</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">Originally posted by tacfoley:
<strong> </font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">Originally posted by panda:</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva"></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">No, that was my statement.
<strong> </font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva"> </font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">As enacted by the Parliament, the UK firearms law accurately reflects the will of the majority of their electorate, even as it betrays their inalienable individual rights. What they need is a written constitution to protect them from the tyranny of the majority.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva"><strong>Dear Mr Panda - your comment above needs some clarification from a sufferer under those laws, I think. UK firearms law most certainly does NOT reflect the will of the majority of the electorate since the issue has NEVER been put to a vote. No has it EVER been put to a vote of any kind. Legislation in THIS democracy is imposed on the population by the government. The people are not asked if they think it's a good idea, they are TOLD that it is a good idea.
Democracy? Yeah.........</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">The British system of parliamentary sovereignty is the very definition of representative democracy.
<strong> </font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">As for inalienable individual rights, the right to bear arms is NOT part of the constitution that we do not have. You can be certain that if we DID have such a constitution, the right to bear arms would most certainly NOT be part of it. It's all very well and good for you ALL to pontificate at great lengths about the way it is where YOU all live, how great it is to have fireams [as we all know], and how it is the right of every person to defend themselves by force of arms. But it simply does not apply here in UK. I have never had to have four or five weapons stashed around my house to ensure my personal survival if the goblins got in, never had to carry a firearm to protect myself on the streets, or where I live, in the winding country lanes. I am 58 years old, and I have never seen a person who has been shot dead or even injured by a firearm, except in Northern Ireland, where circumstance have been made very different by a bloody war of terrorism over the last 30 of years. Most of you on this site seem to have either had to defend yourselves from the acts of criminals by either shooting or threatening to shoot them, almost on a daily basis. That is the American Way of life. Here in UK it is NOT the UK way of life. Please accept that things ARE different here, and let it go. I am getting tired of trying to justify my continued reason for not going more public and screaming the place down to get my guns back, and demanding that the government returns the many guns it took away from me and my shooting colleagues. It will never happen. Ever. As one poster stated most graphically - ALL the handguns taken from us are less then the number of guns in his small county of Texas. Our pathetic little collection of handguns, probably less than 250,000 in total, get lost every day in the USA without anybody noticing. Why? Because there nearly 'everybody' has a gun. Here, hardly ANYBODY at all had a gun. Of any kind. Ever.
People like me, who do have guns, are rare. 1 in 1500 or so, if you want quoteable figures. This present government, or any future government here would be more than happy to see that figure change to 1 in a million, or even better, none in 63 million. Then only the criminals would have guns.
Live with it. I do. In our particular circumstances, leaving here is not an option.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana,Tahoma,Arial,Helvetica,Geneva">I must be blunt, because life is brief. You appear to know next to nothing about the traditional rights of British subjects. My time is running short, so I can only offer a reading suggestion in lieu of providing personal explanations. Read Joyce Lee Malcolm, To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right. If a trip to the library is too much trouble, a more or less accurate synopsis is available online at
http://www.davekopel.com/2A/LawRev/It_Isn't_About_Duck_Hunting.htm