I'm not American (and in some people's minds that invalidates any opinion I may have on the subject) but I am a human being, which I would hope allows me an opinion on the morality of gun laws, in the US or any other country. This is the first thread I've read on the subject of gun regulation, and one thing is immediately clear to me: people are not even entertaining any possibility of the other side being right. It would very much seem that people are responding to old arguments they've had with other people and are just carrying over the conclusions from those arguments. Again, as an outsider I can see validity in both sides, largely I suspect because I have no peronal interests either way. As I see it, it breaks down as follows:
Pro-gun ownership:
1) we have a right to bear arms under the constitution.
2) if we allow the government to take away our guns we lose our means of defending ourselves should a future government become unacceptably dictatorial.
Also, nobody has mentioned this, but personally I would add:
3) if the government of the US ever really tried to impose a national ban on guns there would be a second American civil war.
Anti-gun ownership.
1) guns are for killing people. They cannot be compared to cars or other tools, as if used as intended these items are a safe and productive part of modern life.
2) guns are not the only way to kill people, but they do make it a helluva lot easier.
When you break it down like that (and I appreciate it's a pretty simplistic sketch of the situation) it seems to boil down to
Pro-guns : complex hypothetical reasons
anti-guns : simple practical reasons.
Here is a rather interesting wee chart I found. Feel free to interpret as you see fit
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...true&sortcolid=6&sortasc=true&rowsperpage=250
