[Skybird]

If I understand it, then that Chicago law makes 5 hours training mandatory, and limites the hnumber of weapons somebody can buy to 1 per month. that'S it. While one can argue whethe ror not 5 hours training is sufficient, in principle I neither object to mandatory training for gun owners, mandatory weapon licenses, and limiting the number of weapons somebody may own. While I said in the other weapon thread that I have u-turned on my former objection to legal permission for carrying private guns, I see it that way for other, more prgamtaic reasons than due to some principal statement in a constitution that worded it the way it did from a historical context more than 200 years that is no longer existent. I still think that private persons should be forbidden to own assault rifles, submachine guns and stuff like that, but that permissions should be restricted to pistols, revolvers, and hunting guns. I think owners should hold a license for which they have to undergo obligatory, suffient training and theory test, mental health test - and in an ideal world: a to-be-developed character evaluation -, and that thismoicense should legitimate them to own a limited number of firearms for self protection or hunting purposes. In Germany, green weapon cards allow the owner to own up to three pistols. And more a prvate citizen does not need.

A right to stockpile heavier weapons and even miluitary items becasue somebody claims to be a collector, I still reject, for the same reason why I would not accept the private collection of industrial explosives, etc.

To me, it is about self-defence against criminals exclusively - not about private people arming up like one-man-armies because they have hallucinations of hollywood-style invasions of mega gangs storming their property with grendade throwers and heavy machine guns against which they must defend like the Germans at Omaha Beach. That is just madman's maniac fantasies. Instead of buying an assault rifle, maybe better throw out that TV from your appartment.

I think it would be good practice to have licences also being limited to automatically become invalid after 18-24 months if constant regular practicing is not proven in some way. See a parallel to a flying license here. If you do not fly a certain minimum of hours per year or half-year, it becomes invalid automatically, since constant practice is a life-insurrance in flying - for people in the air as well as on the ground. I think it should not be seen different with firearms. Even more when I remeber one, two encounters with sunday hunters I had in the forests. There is a reason why sport shooters and professional forest hunters and rangers hate these amateurs like the plague over here.

Also, weapons and alcohol, like cars, is a total no-no. You carry a gun currently? No alcohol then . Period.

So, a principal right to own a revolver, pistol or hunting gun, if a private person wants to own that? Yes. But only with the above mentioned restrictions. In principle it is an in parts milder gun control law as we already have it in Germany. A principle right or need to stockpile heavy weapons and ammo like a hamster, I neither see nor would accept.

As long as you live in a society of any form, there is simply no such thing as an unlimited ammount of freedom for the individual. the society sets limts and borders. There must be found a compromise that is sufficiently balanced for the individual's and the community's interests. Utopic maximum demands for unlimited liberty and freedom - lead either to the totalitarian tyranny of the colective/community, or the anarchistic rebellion of the individual outlaw.