Don't look at me- I think everyone should be required to own and learn to use a gun, a la Switzerland.

I will look at you, Small_Ruminant. As you show me how to point and sho -

*sound of sirens somewhere in Switzerland*

I'm torn on this ruling.

I have to agree with small ruminant. I don't know if we should be required to own a gun but I think we should be able to own a gun if we so choose -- If we are properly trained how to operate a gun. I generally think that most of the population has no need for a handgun.

From AP article:

The court also struck down D.C. requirements that firearms be equipped with trigger locks or kept disassembled, but left intact the licensing of guns. The district allows shotguns and rifles to be kept in homes if they are registered, kept unloaded and taken apart or equipped with trigger locks.

It is ridiculous that loaded shotguns were illegal in Washington D.C. What is the point? I have no problem with somebody keeping a loaded shotgun in their home if they feel they need it for protection.

I do not own a gun and do not plan to. I generally dislike guns, especially handguns. I don't think our country's forefathers ever imagined a need for automatic weapons and armor piercing bullets. Militias aren't legal. I can't round up my armed neighbors and storm City Hall. Like I said, I'm torn.

I'm sorry, y'all - but I'm way against any ruling that makes it easier for people to have loaded weapons hanging around the house.

I've never fired a gun, have no desire to, don't even WANT to get close enough to a handgun/shotgun/what-have-you to know how to do so.

I knew someone back in Seattle years ago who was intensely fetishistic about his gun collection - would go on and on about it, how much time he devoted each week to shooting/cleaning/etc.

*shiver*

I think people should be able to own guns, but not all people nor all kinds of guns, and that licensing should be tightly regulated, and carrying quite restricted, and extensive training required. Guns in society are problematic, not easy solutions to anything. Guns in homes are more often used on other family members in the homes than on invaders. Keeping one around is a definite risk. At the same time, there are some legitimate and lawful reasons to have a gun. Hunting is one. Sporting and historical reenactment are others. I basically accept that self-defense is another, though very often, people using guns for self-defense end up being the ones injured by their own guns. So that's why I favor the really strict regulation and licensing. Regulation as in "well regulated."

It was interesting how the majority on the court read [did not read?] the "well regulated militia" part. Really interesting. Scalia's argument was that even though the founders said that, they didn't connect it to anything specific, so it doesn't mean anything. I think that's pretty creative.

Historical reenactment?

Anecdotal: Until a year ago I lived in a neighborhood that was notoriously anti-gun. My car was broken into constantly. My apartment at least once.

A year ago I moved to Oakland, to a border-line sketchy neighborhood. Everyone's armed. My car has not once been broken into.

To me, the writers of the constitution pretty clearly meant for regular old people to be able to have guns.

I don't understand not allowing someone to own a gun, but then I realize my experience isn't usual.

I grew up in a house full of guns: hand guns, rifles, shotguns. We learned how to shoot them and respect them from a young age. We ate meat from pheasant and moose and deer and bear that were shot with those guns; without that meat, our family of 8 would have had some very, very difficult winters. Without those guns we would not have been able to scare wolves and bears away from our house, would not have been able to stop the coyotes that had gotten into our chicken coop and had already killed 20 of our egg layers, would not have been able to stop the shark that we pulled in and was tearing through our fishing nets.

I don't think that I would need or want a gun with me if I lived in a metropolitan area. But here in Alaska I think it's pointless to be without one.

I also grew up with guns.

My car or apartment has never been broken into. Most people here don't own guns and those few who do very rarely carry them. Correlation isn't causation, though people often want to draw a line of simple comparison like that. The most trouble I ever had with car break-ins, in fact, was also in an 'anti-gun' neighborhood - but I'd say that's because it was a middle-class neighborhood in which people had good stuff in their cars (radios, cash, running shoes, CDs) and so it was worthwhile. My friends who lived downtown did not have this problem (though one had her car stolen for a joyride). I never heard a story of an armed person stopping a car break-in. I think it's a lot more helpful to look at effects in the aggregate than at individual stories, because you can find an individual story for just about anything you want to prove. There are entire peaceful and well-policed cities, towns, and nations in this world where no civilian owns a gun.

What always confuses me is that we discuss this as a binary problem. It's not binary. Yes, people should be able to own guns. And yes, the government should be able to dictate the terms of gun ownership and legislate for public safety. Seems pretty simple, and in fact, it is, except that this discussion is often framed in terms of safety/fear (like the terrorism discussion) which immediately polarizes people to the extremes.

Of course you're right on the correlation isn't causation but I assure you, you'd have to be OUT OF YOUR MIND to screw with these people's cars or other belongings. What's that phrase? "Disproportional response?" Whatever it is, it works.

Also- the car break-ins in my other neighborhood happened despite there clearly being nothing worth stealing in the cars. People knew better than to leave anything, but the thieves would break-in on the HOPE that someone left something in a trunk or under a seat. It was bad.

Yeah, because when you go to steal stuff, you go where you HOPE people will have something you can steal. And you don't fuck with the people in your own neighborhood who know who you are and where you live. I just don't think guns have anything much to do with this equation, other than adding to an existing threat. But if you wouldn't fuck with their cars because they had guns, you likely also wouldn't fuck with their cars because they have ten big well-connected friends who could jump you and kick your ass and avoid a weapons charge all at the same time.

Nobody but stoners and dumb teenagers steal out of their own neighborhood.

I love metachat because it makes me feel like a right-winger. Hee!

This decision pretty much puts the lie to any "strict constructionists". Stari Decisis? Not when it gets in the way of my agenda. Sad.

Yeah- I'm not seeing it that way, kodama.

I would be quite happy to ban all guns, and eventually take away the police's guns as well. Maybe with the exception that people who live in the middle of nowhere and want to hunt should be allowed to own a rifle or something, if they pass annual (hell, make it quarterly!) tests that weed out incompetents and nutcases, pay lots of taxes and keep it safely locked up.

But equally, I kind of agree with Scalia et al that as it is, the second amendment is unavoidably an individual right. The linguistic arguments are unconvincing, but I think their case as a whole is strong.

In an ideal world, the solution here would be to repeal the second amendment. But unfortunately it seems nobody in America feels the same way as me.

The people who mystify me, though, are the ones who think that the opinions of the constitution's authors are in any way relevant to the current policy debate. As if oh-but-the-constitution-allows-it is of itself a remotely valid argument in the policy debate! (Obviously, you can argue that the founding fathers' intentions matter for the legal debate, but that's not the same as the policy debate). Aside from the legal-interpretation aspect, why on earth do people care what a bunch of guys two hundred years ago thought about gun 'rights'? I can think of almost no-one whose opinion is less informed or relevant as to the present gun situation, so revering them as some kind of secular demigods is a bit odd. It would be great if it were possible to admit and debate in public the possibility that one or more parts of the constitution may be at best irrelevant nowadays and at worst just really stupid (article II, section ii being a case in point, as per the whole Libby fiasco).