Gun Control

[TheFeniX]

As I said, sporting firearms should be regulated by completely separate legislation. Just like fencing is regulated separately from the right to carry a sword in public.

That's dumb. Ruger makes competition 9mms that have 30 rounds mags. They're functionally no different (nor less lethal) than a Beretta 92fs issued by the military. And you need to keep your arguments straight: I haven't even mentioned CCW except for one factoid about Texas CHL holders. I'm talking ownership. Carry (either open or concealed) and self-defense is actually only semi-related.

Don't take this the wrong way, but you're a fucking moron if you honestly believe that. It's funny in another way because antique guns lose a shitload of value if they don't fire.

If firing a weapon is what is required to maintain it in prime collecting condition than that is part of the function of collecting it. Just like cleaning it would be.

I really really need to cut out adding in little snippets of information in my posts.

I own a Colt 1911 (a firearm designed for military use) and plan to purchase an FN57 (a favorite of the Secret Service and European forces): Please defend your assertion that my only reason for purchasing either is to harm something/someone or for it's collectability.

You do question them. But you do so through the mechanisms provided to you via the system you live in. As in, elections, various ways of protest and complaint etc. You don't do so by claiming that the government is bad by default. I mean, if the government is bad and should have to explain it self for every little thing to the citizens at all times how would such a society function? Indeed if the government is bad by default as you seem to suggest why does such a society persist at all? Why don't you tear it down?

Ah yes, because "government should provide good reasons for limiting rights" = "GOVMENT BAAAAD!" I mean, just ignore that I've been saying that current laws concerning firearms are about the best in the world IMO. I like guns so I must be a gitrdun small guvment redneck. Also, do they even have history books where you're from? Texas education is in the shitter, but damned if I can't point out numerous government backed abuses of power just by what I learned in middle school. There's a thread right now about how Obama is just going to give the Bush admin a pass on brutal torture and murder. Maybe I don't trust the referees being paid by the home-team, fancy that.

But keep pigeon-holing me because it makes you look more objective.....

[Purple]

As I said, sporting firearms should be regulated by completely separate legislation. Just like fencing is regulated separately from the right to carry a sword in public.

That's dumb. Ruger makes competition 9mms that have 30 rounds mags. They're functionally no different (nor less lethal) than a Beretta 92fs issued by the military.

It's not so much about what the weapon is but about the people using it. As in, sports shooters will tend to be much more savvy about how dangerous a gun can be and how to operate it safely. They will also tend to use legal guns and be registered at gun ranges etc. You know, trustworthy people. Or at least more thrust worthy than your average unknown to anyone random guy off the street whose only credentials are that he has newer been arrested for a crime yet.

And you need to keep your arguments straight: I haven't even mentioned CCW except for one factoid about Texas CHL holders. I'm talking ownership. Carry (either open or concealed) and self-defense is actually only semi-related.

I do indeed need to keep who among you is arguing what. And that is proving to be difficult for me. It is late thou, so I will try to re read the whole thing tomorrow.

I really really need to cut out adding in little snippets of information in my posts.

Why?

I own a Colt 1911 (a firearm designed for military use) and plan to purchase an FN57 (a favorite of the Secret Service and European forces): Please defend your assertion that my only reason for purchasing either is to harm something/someone or for it's collectability.

What else could be your reason? You either want to shoot people with them (or provide your self with the capability to do so if threatened) or you want to own them for the sake of having them in its own right (be that hanging them in your room above the fire place or shooting them in your back yard for fun). So either killing or collecting.

I like guns so I must be a gitrdun small guvment redneck.

I would appretiate it if you quoted the exact passage of my post that stated that.

Also, do they even have history books where you're from? Texas education is in the shitter, but damned if I can't point out numerous government backed abuses of power just by what I learned in middle school. There's a thread right now about how Obama is just going to give the Bush admin a pass on brutal torture and murder. Maybe I don't trust the referees being paid by the home-team, fancy that.

I actually addressed the whole political side of the argument in my last post. Read it and ask any particular questions of me to avoid repetition.

But keep pigeon-holing me because it makes you look more objective.....

I am not familiar with that idiom. Could you please elaborate?

[Simon_Jester]

Why should we be "not allowed" to have firearms unless they're needed for urgent self-defense? Why is the average citizen's personal judgment not enough?

Simon, you've said this to me and now I must say it back, you're sounding like an idiot.

Let me replace gun, with tank, or bomb, or nerve agent. All of those are as useless and dangerous as a gun in the hands of your average person.

Uh, no they're not? Tanks and nerve gas are more dangerous than guns, that's why they were invented in the first place.

Explosives are useful to civilians in certain situations- it used to be possible to just buy dynamite to blow up rocks and stumps on rural property, and somehow life went on without everyone dying in a wave of terrorist bombings. Even aside from that, there are huge obvious differences- explosives are by nature indiscriminate and don't have safe uses. Firearms have safe uses that millions of people put them to (target shooting as sport, hunting as sport or sustenance).

"I don't need it" isn't the same as "it's unnecessary and should be banned."

See, the right to carry weapons has been part of "first-class" citizenship for about as long as civilization has even existed. Not every free citizen carried a weapon, or wanted to, or needed to- but historically, not being allowed to carry a weapon was a sign of being one of the peasants. Someone who needed to be kept physically helpless, for fear they would try to topple a social order slanted against them, or attack their 'betters.'

It's been a right to do many other things in history and slowly we've abolished many of those in recent years. I expected better of you than an appeal to history and challenges to others to prove that you don't need a gun. It's like trying to disprove god, a point is raised and is met with many buts and ifs.

