0 sats \ 3 replies \ @Voldemort 15 Feb \ parent \ on: ABORTION and GUNS poll culture
Currently.
I fail to see how geography and/or time ought to govern whether something is a human right.
How can one become trained in a thing without a right to the thing?
Since when is training a requirement for a right?
What does it mean to help? Further, you have no evidence that it wouldn't have helped in some way. I could just as easily say it would have been harder to invade had Ukraine citizens been armed with military grade weapons. Maybe it would have even altered Russia's calculation as to whether an invasion was feasible.
Even if most are untrained, how can you be certain that former members of Ukraine military wouldn't have been able to work with their community to slow down the invasion?
Your entire point about terrorist organizations is ignoring that they had weapons to be trained with. Would the terrorist groups been able to defend themselves as successfully had the only had hand guns?
This paragraph has no bearing on my view. I only provided a hypothetical situation in which US citizens might need to protect themselves against a corrupt or foreign government.
Unless I am severely misunderstanding you, this paragraph is mixing individual rights with how to best govern a society. One does not have a need to use recreational drugs. Recreational is in the name. Though I would argue it would be a better governing principle to de-criminalize drugs.
Yes, free speech is the best way to govern a free society. One does not have a need for free speech. Though maybe we mean different things when we say need. When I say need, I mean required to survive (as such, I take your point about murder but only as it is a right to life, not about civil necessity). Under my definition, the only things I need are food, water, shelter. None of which I have a right to beyond the pursuit thereof.
Currently. Cmon the US is THE world superpower, sure Russia and china are external threats but they're not internal threats. I really struggle to see a likely scenario where civilians in the US would need to be armed to fight against a foreign power.
I fail to see how geography and/or time ought to govern whether something is a human right.
And yet they do, in the UAE a women doesn't have a right to many things.
In Europe you don't have a right to guns, so yes geography clearly does dictate what a right is as it depends geographically which "rights" apply to you. That to me tells me it's not a basic human right at all, it's just an ability to have something legally.
How can one become trained in a thing without a right to the thing?
And yet here I am. I live in a place where there's no right to weapons and yet I have training. So it's very possible. That training comes by necessity of the job. There is no necessity on a daily basis for a civilian to own a weapon. Hell even military personnel don't own the military grade weapons. They're not personal issue.
Since when is training a requirement for a right?
This might be the fundamental disagreement, I don't believe it's a right at all. Besides are you saying you don't need training to be able to have something? Yet you need to have trained in a discipline like medicine as an example to conduct surgery on someone you can't just automatically go and do something you don't know what you're doing and claim you have access to it because you believe you should.
What does it mean to help? Further, you have no evidence that it wouldn't have helped in some way. I could just as easily say it would have been harder to invade had Ukraine citizens been armed with military grade weapons. Maybe it would have even altered Russia's calculation as to whether an invasion was feasible.
I doubt it would have made a blind bit of difference in Russia's mindset. But I do understand your point. For example the UK is currently talking about the possibility of conscription should it need to defend itself from Russia. But that wouldn't arm the general populace that would train a larger army to a higher standard than someone without training.
Even if most are untrained, how can you be certain that former members of Ukraine military wouldn't have been able to work with their community to slow down the invasion?
I'm fairly certain former members of the Ukrainian military were asked to re-enlist and did. It is the job of the military to protect their nation under these circumstances. Not the general populace exercising a "right" that can decide to choose violence against an invading aggressor.
Your entire point about terrorist organizations is ignoring that they had weapons to be trained with. Would the terrorist groups been able to defend themselves as successfully had the only had hand guns?
They had weapons to be trained with because we gave them to them. They didn't have the weapons until we armed them and then trained them.
This paragraph has no bearing on my view. I only provided a hypothetical situation in which US citizens might need to protect themselves against a corrupt or foreign government.
What your scenario was/is is justification for a military not for armament of civilians. You've so far only used war time or warfare examples. Because fundamentally there is no reason that a civilian needs a weapon (whether their laws allow them to have one or not) of that grade in their day to day peace time activities.
Unless I am severely misunderstanding you, this paragraph is mixing individual rights with how to best govern a society. One does not have a need to use recreational drugs. Recreational is in the name. Though I would argue it would be a better governing principle to de-criminalize drugs.
I don't know if I'm mixing them up as they're extremely intertwined. One does not have a right to kill a person, if one also has a right to life. Those two things can't exist without infringing upon someone else's right. You're right one does not need to use recreational drugs, but do they not have a right to choose whatever they wish to inhale? It can't be freedom sometimes when it suits and not others. Either you're free to choose how to live your life and own what you want, say what you want, smoke what you want and do what you want with your body (including remove what you don't want in your body) or you don't have freedom. If you're probably gun you'd have to be pro choice, and pro recreational drugs and pro gay. If you believe in freedom claiming you have a right to guns whilst a women doesn't have autonomy over her body then I'd argue you're not pro freedom.
Yes, free speech is the best way to govern a free society. One does not have a need for free speech. Though maybe we mean different things when we say need. When I say need, I mean required to survive (as such, I take your point about murder but only as it is a right to life, not about civil necessity). Under my definition, the only things I need are food, water, shelter. None of which I have a right to beyond the pursuit thereof.
I'm very much aligned with this as I personally do not believe that a "right" actually exists, a set of rules enforced by fear of consequences is the closest thing to rights. But they're not truly a right. The idea that someone has a right to something is just plain false to me especially if that thing can be removed from that person by force. Sure you need food, water and shelter and that's it, but you don't have a right to them, you want them you need to take them... Nowadays the way we take them is transactional and of mutual benefit. But to claim that someone has something that cannot be removed by a more powerful entity tells me that the "right" is a false sense of security. You don't have a right to life if someone can take it. You don't have a right to education if no one will provide it. And you certainly don't have ant kind of freedom of speech when there are laws protecting religious groups and sexuality, gender, etc. if you can be punished lawfully for saying something against a protected group, then you don't have freedom of speech you have things you are allowed and things you are not allowed.
Slight tangent but to wrap it all up.
Thus far all of your points about the necessity for allowing civilians to have weapons of military grades have only really been justifications for military grade weaponry and a military. Not a reason why non military persons not currently engaged in military operations would need tools for that specific job.
You wouldn't use a chainsaw on a piece of paper just because they're both technically wood, you'd use scissors.
Your not in a warzone, you don't need warzone tools.
The problem with almost (as yes there are some restrictions on who can own, some eligibility criteria) almost everyone having access to that chainsaw to cut the paper is that had they only been allowed scissors, then they wouldn't have caused so much damage in schools...
Infact now I think about it by the definition of a right, does the fact that eligibility criteria for guns demonstrate that it isn't a right? If felons can't own, or those deemed cognitively disabled can't own... Then it isn't open to everyone and thus isn't a right. You need background checks to own right? Then you're being told by a different authority whether or not you can own one... So that's not a right, that's an allowance.