The Thread Where We Discuss Guns and Gun Control

[EgonSpengler]

It's just a who tends to own what. And new restrictions are usually on sale, not on region you live in.

But you're right. Handguns are specifically pulled out be recend SCOTUS precedent, specifically. All the long tools, even of obsolete era, aren't so much. I really do hate handguns, fwiw. But it's always assault rifle this and assault weapon that.

Yeah, I doubt 99% of AR-15 owners could justify it rationally, if they had to, but handguns are a far bigger problem. The media also gets fired up about "mass shootings", which account for a tiny percentage of the overall violence. That's not new, btw: The Wikipedia article about the National Firearms Act of 1934 notes that it was the St. Valentine's Day Massacre that tilted public opinion against the gangsters and the automatic weapons they were using.

 

[Farm Boy]

Yup. Like with all good issues folks, it's often about "who" rather than "what."

Justify yourself! Your labor and rights are mine!

 

[Birdjaguar]

GOP = Guns over People

 

[9gkj548hkm20vk79dj689bnj4]

Why does one need a gun?

ask the authorities.

I can assure you they won't be giving theirs up the next time one of them makes a mistake that someone like me would rightly be ridiculed and punished for

(so yeah I guess I take a very class-conscious approach to the issue in which the 2A is only subordinate to)

 

[Lexicus]

Yup. Like with all good issues folks, it's often about "who" rather than "what."

Justify yourself! Your labor and rights are mine!

I just think the dead and wounded are the real victims here, not rural people en masse. I mean, perhaps ironically, I think rural communities suffer more, proportionally, from gun violence than urban communities, so it's the gun industry preying on the rural community, taking lives and health in addition to labor (all those guns and tacticool stuff get expensive), but somehow people who are concerned about this and want a policy solution are the real villains

 

[Farm Boy]

I mean, I get your argument. It's the one I dust off when I want to call abortion racial and class based eugenics, as it hits the ground.

 

[Lexicus]

I mean, I get your argument. It's the one I dust off when I want to call abortion racial and class based eugenics, as it hits the ground.

So what do you think the actual problems with my view are? Analogies are fun but they aren't arguments.

 

[Farm Boy]

Fundamentally different weight of values, I'd wager.

I acknowledge the cost of the right and deem it worth it. Same as I grudgingly acknowledge a right that kills, in my understanding, more. Disarming minorities always comes first for a reason.

 

[Colonel]

ask the authorities.

I can assure you they won't be giving theirs up the next time one of them makes a mistake that someone like me would rightly be ridiculed and punished for

(so yeah I guess I take a very class-conscious approach to the issue in which the 2A is only subordinate to)

Government employees whether police or military should likewise be held to a higher standard as they have the training associated with use and must maintain proficiency with said weapon. The public at this point no longer has a valid reason in the confines of a well regulated militia to own a firearm. We aren't calling up billy bob when we activate a State Guard, we are calling up personnel who have been trained to the same standard as active duty troops, billy bob and his posse aren't going to fight off a tyrannical government or foreign adversary with shotguns and long rifles. As the amendment is contingent on a well regulated militia the general citizenry no longer have a valid argument to own personal firearms.

 

[Broken_Erika]

Are you saying that the mobility scooter brigade/gravy seals/meal team 6 would be useless in an actual war?

 

[IglooDame]

Yeah, I'm not aware that gun licenses are being denied to people who have a genuine need, but I guess I'm not surprised to hear it. That said, I don't think the answer to discrimination or violence against certain groups is to make gun ownership easier. I still question the value of guns in self-defense or home-defense, but that would only be in the forefront of my mind if the consequences of widespread gun ownership seemed to be otherwise neutral. I don't have a problem with people wearing crystals to balance the color of their aura, but not because I think it works. If owning a gun was just some harmless little quirk or hobby, we wouldn't be having these conversations. So far, it seems like the more we learn about what guns do to our country, the worse and worse it gets. You may find it a slog to convince me that among the problems facing young, Black, starving artists today is that they aren't properly armed, but take a swing at it, if you feel like.

