Nelson, GA: Households required to own a gun...sort of?

How bizarre!

Presumably brought to you by those who insist that the government is too intrusive and overreaching.

“Most everybody around here’s got guns anyway,” Jarrett said

There’s your answer, same as my town and a lot of others. He is simply putting something on the books in case the feds ever did decide to push it. Kind of like stocking your pantry before a storm, just in case.

Sounds like Switzerland.

I think it reaffirms what the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution already allows for them to do but this ordinance might take it a little further than it needs to go. Such as ”.....measure requires every head of household to own a gun and ammunition…...”.

Not everyone likes firearms and wants to be around them so mandating it in such a manner seems problematic to me. But, enforcement of this ordinance doesn’t seem to be too high of a priority either being that it is mentioned ”.......the ordinance also doesn’t include any penalty for those who don’t comply…...”. In a way, seems to cancel each side of it out, sort of.

Maybe the wording of the ordinance should changed to read that the measure encourages those who want to participate which could better provide for the emergency management of the city and to provide for and protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants.

I would move out of that town.

It is simply making a statement – and they know it. Nobody will be prosecuted for not having one.
I heard that Switzerland requires all households to have a gun. I do not know if it is true or not.

My town made a “statement’ law, too – but not for guns. It was for the right to go topless on the beach. Some women asked if it was ok for men to go shirtless, why isn’t it fine for women, too. It took about 30 seconds of discussion for the board to agree they were right and vote yes. (I think the women were shocked actually. It deprived them of making the event into a publicity circus.) In 20 years I have never seen a woman do it but they could.

Nobody there will be bothered if they don’t want to. But there are going to be some of the progressive rags that will be all over this as if it is some horrible over reach of city govt, and scream bloody murder.

Nelson seems a very nice quiet peaceful town just the sort of place where the zombie apocalypse will begin. Best to be prepared.

I am so sick of idiocy.

So, basically what the law says is that you have to own a gun, unless you can’t, or don’t want to?
I agree, we need more useless laws like this.

Keep in mind that Nelson, GA is about 2½ hours from where TV-idiot Honey Boo Boo and her family live.

Nuff said.

Twenty years from now Nelson, GA requires machine guns, hand grenades and anti-tank rocket launchers dealing with homicidal maniacs 2.0

@mattbrowne Why do you anti’s always say stuff like that? You are perpetrating irrational thoughts in the hopes stupid people will be frightened and believe them. Does that work? Is it acceptable to use fear to push an agenda, while at the same time accuse they with opposing viewpoints of doing it? You have been here a long time and up till now shown no evidence of this hysteria. Machine guns, bombs, really?

@woodcutter Agreed, it’s getting pretty common on this site sadly.

Cute little quips are not intelligent discourse, and he is smarter than that from what I’ve read previously.

@KNOWITALL I feel bad for them. It is a classic behavior/ response, whenever their argument has run out of steam because they know they are wrong. So lash out with ridiculous schemes of embellishment in hopes of inserting a different reality that they know uniformed people will buy.

Out of respect I will not name the other member who is currently doing this.

@woodcutter lol, well nobody ever gets out of this life alive, weapon or no. Peace.

Ain’t that the truth. It is better to live long as you can, if there is something you can do to stop someone from making it shorter. Cause they sure ain’t gonna cry for ya.

@woodcutter – Arming every household is irrational and that’s the point I’m trying to make. And the same goes for arming every teacher. It triggers an arms race and makes matters worse. That’s why I’m anti. And I’m glad being anti is common on this site.

I don’t know how people can be intelligent enough to know (or find out) the relationship between guns and aggression/violence, not to mention the US homicide-by-gun rates compared to other countries, and still think that everyone owning a gun is perfectly fine and safe.

Normally, I’d say if it’s in the Constitution, it should be left alone. We were given a right to bear arms, and we should retain that right. That was my position before the school/theater shootings when everyone started freaking out. Living in the South, I’m surrounded by people who are pro-guns and pretty much hate Obama’s guts or even considering tightening up gun control laws.

