EvilKyote

What can i say other than that is one fukced up country!!!

IWatkins

And that is fresh news to you ???

EvilKyote

Well I knew it was a fukced up country but not quite that fukced up!!

ozzy

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Land of the free and all that

chaos.

Makes my jaw drop when I see what kind of weapons the average folkes over there can buy.

The UK government has mutilated thousands of perfectly workable and in some cases valuble war memorabilia by 'disactivating' them ..

..which simply forces me to make my own (gun[s])

Leslie

Perhap's you should join them Chaos, they sound like kindred spirits with respect to your interests.

Les

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Problem is the UK isn't a GUN free society.

Guns in the UK are used only for attack and a means of aggression for low lives
In the US they use them to protect from the above type people.

So we in the UK are defenceless.....

Would you break into someones house knowing that they had a gun and most likely blow your head off?

No....unless you had a pump action shotgun to blow them to pieces. And there you go we have the USA - where does it stop?

ajm

Excuse me, I am in lawful possession of firearms and yet I don't go round shooting people!!!

Lowlifes and scum have a miriad of weapons at their disposal, from religion (yes it too is used as a weapon!), cars, bombs, guns or indeed anything that can be used to control, maim or kill people. It is impossible to ban everything that can be used to harm people, and clearly, as is the case with handguns, automatic weapons and semi automatic rifles over .22 calibre, banning them does not remove them from the hands of the scum!

It is the scum that make objects a threat, not the other way round! Ban the scum or kill the scum: problem solved.

Tiggs

gun rules in the Uk are fine....bann most of them means only a few geeks with dirty harry dreams keep them along with the crooks.......plenty of armed police avalible and the odds are just about as good as they can be in this country.

i have never seen a real gun and hope i never will.

T

ps- i think they still have burglers in the US!

Geezer

I just can't accept that! Have you not been to a UK airport in the last 10 years?
Never seen a policeman abroad?

Never seen a clay pigeon shoot at a game fair?

On the subject at hand though, I don't see the need to allow any firearms in the public domain, except for people with valid pest control reasons, or sport shooters for clay pigeon etc.

People harp on about how you can kill someone with virtually any object, so why pick on guns? Well you try and kill a person from 200yds with a knife!

Of course I agree that people, not guns are dangerous, but unfortunately the world is full of ********, so why give them the oppurtunity?

Geezer

Simon C

Uk gun laws are tough enough, they are just not enforced.

Hungerford saw the end of all automatic and semi auto rifles except 1022 Ruger.
Dunblane saw the end of the handguns in the UK. With some exceptions.

Britain still has a handgun team that competes in the Olympics et al. To keep their guns and a sport they enjoy, they all emmigrated!!!!

Yes I agree the only reson for owning a firearm in this country is for sport / pest control, but thats all you can own them for in this country.

Anyhow is not the law abiding that cause the problems, its the criminal scum who don't give a sh*t if they are using a illegal weapon to kill, the crimes illegal anyhow.

And I don't need a gun to kill you, I can use a catapult / bow and various other things to kill at distance. And as Alison Williamson won a Medal in Greece don't hear crys for Archery kit to be banned. When my parents house was burgled, the scum who did it stole the club kit and were shooting cats with it. And the sale of archery kit is unlicenced unlike firearms.

We just need our current laws enforcing

Simon

Simon C

Guns don't kill people, people kill people. They will always find a way nomatter what's available.

ajm

It probably isn't true, after all the main reason for his post was to weasle in the witty yet entirely erroneous "few geeks with dirty harry dreams" dig, so as you can see, accuracy wasn't first and foremost in his mind!

hedgehog

I think that ajm's point is a valid one, and clearly it is strongly held on his part :-) Guns do not kill or harm people, people kill or harm people. Until the PC nutters manage to get people made illegal there will always be violence and in actual fact violent and gun crime in some urban areas of the UK is now on a par with similar crime in urban America, I don't have the stats for that to hand right now but read an interesting report on it some time back that took me by surprise. There is no question that many people in the US are running about with weapons that I personally can see no justification for carrying (my support is for the sporting gun and so I see no reason for handguns or automatic/semi-automatic weapons) but the truth is that there is more of it about in the UK than you might think. The US overall figures are also skewed by the fact that you can legally use a gun to defend yourself and many householders own a weapon. So, a percentage of the US "killed by firearms" figures are actually criminals who were discouraged from reoffending by legal and reasonable actions of citizens. However, there is no question that the overall rate of death by firearm per 100,000 of population is about an order of magnitude higher in the US than in the UK.