Jub, you're missing my point, because you're not addressing the reason why "right to defend yourself" has been so common. It's not just a historical thing, Jub, it's a basic part of the role of individual human beings in society. A lot of gun owners will ask you:

Can you really be free, if as a matter of state policy you cannot be trusted with the means to cause harm? If the state is allowed to say "you might conceivably break the social order, therefore you must be restrained from having any dangerous weapons," the state is placing the social order above your own rights as an independent human being.

Is that all right, for gun control? There are two conflicting views here, which I'd call 'technocrat' and 'democrat.'

To the democrat, the social order is less important than the right of individuals to have their own way of life. People aren't really free if the system gets to decide their role, especially if the role is something like "unarmed victim-in-waiting."

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.


Now, to bring this back down to Earth, Jub. See, I think you have a really, really technocratic view towards gun control. So much so that you don't even perceive any argument that isn't technocratic. I can almost imagine a stereotypical computer churning out printouts saying "Guns are inefficient. They must be eradicated!"

So I'm going to ask you to try and understand that there are people here coming at the problem from a different angle. Not all the counter-arguments here are about "guns cause X more deaths." Some are about individual role in society, and about whether people have a right to have something that gives them a bit of independence from state security and power.

---

I guess this question is really the heart of the matter - and unfortunately it's probably too subjective to meaningfully resolve. I fall into the camp of "shouldn't be allowed unless there's an urgent need."

And again, 'technocrat.'

The reason I'm so uncomfortable with this is that it doesn't square well with the idea of open society. We have a lot of trouble as a society with people who like to ban things they can't control. Usually when it's an idea or a work of art that's being banned, SDN falls on the anti-ban side. But with guns it's a lot more divided, because guns have the power to cause physical destruction.

And yet "can cause damage" isn't the same as "has no value;" just think of cars.

See, the right to carry weapons has been part of "first-class" citizenship for about as long as civilization has even existed. Not every free citizen carried a weapon, or wanted to, or needed to- but historically, not being allowed to carry a weapon was a sign of being one of the peasants. Someone who needed to be kept physically helpless, for fear they would try to topple a social order slanted against them, or attack their 'betters.'

And yet residents of G8 countries and elsewhere currently live in a society where the government imposes many restrictions and regulations on various devices and harmful substances in the interest of public safety. This isn't the god damn Wild West anymore. So any discussion about gun control should begin by acknowledging the premise that guns are potentially dangerous devices that need to be regulated. They should not be treated as some sort of basic human right anymore.

It depends very heavily on what you mean by 'regulated.' When Jub says it, I'd bet on him meaning "banned." Or meaning to put in a legal regimen because he plans to say "OK, we're just doing this to regulate" this year, then seize all the guns next year as soon as he has the inventory lists and manpower he needs.

Which, again, I find very disturbing. As Lonestar says it's happened, and it smacks of the kind of treachery that has no place in democratic society. A government should not run for office promising to do X but not Y, get voted in by anti-Y people, and then turn around and do Y "because it's right." Part of the point of having a democracy in the first place is to make sure that before radicals can impose an agenda, they must convince the people, not just bypass them.

[TheFeniX]

It's not so much about what the weapon is but about the people using it. As in, sports shooters will tend to be much more savvy about how dangerous a gun can be and how to operate it safely.

You just moved the shit out of that goalpost. First we should regulate different classes of guns that are identical in function, now we're onto someone having to prove they're a sport shooter? Why don't we instead A. Prove they aren't violent and B. they are mentally competent?

You know, trustworthy people. Or at least more thrust worthy than your average unknown to anyone random guy off the street whose only credentials are that he has newer been arrested for a crime yet.

Then please be so kind as to cite statistics showing that the average gun owner is dangerous to him/herself and others. You can't, and I honestly think that scares a lot of people. Just as you don't understand how American's have an inherent distrust of government, I don't understand how you can claim that a person who has committed no crime isn't trustworthy. That form is discrimination is dangerous anyway. It assumes guilt before innocence with no evidence to back it up.

This is really no different than having a man and woman prove they're going to be good parents before a baby is even conceived, rather than making sure they aren't violent, mentally unstable, or sex offenders (and other relevant factors). Sure, that's no proof that they will raise the child well, but millions of parents manage it.

What else could be your reason? You either want to shoot people with them (or provide your self with the capability to do so if threatened) or you want to own them for the sake of having them in its own right (be that hanging them in your room above the fire place or shooting them in your back yard for fun). So either killing or collecting.

There is a massive difference between a collector and a user of firearms. And there's also a wide-range of shooting activities beyond shooting someone or blasting away in your backyard. I didn't shoot in numerous IDPA matches, get my ass kicked in a few IPSC matches, or shoot thousands of clay birds with my shotgun in preparation of that day I'd run into a "bad guy" (or some really mean birds). I did it because shooting is a challenging, yet laid back, sport and you meet loads of interesting people while doing so. I also didn't buy a single gun with the intention of keeping it in good condition. I beat the shit out of my guns (literally sometimes, like when a round breached in my CX4 and I had to beat the retaining clip back into the gun with a hammer to get it apart) because guns are meant to be fired, not looked at.

But, according to your theory, I shouldn't exist. Neither should millions of other people like me.

I would appretiate it if you quoted the exact passage of my post that stated that.

I'll answer that when you answer why making the government accountable for the laws it passes is somehow an attack on the government, rather than a sane way to run one.

I am not familiar with that idiom. Could you please elaborate?

I forget that doesn't mean the same thing everywhere. You took my idea that a government should have good reason to restrict rights (property ownership is a right, no matter what the property is) and took that to the conclusion that I think "government = bad" and that I'm some kind of closeted anarchist. Pigeon-hole was actually a bad comment in retrospect (unless you had actually labelled me an anarchist). You really just strawmanned the Hell out of my post.

[Jub]

Is that all right, for gun control? There are two conflicting views here, which I'd call 'technocrat' and 'democrat.'

