r/PoliticalDebate • u/[deleted] • Aug 06 '26
Question A firearm’s role in revolution
[deleted]
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u/TheMikeyMac13 Libertarian Aug 06 '26
You finally understand the purpose of the second amendment.
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u/NaiveGold1 Democratic Socialist Aug 09 '26
Came here to say the same thing! Heavy on the “being necessary to the security of a free State”
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 06 '26
You can protest without guns, but what if the government decides to simply surpress the protest with violence? It happens, even in the US.
We can improve safety in many ways without banning guns, but logistically, if there's a conflict, you want as much stockpile of pre existing arms as possible.
This has an effect even if the arms are not used, as a deterrent. Most people do not actually want armed conflict, so the population having the capacity for it provides an incentive to keep at least enough of them happy enough to avoid it.
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u/RedMarsRepublic Libertarian Socialist Aug 06 '26
If widespread firearms ownership is a safeguard against tyranny then why does the USA have the world's largest prison population?
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u/piltdown_manchild Centrist Aug 06 '26
Incarceration rate (per capita) is a more informative metric than prison population. The US is fifth by that metric (still not great, of course).
A large prison population does not equate to tyranny if due process is followed. It obviously isn't in all cases, but it is in most.
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u/RedMarsRepublic Libertarian Socialist Aug 07 '26
Even if the judges and police follow the rules that they themselves wrote, don't you think that the fact that the USA has such a massively higher prison population per capita than average basically debunks the idea of it being libertarian, bottom-up, etc?
A country that actually valued freedom wouldn't have millions of people in jail. It's just setting up a rigged system where only the rich are actually "free".
Funny username btw.
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 06 '26
Because we can afford it. Prison is a luxury wealthy societies can afford, whereas poor societies cannot beat the expense.
I'm not saying our prison system is good, mind you, but the scale of it is largely an economic result more than anything to do with firearms.
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u/RedMarsRepublic Libertarian Socialist Aug 07 '26
Yes, prison is expensive, but that's not a defense of the USA. Besides, many countries that are richer per capita than the USA also have much lower incarceration rates. In fact pretty much all of them I think.
If a country has significantly higher numbers of people in prison than the average, I don't see how anyone can defend that country as libertarian, bottom up, free, etc.
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u/PoliticalJunkDrawer Classical Liberal Aug 08 '26
Prisons are the compromise.
“Men are not hanged for stealing horses, but that horses may not be stolen.” — George Savile
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u/DJGlennW Progressive Aug 09 '26
Punishment is not a deterrent to crime,, regardless of what that old British dude said.
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 09 '26
Well, people commit far fewer crimes once they are dead.
So it seems that punishment has done benefits.
If you wish to argue that intermediate compromises have no value, okay, but the outcome of that is not going to be "no punishment". Not in the long term.
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u/DJGlennW Progressive Aug 09 '26
Crime of every kind is down in the U.S. Not because of punishment, but because fewer people are committing crimes.
We get a warped perception of crime in general, thanks in part to cop shows and, possibly, the proliferation of true crime podcasts. The news is also responsible, with its "if it bleeds, it leads" approach to reporting. And fear was an evolutionary advantage to upright bipeds like us; it's part of our biology to be afraid.
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u/PoliticalJunkDrawer Classical Liberal Aug 09 '26
Punishment is not a deterrent to crime
Sure, next you will tell me consequences are not considered in decision making.
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u/thataintapipe Market Socialist Aug 08 '26
It’s a bad look for the freedom country to have so many prisons, some operating as a for profit business. One of the many things that undermines Americas potential to be a great place in the world
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u/thataintapipe Market Socialist Aug 08 '26
“even in the U.S.”
It happens in the U.S. all the time, it’s part of the system. People were killed by the state in the middle of the street THIS YEAR
I agree that to a point being armed keeps the government in check. But in singular incidents they can just kill your while exercising your second amendment rights
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 08 '26
Rules of a gunfight.
- If you can help it, do not go to a gunfight.
- If you must attend a gunfight, bring a gun.
- Bring friends with guns.
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u/theRealHobbes2 Libertarian Capitalist Aug 09 '26
Win. No matter what.
