"Simon Robbins" wrote in message
...

"Dweezil Dwarftosser" wrote in message
...
Well, there is a definite historical culture clash between Brits
and Americans concerning personal ownership of firearms (and that
alone is hard to overcome) - but it actually goes much deeper than
the legal mechanics of private gun ownership.

I believe that to be only a recent (i.e. past century) issue. Until WW2 I
think it was legal for UK residents to own firearms, but as someone else
said they were mainly long-barrelled weapons for sport or hunting. The
hand
gun has no other purpose than to shoot other people.


It still is legal to own long arms, shotgun certificates arent that
hard to get and even rifles can be had as long as they
arent military assault weapons. As a child of the 50's weapons
brought back as trophies from WW2 were not uncommon.
The father of one school friend had at least 2 german machine
pistols as well as a Luger.

Being a Brit myself, I actually wish we did have the right to bear arms,
at
least on our own property, and the legal back up to use them if necessary.
But, (and this is where I give the US population credit they deserve but
very often don't get), is that I don't believe the UK population has the
respect for those weapons tha they deserve. They've just not been part of
our social landscape. If they were to legalise the ownership of hand guns
tomorrow in a similar manner to US laws, gun crime and accidental
shootings
would (I believe) go through the roof as the current generation overcame
the
novelty value of owning a "piece".


In rural areas shotguns are commonplace and the stringent regulations
regarding their storage are the result of 2 factors

1) Accidental discharges of 'unloaded' weapons

2) Theft

There was a period in the 70's when rural farms were the source of
firearms for city based villains, far from protecting their owners
from burglary they attracted unwelcome attention.

Keith