The Thread Where We Discuss Guns and Gun Control

[Arwon]

Nah, I won't be shooting anyone. I'm just going to help facilitate those who do want to shoot people though. If I don't get to have my rights, you don't get to have your peaceful society.

You know there's people with the wrong skin colour or religious faith in your country right now who would be arrested for saying that in public.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I can think of a few things: y'all are really relaxed about speeding and drink-driving and everyone is a protestant, even the atheists and non-christians. Also you're super acculturated to capitalism murdering people through lack of healthcare. And everyone seems insecure and stressed, in large part because of the previous thing.

Honestly I would have thought that with the drinking culture in Australia that drunk driving would be more of a problem. Glad it's not.

 

[rah]

Most did not become moonshiners and drug cartel members. Most just found another line of work.
And while I agree that you don't get all that much respect sometimes, I don't think the answer is lowering yourself to absurd arguments.
There are some here that are actually listening to both sides being made and maybe be somewhat swayed.

I don't think saying until there's a 100% perfect plan to remove guns from criminals before you're even willing to discuss any additional gun control steps is realistic. Let's go back to a discussion. And yes, there are some here that will never be convinced, but that's not who the discussion is for. Please feel free to continue to ignore them.

 

[inthesomeday]

You know there's people with the wrong skin colour or religious faith in your country right now who would be arrested for saying that in public.

We just like to word it a bit differently, a bit more catchily

 

[Arwon]

Honestly I would have thought that with the drinking culture in Australia that drunk driving would be more of a problem. Glad it's not.

It was a few decades ago. There's a been a very long term and high visibility government campaign against it that has changed the culture, coupled with fairly universally accepted random roadside breath testing points with no right of refusal. I was shocked how laissez faire Canadians and Americans were about drink driving, given I'm accustomed to carefully counting my beers and mentally calculating BAC on nights out where I've driven.

 

[Arwon]

Most did not become moonshiners and drug cartel members. Most just found another line of work.
And while I agree that you don't get all that much respect sometimes, I don't think the answer is lowering yourself to absurd arguments.
There are some here that are actually listening to both sides being made and maybe be somewhat swayed.

I don't think saying until there's a 100% perfect plan to remove guns from criminals before you're even willing to discuss any additional gun control steps is realistic. Let's go back to a discussion. And yes, there are some here that will never be convinced, but that's not who the discussion is for. Please feel free to continue to ignore them.

I mean the big difference obviously is the ongoing provision of popular mind altering addictive consumables is pretty non-comparable to peddling illicit capital goods. The nature of demand and the available profits are totally different. There's not exactly a market for black market grenade launchers in the US, after all. People don't get a desperate daily jonesing for flamethrowers if flamethrowers aren't legal to buy in the department store.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

It was a few decades ago. There's a been a very long term and high visibility government campaign against it that has changed the culture, coupled with fairly universally accepted random roadside breath testing points with no right of refusal. I was shocked how laissez faire Canadians and Americans were about drink driving, given I'm accustomed to carefully counting my beers and mentally calculating BAC on nights out where I've driven.

I can't speak for Canada but yeah people are way too lax about drunk driving here.

 

[rah]

Here, while people are probably still too lax, there has been a drastic improvement in the visibility of it.
Personally yeah, I pay way more attention to it and limit myself. Something that I rarely did when I was younger.

 

[Yeekim]

@Commodore You do come off as more than little bonkers.
Just sayin'

 

[Arakhor]

Given that felony murder is a quaint American fiction, Commodore would become a criminal pretty sharpish with his threatened plan of action.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Given that felony murder is a quaint American fiction, Commodore would become a criminal pretty sharpish with his threatened plan of action.

I remember when @Commodore stated first amendment rights should be taken away from anyone threatening his second amendment right and then he spent many, many posts claiming he never said it.

Now he's threatening people with murder over the same thing. I'm sure this will play out the same way.

Edit: oh he said he would just 'facilitate' murderers. Important distinction I guess

 

[Farm Boy]

Oh it's not a fiction.

