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Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
Guns are not a part of the culture of my homeland, except perhaps for the occasional Bollywood movie in which the bad guy meets his demise staring down the wrong end of a barrel.
My childhood in India was steeped in ahimsa, the tenet of nonviolence toward all living things.
The Indians may have succeeded in ousting the British, but we won with Gandhian-style civil disobedience, not a revolutionary war.
I grew up not knowing a single gun owner, and even today India has one of the strictest gun laws on the planet. Few Indians buy and keep firearms at home, and gun violence is nowhere near the problem it is in the United States. An American is 12 times more likely than an Indian to be killed by a firearm, according to a recent study.
It's no wonder then that every time I visit India, my friends and family want to know more about America's "love affair" with guns.
I get the same questions when I visit my brother in Canada or on my business travels to other countries, where many people remain perplexed, maybe even downright mystified, by Americans' defense of gun rights.
I admit I do not fully understand it myself, despite having become an American citizen nearly a decade ago. So when I learn the National Rifle Association is holding its annual convention here in Atlanta, right next to the CNN Center, I decide to go and find out more.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/28/world/indian-immigrant-nra-convention/index.html
(Score: 5, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday May 04 2017, @11:02AM (16 children)
Wouldn't it be nice if all Americans could be arsed to keep a mind open enough to try and understand the other side like this? I mean her mind may or may not be changed but at least she sees the other side of the debate as human beings who could possibly know something she doesn't. Very well done piece.
In before someone calls bullshit irony. I do listen and attempt to understand other people's positions. It's only after doing so that I feel justified in calling them fucking morons. There are plenty of people I don't think are morons, just wrong. It's just not really worth bringing up in those cases; they're perfectly within their rights to be wrong as long as they're not wrongly trying to infringe on my rights.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @02:44PM (2 children)
Sorry mighty bud, that article is one big subtweet about american gun derangement.
It is dripping with sarcastic dogwhistles that right wingers can't hear because to them everything she says is considered totally normal.
Few people here look like me. Most appear to be white and male. Many view the media, including my employer, with disdain -- and they do not hesitate to let me know.
Yes, a wine club for the almost 5 million members of the organization.
Brickell "Brooke" Clark, otherwise known as the American Gun Chic. She has a website by that name and also a YouTube channel. Both are bathed in hues of pink and dedicated to her recently formed passion for guns.
"I own 10 guns. I have a 14-year-old son. I started teaching him to shoot when he was 5.
In a way, I understand her position. My first real exposure to guns came after I embedded with the US Army and Marines to report the Iraq War.
... What if I were the last one alive? How would I save myself?
I grew up in a city that now brims with some 16 million people on a working day. Firing guns in my grandfather's garden would not have been a good thing.
"How many guns do you own?" I ask.
"Not enough," he replies.
"You idiots," Adams says, referring to all people of color.
She wants to protect her family, but she is tired of the eternal violence plaguing her land. She wishes now that every gun would disappear from Iraq.
And those are only the most obvious examples.
She compares being a soldier at war to living in an upscale city suburb and doesn't have to say its ridiculous to think they are at all equivalent.
Her mention of british colonialism of india was masterful. All indians know Gandhi's non-violence was the strategy that made india free, not fighting.
Similarly when the white guy says gun control was about repressing blacks, she doesn't have to mention that civil rights legislation was accomplished not by force but by Dr King's strategy of non-violence.
Once again the elitist liberal press mocks and disrespects conservatives. She was just too cowardly to laugh in your face, instead snickering in a safe-space that most conservatives don't even realize exists.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:31PM (1 child)
You:
Article:
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @04:46PM
His genes may be mixed.
But when he starts talking about pocs as "you" rather than "we" its clear he's fully adopted white culture.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @02:47PM (11 children)
... especially when the immigrants come from countries like India, where there is an entirely different, diametrically opposing world view on matters such as the Second Amendment.
The governments of the United States are founded on the principle that there must be checks and balances between the powers; one of those checks and balances is the right of The People to keep and bear arms—the governments only exist as long as The People choose not to overthrown them with yet another violent revolution (and, no, it's not worthless in the face of a modern military; most military men would side with The People, and the military has proved over the last decade that it cannot fight well against guerrilla militias).
The more third-world people invited to the United States, the less this understanding of checks and balances will be respected; slowly but surely, the shifting population will vote to transfer ever more power from the individual to the State.
Blech!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @02:57PM (9 children)
I can't think of anything more un-american than to say american principles aren't good enough to convince anyone else of their value and correctness.
I think us real americans need to kick your traitorous ass out of the country.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:21PM (7 children)
It is simply a fact that principles are enforced by people who appreciate those principles—if you change The People, then you change the principles.
There's a reason that the third world struggles to implement even the most basic ideas of a Jeffersonian representative democracy; the institutions of such a government have more-or-less worked in the United States not because the principles are inherently workable, but rather because The People appreciate those principles.
NEWS FLASH: The United States Government wasn't created by Indians.
When humanity finally achieves civilization, there won't be a government. How is that for "un-American"?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @04:49PM
Again you proclaim that you have no faith in the inherent superiority of american principles.
If that's true, then we should welcome better ones.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday May 04 2017, @06:04PM (3 children)
I'm sorry, but humans need governments to exist peaceably in dense populations. Actually, even to exist peaceably in sparse populations, but in sparse populations encounters are less frequent, so government is less important. But do note that the murder rate among the Kalahari bushmen was found to be higher than the rate in the Detroit slums. (I'm not the one who picked out Detroit, it was in the original article I read.)
OTOH, the above cited figure isn't quite correct, as the "civilized" murder rate doesn't include those killed in war or by other governmental actions. There may be other problems with it.
People change their nature quite slowly, but the environment within which that nature manifests itself changes rapidly. So I don't expect people to become inherently peaceful, but hope that environmental changes will cause them to react peacefully. Of course, peace can come at too high a price, but as various technologies become more powerful we will eventually find the alternatives of peacefullness or extinction. We're actually already at that point, but currently it's only the large groups (powerful nations) that can unleash extinction. This is in the process of changing. It's is actually probable at this point in time that a medium sized country or a major corporation could unleash extinction on humanity if it really worked at it for a decade. Most of them, though, find other goals more enticing. But as the technologies become more powerful, smaller groups will have the ability to use them.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @07:24PM (1 child)
WRONG
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @09:44PM
Well, you convinced me!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @12:13AM
government is the biggest killer of humanity yet you claim it would be worse without them. you're a slave.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @11:17PM (1 child)
When humanity finally becomes angels, there won't be a government.
FTFY
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @09:52AM
Then why do we have human government? Your argument is nonsequitur: "humans are not angels, so we need government ruled by humans".
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 05 2017, @11:57PM
I can't think of anything more un-american than to say american principles aren't good enough to convince anyone else of their value and correctness.
The obvious rebuttal here is the fact that those other parts of the world aren't already embracing better practices. That's a strong indication that American principles can be much better and still not be good enough to convince someone else.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @12:10AM
the truth is flamebait!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 06 2017, @05:12PM
Hahahahahahjaha yaaaaaa
You, open minded... Of COURSE this is a statement made in a story where someone is trying to come closer to your perspective. Your such a fucking douche.