Many of us in USA who want limited gun access cite Australian laws to those NRA members and gun addicts who are always screaming 2nd Amendment rights. They always come back with it hasn't stopped murders nor mass murders in Australia. I think they're balmy, but what's the real scoop ? I haven't heard of any Columbines, Virginia Techs, grade school, or theater killings in your country.

It doesn't stop criminals having guns or indeed using them. However it does stop the Zimmermans from having a gun.

The copycat type mass shootings have stopped since the crackdown on semi-auto rifles. That worked.. so far. There's always someone trying to outwit the police. The gangs, ie: bikies and street gangs, the drug runners etc., They get guns and do drive by shootings. So that stuff still happens. Mostly the guns are stolen or black marketed locally. ie; the guns that weren't handed in during amnesties. Though customs caught one of my bosses from sending two replica pistols home to himself from America, loads of handguns come in with people buying them off the internet.

Taking the guns away doesn't stop bad people from being bad people. However in the main, they only shoot at each other if they can get guns and ammunition. It isn't like the average person needs to carry a gun to protect themselves. In fact most of us don't see any gun violence. It is limited to gang warfare in certain areas and probably always will be while there is money to be made out of various criminal activities that organised gangs can get up to.

I don't carry a gun nor see the need to get a permit. Though any landholder, ie: farmers are allowed to have guns for shooting vermin and they are able to allow shooters onto their properties and thus can be a guarantee to getting a shooters permit. If this was cracked down on, then the avenues for obtaining guns and ammunition would be vastly decreased. Because who is to say that every permit issued to shoot vermin is authentic? Even if it was authentic there is still room to abuse the system.

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Thanks, AusMac, for your contributions to this subject, and indeed to the whole forum. Thanks for being here.

Kate/Ethel/Starmillway


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No worries Kate. You know I'm a peaceable person. You may not also know that I do have certificates of marksmanship from both the police and the army.

The problem is that I really don't find anything I want to shoot at.

The most memorable bank robbery in my recent memory is of where a guy walked into a bank and demanded money and as far as I can tell there was no obvious weapons threat but bank tellers are basically told not to put any lives at risk.. it is all on camera.. He escaped on a bicycle and even dropped some of the money.. but I can't yet recall reading of him being apprehended. Though that may be because I live in a land where news isn't as sensationalised as is probably more what you are used to. If something else didn't have me dredging news pages, I could have missed it for lack of interest in local gossip.

Many folks don't keep up with what the NRA supports. I don't either. So you might not remember that they were mighty opposed to the Patriot Act. That I did know.

Dave

king jr is an exception to many. Not so sure about Sharpton but Jessie Jackson was not ordained untel recent years. I'm not sure he ever had a regular church he preached at.

But that said. I've noticed that many preachers, get used to having folks provide for them to the point that they truly believe that they are owed just for their existence. I should add that the ones I've known well, personally have all been white men and women.

Dave

Because the Patriot Act could be seen as a prelude to a national gun registry. Oh, the horror of it all.

If guns are outlawed in your country how do you really protect yourself if you are threatened by someone?