Anderton
If you were to visit Canada or Britain would you be very worried about being held up at gunpoint or being injured in a drive-by shooting? Maybe you would because of the coutnry you live in, where those threats are real, but I don't think your fears would be justified. I know I'm going to catch flak for mentioning Michael Moore here, but don't worry because I'm not going to cite his movies as proof or anything. All I'm saying is that he asked why Americans kill each other so much in Bowling for Columbine , and he never got an answer. It's frightening to live so close to a country that has so many guns when if any country in the world doesn't have to worry about being invaded or threatened it's the U.S.
I think going to a shooting range and firing off a few rounds is probably uplifting and relieves stress, but why do you have to personally own a gun? Why not go to the range and rent one for a small fee?
I played paintball with some American friends a year ago. I had never been and was a little scared because these guys had their own guns and everything. I knew them through some friends of mine, and we all went together one night to a paintball club called Sgt. Splatter's. As I got into the game, I was actually having a little fun. Then someone suggested we pit the Americans against the Canadians. Then the fun ended. Until I was shot in the godd*mn forhead, I hadn't even thought about aiming for an opponent's head to "kill" them. Well, I learned my lessons that night. 1)never go paintballing with anyone who owns their own gun, and 2)Americans are scary when they get their finger on a trigger.
First of all, anyone in Toronto knows that there are
tons of guns on the streets in the hands of gangs and criminals. Some parts of Toronto I would not feel very safe in at all because of gun violence related to gangs (Malvern especially). And this is a country where handguns and assualt weapons are completely banned (with the exception of police and military use), yet there have been many handgun murders and some murders using assualt weapons. Most gang killings this year have been committed by handguns (to the best of my knowledge, this would probably be around 10 people). To the best of my knowledge, only two people have been killed/injured by assault weapons in the past year in Toronto. Unfortunately they were both innocent bystanders.
One was a man sitting in his bedroom with his son watching TV when a bullet fired from an Uzi ricoched and hit him. The other person is the now famous Louise Russo, who was getting a sandwhich for her daughter in a restaurant when she was hit by a CAR-15 in what was likely a botched assasination attempt. She is now paralyzed from the neck down and can't take care of her disabled daughter (her other daughter was waiting in their car at the time of the shooting).
What I'm trying to get at is that no matter what laws you make, guns will still get into the wrong hands. And a gun is a dangerous weapon in the wrong hands, as I've shown.
Moving on, you're right, you will catch flak for mentioning Moore's film. While Bowling did have some valid points, he was way off in showing how safe Canadians feel. He showed how people in Toronto leave their doors unlocked. Anyone who leaves their doors unlocked in Toronto is a moron. Moore must have either taken days to get that part filmed, or met some very stupid and/or naiive people.
And your point on paintball is waaaaaay off. I don't know the circumstances when you got shot in the head, but paintball guns are not very precise shooting devices. Unless the shooter was 10ft away (he/she still could have simply missed even at that range), then chances are it was an accident. I know people who paintball all the time and have got shot in every imaginable place (the neck is particularily painful if not covered). And shooting a gun and a paintball gun are two very different things. It's like comparing swinging a golf club and a baseball bat.
And back to the original point on assault weapons, the Swiss army has it's soldiers take their weapons home with them. So that's about 200,000 assault rifles in Swiss homes. Yet that country has a very low murder rate, and a low firearms murder rate. Hmm, maybe it is stupid people with guns that's the real problem (*DISCLAIMER* I'm not saying the Swiss are better than anyone, but a soldier will have extensive knowledge on guns and gun safety).
I have to agree with Solid Lifters, wtf is exactly an assault weapon? I remember seeing a story on the CBC showing a Canadian man losing his 19th century rifle when the new gun registry wouldn't allow him to register his firearm because it was illegal (ie: Unsafe, dangerous to others, etc)...
)
