I disagree with this assessment of the situation. But yes, arms against the government is not the first step to change.
To clarify, I just meant it wasn’t high on the list of oppressive governments you could point to, even in its own era, let alone now. People pivot from how great the American Revolution was to how horrible Hitler was as if the levels of oppression were approximately similar.
I think it’s a mistake to look at history and try to do equivalent comparisons that directly. I mean are we really going to say that the government was not that oppressive because they didn’t stick people in ovens? I don’t believe we need to set the bar that low.
There is also quite a bit of back and forth before outright independence was a thing. Hell even after the shooting started outright independence was not yet the goal. The intransigence of England, and more specifically the King, forced that point. Set aside the management of the war and there was a lot of failed steps to ease tensions. Instead of giving any concession, the king and his ministers ratcheted up pressure, despite multiple persons within Parliament urging otherwise.
So the English government was absolutely oppressive, but in ways that are hard to see without understanding the context. Simply boiling it down to things like the Stamp Act miss the mark quite broadly.
Actually, to think of it, the oppression is of a very similar stripe to many of the factory towns prior to the American labor movement. It was oppression through economic control, and limiting of economic options. Factories paying in scrip, England forcing all trade to be internal to the empire.
Like you said the oppression was quite different, but it was still oppression.
It was oppression that only the upper classes really felt, for the most part. The Intolerable Acts reached deeper and were also just terrible in terms of optics, but if every group that wanted to set its own tax rates and determine its own trade policy has a legitimate cause for armed rebellion, I think we are setting that bar far too low. The point I was trying to make, though, wasn’t that the Americans had no reason to revolt, it was that the American Revolution was about rights of local elites vs. distant overlords, not about the kind of oppressive government people point to when they try to scare us about the dangers of not having guns. I don’t see a lot of folks agitating for armed rebellion by the US territories, despite their lack of representation (though perhaps it just doesn’t get reported on…).
If you’re trying to argue the the reasons and issues behind the American Revolution was not bad enough to raise guns against England and therefore not something we can bring up to justify having guns now, I am going to strongly oppose that position. Oppression is not just genecide and there were multiple attempts to try and avoid war. Economic oppression is just as much a reason to raise arms as threats against life. When one tiny part of the government has it all and the rest have nothing, absolutely you can rise up and overthrow them. In theory, a democratic system gives you an alternative to it, but it doesn’t mean suddenly life is the only factor.
I’m trying to argue that the reasons for the revolution were the concerns of the elite, not the power of armed individuals to resist their government. The bulwark against tyranny by oligarchs will always be the existence of enough independent organizations with power, and not just random folks with weapons.The Deacons for Defense example is a much better example of the value of armed citizens, but it is also a long way off from the typical use-case enshrined in current thinking about 2nd Amendment rights. So what I’m saying is that our current models of how the 2nd Amendment protects people from oppression are poor ones.
And I am telling you I don’t agree with you. In addition to that, I think your position is doing no one any favors, and it’s a losing argument to take. You really want stand up for gun legislation in front of a bunch of Americans and say hey, the American Revolution never should have happened, it was just for a bunch of rich people trying to get theirs, and we should all be English citizens today? Again, I don’t agree with your assessment at all, but your stance… might as well just hand the argument to the NRA now.
Directly? Yes. Indirectly it did impact most people. For example not being able to import sugar from Saint-Domingue meant that the price they paid was far higher. It, in very real terms, did impact your average worker, as they got goods that were either more expensive or inferior than they would otherwise, while selling theirs for less.
It’s not the kind of thing your average farmer may not have grasped the nuances of, but at a base level they could understand ‘the tobacco you sell is worth twice what you get, while the sugar you buy is worth half what you paid’.
You don’t, but there is a fair bit of agitation for greater representation. However there were cases where there was agitation for independence, and that was granted. The Philippines, for example. Obviously it is far more complicated than that. One reason I suspect that Guam, or the Virgin Islands don’t have independence movements is that they are given relative economic freedom. They are exempted from several forms of taxation, have free movement (mostly), are considered U.S. citizens, etc. They can get tourism from Australia, Japan, Europe, wherever with little interference. Obviously the situation is not ideal, but it seems that, on balance, they probably feel the benefits of U.S. citizenship outweigh the negatives.
