More guns, less crime.

[ArrowLance]

I've heard extensive tales on this subject and want to settle this in my mind once and for all. It isn't that I don't think people should have guns, but that I feel this statement can't be true. I suppose the statement itself isn't my biggest problem but the ideas that come with it, such as that more guns reduce violent crime.

To be clear I have heard that more guns means less violent crime, but i have also heard that gun carriers and owners are more likely to be injured in a crime. I would like opinions and articles (specifically statistics, backed up of course) on the subject.

[bobroberts]

If you have a large concentration of neglected and impoverished people, you will have high levels of crime. If you tack on an artificially created and highly profitable black market, it will become worse. There is no legal way to resolve disputes peacefully among those in a black market, and if the black market provides for those who are impoverished and neglected they will look the other way, as the legal alternative is to continue to be neglected and impoverished. The stresses of poverty in a capitalist system and the nature of black markets guarantee this. Easy access to guns probably does not help, but having a large segment of the population willing to engage in illegal behavior makes it unlikely that any gun ban will have much of an effect, since they will go through illegal channels to obtain them if they want them.

More guns in the possession of ordinary people who aren't involved in the black market won't effect gun crime statistics to any large degree, although accidents, homicide occurring from domestic disputes, or suicide via firearm rates might go up.

If you have a high concentration of people who have stable lives and little incentive to engage in criminal behavior involving firearms, then more guns and firearm training among them might act as a deterrent to petty crime.

[Die Rote Fahne]

Per capita there are less violent crimes in nations with stricter gun laws (canada) as compared to where you can have loads of guns (usa).

[bobroberts]

Per capita there are less violent crimes in nations with stricter gun laws (canada) as compared to where you can have loads of guns (usa).

Canada also has a better social safety net than the USA, and as a result, lesser concentrations of urban poverty.

[Foldered]

Canada also has a better social safety net than the USA, and as a result, lesser concentrations of urban poverty.
It's not quite that cut and dry. Look at Vancouver.

[bobroberts]

It's not quite that cut and dry. Look at Vancouver.

I would be willing to bet that Vancouver has a lower gun crime rate than any similar city in the US.

[Hexen]

I have often heard the "A well armed society is the respectful one" statement all my life but I wonder if it's true? Although I always imagined even if you banned guns, people are going to buy them from the black market or people would simply use melee weapons anyways...I also heard "The gun owners would be the outlaws..." In terms of leaving people defenseless against those who do have guns...(although even if gun ownership is legal it probably wouldn't matter anyways depending on the firepower and well trained the offensives are...)

Well I also heard crap from USians saying "Guns are keeping us free" and some other shit like that..

Hmmm...Maybe those statements (like "A well armed society is the respectful one", "The gun owners would be the outlaws...", "Guns are keeping us free") could be examples of Right Wing ploy possibly?

[Tablo]

In the US we would still maintain high crime rates since illegal weapons come in with drug cartels in large bulk(I can vouch for this and please do not ask why). Canada would not deal with this problem on quite as high a level as it is further north, has a smaller population, is more lenient with drug related charges and, has a much much smaller drug problem. Even if guns were made illegal the situation of the US would stay quite the same as we will always have guns all over no matter what. Maybe I have some kind of bias as a gun owning southerner, but I feel that it is ridiculous to argue against the arming of the working class. Besides, why let the state have a monopoly on violence? We need guns to fucking blow the Capitalist and bourgeois brains out(not that I am advocating murder or violence against any group in any way).

[Blake's Baby]

The thing is Canada, with its very low gun crime, actually has more guns than the US per head of population. So it's not as simple as 'more guns = more gun crime'.

The differences are, as has already been said, that Canada has a less blatant divide between the rich and the poor, at least in most places; and also that guns in Canada tend to be of the 'I need to kill a polar bear that's attacking me' rather than a 'I need to rob a gas-station' kind - hunting rifles don't actually translate very well into urban crime sprees.

As for 'we need to arm the working class to blow the capitalists' brains out'... get real. If you get into a pissing contest with the bourgeois state, with nuclear missiles and stealth bombers and way more hardware than you can fit in your survivalist compound (do you have a budget of a trillion dollars? Didn't think so), not only will you die so will the rest of us.

