Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Wolfgang
Date: 20 Sep 04 - 05:26 PM

Outlawing liquor worked, didn't it?

Good example, Clint. It did decrease the use of it, didn't it?

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 02:04 AM

"Outlawing liquor worked, didn't it?

Good example, Clint. It did decrease the use of it, didn't it?"

I don't really know. I haven't seen any statistics, and I don't know how you'd get reliable ones. There was a lot of homebrew around, and those people, like my grandfather, may not have gotten into the statistics. I don't know how you'd get figures on speakeasy/bootlegger sales.

I do know that it was a great boon to Al Capone and the boys. It was difficult to get a conviction for bootlegging. Jurys didn't like to convict, and lots of cops and judges were bought. Institutionalized corruption, almost.

I once looked through the arrest records in my hometown, and a lot of people who were community leaders at that time had convictions for liquor violations. This was in the '50's.

I would imagine that it cut down on drinking by some casual drinkers, but not by alcoholics. But it also made drinking seem daring and glamorous, so no doubt some drank beause it was cool, like I did in my teens. Cary Grant and William Powell drank dashingly, right after repeal at least. I haven't checked dates to see if any of them were speakeasy scenes.

When I was a kid Sherman Billingsley's Stork Club was a symbol of sophisticated cool, and it had been a symbol of cool when it was a speakeasy and Billingsley was a bootleger, too.

Then there were people drinking wood alcohol after filtering it through a loaf of bread in the belief that it would "purify" it. And that sort of thing.

50 years ago it was illegal for the Indians -- Native Americans -- to drink and I don't think it cut down their consumption here, and it increased the drinking of wood alcohol and such. Of course that's "anecdotal, " like a lot of this post.

The analogy with drugs at present and homosexuality in the recent past is really better, but people are more emotional about drugs and homosexuality than alcohol. Like guns. Lots of people want things prohibited because it's "right," whether it stops them or not. Especially legislators, who like to pass laws to indicate disapproval, whether or not they work.

clint

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 02:14 AM

--And even if someone can't get a gun doesn't mean he can't or won't kill. Although it may be comforting to get killed with a rock instead of a gun.

I heard a medical examiner say he thought there were a good many murders by automobile, becuse an observant villain would notice that deaths by car are almost invariably considered accidents and not investigated for homicide.

We need a cultural change, and it won't be quick. You can't pass a law requiring it.

clint

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: beardedbruce
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 02:30 AM

GUEST,Frank

"If assault weapons were not on the street and illegal handguns, there would be a decrease in gun violence in the US which is greater here than any other country in the world. "


Assault weapons are fully automatic, and thus already illegal for most of us to own. Illegal handguns are, by definition, illegal. How would passing any more laws change the number or availability?


And what country requires it's adult male citizens to keep fully automatic weapons at home? I guess the Swiss have the highest murder rate in the world?

Of course, if you really want to reduce the crime rate, just outlaw freedom of the press, and freedom of religion: All part of the same bill of rights. Keep everyone locked up, and remember that anything not required is forbidden...

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Wolfgang
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:00 AM

Clint,

to a short and debatable analogy I gave a short and debatable response. I'm glad you did not respond in kind.

I agree that a decrease wil only be observed in a part of the population and perhaps not in the problematic part of the population. I agree as well that prohibiting something will not shut off the demand but canalise it into the illegal part of the community (Al Capone etc.).

Therefore, since the access to legal guns is very difficult in Germany, I would have to turn to illegal sources if ever I felt a need for a gun. But that is true for anything that is illegal. And there is no country in this world in which nothing is illegal.

Look at sex with children, for instance. It is illegal in each country I know. But there is a demand for that illegal activity. So whoever thinks that they need to do that whatever the consequences has to turn to criminals in order to get what they want. This consideration will not bring us to make sex with children legal, so the poor kids are at least not in the hands of criminals.

A very extreme example I know, but I only want to make the point that the assessment whether the advantages and disadvantages of making something legal/illegal have to be discussed on a case by case basis and not by analogies.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Wolfgang
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:05 AM

(what an incomprehensible sentence)
read my last sentence as: ...but I only want to make the point that the assessment whether there are more advantages or disadvantages of making something legal/illegal have to be discussed on a case by case basis and not by analogies.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:11 AM

As Moore has pointed out, and someone mentioned above, the level of gun violence in the US has nothing to do with the legality or illegality of various types of guns. It has to do with our culture of violence, and the worship of violence as the preferred means of settling a grievance and/or evening up the score. Vengeance is a widely shared value in the US.