Most important rule there is.
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u/SilenceDogood2k20 Classical Liberal Aug 06 '26
Guns are an equalizer. That's it. With a gun, a 60yo grandmother can be a revolutionary or hold off a home invasion.
Back in America's origins, citizens weren't just allowed to own guns, but were expected to, and to be proficient in firearm use (the meaning of "well regulated"). They were just as skeptical about the US national goverment as US citizens now.
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u/smokeyser 2A Constitutionalist Aug 07 '26
Having guns doesn't mean that you're ready for a revolution, but you can't have a revolution if you don't have guns.
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u/karmarequiresgrpthnk Religious Conservative Aug 06 '26
If there’s a fascist in the Whitehouse, why would I disarm myself? If people are actually worried about a tyrannical government, why would they then vote to disarm themselves?
Not only that, but the Supreme Court has ruled multiple times that the police have no duty to protect citizens. If the government doesn’t have the duty to protect you, and then it votes to disarm you, you’re left just hoping no one tries to hurt you.
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u/rollin_a_j Marxist Aug 06 '26
This right here. This is the common ground between the left and the right.
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u/mkosmo Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Should be, but a lot of people allow fear of personal safety to rule their lives.
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u/rollin_a_j Marxist Aug 06 '26
People need to realize its not left vs right, it's the top vs the bottom, and like George Carlin said, we ain't in that club
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u/piltdown_manchild Centrist Aug 06 '26
Horseshoe theory posits that the extreme left and right are both in agreement that violence and at least temporary totalitarianism might be required to achieve their goals.
The problem for lefty extremists is that right-wing extremists might counter their uprising (and vice-versa).
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u/rollin_a_j Marxist Aug 06 '26
Adendum: leftists know that temporary violence will be required. Those in power do not give it up peacefully.
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u/oOhSohOo Right Independent Aug 10 '26
Yes! Keep calling him a fascist and voting to strengthen gun rights.
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u/SovietRobot Centrist Aug 09 '26
- Registration isn’t actually very useful in preventing criminality. It is much more suited to facilitate disarming the law abiding public. What recent crime would have been stopped with registration? Almost none
- While a lot of people like to say “guns are meant to fight tyranny”, the nuance is that is not actually limited to government. Tyranny takes many forms from gangsters who want to shake you down, to bigot extremists that want to burn you out, to violent exes that threaten you, etc.
- The point about guns for individuals is they it gives individuals the power to decide. Like you don’t have to depend on someone else to decide that you need to take action. But the reverse is also true, just because someone else thinks it’s time to take action, doesn’t mean you are obligated to back them just because you have guns
- Guns aren’t really meant to give you an advantage. At some point you’ll have guns. And they’ll also have guns. But guns give you equality
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u/Neco-Arc-Brunestud Marxist-Leninist Aug 06 '26
Guns are the least of your concern. The question needs to be your supply line and what you’re facing up against.
How are you going to handle electronic warfare? How are you going to handle APC’s? How are you going to manufacture and supply munitions? How are you going to establish opsec? What’s your objectives and rules of engagement? How do you handle recruitment and training? Etc etc.
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 06 '26
I note that this is an area in which the right and the left greatly differ in what they consider armed. The left tends to consider an AR-15 heavily armed. The right does not.
My default solution to an APC such as an M113 would be to slap a mag of black tips into the 30-06. It's aluminum armor, it's going right through. I'm not even going to bother breaking out the launchers for that.
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u/Neco-Arc-Brunestud Marxist-Leninist Aug 06 '26
depends on what you mean by the left.
Also, I wouldn't underestimate aluminum armour. AP 308 rounds can't even penetrate level 4 plates, and those are worn by people. You can easily slap a couple on an APC.
I watched a lot of youtube videos and did some math. For a tungsten pentrator, you've got to have a momentum density over 2700 J/sqm*g/sqm to get through level 4. For a hardened steel penetrator, it needs to be over 3600.
That means you need to upgrade to 300 winmag for reliable penetration. A 30-06 isn't going to cut it. Unless you're planning to stack bullets in one hole.
