You haven’t connected the dots, KellyM. How does the hypothetical that a person who causes you property damage with a firecracker doesn’t have the money to repay you justify banning firecrackers? The college kid could do the same or worse damage with a poorly-secured air conditioner falling out his window onto your car. Ban window-unit air conditioners?
I’ve seen plenty of kids rolling grocery carts across parking lots, and I’ve seen some significant damage caused by them. I doubt they had the money to pay for the paint job. Ban grocery carts?
Irrelevant. You specifically said that KellyM’s idiot college “would have gotten fireworks to terrorize you with even if they were illegal.” This is a much stronger claim that merely admitting the existence of illegal fireworks.
Billy Rubin, are you seriously suggesting that if fireworks were banned throughout the US then people would go to the same lengths to which drug sumgglers go to bring them into the country? To the point where there is no change in the quantity available every July?
There’s working and there’s working. If drugs were legal, more people would use them, and those who used the would use more of them, and there would be more drug-related problems in society. Likewise if there were no DWI laws then more people would drive drunk, and people who drive drunk would drive drunker, and there would be more alcohol-related crashes.
Are there legions of bottle-rocket junkies out there willing to shell out large amounts of cash for a fix? Commiting crimes to support their habit? Forming violent street gangs and fighting firework-dealing turf wars?
Fireworks are manufactured by, inported by, and sold by legitimate businessess who would close shop if they were banned (and none of whom operate in states where they are already illegal). People who cross state lines to get them usually supply them just to immediate friends and family. I’m not aware of any black market network in these states. There simply isn’t a demand for fireworks comparable to drugs or prostitution.
FTR, my inner Bart Simpson is all in favor of making/keeping fireworks legal. In Minnesota we recently legalized “fireworks”, but just sparklers and stuff. Whoopee. I want firecrackers and bottle rockets without having to go to 'Sconni.
Perhaps, but remember, I was specifically addressing B.R.'s statement that
The point is that crime will continue, even when that crime is legislated against. This is NOT a good argument for legalizing that crime. YES, there will always be some fireworks injuries, but this does not mean that laws which ban or restrict fireworks serve no useful purpose.
Actually, Sua, you can take that a few steps further: That a person can attend college by definition implies some sort of resources(beside scholarships of course) and that said student can further afford lodging separate from the university is an implication of more resources.
but then, KellyM may be one of the type that believes that parents should not be responsible for the delinquent actions of their children. Already, there’s a tendency away from logic:
apparently insurance isn’t something KellyM believes in either.
JT: Okay, Hammond. Prove to me that the illegality of fireworks would prevent “idiot students” from laying their hands on them.
Prove it. C’mon. Prove me wrong. Can you? No. Nor can I prove that the incident in question would or wouldn’t have happened; however, as I’ve stated and you agreed to, illegality does not imply copliance. Irrelevant. When you take a hit, you should pass it on. Don’t bogart it.
Sua, the grocery cart and air conditioner examples are obviously inapposite. You should know by now that cost-benefit analyses are multifactoral. Grocery carts and air conditioners do not stand comparably to fireworks in terms of either social utility or general risk of loss. Cost-benefit analyses are not generally subject to categorical “brightline” rules, which is exactly what you’re arguing for. If you want a brightline rule, it’s either “ban everything” or “ban nothing”, and neither one of those is particularly practical.
Billy Rubin, I’m under no obligation to report crimes which I happen to witness, and when doing so may have significant costs for me (the time I waste calling the cops, giving a statement, etc. would have caused me to fail to complete my deliveries on time, which could have cost me my job) I’m not going to bother, especially when the likelihood that anything will result from it is exceedingly low.
The point is that you’ve missed it. Entirely. In many areas, fireworks are illegal. In many, they’re legal. In those areas, it’s*** not a crime*** to use fireworks. That’s the way it is. Deal with it. Sorry if it offends your delicate sensibilities. the analogy you draw, between a potentially (but not necesarily so) dangerous (but in many areas legal) product and an out and out illegal activity (Rape, for Christ’s sake!) makes you, er,
Irrelevant.
Sorry, but you’re the one who made the claim. I’m just asking you to defend it. Sounds to me like you desperately want to shift the burden of proof onto someone else.
Wow, what a wonderfully responsible citizen you are! A few moments of your time “wasted” to call a cop and ask him to do his JOB isn’t worth it. Better to ban fireworks, even though that will not stop this sort of thing from happening anyway. That way, when it happens again, you can **BLAME THE COPS THAT YOU REFUSED TO TAKE A MINUTE TO CALL FOR NOT DOING THEIR JOBS. **
All your rant says is that fireworks are legal in some places. Big deal. Nobody contests that… and it has no bearing on the question of whether they SHOULD be legal or not.
If you honestly think that “In those areas, it’s not a crime” is a legitimate and well-reasoned argument, then I think you need to learn the definition of “circular reasoning.”