If we cannot defeat the bourgeoisie through strikes and the refusal of the working class to accept the system leading to the siezing of power by the workers councils (ie the overthrow of capitalism by the working class), then we're all dead anyway. Guns don't make a revolution, that's just a coup d'etat. Given that many Anarchists constantly (and wrongly) claim that's what happened in Russia, it's odd to see someone who claims to be a Libertarian Socialist advocating the same failed adventurist anti-working class tacttics this time round.

[Tablo]

As for 'we need to arm the working class to blow the capitalists' brains out'... get real. If you get into a pissing contest with the bourgeois state, with nuclear missiles and stealth bombers and way more hardware than you can fit in your survivalist compound (do you have a budget of a trillion dollars? Didn't think so), not only will you die so will the rest of us.

If we cannot defeat the bourgeoisie through strikes and the refusal of the working class to accept the system leading to the siezing of power by the workers councils (ie the overthrow of capitalism by the working class), then we're all dead anyway. Guns don't make a revolution, that's just a coup d'etat. Given that many Anarchists constantly (and wrongly) claim that's what happened in Russia, it's odd to see someone who claims to be a Libertarian Socialist advocating the same failed adventurist anti-working class tacttics this time round. Fuck you! While the US government quite easily maintains a strong monopoly on technology pertaining to violence(particularly that of nuclear weapons), that does not mean we can not achieve revolution, as we control the means of production, which is the workers. Nuclear missiles would kill the working class and thus kill the bourgeoisie capabilities of exploiting such a class(they do not want that). In the long run they are dependent on us and until we achieve classes consciousness as a majority we will continue to be wage slaves.

p.s. I'm drunk so qwht I posed might not make sense.

[Crusade]

Fuck you! While the US government quite easily maintains a strong monopoly on technology pertaining to violence(particularly that of nuclear weapons), that does not mean we can not achieve revolution, as we control the means of production, which is the workers. Nuclear missiles would kill the working class and thus kill the bourgeoisie capabilities of exploiting such a class(they do not want that). In the long run they are dependent on us and until we achieve classes consciousness as a majority we will continue to be wage slaves.

p.s. I'm drunk so qwht I posed might not make sense.

Who gets drunk and has a political debate? :lol: Only an Anarchist would do such things.

[Blake's Baby]

And fuck you back, brother-comrade.

I didn't say we couldn't acheive a revolution, I believe we can and must, or we're all dead. Socialism or barbarism, and all that. I just don't think the revolution will be at the hands of gun-totting urban guerillas jacking off to 'people's executions'. Without a strong and united working class it will never happen, and any bunch of jumped up revolutionary adventurers toting guns is part of the problem, not the solution.

[Crusade]

Why a revolutionary would support laws restricting gun ownership is beyond me. That's like a Christian Missionary banning bibles.

[A.R.Amistad]

Saying that guns is the reason for crime really is an idealist statement. The reason the United States has the highest amount of gun crime in the Western World is not because we all own guns or because we have lax gun laws. It is because the class inequality in the US is more obvious and sharp than in other nations. There is a direct correlation between class inequality and crime. This is the historical materialist way of approaching the question. So, say, in a working proletarian state, a socialist society where the majority of the populous was armed, crime would probably be extremely low, and gun crime almost non-existent because of the withering way of class inequality.

[Foldered]

I would be willing to bet that Vancouver has a lower gun crime rate than any similar city in the US.
Lesser urban poverty rates was what I was commenting on, not gun crime, obviously.

[chegitz guevara]

I've heard extensive tales on this subject and want to settle this in my mind once and for all. It isn't that I don't think people should have guns, but that I feel this statement can't be true. I suppose the statement itself isn't my biggest problem but the ideas that come with it, such as that more guns reduce violent crime.

To be clear I have heard that more guns means less violent crime, but i have also heard that gun carriers and owners are more likely to be injured in a crime. I would like opinions and articles (specifically statistics, backed up of course) on the subject.

One word: Texas.