I know the “it’s our right” argument. America was built on violence, which explains why so many gun-related deaths happen here. Compared to our sister countries, we’re a very dangerous and perhaps even barbaric nation. We own more guns per person than any other country, and more people die from gunshots than most (if not all) other countries. And Republicans say there’s no connection? Ha!

Pro-gun people try to make anti-gunners sound like we’re crazy or ignorant or blowing the subject out of proportion but, you know what, the science is on our side. The statistically-supported consequences of widespread gun ownership far outweigh the benefits, if there are any.

There’s a difference between the right to bear arms and being forced to bear arms.

@livelaughlove21 See, I’m a Republican and I do see the connection, as do most. America was built on NECESSARY violence for explansion and progress. Whether it was agression from Britain or WWI, WW2 or any other action, sometimes violence is necessary to survival.

You don’t have to worry about invaders because we have a massive military that is willing to die to save your life. You may not have to worry about home intrusions because you believe the police officers will save you, again risking their lives for you.

I have such respect for law enforcement and military for taking up the duties that most people are too scared or just unwilling to do, and yes, I’ve shot with military personnel that have returned from Afghanistan talking about the great shots they made in defense of our country- to you that’s probably bragging right? About murdering someone who would be happy to have murdered him first? I don’t see how you can’t see THAT connection, and it’s very frustrating.

The most recent college campus spree this week was done with a knife btw.

@KNOWITALL “The most recent college campus spree this week was done with a knife btw.”

You mean the one at Lone Star College? The one where no one died?

Re: that attack: Our local paper said that the victims were chosen at random. I wonder if that is true. Did he run down the street and skip certain people (MMM., no, I am not gonna cut you, you are wearing blue…) or did he cut whomever he came across? In which case they were not selected at random but because of where they were and when they were in a particular spot.

@glacial Yes, because a few brave guys stopped his butt before he could carry out his plans by tackling him.

Here’s another example: My neighbor is a single female parent with two children. She has a stalker who DOESN’T CARE about the law or restraining orders and she was terrified for her life. She has no training or weapons and depends on the police and cameras outside the house as her defense. One time she stopped me while walking my dogs, explained the situation had amped up because he found her at this house, too, right next to mine despite her best efforts to keep moving. I told her to slip out the back door and come to my house and we’d do our best to defend her until the cops could arrive. My point: Crazies don’t care about laws, regulations or what rational people think.

If I’m out innocently picking morels and wander into a meth head’s lab in the woods, and I’m not packing heat, the cops won’t be able to arrive before I’m dead, so I choose the safe path for ME, which is being armed. I’m not crazy, I’m not on drugs and there’s no reason for me not to be able to defend myself as provided by law, to me that would be crazy and irresponsible.

@KNOWITALL Did the brave guys stop him with a gun?

@glacial No they didn’t, does that make some kind of point to you about guns being unsafe?

So you want my neighbor lady to tackle this big guy stalking her for years and risk her life and that of her two children?

You want me and my girlfriend to TRY to outrun the methheads (with unlimited and inhuman strength) instead of arming ourselves which is our right by law?

@KNOWITALL I don’t think anyone is trying to disabuse you of the belief that your having a gun makes you feel safer, I just think that many of us feel that there would be less death in America if there were less people with guns. But we keep going round and round in the same ol’ circles….

@KNOWITALL That incident is a perfect argument for gun control, not against it. If the guy on the spree had had an AR-15, then many students would be dead, not just injured. If the “brave guys” had been carrying guns, the shooter and/or some bystanders could also be dead. In the event, no one died.

@janbb Then support funding for mental illness in schools around the world, maybe we can stop this insanity without infringing on the rights of all our citizens. While you’re at it, teach people morals and consequences so we can keep two parent homes so kids stop being so incredibly angry and killing others.

Let’s take bipartisan action to fix it instead of continuing to try to punish those of us who are stable, law-abiding citizens, because WE are not your problem and are getting tired of being told we’re ‘part of the problem’ when we haven’t done anything wrong.

@KNOWITALL It’s very noble to want to cure mental illness to prevent violence, but the problems are these: 1) No one knows how to identify every person who is mentally ill to the extent that they will become violent. We just don’t know how to do that. I don’t even know how we would begin to try to know how to do that. And once they are identified, how do we prevent them from being violent? Beyond locking them all up or drugging them into insentience, we don’t know how to do that either. 2) How do we keep from infringing on the rights of those who are mentally ill, but not violent? Is the plan to lock up or heavily drug everyone diagnosed with a specific condition? What if only a small percentage of those people would actually have harmed anyone?