We all have our guns in the US. No one has ever stopped Americans from owning guns, legally or illegally. It has also given us the highest murder rate in the world, especially among children.

Makes you proud, doesn't it, that our guns make us so safe that we have the highest murder rate in the world?

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:35 AM

Another brilliant uses of statistics:

Most automobile accident injuries occur within 25 miles of home at speeds less that 30 mph. Therefore, when you get near home, speed up.

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Amos
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:43 AM

What works pretty well, right now, is registering automobiles from manufacture through their whole life cycle. I don't really know if it reduces the number of vehicles abuses, actually, but I assume it does, since reckless drivers can be traced by their plates.

A

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Wolfgang
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 02:42 PM

TIA,

nice example. Other solution: never park closer than 25 ml away from home. (Somehow I have the impression that really would reduce the number of accidents though for different reasons)

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: Nerd
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 03:20 PM

bb,

as I've pointed out on another thread, several US government agencies recognize the existence of SEMI-Automatic assuault weapons.

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Frank
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 03:57 PM

Brucie,

People do have assault rifles in their homes. They are stolen and sold on the streets. No locked gun cabinet is secure enough. If they weren't available, this would help stop their proliferation. Perhaps next we should advocate freedom to own hand grenades. Where does this stop?

As to prohibition, the logic is this. We prohibit crime. Does this mean that we should lift the ban on murder, rape, arson, fraud, drunk driving etc.because if we don't people will do it more? That's crazy.

As to the effect of the media on the masses, it has become more and more irrelevant in its journalistic accuracy.

As to the Second Amendment, there are no well-ordered militias today that need to defend against foreign invaders. The so-called right to gun ownership is questionable.

Guest,

Micheal Moore is only doing what Fox News does 24/7. The only difference is that in my opinion, Moore is far more factual and accurate.
And fair and balanced.

As to Charlton Heston, he knew what he was getting in to. He's been in show business for years. He represents one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington and was selected as its spokesperson precisely because he knows what he was doing.

Frank

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 04:53 PM

Wolfgang

I can't quite get the words sorted out, but

There is a difference between prohibiting actions and prohibiting material objects. Prohibiting drunk driving makes more sense than prohibiting possession of a bottle of wine for use in after-dinner drinks, or for use in gettting quietly looped. A target-shooting gunner is not more dangerous than a target-shooting archer. It would be ok to pass a law requiring a backstop behind the targets.

And then, there's consistency. Are all you gun-ban people in favor of reinstating Prohibition, and including tobacco as well as alcohol? Of course that's more of an aside than an argument, but it's worth thinking about.

Even if guns were successfully prohibited, are you sure that homicides would be decreased? There's a lot of bludgeoning and machete work in the world as it is.

But my basic argument is that as far as I can see, we have a cultural problem, not a material problem. It seems to me that it's not the people with guns, it's the people with the will to kill. Members of my family have had firearms, including handguns, at least since the American Civil War, and haven't murdered anyone. Some people have kitchen knives and use them homicidally. They're cultural things.

clint

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 22 Sep 04 - 02:44 PM

sorry -- "IT'S a cultural thing." Or subcultural?

clint

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Frank
Date: 22 Sep 04 - 04:01 PM

By this logic, we might as well produce poison gas, nuclear weapons and a SDI program that doesn't work. If you have the means to kill, you will have killers.

Frank

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 22 Sep 04 - 08:54 PM

Frank, if I could un-invent firearms I would.

I just think you can't hardly keep anything out of the hands of people who want it. Particularly Americans. And I think that passing ineffective laws is a bad practice. That's all.

I don't remember the dates, but when Europeans introduced firearms to Japan they were extremely popular, but the Japanese were able to stop their use and prohibit them for many years, maybe even generations. I'd have to look it up. But that was a different culture. Very authoritarian, which had lots to do with it, but I think the fact that the Japanese accepted the idea that guns were not honorable had more to do with it. But Our Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys.

And they tell me that Japanese gangs carry short-swords.

clint

Subject: RE: Anti-Moore 'Revoke the Oscar' website
From: kendall
Date: 23 Sep 04 - 08:15 AM

It's all England's fault anyway. If they hadn't treated we colonists so shabbily we wouldn't even HAVE a second amendment.