I've never really had a lot of chance to mess around with an FGC-9 or any similar 3D-printed firearm, but I love the idea. It's great to see people building up the idea of 3D-printed guns that use these printers, then buy some parts from a hardware store, and have a gun that can be made anywhere in the world.

I get that some people are trying to stop that, some with laws and some via other means, but that's not likely to happen.

Perhaps my favorite part of that particular firearm is that FGC stands for "F*** Gun Control."

Gotta love it.

Unfortunately, a British kid who built one is about to spend the next several years in prison.

A teenager who was part of a chat group called 'domestic terrorism' was jailed for making a semi-automatic gun using a 3D printer and parts he bought online.

Owain Roberts, 19, of Pill, Newport, made a semi-automatic gun which was tested by firearms officers and found to be a viable weapon.

Roberts was just 17 when he purchased nuts and bolts, steel barrels and metal rods online and used a 3D printer to make the FGC-9 gun, an acronym for 'F*** Gun Control'.

A raid on his bedroom also found Nazi posters, gas masks, body armour, knives and ingredients that could be used to create explosives.

A court heard Roberts was a member of an online gaming chat group called 'Domestic Terrorism' using the name Strelok which translates as 'gun slinger' in Russian.

Prosecutor Rebecca Griffiths said messages from Roberts included posts about Adolf Hitler and indicating he wanted to hurt Jewish people and Muslims.

She said he sent racist and far-right political messages his friends which included, 'beating up Muslims is my pre-workout' and 'lefties are weird.'

Cardiff Crown Court heard Roberts had entered basic military training in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, and undergone training in marskmanship but dropped out after five months. 

...

Roberts admitted manufacturing a part/component of a firearm and was jailed for four years and nine months.

I honestly don't know what the alleged racism had to do with anything since he wasn't convicted of any hate crimes or anything. It sounds like that was more about poisoning people's opinions of the kid more than anything.

Now that he's got four years in prison, well there goes his gun rights.

Oh, wait, this is the UK where he didn't have any in the first place, which is why he designed the blasted thing.

Unsurprisingly, Roberts seems remorseful over his supposed crimes. However, I'm going to say he has nothing to be remorseful for, at least when it comes to building a gun. He exercised a basic human right. The fact that the UK government doesn't acknowledge it is irrelevant. The right to keep and bear arms is preserved in the Second Amendment. It's not created by it. It's simply a right that we, as men and women, have.

I get that the UK isn't a free country, but this is ridiculous.

"But he was a racist."

Was he? Or was he a stupid kid who liked to appear to be edgy?

More importantly, what does it matter? Rights cannot just exist for people you personally approve of. If that's the case, they're not rights. They're privileges and they're only parcelled out with your approval. That's not a right by any stretch of the imagination, so even if the kid is such a profound racist that he makes David Duke look like the next chairman of the Rainbow Coalition, his rights don't change.

What happened here is wrong. It shouldn't have happened.

But there are plenty of people who want this to be the case here. They'd want this kid imprisoned for the exact same things, all while screaming about public safety, but no one has ever found where Roberts sold the guns, used them against another person, or anything. He just made them. Maybe the most amazing thing is that he got less than five years in a British prison for his home-built gun, while Dexter Taylor was recently sentenced to ten years behind bars for building homemade guns in New York City. As bad as Great Britain's gun laws are, in some respects New York's are even worse.