@glacial Exactly, but let’s put some effort into it at the very least.

But we can spends billions researching cloning that will only benefit a few wealthy clients who can afford to pay for new organs? We can spend millions to defeat SSM or elect a new congressman or President?

Priorities. When everyone in this country is truly sick of the massacres of innocents, we may actually step up and make our government truly work for us.

My mom has bi-polar and runs a bi-polar support group and suicide line at our local National Alliance for the Mentally Ill. There are lots people who are well informed on the subject that could make changes if they were funded.

@KNOWITALL Oh, hell yes. I am all for putting effort and funds into it. We need to learn more than we know right now. But to your point about priorites – no one’s life is going to be saved by this vague “let’s give support to those who have mental illnesses that could harm us”. Because we won’t see an effect on violence, not for many years. And the thing is, gun control is not harming anyone who has a gun. It isn’t about infringing on anyone’s right to have a gun. It’s about making guns that have no purpose other than 1) being a toy, or 2) killing a lot of people very quickly less available. It is selfish to demand to be able to keep that deadly toy when the price is mass shootings. And the fact is, most gun owners believe in this kind of gun control. It is totally reasonable under the circumstances.

@glacial There has to be a starting point though and I’ll have to disagree that lives won’t be saved by addressing mental illness IMMEDIATELY. Who’s to say that an open forum in unior high and high schools across the country won’t save lives now, or that the next shooter won’t think twice about addressing his mental illness with his counselor, if people like my mom spoke at his school about their experiences.

Diagnosing mental illnesses is often difficult, psychopaths look like normal people usually, but this continual apathy and focus on guns instead of the true causation is distracting all of us from finding and making real solutions.

The decline of morality and the disappearance of the nuclear family is having a very negative affect on our culture, in my opinion. I won’t get too religious on you, but denying that religion and morality and the lack thereof is NOT a problem is getting ridiculous.

Gun control is not harming me in any way, but I’ll hanged if I’ll allow anyone to continually imply and preach to the ignorant that being a gun owner is tantamount to handing a child a loaded weapon.

@KNOWITALL First of all, I never said no one should have a gun. Law enforcement and soldiers should certainly be armed. And I won’t go into my views on a soldier talking about all the “great shots” he made “for his country” – but no, I wouldn’t call it bragging. That’s a whole other issue entirely. I’m talking about civilians owning guns.

And I’m not sure why anyone would say that American violence has always been “necessary.” What about what we did to the Native Americans on their soil? What about all the people we’ve killed because we constantly want to push our democracy onto other countries? Americans are bullies and always have been. Freakin’ world police… Greatest country on earth? Far from it.

I love how pro-gunners always go right to mental health. Let’s do mental health checks before someone buys a gun. Let’s get better mental health assessment in schools. Sounds good on paper, but…

1.) Mental health records are confidential, as they should be
2.) There’s no accurate way to decide which mental illnesses should disqualify someone from buying a gun
3.) Some of the most potentially dangerous mental disorders, like schizophrenia, don’t develop until the late teens or early 20’s (or later), so mental health screenings in elementary school wouldn’t be very helpful

Let’s talk about the two 4-year-olds that shot and killed other kids because their gun-enthusiast parents left their loaded guns out, one because daddy was showing off his weapon collection, both in the last week. Until we can ensure that gun owners have an acceptable level on intelligence and common sense (puh!), then maybe it’s the case that civilians don’t really need guns.

And the fact still remains that Americans have more guns per capita and more gun-related deaths than any other developed country. Give me a reason why that is necessary. The only reason we need guns is to protect ourselves from other people with guns. There’s a solution for that, but none that’ll ever be put to use in America. Republicans will see to that.

@livelaughlove21 Then we can agree to disagree, it takes all kinds to make this big world go ‘round. I replied on the mental illness issue above quite succinctly I believe.

