Is gun ownership a right?

[liberal-hater]

Rights are not derived from the law.

Dead on correct. Rights are inherent in the creation of man by his maker.

Men have a God given right to defend self, family, and property. The only highly effective tool to do that are guns.

All of us have the right to own guns, whether the government of the day recognizes that right or not.

 

[osovega]

Being an atheist, while I reject this wording, I spent a few years enjoying and espousing the non-theistic version of it (something like "rights come from within").

But in recent days I've been questioning what this means. It's essentially meaningless, as I don't ascribe any special mysticism to humans over any other species (or even a rock) that "should" grant us any more inherent rights. We're all just evolutionary bundles of chemicals and chromosomes and to ascribe some inherent form of ethics (including "rights") doesn't work for me.
The truth is that for most of human history, and in fact the history of every other social species as well, the alpha-males tend to dominate and rule their little slice of the world via force. We are now able to limit this via the idea of human rights and the force of the people to back it up (and, let's face it, because most of us in the developed world have enough food/water/shelter that we're not constantly violently desperate or angry), but make no mistake: we invented these ideas, because they're good for most of us.

Personally, I think this is actually an even more compelling argument for the existence of human rights, even if they are a human-mind-created notion. Rights aren't granted by the government, or god, or an inherent inner force. They're whatever we are able to demand from ourselves and retain; a social contract. If anyone steps on what you consider to be your rights, you have the ability to fight for them in one way or another as long as you breathe or speak. If you fail... join millions throughout history. Not a lost cause.


Anyway, Canada doesn't have a Constitution document per se. We have a Charter of Rights and Freedoms that came about from the Constitution Act.
Just read it and answer your own question. It's not difficult reading.

The first step in recognizing the existence of rights is recognizing the basis of proper morality and that basis is the existence of an ultimate goal which men ought to pursue. In order to be the ultimate goal it must be “that which is always desirable in itself and never for the sake of something else,” as Aristotle put it and it must also be attainable by man. The only goal which satisfies these criterion is man's own happiness.
Morality is a code of values to guide man's choices and actions and a proper morality is one which guides him towards survival and happiness on earth. The good is that which serves man's own life, and the evil is that which destroys it. Since man should, by his nature, seek a life on earth, he has an inherent right to life. This right to life is the source of all other rights. If a man has a right to life, he must have the right to the actions necessary to sustain his life as a rational being, which means, the right to liberty. Also, if he is to survive, he must have the right to the physical manifestations of his actions which means, the right to property. Also, the right to life means more than just a right to survival, it means the right to the actions which are necessary for a rational man to flourish and be truly happy on earth which means, the right to the pursuit of happiness.

 

[plopper]

The first step in recognizing the existence of rights is recognizing the basis of proper morality and that basis is the existence of an ultimate goal which men ought to pursue.

What is "proper" morality? Why would the morality of one be more proper than another?

I find it more useful to define morality not as an ultimate goal, but rather as the opposing force of universally-rejected ideals.

If, for example, we might define the most universally-rejected ideal as something like "The greatest amount of suffering inflicted on the greatest number of people," then morality must be the road which leads us as far from that as possible.

 

[Exhopek]

The constitution only lists rights. The government is supposed to guarantee them. But rights don't come from the state and the state can't take them away, no matter how much they decide to infringe on them. The constitution, any constitution, isn't worth spit once the commies seize power.

So, to review, you have God-given human rights because you are human.
Historically, governments like to pretend this isn't so and enjoy trampling the citizenry.

Among your rights are the right to property and the right to self-defence.

Try mentioning that when you get a firearms license and see if you get approved. that there is the answer.

A humongous HELL NO.

 

[screwtape]

To anyone who thinks firearms ownership is a 'God-given human right', try putting a pintle-mounted machine gun in the back of your pickup truck. Then tell the judge that property ownership, including firearms ownership, is a God-given human right that the government has no right to infringe, so the machine gun is completely legal despite anything the Criminal Code or Firearms Act might say. See how far that gets you.

Oh, and by all means tell the Parole Board the same thing at your hearing to encourage them to release you earlier.

I have read the English Bill of Rights of 1689. A very nice document. I personally quite like the section saying that it is the right of all free-born Englishmen to possess arms.

Unfortunately, when all is said and done, it's nothing more than an Act of Parliament, passed in a country where Parliament is supreme. What one Parliament enacts, a subsequent one has the power to repeal, override or simply ignore.

For those who disagree, please explain how it is that in England, where the English Bill of Rights of 1689 originates and presumably should have more direct power than in Canada, private firearms ownership has virtually disappeared? Obviously, nobody in England seriously considers it to have any significant legal effect.

I think the problem is that people here see 'Bill of Rights', and equate the power and significance of the document with that of the American Bill of Rights. Especially since many of the concepts in the American Bill of Rights - including the 'right to keep and bear arms' - seem to have been drawn directly from the earlier English document.

The difference is that the American Bill of Rights is one of the founding documents of the American state. And as part of the foundation law of the country, it takes precedence over any laws that might later be passed by the governments which owe their very existence, powers and legitimacy directly to that foundation law. And fortunately for American firearm owners, one of the rights embedded in that foundation law is the right to own arms.

