Quote:
Originally Posted by Autumn
Yeah, in the end people don't want their toys taken away. This is true not only in guns, but in video games, drugs, internet, porn, etc. Whether there was a great ironclad reason to regulate any of these things, whether it would make the world safer or better, the people who like these things are going to resist. They may come up with good reasons for it, but the real reason is we all like our toys, and human beings are just not generally inclined to go without something they like for anybody else's benefit. This is not to say that it would necessarily help to limit guns, or violent video games, or alcohol, or pornography. It's just to say that no matter if we solved those debates or not, no one really likes to inconvenience themselves for some abstract concept. We all want individually to be able to do whatever we want, while other people probably need to be regulated.
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And I think there's an element of "my toys are necessary and valuable and yours are stupid and worthless". It's pretty easy to oppose a right that you yourself don't value, I think we see that in all kinds of contexts. When people see gun owners as "compensating for small dicks" and "jerking off to red dawn fantasies", you can see how this debate is as much about cultural superiority as it is about policy. We want to keep our toys but take away other peoples' toys that we don't approve of, or whom we feel superior too. Or at least, that becomes the perception, so you can see why the other side digs in - it's not a policy argument, it's really an attack on them personally.