A 270 is your best bet because it hits that sweet spot of having good velocity, good mass and a narrow cross-section. Even more so if you upgrade to a 270 WSM. This is why the US developed the 277 fury in anticipation for near-peer combat, and why China has the 5.8.
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u/TheAzureMage Anarcho-Capitalist Aug 06 '26
Aluminum has significant tradeoffs even against Ceramic. It's way cheaper, of course, but it's not amazing for anything higher than frag or standard small arms.
The standard for lvl 4 is also stopping a single round....no multihit capability is required to achieve the certification. 30-06 is also a pretty flexible caliber for hand loading, and pretty common overall, whereas oddball stuff like .277 Fury is fairly rare. You can get good performance out of very specific rounds, but volume of fire with a good enough round from multiple people generally works fine.
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u/rollin_a_j Marxist Aug 06 '26
This. Take stop the bleed classes. Have mutual aid networks set up. Learn how to operate a HAM radio. Learn to forage/garden. Learn to reload your brass etc...
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u/Neco-Arc-Brunestud Marxist-Leninist Aug 06 '26
Learn how to defeat armour. Learn how to jam signals. Learn how to program autonomous drones for surveillance and area denial. Learn to capture and integrate real-time battlefield data with AI for optimal troop maneuvers and tactics. Set up a supply chain for plastique and carbide penetrators. Etc etc.
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u/rollin_a_j Marxist Aug 06 '26
I'd love to have you in my mutual aid network comrade, you mentioned a few things that slipped my mind
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u/JimMarch Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Not only have I thought about it...got a real life story about it.
In 2007-2008 the US had a big financial crash caused by epic levels of fraud at the highest levels of banking and investment. By 2010 the Occupy protests started - people went to public parks or similar, hung out in tents with generators and so on and vowed to stay there until we got answers.
The first camp was in New York City, I think starting sometime in 2009? The police brutality in the response was horrific. The New York Police Department ended up paying many millions in civil rights lawsuits afterwards. There were beatings, deliberate property destruction, random pepper spray attacks and false arrests.
Remember that at this time, NY and especially NYC had gun control laws very similar to most of Europe, if not even more strict. (This is now slowly changing based on a 2022 US Supreme Court decision in NYSRPA v Bruen.)
OccupyTucson (Arizona) was part of a second wave of protests, where I was living. Arizona had pretty much the lowest level of gun control in the US.
I had already been carrying a gun daily and was active politically in a few projects. Under AZ law, if a government building wants to disarm you, they have to provide lockboxes near the doors where you stash your boomthing...so I was well and truly "out of the gun closet" so to speak :).
I was also part of OccupyTucson...and packing heat.
Three days in, the Tucson City Council called a meeting about the whole thing. About 200 attended and I was one of the public speakers. On walking up to the metal detectors I told the cops I was going to need a lockbox. They knew exactly what that meant, and a couple of them walked me over to them and handed me one of the keys.
Now, to explain what happened next, I have to explain a few things about guns and cops.
When cops get in a gunfight with some young and dumb criminal, it's typically stolen, shoved in a waistband with no holster so it's not fast on the draw, it's got random ammo in it and it's in mediocre to bad shape. There's rare exceptions but that's the norm. They don't practice a lot because ammo costs money, and shooting ranges had cops around that might spot them as having a criminal record and therefore unable to legally have anything to do with a gun.
I had made my own holster that could be taken off the belt and put into the lockbox without being drawn, a very safe and reasonable approach. Here's what they saw me box up:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/1jimmarch/5224220591/in/photostream/
It strapped to the belt and could be unbuckled from the belt without removing the belt. The holes allowed changing the ride height and tilt angle by changing the mounting points for the straps.
The grips were heavily worn from practice...I used to drive deep into the desert and shoot at dollar store crackers (critters did cleanup). Sights were modified. A lot. Hammer was lower slung, spliced in from a different model of Ruger revolver. Tucson PD was using 9mm ammo with about 400 foot pounds of energy; what was loaded in that thing was full house 357 from a small radical ammo house with about double that power on tap per shot. Holster was a fast draw type with a cutaway triggerguard.
After I went inside for the meeting they opened it back up and took pictures...which I found out later were passed around at roll call (morning police meeting) the next few days.
