American here with a few questions

[u/CapThePunch98]

I'm not trying to gloat or anything like that, just genuinely curious about Canadians and how they're feeling about guns, gun rights, and gun purchases. You guys were clearly given the shaft when it comes to guns.

Question 1: I see a lot of comments here passing up on $900 SKS's or Carmel's because they're a ripoff. Why not spend a little extra to get your hands on a semi-automatic rifle since the vast majority of them are banned? I feel like I would if I were in your shoes. 22's are just cope imo.

Question 2: how sacred are guns to the average user here?

Question 3: how is morale? Do you guys have hope for the future? If a conservative PM wins, do you think he'll unban a lot of shit?

[u/jayecal]

Q1 - There's a few reasons I don't want to go for the Carmel or one of the slim pickings semi autos that aren't banned. Partly is that because we are such a small and captive market the price for them is high. In the US you can get a cheap AR for what? $400-600? To get that same thing here in a semi-auto we'd be looking $1600-2200. And personally I just can't afford to buy another right now.

But also the fact that they are ok now doesn't mean the current government is going to let them slide. With any tragedy that happens anywhere in the world (doesn't even have to be here) the anti-gun groups push for more bans. Something happened recently and there was worries that the SKS would end up on the chopping block after all. (It didn't this time, but concern was there.) So I don't want to risk that 2k gun is suddenly going to be another paperweight overnight because the gun control groups got their way again.

Q2 - To the average user here, probably fairly sacred. Most of us here I think understand what comes next if the gun control groups get their way. But that doesn't mean all gun owners are this way. Sadly there are a lot that simply don't care. Others are more than happy to serve sport shooters up if they think they'll be left alone. Only that's not what happened and they got a bit of a rude awakening (the ones paying attention anyway) that even their guns are on the chopping block.

Q3 - I'd say morale is on the low side. We have a government that is actively hostile to us, has no issue with telling lies to the public and misleading people with false headlines and manipulated stats. And is pretty much bent the knee to a group of overly hysterical anti-gun fanatics who have admitted the end goal is the end of civilian firearm ownership in Canada. (I'm not saying the Ecole Polytechnique survivors don't have trauma, but they are the exact epitome of why victims aren't permitted to handle sentencing. Nothing is ever far enough for them. And they don't care who they hurt to get their way.)

Even if we get a conservative government this is no guarantee they'll undo or rollback anything. Previous conservative governments have had chances to do that with getting rid of the prohibition of short barrel pistols and they didn't. While they threw us a bone by getting rid of the long gun registry, there were places that didn't follow orders to destroy it (Quebec) and kept it to use later on.

The only thing kind of keeping spirits from tanking completely is that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case against the Government in this firearms ban (done using what amounts to an Executive Order). And they don't take cases lightly (pretty much only if there's something actually worth looking at). But there's no guarantees there what will happen. The previous courts have sided against Canadian gun owners. And even if we win the supreme court case there's no telling what that will actually look like. Or what the government will do following it.