THE DANGER OF GUN-FREE SCHOOL ZONES

gungasnake wrote:

the disarmament of German civilians perpetrated by the nazis

Just a tiny annotation here: The Nazis didn't disarm German civilians.

Or: yes, they did, but not the German population. Just a selected few.

The first comprehensive gun laws were enacted in Germany in 1928. The "Gesetz über Schusswaffen und Munition" required a license for everyone who wanted to produce, own, repair or even reload a gun. In other words, you had to get a permit to buy ammunition.

In 1933, the Nazis rose to power. In 1938, they enacted a new, far less restrictive gun law, the "Reichswaffengesetz". The stated goal was the "Defense-Ready German People". The requirement for a license to buy a gun was dropped. Same with ammo. Carry laws became far less restrictive, and all officials of the NSDAP and other NS organizations as well as SS officials had now automatically the right to carry handguns.

Those barred from acquiring, owning or carrying guns were: individuals perceived as dangerous to the society, and Jews - seen as synonymous by the Nazis, of course.


So if you argue with the disarmament of the Jews, you would have to argue in favor of arming all those groups in the States which are being perceived as a danger to society. In the America of 2006, this would probably mean starting by heavily arming all young, male, Middle-Eastern foreigners - as they are most likely to suffer from a government turning abusive of the population. Then, we could talk about illegal immigrants, about underclass, homeless, gay, poor, .... people.

And you would probably be the last one to get a gun.

Thank u for this information, Old Europe.
I am uncertain as to its accuracy,
tho I do not deny it; not at this time, anyway.

OmSigDAVID wrote:

Thank u for this information, Old Europe.
I am uncertain as to its accuracy,
tho I do not deny it; not at this time, anyway.

By all means, go and double-check the information. My sources are in German, but I can give links if somebody is interested. Otherwise I recommend doing a search on the subject. We're on the internet, after all.

There's even more info to ponder: in 1945, the Allies strictly curtailed the rights the 1938 law gave to German civilians. The demilitarization of Germany was the prerogative, not providing people the right to buy guns. On January 7th 1946, Allied Control Council Order Nr. 2 banned gun ownership completely. Guns had to be turned in within 10 days, and the order explicitly stated that the consequence of not complying could be the death penalty.

The order remained effective until 1950. In 1951, the Reichswaffengesetz was partially reinstated, and finally, with the German souvereignity in 1952, the 1938 law became fully effective again - minor changes due to the new federal nature of the German state. The Reichswaffengesetz from 1938 remained in effect until 1972, when an amendment to the German Basic Law (essentially the equivalent to the US Constitution) made it a federal responsibility to regulate gun ownership.

will u tell us what rights a German citizen
has to self defense when he is being robbed ?
or if a criminal attempts to kill him ?

OmSigDAVID wrote:

will u tell us what rights a German citizen
has to self defense when he is being robbed ?
or if a criminal attempts to kill him ?

My understanding would be: The law defines self-defense as any measure necessary to defend you or someone else against a current illegal attack on life, limb, freedom, honor, property.

That's mostly it.

__________________________________________________________

For the purposes of the above statement: the situation of self-defense is given in the case of a current* illegal** attack***.

* current: immediately about to happen or currently happening or continuing to happen

** illegal: not in accordance with the law. The attacker has to be violating the law (unless the attacker is acting in self-defense (you can't claim self-defense as justification for attacking someone who is rightfully defending himself))

*** attack: human behavior threatening an individual object of legal protection (life, limb, freedom, honor, property)


Means of defense have to be proportionate, meaning the defender has to use the least violent means of defense possible without actually having to take risks himself. The defender does not have to flee (disreputable escape), as right does not have to give way to wrong.


Will have to look up stuff to answer your other question.

David,
I have a question.

You say that you armed yourself at the age of 8. Where were your parents and how did you acquire the weapon? Did you live in a rural or city setting? I guess that is more than one question.

gungasnake wrote:

Sort of a good image site...

Do you know what "beyond the pale" means, 'snake? Whoever is using these images to push a pro-gun agenda is a moral sleaze bag...

What is wrong with genocide victims being able to shoot back?

Seems perfectly moral to me.

oralloy wrote:

What is wrong with genocide victims being able to shoot back?

Seems perfectly moral to me.

To me, too. The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back. You want them to be armed before an actual genocide occurs.

The lessons we can learn from the Nazi genocide is that it was directed against the Jews, a demographic group that a a large percentage of the population considered suspicious.

So if you are arguing in favor of arming people as a means of preventing a potential genocide, it seems as if you would have to make sure that the demographic group that many people hold in low esteem/are suspicious of is capable of defending itself.

To me, drawing parallels with the Nazi genocide appears to be a convincing argument for arming all young, male Muslims living in the United States today. It appears to be a rather unconvincing argument when it comes to arming white middle-class people of European descent.

old europe wrote:

The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back. You want them to be armed before an actual genocide occurs.

How is that a problem?

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

oralloy wrote:

old europe wrote:

The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back. You want them to be armed before an actual genocide occurs.

How is that a problem?

(We're still extrapolating from gunga's statement that arming all Jews would have prevented the Holocaust, right? So we are talking about a group of people who had absolutely no standing in society, right?)

Well then, I would say that you have to be aware of the fact that you are going to lobby for the right-to-bear-arms of exactly those groups you (yes, you personally) loathe most.

Let me quote H. L. Mencken here, because I think it's so fitting:

H. L. Mencken wrote:

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

If you have no problem with that, that's fine with me.

oralloy wrote:

What is wrong with genocide victims being able to shoot back?

Seems perfectly moral to me.

To me, too. The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back.

You want them to be armed before
an actual genocide occurs.

By the time that the Jews are standing naked in a line,
waiting to walk into the ovens, or the gas chambers,
it is TOO LATE for them to be thinking of acquiring guns,
and it hardly seems likely that the oppressors will be
putting guns in their victims' hands, at that time.

Do u disagree ?

David

The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back. You want them to be armed before an actual genocide occurs.

If any PERSON misconducts himself,
or any group of people do so
( like Krystalnacht, or a lynch mob )
that person, or those people can be
removed from contact with society.

old europe wrote:

The problem is that you want potential genocide victims being able to shoot back. You want them to be armed before an actual genocide occurs.

Little bit hard to shoot back AFTER you done been genocided, dontcha think??

As to suspicion vs trust, I suspect ALL demoKKKrats, but I'm perfectly happy to watch them buying guns; doing any sort of a thing like buying a gun which mitigates towards self reliance is a first step towards ceasing to be a demoKKKrat....