r/canadaguns • u/Callie7680 • Apr 19 '26

News / Politics / Activism Genuinely curious on liberal views of gun laws

Hello all. Looking for a debate on the other side of all of the gun laws / bans from a liberal point of view. How does it ACTUALLY make sense to liberals with the current laws. C21 was passed with hopes of lowering crime? How is that going? The OIC. How has the crime rate gone since? How are these “liberal experts” in power thinking this is actually going to make a difference? Canada could 100% ban every single firearm and gun crime would not go down 1 bit. I don’t really know any liberals to talk about it with I’d actually like to hear their side on it. I’m clearly not an expert on any of this but it just seems so ridiculous

51 Upvotes

79% Upvoted

326 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

52

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

It's interesting reading some of his replies. His one on how he supports removing the bans highlighting he doesn't support everything the party says.

People here seem to be so black and white single issue. But ignoring everything else the cons have within the party that they support. Like as a conservative do you support conversion therapy or removing trans rights? Or removing access to abortion? There's plenty of shit the cons can say that many I'd assume dont support.

Kind of like I was saying in my comment how many liberals aren't for the ban but it doesn't affect them so why speak up? No different than say a conservative voter might not actually be homophobic and want gay marriage banned but it doesn't affect them so do you really think they'd speak up against it?

I hate how black and white many in this sub and the gun community act like the two parties are. So much so I know I'll be down voted just for saying this and I didn't even vote liberal.

7

u/Remarkable_Vanilla34 Apr 19 '26

I think a big issue is that people might not agree with or care about the gun bans but we are so partisan now that some people are afraid to criticize their party because they are concerned that any criticism make their party look weak. This doesn't just apply to the LPC.

The other thing is with guns, the default stance of "progressives" is guns are bad and people shouldn't own them. A lot of people haven't formed much of an opinion on the topic, they have adopted one they believe is the default. We tend to look at our own politics, the politics of our southern neighbors and of other commonwealth countries, but if we looked more broadly we would see that many progressive countries like Finland or Switzerland have gun laws that are more inline with our pre 2020 laws or even less restrictive.

I know LPC and NDP supporters who own guns, don't support the policy or are just indifferent to it. I know conservatives who are total Fudds, or like my mom who is a life long conservative, just feels uncomfortable about handguns or whatever.

More often than not, I find that with gun owners, we are passionate about firearms ownership, but we are not necessarily staunch conservatives, I know i certified am not, but these bans have drove us to the conservatives, and people attack single issue voting because they don't understand it or it makes them mad that we won't accept being criminalized to support their preferred ideology and party.

As for myself, I don't think our parties are that different, as much as the zeitgeist would have us believe. Generally when parties get into power they will have to deal with the same problems and govern in very similar ways. But firearms is one issue i know will be different and its one i care about. I don't think any party is bringing in a utopia, so I put my vote behind an issue i care about.

20

u/GreenMan165 Apr 19 '26

One thing I will say in regards to the belief of a black and white single issue, you're on a sub called r/canadaguns, people primarily come here to talk about guns, and I would tend to believe skews to a place where guns are a huge deal in their lives. You'd end up potentially with more nuanced discussion in a political sub, if you went looking for opinions there. Also of note, people are seeing red here I think, being under attack from Liberal policy for so long, and they come to a sub like this with that dissatisfaction to talk about guns, primarily.

1

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 20 '26

I get that. But they also attack anyone that isn't blue and dares to say there's more to ones life than guns.

18

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

7

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 19 '26

They don't talk about it because just like they aren't very vocal on the guns. They're smart enough to know it's political suicide to discuss it openly until in power. But they don't actively shut it out of the party either.

If they won't come right out and say there is no place for that discussion in the party, they are allowing it to live quietly within the party.

12

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 19 '26

The conservatives have said though that they are ok with it being discussed internally. They don't want to shoot it down because they don't want to suppress said members. But by saying just that they are admitting they are open to it being a discussion later.

3

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

Yes, because the CPC is the reform/classical liberal party; message discipline is less important/less taken-for-granted than the LPC, which is the "the only thing bad about Stalin is that there aren't 50 of him"/conservative party.

