>>>>>>After several devastating wars on the European continent that costed millions of lives, gun control was one of the things that was put into place to make sure that people could not just kill eachother by pulling your finger on the trigger. Perhaps because the most of the US did not experience the horrors of genocide and destruction to the level that was practised here, they are still in the believe you can protect yourself with a gun. Who knows, But I find it unbelievable.
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>>>>>You might not realize it :), but I think you are incorrect. 99.999% of people do not resolve problems by looking for a gun. But when people hate they find a way to kill ( pressure cookers, airplanes, cars, etc.). I repeat what you have heard many times: ... people kill people.
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>>>>Atom bombs do not kill people, people do kill people. Can you explain why it is a good idea to let individuals own atom bombs, tanks. Etc. it takes only a few wacko's to kill large number of people. Do you really think that the availability of guns have nothing to do with small children killing their siblings or parent by accident. Do you really think that the 21 y old racist would be able to kill 9 people if he had no (automatic) gun available? How about that wacko that shot half of the cinema down? And how many students have caused slaughter at university campus. Ask Bill kuhn here on the UT what the chance would be if his son did not have access to a gun. For ordinary individuals not living in the wild, guns only increase unsafety.
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>>>>It really is that simple as "cars do not kill people, people do kill people". But if you take away cars, nobody is going to be killed in a car accident. But the cars has a very valuable social and economic purpose that outweighs that risk. A gun has no other purpose than a violent one.
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>>>>>As to the genocide and the millions killed in Europe, that was not done by civilians with guns. That was done by police and armed forces. Europe still has police and armed forces. So what has changed?
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>>>>What has changed is the awareness that guns are associated with death and injury and wherever guns show up, you'd better get out rather than trying to be clint eastwood.
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>>>Ah.. so the Nazi killed millions of people because there was “no awareness that guns are associated with death and injury”..
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>>Reverse logic... nice.. Would you allow your society to carry guns around when one half has killed the other half in the past. Regardless of war, guns and a dense society does not mix.
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>>>Do you ever think (on non-technical threads) before you write or the mind is in the auto-pilot? :)
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>>Nice try, I think its you wearing blinders on. You avoid to having the accepts the obvious, which is out there by virtually every existing statistics and hold on to your faith in the religion of the gun lobby.
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>Whenever I get into a discussion with your the saying "pissing against the wind" comes to mind :). You pretend that the genocide in Europe in 20s century was simply because of lack of awareness ... I don't want to insult you but this is idiotic (to put it mildly) or you are being hypocritical and phoney.
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>>Again, please explain to me why the American society is significantly more violent than in any other developed country in the western world.
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>Because there is a lot of hate and economic disparity in this country. There are too many wackos on the left (like you I must say :)) and racists (like the crazy guy in S. Carolina). There is a history of slavery the permeates the society and still affects many. I cited in another message that in Iceland there are 90,000 hand guns for for the population of about 300,000 but the crime rate is low. So it is people that makes the difference. Now to add to the mix, in the USA there is a great deal of immigrants, good and bad. I watch news from Spain and I see many cases of domestic violence in Spain (mostly ex-husbands and ex-boy friends) attacking theirs former companions. And these are mostly done with knives. I think being killed with a gun is less painful than with a knife (not that I would want either way on anybody).

"There are too many wackos on the left" really not seeing that as an American issue.