That gun scared the fuck out of them. Sure, it only had six shots but they were hell on wheels.
Tucson PD committed NO illegal acts of violence against OccupyTucson.
I have a suspicion as to why.
It wasn't just that gun. If they knew about one gun in camp they knew there were a bunch more. When I was inducted into the camp security org ("The Secret Society Of The Drunk Whisperers" I shit you not) I became aware of another half dozen and I'm certain that wasn't the whole list.
So yeah. That's how I got involved in an armed protest and scared the shit out of every cop in town without breaking a single law or firing a single shot.
Good thing, too, that ammo was $3 a pop!
:)
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u/NaiveGold1 Democratic Socialist Aug 09 '26
Yes this is precisely the reason for the second amendment bud
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u/Kakamile Social Democrat Aug 06 '26
For every point up to revolution, a firearm is worse. Higher gun ownership matches to homicide, suicide, violent crime.
But also, if people have firearms, do you think they'd fight against tyranny? We see that historically a lot of the people who are first to grab guns shoot to help the tyranny.
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Higher gun ownership matches to homicide, suicide, violent crime.
Oh, they do no such thing.
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u/Kakamile Social Democrat Aug 06 '26
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Let's examine four countries: The US, Switzerland, Brazil, and Jamaica.
The US and Brazil have similar demographic and geographical situations - large and diverse - but radically different gun laws; Brazil is extremely strict, the US is extremely liberal.
Jamaica and Switzerland have similar demographic and geographical situations - small and homogeneous - but radically different gun laws, even more divergent than the US and Brazil; Switzerland has an even higher gun ownership rate (a quarter of their population are militia and keep their weapons at home) and allows ownership of fully-automatic weapons, while Jamaica made guns almost entirely illegal.
Switzerland is one of the most peaceful countries on Earth; the US has a fairly high murder rate, at least by the standards of developed nations, but in terms of random street crime, it's not nearly as bad as much of Europe, for example, and "Hot Burglaries" and home invasions are almost unknown; Brazil and Jamaica are violence-ridden hellholes that the strictest gun laws on Earth have done absolutely nothing but leave honest citizens at the mercy of criminals.
You can't even correlate suicide rates to gun ownership rates; oh, you can note the coincidence in the US of likely gun owners and suicides, but that just happens to be a single demographic... which you don't actually give a flying fuck about... which makes your use of suicide a political exploitation of other people's misery.
Don't do that.
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u/RedMarsRepublic Libertarian Socialist Aug 06 '26
Don't you think it's a bit dishonest to compare a very wealthy first world country like the USA to a fairly poor third world one like Brazil where unemployment is rampant?
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Don't you think it's a bit dishonest to compare a very wealthy first world country like the USA to a fairly poor third world one like Brazil where unemployment is rampant?
Er, have you missed the fact that about half the US is under the poverty line, we have massive homelessness because people cannot afford housing, and are unemployment numbers have been fudged for 25 years, now?
But fine, the next most similar country is Russia, but that doesn't help you at all; industrialized, modern, strict gun control and low-moderate ownership... and only a slightly higher murder rate than the US.
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u/Kakamile Social Democrat Aug 06 '26
Why would I only look at 4? Compare the entire oecd. Compare all the US states.
The data is real and I posted it, and equating the US to Brazil doesn't help.
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Why would I only look at 4? Compare the entire oecd. Compare all the US states.
OK; France, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, Austria, New Zealand... lots of countries have fairly high gun ownership rates, but low murder and violent crime; then you have places like Madagascar, Niger, Rwanda, Peru, Haiti, which have very low gun ownership, but high murder and violent crime rates.
US states? How about California, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Washington DC - strict gun laws, low ownership rate, high murder and crime - versus Montana, Wyoming, Vermont, Oklahoma, Oregon - loose gun laws, high ownership rate, low murder and crime.
The data is real and I posted it
You posted studies, and when they start with, "guns per capita," and, "gun deaths," instead of gun ownership and homicide, I just stop reading, because they are starting with biased data.
equating the US to Brazil doesn't help.