There is no way you can trust an idiotic government like ours with the Obamacare debacle, to decide whether we are intelligent or not, since we often question their sanity.

My heritage is Cherokee and all my family have their cards, I know very well that they were treated poorly. The Trail of Tears goes through Missouri close to my home as well.

As someone who still thinks this is a great country, and that our military deserves our respect, you keep believing it’s gun owners like me and your buddies in the South who cause those massacre’s and see where that gets you. It won’t stop until you and others who think like you, address the underlying issues, and if you refuse, then others pay the price, innocent children like Sandy Hook.

@KNOWITALL Maybe you could enlighten me about what those “underlying issues” are, since that’s where people who think like you seem to get stuck in their argument for guns.

@livelaughlove21 I did above when I mentioned morality and religion as well as mental illness.

If you believe you have the answers to this important issue, please feel free to enlighten us all so we can stop it.

@KNOWITALL Uh, I believe my suggestion was stricter gun control laws. Was I not crystal clear on that?

So, religion is the issue, huh? Yeah, because religion hasn’t caused any violence. Ha!

Are you aware that gun homicide rates are highest in the southern part of the country? As in, the Bible Belt. But you’re right, Christianity would solve everything.

@livelaughlove21 Um, Obama is enacting those. I believe we were discussing underlying issues so we can prevent further massacre’s.

Then instead of going off on a tangent about religion, why don’t you give me your solution?

@KNOWITALL I’m not going off on a tangent about religion. Four sentences is hardly a tangent. I don’t have strong feelings against religion and I have no problem with religious people, but saying people are more violent because they aren’t religious enough is simply ridiculous.

I’m not arguing underlying issues here. There are way too many to discuss. Yes, mental health is one of them, but pointing at that isn’t going to solve anything (for reasons I mentioned). The first thing to address is gun control, and hopefully Obama will do a decent job there. Reducing the amount of guns would help without addressing ANY underlying issues. Addressing the problem itself seems more efficient than individually addressing the millions of other issues that may or may not be indirectly contributing. Those should certainly be addressed, but it won’t happen quickly.

The American culture in itself is a problem, but nothing will fix that either.

@livelaughlove21 Okay okay, your post seemed a little angry- lol, whatever.

If you know that the American culture itself is a problem, what do you mean specifically? You truly believe that if a madman was bent on killing and didn’t have a gun, he wouldn’t find another weapon? A crossbow? A harpoon? A hatchet? A homemade bomb? It’s awfully convenient for everyone to restrict guns, then what happens in ten years when nothing has changed again?

The only people that pay for our apathy in determining the reasoning behind these are the innocents who die. I don’t want that on my conscience and neither do other gun owners, that’s why we’re okay with gun control, but we don’t have to agree that it’s the end-all be-all solution to this madness. If we’re still on fluther in ten years, let’s talk and see.

@KNOWITALL Nope, no anger here.

What I mean by American culture being a problem in itself is what I already said – America is a violent nation. How do we fix that? We don’t. It’s so embedded in our psyche at this point that the only thing that might work is unarming us and hoping our minds will follow. Meh, good luck with that, but stranger things have happened.

Aside from that…

America – high gun ownership, high gun violence
Most developed countries – low gun ownership, low gun violence

Simple as that. Sure, there are other weapons, but bombs and harpoons aren’t nearly as accessible as a gun. Buying a gun is simple – any idiot can do it, and plenty do. Even if you can’t get through the background check, so many people own guns, it’s easy to get your hands on one. The fact that violence/aggression increases in the presence of guns suggests that eliminating them would be helpful on its own.

Additionally, it’s much easier to disarm someone with a knife than one with a gun. Someone with a harpoon or bow and arrow is more noticeable than one with a gun hidden in his pants. I seriously doubt any recent shooter could’ve done the same damage with a bow and arrow before being apprehended, even if he knew how to use the damn thing. A gun is a very deadly weapon that requires little to no skill to inflict harm on others.

Nobody to date has ever suggested every household be mandated to keep arms.