To the democrat, the social order is less important than the right of individuals to have their own way of life. People aren't really free if the system gets to decide their role, especially if the role is something like "unarmed victim-in-waiting."

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.


Now, to bring this back down to Earth, Jub. See, I think you have a really, really technocratic view towards gun control. So much so that you don't even perceive any argument that isn't technocratic. I can almost imagine a stereotypical computer churning out printouts saying "Guns are inefficient. They must be eradicated!"

So I'm going to ask you to try and understand that there are people here coming at the problem from a different angle. Not all the counter-arguments here are about "guns cause X more deaths." Some are about individual role in society, and about whether people have a right to have something that gives them a bit of independence from state security and power.

You nailed it. Elect me and I'd start with getting all guns registered, then I'd start choking down from there until I squeezed most of the guns out. Then we can visit the holdouts with Mr. No Knock and clean up even more of the city. From there we should have driven the cost of guns beyond the means of petty criminals and things can settle into a holding pattern while we see what else can be done.

[Alyrium Denryle]

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.

Here is the thing. He is irrational in his calculation regarding a rational social order. If there is no difference--as I have shown rather handily--between banning guns and not banning guns, then there is no reason to not default to individual liberty.

What Jub is doing is assuming that his fears and prejudices are equal to a rational social order. They are not.

[Jub]

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.

Here is the thing. He is irrational in his calculation regarding a rational social order. If there is no difference--as I have shown rather handily--between banning guns and not banning guns, then there is no reason to not default to individual liberty.

What Jub is doing is assuming that his fears and prejudices are equal to a rational social order. They are not.

If removing guns doesn't result in less death due to violent crime then why are they the weapon of choice for murders the world over? Why don't we arm our soldiers with knives and baseball bats if these are equally deadly weapons?

[Purple]

It's not so much about what the weapon is but about the people using it. As in, sports shooters will tend to be much more savvy about how dangerous a gun can be and how to operate it safely.

You just moved the shit out of that goalpost. First we should regulate different classes of guns that are identical in function, now we're onto someone having to prove they're a sport shooter? Why don't we instead A. Prove they aren't violent and B. they are mentally competent?

Because you can be a completely non violent and mentally competent person that gets a bad day and go out killing people. A sport shooter who is registered at a shooting club should in my opinion get to rent out a gun while he is there and shoot it there. No need to let him take it home. It's not like the Olympics will let you bring your own pimped out gun. The same can be done for hunters unless they live in the country side and thus need weapons for regular animal control or what ever.

Then please be so kind as to cite statistics showing that the average gun owner is dangerous to him/herself and others. You can't, and I honestly think that scares a lot of people. Just as you don't understand how American's have an inherent distrust of government, I don't understand how you can claim that a person who has committed no crime isn't trustworthy. That form is discrimination is dangerous anyway. It assumes guilt before innocence with no evidence to back it up.

I should not need to cite statistics that they are a danger. You should have to cite ones that they are not. And I honestly stand confused as to why anyone would believe otherwise.

This is really no different than having a man and woman prove they're going to be good parents before a baby is even conceived, rather than making sure they aren't violent, mentally unstable, or sex offenders (and other relevant factors). Sure, that's no proof that they will raise the child well, but millions of parents manage it.

That is a whole other debate that I don't think we would agree on either.

There is a massive difference between a collector and a user of firearms. And there's also a wide-range of shooting activities beyond shooting someone or blasting away in your backyard. I didn't shoot in numerous IDPA matches, get my ass kicked in a few IPSC matches, or shoot thousands of clay birds with my shotgun in preparation of that day I'd run into a "bad guy" (or some really mean birds). I did it because shooting is a challenging, yet laid back, sport and you meet loads of interesting people while doing so. I also didn't buy a single gun with the intention of keeping it in good condition. I beat the shit out of my guns (literally sometimes, like when a round breached in my CX4 and I had to beat the retaining clip back into the gun with a hammer to get it apart) because guns are meant to be fired, not looked at.

But, according to your theory, I shouldn't exist. Neither should millions of other people like me.

You seem to be under the illusion that when I said collect I meant exclusively the kind of collectors that prefer NRFB and talk about "collectors value". Even thou I explicitly explained how I did not.

This is getting quite tiresome.

I forget that doesn't mean the same thing everywhere. You took my idea that a government should have good reason to restrict rights (property ownership is a right, no matter what the property is) and took that to the conclusion that I think "government = bad" and that I'm some kind of closeted anarchist. Pigeon-hole was actually a bad comment in retrospect (unless you had actually labelled me an anarchist). You really just strawmanned the Hell out of my post.

I did not mean to imply you were an anarchist. All in all I think SJ hit the nail on the head when he talked about democrat vs technocrat. From what I understand of your posts you seem to believe that individual freedom is the highest goal of the social order and that said order exists to further and preserve it where as I believe that the social order exists to provide citizens with a safe and comfortable way of life and that it is completely logical for non essential freedoms to be sacrificed in favor of maintaining it. After all, most freedoms are just a luxury. So where you see "unalienable rights" I see "non essential luxury privileges".

[Dark Hellion]

It's not so much about what the weapon is but about the people using it. As in, sports shooters will tend to be much more savvy about how dangerous a gun can be and how to operate it safely.

You just moved the shit out of that goalpost. First we should regulate different classes of guns that are identical in function, now we're onto someone having to prove they're a sport shooter? Why don't we instead A. Prove they aren't violent and B. they are mentally competent?

Because you can be a completely non violent and mentally competent person that gets a bad day and go out killing people.

Bull-fucking-shit. If you knew anything about how the psychology of killers worked you would know this but you have already made up your mind that it is guns that cause the violence.