[Tablo]

Who gets drunk and has a political debate? :lol: Only an Anarchist would do such things.
Yeah, it seems like the only time I even get on RevLeft these days is when I'm drinking. xP

[Os Cangaceiros]

"Gun control" is about as bourgeois as a political cause can possibly be.

[ed miliband]

"Gun control" is about as bourgeois as a political cause can possibly be.

A certain (lovable) uber-individualist is violently passionate about gun control, seeing anyone who is against it as a nut. You may or may not know what I mean...

[Blake's Baby]

Funny, the only people I ever hear advocating not controlling guns are American right-wingers and occassional lunatics who think that the revolution means 'shooting capitalists upside the head'.

Terrorism is a failed weapon. The working class can never militarily defeat the state. If we cannot paralyse the state's repressive functions by striking (ie by the working class united against it, organised in the workers' councils) then some banditos and death squads won't do the trick.

It's also horseshit to say America has more gun-crime because of greater extremes of poverty. There ain't no country in the world with gun control where the death rate from guns approaches America. It's up there with Liberia and Somalia - places where there isn't that great a disparity of wealth (almost everyone is poor), but there are no effective controls on guns. Conversely, countries like Britain, Germany and Japan, which have similar economic profiles to the US but tougher gun control, have lower gun murder rates.

It's not rocket science, it's pretty basic stuff. The more guns there are (especially handguns) the more likely they are to be used. Canadian guns are better used on moose; American guns are better used on people.

[The Douche]

It's not rocket science, it's pretty basic stuff. The more guns there are (especially handguns) the more likely they are to be used. Canadian guns are better used on moose; American guns are better used on people.

Canadian chauvinism...cool bro.


I own those scary dangerous weapons like handguns and assault rifles. I have never used them to kill anyone. But recently in my town somebody used their duck hunting shotgun to kill their wife and themselves...

Look how serious knife crime is becoming in London.

I have brandished my weapons in self-defense twice in my life, and they solved the problems quite well without ending any life. You have no right to tell me with what items I can defend myself and my family.

[Robocommie]

I think the argument that gun control reduces crime rates is a bit silly and naive. Crime is a social phenomenon that is directly connected to things like poverty and substance abuse. The presence of weapons in a society can only facilitate crime, it can not in and of itself cause it.

But for the same reason, the right wing libertarian and conservative argument that guns reduce or control crime is equally silly. You cannot shoot poverty in the head, you can't intimidate desperation. In this aspect of their use, guns represent nothing more than the fear of the petit bourgeoisie of the poor. They are a reactionary attempt to maintain social control in a decaying capitalist society, but they mean nothing, because guns cannot address the root social causes of crime except in the hands of revolutionaries.

At most, they'll end up blowing the head off of some poor bastard trying to get a fix or pay his bills on time, or alternatively, be used to gun down some poor bastard working behind the counter of a gas station in a panicked robbery.

[Blake's Baby]

Canadian chauvinism...cool bro.

Hardly. I'm not Canadian. And I wasn't advocating using them against Americans, I meant 'most efficiently employed'. The guns in America are to a large degree anti-person guns and in Canada they're hunting rifles.



I own those scary dangerous weapons like handguns and assault rifles. I have never used them to kill anyone. But recently in my town somebody used their duck hunting shotgun to kill their wife and themselves...

Well that obviously means the thousands of people who die in America every year really don't, do they? Oh look, one person used a hunting rifle. Let's ignore the 22,000 that died from handguns.


Look how serious knife crime is becoming in London.

Particularly relevent in a thread about guns... even so, no where near the death toll from guns in the USA.


I have brandished my weapons in self-defense twice in my life, and they solved the problems quite well without ending any life. You have no right to tell me with what items I can defend myself and my family.

Yes I do. As long as you live on this planet you have to share it with the rest of us so we all have to try to get along. That's what 'society' means. It doesn't mean we all sit our little compounds blasting away at each other.

[Robocommie]

The guns in America are to a large degree anti-person guns and in Canada they're hunting rifles.

Fallacy of the excluded middle! I don't see why you gotta look down on Canadians or Americans who use hunting rifles to hunt people.

[syndicat]

Canada also has a large gun owning population...it shares the same frontier culture of the USA. but lower crime rate.

