London murder rate rises higher than NY City

That's the thing about facts. I don't need to "make" them true. Facts are just naturally true on their own merits.

The notion that freedom is so unpopular around the world is pretty scary.

Regardless, the US chooses to remain free even if the rest of the world rejects freedom.

So the fact that these unfree countries only abolish some rights is supposed to make abolishing those rights OK?

That's because it means something very specific.

 

It seems to be very narrow. Pakistan may be for you.

Gun laws in Pakistan - Wikipedia

 

You're saying that gun ownership is an ancient right, and that's supposed to be based on fact? Toggle, I don't want to hurt your feelings, but it doesn't even sound right to me. It's actually pretty absurd that you would be saying that. It strikes me as something someone would say if their entire motivation was to normalize guns. You seem to feel that they already are normal. I can tell you, there are a good 150 million people who strongly disagree. That's about half of all Americans. It's a rough estimate.

So, what I'd really like to talk about is how this thread doesn't need to be about gun control in Australia. It's supposed to be about the astonishing murder rate in both London and New York; though from what I understand through doing a little research, there aren't many occasions on which one can make a reasonable comparison between the two.

 

If only the women could walk around in bikini tops and shorts, it'd be just like America.

 

You're stating an opinion, not a fact. I think learning the difference will enrich your life

 

That is incorrect, I was stating facts.

I understand the difference.

This is an example of a fact: The sky is blue.

This is an example of a fact: Grass is green.

This is an example of an opinion: I think it is great that the sky is blue and grass is green.

This is an example of an opinion: I think it is terrible that the sky is blue and grass is green.

This is a fact: We have an ancient human right that protects our ability to have guns for self defense.

This is a fact: Australia abolished this ancient right.

This is a fact: Australia could have achieved all of their gun safety goals without abolishing this ancient right.

This is an opinion: I think that what Australia did is a terrible tragedy.

 

Hobbes published Leviathan in 1651. The English Bill of Rights was passed in 1689.

That's pretty ancient in my book.

It is right. My feelings are not hurt.

All I do is point out facts and reality.

My goal is to defend and justify freedom and civil rights by posting facts and logic.

Well, they are.

Those people are wrong.

I think it is possible to compare them reasonably. Just get the national stats from both governments and see how they compare.

 

Ancient right? Like 5000 years ago when everybody had assault rifles?

 

Hobbes published Leviathan in 1651. The English Bill of Rights was passed in 1689.

 

I'm sure Australia published their laws too. Now what is factual is that guns are abhorrent. The new norm is no guns. People in Australia probably recognize that they are dangerous and that anyone who has one is likely a criminal, as it should be.

England has also "published" their right to not have guns. I think only the police have guns in England. I guess their Bill of Rights was a little bit archaic. Somewhat like ours has turned out to be. Burdensome and less applicable to today than it was to yesterday.

Who is Hobbes, toggle?

 

England has no formal Constitution like America because there was never a revolution. All their laws are a mix of documents spaning many years and some of it seems to be just assumed from other laws. This is why right wing Americans say the English have no free speech. They sort of do not like America even though you can pretty much say anything that is not hate speech and it's no big deal.

Part of this is that there was never a point when their culture was built around guns and taking back the goverment. Hell, for most of their history a few thousand men with a sword was good enough to get rid of an evil king.

Why are right wingers citing their laws when in their mind it's a country over run with Muslims where you go to jail for teaching your dog a Nazi salute? We Americans had a war to not be part of that? Are you nor proud of your own law?

 

The English Bill of Rights declared the right to "arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law"

Not "the right for any insane murderous idiot to walk into a pawn shop and purchase a weapon of mass destruction with no restrictions"

 

Abolishing freedom and civil rights may well be the norm outside America. It will never be the norm within America. We will remain a shining beacon of freedom and liberty for as long as our polity exists.

Thomas Hobbes was the political philosopher who created the concept of government as it is understood today.

Our Constitution did not create any new rights when it was formed. The Framers merely took the preexisting rights of English Common Law and forbade the government from violating them.

Since I was answering a question about how ancient these rights are, it seemed proper that I refer to their actual origins.

Yes. That's why we can't buy nerve gas at Wal-Mart.

 

Really? Did the English Common Law provide that the legislature could make no law regarding an establishment of religion? Or that the government could not quarter troops in people's home during times of peace? Or that the government could not use cruel and unusual punishments? Or that all powers not delegated to the national government nor prohibited to the states are reserved to the states and to the people? You just make this stuff up!

As a matter of fact, on the Cato Institute's 2017 Freedom Index, Australia ranks number four and the United States ranks number 17--below Hong Kong, Ireland, the Scandanavian countries, the Netherlands, the U.K., Canada, Austria, Luxembourg, and Germany. . https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/human-freedom-index-files/2017-human-freedom-index.pdf

That's funny. Thomas Hobbes was the English philosopher who justified absolutist government. He believed that self-preservation was the most basic natural right, but that without the protection of government from violence, we'd have a "war of all against all" and life would be "nasty brutish and short". Therefore, humans gladly surrendered their natural right of self defense to an absolute sovereign who was given a monopoly of legitimated violence. Not a philosopher an NRA fan should be quoting.

