What he’s describing is hardly apocalyptic. It might be two to three times as bad as it is now, but that’s still a far cry from end of the world, or even the end of the United States.
I’m mildly curious how, in such a scenario, personal security issues are handled regarding someone like the President. Can he/she still appear in public or would the chance of someone taking an impulsive shot be considered too high?
I think he’s trying to make some sort of point but I can’t figure out what it is yet.
I was trying to ask “And how often does that happen?”, but I got called away, and didn’t get back in time to edit.
Not like it makes any difference to the JAQing. How is this hypothetical information relevant to this magical hypothetical?
No, it would not include people who are actually in jail. But it would include anyone who has served their time, and is a free citizen on the streets.
People who we KNOW are homicidal maniacs would be locked up, due to their actions. Of course there may be people who we DON’T know are homicidal maniacs, but that is the same as the current situation today. We can’t go arresting people and locking them up because we KNOW they will commit a crime in the future.
The same is true with “maniacs”. This would be carefully defined as “anyone who has been committed to an institution and is not allowed out”. Anyone else is a free citizen, entitled to the same rights as anyone else.
First, its a hypothetical, not a “magical hypothetical”.
Second, I was asking because if the only persons to be disqualified are felons and those deemed to be legally insane, we have a pretty good idea of how many felons and former felons there are in the United States, so I was inquiring as to what impact, if any at all, the “insane” part would have on the equation. Are there enough people declared legally insane in the United States to even be worth discussing?
No, since a Court has ruled on their status. If they were so suited, then they woudl no longer be judge “insane”.
These would be “mentally ill” people, and as long as they are not incarcerated, they would have the exact same access to firearms under my hypothetical. Only those incarcerated in prison or asylums would have access restricted.
The point (if there is one) behind my question/debate is;
I have a friend (more of a facebook acquaintance), who is quite convinced that if we only had complete and unfettered access to firearms (much like in my hypothetical), then we would have a much improved society, with less crime, more civility and an overall improvement on the quality of life. In short, it would be a fantastic place to live.
I take the opposite tack; That we would have more accidental deaths due to people generally being dopes, as well as additional killings by people in moment of anger/passion (eg. two guys in a bar getting into an argument, and rather than fists, guns come out). More innocent bystanders getting shot as well. I don’t subscribe to an apocalyptic Mad-Max future, but rather an marked increase in shootings generally, with no measurable increase in “politeness” or a better society.
He is adamantly opposed to my way of thinking. I am apparently an idiot for even considering any downside to his utopia.
As my esteemed colleague alludes to below, it is an increase in what we see now and hardly the end of the world. All these things are happening already, they will happen more often.
Society would need to value civility and emotional maturity far more than it does.
Yeah, I don’t see it. I’ve heard this argument before but I just don’t buy it. The thing is, I don’t think that having more people armed in public would no more change the fundamental issues in American or with Americans than more gun control would…America and Americans are seemingly violent people, with or without guns. If you look at Switzerland, they have high levels of gun ownership yet orders of magnitude less violence, even when adjusted for their lower population.
Conversely, I doubt that if you loosened gun restrictions such that people could go armed (which they can in many states…including my own, which has open carry) that many actually WOULD, or that it would be the wild west shootout people seem to assume. I doubt it would have a very large change one way or the other wrt violence, suicides or anything else.
Then your hypothetical is bogus, due to this gaping hole. No one wants violent felon out on parole to be able to own guns.
I already said that IMHO it would be a bit of a wash, both sides would be somewhat correct. Certain crimes (rape especially) would decrease , but “incidents” would increase. Civility would increase after an initial period as many of the worst angry idiots would be dead.
So, you’re both wrong *in your extreme. *
I don’t think I’m that extreme. I think accidents would increase markedly, and would not go down that much. Because people. I don’t think your “initial period” would exist, rather we’d see a “new normal” of random gun violence. I’d guess three times the accident rate and three times the homicide by gun rate. And that would be the “price we’d pay for freedom”.
In terms of “civility”… I see it more as a culture of living in literal fear of offending anyone at all.
I don’t really grok the notion that it would reduce robberies/burglaries/muggings/carjackings. An armed victim just means you gotta get the drop on them (already the case with unarmed ones) and then shoot first (which is easy when you have the drop on them).
Hell, most liquor store cashiers, bookies and the like - i.e. clerks at commonly robbed places - are *already *armed. They still get robbed at gunpoint, and most of the time those robberies succeed. Because ultimately few people are eager to risk getting into a deadly shootout over a small, insured stack of twenties which more often than not isn’t even really theirs.
In my opinion, this would probably happen. If you’re a mugger now, having a gun is a tactical advantage during a robbery. You threaten your victims and they give you their valuables.
But if you’re a mugger in a society where people are generally armed, merely possessing a gun is no longer an advantage. In order to rob armed victims, you have to shoot them before they’re able to defend themselves. So muggers would routinely shoot their victims in the back and then rob the corpses.
I doubt that. See- minor robberies are often not reported, or if reported, little investigation is made. Murders are different.
Even in the Wild West, robbers did not often “shoot first”. The few that did were considered “mad dogs” and often hunted down like same.
3 times? :dubious: But like I said, you could spin any figures you want since this is so far outside of any sort of reality that any answer is going to reflect the world view and assumptions of the person making it. My WAG is that there would be little change if you implemented this today…very few people actually would go armed, just like today in open carry states very few people do. If you want to posit some sort of society where folks spit on those who don’t go armed then basically make any assumptions or assertions you like, since any or all of them could be equally valid in such a fantasy world. Like I said, I’d move to Canada. 
I guess the thinking is that anyone who would consider a career in mugging, would see the prevalence of guns, and go into another line of business, like selling hot dogs or something.