And there is also the fact that any armed resistance has literally no ability to stop even the slightest of efforts from the military. They are simply too small in population and economic size.
Again, this is not at all what I’m saying - I said it was a revolution carried out by rich people for rich people and that such revolutions don’t require an armed populace. That isn’t an argument against the Revolution itself, it’s an argument against the way it is twisted to support a gun culture.
There were lots of benefits of being part of the British Empire, though, which were lost when the colonies broke away and probably were more helpful on balance than direct trade with foreign powers. The economy was not better-off after the war. “Sugar costs too much” isn’t oppression, it’s just a convenient target for rabble-rousing.
We already know that not every citizen supported the rebellion and the war. Of those who did, what did you expect them to use if they were not armed when they faced the British army?
This is exactly my point: a) They would have been able to get weapons because they were fighting for an organization that had access to them, and b) is this really the best model of how we should live our daily lives? Everyone drilling with a rifle in case the US government crosses the line?
Everyone accepts that some weapons are too dangerous for citizens to possess, so banning specific weapons is not, fundamentally, a Constitutional problem, and arguments about how a 9mm is going to make the difference when King George goes after your trade rights is just a red herring meant to drum up patriotic fervor. It is really completely irrelevant at best, and it becomes dangerous fear-mongering when you pivot from King George (and really Lord North and Parliament deserve the blame, so even King George is a red herring) to Hitler, and then to vague similarities with something Obama has done or proposed or be accused of wanting to do or propose.
A story in three tweets (click through to each to see context)
https://twitter.com/DeondreLamont/status/767782024086118400
For those of us not tuned into the Twitter-verse, is there a summary?
This guy Zac Penton was looking for a roomie, finally found one, figured out they hated each other, then he bought a gun and shot the roomie? Is that it?
That’s the entire thing.
Commentary about how absurdly easy it is to get a gun, and how gun ownership inherently increases the risk of violent people murdering others instead of “only” injuring them.
Firearm safety fail and Black Lives Matter paranoia. It’s not a good mix.
[quote]
Atlanta lawyer Claud “Tex” McIver was driving with his wife Sunday night near Piedmont Park when their car hit a bump and a gun in his lap accidentally fired, killing his wife, a family spokesman told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Diane McIver was taken to Emory University Hospital on Clifton Road and died in surgery several hours later.[/quote]
[quote]
The McIvers retrieved their gun — a .38 snub-nose revolver — from the center console of the 2013 Ford Expedition, alarmed about recent unrest surrounding several Black Lives Matter protests in the area and fearing a carjacking, Crane told The AJC.
The couple, who were being driven by an unidentified individual, left the area unharmed. But several blocks later on Piedmont Ave. near the park, the SUV hit a bump and the gun fired, Crane said. It was still wrapped in a plastic Publix bag in which it had been stored, Crane said.
Crane said McIver does not remember firing the gun. He was leaning back in the seat and nodding off when they hit the bump, the gun in his lap, Crane said.
Tex McIver was in the SUV’s back seat. Diane McIver was seated in the front passenger seat.
The Fulton County Medical Examiner said she died of a gunshot wound to the back that had passed through the seat.[/quote]
Waiting for confirmation that he accidentally bought her additional life insurance a week earlier.
I swear the first rule is the one people always ignore. Plus, I can barely fathom how a bump would set it off unless his finger was on the trigger… while pointing his gun at his wife. It was a revolver. So he almost had to have it cocked and ready to fire. He’s either the dumbest fuck ever or something else.
From the story, I suspect it was this. Dude was so afraid of the nasty blacks that he had a cocked revolver in his lap as they drove around.
He’s a partner at his firm and she was a CEO at her marketing company. I suspect he didn’t do it for the money.
Yeah, fall asleep in a car with a loaded gun on your lap. Whatcouldgowrong?