Nobody has expected every teacher be armed. This is the embellishing part. It’s one extreme to the other. That word, every becomes inflammatory because it changes the meaning of the discussion completely. It is an attempt at using emotion to force change in areas that may not even be needed. I have zero respect for those who purposely shed crocodile tears as part of the debate process. There is nothing any new gun law can do that will stop or slow down mass shootings or even make them less horrific. Would 10 lives lost instead of 20 made the debate less visceral? Stop parading the dead out in front of us all to shame people into giving up rights that once gone will never be seen again. I find that whole tactic dishonest.

@woodcutter Who’s talking emotions? I’m talking statistics. Additionally, it’s of no consequence to me whether you have respect for me or not. :)

@livelaughlove21 You choose to see only the bad in gun ownership when statistics have shown more crimes of wanton assault/ murder have been turned away by they who refused to be victims than the typical gun crimes you tally up. You discount all the inner city drug gang shootings and the incidences become more random. You would like to deny protection from the 99.9 of gun owners by using the gangbangers actions as the excuse.
What makes you think I was referring to you anyway? . Hey if you want to use the same old tired life is better in other counties illusion more power to you. It says something, that lawmakers in DC won’t use that one because they know apples and oranges wont fly when a constitutionally protected right is being discussed.

I take it that you don’t have a firearm in your house just in case?

@woodcutter Nope, sure don’t. We never had one in the home I grew up in either. I don’t know how I’ve survived all this time.

I never said it was “better” to live in another country. How would I know that? I’m an American and I’ll always live here. However, you won’t see an American flag outside my house or hear me going on about American pride. Having pride in a country is an odd thing to me – it’s just where I happened to be born. I don’t hate America, but it’s got more than its fair share of problems.

Also, who’s focusing on inner-city gangs? I don’t believe I said a single thing about gang violence. And if you have a link breaking down the context of these gun-related homicides into gang violence vs. non-gang violence, I’d love to see it.

@livelaughlove21 435 gun murders in Chicago last year. Abut 500 murders total. Now I couldn’t tell which were gang related but if we are to be honest with ourselves we would be safe to assume damn near all of them were. At any rate it is in the urban arena. These high kill zone places are perfect for those who want to showcase how bad guns are. Bad guns!

Do you know how many gun shops there are in Chicago? None

But they aren’t far away.

They have no shortage of gun laws.

@woodcutter As I said, the highest gun homicide rates are in the South. I’m not talking about Chicago, NYC, Detroit, or Oakland. I’m talking about the southern US, where “big cities” and gang violence aren’t as prevalent. So, I wouldn’t go making such statements with nothing to back it up.

You would think the south would have the most gun homocides because it is the most populated part of the US. But California is ranked number one for firearm related murders, @livelaughlove21, according to the

1. California – 1,220
2. Texas – 699
3. Pennsylvania – 470
4. New York – 445
5. Michigan – 450
6. Louisiana – 402
7. Illinois – 377
8. Georgia – 370
9. Ohio – 344
10. North Carolina – 335

This is insightful and also, this.

@bkcunningham You’d have to compare those numbers to the population of each state in order for those numbers to even matter. Of course California has high numbers, its population is over 38 million. I can’t find the per-capita list I’ve been referring to (still looking), but this article addresses it.

Aha! This isn’t the one I originally looked at, but it’ll do. California, New York, and Illinois are pretty low on that list, eh?

Out of those top ten on your link, @livelaughlove21, only two states are southern states. Taking it to the top 20 and it doesn’t get much better for the theory that most murders by guns happen in the south.

I should have said three.

@bkcunningham Huh?

Louisiana
Alabama
Mississippi
West Virginia
Tennessee

(That’s half of the top 10, by the way.)

And out to 20…

Arkansas
Oklahoma
South Carolina
Kentucky
Georgia
Florida

(Yep, more than half.)

We can argue all day about what states you consider southern, but my point was that the states with the big cities where you’d expect gang violence aren’t as high on this list as one might expect. And yes, Southern pro-gun states have very high gun homicide rates. Period.

West Virginia isn’t a southern state. Neither is Tennessee.

@bkcunningham According to the United States Census Bureau (and most that live in or have been to WV or TN), they certainly are. And, I’m sorry, but have you seen Tennessee on a map? That’s quite clearly the south.

I can see where you would get that Tennessee is a southern state, but not West Virginia. Did you know Hawaii is the most southern state on a map?

