noseymutegirl wrote:
The Swiss have had a long independent history and were early adopters of democracy and being situated where they were they were used to seeing cultural conflict, the austrians,italians,hungarians,germans,french were all but a stones throw away so to speak.
They discovered that neutrality and direct democracy backed up by a vigilant populace was all important to maintaining a healthy society.

Some speculate as to the reasons why the elite never tried to conquer them, I personally believe that they valued their situation as being useful vis a vis banking.

Regardless...the Swiss being Europeans valued social freedoms more than Americans did who value economic freedoms more.

This is why American libertarianism is so shit.

European libertarianism is less well known and understood quite simply because their media is less pervasive than the Americans.
And also no doubt because its only really the Swiss and perhaps The Basque and too a teeny extent the Icelandic people who have really given it a go.

In a word...culture. The culture in Europe is much more...gah bad word to use but lets say they have a more social outlook than the Americans. I personally blame the media more than anything else.

Again I'm not saying Switzerland has the sun shining out of its arse or its perfect blah blah blah. Its just 'better' than the usual vote for your dictator every few years from 2 parties. It has some bloody well educated people and well travelled people for various reasons and not all of them of their own making. The world is a complicated place and this matter could be discussed at length for hours

oioioi wrote:
Finally the truth comes out about why my Anti-Monarchy thread was locked here....

dubmeup wrote:
There was no ''bait'' dubs...but thanks for clarifying anyway, and proving my point...

It's got fuck all to with the monarchy mate ........

.......... wrote:

StarsChildren wrote:
Goddam kids...I'm sick of their shit...day in day out..,never listen to me...a man can only take so much

Hey sir the dog ate my homework

It did? Well you eat this motherfucker *Kapow!*

_______________________________________________________________________

Remember children. Armed guardians are watching over you at all times. This is normal. It is for your protection. Get used to authority figures with firearms monitoring you from an early age.
When you're old enough you can, should you choose, get a firearm yourself. This is vital to protect yourself from government tyranny. Without guns the United States would be liable to lapse into a country with tent cities of unemployed people, a rising gap between the haves and have nots and poor people not being able to afford to see a doctor. People having guns forces the government to respect the population and stops the police strutting round like they own the place and tasering people. Guns make the United States the proud nation of empowered citizens we see today. There's no way SWAT teams, tanks or helicopter gunships can oppose the might of a population with access to arms. Just look at Waco or Ruby Ridge.
From my cold dead hands y'hear.
God bless America.

You know dogsmilk, I sure you meant that as a joke... but the insinuation that a teacher would shoot a student makes me wanna deck you. Fucking straighten up, there is nothing funny or a joking matter about that. Open your mouth again like that and I will find a way to cram my fist down it.

As to the rest of it...piss off as I don't really give a flying fuck about your opinion now after that first statement.

StarsChildren wrote:
Exactly!

.
noseymutegirl wrote:
Sorry but that’s absurd. If I am a complete and total maniac (an autard with daddy/mommy issues as this one seems to be the case) with a gun and I’m not supposed to ‘be there’, I just shoot my way in. Simple!
Security staff: “You’re not cleared, you can’t get in.”
Me: Bang! Matrix style right on the face - rinse and repeat to any idiot approaching me, daring to question my microchip/RFID is flagging me as an intruder or whatever, until I reach my target/s.

Is still false sense of security which ever way you cut it.

Mind you, I do understand that’s not what you necessarily believe in but non the less that’s certainly what they - as in: the masses - believe in (enough for me to lose all hope in any kind of human rationality btw).

AJFA... they had locking doors, he had to be buzzed in. Or so I've heard it said... he obviously had gotten permission to go in, maybe pick something up for his mother who worked there (but was at home).

diamondgeezer wrote: I wasn't implying owt negative by the use of the word bait DG. What I meant is that I went off my own question, about what makes people want to own a gun by responding to your question, if you get my drift.

Thanks, andy. Good post and yes, there is so much to talk about there.

Could you give one example of this?

Was there another phrase that you were going to use instead of social outlook? Go ahead and say it.

StarsChildren wrote:
TBF Stars I think he raised a legitimate point. That if an armed teacher were to lose the plot, which is entirely possible if not probable, there's potential carnage there too.

StarsChildren wrote:
There you go! How can you prevent a son/daughter from visiting their parent at work? Let’s say it’s an emergency (or they say it’s an emergency) You buzz them in, right?

A guestbook for condolences to the families has been set up here
www.legacy.com/guestbooks/guestbook.aspx...ictims&pid=161707001

For anyone questioning the "right" to gun ownership, I have two words: Home Invasion.

When a pair of cracked-out, nothing-to-lose-jonesing-for-a-fix meth-heads find their way into the home of a single mother with children, I don't see how being a more highly mentally, emotionally or spiritually evolved individual is going to make a shits-worth of difference. Especially when they could very well be armed with (stolen?) guns themselves. But a legally obtained firearm in the hands of said single mother would go a long way towards leveling the playing field. Alarm systems DO exist, but in some cases cost more (sometimes significantly more) than a modest handgun. Not to mention that some criminals are not dissuaded in the least by the whirring sound of an alarm. If they came for business, nothing short of a well-placed bullet (from cop OR citizen) is gonna stop them from getting it done.

In the case of this 20 year old kid that shot these children, does anybody really believe that if guns were illegal that he would have been sidelined from going through with his plan to hurt and kill?? Someone that elects to shoot their mother in the face and kill her and then go on to murder innocent children (damn near babies!) isn't someone that's gonna let ANY kind of a "law" stand in their way!! Sure, it may have been more difficult for him to obtain a gun (laughable, but I'll play along) but this kind of mindset (the killers') is one that was bent from the word Go and there would have been tragedy regardless. My two coins.

StarsChildren wrote:
Word in the news over here is that he forced his way in. Though that isn't necessarily the truth of it ofc.

And right on to noseymutegirl!! Gun-control smokescreen to bring in RFID's!!

StarsChildren wrote:
Really? And how are you going to guarantee a teacher is somehow immune to losing their shit? What do you think might have happened if this guy had had a gun?
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/76...ttempted-murder.html
Teachers are just people, not some special breed somehow above the rest of us.
How are you going to guarantee in a school full of firearms there aren't going to be accidents? Do you really want children spending their days in institutions full of armed people? Is this a good thing in your mind??

one one hand you've got this thing about Oooh does this mean there shouldn't be guns, but you're acting exactly the same from the other direction - Arm EVERYONE!!!!!!!

And don't say dumb things about cramming your fist down the throat of someone the other side of the Atlantic you don't even know the identity of. Why do you resort to aggressive posturing just because somebody says something you don't like? Do you make a habit of threatening people with violence if you don't like what they say?
I hope you don't own a gun...

dubmeup wrote:
I really do not give a shit if its a valid point or not. You do not say something like that... especially given the current events that have taken place.

phemohilia wrote: Again, I myself wasn't questioning the "right", I was questioning why people take up the right. Which we have now had some pretty good answers too, including your own. To my mind those answers do show a very real problem right at the core of the USA though which isn't really being addressed.