• California authorities found a man illegally owning 248 guns and 1 million rounds of ammo.
  • The state attorney general said he also had 3,000 magazines and several grenades in his home.
  • The guns included 11 machine guns, 133 handguns, and 60 assault rifles, authorities said.
  • LemmyExpert@lemmy.zip
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    10 months ago

    Speaking as a very very casual gun enthusiast myself - - I think it’s a tricky subject. Guns & ammo are great, a million rounds certainly seems excessive, and idk it’s possible this guy was a black market arms dealer for very very bad people.

    When you have guns, you wonder how you’d react to a knock on the door & an attempted gun confiscation. I don’t see many scenarios playing out where violence is called for; they are not (directly) threatening my life, but rather confiscating tool(s) that can be used for hunting, recreation, and yes preserving my life in self-defense. Very not cool. But it’s still technically not a physical threat to me. If I were to pop off some guns in defiance of a gun collection attempt, that would lend credence to the idea that I’m an “unstable person” that “shouldn’t be allowed” to own firearms. Also, my fight isn’t with the guy doing the confiscating. He’s a member of my community, he’s just some guy doing what he’s told, maybe he’s got a wife & kids. What is to be gained from shooting him in the face? Does that not make me a monster? Maybe this guy thinks similarly, he was confronted without a shot being fired.

    No, from one red-blooded American to another, the no-conflict response is wisest & best. Tell them a warrant is needed, when they can’t find what they’re looking for, give them the ol’ classic “lost the guns in a terrible boating accident” line. They will be forced to accept it & move the fuck on. When tyranny reigns, defiance is duty, avoidance/lies/concealment are justified.

    My line of thought is this: you can have twenty safes full of badass guns & ammunition in your basement. But that doesn’t matter if you’ve got a gun to your head on your front porch. What is practical? What is reasonable? What is necessary? Just a handful of nice guns made ready & accessible, a daily carry you’re familiar with, a solid 12-ga, a .223 hunting rifle, and a few thousand rounds of ammo for each caliber you own.

    My gut tells me this guy wasn’t a prepper, if his ungodly massive stores of firearms & munitions were so easily found & rounded up. At least not a good one. My gut tells me this guy was involved in the illegal arms trade, he had a setup in his home that no-gooders could visit & “shop” for what they needed.

    • merc@sh.itjust.works
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      10 months ago

      when they can’t find what they’re looking for, give them the ol’ classic “lost the guns in a terrible boating accident” line.

      Ah yes, lie to the cops.

      They will be forced to accept it & move the fuck on.

      Or they’ll actually investigate and found out that you planned out that scenario, and even talked about it on social media.

      • LemmyExpert@lemmy.zip
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        10 months ago

        Ah yes. Lie to the cops. Fucking duh. Idk what deep-dive internet policework your local cops do, but it just doesn’t happen all that often in my opinion. I’ll roll those dice. I only mention it to give others the idea; we the people need to stand in solidarity or our rights will systematically, legally, be taken away.

        If concealment is done properly, there is no physical proof. People literally get away with murder in this manner. Law enforcement doing a sketchy arms confiscation will not aggressively search for…something of low value or concern that they will never, ever fucking find. Common sense. They will be forced to move on. You apparently are not able to understand that. But they will.

        Authority isn’t synonymous with right. The law was rounding up the Jews in Germany. The law was rounding up the runaway blacks in America. At best law is merely a guide for people who are incapable of thinking for themselves, at worst it is a cash/resources/power grab, law does not determine right or wrong. A disarmed population of generally law-abiding citizens is not in the best interest of the private citizens, and I would go so far as to argue the United States.

        • merc@sh.itjust.works
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          10 months ago

          we the people need to stand in solidarity

          But not by voting, by breaking the law. In other words, the position you hold isn’t popular enough that you can get there legitimately, you can only get there by breaking the law.

          • LemmyExpert@lemmy.zip
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            10 months ago

            This is a gross oversimplification…laws can be passed just to grab money, power, resources. Or just on a whim. 2 examples come to mind: the Boston Tea Party & the United States Library of Congress making cell phone unlocking illegal. The Americans weren’t begging for a tea tax (and they sure as hell didn’t vote to bring about change). And idk if you’re aware of this obscure little blip in history: James Hadley Billington, Librarian of Congress in 2012, decided to make cell phone unlocking illegal. I was fresh out of college…and an 83 year old man unilaterally passed a law telling me what I can & cannot do with my smartphone. Nobody asked for this, to borrow your terminology, it was unpopular. There were petitions I signed. Do you have any idea how infuriating that is?? The LoC JHB was so old, he’s dead now. Obama said the law couldn’t be repealed (???) 🙄 Eventually 2 years later it was, but it was a wild wtf type moment.

            To be fair to Mr. JHB, you look at his record & it seems like he/his team accomplished a lot of good things during his service. He just really, really fucked up in 2012.

            I don’t know how productive further discussions will be; we appear to take very different positions on law, authorities, government, right & wrong. ¯\(°_o)/¯ Have a good night

    • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      Yup. The guns aren’t there for when a cop is knocking on your door. The guns are there for when a cop is raping your wife.

      And if people think that latter scenario unrealistic, just look at history. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and the reason we have a government-recognize right to guns is to prevent that absolute power from existing as a state of affairs.

      It’s okay if the government has the majority of the power. It’s okay if the government has relative power. The guns are here to prevent the government from having absolute power. That’s the kind of scenario where the women are getting raped by the men in uniform, while the men who arent in uniform either watch helplessly or get tortured to death for trying to intervene.

      • merc@sh.itjust.works
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        10 months ago

        The guns are there for when a cop is raping your wife.

        Yes, a common scenario that everyone experiences at least once or twice, thereby justifying a huge armory of guns.

        And if people think that latter scenario unrealistic, just look at history

        Better to look at statistics. How often has that scenario actually played out?