Where are the arms bearers?
I've seen two posts today of ICE agents arresting and terrorising 'alleged' US citizens. Where are the bearers of arms who bear arms in case of government tyranny? Is now the time to rise up and force back this disgraceful bullshit we're seeing in the US?
Who wants to be the first to martyr themselves getting turned into Swiss cheese after firing the first shot? Is it you? Why not?
That is your answer.
Exactly. And after the first martyr gets domed or swiss cheesed, all of the armchair analysts will come out of the woodwork creating a prevailing opinion like "well it would have been better if he had done X instead of Y, rookie mistake, what an idiot" and life will go on fundamentally unchanged besides that person now being dead and posthumously tut-tutted at.
Well it can't be me because I don't live in the US.
And over the years, I've heard the argument for bearing arms in case of government tyranny.. And here we are, government agency kidnapping people off the street like my grandparents were in Poland.
The only people who really say that are paranoid psychotic fascists who have been stockpiling weapons for decades
They’re now in control
The "resist government tyranny" people have always been a (very vocal) fringe group. Quasi-historical, quasi-fantasy, a little bit like historical re-enactors, but with a plot that makes it seem like they could be talking about today and real life. AFAIK, no one outside the groups actually think they will be the people to lead an armed resistance, mostly because no one outside of the groups actually thinks there will ever be a circumstance involving a widespread, armed resistance.
The one I knew, we're sitting in this little pizza shop having lunch, and he starts going on about how he's mapped the exits and positions of cover in the restaurant, in case a crew would barge in to rob the cafe and its patrons. Had his eye on a couple of people who might be troublemakers. Obviously had his gun with him, but probably too many people around to use it if the place did get raided. All in this nice, quiet, suburban neighborhood.
Who wants to be the first to martyr themselves getting turned into Swiss cheese after firing the first shot?
Thomas Matthew Crooks tentatively raising his hand
Living in the US South for the last 30 years, my experience has been that most of the "Don't tread on me " crowd are very much only interested in protecting themselves and their families. That often means keeping your head low when trouble is about.
Additionally, ICE seems to have been keeping a low profile in areas where that mindset is most prevalent. Still active, but keeping their wits about them.
Sooner or later, though, ICE will fuck up, knock down the wrong door, and multiple people (both ICE and citizens) will catch a bad case of lead poisoning. And then things will get bad.
From what they're doing it looks like they're really hoping that would happen and the orange turd will have a reason to trigger a national emergency.
No one wants to go in alone. That’s suicide.
Hard to find groups and organize sometimes.
Oh they're easy enough to find, they're just aligned with the fascists.
If you could only find a well regulated militia around… you know, the whole reason you’re constitution provides a right to bear arms.
Gun rights are rights of ALL American citizens.
If you feel the need to arm yourself, train, and protect what means the most to you by all means do it! It is your right to do so. The same info and equipment is available if you want it.
But like how freedom of religion doesn't mean everyone is religious, many people opt to not to use that right. And like people in different religions, the people using that same right can differ vastly from one another on beliefs and motivations.
Some people take up guns for fun and competition and nothing else. Others to defend themselves from crime or other personal harm. And some have guns for added community resilience if government cannot/will not help. Like major disasters, civil unrest etc. It can be all the above too.
Gun owners are not a simple neat group or a political party. One can't control what another does or what tolerances they have any more than you can control what another person says when they use free speech. And following that line of thought, you cannot force someone to use their rights in the way you would prefer.
Thank you for your well thought out answer.
I think most of them are doing the tyranny.
As a wise man once said: Things will have to get worse before they get better. The average American will need to suffer a lot more before they're ready to think about taking their guns to protests, let alone using them.
Where are the bearers of arms who bear arms in case of government tyranny?
They're the guys in the ICE uniforms, more often than not
Imagine the backlash the folks with the monopoly on violence would have if someone used violence against them.
A ton of the arms bearers don’t see anything wrong.
But what about those on the left? There are liberal guns owners. Where are they? No clue.
You're going to run into an issue of two low probability events overlapping. You are on lemmy, so you likely have an outsized notion of how common/public these instances with ICE are, and of how common left-leaning gun owners are.
The vast majority of ICE arrests will happen in isolated locations, like someone's home or place of work. So already, there are few people around. Of those who are around, most will not be gun owners, will not be carrying a gun, will not see ICE's actions as tyrannical, or will have overestimated their confidence in whipping out their glock to defend liberty.
But what about those on the left?
Idk about the rest of y'all, but I've been volunteering with the Houston Chapter of Food Not Bombs at every opportunity.
There's far fewer of us than cops, and we're more focused on keeping our impoverished neighbors alive than getting in gunfights with the police.
But maybe that'll change. I guess we'll see.
The Nazis want violence, that way they can justify even worse acts. Not that they need justification, they'l just keep getting worse anyway.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Dallas_ICE_facility_shooting
I dunno where the others are but they better be at the range, cause this guy did the opposite of helping.
Right here, where ICE is not. Want me to chase them down in another state?
If you are on the same side as illegal immigrants, you are not on the same side of the law in our nation.
Hence, you may be an "outlaw".
No... as a legit citizen of the united states, this is not the time to rise up against the government because immigration has been restricted.
Yall are really far out....
(And stupid)
Leftists don't like guns... that's why all the nutjobs have them. :/
Do a search for “Under no pretext…” and let me know what you get back.
Yes, I once posted that quote on Lemmy and used that to criticize the US Democrats' Gun Policies and got downvoted lmao
That's not true, and don't make the mistake of conflating liberals and leftists.