In "Deer Hunting with Jesus" Joe Bageant has a chapter on this subject. He points out that given the milliions of guns people own in this country, the number of accidents is extremely small. Also, he points out that in poor neighborhoods there are in fact many, many cases where a crime is avoided because someone flashed a weapon, a knife or gun. Bageant also points out that, especially in rural and small town areas, the working class tends to own guns. It is plainly stupid for the Left to advocate for gun control under these conditions. It means you believe the cops and army should have a monopoly on guns. Why should we favor that? and referring to these guns as "hunting rifles" avoids the issue since working class gun owners don't view the issue this way.

Gun control is advocated by elite liberals. The same class who also favor building up the police, who act as an army of occupation in poor communities and intimidate workers in strikes, etc. During the big carpenters uprising in southern California in the early '90s, one of the things the Chicano carpenter leaders brought with them in their pickups were shotguns in case any mobbed up contractors brought in their armed "friends."

[Blake's Baby]

Fallacy of the excluded middle! I don't see why you gotta look down on Canadians or Americans who use hunting rifles to hunt people.

I'm not looking down on anyone. Merely pointing out that handguns and assault rifles are used most efficiently against humans, generally at close range, and hunting rifles against targets such as bears and moose, at long range. Sure you can use a hunting rifle as a sniper rifle, let's say, but it's hard to rob a liquor store with one. Equally, you could try taking out a polar bear with an M16, but I wouldn't want to be there when you did it.

Most gun deaths in America are in urban areas and involve handguns. That's not because there are thousands of moose-hunters all mistaking people for moose. If those people didn't have handguns then perhaps they'd find some other way to kill people. Or perhaps they'd try to find a way of doing what they were doing without killing people. What's pretty certain is that it won't increase the numbers of people killed.

Syndicat, have you ever discussed this point with fellow-members of your tradition from the other side of the Atlantic? I think some of them might find your support for gun ownership quite surprising. You say 'the working class owns guns... it's stupid for the left to advocate gun control'. One could also say 'the working class is religious, nationalistic, and racist... it's stupid for the left to oppose religion, nationalism and racism...'.

[Ismail]

In Albania practically everyone had a gun. In the first place, Albania had a gun-friendly culture where the various tribes (pre-1940's) were practically required mandatory training to defend themselves from blood feuds and the like. On the other hand, the Albanian Government in the 1960's and early 70's encouraged a "People's War"-esque defense of the country, wherein everyone would be armed. As Hoxha said in 1968, "All our people are armed in the full meaning of the word. Every Albanian city-dweller or villager, has his weapon at home. Our army itself, the army of a soldier people, is ready at any moment to strike at any enemy or coalition of enemies." Jan Myrdal, who visited Albania once in the late 60's and again in the early 70's, also saw how practically hundreds people would rush out their houses, rifles in hand, upon hearing drills for practice and such.

The result? Nothing. There were no mass murders, no horrible crimes, and it had no result upon the fall of socialism in the 1990-1992 period.

[The Douche]

Yes I do. As long as you live on this planet you have to share it with the rest of us so we all have to try to get along. That's what 'society' means. It doesn't mean we all sit our little compounds blasting away at each other.

I think you are at the wrong website, you would probably fit in better here, http://www.democrats.org/.

[Robocommie]

I'm not looking down on anyone. Merely pointing out that handguns and assault rifles are used most efficiently against humans, generally at close range, and hunting rifles against targets such as bears and moose, at long range. Sure you can use a hunting rifle as a sniper rifle, let's say, but it's hard to rob a liquor store with one. Equally, you could try taking out a polar bear with an M16, but I wouldn't want to be there when you did it.

Well, I was making a joke about "hunting people" but really man, as I was saying earlier, guns can neither cause nor prevent crime in and of themselves. If you're a Marxist you should understand that. Everything political is economic.

If you're a revolutionary, you should also understand that the state monopoly on violence does not work in our favor, and that making the old arguments about not needing an M16 to hunt a bear is entirely missing the point. Make these kinds of arguments after the revolution, after socialism has been achieved, not before.