It is reasonable that reformers will want to be able to discuss reform (that's why we're voting for them); further, reactionaries and reformers don't look very different to someone whose whole political outlook is tied to Stalin's views.

6

u/GoGetInvolved Apr 19 '26

They've said outright they won't touch abortions. They don't talk about it but they also don't act on it. You're just making the Harper hidden agenda argument again and we all saw that didn't pan out.

The Liberals act on their worst instincts on guns, censorship etc.

3

u/sirbobthefish Apr 19 '26

Pierre's adoptive father is gay, he's not going to shove gay people into conversion camps

-4

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

You haven't looked hard. They literally use transphobic talking points in their official docs. "Women only spaces" is a transphobic dog whistle. 

11

u/AgreeablePanda9805 Apr 19 '26

How is wanting women only spaces transphobic when women are a protected class that had to fight for the rights to women only spaces?

3

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

women are a protected class

If men aren't a protected class, why should women be?

Boomers and Gen X believe, axiomatically, that women > men- so they vote in support of policies that advance that worldview. "Ban all gunz now" is a symptom of this problem; most of these people think guns are just another way for evil men to shoot holy women.

The younger generations have a different take, but they don't vote so it doesn't matter.

1

u/jwubadubdub Apr 19 '26

You'd probably appreciate what Helen Andrews has to say on the subject

1

u/AgreeablePanda9805 Apr 20 '26

Men are also a protected class.

Sex is a protected class just like race or religion, etc.

I disagree with the generality that boomers or gen x believe women > men.

I’d argue that it’s probably the younger generations (millennials, gen z, whatever is after them) are more likely to believe women > men bc they tend to buy into that hierarchy of oppression that likes to rank people by identity and determine what rights a person should based on a comparison to whose life is worse than theirs.

-5

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

I'm not going to bother arguing with you. Trans women are women. End of story. 

4

u/TheGreenBastich Apr 19 '26

Cool story them/them.

6

u/TheGreenBastich Apr 19 '26

Women only spaces isnt transphobic.

-1

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

It is when it's exclusionary of trans women. Trans women are women. End of story. 

2

u/jwubadubdub Apr 19 '26

You can keep repeating it like some sort of Tinkerbell clapping situation, but it's not gonna work

Your religion is losing steam, and for obvious reasons

3

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

Yeah, that's why the conservatives have a majority and keep gaining floor crossers.

Oh wait. 

4

u/jwubadubdub Apr 19 '26

Lol! You think the liberals gained a majority through floor crossers because they're ideologically aligned on the trans agenda?

What's Gladu's position on whether men can become women? She's super left now right? 😂

Seek help

2

u/TheGreenBastich Apr 20 '26

Im surprised you didnt get flagged for hate speech while telling the truth.

2

u/CollectibleHam Apr 20 '26

There's a lot of trans firearms owners, don't push people away for the sake of US funded culture war bullshit.

11

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 19 '26

I don't think there is anything in the conservative platform about ending abortion rights or pushing conversion therapy.  They wouldn't touch that with a 10 foot pole. They aren't after a ban on gay marriage either.

9

u/GoGetInvolved Apr 19 '26

There isn't. It's so weird to see people justifying voting against CPC because of issues that they said they won't touch and didn't touch last time they were in power, but also that the things the Liberals are actually doing and have done every single time they got power are things the Liberals won't keep doing if they vote for them again just one more time.

9

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 19 '26

The fact that at the leadership convention they wouldn't speak out against it. It still lives within the cons.

The very issue with the cons and why they won't form government in Canada. They are an amalgamation of the far right and centre right. Because of the fear of losing that added support they just keep it entertained.

Similar to NDP/liberal dividing the left. Though with this recent election we saw the NDP lose support in strategic voting to help the liberals to ensure the cons wouldn't win. Because that far right rhetoric still lives in the party.

5

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 19 '26

It still lives, but it doesn't influence the official party position. They aren't ending abortion rights or taking any other extreme action that would hurt their position. 

The Liberals, on the other hand, do allow extreme actions like banning firearms.

-5

u/LongRoadNorth Apr 19 '26

They haven't had the opportunity to enact such extremes.

I wouldn't rule out them trying it if they had a majority. They might not get any outright ban but they'd definitely try and limit access. Just like they'd absolutely look into limiting access to maid.