The title 'Bill of Rights' has no special magic. The 'special magic' for Americans is the location of that Bill of Rights as part of their country's original Constitution. By contrast, neither the English Bill of Rights of 1689 nor the Canadian Bill of Rights passed by the Diefenbaker government have any such significance.

Two final points:
1. Right of Property - There isn't a government anywhere in the world that does not hold the general power to expropriate property if the general good requires it. There are usually laws setting out the necessity to pay fair compensation, but ownership of private property is neither sacrosanct nor inviolate even in the USA.

2. Right of Self Defence - The right to protect one's own life and those of one's family is arguably a universal human right. The question that we face is: how exactly do you make the jump from a general right of self defence to a specific 'inborn' or 'God-given' right to own firearms?

The one is a general right to take reasonable actions in dangerous circumstances to preserve one's own life - even if that requires one eventually to deprive a wrongdoer of his. The other is the ability to possess a specific type of physical tool or weapon.

Are the two necessarily congruent?

 

[Dakk]

The source is British common law, a particular piece of legislation enacted in 1660 ish if I recall correctly. All English common law became part of Canadian law. There are many references to this. Look at the CSSA site. These old pieces of english legislation are being referred to a lot more lately.

Nope.

Unfortunately, we have no ties to British law anymore. Canada has its own constitution, and the Constitution Act of 1982 severed the last constitutional and legal ties to British law. The rights of Canadian citizens are now fully covered under the Canadian Charter of Rights & Freedoms, which includes nothing that makes gun ownership a right.

Canada's actual ties to Britain at this point are meer formality. Yes, we're still part of the Commonweath, but the Commonwealth holds no real power as a political entity. Its basically a diplomatic 'club' for former British colonies, with the Queen as its ceremonial figurehead.

Because my answer was going to be "No, it's not a birthright. No in this country."

Speaking as to the actual constitution and laws of Canada, you would be correct to say 'no'. But most of the people here seem to look at the term 'rights' in a different way. In other words, there's the accepted legal definition of 'rights', and then there's that definition where everyone gets to just make up whatever 'rules' they want to respect and ignore the ones they don't care for.... "god given rights", etc. God didn't even give us the right to keep breathing indefinately, so go figure how he's managed to give us the right to guns. The reality is... those people simply give themselves 'the right'.

 

[Alex_Zues]

Damn this is getting philosophical

 

[osovega]

What is "proper" morality? Why would the morality of one be more proper than another?

I find it more useful to define morality not as an ultimate goal, but rather as the opposing force of universally-rejected ideals.

If, for example, we might define the most universally-rejected ideal as something like "The greatest amount of suffering inflicted on the greatest number of people," then morality must be the road which leads us as far from that as possible.

Proper morality is a morality that leads man towards a proper ends. One morality would be more proper than another because one leads him to proper ends while the other leads him to improper ends. One end is proper because it is inherently desirable in itself and thus ought to be pursued. Another end is improper because there is no reason to pursue it. The only end which is inherently desirable in itself is happiness.

What is proper is not based on consensus, or whether something is universally accepted or not. It doesn't matter how many people agree on something, it only matters whether something is logical and based on reality. Logic will lead you to conclude that your own personal misery and death is your rejected ideal and the proper morality is that which leads you furthest away from misery and death. However, it would be really stupid to say it that way instead of just saying, life and happiness is my ultimate value and the proper morality is that which leads me to achieve it.

 

[tacfoley]

Here in the yUK the Bill of Rights is treated as an 'interesting historical discourse...an amalgam of utopian values construed as to be applicable to the Common People by some sort of presumed God-given and Bible-inspired 'rights''

The first Firearms Acts came into play in the middle 1920's when subjects of the Crown in UK were prohibited from buying fully-automatic firearms like the Thompson.

Successive 'amendments' and 'revisions' brought into play during the 1960, 70s, 80s and latterly the 90's and even the 'noughties' successively robbed the Brits of semi-auto centre-fire rifles and carbines [1988], 99.9999% of all cartridge-firing handguns [1997/8] in England, Scotland and Wales [but NOT Northern Ireland], and then in 2008, with the VCRB [Violent Crime reduction Bill] made air-cartridge arms like the Brocock illegal to own, to transfer or to sell. As such they may only a. be licensed as though they were REAL firearms, like a MacMillan .50cal, or b. handed in to the pleece for destruction without compensation. As such, my pal Miles, who has the largest individual collection of Brocock guns in the world, including many one-off experiments like the SMLE and Mauser KAR98, now legally owns what may be the largest collection of prohibited firearms in the UK, maybe the world. He has, of course, MANY pages on his Firearms Certificate listing his hundreds of unuseable, unsellable and untransferable popguns. With one stroke of a pen, an unnamed minister turned him from a guy with a VERY valuable and definitive collection of interesting airguns to a guy with several large map chests filled with wood and steel paperweights.

At the same time, AirSoft replicas, particularly those driven by gas or volts but not by spring, can now only be bought by registered re-enactors or 'skirmishers'. I have eighteen Section 1 [rifled] firearms here in yUK - fifteen rifles and three handguns - but I can't legally buy a 1 joule plastic pellet gun.

tac, who has suffered extensively from ALL of the post war-stuff.