I don't feel like it, not into slogs. I've been discussing this topic here for well nigh on two decades, I think folks know my position, I know theirs, and there's precious little budging going on. And over the past couple years, my interest has gone from discussing things as an intellectual exercise to it feeling very visceral, as I'm now carrying (concealed) daily and regularly attending Pink Pistol gatherings where I help other people learn to be safe, sane, and competent with their firearms. You know what, maybe y'all are right, that relatively uncontrolled firearm ownership is a net negative for the United States. Fine. As a practical matter, there's no likelihood on the horizon for any serious gun bans, and people can make all the cracks they like about 90% of drivers thinking they're above average but I think it's pretty obvious that my personal possession and use and training is a positive for me and others so I'm going to stick with it. I'll obey the law just as I always have, unless the laws become hostile to me (like declaring gender dysphoria a disqualifying mental illness) at which point things will be getting pretty interesting (in the Chinese curse sense) anyway.

 

[zxcvbob]

Government employees whether police or military should likewise be held to a higher standard as they have the training associated with use and must maintain proficiency with said weapon. The public at this point no longer has a valid reason in the confines of a well regulated militia to own a firearm. We aren't calling up billy bob when we activate a State Guard, we are calling up personnel who have been trained to the same standard as active duty troops, billy bob and his posse aren't going to fight off a tyrannical government or foreign adversary with shotguns and long rifles. As the amendment is contingent on a well regulated militia the general citizenry no longer have a valid argument to own personal firearms.

1. Non-military government employees are not held to any standard at all; they are give various levels of immunity.
2. BillyBob and his posse have fought off a tyrannical government before, and it wasn't all that long ago. Read about the Battle of Athens (1946), also called the McMinn County War.

 

[Lexicus]

"The Non-Partisan GI Political League replied to enquiries by veterans elsewhere in the United States with the advice that shooting it out was not the most desirable solution to political problems."

 

[Bamspeedy]

BillyBob and his posse have fought off a tyrannical government before, and it wasn't all that long ago. Read about the Battle of Athens (1946), also called the McMinn County War.

A local sheriff's office, sure, BillyBob and his posse can go toe to toe with them.

No match at all if the army is called in.

 

[Colonel]

1. Non-military government employees are not held to any standard at all; they are give various levels of immunity.
2. BillyBob and his posse have fought off a tyrannical government before, and it wasn't all that long ago. Read about the Battle of Athens (1946), also called the McMinn County War.

As I've been in law enforcement I would beg to differ, even the worst department's have some degree of firearm safety and use requirements. Anecdotes about isolated incidents aren't a valid counter argument to the fact that the Constitution by virtue of the 2nd Amendment doesn't actually give the individual citizenry any rights to weapons. The Amendment was intended to be a right reserved to the state government, hence the contingent clause about a well-regulated militia. The Supreme Court is who created this magical inherent right to own a gun, not the Constitution. Outside of war crimes across the world the Supreme Court by that action(s) has most assuredly caused the most deaths to innocent people by enshrining an individual right to own a gun. See every mass shooting in the past 100 years.

 

[IglooDame]

As I've been in law enforcement I would beg to differ, even the worst department's have some degree of firearm safety and use requirements. Anecdotes about isolated incidents aren't a valid counter argument to the fact that the Constitution by virtue of the 2nd Amendment doesn't actually give the individual citizenry any rights to weapons. The Amendment was intended to be a right reserved to the state government, hence the contingent clause about a well-regulated militia. The Supreme Court is who created this magical inherent right to own a gun, not the Constitution. Outside of war crimes across the world the Supreme Court by that action(s) has most assuredly caused the most deaths to innocent people by enshrining an individual right to own a gun. See every mass shooting in the past 100 years.

Oh good, someone who can answer a question I've had for a while. Can you share what you've seen as the average department's minimum training standards and qualifications (not SWAT, just Joe or Jane Officer), and also that for the worst departments?

