[olalonde]

You've missed the parent's point. Society routinely accepts some level of risk, even when it leads to deaths, in exchange for other values. For example, dogs kill about 43 people annually in the U.S., yet we still allow them as pets. Electricity causes over 1,000 deaths a year, yet we don’t ban it. Kirk's position was simply that gun deaths are an acceptable price for the right to own guns - a fairly mainstream view in the US.

[thrance]

What do we get out of guns that would justify all those deaths, exactly?

[Sabinus]

You can keep poor people in more desperate circumstances, and fantasise about how you and your militia will resist a tyrannical federal government and restore the country.

[olalonde]

Hunting, entertainment, tyranny prevention and respect of the constitution.

[thrance]

> tyranny prevention and respect of the constitution.

Haha, sure. One, the tyrannical government is taking roots day by day and no one does shit. Two, even in this fantasy world where half the people wasn't on board with the destruction of our democracy, if the people as a whole were to take arms, they'd be going after a professional army whose budget is many orders of magnitude higher than this citizens militia's.

[olalonde]

> they'd be going after a professional army whose budget is many orders of magnitude higher than this citizens militia's

History shows that an underfunded militia can still tie down or even outlast the U.S. military in a guerrilla context - Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq are all examples.