See, this is the kind of thing that gets my hackles up about this. I am not especially pro-gun. I don't own any guns, haven't fired a gun in well over a decade, and have to real desire to spend any of my money on guns. But I am not terrified of guns either. They are mechanical devices that if improperly handled can cause injury of death, just like a circular saw or a vibrator. The stigma being attached has nothing to do with the actual functionality of the gun and entirely with personal unease and this is an incredibly poor position to argue from.

Excepting that I want to ask a different question: how many who are in favor of banning or severely limiting guns are in favor of doing the same thing for sports cars? Sports cars are an unnecessary vanity item (a small car is better in nearly every metric that counts for basic transportation) and cause more deaths per year than guns. Banning sports cars would save more lives that banning guns so obviously they should be a higher priority on the chopping block right?

[Crazedwraith]

See, this is the kind of thing that gets my hackles up about this. I am not especially pro-gun. I don't own any guns, haven't fired a gun in well over a decade, and have to real desire to spend any of my money on guns. But I am not terrified of guns either. They are mechanical devices that if improperly handled can cause injury of death, just like a circular saw or a vibrator. The stigma being attached has nothing to do with the actual functionality of the gun and entirely with personal unease and this is an incredibly poor position to argue from.

Where as when properly handled they are cute and fluffy and harmless?

[Scottish Ninja]

See, this is the kind of thing that gets my hackles up about this. I am not especially pro-gun. I don't own any guns, haven't fired a gun in well over a decade, and have to real desire to spend any of my money on guns. But I am not terrified of guns either. They are mechanical devices that if improperly handled can cause injury of death, just like a circular saw or a vibrator. The stigma being attached has nothing to do with the actual functionality of the gun and entirely with personal unease and this is an incredibly poor position to argue from.

Where as when properly handled they are cute and fluffy and harmless?

Yes.

I think AD has it exactly right above: a society should default to individual liberty, absent a compelling reason to act otherwise. This applies to any topic. I sure as shit would not want to live somewhere where that wasn't the case - if a government could seize my property because they thought it would improve society somehow - say they seize my laptop because they want to reduce video game playing and I might commit crimes with it besides. Is that a good idea? It could sure sound like one, especially if you have no interest in computers or technology. Why - under any circumstances - should someone be guilty until proven innocent? How do you avoid drawing an arbitrary line?

[General Zod]

See, this is the kind of thing that gets my hackles up about this. I am not especially pro-gun. I don't own any guns, haven't fired a gun in well over a decade, and have to real desire to spend any of my money on guns. But I am not terrified of guns either. They are mechanical devices that if improperly handled can cause injury of death, just like a circular saw or a vibrator. The stigma being attached has nothing to do with the actual functionality of the gun and entirely with personal unease and this is an incredibly poor position to argue from.

Where as when properly handled they are cute and fluffy and harmless?

Do you have any arguments that aren't incredulous strawmen?

[PeZook]

I like the grip that's made to comply with the AWB yet is obviously designed to be easily filed off.

God, either ban fucking semi-autos altogether (at least the type of action has something to do with lethality of the gun) or don't bother writing hundreds of pages of legislation just so that you can later appear foolish to everyone with a brain.

[Simon_Jester]

It's not so much about what the weapon is but about the people using it. As in, sports shooters will tend to be much more savvy about how dangerous a gun can be and how to operate it safely.

You just moved the shit out of that goalpost. First we should regulate different classes of guns that are identical in function, now we're onto someone having to prove they're a sport shooter? Why don't we instead A. Prove they aren't violent and B. they are mentally competent?

You know, trustworthy people. Or at least more thrust worthy than your average unknown to anyone random guy off the street whose only credentials are that he has newer been arrested for a crime yet.

Then please be so kind as to cite statistics showing that the average gun owner is dangerous to him/herself and others. You can't, and I honestly think that scares a lot of people. Just as you don't understand how American's have an inherent distrust of government, I don't understand how you can claim that a person who has committed no crime isn't trustworthy. That form is discrimination is dangerous anyway. It assumes guilt before innocence with no evidence to back it up.

Purple tends toward fascism, so this really shouldn't come as a surprise.

You nailed it. Elect me and I'd start with getting all guns registered, then I'd start choking down from there until I squeezed most of the guns out. Then we can visit the holdouts with Mr. No Knock and clean up even more of the city. From there we should have driven the cost of guns beyond the means of petty criminals and things can settle into a holding pattern while we see what else can be done.

In other words, when it comes to the exercise of power, you are untrustworthy. I would not elect you as a dog catcher on the basis of that statement.

You're reminding me of all the crap the Republicans in Wisconsin got up to since 2010. Once they'd won a narrow majority in the state legislature, they started ignoring rules about parliamentary procedure. They started doing things no one voted them into office to do. They started doing things that had widespread, majority disapproval. They started doing things that people would have actively voted against them for, if they'd known ahead of time what would happen.

That was very unpopular on SDN. This should be to, I'd like to think.

The word for that kind of action by politicians is "treachery," if you ask me. Democracy is there because government doesn't work unless it's both responsible and responsive to the public. Your agenda is theoretically responsible, but not responsive because you don't seem to care what anyone thinks about gun control, unless they already agree with you. Being elected does not give you a license to fulfill your wildest fantasies to the absolute limit of your ability- that's why there's a minority party in opposition, and that's why there's minority rights.

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.

Here is the thing. He is irrational in his calculation regarding a rational social order. If there is no difference--as I have shown rather handily--between banning guns and not banning guns, then there is no reason to not default to individual liberty.

What Jub is doing is assuming that his fears and prejudices are equal to a rational social order. They are not.

In my opinion, a lot of would-be technocrats do this. The Bolsheviks come to mind.

