LarryP wrote:What good would they do you if they were banned/required to be turned in? Couldn't use them anywhere, or let people know you have them. You'd be in jail before you knew what hit you.
Larry, there is so much wrong with that statement it's not even funny.
I will die on my feet before I will live on my knees for any god, government or individual. I don't fear death, but I do fear imprisonment, tyranny, crimes against freedom and humanity, and other things along those lines. If "they" come for my guns, I will fight them. No, I would not fight them for my guns, because those are just tools to use for the greater cause of freedom; and it is that freedom which I would fight for by using those tools. Those tools protect our freedoms. As has been said so many times, the second amendment protects the first.
I am in no hurry to give up my life, but a life without freedom is not worth living. Yes, the government would kill me most likely, but I'd die a free man for a cause I believe is greater than myself or my own life. I'm sure you're saying how do you know what you'd do when the time comes, if it comes? Well, let me tell a true story.....
I realize that what follows is not exactly on the same level as what I'm talking about above, nor is it equal to someone doing brave actions in war, but my story which follows is equal in the sense that I put something I believed in to be greater than myself, which in this case, was my family. So prefacing that, here we go........
When I was 5 years old some "kidnappers" came into our house and grabbed one of my sisters. Now they were really friends of one of my sisters who was turning 18 at the time in 1973, but this inside job and connection was unknown to me. My other family members were in on it, but I wasn't. Who figured to tell the 5 year old kid, right? So what did I do as my family watched? First for a few seconds, I was in disbelief at their inaction, then a few seconds later, I attacked 3 almost grown men because they were attacking my family. I know now that I wasn't at risk of getting killed then, but at the time, that though crossed my mind - and I still went for it - because I put my sister, my family over my own life. I believed in something greater than myself, and that's the point of relaying this story is that I've done it before and would do it again for something I felt so strongly about.
Would I do it again?
You bet your life I would. Every single time.
The 2A is so the people can protect themselves from a tyrannical government because we learned our lesson once when we paid for our freedom with the blood of patriots who fought in revolution for the freedom to live as they choose. We and our freedoms already die a thousand deaths of little paper cuts in the forms of laws and other things in which we so willing give for the sake of "freedom" and "safety" and "Anti-Terrorism".
We all must draw the line for ourselves, but if "they" tried to put people in camps, to take away our guns, to force use to be registered with tattooed arms, to give up our children, to be forced into servitude, yes, I would fight, and I would probably die, but either way, I would be free.
I do not worry about the big battles such as these happening, because if they happen, I will fight.
It is the little battles, the one more law, the one more restriction, the freedoms we have being legislated away one at a time, much more subversive, much more silent, but just as deadly....and for these things, we must fight as well.
I see far too much fear around here about not making waves, trying to fly under the radar, fear, uncertainty and doubt about the taking of guns, etc. There is a time and place for that, and then there is not. I am not proposing any kind of revolution other than the one that is needed to take place inside each and every one of us right now.
Larry, ya struck a nerve with me.
Maybe people on here think I'm being an Internet tough guy, but rest assured, I am not. I'm sure someone will disagree, flame, etc, and I don't care, but I do care about our freedoms and I hope I will never need to prove my words here, not out of fear that I won't act, but rather that I had to.
Yes, they will take my gun when they pry it from my cold dead hands; but they will not ever take me. They will not own me, they will not supress me, they will not take my freedom.