England Used to Be a Country of Men

...but is considerably more lethal; as America's woeful record of crime involving guns demonstrates perfectly.

 

Rioting is pretty lethal, especially for the victims who are not allowed to protect themselves:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/12/britain-riots-idUSL6E7JC0C920110812

 

Compare that with the LA riots ...

 

No, but my neighborhood doesn't need heavily armed homosexuals. Yours ?

 

Well, the thing is: ideally the government in democratic states should not be a seperate entity from its people. The state who's been given the monoploy of weapons control in my country is us, the people, who've democratically decided who is to carry weapons and who is not and how and in which circumstances policemen are allowed to use these weapons they were trained to use for our common protection. Personally I find that kind of arrangement to have quite relaxing effects on our society. I would not want to have a firearm in my house or business and luckily just like the vast majority of my fellow-citizens I can do without.
If other countries for whatever cultural reasons decided to have other arrangements that's fine. It's your business how to sort that question out in your society.
Unfortunately some posters in this thread seemingly want to press their Wild West mentality on European cultures and can't bear the fact that it's just not ours. The fantasies on how to take out possible aggressors expressed here are outlived by the average European male at about the age of 12 and sometimes creep back in the occasional alcohol-and-testosteron-lead fist-fight. People taking part in such forms of violent outbursts are generallly regarded as dumb cavemen-like losers in this culture of mine and from that perspective it is very clear to me who's the loser in the picture shown in the OP: It's not the bloke lowering his trousers.

 

I'll take that as a no, then (as in no surprise) that you haven't read it accurately. Or is it deliberate cherry picking and omitting key facts?

Should I draw you a picture? I said order should be instilled. Look: "They must immediately stop the violence and instill order." First line second paragraph. If you read the post, you'll see I said that.

Now the fire raisers who broke the law are already in jail. How is that pandering?

How is equality in law, pandering?

Not providing equality in law...CAUSES RIOTS. Look at the cause of the initial protest march then led into the riots. They were protesting against the possible unequal application of law.

People here notice those things. Then they protest about them.

Equality in law is not pandering. It is a basic citizens right. Even in US...

Not really...don't let facts worry you now, but I've been publicly predicting riots for a while, and more so since US' refusal to deal with its own poor created ACORN, which created housing and mortgage lending issues which helped crash the world economy and impacted on the UK economy, allowing the financial sector to hold UK to ransom and ....caused rioting.

 

Go ahead...

 

Mob violence by the young has been followed by mob insanity and (to quote the Mail) 'revenge' by the spiteful eunuchs who watched the bankers and the MPs and Murdoch get away with it with narry a squeak. The same sort in the US are cheering them on, despite their spiteful and Anglophobic ignorance. Its a good thing their big business will soon burn the world perhaps.

 

People have the right to protect themselves...in the US. I'd rather have that right then a bunch of spoiled thugs who think that everything is owed to them, and that they can riot at will if the public money teat is cut off.

But then again, I am a law abiding taxpayer. I give much more then I get from social programs. I don't feel anything is owed to me, except my unalienable rights, and what I rightfully earn.

Like Cameron said - a different culture.

 

Yep, this is very true.

 

Democracy is two wolves and sheep voting on what's for dinner. If you try to use the gun-monopolizing government to impose your will on upon others, that's no different from hiring a gunman to your dirty work for you.

No, it is not. It's the business of the individual how to sort it out in his own household.

Cultural relativism doesn't extend to justifying aggression. I don't care if you prefer to be a serf. I care about the people that want to live independently but are forced into serfdom by your aggressive "democracy."

And those who don't outgrow it, join the police.

Regarding as dumb cavemen-like losers by people who prefer to hire gunmen to do their dirty work and euphemize it as "democracy."

 

Not providing welfare checks causes riots.

 

Oddly enough, as we've discovered , most of the rioters are recipients of "welfare checks " and a fair number are fully employed, Hell ! many from middle class backgrounds , at least one was a millionaire's daughter. Guess most simply have extremely low standards + motivated by sheer greed.

 

It can be that if you don't put protections for minorities in place.

That's an interesting way to put it, but I'm afraid I find it flawed.
A democratic society agrees on a set of rules its members want to abide by and employs various people (traffic wardens, policemen, judges etc.) to make sure these rules are observed. That is different to hiring a gunman to do my dirty work, in that I have to abide to the very same rules as everybody else and a police-man must not impose my personal will on my fellow-citizens regardless of these rules.

I'd much rather a judge decides on how to resolve a dispute between neighbours about the size of the garden wall than these imaginative neighbours sorting the problem out by pointing guns at each other and the person who's got the biggest gun wins. The latter would in all likelihood lead to nothing but the 'survival of the fittest' that you lamented in your first sentence.