The biggest single reason I am not a technocrat is that I've never met any large group of people I'd trust to 'rationalize' a civilization. Not if I had to live in it afterwards. We're human. We have emotional issues. We have cultural baggage. We have biases that are always, always hidden to us. People who congratulate themselves on how logical and smart they are are not immune to this.

The dream of tearing apart civilization and this time doing it right is not new. Off the top of my head, I can think of examples dating back over 200 years, more like 500 if you count religious motives that the adherents of the day sincerely thought were 'rational.'

So yes, I do think it's a good idea for leaders to be elected, and to restrain themselves to doing the sort of thing their voters would support. And to generally follow and honor the rules of democratic society, instead of trying to sneak around them. Even if "but this time it's really important that we break public employee unions, or get rid of all the guns, or crush Wall Street, or make sure every citizen is being tracked by the state police!"

[Crazedwraith]

See, this is the kind of thing that gets my hackles up about this. I am not especially pro-gun. I don't own any guns, haven't fired a gun in well over a decade, and have to real desire to spend any of my money on guns. But I am not terrified of guns either. They are mechanical devices that if improperly handled can cause injury of death, just like a circular saw or a vibrator. The stigma being attached has nothing to do with the actual functionality of the gun and entirely with personal unease and this is an incredibly poor position to argue from.

Where as when properly handled they are cute and fluffy and harmless?

Do you have any arguments that aren't incredulous strawmen?

Whose Strawmaning? Or arguing for that matter. I'm not saying that that point makes what he's saying completely invalid. But I am curious to what his definition of 'improperly handled' is in this context. I mean the people massacring people with guns aren't doing it by accident because the left the safety off and dropped it or whatever. it's not negligence that massacres people, it's whackos with intent.

Which is where I think the analogy to dangerous driving breaks down. Very few of those deaths are intentional murders with cars.

There's also a false dilemna there. If someone is in favour of gun control they can also be infavour of harsher punishments for dangerous driving. With out contraction.

No i wouldn't ban sports cars, because remarkably car accidents are not exclusively the province of sport cars. You ban sports cars and people will still buy other cars and still kill themselves others in them. Which I guess is a good parallel to the pro-gun argument that if you get rid of guns people will massacre each other with knives and bats and rolled up newspapers equally effectively.

But of course, I'm not in favour of entirely banning guns either. As many people have pointed out its a practical impossibility. And really, I can't object to people target shooting as a hobby. That's not what I mean when I say gun control. By gun control i mean better checks/safety courses/psych evalutations for people wanting to own guns and whatever additional checks and balances that can be put in place that will reasonably stop people massarcing people with them. (in addition to many other measures aimed to do the same thing.)

Now you might say there's no way gun control will stop these attacks and maybe that's right but I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand myself.

In this thread, I think there seem to be a lot of people describe themselves as pro-gun who still want sensible checks and balances and people who describe themselves as for gun control who just want more or less the same thing (with the exception of jub) so there's a lot of violent agreement going on as each side 'strawmans' the other.

[TheFeniX]

Because you can be a completely non violent and mentally competent person that gets a bad day and go out killing people.

You may want to base your justice system and property rights on statistical anomalies, but it's not a sane way to run a government.

A sport shooter who is registered at a shooting club should in my opinion get to rent out a gun while he is there and shoot it there. No need to let him take it home.

So, you actually do want to ban gun ownership for the private citizen.

It's not like the Olympics will let you bring your own pimped out gun.

Hahahaha. Oh man. Maybe not the London Olympics.

There were no exceptions: an up-and-comer like Geikie and a veteran like Mick Gault, who was awarded the Order of the British Empire as one of the most successful British competitors of any sport, both kept their guns in Switzerland and traveled there on weekends to practice.

Those who kept at it faced some unusual arrangements. At the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester, pistol event competitors were handed their guns only after being locked in the firing range, and they had to return their pistols to officials before the door was unlocked.

This kind of bullshit reminds me of "no tolerance" policies in US schools. It can always be translated to "no thinking." But you honestly believe the Olympics (or someone else) actually hands out stock guns to the shooters just before their match? No, they all have their own sometimes given to them by a shooting sponsor (like Team Beretta).

I should not need to cite statistics that they are a danger. You should have to cite ones that they are not. And I honestly stand confused as to why anyone would believe otherwise.

Oh wow. Not only is your burden of proof pretty bad, you also ignore the numerous posts with data concerning private ownership of firearms.

You seem to be under the illusion that when I said collect I meant exclusively the kind of collectors that prefer NRFB and talk about "collectors value". Even thou I explicitly explained how I did not.
This is getting quite tiresome.

Tell me about it. You may have explained your flawed theory a bit more, but your original post was about 2 uses: shoot people or collecting like stamps. People generally don't lick stamps they are collecting. Collecting things is usually about keeping them is an good condition as possible. Firearms collectors may shoot a collected firearm to ensure it still works, but it's rare to see them put 10,000 rounds through one (at least the collectors I know).

I did not mean to imply you were an anarchist. All in all I think SJ hit the nail on the head when he talked about democrat vs technocrat. From what I understand of your posts you seem to believe that individual freedom is the highest goal of the social order and that said order exists to further and preserve it where as I believe that the social order exists to provide citizens with a safe and comfortable way of life and that it is completely logical for non essential freedoms to be sacrificed in favor of maintaining it. After all, most freedoms are just a luxury. So where you see "unalienable rights" I see "non essential luxury privileges".

How's that safety working out for you. You sacrifice all that freedom and tax money for safety and comfort, and get neither. The American political parties pull the same shit, but I'm not about to give them a medal for it.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Hey Jub, you can have my guns when you pry them from my cold dead fingers, motherfucker. Lock and load!


