of signatory nations. American gun owners are very aware of this effort of the UN and it will be a cause of much consternation when the international community trys to interfere with the people and laws of the US.

Have a good week gents, I'm off to work.

Britain is an interesting case indeed - it went from being one of the most free societies (in the particular sense of small government with minimal interference in economic and social life) at the start of WW1 in 1914, to one of the most unfree (except in social life) in the non-communist world, by the end of WW2. 31 years only.

The reason of course was that only this degree of state mobilization of the nations resources could save the country from being gobbled up by the Germans. I am sure most would agree that this was a very real threat, and not some conspiracy theory invented by the establishment in order to boost their power.

Then once this new equilibrium was established, the majority of the population decided that it preferred the new deal. There was no going back.

Personally I can live with that - my take is that all developing countries sooner or later have to co-opt the majority of the population into their economic systems through some mechanism of positive rights and redistribution, otherwise development stops. The UK just did it very abruptly due to war - other states have done it as a response to the threat of revolution or economic stagnation.

The problem then becomes how to manage the moral hazard or free-rider problem, when there is a growing constituency of welfare providers who increase the size of their power base by calling for "more resources", and so are not motivated to restrict the distribution of public funds. Sadly the police seem, in some respects, to have been co-opted by this group.

I am not convinced that there is any answer to this problem except that of a major moral revolution spurred by a religious revival, which brings its own disadvantages, to put it mildly, (speaking as an unbeliever).

Waves of Arguments have been thrown into the fray, their broken bodies now twisting on the barbed wire. Huge armoured Rebuttals have ground the front line Arguments into the mud of no-man's-land, only to fall prey to concealed Ripostes. Meanwhile the special forces - hordes of highly trained Fallacies - have created chaos in the rear areas. The front lines are static. The combatants are exhausted, all reserves committed.

An erie silence falls over the field.

Peace in our time? :-P

As opposed to the US involving itself with the people and laws of the international community? There is some innocent hypocrisy there, but as always I'd much rather be with the US than against it and I have admiration for the USA's willingness to put itself in harm's way for the good of everyone.

I agree with your sentiments though I'm pretty sure that the international community will not be able to "force" the US to comply. For my part the UK lost its sovereignty a while back and I just love seeing my taxes not being used in the UK but going to help shore up the economies of other European countries.

Personally I'd go down the Norwegian route of being in the European Economic Area but that's part of a debate that's bigger than this forum and a little bit further away than the riots.

Hood

Let's go a bit further and dismiss all black on black crime in the U.S. as well. Because most of that is gang related (organized crime). With that in consideration then we don't have much of a firearms crime rate at all.

And lets be fair, those pesky blacks had it coming. Right? :confused:

Cross-reading the thread, looking for some monday amusement, I thank some of you to remind me of what happy enviroment I am living.

A shooting here and there, someone occasionally stabbed in the train, a violant robbery (experience that myself, I am today quite happy I didn´t have easy access to a gun, these days, after being released from hopital - I am not sure if I wouldn´t have used it in revenge), but afterall I do not have to live in a constant state of fear, that I only feel safe, while wearing a gun.

Serving my time during the Kosovo-conflict, I spent enough time wearing guns and rifles in public, day and night, even while shopping. That days I experienced that some usually nice, kind fellows, started to act strange over the time. I thought that the given power corrupted their character and they were somewhat different, while wearing these guns - and switched to normal again, as soon as the weapons, where locked safe again.

Anyhow, the day I would only feel safe in my enviroment with a gun, I would pack all my belongings into my sailing boat a leave. As some of you are talking about freedom, there is no such thing - only the big streams and seas of this world.

So do you really feel that you live a free world, if this world makes you believe, you are safer, with the power of a gun?

ah ok, gotcha now.


aawww come on, it was in reply to winny's distorted view of democracy. Plus don't forget that Nazi Germany was born as a democracy anyway, it was deformed into what it was eventually, but nobody was looking for an emperor. The historical problem with regimes and social problems is that we never see that coming, we think of the examples of the past as...well..the past, and don't think for a minute it could happen again. The issue with modern society is that it's a headless beast, it can take the most unexpected directions and get ugly very easily.

I didn't start the insults war, it was others that stated going on the low levels cos they ran out of arguments. I'm just asking to THINK objectively about the issue, and not give me the ready-made propaganda that you've been fed with so far, simply cos I come from another culture and find some of your decisions extremely contradictory and too bent towards the political correctness.

sales of baseball bats in the U.K. increased by over 6,000 percent
 

Batter up!

"sales of baseball bats in the U.K. suddenly increased by over 6,000 percent last week"

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20...ment-s-failure

That's a bit of a generalisation man, you have to trade some of your market with the outside world to survive on this planet. Come to think of it, it's the United Kingdom who's actually racking up money from other countries, thanks to the Tertiary industry. You shut down most of your industries, leaving a lot of people unemployed, your agriculture is only marginally capable of keeping up with the demands of a spoiled market like the one we have (ANY kind of fruit available all time through the year, do we REALLY need that?).. where's the wealth of the UK coming from then? Banking, Blue Chip, research, Services.. you've changed the face of a nation that built its strength on the industrial revolution, with little or no concern for the changes that it would have cost to the population. It's a choice, like many other countries did, the point is how much did the average population have voice in this change?