I'm suggesting option A.

The issue is that without firearms freely distributed to the populace, as they are in Switzerland, the US, and other countries, it's easy to keep in power once the regime has been implemented. If there were/are dissidents in the country, how are they going to fight the government once guns are outside of the general populace? I understand the argument that firearms were available due to the actual revolutions themselves, but what about after that? Once the communists got into power, they sought to remove firearms from the general populace, thus severely reducing their ability to revolt.

I wonder, what would of happened at Tiannamen Square had the pro-Democracy group been allowed to defend themselves from the army? What about all the repression in Tibet? I agree if there's no motivation to revolt, then guns may not matter at the time (because the bad regime is popular at the time of it's rise to power - be it Hitler's Germany, Lenin's USSR or Mao's China), but as we know, after awhile, the tyrannical regime is found out for what it is, but by the time the populace realizes, it's too late to do anything, since the populace has had it's weapon(s) taken away.

Also, it's very easy for the media to over-report and demonize firearms, as they rarely report the good that they do on the crime prevention side of things. Firearms are used to safely defuse robberies, attempted murders, and rapes against citizens. For every 650,000 crimes that involve firearms, 1,000,000 crimes are prevented due to the employment of firearms. I don't think that's a very bad return, do you? You can find this study here. Again, 1,000,000 instances of a armed US populace using firearms to diffuse a crime, with under 1% of incedents resulting in the injury or death of the criminal.

I will ask you again, does the US, or any other country in this category, count itself as part of the West suffer from the possibility of such a regime? Or even more interestingly, if such a thing were to happen, are you telling me you, our buddies,  and your handguns would be able to deter the army?

Just a sad situation. The man even went as far as to kill a cop's wife and child while the cop was on duty. That horrifies me. I won't discuss the politics of this situation. It's just a horrible, horrible incident.

Yes, I think the West can easily suffer from an authoritarian regime if we allow ourselves to dive into such. In any Democracy, we allow ourselves to vote on our next leader. If the leader is bad, and has bad motives behind their candidacy as leader, things can happen. What about Chavez? Putin? Both were democratically elected, but have projected their powers into a far different sphere. Yes, in typical Western countries it would be difficult, but not impossible. Hitler did it, after all, and caused 100 million deaths. I tend to think that the 12,000 deaths due to handguns in the US per year is a small price to pay to prevent the atrocities committed by horrible regimes.

And yes, having an armed militia could deterr even a great army such as the US Army, or any others. Just look at Iraq for proof. The uprising there has hampered military efforts in the region thanks to a few ten thousand insurgents. If such a regime took place in the US, the insurgency would be in the millions, if not tens of millions. When you have numbers like that on your side, it would be very difficult for any army, no matter how competent, to wage a guerilla style war against an insurgent force 10-20x your armies size.

Tighter gun laws are needed in America. Gun violence is very common in America. There is a higher chance of getting shot in America than dying in a car crash.

Stop morons from buying guns on the streets. Anyone with a criminal or a psychiatric record can just go to a market and buy a gun and ammo in the USA. More checks needed to be done before selling guns.

Every home in America on average has a gun so around one in two people in America have a gun.

There are countless mass school killings in America that could of been prevented. Kids as young as 5 or 6 have been known to get access to guns and kill kids with them.

The problem is that, law abiding citizens are the ones without guns.

All you do it giving the criminals more advantage. They bring guns to a fists battle, guess who just won?

I think guns should be allowed for responsible people. Just give tests to make sure whoever wants one can take a physical/mental test and get a license.

@stickball

In the UK you don't directly vote for your leader, which is why I said that it would be impossible for any PM to install some ridiculous regime that could only be destroyed by guns (someone's never heard of Ghandi )

Did you not read where I stated they are done with ILLEGAL firearms?

You can't just walk into a store. They do a criminal history check. Certain felonies remove the right for a gun. Mainly violent crimes. It takes 2-3 weeks to get a pistol, and even longer for a rifle. In a lot of places you need a permit as well. Legal guns are very little harm, illegal guns are what are used to kill people.

^It's much easier to get your hands on illegal firearms if they are also legally attainable. Also, guns can't do much damage without bullets, which are even easier to get a hold of legally.

Here are the problems I see with yoru argument:

You can't to even begin to compare Germany post-WWI government with current government systems, so don't even bother bringing in Hitler. Also as I remember Hitler had huge public support, the deaths were not because he was killing or oppressing HIS country. Basically, that whole argument is pointless.

If for some reason a president comes in, and he does take such a control as to begin a regime to the point where he has to start killing off the populance to keep them quiet, do you really think it will be the same as Iraq? First off the people in the army would have to be fine with it, or it would ever happen. Second, that means he wouldn't give a fuck if he killes civillians, children, women, whatever. He'd just bomb the entire neighbourhood and be done with it, you wouldn't even get to use your guns. In Iraq the army is trying to minimize the entire collateral. A regime you describe jsut won't give a fuck who they kill as they shut you up and make an example to anyone else who would think to do the same.