-- there, that's the same level of rationality the technocrat is showing in this argument. The exact same level; and he deserves nothing better than it. A moron, an idiot, who prefers to ignore the actual social causes of violence in favour of a reflexive, totalitarian response where you can almost hear his desperate fapping to totalitarianism when he says "Mr. No-Knock". Jesus christ, everyone here can agree the No Knock warrant is an abuse of power, and suddenly you're just salivating over the prospect of using it on people who dare to disagree with your vision of society. Your statement essentially says that there's no point in communicating with you in any way except the way you want--force. You are more dangerous than any gun owner.

I mean, seriously, where is the outrage here? Why did only Simon reply? This guy is advocating a regime of terror, a second and even larger drug war in the US, except against people armed with weaponry so guaranteeing more police murders and more police militarization, to totally ban guns even when large scale gun ownership in countries like Finland and France conclusively prove that social factors drive violence, not gun ownership. He is engaged in a fantasy based around his desire to oppress, and the totalitarian nature of that fantasy is far more dangerous than thousands of guns or even millions in the hands of law-abiding citizens.

[Purple]

You may want to base your justice system and property rights on statistical anomalies, but it's not a sane way to run a government.

?

So, you actually do want to ban gun ownership for the private citizen.

More or less yes. There are those people who actually need them (like people living in rural areas where animal attacks are a danger) but for most of the population it really is just a luxury they can go without.

It's not like the Olympics will let you bring your own pimped out gun.

Hahahaha. Oh man. Maybe not the London Olympics.

There were no exceptions: an up-and-comer like Geikie and a veteran like Mick Gault, who was awarded the Order of the British Empire as one of the most successful British competitors of any sport, both kept their guns in Switzerland and traveled there on weekends to practice.

Those who kept at it faced some unusual arrangements. At the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester, pistol event competitors were handed their guns only after being locked in the firing range, and they had to return their pistols to officials before the door was unlocked.

This kind of bullshit reminds me of "no tolerance" policies in US schools. It can always be translated to "no thinking."

To me that kind of behavior you quoted sounds like a good thing. Not the "no tolerance policies" you compared it to. But the kind of behavior you quoted yes.

No, they all have their own sometimes given to them by a shooting sponsor (like Team Beretta).

How is that fair to the competition than? Honestly I find that to undermine the contest between shooters. If they don't all have a level playing field what's the point?

Oh wow. Not only is your burden of proof pretty bad, you also ignore the numerous posts with data concerning private ownership of firearms.

I am not ignoring it. I am citing a principal. What you call "rights" are just privileges. And you should be required to prove that allowing a privilege is good for society before it is allowed. Not just that it would do no harm but that it would actively improve society.

Tell me about it. You may have explained your flawed theory a bit more, but your original post was about 2 uses: shoot people or collecting like stamps. People generally don't lick stamps they are collecting. Collecting things is usually about keeping them is an good condition as possible. Firearms collectors may shoot a collected firearm to ensure it still works, but it's rare to see them put 10,000 rounds through one (at least the collectors I know).

You seem to be using one definition of collector whilst I am using another. And this is where we diverge. You use it to refer exclusively to the kind of professional collectors where I use it to refer to anyone who collects things even in a casual way. You know, people who buy luxury items they don't really need just because they like having them.

How's that safety working out for you. You sacrifice all that freedom and tax money for safety and comfort, and get neither. The American political parties pull the same shit, but I'm not about to give them a medal for it.

What benefit does allowing firearms bring for a society? Ask your self that. You are operating from the perspective that if baning something would do no good it should not be baned where as I am operating from the perspective that if allowing something does no good it should not have been allowed in the first place.


Also, at no point do I expect my idea would be in any way applicable to America. You people don't even have the same gun laws across the board so expecting any sort of change there would be beyond wishful thinking. It would as The Duchess of Zeon pointed out case what amounts to a civil war. My point is purely hypothetical about how a society should function, not a manual that should be applied to any current real world nation.

PS. Just so you are aware. I am sane enough to know that most people in the world would disagree with me so I am not going to be politically active and try to make my system a reality. But you know.

[Simon_Jester]

You may want to base your justice system and property rights on statistical anomalies, but it's not a sane way to run a government.

?

Mass shootings are RARE. They affect few people, rarely.

Why would you create a policy that affects everyone all the time, to remove a 'risk' that almost never happens to anyone? At the very least you should sit down and do the goddamn math on risks, because if you're going to abolish guns for fear of mass shootings, you should also be abolishing going outside for fear of getting caught in a thunderstorm or a blizzard.

This kind of bullshit reminds me of "no tolerance" policies in US schools. It can always be translated to "no thinking."

To me that kind of behavior you quoted sounds like a good thing. Not the "no tolerance policies" you compared it to. But the kind of behavior you quoted yes.

Why? What's the appeal? Why do you enjoy the idea of tyrannical power and constantly refusing to trust anyone with anything?

I don't see the fun in it, myself.

Oh wow. Not only is your burden of proof pretty bad, you also ignore the numerous posts with data concerning private ownership of firearms.

I am not ignoring it. I am citing a principal. What you call "rights" are just privileges. And you should be required to prove that allowing a privilege is good for society before it is allowed. Not just that it would do no harm but that it would actively improve society.

Why do you believe this principle to be true?

What benefit does allowing firearms bring for a society? Ask your self that. You are operating from the perspective that if baning something would do no good it should not be baned where as I am operating from the perspective that if allowing something does no good it should not have been allowed in the first place.

So will you then ask yourself:

"If I believe this, does this not make me a totalitarian? And as a totalitarian, why am I worthy of more respect than the discredited and evil totalitarianism of the past? And if I am not worthy of this respect, then why am I right?"

Because the question really needs to be asked. Especially that last one. Why do you think that society ought to be 'perfected' by getting rid of everything that you don't see the reason for having?

[Beowulf]

I should not need to cite statistics that they are a danger. You should have to cite ones that they are not. And I honestly stand confused as to why anyone would believe otherwise.