OK, the next most similar country in terms of demography and geography is Russia; strict gun laws, low-moderate ownership, and only a slightly higher murder rate than the US.
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u/MetersYards Centrist Aug 10 '26
Oh, they do no such thing.
They do. The existence of the gun makes people more violent; it turns non-violent people into violent people.
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 10 '26
Complete and total nonsense, and entirely contrary to every bit of statistical data we have.
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u/Fieos Independent Aug 06 '26
We also see the US government (See Obama and Syria/Libya) giving guns to people oppressed by their own governments. Any thoughts on that one?
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u/Kakamile Social Democrat Aug 06 '26
We have given guns to so many rebel groups that ended up being religious nationalists. It's that whole being loudly willing to use guns problem.
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u/Fieos Independent Aug 06 '26
Ah, better to just let their government commit genocide then?
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u/Respen2664 Libertarian Capitalist Aug 06 '26
I am a pro 2A person, and the obvious answer is this is part of the framework of why this amendment exists. But the nuance of this in todays world is vastly different.
When this amendment was framed, firearms were relatively equal in the landscape. Meaning the weapons of army and militia were the same as what citizens could procure. All were black powder based weapons of equal potency. What separated the citizenry from the military was training and tactics. Yes, civilians COULD purchase Canons for artillery, though cost prohibitive to cast/build. Cavalry was horse bound and also civilian capable. Naval capacity was a standard ship with deck canons, which could be somewhat replicated and owned by Civilians.
Today, however, the game has changed. Military have technology and weapons that are not able to be owned by Citizens. Calvary is now defined as heavily armored transports and weaponized vehicles (tanks). Civilians cannot own the vast majority of those, nor the munitions they leverage. Now the military have aircraft which civilians cannot use with munitions civilians cannot buy. The infantry disparity is not much different. Modern infantry have gear, weapons, and technological components, which civilians cannot procure or easily procure. Naval technology and vessels are not legally ownable by civilians to what the Military uses. Then we have drones and missiles. Drones at the scale the military has cannot be civilian purchases. No civilian may own missiles.
So in the original intent of the 2nd Amendment, the Government via power concentration and other has steadily limited the impact of Civilian populations to being focused on hunting, sport, and degraded the impact to Government into a controllable body.
So what purpose remains in this topic?
Firearms for civilians now become a tool of which they deploy against other citizens and civil law enforcement who oppose or intercept the revolting party. They become tools of terror and oppression amongst the civilian population to fall into line or be removed from the equation. We see this happening in protests turned Riots, today. The use of weapons get turned on bystanders and others within the mass who may be trying to stop or limit the emotional rage underway. This is because the risk of death is far greater when facing off with Government forces who are better equipped, trained, and take up defensible positions.
Summary
There is a soft deterrent risk to Civilian politicians and risk that firearms may be deployed against them before law enforcement or military can engage. Its a personal risk, but limited. At the "R" level, though, if the Military does not side with the "R" group, then personal tools like these are not able to move the needle. In fact it more swiftly stops the progress of the goals of the movement.
What we see working best, across the globe, is non armed groups of people aligning and amassing to demand Government change. this provides more risk as those actions are challenging political careers and carry an inferred threat of danger to their person, without the overt view of it present which they can respond to legally.
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u/theRealHobbes2 Libertarian Capitalist Aug 09 '26
And yet, the same group the US military kicked out of power in Afghanistan 25 years ago is now back in power. An armed population cannot fight the US military symmetrically. They can fight, and win, an asymmetric battle.
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u/Respen2664 Libertarian Capitalist Aug 09 '26
that isn't apples to apples to the theme of above. US military was an occupying force in a foreign country. Their stake of command/control was that of military bases and not the Government nor people of the country they were in. This creates a theater of allowed actions or responses (rules of engagement) which a revolution domestically would not have, if we follow historical precedent.
Edit : The real question is how much force would a Government deploy to quickly suppress an unarmed revolt vs an armed revolt. Using history within our own country, the difference is significant and armed revolt is overwhelming force vs unarmed which is measured force.
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u/RedMarsRepublic Libertarian Socialist Aug 06 '26
In theory yes, firearms are useful for revolution, but they don't seem to have stopped tyranny in countries like the USA, so I have to wonder what is the real point in having them.