 

[EgonSpengler]

1. Non-military government employees are not held to any standard at all; they are give various levels of immunity.
2. BillyBob and his posse have fought off a tyrannical government before, and it wasn't all that long ago. Read about the Battle of Athens (1946), also called the McMinn County War.

I'd been wondering if there was even a single instance of a successful use of private arms against the government since the War for Independence, so thanks for the tip.

Oh good, someone who can answer a question I've had for a while. Can you share what you've seen as the average department's minimum training standards and qualifications (not SWAT, just Joe or Jane Officer), and also that for the worst departments?

I wonder that, too.

Just to use one example, the officers who killed Breonna Taylor were just generally incompetent, but one relatively-minor detail that stood out to me is that the officers who actually made entry into the apartment were not very good at using their weapons. 7 officers made entry, a total of 32 shots were fired, in two barrages of 16, separated by a space of about a minute, and not a single one of them hit the target. The guy they were actually shooting at went unscathed. One of the officers was so reckless, he was fired just for being an unbelievable moron, even by the standards of his department (he fired several rounds through a window, from the side of the apartment, with no view of anyone).

For another example, the officers trying to apprehend the Tsarnaev brothers in a suburb of Boston after the Boston Marathon bombing fired hundreds of rounds in a running car chase and gun battle. Homes on either side of the gunfight were riddled with bullets (estimates are that police fired ~250 rounds and the Tsarnaevs fired ~50). I remember thinking at the time that, from the way it was described, it sounded like the officers were firing in all directions, as if they were fighting a Predator. It was a miracle no civilians were hit (the government had issued a "shelter in place" order for the entire region, so everybody was home). I think the officers actually put each other in a cross-fire. When I was a kid, we used to call that a "[Ethnic group] Firing Squad", where the shooters all stand in a circle around the target. In this case, it wasn't a joke: A police officer was actually shot in the leg by a police round. His femoral artery was cut, and he barely survived after paramedics disregarded protocol and took him to a nearby hospital, even though that hospital didn't have a trauma unit. One of the brothers was killed in the gunfight, but 15 police officers were injured in the process.

 

[E.man]

Today on US ABC News a cheerleader shot in a Car park mix up.

It looks like gunning someone down is the first response of any kind there. Just gun'em down. Rest of the world seems able to check into what's happening first without needing to shoot someone in the head.

Bunch of nutters.

 

[Farm Boy]

I'd been wondering if there was even a single instance of a successful use of private arms against the government since the War for Independence, so thanks for the tip.

You could always go with the trite. One fascist lay dead at the end of Ruby Ridge. No research required. The piggy public at home, naturally, was outraged.

The response is sometimes the goal. Like figuring out who the pocket fash are when the chips are down with Mac n Cheese in the empty isolated facilities.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Today on US ABC News a cheerleader shot in a Car park mix up.

It looks like gunning someone down is the first response of any kind there. Just gun'em down. Rest of the world seems able to check into what's happening first without needing to shoot someone in the head.

Bunch of nutters.

I don't have it at my fingertips right now, but I think it was even worse than these other high-profile incidents of the last couple days, in a way. From what I read last night, the guy didn't shoot at the girls while they were in his car. They realized their mistake immediately and got out of his car right away. He then got out of his car, followed them over to their car, and shot them there. It wasn't even some perverted version of self-defense. I'm not sure yet what it was. Misogynist homicidal rage? Psychosis? Machismo run amok?

You could always go with the trite. One fascist lay dead at the end of Ruby Ridge. No research required. The piggy public at home, naturally, was outraged.

I fail to see how that's a 'successful' use, unless simply killing someone was the goal. In which case, Weaver was just a violent donkey who wasn't trying to accomplish anything, even in his own mind. Which could well be, I suppose. I suspect a lot of gun owners are just violent donkeys who aren't trying to accomplish anything by owning a gun, they just think it's cool, and if someone hadn't told them that owning a gun was to resist tyranny, they'd never have thought of that themselves.