Beto says the quiet part out loud.

[Makeshift Python]

Yes. There's also a history of people just accepting this, because they know with modern technology, any chance of overthrowing a well-entrenched entity like the state with the support of military and full access to the wide range of infrastructure and backed up by tanks, heavy guns, jets, aircraft carriers, and heavy ordnances ranging up to nuclear capability, that the ordinary person stands no chance. So most just go with the flow.

Sensible post.

[Admiral X]

You seem to keep thinking that this would be conventional warfare, like the Civil War, but that wouldn't be the case. Why you keep thinking that? Do you think people still line up in ranks and shoot at each other, too? And they aren't going to use nukes, because they'd literally be shooting themselves if they did so.

As for why most people go along with the flow, it's mainly because they are comfortable enough, and resistance would be hard. They have jobs, homes, bills to pay. But if any of that was made to difficult to maintain...

[Yukaphile]

You also just assume people would get involved. Most people would not, even with an underground resistance leading terror attacks on the police state. How often have we seen that in nations like Germany and Russia? They tried to stop it, but most people were too terrified to get involved. They knew the consequences, and they didn't wanna suffer, or have their families targeted. Of those that did, I applaud them for it, but of those who chose not to, I can't blame them and I certainly won't demonize them the way lots of people try to do with their political agendas. No, I've said it over and over. People don't want freedom. They just want the illusion of freedom to make themselves feel better while they glut themselves upon luxury, indulgence, and the lie of comfort and security.

[Yukaphile]

Besides, you severely underestimate how damned efficient a police state is. They try to change how their citizens think, playing the generational game. It's more of this cowboy-styled "we're rebels fighting to MAKE RIGHT THROUGH MIGHT to get justice" mentality I was rolling my eyes at. It's what clearspira has talked about before with our gun culture. It goes back to our roots and it's a serious flaw we are not addressing. It feeds into an illusion of security, a way to protect yourself, that is not always consistent to reality and is in fact damaging to subscribe to when it ignores the way history has showed these things play out.

[Nealithi]

Gun control laws. I think the 'Well Regulated' portion should mean you have to be trained and certified federally to own a gun. Because there are in fact stupid people out there.

I'd agree to an extent, but if requiring an ID represents a poll tax, requiring someone pay for some kind of Federal certification to exercise a right would be in the same vein. On top of that, it kind of misses the point of the Second Amendment acting as a kind of check against the government by having the government hand out licenses for it. This is why I'm more in favor of having a kind of graduated set of courses for gun safety in schools.

As to the home defense dispute. While I choose to not own a gun to defend my home. I accept others do. And claiming that a gun is not a 100% protection is spurious. Do you have locks on your doors? They are not 100% either. But it is a defense.
The police are not on the street to protect you. That was even stated in a court case. They can arrest someone that harms you after the fact. But not prevent it. So having a weapon in those instances seems a good idea. I prefer knives, but that stems from a previous point I had about stupid people.

Well we agree on some things at least.

While I see your point on not wanting a fee and long list of everyone with a gun sitting around. Thus the government tracking all potentials. Or blocking access by setting the fees so high only the wealthiest could afford them. I want across the nation standards. Why? Because someone going to a show in NYC obeyed every law of their home state. Every TSA regulation on the transport of their gun to be used in a competition and fully secured. Got arrested in NYC because they still violated laws of the place they entered. That to me is pure BS. Obey the rules and still wrong and prosecuted? No.

As to us agreeing. I think on this topic we may be agreeing more than you think. I am middle of the road. I may choose not to own a firearm. But I also do not wish to preclude your right to do so either. My only concerns being to reduce the rate of accidents and sprees. But in a manner with as little chance of abuse as possible.

[CmdrKing]

All this tells me is that you don't understand more conservatively minded people very well.

Trump has already successfully, and with stated intent to accelerate, removed rights from citizens based on identity, and if anything only improved his standing among supporters.

2019 conservatives fail to understand the severity of their own positions.

[Yukaphile]

Again, Admiral X, please don't underestimate citizen apathy and institutionalized efficiency in a police state. I know you gotta be smarter than that. If it's just your dream to see people rising up in rebellion and overthrowing a police state, fine. Dream it all you want. But it ain't happening in reality.

[Yukaphile]

I mean, fuck, Nazi Germany was overthrown from without and the USSR slowly decelerated from its Nazi Germany twin practices into something more reasonable over time, and thanks only to the changes undertaken by those in power. NOT the average citizen.

[Makeshift Python]

You also just assume people would get involved. Most people would not, even with an underground resistance leading terror attacks on the police state. How often have we seen that in nations like Germany and Russia? They tried to stop it, but most people were too terrified to get involved. They knew the consequences, and they didn't wanna suffer, or have their families targeted. Of those that did, I applaud them for it, but of those who chose not to, I can't blame them and I certainly won't demonize them the way lots of people try to do with their political agendas. No, I've said it over and over. People don't want freedom. They just want the illusion of freedom to make themselves feel better while they glut themselves upon luxury, indulgence, and the lie of comfort and security.

Yup. If people had to choose between the real world and the Matrix they'd sooner stay in the Matrix.

[Yukaphile]

-waves arm about excitedly-

And that is our future now that Internet hook-ups to the brain are perhaps only a few generations away.