Deconstructing Arguments Against Gun Ownership, Part 1
Argument 1: The Constitution doesn't cover modern technology!
By that same logic, the First Amendment clearly doesn’t apply to fully-automatic word processor programs and high-capacity inkjet printers. Think of the children! Any crazy person can buy one of these machines and hose down a street full of innocent people with hundreds of leaflets, all with no oversight! How could anyone argue that the Founding Fathers meant to protect THIS?
Yeah, that was sarcasm.
Rights are not dependent on the level of technology or old documents signed by long-dead men. Natural rights theory explores the universal and reciprocal spheres of individual authority. I have the right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness within the sphere where I do not trespass against the equal rights of others. In short, this is the basis for the concept of self-ownership, because no one has a higher claim of authority over myself, my actions, and the consequences of my actions.
Rifles are property. They can be used to defend against the trespass of my rights without infringing on the equal rights of others. They have no inherent attributes that could violate the equal rights of others. I can and do use a rifle without harming others.
Guns bans are a claim to a "right" to trespass against my life, liberty, and property. In order to enforce any prohibition policy, you must threaten peaceful people with harm and carry out the threatened harm should they disobey. "Common-sense regulation" is sophistry to excuse bans based on arbitrary features that have nothing whatsoever to do with the root causes of violence.
Even if we accept the constitutional arguments, the presumption is that governments exercise rights delegated to it by "The people," so government cannot own or do anything I cannot own or do on my own.
Even if we set aside that argument about the nature of governmental authority, there were repeating arms prior to the Second Amendment, and private ownership of literal artillery was not unknown at the time.
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Click here for Part 3.
Click here for Part 4.
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Exactly. A few years back I would not have known this. An I might have agreed with gun laws and stuff, I have gone through the European indoctrination system. that's why, lol.
Luckily I got in contact with voluntaryism, all makes a lot more sense now.
Thanks for the good post.
@jacobtothe as a proponent of private ownership of guns, would you allow your insane child to own a gun?
If your answer is yes, then i will ask you to carry out a research on how many people that are being killed by mentally disordered.
The media reports and the inquiry findings state 1,216 homicides leading to a conviction were committed by patients or people with mental health illness over the period from 2001-2010 in the UK.
I would not allow my hypothetical insane child to own a gun or have access to my gun, but that is because I would be the steward of my child's rights when he is incapable of exercising them. Government serves no such function. And I do not trust government to determine who is fit to exercise rights because governments historically are notorious for determining dissenters to be incompetent.
Thanks for accepting to be the steward of your child, what about those without "stewards" like you to decifer for them.
If your stands is to be considered for only a day, then you will be advocating for anarchism and chaoitic society.
Government and Authority serves as steward to its citizen, I maintain.
Government is a group of people who have usurped authority they cannot hold legitimately, and the history of wars, genocides, and police states contradicts your belief in the inherent benevolence of the State. I do advocate for anarchism, because imposed "order" creates real chaos. Real order is organic, grassroots cooperation and competition working hand in hand. central authority cannot produce anything of value despite the propaganda machine.
I do not know where you got your definition of Government. But i think Government is the group of people with the authority to govern a country or state.
Once a Givernment is acceptable, the government is legitimate.
Immanuel Kant a German Philosopher, sees Anarchism from a pragmatic point of view as consisting of "Law and Freedom without Force". Hence, anarchy falls short of being a true civil state because the law is only an "empty recommendations".
If force is needed to make laws eficacious, then Government becomes the instrument a state needs for law and freedom to be maintained.
Political Science 101: A government is a group of people who claim a territorial monopoly in violence. Even Obama stated this, and he's no anarchist.
What is the source of governmental authority?
How is an appeal to popularity legitimate?