That's not how it works here at SDN. You have made a positive claim: "Guns are innately dangerous to others." You must back up that claim. DR5. You may not claim it is self evident, attempt to make your opposition prove the opposite, or otherwise weasel out of this. You motherfucking authoritarian moron.

And you should be required to prove that allowing a privilege is good for society before it is allowed. Not just that it would do no harm but that it would actively improve society.

Fuck you. Why? That's the most retarded thing I've ever heard of. That's up there with "What's a barrel shroud?" "That's a shoulder thingy that goes up" and "Marijuana is harmful, because it's banned, and we don't have to show why it's harmful, because it's banned." Do you eat meat? Prove that it's good for society. Drive? Drink Alcohol? Waste time on the internet, or computers in general? Swim? Use a fork? I could probably kill you with a fork, if that's all I had, and I had to.

Everything is banned unless it's allowed, right? And it can only be allowed if you can prove that it's helpful, right? But it's banned, so you can't get proof. Have fun being wrapped in cotton padding and being fed tasteless pap with a spoon. Oh wait, no spoon. I could kill you with one of those too. You authoritarian moron.

This applies as much to you too, Jub.

[TheFeniX]

More or less yes. There are those people who actually need them (like people living in rural areas where animal attacks are a danger) but for most of the population it really is just a luxury they can go without.

I've already answered this: a system that bans access to property (or anything really) based on no data or bad data, merely the gut "it's dangerous" thinking, is dumb.

To me that kind of behavior you quoted sounds like a good thing. Not the "no tolerance policies" you compared it to. But the kind of behavior you quoted yes.

Ah, yes. Treating a risk-group that doesn't even exist like criminals, forcing them to travel to another country to practice, so as to push them out of a competitive sport is totally a good thing.

How is that fair to the competition than? Honestly I find that to undermine the contest between shooters. If they don't all have a level playing field what's the point?

At the age of 23, wielding only my Mossberg 12-gauge pump (a $200 shotgun), I outshot a middle-aged man with a customized Benelli automatic (worth about $3,000 by his estimate) 23 to 21 out of 25 birds. He was not pleased.

Guns don't make a shooter. It's arguable in sports like IPSC, but even then, guns are broken into classes so that a revolver could compete against an automatic.

I am not ignoring it. I am citing a principal. What you call "rights" are just privileges. And you should be required to prove that allowing a privilege is good for society before it is allowed. Not just that it would do no harm but that it would actively improve society.

That's such a fucking retarded concept. You actually think it's a respectable argument and it scares me. The right to free speech means that not only should people who preach tolerance have a voice, but also the biggest scumbag racist has a voice as well. We regulate free speech and we even ban it in some places, but this should only be done for good reason. Not to placate the fearful.

You keep saying guns are a privilege when I say the right to property is just that, a right. We regulate rights and sometimes we even take them away. But actually defending arbitrary banning of items because you are completely ignorant of the dangers is straight up bullshit. Worse than that, it's what Britain actually did and their violent crime has been increasing. Meanwhile, as already stated, Americans have been given the right to carry loaded weapons in public and also the right to use them for self-defense. And violent crime has been steadily increasing. At worst, legal gun ownership has no negative effect on society. At best, it's actually fighting crime.

The only real foothold left is the idea of "mass-murders," which are not an American phenomenon. Americans seem to be using guns more often than anything else. But we also see 10+ homicides in countries like Japan using combinations of vehicles and knives.

You seem to be using one definition of collector whilst I am using another. And this is where we diverge. You use it to refer exclusively to the kind of professional collectors where I use it to refer to anyone who collects things even in a casual way. You know, people who buy luxury items they don't really need just because they like having them.

Your definition of "collector" is worthless because I could literally apply it to anything that wasn't a basic need like food or shelter.

What benefit does allowing firearms bring for a society? Ask your self that. You are operating from the perspective that if baning something would do no good it should not be baned where as I am operating from the perspective that if allowing something does no good it should not have been allowed in the first place.

Hundreds of thousands of job manufacturing them. Millions of hours of entertainment for the young and adult. A great tool for self-defense. An effective way of hunting (an actual necessity in many areas).

What benefit does football bring to a society? If I'm to believe the news, all the players fake injuries and basically kick the shit out of each other. Hooligans start fights in the stands and trouble in the streets. Loosing a big game (or even winning it) leads to massive riots in the streets. Why not just ban it? No benefit at all, and I know this because random excerpts from news stations told me so.

Also, at no point do I expect my idea would be in any way applicable to America. You people don't even have the same gun laws across the board so expecting any sort of change there would be beyond wishful thinking. It would as The Duchess of Zeon pointed out case what amounts to a civil war. My point is purely hypothetical about how a society should function, not a manual that should be applied to any current real world nation.

Your hypothetical only exists in fantasy land. Why is it in a country like Britain where guns are effectively banned, cops are starting to arm themselves with firearms more and more? Why would they need to? Gun ban means no guns, right? Cops shouldn't need them.

[TheFeniX]

You keep saying guns are a privilege when I say the right to property is just that, a right. We regulate rights and sometimes we even take them away. But actually defending arbitrary banning of items because you are completely ignorant of the dangers is straight up bullshit. Worse than that, it's what Britain actually did and their violent crime has been increasing. Meanwhile, as already stated, Americans have been given the right to carry loaded weapons in public and also the right to use them for self-defense. And violent crime has been steadily increasing. At worst, legal gun ownership has no negative effect on society. At best, it's actually fighting crime.

Bolding my typo. Violent crime in America has been decreasing and has been doing so for at least 3 years.

