jdege wrote:Markemp wrote:A licensing requirement for semi-auto weapons doesn't infringe on your freedom. Regulation is not the opposite of freedom.
Allowing the government to control who does or doesn't, or even to know who has or hasn't, is the end of freedom.
If you only see the world in black and white, I can see how you can come to this conclusion. But the world isn't like that. There are a million steps in between where we are and locking up all gun owners (which would include me, by the way). I'm sure we're about to start down the "slippery slope" part of these discussions, but those are just silly and intellectually dishonest. Let's not go there.
We could talk about freedom in the vein of smoking bans in restaurants, or drunk driving, or speech. But most people don't seem to consider regulations on those to be infringing their freedoms.
Let me put it this way: Regulations and laws aren't the loss of freedom. They are the balances between all people's freedoms.