water cannon

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by Bewolf

If I listen to my inner child, I can more then understand this fascination with guns. As a mature adult however, I can't.

A gun is a tool made for killing. That is it's sole purpose. The only way a gun thus makes sense is that killing is acceptable under certain conditions in any given society. Once that line of thinking is established, it is rather easy for people to justify their own reasons for using deadly force. That applies to criminals as much as to people defending themselves.

This whole debate is questionably a debate between instinct and rationals.
Instinct dictates the right for defence of home, family and one's own life without trusting others or institutions to do that job. THat is an emotion I can more then understand.

However, Rational dictates to ban killing outright (including the death penalty) and a ban on tools for killing is a logical consequence. At first glance this may look naive, as there always will be people willing to use deadly force. However, a) emotional barriers will be higher (yes, it does make a difference for people if you told them as a child that it is ok to use deadly force in some circumstances opposite to telling them that killing is wrong, period)

and b) a lack of tools for that purpose makes it quite a bit harder from a purely physical PoV.

It's a simple matter of maths. Ban on firearms=fewer firearms=fewer kills. The individual may feel more unsafe without lethal means for defense, but that person is also much less likely to be confronted with a firearm.

That said, there are some grave differences between the US and the UK; or any other european country for that matter. In the US there is a lot of space for people to spread out. In Europe there is not. And the fewer space there is for a society to spread out, the more there is a need for compromise.

bewolf, people get killed regardless of firearms, if someone wants to kill, he/she still will do it, with or without a gun.

Following your idea we shouldn't even have armies, nor embark in things like invading other countries for "peacekeeping". This kind of societal hypocrisy really annoys me.