 

[Lexicus]

Without strict federal oversight, though, there is no way to ensure the money would be spent to develop their economies. That's the crux of the matter - federal dollars alone guarantee nothing. Federal "intrusion" as many of those states like to call it actually serves a purpose.

In theory, I'm in favor of broad block granting. I just don't know how, in practice, you can ensure money is spent for the common good without attaching lots of strings to it, and even then it ends up mostly wasted a lot of the time.

Exactly - it's inadvisable to block grant money to states that are controlled by neo-confederates.

 

[El_Machinae]

Oh it's not a fiction.

It is absolutely a sentiment I have seen expressed elsewhere. To me, it seems a mistake was made letting them have guns in the first place. Like, "I promise to use my gun for evil", doesn't Inspire moral confidence in me

 

[Farm Boy]

I'm not following El, I was trying to respond to Arakor about felony murder. I got tired of turdshining myself a while back and may be missing content relevant to your point. What was it you were addressing? I'd like to hear.

 

[Commodore]

You know there's people with the wrong skin colour or religious faith in your country right now who would be arrested for saying that in public.

No, there isn't. In fact, that's one of the main criticisms of our law enforcement right now. When people do openly say the things that I'm saying, law enforcement doesn't do anything about it and then scratch their heads in puzzlement wondering "how could we have stopped this?" when some of the people saying these things actually make good on their threats.

I don't think saying until there's a 100% perfect plan to remove guns from criminals before you're even willing to discuss any additional gun control steps is realistic.

I just want to know what the plan is for those who refuse to comply with a gun confiscation order? I mean, the gun control crowd talks about banning them like that's the only thing they need to do, but they forget that it doesn't matter what laws you get passed if you can't realistically enforce those laws. Just look at what happened in Connecticut after Sandy Hook. Connecticut passed a law that said anyone with an AR-15 had to have it registered by a certain date or it would be confiscated and the owner would be charged with a felony. The designated date came and went, and an estimated 20,000 to 100,000 AR-15 owners in the state refused to register their rifles. What did the state do about it? Nothing. No confiscations, no charges, no arrests. Gun owners in Connecticut basically dared the government to "come and take them" and the state government shied away from a potential showdown with their tails between their legs. And because of that, they now have a useless gun control law because the state has shown that they don't have the political will or backbone to enforce it.

And that's just one state we are talking about here. If one state can't even enforce a simple registration law, what makes anyone think a nationwide ban and confiscation would meet with any kind of success? So again I ask the gun control crowd: Assuming you finally get all the laws you want and the Supreme Court upholds them, how exactly do you plan on enforcing your gun control laws? You can't arrest gun owners because our prisons are overcrowded as it is. You can't freeze their assets and wait them out because the impact of cutting millions of people off from the economy would be absolutely disastrous for the entire country, not just gun owners. You can't send the police door-to-door because 1. there simply aren't enough even if you deployed every local, state, and federal law enforcement agent and 2. once a few thousand officers take two to the chest trying to confiscate guns, I guarantee they are going to either refuse to do further confiscations or walk off the job altogether. You can't use the military because using the military for law enforcement is a legal no-no. Even the National Guard can only be used for riot control. You can't hire mercenaries because that's also illegal both in US and international law. You can't shut down the gun manufacturers because there's the chance they will just move their business elsewhere and start refusing to supply our military and police with firearms and ammunition. They have plenty of other customers willing to buy their products elsewhere in the world.

So what's the plan? How do you enforce gun laws in the US in a way that doesn't cause some kind of civil strife/unrest? And if there is no easy or peaceful way to do it, then the gun control crowd has to ask themselves if they really think their peace of mind about gun violence is really worth the path that the government would have to go down in order to enforce the law.

You do come off as more than little bonkers.

Well, let's have society try to take some of your rights away and we'll see how "bonkers" you get.

