> RECREATIONAL USE??? Taking your older kids out for a friendly session at the local shooting gallery, and mowing down targets with a lethal weapon whilst possibly damaging their eardrums and poisoning their lungs with metal combustion gases, is supposed to be FUN?

Like Sam said, it's a matter of taste. I find it very fun. And you don't damage your eardrums if you use protection; and there's none of this lung poisoning you talk of.

>The general Canadian view towards firearms is that owning a gun is excessive force and undesirable. That's why the school-shooting tragedy in Taber, Alberta, was not a Columbine-Littleton level of massacre. The Taber student simply wasn't able to obtain the same kind of lethal firepower to which the Columbine students had access.

REALLY? Well, the 'General Canadian View' where I live is that owning a gun is a god-given right, probably because I live in a more rural area, and you live in a large city.
Also, I doubt that the Taber student would have had any trouble getting more firearms if he had tried.

In my opinion, gun control laws are a waste. Why? Because the criminals who have intent don't follow them. They're criminals, and institiuing laws until the country goes into civil unrest won't stop them.

Wormwood