[NYCFarmboy]

http://www.lubbockonline.com/stories...12403032.shtml

GEUDA SPRINGS, Kan. — Residents of this tiny south-central Kansas community have passed an ordinance requiring most households to have guns and ammunition.

Noncomplying residents would be fined $10 under the ordinance, passed 3-2 earlier this month by City Council members who thought it would help protect the town of 210 people. Those who suffer from physical or mental disabilities, paupers and people who conscientiously oppose firearms would be exempt.

"This ordinance fulfills the duty to protect by allowing each individual householder to provide for his or her protection," said Councilman John Brewer.

[einmakom]

This is just as wrong as legislation banning all firearms- government coercion is using a sledgehammer to drive screws.


This was tried in a town in Kennesaw, Georgia, and was wrong at that time too.

It was also tried in Virgin, Utah.

However well-meaning, it's a bad proposition to use government to coerce the public.

I believe in both prior cities, the ordinance was found illegal because the state legislature retains the power to pass gun-control laws not the cities.

[BRussell]

So what happens when a 6-year-old shoots himself with one of these required guns.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by BRussell:
So what happens when a 6-year-old shoots himself with one of these required guns.

Hopefully the nanny will use her gun to force the child to surrender peacefully.

[einmakom]

(sarcasm) Yeah, because there's no way people could ever actually be responsible with firearms. (/sarcasm)

It appears the Kennesaw law requiring ownership of firearms is still in effect, after all. It also appears that it has had a positive impact for that community, despite my objections to it on principle.

Apparently such widespread ownership has contributed to crime reduction, without the attendant 6 year old deaths.

Yes, there are times when gun accidents occur. There are many more accidents involving automobiles, airplanes, bathroom shower stalls and backyard swimming pools, however. And let's not forget that freedom is risky business. Freedom allows people to make mistakes recognizing that the alternative is worse._


http://www.kennesaw.ga.us/PoliceDepa...tatistics.aspx

Overall Crime for the City of Kennesaw is approx. half the state and national rates.

Burglary incidents are approx. half the state and national rates.

Violent Crime incidents are approx. four times less than the state and national rates.

http://www.kennesaw.ga.us/CodeOfOrdinances.aspx

The City's most famous ordinance adopted in March 1982 reads as follows. Click here for a link to the Police Department for statistical information on crime or contact the City Clerks office for additional information.


Sec. 34-1 Heads of households to maintain firearms.
(a) In order to provide for the emergency management of the City, and further in order to provide for and protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants, every head of household residing in the City limits is required to maintain a firearm, together with ammunition therefore.


(b) Exempt from the effect of this section are those heads of households who suffer a physical or mental disability, which would prohibit them from using such a firearm. Further exempt from the effect of this section are those heads of households who are paupers or who conscientiously oppose maintaining firearms as a result of beliefs or religious doctrine, or persons convicted of a felony.

Besides,

Former Florida Attorney General Jim Smith told legislators that police responded to only 200,000 of 700,000 calls for help._ When asked why so many_ Dade County citizens were buying guns he said,_____ "They damn well better, they've got to protect themselves."

[Shaddim]

Originally posted by BRussell:
So what happens when a 6-year-old shoots himself with one of these required guns.

Which is why people who own firearms need to teach their children proper gun safety at an early age.

[thunderous_funker]

We had a pretty good discussion of Kennesaw in a thread some months ago. As near as I can tell, their drop is crime has more to do with economics than the gun ordinance. Kennesaw is a very different place economically and demographically than it was some years ago.

I'm trying to use the search for the thread because we really got into details so you could see what I'm talking about.

And Virgin, UT is a collection of trailer homes on a patch of dirt in the middle of nowhere. I lived in the area and we shared a high school. The most exciting thing that ever happened in Virgin was when Johnny the indian kid got shot by his friends while they were shooting at jack-rabbits or beer bottles. He was fine, but he couldn't finish the football season and lots of people thought it was a contributing factor in losing the state championship that year.

<edited to add link>
http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...p;pagenumber=2

[petehammer]

Woah, woah, woah... T_F!

Are you saying small data sets, anecdotal evidence, and multiple other factors might be playing a role here?

