Ambi wrote: ↑Fri Sep 02, 2022 3:47 pm
What 'Right' exactly does the 'R' in RKBA refers to?
1. Right to buy and Right to use guns like buying and using a fridge? Or
2. Right to buy only and Right to use guns with licence, like a car? Or
3. Right to buy and Right to use both with licence?
The obvious choice is of course 3,and it is also the basis of Arms Act 1959 with its various ammendments.
Ambi, pardon me, but your argument here mirrors that of opponents to gun rights for the public.
You say, "It is the obvious choice." Other arguments are "reasonable gun control" and "common sense measures." Those who stand for gun rights are called to make "reasonable compromises."
The problem with with all of these fine-sounding adjectives is that they are not reasonable, nor do they represent "common sense." Those terms are not productive to use in a discussion of this importance, because first of all, they are only opinions, and not facts supported by data. More perniciously, they are a very subtle means of coercion, since they imply that everyone who doesn't agree lacks these characteristics.
Oddly enough, though, as Bertrand Russell says, "Common sense, however it tries, cannot avoid being surprised from time to time."
So, is it common sense that we should have a license to use the right of free speech? Is it reasonable that the government should regulate our right to practice the religion we believe and follow, or the books and newspapers we read, or the sites we browse on the internet? There is a near neighbor who does such things.
Gandhi recognized that the "half-freedom" offered by the British in the 30s was really no freedom at all, and reasonable people with common sense only had to look back to General Dyer and Jallianwala Bagh to recognize that this was true.
But as far as the danger of guns and their potential, I would cite the fact that Hitler tried using guns (of which there were plenty in Germany in the early 20s) to overthrow the state and take control. He wound up in prison and, reconsidering his methods, used free speech to overthrow the German State and unleash a Holocaust and a terrible war.
Stalin, Hitler's henchman, collaborator, and enemy recognized this fact when he asked,
"Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas?"
So, as we look about what is happening around us today, let us ask, is it reasonable and an exhibition of common sense for us to allow the government to be the fair, impartial, and final guarantor of our safety, and to regulate the means thereof?
I wonder whether, at those critical moments, it would have seemed common sense to a young couple traveling on a bus at night for their protection to be regulated by the government? Would it have seemed reasonable to a pair of country girls stepping out one evening to apply for a license before they could protect themselves?
Is it obvious, and is it common sense to suppose that the home manufacture of kattas can be curtailed and guarantee our safety?