Summations Only

The relevant text of the Amendment is:The meaning is pretty obvious: the right ... to keep and bear Arms is regarded by the Second Amendment as a pre-existing right (it certainly isn't enumerated anywhere else, so the Amendment cannot be referring to some other portion of the document) upon which the government is forbidden to infringe.The Second Amendment does not grant a right to anybody; it instead restricts the government's authority to remove a right considered natural to the human condition: the right to defend oneself and be armed in a manner that makes such defense possible.The Second Amendment applies to the government not to the people. So it certainly cannot have the meaning you think it does.

We've seen this argument before, and it is an argument that is pretty easy to address. Here is the text of the 19th amendment.

quote:

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The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

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Now you might make the argument that women always had some natural the right to vote and that we just decided to protect it when we passed the 19th amendment. But that would be a pretty bizarre claim. It is pretty clear that female suffrage rights were created with the nineteenth using wording pretty similar to that given in the second amendment.So clearly the text you refer to cannot decide the issue. We could make a similar argument using the 15th amendment. And clearly there is no way to argue that the 15th amendment did not establish a right for freed slaves to vote.A further argument is that even after the 2nd amendment, states still had the right to restrict firearms until after the 14th amendment.Finally, isn't the distinction between legal and natural rights a bit off the mark? The fact that a right is natural does not mean that the scope of protection is universal and it does not mean that it cannot be abridged by legislation or amendment to the constitution. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

My point is not that the right to keep and bear arms is a natural right but that the text of the Second Amendment reads as though it is. Apparently everything is off the mark in this thread except Percy's artificial restriction on discussing anything other than the obvious fact that fewer guns would result in fewer gun deaths.

It is the mark, its not a question of if you can, its a question of if you should.The answer to gun violence is not a denial of The Peoples' right to arm themselves.

And why does natural vs legal make any difference in answering that question?It is the character of the right and not its source and the character of the imposition on that right that make a difference. Natural vs legal is philosophical wanking. As you've indicated there is nothing particular special about people who do not subscribe to the theory of natural rights.

Fine. My point is that such appearances can easily be shown to be meaningless and without any weight. You made a number of arguments based on this appearance. My point is that those arguments actually turn out to be without any basis. Sure. That's exactly what Percy has said during his posts to this thread as moderator.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Nice how you did not address any of the substance of his post.
So the right of women to vote is a natural right, but it was infringed prior the amending of the Constitution?
Is there a list of natural rights or is it just philosophical navel gazing? Edited by Theodoric, : No reason given.

Listen to the feedback you're getting because it's how people are really experiencing you here. You're cryptic. A lot. It comes across as sanctimonious poser crap. Let's dispose of this fiction right off the bat. Wherever the public impression came from that psychology can predict what someone might do in the future, forget it. Untrue. Completely false. Psychology has no such ability. Any such faith in psychology is completely misplaced.You know what I bet lots of working psychologists think every time it's reported that some murderer in the weeks before the crime told his psychologist that he heard voices in his head telling him to "Kill, kill, kill!" These psychologists are thinking, "Gee, I've got patients telling me that right now." What a quandary for psychologists! Should they just turn these patients in? Obviously not, since almost none of them ever act on it. And there's no way to tell who will act on the voices and who won't.It's way past time to dispense with the post-massacre handwringing about why the perpetrator wasn't stopped before he started. There's no way to tell what's really going on in someone's head, much as we might want to believe otherwise.A history of arrest for violence or murder is a sure indication that one should be placed on the "no gun" list. Psychiatric diagnosis or hospitalization for serious mental conditions like schizophrenia and so forth is another indication.But most murders are committed by people who don't fit within any category that would allow us to tell that they're going to murder before they murder. In 2010 out of 12,996 murders, 5544 were committed by someone known to the victim (FBI Homicide Data on Murder Circumstances for 2010). You want to prevent most of those 5544 murders? Remove handguns from the general population. An aside: There'd be better luck with achieving such goals if one party wasn't a bunch of crazed border enforcers intent on making life as hellish as possible for illegal immigrants. How about we first start living up to, "Give us your tired, your hungry, your poor," before we start registering everyone only so we can make it possible to more efficiently throw illegal immigrants into the US Immigration Department's torture maze. Whether Bozo the gun clowns walk around with their manhood in their underwear or hanging out for all to see is not relevant, and neither is the potential instructional impact on us gun sissies. You're ignoring a fundamental reality: more guns mean more gun deaths. Positive steps. Also needed is removal of the exception on background checks for guns sold at gun shows or in private sales. Annual re-registration for guns, just like motor vehicles, is another important step. Technology improvements to makes guns safer is another. Coupling safety improvements in different realms makes no sense. Let the experts in congress conduct all the irrational wheeling/dealing.--Percy

What you mean, "We?"--Percy

Yes. This thread was pointless the first post in.

Then move on and don't post to the thread. Would you like it if people came into your house and shit all over it?
Lack of self awareness around here is astounding.

Apparently my sarcasm did not come across. Admin has actually had very little to say so far. But if you find the thread useless, perhaps you can pep things up a bit with some insightful commentary.

The pseudo-intellectualised, linguistically masturbatory lengths you guys go to to defend an obvious wrong is remarkable. Step back. These are the writings of men, not gods. There is no god given right, natural or otherwise, to own a gun. Or a knife, or a cannon.People make and change laws to suit the needs of the societies they inhabit and none are sacrosanct. Your obsession with guns is harming your society but you can change that if you have the will. If you'd prefer to keep your guns despite the harm they do, that's your decision, but for God's sake stop trying to defend it with bullshit philosophy.

You miss the point just like NoNukes did. You hopelessly rebut the crappier argument you wish were being made while ignoring the argument that actually has been made.The text of the Second Amendment (and many others, as NoNukes was so kind to point out) reads as though the right ... to keep and bear Arms were a pre-existing right and forbids the government from infringing upon it.The text does not say: we grant this right. It says: this right exists and we will not take it away.Maybe the Constitution's wrong, but that's what it says. It reads as an enumeration of natural rights as New Cat's Eye argued, not as a list of rights it is granting.Edited by Jon, : No reason given.

Alternatively you can learn self-defense in any good martial arts school like I did. They can even train you to defend against knives and guns. As a bonus, the student learns respect and confidence.You said multiple times in this thread that guns are the best weapons right now. You seems to forget hand grenades, nuclear weapons, landmines. Why don't you bury landmines in front of your house? Warn the people you know and let the evil strangers die then harvest the ketchup. Yes that's how guns lovers sound to me.