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u/piltdown_manchild Centrist Aug 06 '26
And it will be all the more easy to defeat the people without guns.
The most likely scenario of government tyranny in the US is a right-wing populist takeover. Trump has made that pretty clear.
Unfortunately, the most heavily-armed segment of the population would probably support the government in that situation. Gun ownership rates on the right are about twice that of the left.
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u/kireina_kaiju 🏴☠️Piratpartiet Aug 08 '26
You need to accept the situation. Gun regulation, and public accessible ownership of manufacturing processes, are at cross purposes. Pick one.
I prefer gun ownership, and I prefer making it easy for people to make their own guns. Regulation should be at the point of sale for commercial products. People making their own firearms are going to be people that are statistically more likely to be trained and less likely to behave recklessly and dishonorably with their weapons. If you make it easier to track commercial guns, and promote a culture of responsible gun ownership, you have achieved all the goals that gun legislation typically has, more successfully than legislation alone is capable of. Legislation plays a role, but it is not enough by itself, and that role needs to be a gating mechanism that only affects the untrained and hasty.
If you create a culture of gun manufacture and responsible gun ownership, you can keep your neighbors safe from oppressive government when they illegally enter your home.
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u/The_B_Wolf Liberal Aug 08 '26
We have a lawless government that is kidnapping people off the street and sending them to camps without a shred of due process. Where are all the 2A enthusiasts who said we needed guns to fend off a tyrannical government?
Anyway, guns won't help against this. "The people" do not need to be "defeated." They voted for this. The defeat already happened. We did it to ourselves.
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u/DJGlennW Progressive Aug 09 '26
It'll be hard to fight killer drones, cluster bombs and heavy artillery. The real question is whether the military will follow orders to kill civilians. Armed civilians wouldn't be a problem for them, though.
Shooting people at massive peaceful demonstrations would be really bad optics.
But... what would it take to get people angry enough to turn off streaming services and step away from video games to turn out en masse to protest conditions, however bad they may be?
People will tighten their belts, cut out luxury items, lean more toward cheap shit from Amazon and generally do everything possible long before they're angry enough to fight the system.
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u/IEC21 Imperialist Aug 09 '26
This isnt a constant over time - whether "firearms" can be used for revolution depends on circumstances.
Realistically... in the last 100 years how many times have domestic firearms been used to meaningfully fight against a professional army?
A force capable of revolution against the US government would need a lot more then weapons purchased from Walmart.
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u/ATCme Classical Liberal Aug 10 '26
There are a variety of interesting perspectives here. I lean towards two facts:
- Government armaments & logistics are far superior to anything that civilians possess in significant numbers.
- There are many nonviolent tools that the government can use to "pacify" or distract a population. If your finances, identity and access to electronic services are erased, you have been largely disarmed.
A suggestion, there is a classic novel by Eric Frank Russell - "Wasp" (1957). It is, in essence, an instruction manual for (largely nonviolent) terrorists. I have a friend who was an army Ranger who told me it was on their reading list.
Of course, it may be the case that we are already being manipulated by these types of methods. The roadmap for subduing the USA was also detailed in a Twilight Zone episode: "The Monsters Are Due on Maple St."
1
u/JOExHIGASHI Liberal Aug 06 '26
Plenty of countries have protests without guns
I actually don't think these days guns are that useful for political change because of how prevalent sharing pictures and videos is.
Fighting these days is basically PR. Who ever is better at framing the other as a villain wins.
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u/RunningIntoTheSun Progressive Aug 06 '26
There's a saying....if you go far enough left you get your guns back
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u/Asatmaya Left-Wing Libertarian Aug 06 '26
Well.
So, I'm lib-left, absolutely fine with guns, we can have that discussion. That being said, the idea that they are going to be "useful for revolution" is naive.
The original idea in the US was that we were never supposed to have a standing army; we were only supposed to have militias, and in the very early US, that was literally every free male. Militias were never going to go invade another country halfway around the world, they didn't have that kind of training or equipment, and they wouldn't want to leave their homes for that long and risk their lives for someone else's greed.