[Beowulf]

http://www.atf.gov/publications/firearm ... e-2011.pdf Approximately 8.9 million new firearms were sold in the US in 2009. There were ~15k murders that year. Assuming each one was done by a firearm made that year, and each was done by a different gun (neither of which are true, but it's the most pessimistic assumption), about 0.3% of new guns are used in a murder each year. Or in other words, 99.7% of new gun owners aren't going to be using them to kill someone.

[Alyrium Denryle]

To the technocrat, a rational social order trumps individual self-determination. Individual happiness can matter in a utilitarian way, but if my preferences conflict with the proper organization of the system, the system should win. If the optimal, rational way to run society is with 95% of the population unarmed, then obviously we should forbid people to have weapons.

Here is the thing. He is irrational in his calculation regarding a rational social order. If there is no difference--as I have shown rather handily--between banning guns and not banning guns, then there is no reason to not default to individual liberty.

What Jub is doing is assuming that his fears and prejudices are equal to a rational social order. They are not.

If removing guns doesn't result in less death due to violent crime then why are they the weapon of choice for murders the world over? Why don't we arm our soldiers with knives and baseball bats if these are equally deadly weapons?

If there is a God, he crafted you out of something special. Guns are deadly, yes. They are wonderfully efficient, cheap, and lethal ways to kill people. Good for them.

They still do not cause murder. They are tools. They have a variety of uses from recreational target shooting, to self defense (because the police cannot protect you, only catch someone after the fact, most of the time), to regulating the deer population. Murder is caused by people; their motives, and behavior.

I have already demonstrated how gun control laws have no effect on the rate of murder. Hell, I even broke it down by specific law--none of the laws tabulated reduced the murder rate. In fact, some of them decreased it. Here, I will even run the data to include guns per capita.

Oh, what do you know! Nothing. P=.104

Various gun laws? Well lets see.

Legal Concealed Carry: Excluding other gun laws, but controlling for poverty, mental illness, drug and alcohol abuse stats, and the number of guns per capita.
P=.167 not significant

Open Carry?
p=.128 not significant

The requirement of either of these to so much as have a license?
P=.422 Not significant.

Licensing requirement to purchase (over and above NCIS background checks on gun purchases to make sure people are not felons)?
p=.743 not significant.

Gun registration?
p=.769 A whole lot of no effect.

Like the goggles, gun laws intended to limit the average person's ownership of guns, taken individually or as an aggregate, do nothing. Moreover, the number of legal guns in the hands of the population also has no statistical effect. Your argument is meaningless. Your argument has no intellectual worth, and is empirically bankrupt. On top of that, you masturbate to totalitarianism, which is never a good thing.

More or less yes. There are those people who actually need them (like people living in rural areas where animal attacks are a danger) but for most of the population it really is just a luxury they can go without.

But why should they have to? I can go without a lot of things. I can live without being able to consume gatorade, which incidentally has about the same effect on the murder rate as banning guns (which is to say, zero), but why should I have to do so? You have been confronted with a literal mountain of data, and your opinion is in contradiction with the conclusions of that data.

What you call "rights" are just privileges. And you should be required to prove that allowing a privilege is good for society before it is allowed.

No. That is not how it works. Should I have to prove I am responsible before I exercise any sort of individual autonomy? Before I am allowed to own property? Before I am allowed to vote? Before I am allowed to hold political opinions? No.

People have discussed dangerous chemicals and explosives in this thread. Unlike almost all of them, I actually have experience working with them. I have worked with things that will corrode your flesh, kill you if inhaled, or cause cancer practically instantly if it touches the skin. Methyl fluorosulfonate. It is volatile and has this horrific tendency to methylate you. You do not want to be methylated. It is so dangerous that it has been pulled permanently from commercial chemical supply. There is an inherent massive risk working with these compounds (by which I mean, anything containing fluorine or perchlorates. The former are usually better oxidizing agents than oxygen, the later tend to...well... explode on contact with anything organic. This makes fluorine perchlorate really god damn scary ) that requires certification. The risk is, by itself, so huge that there is by the very nature of these chemicals a reason to tightly regulate them. It requires no special stupidity to kill yourself (and a few hundred other people) with these.

On the other hand, liquid nitrogen can be dangerous, but requires no certification other than an age requirement, knowing where to get it, and following the simple instructions on the pump. Why? Because the risk to yourself and others is minimal unless you are monumentally stupid. Oh sure, you can asphyxiate if the partial pressure is too high, and if you drink it, have fun with your frozen esophagus. Hell, I can readily murder someone with it were I so inclined. Still, the risk is no big deal. It is there, but I need not actively prove my ability to mitigate that risk. Instead, I have to prove I am incompetent. People walk around with 5 gallon jugs of muriatic acid for swimming pool treatments. Drain cleaner is not something you want to get on your skin. Rat poison exists. Raid is a dangerous nerve agent. I can go out right now and buy a chainsaw or motor powered hedge clipper. Both of those can cause obscene amounts of damage.

Using all of these things are privileges, but that does not mean every privilege is something where the burden of proving competence rests on the individual.

So prove your case. Why should we regulate guns and not say... chainsaws? Why should we not default to individual autonomy and judgement with a few common sense regulations and education will do the job? Dont let crazy people have them, dont let kids get near them. But otherwise, they, like liquid nitrogen or drain cleaner, require either abject stupidity, chemical impairment, or an act of will in order to be a danger to yourself and others around. As opposed to perchlorates, which can kill you if you sneeze in their general direction.

-- there, that's the same level of rationality the technocrat is showing in this argument.

To be fair Marina, I am a technocrat. The difference is that I am rational. I let this thing called Data drive my positions, rather than twisting said data to fit a pre-existing conclusion.

[Darth Tedious]

If removing guns doesn't result in less death due to violent crime then why are they the weapon of choice for murders the world over?

Except in Britain, where very few people have guns.

So they mostly just stab each other to death with sharp objects...