No way... I refuse to believe it. Guns save lives, despite the fact that they are expressly designed to take them.

[Face Ache]

Originally posted by NYCFarmboy:
http://www.lubbockonline.com/stories...12403032.shtml

GEUDA SPRINGS, Kan. — Residents of this tiny south-central Kansas community have passed an ordinance requiring most households to have guns and ammunition.

Noncomplying residents would be fined $10 under the ordinance, passed 3-2 earlier this month by City Council members who thought it would help protect the town of 210 people. Those who suffer from physical or mental disabilities, paupers and people who conscientiously oppose firearms would be exempt.

"This ordinance fulfills the duty to protect by allowing each individual householder to provide for his or her protection," said Councilman John Brewer.

THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING!!!

The US was funny when it was just freaky. Now it's plain scary.

[theolein]

Has anyone here heard of the Internet time traveller John Titor? He would have been happy with this, coming from 2038 after a 10 year civil war between the gun owning "countryside" and the governmental thug "cities" and a Russian nuclear attack in 2015

[Millennium]

Originally posted by BRussell:
So what happens when a 6-year-old shoots himself with one of these required guns.

We will mourn. And we will take it as a lesson in the fact that kids need to be taught a healthy respect for guns, so that they will not become overly obsessive or overly fearful.

And life will go on.

[BRussell]

And no one sees anything wrong with the fact that this would be a gun that a parent was forced by the government to purchase? Yes, kids should be taught respect, everyone should be careful, etc. But it's harder to blame the family, it seems to me, when they were required by the gov't to purchase the gun that killed the kid.

IMO, the evidence shows that your risk increases when you have a gun in the home, not your safety. Yeah yeah, there's lots of research and debate back and forth about that, and I've done that before here many times. But at the very minimum, it's debatable.

It seems to me that requiring that people have something in their home that is quite possibly a danger to them is government gone very, very bad.

[thunderous_funker]

Maybe the government should require everyone to own a Pit-Bull?

[einmakom]

Originally posted by BRussell:
And no one sees anything wrong with the fact that this would be a gun that a parent was forced by the government to purchase?

Read up. I put forth that as my objection on principle in the second and fifth posts in this thread.

Government coercion is wrong, even when it aims to make the public safer. Freedom is risky, and I'm willing to take that risk.

[finboy]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
We had a pretty good discussion of Kennesaw in a thread some months ago. As near as I can tell, their drop is crime has more to do with economics than the gun ordinance. Kennesaw is a very different place economically and demographically than it was some years ago.

So crime is dependent upon economic and demographic factors? I think that when the NRA says that, they get ridiculed or called racists.

MacNStein's comment is appropriate: every child needs to know gun safety, EVEN those who live in homes without guns. Once again, society relies upon parents to take some personal initiative and BE PARENTS.

Requiring gun ownership is just as bad as banning it, IMO. There are plenty of morons out there who don't need to be owning guns. Is it a violation of civil liberty? No more than a draft would be; it's based upon the same idea. In fact, it may be more Constitutional (I can't believe I qualified that word) than a draft, since it's clearly right there in the 2nd Amendment.

[finboy]

Originally posted by BRussell:
But at the very minimum, it's debatable.

Agreed. The debate continues because there are folks out there who shouldn't have access to guns (b/c they're irresponsible, or don't know how to behave with/around one). "Dumb" shootings bias the statistics.

[teszeract]

Originally posted by MacNStein:
Which is why people who own firearms need to teach their children proper gun safety at an early age.

Hmmm. Reminds me of those parachute tests.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by finboy:
So crime is dependent upon economic and demographic factors? I think that when the NRA says that, they get ridiculed or called racists.

Its racist to link crime and poverty? News to me. I thought it was patently obvious to everyone.

Kennesaw was literally transformed from a low-income manufacturing town to a medium to high income suburban sub-division due to local commercial investment and Altanta's big boom. Education levels changed, age demographics changed (lots of retirees), as did employment levels. Homeownership is also significantly higher.

Seems to me that the relatively marginal changes in their crime statistics have a lot more to do with Kennesaw's newfound prosperity than with its gun ordinance.

[SimeyTheLimey]

an ordinance requiring most households to have guns and ammunition.

This would be an ordinance ordinance?