 

OK, I'll concede that one. But in general our rights were derived from English Common Law.

Yes. That comes from English Common Law.

Yes. That comes from English Common Law.

That's not a right. That's a principle that the federal government's powers are limited to only what the Constitution explicitly says its powers are.

No, the Framers really did incorporate all of the rights of English Common Law into our Constitution.

People only surrender their right to defend themselves if there is an agent of the government (say, a police officer) present to provide that defense.

Hobbes established that there is a natural human right to engage in self defense if an agent of the government is not immediately present to provide a defense when it is needed.

 

But the framers added more. Like separation of church and state, protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, grand jury for life and limb. As for the right to bear arms, the English Bill of Rights 1689 allowed Protestants the right to bear arms, subject to regulation by Parliament and Blackstone acknowledged a "natural right of resistance and self-preservation" subject to suitability and allowance by law. The U.K. never recognized a general right to bear firearms, and indeed bans most private ownership of most handguns, automatic, and centerfire automatic weapons without special permission. And (not coincidentally I think), the UK has one of
the lowest death rates from firearms among industrial countries: 0.2 deaths per 100,000 compared to our 10.2 deaths per 100, 000.

You need to re-read Leviathan. Hobbes did not believe people had rights they could assert against government regulation under any circumstances.

 

Yes.

That is incorrect. English courts recognized this right until around the early 1900s when Parliament overruled the common law right with a statute.

They overruled the common law right to keep and bear arms when they passed these statutes (much like Australia did).

I'm not sure there is any point in someone being killed with a knife instead of with a gun. They are just as dead either way.

A Mans Covenant Not To Defend Himselfe, Is Voyd
A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is alwayes voyd. For (as I have shewed before) no man can transferre, or lay down his Right to save himselfe from Death, Wounds, and Imprisonment, (the avoyding whereof is the onely End of laying down any Right,) and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no Covenant transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may Covenant thus, "Unlesse I do so, or so, kill me;" he cannot Covenant thus "Unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me." For man by nature chooseth the lesser evill, which is danger of death in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men, in that they lead Criminals to Execution, and Prison, with armed men, notwithstanding that such Criminals have consented to the Law, by which they are condemned.

Leviathan, by Thomas Hobbes

Subjects Have Liberty To Defend Their Own Bodies,
Even Against Them That Lawfully Invade Them
First therefore, seeing Soveraignty by Institution, is by Covenant of every one to every one; and Soveraignty by Acquisition, by Covenants of the Vanquished to the Victor, or Child to the Parent; It is manifest, that every Subject has Liberty in all those things, the right whereof cannot by Covenant be transferred. I have shewn before in the 14. Chapter, that Covenants, not to defend a mans own body, are voyd.

Leviathan, by Thomas Hobbes

 

Interestingly, the Hobbesian natural right to self-protection does not entail a corresponding civil right requiring the Sovereign to protect the individual's right to possess arms or to forbear from penalizing the subject's exercise of the right. Hobbes is clear that the right of no way affects the right of the sovereign to punish him. The sovereign is justified in “punishing his refusal with death” ( Leviathan 21.16).Hobbes Today: Review of Eleanor Curran's Reclaiming the Rights of the Hobbesian Subject
Note that "subjects have a liberty to defend their own bodies. A liberty is a freedom to do something, as opposed to a right, which is a claim for government protection.

 

Ancient isn't just a word for old. It has a more precise meaning. Before the start of the early middle ages (after fall of the roman empire). If you keep repeating something, it doesn't make it true.

The English Bill of Rights declared that Protestants should have the right to bear arms. It was passed in the context of being right after the Glorious Revolution, where England overthrew a catholic king with Dutch help.

Repetition isn't a replacement for facts.

 

You keep equating abolishing guns with abolishing civil rights. The two are mutually exclusive. You can have your freedoms of everyday life, and your civil liberties without owning any guns. Australia and England are shining examples of this freedom and civil liberties.

Your right, as you keep asserting, is only that to bear arms. They may and do change that frequently in so far as what it means. Your denial of the facts is self-serving and only continues in order to promote your weak political agenda.

I'm frankly bitter about the tactics you are using. I feel like what you are doing interferes with regular discourse of this forum. You are very repetitive, redundant, and quite honestly I feel like some of your statements are delusions of grandeur. How do you reason with someone who is clearly delusional? The answer: you don't.

You aren't going to brainwash anyone into thinking guns are any more the norm than they were 22 years ago when we had the last ban on assault weapons. We don't share your nostalgia for any of it. You're not impressing anyone by continuing along this path.

I noticed you have some normal postings in other threads. I commend you for it. Here's hoping we see more of that, and less of this.