The truth of the matter is that the criminal elements in UK society can get all the weapons they want, we need only look at the little terrorist organisations in Ireland to establish this as a fact and it is now believed that they are selling their "surplus" weapons to gangs in England, Scotland and Wales. Getting a sporting rifle is a tedious and difficult business and the process is made all the more depressing because some thug is standing at the street corner carrying a large calibre automatic weapon and he appears relatively safe from the attentions of the law. I saw a recent report which asserted that 1 in 10 people on the street in Northern Ireland is carrying a legal or illegally held firearm.

So, while I agree with some level of control on access to weapons purely to stop idiots from accidentally killing themselves, or others, I believe that access to sporting weapons should be easier and I believe that real criminals should be removed from society as this would make a greater contribution to public safety than any attempt to restrict access to firearms.

It is also the case that access to weapons in itself does not necessarily mean a higher level of gun crime, almost every household in Switzerland holds a rifle, for sport, and every young man is a member of the militia (national service type arrangement) and keeps his automatic weapon at home. Switzerland has more per capita firepower than any other country on earth and yet has an almost insignificant level of gun crime and it is estimated that about 50% of all gun crime in the country is carried out by foreign nationals! We don't see many programmes sensationalising the level of gun ownership in Switzerland because despite the fact that nearly everyone owns a gun there is just no story. People in Switzerland do not kill each other with the firearms they hold. This brings us back around in a circle again: it's not the gun that's the problem it's the person behind it.

Claudius

Exactly.

I cant see a problem with law abiding citizens owning handguns for self defence purposes. Sure, some people kill their wife or husband during a fight with a handgun legally owned by the family in some countries; in other countries, they get stabbed

One problem is that people in the USA seem to leave their loaded handguns lying around and have their children end up shooting each other. But then again, I never said stupid people should be allowed to keep loaded handguns on the dinner table... A few days training and psychological examination should be good enough to give honest people the right to own handguns and ammo, kept separately in locked places, like they do in Switzerland. Not many people get shot there...

Claudius

Only just saw that, very good points hedgehog

Forgot to say in my previous post that most gun crimes commited in the USA are not committed with firearms bought legally in a shop anyway.

Simon C

I may be wrong on the figures in this I'm doing it entirly from memory.

Out of the 12000, or 120000 in USA (I can't remember which), killings by firearm only 174 were justafiable homicide!!!! And that was just in 2001!! :yikes:

tiggers

hedgehog,

The statistics you mention about the gun crime comparison between urban areas in the UK and the USA make interesting reading. I was reading a very similar article some months ago and it is quite surprising when you think of the way the US is perceived with regard to violence in it's society.

Of course statistics can be manipulated in the same way a TV programme can be and usually is sensationalist (didn't see last night's offering, but as it was on Sky One I can imagine) hence it's difficult to get a true picture.

Part of my time is spent working in the US and I must say that for the most part I feel 'safer' there than I do in much of the UK. My time spent in both countries is in large towns/cities so they should be comparable. Now I stress that this is very much a 'feeling', but in the US the police seem to have a much greater street prescence and most people seem more friendly and trusting.

Obviously I'm not saying the availability of firearms is necessarily a good thing, but these are just my thoughts on a country that many in Britain assume to be a violence laden gun toting mess.

tiggers.

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Gang culture:

I have a gun...respect me

No, I have a bigger gun, YOU RESPECT ME.

Err, no, I also have an uzi...you respect me

Well I have a bazuka...so kiss my butt.

You dissin' me?

BANG!



Happens in the UK, Happens in the US.

What I am saying is the general low lives associate the gun with power and control....put someones life at risk and they'll bow to your wishes. I can understand why the US allows guns, but the "protection" reasons behind it falls to pieces when you get someone how will to kill someone with it.

oh Apologies AJM...I meant banned firearms used for illegal conduct (car jacking, robberies etc.) Same as a knife, but hey a gun looks better

ajm

talking of looking cool.... why do "gangstas" feel the need to hold their handguns sideways? Do they like being hit in the face by hot shell casings?

Brendan Hughes

Thanks ajm, that's going to give me a big smile next time I have to sit through some stereotypical homeboy macho crap

Geezer

Simon,
I agree that our laws are tough enough and just need enforcing, but still, it is far easier to kill with a gun than catapult/bow and arrow/crossbow etc. Apart from the fact they are not easy to use, you cannot kill indiscriminatly AND quickly with them. They are one shot wonders. You could easily disarm someone once they have loosed off an arrow before they have time to put another one in and get it off, especially if they were rushed. You cannot do that to someone armed with an automatic assault rifle. That was the problem with Michael Ryan.

Geezer

the moose

And it's the old, old story. Guns don't kill people, but people with guns undoubtedly do.

Sure, you could get stabbed in an argument and die, but the likelihood is that you'll suffer greater injuries if a firearm is involved. And yes, the criminals *can* get hold of guns in the UK, but if you look at the US model you'll see that a huge number of homicides are caused by non-criminals, be that hunting accidents, family disputes, idiocy on the part of the user, suicide .....

