ok, this is a gunuine question, I would like to try to understand this, and I promise not to argue or point out if I disagree with your position.

some body on one of the gun threads wrote about wanting to "excersize" his second ammendment rights - sort of carrying a gun to protect the right to carry a gun, I guess. does that extend to other rights? should we all excersize our right to free speech by standing in public and saying a lot of stupid hateful things? is that equally patriotic? what about abortion? there seems to be a right to have abortion, I don't think that abortion is a good thing, but I am glad that there is a right to access of legal abortions. should I get an abortion every few years, to excersize the constitutional right?

on AAAC, there seems to be a feeling that the very act of having a huge number of citizens carrying guns in the US makes the US safe from everything. honestly, this seems to me to be magical thinking - I can't see any rational thought behind this at all. sort of like believing that if we pray that the rains will come, as far as I can see. can anybody explain this to me (and, not by explaining how 100,000 middle aged untrained men with pearl handled 45's are going to stop a column of tanks, that is not rational reasoning, I mean the concept that the very existance of firearms makes the world a better place)


thank you

Well, the original rationalisation for civilians having guns was not so the U.S. could protect itself, I think it was based off the idea that a good government feared its people, while a tyrannical government is feared by the people. It was a method of making sure the government didn't get out of hand like it has in some countries. This was way back when the constitution was written though, it is somewhat dated now. Although, that's really only what I think was going on. I'm not actually American so I'm not really positive.

Yes, the right to bear arms is more to protect against tyranny, it's outdated by now.

On one side of the argument, carrying a gun does offer an amount of protection, but for every level headed guy who carries, theres at least 3 maniacs who would probably put a bullet in you if you cut them off on the highway.

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