Billy Rubin, you will note that I previously stated that I could not get comprehensive insurance (the only form that will cover “destroyed by random fireworks”) for my car at a reasonable price. People who deliver newspapers for a living are driving rustbuckets, not brand new Ford Expeditions, and you can’t insure rustbuckets for anything other than indemnity (which never pays the policyholder). Further, my automobile insurance would not have paid my medical expenses if I was burned in the fire had one actually occured, and there was no way I could afford my own medical insurance on what I made delivering papers.
College students may get resources from their parents, but their parents are not legally obliged to cover their tort judgments. And many college students get through on loans and grants, which cannot be attached to pay judgment debts. So, unless you want to amend the law of tort such that these things are true, you haven’t solved the problem.
Well, I can’t defend the claim in that specific situation, I wasn’t there, I don’t even know where it was.
What I can say is that since the chinese invented gunpowder, kids who wanted to use firecrackers, bottle rockets, etc. have been getting them legally or illegally, all over the world. When fireworks were illegal in Indiana many years ago, my cousin hd no trouble whatsoever laying his hands on bottle rockets and shooting them at the cars in the junkyard behind his house. Now, get me a time machine, and I can prove that in this circumstance that would have happened too, but until that happens, i can only prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the type of behavior I describe does in fact happen. Satisfied? or do you want to shift the burden of the blame onto the law, rather than the assholes responsible for this behavior? Accusing people of wanting to shift things makes you seem rather, er, shifty. And a practitioner of “circular reasoning”
Okay, Kellym, Now try to tell me that your car cost more than a semester of college. if a student can afford that, he can afford the replacement of the car.
BTW, you still haven’t come forth with your “proof” that these were “idiot college students living in the apartment complex”. All you know is that they bottle rocket came from that general area. If it came through a window, of course you would have said that, and knowing that it came out a window defines knowledge of which apartment it came from. Making it only one door the cop has to knock on. Oh, wait, you never called a cop. Nevermind.
Still inapposite. Falling surfboards and air conditioners are extremely unlikely to cause fires, and generally fall in a more or less straight vertical line. Because there is much less risk of fire and a substantially greater chance of identifying the tortfeasor, the need for a preemptive ban is much lessened. Bottlerockets, on the other hand, are ballistic weapons, may go off well out of sight of the person who fires them, and may very well start substantially damaging fires.
The thing that makes fireworks so problematic is the combination of high potential for destruction and the difficulty (especially in densely populated areas) of identifying the responsible party. The potential for anonymous harm is a substantial factor in deciding to ban a thing.
So please tell me again how when someone shoots an illegally obtained bottle rocket at you this changes? and while you’re at it, I’d love to know how you employ banannas to prevent earthquakes.
Billy Rubin, you can’t attach scholarship funds or student loans to pay a tort judgment. Even if I identify the individual firing the rocket and even if I can successfully sue them for the damages, they can continue to receive student loans and grant money to pay for school that I legally can’t touch to recover my damages.
This may or may not be right, but it is the law.
Replacing the car I had then would have cost about $1000. The car was “worth” (blue book) about $150, but in practice it is impossible to buy a car at that price.
If nobody is selling them, it makes it kinda hard to shoot them, eh? I’m not that worried about “homemade bottle rockets”.
Bottle rockets can only be fired in Indiana from “designated firing areas” (and I’m not even sure about that; they might be restricted altogether for those with the proper permits). I agree that the current system of prohibiting the sale (or use) of dangerous fireworks but not enforcing those prohibitions is ludicrous. If anything, the current practice may even encourage the inappropriate use of fireworks because you get the added thrill of “doing something illegal”.
Either ban them properly, or not at all. I vote for banning them properly.
KellyM, I’m sure you know a lot about the law. I know a thing or two about human nature, and the real world. If a kid can get to school he can get cash for a car. I barely made it to school, working all the time, and I still managed to buy a car. It wasn’t great but it ran. Of course, that’s neither here nor there. I still want to know how the bottle rocket being illegal would change the situation? legal or illegal, it still would have made it to your car. Please tell me one thing that’s been “banned properly” and no longer exists. Can you? As for “if nobody is selling them”- well, that works pretty well for drugs and other illegal things, doesn’t it? tell me, how you gonna stop it? Explain the practicalities of that to me. Oh, by the way, a police department busy trying to stop violent crime, drug dealing, etc. is NOT going to make ANY effort to enforce fireworks legislation unless a responsible citizen calls them. So adding more legislation/banning accomplishes nothing.
Not being responsible and calling the cops (because “nothing” really happened, and because you couldn’t be bothered) and not getting the kids in question stopped or at least investigated, helps promotes this behavior. (hey, we got away with that, let’s use an M-80 next time!)Way more than ready availability of fireworks. Especially if theyre legal and only available for sale to and use by adults. (no I’m not naive enough to think that that’s fully controllable either, but it’s practical)
Oh, JT?
Argument? This is what we like to call a “Statement”. In this case it’s a “statement of fact”. Pretty soon, you’ll get the hang of this language thing just fine, I’m sure.
