I’m a she!
Okay my original hypothesis may not have been argued well but I still think it’s a good hypothesis.
The rape cases not being processed illustrates a lack of resouces.
Making an anti-sniper gun law indicates a waste of resources.
What will happen next time a major gun incident occurs? Will we have an anti-fill-in-the-type-of-gun-used law. An anti-sniper gun law is hardly likely to be enforced. “excuse me sir, what’s that you are carrying? Oh, it’s okay, its a machine gun, they’re legal, on your way.”
Use the money to process cases that are already backed by law rather than make silly new laws that are unenforceable.
—I’m gonna have to say…Cite? I find it hard to believe that citizens without a criminal background who were not engaged in some sort of larceny-type activity commit most crimes involving guns.—
I didn’t say “criminal background.” What I said was poorly phrased, however: I didn’t mean to imply that a) you own a gun b) you therefore will kill someone. My use of “most” was entirely inappropriate, and it was right to call me on that.
However, what I meant was that it’s a little misleading to compare legal gun owners against criminals, since committing a crime with a gun automatically takes you out of the “legal gun owner” category.
—Are you speaking of the pattern that shows a vastly overewhelming number of gun owners never commit crimes with their guns?—
That has nothing to do with the people who DO use guns illegally. You’re letting your knees jerk you around. I’m not aruging against gun ownership (anymore than I argue against drug ownership). I’m pointing out that it’s a little disingenuous to count law abiding gun owners (who are by definition those who have not YET misused guns) against gun criminals (some of whom used to be legal owners) when trying to examine who’s misusing guns.
You can easily a choice statistic against gun-outlawing advocates by the way. They point out that there are such and such many guns in the U.S. for every man woman and child. Since the vast majority of citizens never commit felony crimes, however, and if the activists really believe the seeming implication of their own statistic, this means that the number of guns never used by criminals crime must likewise be vast.
—I find it hard to believe that most criminals used a firearm in commission of their very first crime. I find it much more likely that a criminal would have committed a series of lesser crimes before leading up to using a firearm in commission of a crime.—
The relevant statistic isn’t prior criminality: it’s whether or not the person can legally own a gun before using it for an illegal purpose. Most people who commit crimes have backgrounds of minor offences: but that’s not always enough to trip various state’s cut-offs for gun ownership.
I think maybe Mel’s argument might be put more simply like this (correct me if I’m wrong, MelCthefirst):
Rape is an EXAMPLE of a crime for which resources to investigate and prosecute are limited, and as a result we have a backlog of cases.
A proposed anti-sniper-gun law would be a specific, rather picayune piece of legislation which would be difficult to articulate and enforce.
An outright ban on ALL guns, on the other hand, would be a broad, general policy, easier to enforce because it would not necessitate checking registrations, defining a “sniper-rifle,” or any other difficulties which might be encountered by targeting a specific type of rifle as opposed to ANY rifle.
Actually, I’m not too sure how far she meant to go with gun control, but she did mention “…taking guns out of circulation.”
Obviously, there would be obvious 2nd amendment objections to an outright ban (or virtually any other legislation, but ESPECIALLY an outright ban) A ban would be impossible to enforce in any case (how could the government possibly ever hope to confiscate millions of weapons from the populace?)
Mandatory registration? Still a nightmare to enforce, although I’m not philosophically opposed to it.
“fingerprinting” ammo? I think this would have the best chance of helping to trace a criminal AFTER a crime, and would probably be a pretty good deterrant not to shoot anybody. I also don’t believe it would violate the 2nd amendment (although some NRA types would probably argue with me on that.
I’m actually pretty neutral on the gun issue. I’m not ANTI-gun, but I don’t have the same fetish for them that some others seem to have. (my brother-in-law for instance)
All in all, I suppose the occasional whack-job sniper is the price we have to pay for the right to bear arms.
Thanks Mr Cynic, that’s exactly what I was trying to say (note to self: fully formulate argument before starting debate)
PS: can’t help but think that all guns should be taken out of circulation then they couldn’t get into the wrong hands but I come from a country with few guns in circulation
I suppose it was aimed there but I find it disappointing that such an intriguing thesis (laws should no longer be made if there are no resources to enforce them) ends up being just one more pointless gun debate.
Seriously, I’m with Sua on the lack of wisdom in attempting to establish regulations without providing any regulators. Perhaps we come to a point where, to enact new laws, we should do some cost-benefit work to determine what the cost for enforcement should be and decide whether there are other ‘less worthy’ laws that should be eliminated to free up sufficient resources.
So you’d prefer wide sweeping legislation be enacted rather than small pieces targeted at specific problems? This is a slap in the face of the very idea of liberty. To take this to an absurd extreme (which I feel justified in doing since your example “removing all guns from circulation,” is equally absurd; at least it would be here in the U.S.), that would be like outlawing driving because some people are hurt and killed by drunk drivers. There’s something that would be “easy” to enforce, much easier than enforcing a drunk driving law. We could simply arrest anybody in a moving automobile. Useful? No. Simple? Yes.
Anyway, just because something is “easy” to enforce doesn’t mean that a sweeping ban on all activities related to the problem, is gonna cost less, or free up additional resources to be used in solving or preventing other categories of crime. In fact, sweeping legislation would likely initially cause a massive expenditure of scarce resources and draw down those available for use against “real” crime.
I do, however, think regular review and evaluation of the efficacy of any law enacted would be a good thing. Those that prove ineffective, should be repealed. I’ve suggested as much here on these boards in past threads. This method would tend to uphold libertarian principles, rather than push them aside as sweeping legislation would do.
Am I back on topic now? Sorry 'bout the sidetrack there. Although I’d still like to know just what “pattern of misuse,” Apos is speaking of, as well as see that cite Sgt. J asked for. Perhaps another thread and another day.
And one more apology. MelCthefirst, you have my humble apologies for gender specific language I may have used.
I guess part of my arguement has been somewhat lost: don’t we have enough laws already?
As far as technological changes go, I guess we will always be trying to catch up with legislation because of the constant change but the gun thing illustrates my point: An anti-sniper gun law??
Is this not just to keep everyone happy, showing that the state is doing something whilst this bastard(ess) is at large?
Doesn’t the shooting people is illegal law already cover this?
For every new law made, is there not already a law in place that covers it? (apart from IT stuff)
That, my friend, is an ideological question, not a question of praticality.
For all the laws we have now, there are still oodles of activities that the majority of us would consider “bad,” immoral, undesireable, etc., that are not criminalized.
Add to them a bunch of activities that the majority of us have no problem with, but which small groups would love to make illegal.
So the ideological question is whether any/more/most “bad” conduct should be criminalized.
I suppose the theory behind an anti-sniper gun law (and I’m not advocating such a law) is that by criminalizing a step on the way to the bad act - shooting people - makes it less likely people will be able to commit the bad act. YMMV on the wisdom of the concept.
This is where you are probably wrong. The capacity of humans to find new and novel ways to act badly is amazing. Whether these new and novel ways should be criminalized is the ideological issue noted above. However, the answer to the question of whether at least some of these new and novel ways of acting badly are not covered by existing law is an unequivocal “yes.”
Sua