@bkcunningham Are you doing some sort of experiment on how long you can draw out a pointless argument? You’re really going on about one tiny state after I’ve proven you wrong on everything else you’ve said here? I’ll say it again – according to the United States Census Bureau (and the Association of American Geographers), WV is a southern state. Simple. I’m not arguing about a fact – it is what it is.

Umm… Hawaii is a Southern state, but Tennessee isn’t? Is this alternate-universe Fluther?

@glacial No one said Hawaii is a southern state, just that it was the most geographically southern state on a map. @bkcunningham was trying to make the point that just because a state is southern in location doesn’t mean it’s a “southern state.”

@livelaughlove21 Well sure… but the point is that being a “southern state” is not solely a question of geography, as you pointed out above.

True. Being Southern is a matter of attitude not latitude.

@rojo And if anyone here has been to West Virginia, you know it doesn’t get much more southern than that. My family is from there and they’re more country than the people down here in South Carolina.

@livelaughlove21 Humans inherently have the capability of violence in them, it is different for each person what it takes to release the anger into violence. That is why I and many others feel funding the mentally ill programs is so important, now more than ever.

As far as not taking much skill to harm someone with a gun, I’d beg to differ, unless you’re up close with a shotgun. Which is why a lot of us hunt and target practice with no intention of harming another human being ever. Not that I wouldn’t if my life were on the line, but thank God that hasn’t happened at this point.

Making laws that restrict automatics to law-abiding citizens, is not a bad thing, as most of us who own guns admit.

Projecting blame for child massacres and random shootings by the mentally ill on ALL gun owners is rather a crime in my opinion, and that’s why so many of us are trying to converse about this.

@KNOWITALL “Everyone has some bad in them” isn’t really an argument about gun control…

I’m sorry, but target practice is a little harder than going into a crowded place and shooting people. You may need skill to shoot one person or an object, but it doesn’t take much to cause casualties with a gun when there are multiple “targets” to hit. This is quite obviously true considering a great number of shooters have not previously been trained to shoot.

The mental health argument is such a cop-out, and a weak one at that. The first mistake is thinking anyone who shoots people is mentally ill. Just because you do a crazy thing doesn’t make you crazy. Some of these people are actually sick, yes, but assuming they all are is simply incorrect. That’s like saying all criminals are mentally ill. Nope.

Let’s say someone develops a mental illness, like schizophrenia, at 18 years old. Unless that person has proven themselves to be a direct threat to themselves or others, they have every right to refuse treatment and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. You can’t just toss someone in a mental hospital anymore. So, who’s to say these shooters show any sign of violence before the act in question? If they don’t, then by the time a judge or a psychiatrist can do anything about it, it’s already too late. Yet another reason why the mental health argument is weak. Many of these killers don’t have criminal records or a history of violence before they snap. It just happens.

Punishing all gun owners for the few bad ones, to me, is similar to taking a toy away from children because a few of them won’t share it. If you all can’t play nice, none of you get the toy. Sucks, but c’est la vie.

Does making someone pass a driver’s test and register their car take away their right to own and operate a vehicle? Just wondering why stricter gun control is taken as destroying a fundamental right.

@livelaughlove21 The White House, Obama and doctors across the nation are pointing to mental illness, it’s not just me and the NRA. I feel this discussion is over at this point, thanks.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/wh_now_is_the_time_full.pdf

@KNOWITALL It’s just as much of a cop-out for them as it was here.

So long.

@janbb Exactly.

@livelaughlove21 How about we make every effort at gun control as we are, AND consider mental illness may be a bigger deal than we think. Wouldn’t that be the best case scenerio?

@KNOWITALL I believe I said something along those lines a few comments ago. Addressing both, I mean. I’d never insinuate mental health doesn’t need any attention. I’m a psych major, after all.

I just don’t think it’s a bigger issue than it’s made out to be regarding gun violence. Quite the opposite. But it’s certainly a factor.

@KNOWITALL I’m happy with that solution. Funding for the mentally ill would help all mentally ill people – not just those who are violent.

@livelaughlove21 Great, I thought you were dismissing it like a lot of liberals, I’m happy to be wrong in that case. Peace.