When as a party or party leader you won't outright denounce said ideology you support its existence.

As I said in another comment, the current cons are an amalgamation of far right and centre right. And as long as that be the case the discussions around maid, trans, gay and abortion rights will continue to live within the party.

A centre right party could easily win a majority, a party with far right echoes though, not very likely in Canada.

7

u/GoGetInvolved Apr 19 '26

This was a talking point under Harper who was an actual pro-life person and he didn't limit it. They said he'd do it when he's elected then that he'll do it when he's elected again then that he'll do it when he gets a majority then that the party will do it when they're elected again.

He didn't.

And Poilievre is pro-choice.

10

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 19 '26

"When as a party or party leader you won't outright denounce said ideology you support its existence" Getting liberals to denounce terrorist organizations is like pulling teeth.  They must support terrorists, then, right??

3

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

The fact that at the leadership convention they wouldn't speak out against it

Oh, just like the sexism and racism at the NDP leadership convention? (Which the LPC is just a milder version of?)

why they won't form government in Canada

Because the Easterners, and Boomers more specifically, would rather have sexism and racism than reform (or "standing up to Trump" for short). There's really nothing else to say.

6

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

There are absolutely undercurrents of transphobia in current conservative talking points. 

As recently as March of this year, PP was embracing JK Rowling's bathroom bans on trans people. 

1

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

Ok, now extend that to the average LPC voter, who is more likely than average to believe the existence of guns is gynophobic.

In fact, their lobbying arm constantly claims this (and is named after an event where the perpetrator claimed to be acting on this). Yeah, it's shut up more recently because most recent mass shooters have been women [or rather, to not claim they're women would be said by those same women to be transphobic; I'm happy to indulge this own-goal]- but it's still there in the background.

We can play word games about "pHobiC" all day long, but at the end of the day there are reasonable asks and unreasonable ones. An act is not illegitimate just because it made some loud group very mad, which is also what LPC gun-banners say about us- all we're asking is for a little fairness.

-3

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

The false equivalence is strong in you. 

2

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

No, you're just mad about the fact that words mean things, and don't like your privilege being called out.

0

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

Seriously, what the hell are you talking about? 

I'll wait for your data, as requested. But since it doesn't exist...

-1

u/ComplexQuiet6790 Apr 19 '26

Please point to your statistics about recent mass shooters. I'll happily change my opinion if proven wrong, but the preponderance of mass shooters remain white men. It's just that the majority has changed from something like 95% to 85%. 

4

u/Q-Ball7 In the end, it's taxes all the way down Apr 19 '26

white men

I'm sorry, what does race have to do with it? I mean, I get that LPCers/modern conservatives [they call themselves something else though] are just flat out racist against this group but I figured it would have taken you at least a couple of comments to get there.

Anyway, the pattern of what makes a mass shooter is more along the lines of "disaffected young person is depressed, finds a support group or some purpose to latch onto (and/or starts taking anti-depressants, so the no-energy problem is fixed), and the first thing they do is go out and sacrifice their life for The Cause".

Back in the Before Times we had far more pro-social causes that someone looking for purpose could latch onto, which is part of why mass shootings in the name of "I hate group X" are mostly a modern phenomenon. Now we don't, so this happens more often in the name of what the dominant "I hate" is at the time.

It's just that the majority has changed from something like 95% to 85%.

100% of the mass shooters in Canada since 2022 have been female. Or rather, the dominant "I hate" has become "normal people" after that time.

Not that it ever wasn't, of course.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/canadaguns-ModTeam Apr 19 '26

In accordance with the subreddit rules, your post/comment has been removed for the following reason:

[4] Not Relevant/Low Quality Content This subreddit is for the discussion of Canadian firearms ownership, shooting sports, safety of firearms, Gun Clubs, Firearms groups, advocacy, and the Canadian political effects of online communities/groups.

Posts, commenting, articles, and discussions are to be specific to Canada and Canadian laws. Posts not specific to Canada but may reasonably have a link to Canadian gun culture or laws, which would foster thoughtful and productive discussions, may be approved at moderator discretion.

Off-topic, non-relevance to the context of a submission, exaggerated/extremist commenting may be removed at moderator discretion.

