I disagree with gun registries being a precursor to confiscation and prosecution. I think the Government in their wisdom is trying to do the right thing. Having weapons registered means that if a crime occurs with a gun, it can be traced to a legal owner and they can be held accountable for the crime. This in turn means that legal gun owners will be more responsible with the storage and use of their weapons which will reduce the amount of crimes perpetrated by "legal" weapons. It will mean that if a weapon is stolen, it will be reported as such because the registered owner doesn't want to be held accountable for a crime with a stolen weapon.

There is much good that can come from registration. It will lead to more responsible gun owners.

However, the argument on the other side of the fence is also true - criminals will always be able to get unfettered access to illegal weapons. However, those weapons will have to be smuggled into the country, not stolen from those who purchased them through legal channels.

But just like the Jews, if you've got a gun and owning a gun becomes a crime that the government decide to enforce retroactively, then you have effectively signed your arrest warrant by registering them.

I don't think this is their intention however. Their intention is merely to hold legal gun owners to a standard of care that I believe they should be held and currently aren't. They're saying "if you own a gun, you're going to be expected to care for it responsibly. If you do not care for it responsibly, you are going to be held accountable for the damage it causes."

But you know what they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The government has a history of making laws that seem to be well intended that end up being exploited because they're overreaching while saying "oh, we don't mean that, we'll never enforce it in that way."

>I disagree with gun registries being a precursor to confiscation and prosecution.

So gun owners shouldn't fear gun registries as a precursor to prosecution?

Yet in the very next sentence you advocate for prosecuting gun owners under a strict liability that holds them responsible for anything that happens using their gun.

>But you know what they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I'd say you've already gone too far when you criminalize someone getting their property stolen.

Why shouldn't you be held under strict liability for anything that happens using your gun? It is a tool for killing. If it is used to kill someone because you didn't store it responsibly, it was stolen and you didn't report it stolen, why exactly shouldn't you be held accountable for your part in that? You were accessory to a crime by your negligence to store your weapon responsibly.

I also didn't say you shouldn't fear gun registries being a precursor to confiscation. I suggested that the spoken intent is to hold gun owners to a higher standard of care of their weapons. I totally understand that there may be unspoken intent to use it as a precursor to confiscation, and while I don't believe this to be so, you're right to be wary of this. But frankly I think too many gun owners are criminally complacent about ownership and storage of their weapons.

A gun is serious, it should be treated as such. Store it safely and properly, if you don't store it safely and properly and you're caught in that position (i.e. by having it stolen, not reporting it as stolen and used in a crime), then you should be at least be charged for negligence. I don't think there's anything wrong with this - a gun kills. I don't care how you want to spin "guns don't kill people, people kill people," a gun is a weapon that is designed to kill, or at the very least used as a threat to kill. It should always be treated as such.

I don't criminalize people for ownership or having their property stolen. If you can prove it was stored responsibly and your legally approved gun safe was forcefully broken into and your weapon stolen and you reported it as stolen at the time you discovered it, you have absolved yourself of the responsibility of its use in a crime. You have acted responsibly. No charges should be laid against you.

If it was laying around on your night stand and an opportunist kid broke into your house and stole it, loaded and ready to kill, you didn't report it stolen, and it falls into the hands of someone who uses it in a crime, guess what? You're responsible for contributing to that and should be held accountable for your part in that to some appropriate degree. That degree in my mind is at least criminal negligence, in the same way as letting your baby die in the back of a car on a hot day because you forgot about them or getting into a car accident and killing someone because you were texting and not paying attention. What about how bar tenders can be charged for over-serving someone alcohol who then gets into a car and kills someone because they're driving over the legal blood alcohol limit? Your action, or inaction contributed to your weapon being used in a crime. You can argue that if it wasn't your gun, it would've been someone else's all you like. The fact is, it wasn't someone else's, it was yours. If it was someone else's, they would be charged with the same thing you were if they'd acted with the same negligence you did.

If you have a gun, it is your responsibly to store it safely, treat it with the gravity it's warranted. If it is stolen, report it as such. Be a responsible gun owner. If everyone treated their weapons with this amount of care, nobody would be screaming for gun registries.

They also have a history of pushing through unpopular legislation by tacking it onto bills they can force it through with by holding congress over a barrel. "If you want this, you have to agree to this too." I view this as malpractice and a corrupt way of introducing legislation, but this seems to be an accepted way of behaving which leaves me aghast every time I see it.

> I disagree with gun registries being a precursor to confiscation and prosecution.

I have two friends who openly advocate for this method of removing guns from the US. Regardless, I think this is something gun owners fear. When Canada had a registration list, it seized weapons that were legal when purchased and later made illegal by bureaucratic decision, without compensation.

Indeed. I've also known people who had legally owned antique weapons they'd been grandfathered by deceased parents illegally seized and had to fight through the courts to get them back. They got them back eventually, but not everyone is that lucky.

> "Historically speaking governments have always been the worst perpetrators of violence on their own people."

Yes, when people talk about deaths and dangers it's amazing to me that just about every other cause of death is so tiny compared to the numbers our own governments have produced.

and in the case of the Jews as I highlighted, the violence perpetrated by the government underwritten by data freely given by the hand of those in jeopardy, writing their own death warrant.

On one hand, I think free access to data could be both fascinating and beneficial to the entire human race if used benevolently. But let's face it. History has shown us that any company with access to this data will eventually share it or sell it to someone less scrupulous and it will end up being used against those who gave it freely in the first place thinking that it was either safe or at least couldn't harm them.

I'm looking at you, Cambridge Analytica.

It's worse than just confiscation. The Journal News created an interactive map of permit holders[0] in New York. It is not hard to see how this information could be misused by criminals looking to acquire a weapon, cop-haters (lots of them are cops or retired cops) or others.

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/19/nyregion/newspaper-takes-...

"This is what car owners and house owners are going through right now, they know that car and house registries are precursors to confiscation and prosecution."

Oh..wait...

The insurance companies with a "put this device that monitors everything you do in the car, tracking you wherever you go, whatever you do and we'll give you an insurance discount."

Um... you could give me an almost 100% discount and I'm still not giving you the very ammunition that you will use against me at the first opportunity I need to make a claim despite never having made an insurance claim in the last 20 years. Not to mention, I'm not having you watch everywhere I go, when I go, building a profile about where I spend my time, who I spend that time with, when I do that, when I'm home, when I'm not home. You can have the mandatory information I must give you in order to be able to drive my car and take care of people in the event of an accident. Beyond that, I'm not giving you anything.

Of course when you crash into me and it's your fault, you'll just walk away because I doubt that you'll be able to pay for your mistake, and MY insurance and my money will be spent to cover for your inadequacies.

Freedom is not free, except you just want others to pay, it's the classic argument against government.

My insurance is fully comprehensive and is plenty enough to cover taking care of whatever is damaged and whoever is hurt.

The wording of your statement makes a lot of assumptions about the kind of person I am and my level of responsibility towards others without you even knowing me.