[Robocommie]

I think you are at the wrong website, you would probably fit in better here, http://www.democrats.org/.

Sick burn. :D

[Dimentio]

I do not think guns are creating or stifling crime. I think there are other factors at bay.

In general, people in the countryside possess proportionally more rifles and guns than people in cities. Cities always have a higher crime rate since they have a higher amount of impoverished and desperate people.

[syndicat]

Cities always have a higher crime rate since they have a higher amount of impoverished and desperate people.

I don't know about the explanation you give. rural areas tend to have very high unemployment and poverty rates. people know each other, tho, and that may have something to do with lower crime rates.

[Guerrilla22]

crime happens due to social inequality in most cases. You notice most crime in the US happens in economically deprived areas. You throw easy access to guns into the mix and you're going to get gun crimes, no amount of arms in the hands of "law abiding citizens" is going to change that fact. The only way to reduce any type of crime is to reduce social and economic inequality.

[Blake's Baby]

Exactly. Social inequality = crime. Social inequality + handguns = lots of dead people. That's why states such as the UK and Germany, which both have social inequality to match America's, or Canada which has social inequality and hunting rifles not handguns, do not have the USA's gun-death rate. The USA's rate of gun deaths is equal to states like Somalia and Afghanistan where there are civil wars going on. On gun crime, America is 'failed state'.

[The Douche]

Exactly. Social inequality = crime. Social inequality + handguns = lots of dead people. That's why states such as the UK and Germany, which both have social inequality to match America's, or Canada which has social inequality and hunting rifles not handguns, do not have the USA's gun-death rate. The USA's rate of gun deaths is equal to states like Somalia and Afghanistan where there are civil wars going on. On gun crime, America is 'failed state'.

You're still just making a liberal arguement for a liberal idea.

[Blake's Baby]

And yet you can't explain why 20 times more people in America die from handguns than in the UK, even though there are only 6 times as many Americans, and the UK has the same social problems as the US, but much stricter gun laws. Americans are more than 3 times more likely to die of being shot than British people. Why is that, if not the much larger number of handguns?

Also, I'm not aware that I 'advocated gun control'. I haven't said that the state should take your guns off you, just pointed out that America has a much higher gun-death rate than other advanced countries (comparable in fact to Somalia and Liberia), and that the arguments for holding on to guns are moronic. I'm astounded that you're proud of this.

Also, the thread is about crime now, not the revolution in the future; even if it were about the revolution, the idea that guns will be necessary during the revolution, therefore pointing out that loads more Americans die from being shot that the inhabitants of other advanced countries is somehow counter-revolutionary, is also pretty lame. Do you think the October Revolution succeeded because the Petrograd Soviet had more guns than the Provisional Government? Do you think the Berlin Rising failed because the German workers didn't have enough?

These kinds of debates happened in the revolutionary movement in Europe in the 1960s and 1970s. How would we get the guns? It was the militants who had survived from the 1920s (who'd gone through the Russian and German revolutions) that convinced the new groups that guns aren't the answer. If you go up against the military power of the state you will lose, and we will all die. If you can't neutralise the army there is no revolution. That neutralisation comes from mutiny, that mutiny comes from identification with the working class. Class consciousness is the key. It's difficult to shoot someone to consciousness, comrades.

[Blake's Baby]

A very weak response. A more considered one was quickly added.

Revolutionary socialism is not putschism or launching a coup d'etat, nor is it terrorism or banditism, guerilla attacks or assassinations. It's the working class posing its own solution to the crises of capitalism and overthrowing the state(s) and the economic system.

[syndicat]

Fine. But why should "our" solution involve building up the state's monopoly of armed force? do you believe that the cops are really going to protect people against crime? There is no evidence for that view. And in the history of class struggle in the USA, guns have sometimes been used by workers in strikes in self-defense. Take a look at the John Sayles movie "Matewon." In the 1909 strike of workers at Pressed Steel Car Company, the Pennsylvania state police opened fire on strikers. That police force had been formed on the insistence of the coal barons and other bosses to have a strike breaking force. In that case the IWW workers shot back and defeated the state police.

