vertices said:
It's not a viable solution because it takes a relatively long time to accomplish? An armed struggle would have left India in a state of anarchy - democracy is never granted, it is won and it takes time to win it.
<shrug> Okay. Not really relevant here...
Btw can you provide evidence to back up the bit in bold - I think you are quite wrong on that (as far as I am aware there was only one such massacre in Amritsar).
I was basing it on movie Ghandi, I think there were a few scenes of famous events where this happened. Anyways, I'll take it back if its not true - it's not really the main point here anyways. The point was that it took a very, very, long time.
The problem is that illegitimate governments invariably have atleast some support in the population (eg. Shah's Iran, Sadam's Iraq, Idi Amin's Uganda) - what if you only have a minority of people wanting to overthrow the government? That's why I raised the example of MLK - the pre-civil rights American government was by definition undemocratic and illegitimate - could civil rights supporters (the minority) have overthrown the government if they had resorted to an armed struggle (without attempting to inspire others with their message)?
It was "undemocratic" and "illegitimate"? Umm...no. That doesn't even make sense. And what does it matter what they did or didn't decide to do? You are under a the false impression that just because you can peacefully protest the government you don't need to have the 2nd amendment, the same way you are under the false notion that banning guns reduces crime rates.
Your (and dare I say, the founding fathers') ardent belief that private citizens must own muskets and dualing pistols, as this is the only 'viable' way to overthrow the government, flies in the face of hard empirical evidence.
Not really, as they overthrew a government, namely, yours, using weapons. I don't know why you choose to ignore history. Your "evidence" comes hundreds of years after the creation of the constitution. Do you honestly think they had a magic crystal ball to look into the future and predict these later world events (absurd)? Besides, the founders never said it was the
only viable way. They were much smarter than you give them credit, because they
included the ability to have an armed uprising, if we Americans so choose. That does not mean that we here in the US grab our arms and start armed revolutions every time something doesn't go our way. I don't know why you have this false impression, perhaps if you were more well traveled, you'd understand.
Furthermore, the discourse (which is quite belligerent in tone) surrounding the 2nd amendment gives ammunition (no pun intended) to a number of thoroughly Anti-American and anti-democratic lunatics in the teabagger movement, who want to secede from the union because Obama apparently isn't "their" president - this shows that a non-violent approach to solving crises in democracy is always the best approach as its entirely in the spirit of democratic ideals.
Who cares what tea baggers have to say? Why is this relevant? Stop arguing straw men. And, BTW, this
does not show why non-violent approaches to solving problems in democracy is always the best approach. ---------------------------------
The 2nd amendment gives us (US Citizens) the right to bear arms. End of story. Finito. Fine.
In case you have not noticed, everyone here has relentlessly and mercilessly shot down your argument. So, I'll lend you a helping hand: if you want to make a case for gun regulation, you need to do so from a constitutional stand point -not by arguing irrelevant (and incorrect) safety figures, or tea part movement rhetoric. And, going back to the OP, not by trying to pawn it off to poor sentence structure by the founders.
