the right to carry arms? f*** you!

Steve,
thx for your intel.

May I ask another question?

When I go shopping to Leuven, Hasselt, Gent (3 major cities in Flanders) I have a hard time to find a gunshop. For me this is normal in a community where owning a gun is considered as: "why should I?"

When I see reports from within the States I see MANY gunshops and they are PACKED with guns... not only the small ones but BIG guns with the hundreds....

Isn't it a matter of how people grow up? When I see videos or pictures from kids/teens who get guns as a present for X-mas my stomache turns....

There is no question that the US has a different attitude, concerning all things firearms, than the rest of the world.

My Grandfather was a gun smith. I was given my first gun as a Christmas present when I was 10. I was expected to be responsible for all things concerning that weapon.

When I went hunting it was up to me to contact the land owner. It was my responsibility to use good judgement with it. I had access to dozens of weapons from age 10 on. My Grandfather had a large collection of firearms. Many of them military weapons. I've shot several types of WWII firearms from various nations. While in the service I shot more military type of weapons including machine guns.

The issue is that I've yet to kill my first person and no gun I've ever owned has killed a person. Nor did the weapons I was issued in the military ever kill a person while they are assigned to me.

That's why so many Americans are quick to point out that guns don't kill people. People kill people.

There are literally millions of gun owners in the US and only a very small percentage of those every use a fire arm in a fashion that is not responsible.

In the US I would think that gun ownership is broken down into something like this:

80% for hunting. Very few automatic weapons or pistols in that group. Most owned by people in rural areas.

15% for personal defense. Not counting those who own guns primarily for hunting, because those can be used in self defense as well, but just talking about those who own the gun specifically for self defense. Most of these people live in urban areas. These include a lot of hand guns. Some assault weapons and shot guns.

5% for personal freedoms from the government. This group is very heavily armed and has large supplies of ammunition and multiple weapons of large caliber and military style assault weapons.

As I said before the US is a very different society when it comes to gun ownership.

The issue is not the gun ownership. It's what happens when someone that is mentally unstable gets a gun and wants to use it for a violent purpose. I'm not sure what the answer is but making schools something other than defenseless has got to happen. Whatever it takes, we have to make it so dangerous for a shooter that they choose another target. The last 2 shootings have been with guns the shooters didn't buy or own. Tighter restrictions wouldn't have stopped them from happening. The last one was against firemen. They shoot at people that can't shoot back then when police respond they kill themselves.

Not sure what the answer is. It's not a simple problem to solve.

Good Hunting.

MR

See there you get my point, how can FN sell so many guns (besides the hunting rifles and police/army) thats falling into the hands of criminals?
Because we have governments that allowed them to, why, its big bussiness.
Guns and power go together, selling guns mean big profit and with that profit comes power.......

Today 2 guys got killed in Amsterdam, probably a criminal action, firefights in the middle of town with automatic weapons.(probably AK's)
2 motorcops were shot at as well when they tried to follow one of the suspects cars.
And here is the biggest problem we face in Holland.
Policeofficers only carry a small sidearm, the Wather PKK.
We have mp5's like most other countries, but the average policeman is not allowed to carry that weapon anymore.
We expect the government to protect us but that same governments justice department has a lot of left winged politicians who think that guns are dangerous.
They ordered that the new policeofficer should be able to solve problems with his mouth.....violence is something dirty.
If you draw your weapon today you have to fill in thousands of papers why you did that, and may god help you if you fire a single round with that gun.
In contradiction to a criminal who is unguilty until proven otherwise a policeofficer here is always guilty untill proven otherwise.
Even I as security have to fill in a lot of paperwork whhen we have to use violence to get a violent guy out of  a stadium.
Every criminal knows that, they get better armed every day they even use bodyarmor.
Our officers dont go out anymore to those calls unless they are with many together. (nice example is the massacre at Alphen)
Number of killings will rise and I think that the illegal handling and selling of guns will rise as well, simply cause we dont have to expect help from the police anymore.