Why was the state militia system in the USA done away with? (The militia system is the origin of the Second Amendment.) It's because it proved too weak and dangerous for the capitalist elite for dealing with strikes, and was not adequate for the USA to become an imperial power. In the 1870s the state militias sometimes sided with the workers.

[Robocommie]

A very weak response. A more considered one was quickly added.

Revolutionary socialism is not putschism or launching a coup d'etat, nor is it terrorism or banditism, guerilla attacks or assassinations. It's the working class posing its own solution to the crises of capitalism and overthrowing the state(s) and the economic system.

Maybe you're from a tendency that doesn't particularly care, but I think the Cuban 26th of July movement, the Viet Minh and the Viet Cong, and the Chinese People's Liberation Army show otherwise.

The workers have a right to arm themselves and form militias. As Syndicat said, even if you're not from a group that sees the legitimacy of guerilla warfare or armed insurrection, that does not mean you have to argue so heavily in defense of the state monopoly on violence.

Tell the Black Panthers that guns aren't revolutionary tools.

[Blake's Baby]

Maybe you're from a tendency that doesn't particularly care, but I think the Cuban 26th of July movement, the Viet Minh and the Viet Cong, and the Chinese People's Liberation Army show otherwise...

Implying you think that any of those were revolutionary? In which case, you probably think that I 'don't care'.

Of course, I care very deeply. One thing I care deeply about is the working class not trusting to bandit gangs to deliver them from capitalism into... anotherl form of capitalism.


The workers have a right to arm themselves and form militias...

Apart from the fact that I think 'right' is a very odd word - necessity I'd say - yes, I agree.



...As Syndicat said, even if you're not from a group that sees the legitimacy of guerilla warfare or armed insurrection...

I'm not currently a member of any group, though I was close to the Anarchist-Communist Federation/Anarchist Federation in Britain for about 15 years, and have more recently started to read a lot about council communism and left communism, and I see a lot that's worthwhile there.


... that does not mean you have to argue so heavily in defense of the state monopoly on violence...

At no point have I supported the state's monopoly on violence. I have argued that widespread ownership of handguns guns is a contributary factor in high numbers of gun deaths. This is self evident, and hasn't been refuted by anyone.

I've also argued that the state's monopoly of violence must be challenged by suborning and/or paralysing the repressive arms of the state, rather than 'shooting capitalists upside the head'. This is also self evident, and has not been refuted by anyone.

I've also argued that given the massive imbalance of firepower between the state and any collection of gun-toting 'revolutionaries', armed insurrection as a tactic is bound to end up in wholesale death and destruction. Again, this is self-evident. Guess what? No-one's refuted that either.


...Tell the Black Panthers that guns aren't revolutionary tools.

Hey! Black Panthers! Guns aren't revolutionary tools!





I don't think they were listening.

[Blake's Baby]

Fine. But why should "our" solution involve building up the state's monopoly of armed force? do you believe that the cops are really going to protect people against crime? There is no evidence for that view...

What are you talking about?

I'm talking about more guns equalling more dead people. I mean now, not in a revolutionary period in the future. Killing people is a crime. Is crime going to protect people against crime?

The best protection against 'crime' is ending poverty and exploitation. In other words, socialism. That is why you're an Anarchist, right? You're not just some douche who thinks the revolution will be 'cool' coz you get to cruise round in a pickup waving an AK, right?




... And in the history of class struggle in the USA, guns have sometimes been used by workers in strikes in self-defense. Take a look at the John Sayles movie "Matewon." In the 1909 strike of workers at Pressed Steel Car Company, the Pennsylvania state police opened fire on strikers....

Not denying it. On the other hand, also in 1909, when British (unarmed) police were chasing some (armed) Lithuanian Anarchists through the streets of London, and I quote, "there was no shortage of passers by to lend them (the police) pistols". Cuts both ways. More guns on the street means more dead Anarchists.


... That police force had been formed on the insistence of the coal barons and other bosses to have a strike breaking force. In that case the IWW workers shot back and defeated the state police.

Leading where, exactly? Was there a revolutionary situation in America? It certainly didn't lead to world revolution.