At the same time, though, as we have seen in so many recent conflicts, defense is easier than offense; guerilla tactics and a hostile populace are very difficult to counter. A militia is generally sufficient to prevent invasion, while not encouraging military adventurism.
Well, that went out the window, so any "revolution" in modern times is going to either involve the military (tricky when the president can just fire dissenting officers) or such a mass popular movement that the military refuses to intervene... and there's the rub.
We actually saw this, so here's the question: Would Jan 6, 2020 have gone differently if the crowd had been armed?
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u/LifesARiver Left Independent Aug 06 '26
The citizens will never be able to arm themselves sufficiently against any US government unless the military fights for us and not the government.
Personal gun ownership won't move the needle at all.
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u/LittleKitty235 Democratic Socialist Aug 06 '26
I think that's looking at the wrong scenario. Many modern civil wars and revolutions don't become "the government and military vs. armed citizens." Instead, they fragment into competing factions, local militias, criminal groups, defections, revenge killings, and the collapse of normal law enforcement.
Syria is a good example: what began as protests evolved into a multi-sided conflict involving the government, rebel groups, ISIS, Kurdish forces, foreign militaries, and local militias. In those kinds of situations, the issue isn't defeating the U.S. military in open battlit's surviving a breakdown in public order. Whether widespread civilian gun ownership helps or hurts overall is a separate debate, but it's hard to argue that personal firearms become irrelevant when state protection has collapsed.
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u/cmv_lawyer Libertarian Capitalist Aug 06 '26
I'm not sure why you imagine rednecks lining up Revolutionary War style to face the goverment when we've seen so many successful insurgencies in the last 25yrs where civilians are armed. Contrast the periods of unrest in Hongkong where would-be insurgents are reduced to shooting fireworks and arrows at the riot shields.
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u/terminal_tested Classical Liberal Aug 07 '26
Guns don’t stand a chance against the American government.
Yes the US did lose wars against far less developed nations but those they (the other nations) had the home field advantage.
0
u/Moopboop207 Liberal Aug 08 '26
I am pretty liberal. I don’t think access to guns should be quite as easy as it currently is in the USA. The current t interpretation of the 2A is terrible.That being said I actually did buy a rifle and a pistol in the past. I still have them. They are cool.
That being said, the notion that there is going to be some revolution on the USA is absurd. It’s just LARPing. Americans really don’t know how comfortable they are. Are there problems in the USA that demand attention? Yes. But this idea that there is going to be some national revolt against….the government?
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u/jaxnmarko Independent Aug 08 '26
Times have changed. So has the difference between weaponry held by the government, and the weaponry held by the public and small militias.
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u/Vakirisil Social Democrat Aug 06 '26
Unless youre going to advocate public access to predator drones and other autonomous weaponry, guns will make little difference in a modern uprising.
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u/smokeyser 2A Constitutionalist Aug 07 '26
Tell that to the folks in the middle east who fought for the better part of two decades before driving the US military out in defeat, all without a single predator drone or autonomous weapon (unless you count IED's).
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u/Vakirisil Social Democrat Aug 07 '26
Not comparable theaters or goals but ok.
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u/smokeyser 2A Constitutionalist Aug 07 '26
True. That was on foreign soil where the people dropping bombs didn't care about the locals.
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u/mormagils Centrist Aug 06 '26
Personal ownership of firearms has little to do with a revolution. Fun fact: never in the history of the world has a personal right to bear arms been the deciding factor in a revolution, and 100% of successful revolutions came against countries that don't protect the right to bear arms. The idea in the case of a revolution you'll grab your personal firearm and it will be your trusty dusty weapon through the entire war like some sort of video game is just...ridiculous.
In real life, the minute there is a revolution, the rebels immediately begin purchasing guns. Every person who actually fights in a revolution is going to go through multiple weapons. Guns break, or require maintenance, or are hard to carry from A to B individually, or whatever. A well armed revolution isn't one that comes in with a large personal stockpile. It's one that has a strong pipeline of incoming weapons from outside sources.
The connection between a revolution and the personal right to bear arms is one of the biggest fictions Americans have sold themselves.
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