Too easy to get guns nowadays

[falcon2]

I've heard this statement:
"Its just too easy for ____ to get guns nowadays."
from a couple people and I've wondered.
Has it ever been harder? If so, when?

[DougC]

- - - Guns were more prevelent in years past, and their ownership and use was more casual. What we didn't have was a generation of underclass taught that their desires deserve to be met regardless of how irresponsible they are. - MC

[JMSaSU]

When I was a kid and had real guns to play with we had woods to play in. Shot a lot of trees in my youth.
There was less graffiti too. We had trees to carve our names into.
The woods are all gone now. Been replaced with houses. There is no place to play with guns.
Probably get into trouble for carving your name into a tree, since they are all in peoples yards now.
If we could all carry guns at least we could shoot back at assholes that start shooting near us.

JACK

[1420Vel.GN]

with the instant check procedures going into effect in many areas, it will be easier for law abiding citizens to get guns, but no law is going to change the availability for criminals. Even a total ban has not hurt the availability of pot, cocaine, lsd...

The statement you heard seems to be one of attempting to create a false sense of *need* to correct an imagined problem.

[TubaDiva]

The statement you heard seems to be one of attempting to create a false sense of *need* to correct an imagined problem.

Thank you!

Not to start a fight here (or a Great Debate, even ) but you just hit the nail right on the head.

All the furor over firearms has done is make it more difficult for Mr./Ms. Law-Abiding-Citizen to get a gun. It's done nothing to keep firearms out of criminal hands, but it does give a lot of other people the warm fuzzies thinking about how they're making the world a better place by keeping guns out of it. Buys some votes too.

If you think "gun control" or banning guns outright will make this a safer society or reduce crime, I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings here but just ain't so.

your humble TubaDiva

[DougC]

- - - Oldsters will tell you, four or five decades ago, gas stations used to SELL cheap handguns and ammo. There was still crime, but the reason they stopped (selling guns) was because of government regulation, not any public outcry. - MC

[Rich Barr]

I came in here intending to torpedo some dingalings, and found a bunch of smart people. Boy am I bewildered.

Let me just add an example of how those who spread the "guns are too easy to get" misinformation operate. Immediately after the Columbine shootings, they raised a hue and cry for more "gun control" laws...including a ban on people under the age of 21 buying handguns. The problem is, of course, that such a ban has been in place for 30 years. But the agendas of the banners demand they imply that the mental defectives in question could have obtained their weapons legally some how, in order to justify more laws.

My all-time favorite example of such lies by implication comes from a magazine ad around 20 years ago--I believe it was taken out by the National Coalition to Ban Handguns, which has since changed its name to something that obscures what it does. It had a picture of a revolver in red, white, and blue stripes, and a list of foreign countries and their firearms deaths for the previous year. (Not just HANDGUN deaths, and there was no distinction between a murder and a police shooting and a suicide--that would introduce issues that they didn't want anyone thinking about.) Then there was the figure for US firearms deaths, and the tag line "God Bless America." Problem was, one of the countries listed approvingly as having few firearms deaths was Switzerland. The implication was that these countries had more restrictive gun laws than the United States, but Switzerland had and has one of the most heavily armed civilian populations in the world--they are REQUIRED to be armed, with handguns, automatic weapons, etc. That's a big reason why even Nazi Germany didn't take the Swiss on.

So much for truth in advertising.

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Rich Barr
massivemaple@hotmail.com
AOL Instant Messenger: Hrttannl

[TubaDiva]

Ya know, this really IS a Great Debate . . . so let's move it.

your humble TubaDiva/SDStaffDiv
for the Straight Dope
don't shoot me!

[falcon2]

this really IS a Great Debate . . . so let's move it

Try reading the original question again. There is a matter-of-fact answer unless you want to debate the meaning of "easy".

[tracer]

Rich Barr wrote:

Immediately after the Columbine shootings, they raised a hue and cry for more "gun control" laws...including a ban on people under the age of 21 buying handguns.

The gun control bill in question (which raised the Federal minimum firearms purchase age from 18 to 21) was one that had been on the floor of Congress before the Columbine shootings. The Columbine incident merely provided the "push" necessary to get it voted into law quickly. Ironically, it wouldn't have made a damn bit of difference, since both Columbine shooters were under 18 and were already prohibited from buying firearms under existing laws.

It had a picture of a revolver in red, white, and blue stripes, and a list of foreign countries and their firearms deaths for the previous year. (Not just HANDGUN deaths, and there was no distinction between a murder and a police shooting and a suicide--that would introduce issues that they didn't want anyone thinking about.) Then there was the figure for US firearms deaths, and the tag line "God Bless America."

I remember seeing this ad on a roadside billboard less than 10 years ago. I remember the number for U.S. firearms deaths was in much larger type than for all the other countries, and was a little over 9,000. I remember thinking, "Nine thousand? Out of a population of, what, 300 million people? That's a far better safety record than for automobiles!"

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I'm not flying fast, just orbiting low.

[Big Iron]

[[All the furor over firearms has done is make it more difficult for Mr./Ms. Law-Abiding-Citizen to get a gun. It's done nothing to keep firearms out of criminal hands,]] TubaDiva


I'm not at all sure about that (one way or the other).


[[ but it does give a lot of other people the warm fuzzies thinking about how they're making the world a better place by keeping guns out of it. Buys some votes too. ]]


No denying it's a major grandstanding issue.

[Rich Barr]

The point is that raising the age to purchase handguns to 21 is redundant. It was raised to 21 by the Gun Control Act of 1968--31 years ago. The staged outcry for this measure after the Columbine shootings was pure grandstanding. (Like, big surprise.)

Since we're talking about the availibility of guns--so the title of this tread says--it seems a good place to bring up so-called "Saturday Night Specials," ie. relatively cheap handguns. The advocates of "gun control" assert that these weapons are too available, and that they should be banned--for the public good, of course.

The irony here is where these people, who are mostly of the political left (there are exceptions both left and right), got the idea. The original "gun control" laws in this country banned cheaper firearms in the post Civil War South, and had as their goal keeping guns out of the hands of freed former slaves--blacks were less likely to have the money to buy more expensive weapons than whites. The advocates of banning "Saturday Night Specials" are trying to revive what was in essence a "Jim Crow Law."

Who says politics isn't funny?

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Rich Barr
massivemaple@hotmail.com
AOL Instant Messenger: Hrttannl

[Action Jackson]

To those who don't guns around the term "too easy" seems to mean that the ability people to get them at all is "too easy". They know little of how easy it was to get them in the past. The man who killed Kennedy purchased the rifle he used through the mail with no checks whats so ever. Back then if you had the money they would sell you a gun. After Kennedy was killed the Gun Control Act of 1964 was passed which prohibited the sale of fireams through the mail. Each year more and more restrictions have been passed, it has not helped there must be another problem that needs to be addressed that is the root cause.

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ILLEGITIMUS NON CARBORUNDUM EST