I mean, 2nd Amendment advocates have done nothing but compromise on the issue of gun control, but the anti-gun crowd refuses to do the same. And since I know someone is going to try to lie and say 2nd Amendment advocates haven't compromised I'll list just a few compromises for you: The National Firearms Act of 1934, universal background checks for every purchase (something no other consumer good requires), allowing certain accessories to be banned, and countless state-level restrictions on the purchase, trading, storage, etc. of firearms. All those compromises and the anti-gun crowd just keeps taking more and more.

I remember when @Commodore stated first amendment rights should be taken away from anyone threatening his second amendment right and then he spent many, many posts claiming he never said it.

Because I didn't say their 1st Amendment rights should be taken away. I'm still waiting for someone to quote where I said that. I want the exact post with the exact wording. Keep in mind, I know you think this is going to be a softball that I'm tossing you, but it's not going to be the "gotcha!" moment you think it will. And just because I'm a bit paranoid, I even took a screenshot of the post already just in case a certain moderator that I know has a grudge with me tries to edit the post to make it look like I said something I didn't.

Moderator Action: This is PDMA. Report the moderator or don't talk about it. --LM

Now he's threatening people with murder over the same thing. I'm sure this will play out the same way.

Well, you are free to quote the post where I said it. Come on man, I'd think you'd jump at the opportunity to shut me up. But just like the 1st Amendment thing, you keep saying I said something but can't quite seem to produce the post where I said it when I ask you to back up your claim.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well it's kinda hard to have an actual discussion when I've tried and get no reciprocation from anyone else. Just look at the ghost gun point I made. I linked to an article that describes what I'm talking about and even said that a simple Google search will yield many more results from many more sources that corroborate my argument, and Tim just ignored all that and said "that doesn't exist, that's just a fantasy" because he doesn't want to admit that he was wholly unaware of the ghost gun issue and what that would mean for gun control efforts.

No, I pointed out that your "if factories pumping millions of guns into the marketplace are shut down a cottage industry that currently produces a few hundred will explode" argument was a fantasy. I did not ignore it, or claim that the cottage industry doesn't exist. As to your constant claims about anyone who disagrees with you being "just uninformed," shove it up your butt. Oh, and leave some room up there for your equally consistent claims about how respectfully you claim that no one but you knows anything.

 

[Sommerswerd]

I think this man asks some very good questions that I doubt anyone has a good answer for. When is the government going to start standing up for the majority? Why is it the actions of a criminal get laid at my feet when I've been a law abiding citizen my entire life?

What is ironic to me, is that this exact statement squarely applies to being racially profiled... but you don't have anywhere near the sympathy/receptiveness for this exact same statement when it is raised in that context (ie Black Lives Matter)

In fact, given the cultural differences between Australia and the US

Again... I think this is a dogwhistle, buzz-argument. These cultural differences you are referring to, are non-existent, and just empty rhetoric. It might sound good, but the people who came up with that line were mostly talking about races, ethnicities and religions that they don't care for. Again, I know that's not what you mean, but I wish you'd stop saying that, cause that's where it comes from.

Treat me like I'm evil, then I'm going to start being evil.

Again... another argument that squarely applies in the BLM context, but you would reject wholesale when applied in that context.

 

[Samson]

I just want to know what the plan is for those who refuse to comply with a gun confiscation order? I mean, the gun control crowd talks about banning them like that's the only thing they need to do, but they forget that it doesn't matter what laws you get passed if you can't realistically enforce those laws.

It seems to me that there would be a massive win in just stopping selling them. Once you stop new and existing guns entering the market then the flow of illegal guns is stopped. If they are hard to get fewer people will be selling their old ones, and people who have them can be assumed to be criminals. Sure this may be slower than getting everyone to hand back their guns, but will be an enormous move in the right direction.

What effect (quantitatively, but obviously roughly) would you expect a ban on gun sales to the public to have on the availability of guns to gangs?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

What effect (quantitatively, but obviously roughly) would you expect a ban on gun sales to the public to have on the availability of guns to gangs?

None, because Commodore is going to manufacture millions of illegal guns in his basement to make up the shortfall.