The claim was that a gun had only one, and exactly one purpose - to be dangerous. Only by being willfully ignorant can that statement be defended. At first I thought it was poorly chose phrasing. But no, it seems that is an actually honestly held belief. Stunning really.
It’s amusing how none of this post is related to anything being talked about. Calling it a strawman is being charitable.
[ul][li]Most people don’t shit themselves with fear at the prospect of having to leave their house without being strapped. - Agreed. Good thing no one has stated anything like this.[/li][li]That’s not a healthy level of fear. - Agreed. Good thing no one has stated otherwise.[/li][li]We don’t live in the wild west and I personally am glad we don’t. - Agreed - related how?[/li][li]Do we really want to go back to that world, where all that matters is how fast your draw is, and how little regard you have for the lives of other humans? - Is this what’s on the table in your mind? Nothing being discussed is anything like this.[/li][/ul]
Needing to carry a lethal weapon to feel safe is braver than not needing to? You are not living in reality. This comment is ludicrously illogical.
What about women who live in England and were past victims of rape or assault? Do they just never leave the house again? Are rape stats way higher in England because noone can carry? Your fantasies are exposed when you look at your arguments in the context of countries with strict gun control laws. If your theories were true, these countries would just be riddled with rapes and attacks constantly. Why are they not? What is different about people in America that we are constantly under threat from everyone, when in other places that is not the case? Why are you so afraid of your fellow citizens?
Oh there’s willful ignorance here, but you’re looking in the wrong direction. Do me a favor, define for us the purpose of a gun. What do you think is its ‘purpose’? I’m not looking for a list of things one can do with a gun, but how you personally define the purpose of a gun, as simply and concisely as possible please.
It has been argued in this thread by gun advocates that it is wise to carry a gun around when not at home in case they are attacked by someone when out and about running errands or whatever. Most people don’t walk around in constant fear of being attacked. You may be too constantly in that place to see it in yourself it seems.
As for the wild west remark, gun rights activists are trying and succeeding at passing more liberal (heh) gun laws in various places, such as Georgia’s guns everywhere law, and the open carry advocates are trying to ‘normalize’ the sight of everyone carrying guns everywhere. This, to me, is trying to get us back to the old west days, where everyone you see had a gun and every conflict was resolved by someone getting shot with one. Not everyone wants to live in a place where everyone is packing heat. When shit ever does happen to go down, I don’t really see it as a benefit if a bunch of random people start pulling out guns and shooting at each other. In a heated situation like that how does the average citizen tell a good guy with a gun from a bad guy with a gun? Wait until they use it and decide based on who they are shooting at?
Or it may be that there are a number of people who go out armed actually hoping they *will *be attacked, or looking for a situation they can tell themselves constitutes being attacked, or looking to escalate situations to that point, just for the fun of acting out a Good Guy vs. Bad Guy fantasy - picturing themselves as the former, naturally. They may not admit it or even necessarily realize it, though.
There’s good reason to believe *that *Wild West existed only in dime novels and formulaic movies, but that’s a different discussion.
Fair enough. Well for this discussion we’ll just consider the term short hand for the movement to make carrying everywhere legal, and the efforts to normalize the sight of seeing people with shotguns and AR-15s slung over their backs in Target and so forth. Just imagining these things taken to the logical extreme and how that would actually be in reality.
I meant the fetishists want a world even wilder and more lawless than we’ve ever actually had. Not the Dodge City where every newcomer had to check his guns with the sheriff.
Making the distinction between humans and animals is mucking the water in this circumstance. At no point have I stated or implied that killing a human is inherently immoral–naturally, there are circumstances where shooting someone is justified or even desirable due to the danger the target poses to others.
However, gun advocates keep making the bullshit “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” argument, as well as the bullshit “cars kill more people than guns” argument. For that reason, it’s important to emphasize the inherent ‘killingness’ of guns. Guns are killing tools. Whether they happen to be killing animals or people is irrelevant. To the extent that guns have utility, it’s because they kill or because they threaten to kill, or because of sports that evolved from practice how to kill.
Based on their fundamental nature as weapons, I submit guns (and yes, bows and arrows too) merit special consideration in terms of their use and legality. That’s not to say that guns must be restricted or banned1. However, statements like “guns are a tool just like a knife or a hammer; I could use any of them for good or to kill someone” or "I could run people over with a car as surely as I could shoot them"2 are nonsense, given the fundamental difference in function between a gun and the other tools. Such arguments are not remotely persuasive in defense of widespread firearm possession and use.
Unfortunately, Bone appears not to accept this. Granted, RTFirefly is wrong in his absolutist claim that guns have exactly zero utility outside of being dangerous; there are corner-cases to everything. But 99.9% of gun utility stems from the fact that guns are lethal weapons. Bone’s denial that this is the case is the real “mucking the waters of this discussion.”
1 I do think they should be harshly restricted–but not for this reason alone
2 paraphrased, but I’ve seen both of these arguments several times in multiple versions of this thread
Yeah they want that fantasy world to be real. Its scary. What would the NRA say to Wyatt Earp these days if he tried to institute the ‘no guns in town’ policy I wonder?
Assume, for sake of argument, identical. You point and shoot and get exactly the same effect as an AR-15, only the target can get up again 15 minutes later.