Low quality, AI generated content, spammed content may be removed at moderator discretion.

If there is a major event/change in another country that you think would be worthy of discussion here, please contact the moderators first to review for content & suitability for the subreddit.

Generic news articles about crime, containing the word "gun, "weapon", etc., and not necessarily relatable to the context of this subreddit, may be removed. This isn't a gun crime subreddit.

Memes that are copied/pasted from other subs, are reposts, or are not relevant to Canadian firearms ownership may be removed at the moderator's discretion.

Major off topic tangents can result in content removal and/or being banned.

1

u/Sharp_Phrase_9066 Apr 19 '26

wront. that was JK's not supporting transgenders in Olympic Games. I don't know why liberal voters are enjoying men beating up men beating up women in Olympic Games.

-1

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 19 '26

It was the race wars for me. There’s not a single data point that hints South Asians commit more crime, but they kept pushing that narrative. I know Canadians of South Asian descent that have been shot because of how much they brainwashed people by pushing a bogus narrative and highlighting anecdotal data as the norm. It’s disgusting, and I hope they pay for their crimes.

2

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 20 '26

You know people (plural) who have been shot just because they are brown?  Right.  Sure you do.

-1

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 20 '26

Wasn’t there one 2 weeks ago in Alberta, again?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/fatal-shooting-singh-9.7136695

I love this delusion you folk live in. This is why you can’t have nice things.

1

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 20 '26

Nice try.  "RCMP say no evidence the shooting is racially motivated".

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/birinder-singh-homicide-shooting-9.7150336

You guys will scream racism at the drop of a hat.  But if someone mentions a pattern in crime stats related to a minority you want them thrown in jail.

0

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 20 '26

If it’s any consolation, the RCMP also says there was no involvement from the Indian government in the Nijjar killing, so your sudden change of heart for the RCMP is kinda weird.

0

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 20 '26

You don't know my thoughts on any of that but thanks for trying your carnival esp cold read.

0

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 20 '26

It doesn’t take much to read your thoughts, bud! “You” may be an anecdotal data point, but Canadian conservative racism has spread far and wide!

0

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 20 '26

And you're a card carrying liberal who wishes he was at that latest NDP convention so you could have patched over. Go acknowledge the land you live on but balk at giving it up.  Lol

→ More replies (0)

-1

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 20 '26

And if you read the case, it’s fairly obvious what It is. Yeah, I’ve seen how people treat people of colour at the neighborhood range, so save your stories for someone who doesn’t pay attention to what you say or do. I bring up “Indian or South Asian Indian” in front of my conservative friends and they literally lose their shit. We weren’t born yesterday you know?

0

u/niagaragagarafalls Apr 20 '26

Again, "You guys will scream racism at the drop of a hat."  Thanks

0

u/Sweetchildofmine88 Apr 20 '26

LMAO! You mean the Canadian racism the entire world is making fun of? There’s comedians in Czechia that’s making fun of this. My god, man!

1

u/xpingux Apr 20 '26

The Canadian Conservative party has supported abortion for as long as they've had a website showing their platform. It's never changed.

The fact that you THINK either "Trans rights" (which is a nebulous thing in the first place) or abortion are at risk under a Conservative government shows exactly how bad the news media and internet propaganda have captured you.

1

u/HappyCan7250 Apr 22 '26

You do know that Polievres adoptive father is gay right? Polievre and the modern CPC has no intention on ever touching the gay marriage or rights issue. You can't take quotes from a decade ago and apply it today.

Hell even back around 2008 Obama in the US was saying marriage is between a man and a woman, and he's one of the idols of the left (and I personally have no issue with him, I think he was a good man despite me disagreeing on policy with him).

If you look back far enough, I'm certain there was a time where the LPC opposed gay marriage as well. You're basically just quoting strawman arguments used to scare voters away from the CPC.

-1

u/Davor_Penguin Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 19 '26

Yea like I'm pro-gun, but I'm far more pro LGBTQ, human, and climate.

Sadly we can't mix and match our perfect politician, so all we can do is speak out, send letters, and vote for the best of the worst. 🤷🏼‍♂️

Edit: downvote all you want, doesn't change shit