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doctorno wrote: I do not know why private persons are allowed to own guns anyway.

This is the consensus among Europeans in general, and a practical and sensible notion it is. But I don't know if it's possible to extricate guns from the American national DNA. We love our guns, even though they are obsolete and troublesome on a practical level they are symbols to us that even though they no longer serve us we don't want to part with our rights to have them. I don't want to start a gun debate because opinions are too strong on both sides to start in here about it. I'm just naming the obvious fact that, for what it's worth, guns are a deeply embedded aspect of our collective psyche here in America.

kiramdear wrote:This is the consensus among Europeans in general, and a practical and sensible notion it is.

Unfortunately it is not a consensus over here. We had a school shooting in Germany a few weeks ago, where a 17 year old "borrowed" a revolver from his father that was lying around in his bedroom. This kid killed 3 teachers, about 12 fellow students, some other people walking by and finally himself. After that there was a huge discussion in Germany once again why the possession of guns is still allowed for private persons. You know what, ALL the politicians of the major political parties in Germany defended the possession of guns. The media reported that more than 7 million guns are in the private possession of the 82 million people living in Germany right now - and these are only the guns that are legally possessed. I just cannot understand why. In my opinion policemen and soldiers should be the only ones allowed to use guns. And not even they should be allowed to take them home.

Unbelievable that things are so in Germany. I believe in Netherlands they are still very strict with shooting crimes being very rare and always shocking to everyone. But maybe this has changed, too.

kiramdear wrote:Unbelievable that things are so in Germany. I believe in Netherlands they are still very strict with shooting crimes being very rare and always shocking to everyone. But maybe this has changed, too.

In the Netherlands almost everything is regulated with much more common sense. They are very liberal with certain things that do not really hurt anybody, such as drug abuse, regulations for private businesses, regulations for architecture and building and things like that. But concerning some important things, rules in the Netherlands are very strict. This concerns gun possession as well as social regulations, rules for health care a.s.o. I am living only 15 kms from the Dutch border. If my Dutch was better and teachers would get better pay in the Netherlands, I had immigrated long ago. Unfortunately teachers do earn only a fraction of the salary there that I get in Germany, and Germans are still viewed with a lot of prejudice and suspicion by the older generation of the people in Holland ... because of the war crimes in World War II.

By the way ... unfortunately everyone who wants to possess a gun in the Netherlands can easily get it in Belgium.

I lived in Den Haag for some years when I was a student, and I enjoyed the society there so much that I didn't want to leave. But I found the Dutch language is horribly difficult to speak correctly, though I did gain proficiency eventually I was quite the laughingstock at first

doctorno wrote:Germans are still viewed with a lot of prejudice and suspicion by the older generation of the people in Holland ... because of the war crimes in World War II.

This is true, I'm here to tell you. I was shocked to see the attitude of Germany's neighbors, among not only the older but also with three generations after the war.

kiramdear wrote:I lived in Den Haag for some years when I was a student, and I enjoyed the society there so much that I didn't want to leave. But I found the Dutch language is horribly difficult to speak correctly, though I did gain proficiency eventually I was quite the laughingstock at first

Yes, the most difficult thing is that almost everybody in the Netherlands speaks much better English and German than you speak Dutch. So they always laugh and then they speak your language.

doctorno wrote:
By the way ... unfortunately everyone who wants to possess a gun in the Netherlands can easily get it in Belgium.

Yeah, who'd believe that Belgium was such a wild and wooly place? It's where the Dutch go to play.

kiramdear wrote:This is true, I'm here to tell you. I was shocked to see the attitude of Germany's neighbors, among not only the older but also with three generations after the war.

Well I have never experienced this personally by younger people in the Netherlands, Belgium and France. But occassionally you get the impression, that they are more impatient, if you appear to be German, that they do treat you "cold" ... the funny thing is that you can experience just the opposite in Ireland. I was visiting Ireland when I was 18 and some younger Irishmen thought that I was English and got very angry. When I told them that I was German they suddenly were my best friends.

What a world!

To be serious: this is why the European Union is such a great and such a very, very important thing. People who killed each other just 65 years ago are now sharing the same market, the same currency - and ... they have always shared the same values, the same culture, the same religion, the same music, almost the same philosophy and almost the same literature. Let´s hope we get this thing right this time.

Very well said. I agree completely. As the world contracts around us our viewpoint must expand and rise above the squabbling.

Gun control is a VERY difficult issue even if you dislike guns, like me. I hate 'em, I hate shooting 'em, but I don't know that they should be 100% stripped from the citizenry. There are valid arguments and statistics on both sides. In any case I know plenty of people who own guns that maybe shouldn't. But how do you qualify that? I also believe a number of people shouldn't be allowed to have kids, but who am I to say who should and who shouldn't? It's tough.

cassius987 wrote:I know plenty of people who own guns that maybe shouldn't. But how do you qualify that?

All people are not allowed to possess drugs. How do you qualify that? A kid who uses heroin only kills himself, a kid who uses a revolver might kill 18 others - like the one in Germany did recently. And how do you qualify that? If it is legitimate to banish all drugs, it is also legitimate to banish all weapons, especially as they are much more dangerous for completely innocent victims.