I’ve stated, and I don’t believe anyone will disagree, that guns are dangerous objects. It is inherent in their being. My point that seems to be purposley ignored, is that they can be more than that. The dangerousness is not being denied by me. You and **RTFirefly **however, are denying everything else but the dangerousness.
A kitchen knife is a dangerous object. It’s purpose is to cut things. When used for butchering meat is still dangerous, but it is simultaneously dangerous because of it’s ability to injure and effective at cutting meat. A gun is dangerous, but it can also simultaneously have positive utility.
Police carry firearms. Do you think the **ONLY **reason they do so is to be dangerous to others or themselves? Not to defend or protect themselves or others? Read this again:
(my bold)
Do you agree with the bolded part?
Where was this claim made? The strawmen you put out have been pretty pathetic - so I’d like to see the original statement and how you construct this interpretation.
No one has made the claim that they are in constant fear of being attacked. Do you think people who have fire extinguishers are in constant fear of a fire?
Do you realize that in 40 of the 50 states, anyone who is not otherwise disqualified can either obtain a permit to carry a concealed weapon, or do so with no permit at all? Claims of things turning into the ‘wild west’ or that every conflict would be resolved with guns are absurd. There is no evidence that anything remotely approaching these claims has come to pass. Willful ignorance indeed.
How wonderful for you. It must be supremely frustrating that the law permits such behavior you disagree with. I suggest you either move to a place that better suits your predilictions, work dilligently at changing the law, or get used to disappointment.
I’ve never denied that the utility of a gun stems from the fact they are weapons. I don’t believe I have ever made the argument that cars kill more people than guns so X. I do believe guns are a tool, like a hammer. The main use of a hammer would be to drive nails, the main use of a gun would be to project force.
My point at this juncture of the thread, is that **RTFirefly **was wrong, and that his statement was factually untrue. Glad you agree.
Just started reading this thread today, so I hope this hasn’t been asked yet.
Those of you that live in areas where open carry is permissible and take advantage of that, how do you feel about the seemingly increasing incidence of police officers shooting now, and asking questions later?
What I mean by that is - do you ever worry that someone will call you in for whatever reason, or you’ll run in to a police officer in whatever circumstance, and by virtue of the fact that you simply have a visible gun on you, that they will react strongly (i.e. shoot you/kill you)?
Do you think that police officers in these pro-open carry states will start getting more trigger happy simply because there are so many more threats to them in the course of their work?
But the only reason that the police officer can use the gun to defend or protect themselves or others is BECAUSE its dangerous. The utility you claim is unrelated to being dangerous is only actually possible due to them being dangerous. If a gun wasn’t dangerous one would not be able to use it at all for protection. The assailant would laugh at you if you pointed something non-dangerous at them, right?
See post 546 for starters. I would ask that poster how many times in life they have been attacked by someone larger than them or by a group of people. If its once or never, then is it really reasonable to be constantly afraid of that possibility and thinking about it all of the time? If you are carrying due to this fear, it just seems paranoid and unnecessary. Life isn’t an action movie.
If you are constantly carrying a gun to protect yourself, then you must constantly be aware of this perceived threat to yourself. Seems exhausting to me. Also, I’ve never seen anyone carrying a fire extinguisher around with them just in case they happen to come across a fire so they can play amateur fire fighter, have you?
Your side is the one diligently trying to change the law. If everything is great how it is for your side, why the efforts to make carrying everywhere legal, and to normalize the sight of random people carrying deadly weapons everywhere? What are these efforts for, if not to expand the presence of guns everywhere? Noone is allowed to discuss these things or something? Society is just supposed to sit back and take whatever changes you gun advocates see fit in implementing?
The police wouldn’t bother carrying guns if they weren’t dangerous. Such positive utility they have is a consequence of their negative utility, their inherent dangerousness.
And if you’re going to be a semantic nitpicker, please learn the difference between it’s (the contraction of it is) and its (the possessive).
And as Reyemile said, “A magic knife that did everything a knife could do but couldn’t harm living beings would still cut my steak.”
Speaking of “mucking the waters,” what does “project force” mean if NOT to do injury to living things?
So?
He’s hyperbolic, exaggerating 99.9% of the time to 100% of the time. He’s technically wrong, in that 0.1%, but I’m not sure how you think being technically right here does anything to help the general case for open carry. Especially when you immediately discredit your minor victory with nonesense like
You know damn well that the only reason a firearm is capable of protecting themselves and others is because firearms are dangerous to the criminals we need protecting from (notwithstanding that in many cases, we need protecting from criminals because criminals’ firearms are dangerous to us)
All those lives of *other *people, they’re just abstractions, brought up by the pussy libruls to distract from what’s *really *important, the feeling of power in one’s hand. Besides, if those other people get shot, it’s their own damn fault for “causing” problems, right? A cap or two will teach 'em about being Bad Guys.
But again your claim elides the critical difference between killing in the process of hunting game, and killing humans. Guns are a tool just like a knife or a hammer – they are the tool of hunting. You might say, “But hunting is still killing,” and you’d be right, but by lumping all killing of living creatures together you erase the distinction between perfectly permissible utilitarian killing and the not-always-so-good kind.