I'm all for individual freedoms. We should all have as many as possible. But I'm sure you know the saying that one man's freedom ends where another man's freedom begins.

So, if you moved to my country you'd have to accept that your unlimited freedom to carry a gun ends where my freedom begins to live in safety with little risk to be faced by a loon with a gun. (By which I don't mean to say that you're a loon, but there are loads of them in any society).
If I moved to your country my freedom to live without a high risk of being threatened with a gun would probably be limited by your unlimited freedom to own a gun.
It's a question of priorities a society sets.

Don't worry, I feel rather free and I certainly don't justify aggression, quite the contrary.
In your logic the only way to escape being a serf would be to live secluded from society or in anarchy (in the negative sense of the word). You'd then be a serf to the constant need of self-protection and the moment you'd be to weak to enforce your rights you'd be eaten by said wolves.

Well, I don't know about the USA but in my country there are preliminary tests in place that keep the biggest loons from joining the police-force. They might have a slightly better chance to get employed by a shady private security agency - but even those would check on your criminal records first.

That said, it is of course our democratic duty to keep our police-force in check. It's what's happening in Britain at the moment – some police-men seem to be in a bit of trouble for having neglected/abused their duties. If found guilty they will be convicted.

Democracy involves constant negotiation and I have a lot of issues with the one I live in – but apart from various points where I'd like to see adjustments I have not quite worked out a better system of living together yet. Have you?

 

You mean like the Second Amendment of the US Constitution?

All you're talking about is tyranny of the majority, not individual liberty. It doesn't matter how many people in the "society" agree to take someone's gun (or any other property). It's still wrong.

A judge who's rule is enforced by the biggest gun. The problem is place the state in a special box. It's just a bunch of people with guns.

Good. Your freedom and the state's freedom to take guns ends where my freedom to peacefully own a gun begins.

Nope, I'm still at plenty of risk of a loon with a gun, except I wouldn't be able to defend myself against him. Loons generally don't follow laws.

Or perhaps the loon will be wearing a government-issued costume and a supposed imprimatur of "the will of the people." But he's still a loon, even if he's backed by a loony electorate.

No, it's a question of morality. Infringing on someone's peaceful bearing of arms is immoral here, there, anywhere, anytime, from the dawn of history till the end.

Violently using guns to prevent people from peacefully wielding guns is aggression; it's exactly what criminal gangs do.

Violating peoples' rights in the name of defending their rights is a non-solution.

Are there tests against loons joining the voting electorate? What difference to the anti-loon tests of a loony electorate make?

Who keeps the voters in check when they violate your rights?

Yes, it's called individual liberty and voluntaryism. No tyranny of the majority. Two people beating one person up is just as bad as one person beating two people up.

 

I give up. For all I care you may lock yourself in your US-Home with your gun in fear of other people with guns and advocate a society where there are no rules other than that of the survival of the fittest. Your problem.

I shall stay here and enjoy my individual freedom to wander the streets without needing a gun to feel safe.

 

A democratic society rarely agrees on anything, especially the rules.

 

Well, it's a shame you're unwilling to grapple with the crucial moral issues at stake. The fact is that it's you that advocates using violence against the nonviolent, so it's you that advocates "survival of the fittest."

So you still persist in imagining that the unjust laws you support have engineered a society in which no one has guns? No, they've engineered a society in which only violent, aggressive people have guns. That's the least safe society of all.

 

The majority of civilized, western nations have gun control laws. That the nation which touts itself as the greatest and most advanced does not, speaks volumes.
You have a society in which both lunatics and normal people are allowed to own guns. We have witnessed the results on many, many occasions.
I'm proud to be living somewhere I can walk safely at night without being in fear of some madman with a gun wanting to shoot me.
America has a lot of growing-up to do.

 

If by "grow up" you mean adopt a more Authoritarian Government than we already have? No thanks.

 

lol moon i find your general attitude on these boards despicable and i know that if i were ever in trouble and needed your help i wouldn't get it because im white and American but.... dude that made me laugh out loud

 

maybe so, but i dare you to stop us on a corner in broad daylight and demand our pants.

 

there is no need to advance beyond common sense. a mans right to defend himself and his property is not something we need to evolve away from. your notion that an advanced civilization should be passive when faced with the reality of being violently victimized is flawed. you keep telling your criminal ok and we will keep telling ours no, forcefully if needed, and we will just have to agree to disagree on this point.

 

well, we arent going to teach our government a lesson by victimizing other innocent citizens, at least i hope not. but you go right on ahead and be proud of the youth for teaching their government a lesson by burning the whole thing down, to hell with all those innocent people that are being caught in the crossfire.