...Why was the state militia system in the USA done away with? (The militia system is the origin of the Second Amendment.) It's because it proved too weak and dangerous for the capitalist elite for dealing with strikes, and was not adequate for the USA to become an imperial power. In the 1870s the state militias sometimes sided with the workers.

And in Britain in the 1926 General Strike the governemnt disarmed the majority of police officers in Britain (and the majority still aren't armed). For the same reason, in case they went over to the strikers. What's the common thread here? Is it the guns? No, that's a side issue. It's the strikes. That's what the capitalists are afraid of - the working class uniting and challenging their power. Not armed gangs of bandits. And no amount of getting exited by guns will get round that. Without mass action by the working class, it's all just macho posturing, when it's not thoroughly elitist and anti-working class.

[Robocommie]

I've also argued that the state's monopoly of violence must be challenged by suborning and/or paralysing the repressive arms of the state, rather than 'shooting capitalists upside the head'. This is also self evident, and has not been refuted by anyone.

You know, I'm not really in the mood for any more of this trifling bullshit, so I'm just going to let you know that every time you say "shooting capitalists upside the head" you sound really dopey. "Upside the head" is a slang term referring to a swipe. You slap someone upside the head. You hit them upside the head, with a club or something. You don't shoot someone upside the head. Every time you say that you sound like some dumb suburban kid trying to be clever by making jokes about "popping a cap, yo."

[Blake's Baby]

Sue me.

Too old to be a kid and don't live in the suburbs, and taking the piss out of an attitude that equates serious revolutionary work with gangsterism.

If you don't want to argue, that's fine, I'm not really up for debating with someone who seems to cheerlead for murderers like the PLA either.

[Robocommie]

Sue me.

:lol: Man, I am trying to tell you, you don't sound defiant, you sound dumb.

Anyhow, this is what I love about being Robocommie; the hardcore Stalinists think I'm a pansy liberal, the left-coms apparently think I'm a cheerleader for murder.

[Franz Fanonipants]

:lol: Man, I am trying to tell you, you don't sound defiant, you sound dumb.

Anyhow, this is what I love about being Robocommie; the hardcore Stalinists think I'm a pansy liberal, the left-coms apparently think I'm a cheerleader for murder.

I'm neither.

And I still think you're a pansy.

[Robocommie]

I'm neither.

And I still think you're a pansy.

:blink:


You and your name calling. I HATE YOU. I'M GOING TO MY ROOM.

:D

[syndicat]

I'm talking about more guns equalling more dead people. I mean now, not in a revolutionary period in the future. Killing people is a crime. Is crime going to protect people against crime?


I hate to imitate the conservatives, but when they say it's people who kill people, the evidence is on their side. All I see here is you taking the side of the cops and the elite liberals.

There's one other problem for you: Your view seems to be based on a naive liberal belief in the neutrality of the state. But whose guns do you think the cops would go after? And who do you think are the people that get popped for weapons infractions? Let's say you are a radical activist and they find a gun in the trunk of your car. You'd been to the range and forgot to take the ammo out or didn't know it was iilegal. So they haul you in on a weapons charge. Would they have done that to some wealthy person? Well, they would have been less likely to even stop them or search their car.

[The Douche]

The existence of guns relates to gun crime, is that your arguement? Well no shit. London has banned knives haven't they? Is that working?

Either way, weapons (and the knowledge of their proper use) is essential for self-defense in an armed environment. Do you think we can sieze the means of production peacefully? American labor struggle prooves that its risky to make a militant strike, let alone revolution without the means to defend yourself.

It is my right to defend myself and my family, and I will use whatever is most effective to do so.

[anticap]

I don't intend to read yet another one of these threads; suffice it to say that I advocate leftist militias, and I reject all arguments for gun control in the absence of democracy.

[Cjwillwin]

Per capita there are less violent crimes in nations with stricter gun laws (canada) as compared to where you can have loads of guns (usa).

Switzerland has more guns per capita than USA and has far far less crime.

Violent crime in Arizona went down when gun laws were loosened.

The UK saw more violent crime as they had stricter gun control and almost no crime in the time when they had no gun control.

Draw from it what you will. I just gave a speech on the matter, but am coming into this too late to argue