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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!ihnp4!ihuxq!ken
From: ken@ihuxq.UUCP (ken perlow)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Gun Control again... A Position Paper
Message-ID: <1128@ihuxq.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 10-Aug-84 17:17:31 EDT
Article-I.D.: ihuxq.1128
Posted: Fri Aug 10 17:17:31 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Aug-84 01:09:21 EDT
References: <1565@sun.uucp>, <1076@hou4b.UUCP>, <1117@ihuxq.UUCP>, <379@loral.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL
Lines: 39

--
>> >[from Royko's column]
>> >
>> >    Comment:  No, I didn't wish I had a gun.  But I kind
>> >    of wished that the stick-up man didn't have one.
>> >    That's usually the problem, if you hadn't noticed.

>> 	Ken, we have noticed.  The above exemplifies the problem
>> with this debate.  Gun control advocates continue to cling to the
>> absolute myth that laws can keep guns out of the hands of such
>> as the mugger above...

>> 	Why in the world would anyone believe that the person who
>> mugged the interviewee in the above would be willing to perpetrate
>> such a crime, but be restrained by a law that makes his gun illegal???

>> You can't be serious!

>> Ray Simard

I am indeed serious, though I agree with you about the ineffectiveness
of gun-control legislation.  What burns me up is the "I gotta have a
gun" frontier mentality in America.  It's shared by certain classes of
criminals and, of course, the law-abiding gun nuts.

America is arming itself.  A lot of this is our peculiar quick-fix
mentality:  Feel insecure?  unsafe?  Buy a gun.  No matter that it
is often the case that the gun makes you significantly less safe.

I have no quarrel with your right to own a gun, not even one whose
only purpose is killing people at close range.  I would, however,
question your motives for doing so.
-- 
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