The average US user knows almost nothing of how to use a gun responsibly, unlike Switzerland, where people are required (as part of National Service) to use and respect firearms. Ironically enough, the UK mirrored the Swiss experience rather than the US one, in that (generally) the owners of guns were incredibly responsible.

But Dunblane made us all question this, and rightly so. Surely even one death is too much, and although people *can* get guns illegally, the fewer guns there are, the better. If you look at the number of children killed in the US through handgun accidents you might see where I'm coming from.

GaryCat

The documentary is on again tonight at 9pm on Sky One Mix if anyone interested.

IWatkins

Yes, always makes me laugh

Saying that, was shooting at the weekend, pulled back the bolt on a .308, case ejected, bounced off the wall and down my shirt. Burnt belly button anyone ? Ouch

Cheers

Ian

hedgehog

mmm, moose. tasty, pass the rifle :-)

Actually moose makes a good point about gun accidents and attitudes to guns. In the US the population seem to view guns as something you kill people with while I, as an example, view a gun as a sporting weapon that you might shoot a stag with. If I had a loaded rifle in my hand and someone attacked me I'd probably put the rifle down to pick up a stick and defend myself. That is a difference in attitude that is cultural and that probably can't be easily explained or eliminated.

The safety and sensible use issue is a similar thing, I doubt if there is a legal UK firearms owner who would leave weapons unsafe or available to children and firearms accidents are rare. About the same number of people die putting on their trousers as die in road accidents at speeds above the posted limit, so do we ban trousers? People choke on food and die, do we ban food? In my area a nutter converted a fire extinguisher into a home made flame thrower and attacked children in a school exam room with it, do we ban fire extinguishers?

I personally am not keen on handguns being available in any form to the general public as, apart from target shooting, I don't see any purpose for a handgun other than offence or defence relating to another person. However I think it was unwise to ban handguns based upon an emotional argument relating to one incident. As in my fire extinguisher incident it is impossible to legislate for every eventuality and to attempt to do so reduces the quality of life for a very many innocent people. The net result of banning anything for which there is an example of it causing death or danger is that you ban literally everything.

So there is no question that this is a tricky one and even within those who would support responsible and legal access to guns there are differences of opinion, for example I see no reason for handguns to be available to the general public while others might support target shooting with handguns. There does however seem to be some consensus that the attitude of society to firearms is ciritcal in determining how that society treats the firearms available to it and the Swiss situation is a good example of a society with a good attitude having no problems with a very high level of gun ownership. The UK has to be careful that it doesn't make owning a firearm so difficult that only the "bad guys" have one as then it will be their attitude to the weapon that determines the general attitude in society. I think we need a healthy population of responsible gun owners to pass on their attitudes, knowledge and good sense to younger generations and to spread sensible attitudes to firearm use and ownership throughout society. That way we stand a chance of maintaining and perhaps even improving our current attitude and record. If we start banning things in knee jerk reactions to emotional arguments then the only people left to pass on attitudes to firearms will be the hoods who want them for "macho" reasons and who have no awareness of safe, responsible sporting firearm ownership.

ajm

LOL! I have had the same thing with an L98A1 version of the SA80. We were doing a rapid fire competition and its weak crappy ejector sent several cases down my sleeve!

P1Fanatic

I saw the program and it was a bit one sided to be honest. Although they did comment that any legislation only really effects the legitimate gun owner - the crims dont care. Same in this country - wont be long before they even ban airguns I reckon.

States like Nevada with the weakest gun sales laws have the lowest gun crime rates - work that one out.

I for one feel safer in the US. Ive seen a few bits of trouble and the cops turn up - you dont get cheeky lowlife chavs trying it on with a cop who has a gun, they simply apologise and go on their way.

I liked the bit about the most powerful round - a .454 casull - shot that with Taurus Raging Bull in Florida - can only fit 5 rounds in the cylinder as they are so big. Gas vents above barrel mean minimal recoil.

Simon.

midget1500

guns don't kill people, rappers do

<<I saw a recent report which asserted that 1 in 10 people on the street in Northern Ireland is carrying a legal or illegally held firearm.>>

err, what?????????????????????????????????????????????? ????

hedgehog

Yep, can't find it right now but I seem to recall that the Belfast Telegraph carried an article on it. When you consider the number of personal protection weapons issued plus the other people who may consider their lives at risk and who have acquired their own protection it doesn't seem too unreasonable, though clearly statistics only apply when considered across a large sample size and I would guess that it also assumes that everyone is carrying their weapon at all times.

Came as a shock to me at first as well, until I sat and thought about it. After thinking about it I decided I certainly wouldn't like to bet much on being able to disprove it and so decided to take their word for it.

I wonder what the figures would be for the UK and the USA?