Flying bullets are my responsibility?

Great Debates
61

Thanks for proving my point. I was well aware that Switzerland allows guns and gun collecting. They even state sponsor sporting ranges. So, we may conclude now that gun regulation does not increase crime or tyranny. Now please tell me where I said that guns needed to be outlawed? Please tell me where I said that guns “cause” crime? I said that crime was facilitated by guns but was caused by other things, namely poverty and segregated ghettos and lack of education and opportunity and overbreeding (crime is then not fostered through guns, but is facilitated or made worse and more expensive by freely distributed guns). You gun-lovers have assumed that guns prevent crime and pretend the counter-point is that guns cause crime–a double fallacy if there ever was one:

*Switzerland, through its militia system, distributes both
pistols and fully automatic assault rifles to all adult males and
requires them to store their weapons at home. Further, civilian
long-gun purchases are essentially unregulated, and handguns are
available to any adult without a criminal record or mental
defect. Nevertheless, Switzerland suffers far less crime per
capita than the United States and almost no gun crime.

Allowing for important differences between Switzerland and
the United States, it seems clear that there is no direct link
between the level of citizen gun ownership and the level of gun
misuse. Instead of simplistically assuming that the fewer guns
there are, the safer society will be, one should analyze the
particular costs and benefits of gun ownership and gun control
and consider which groups gain and lose from particular policies.*

Notice that word “regulation” or registration or gun or bullet taxes were carefully omitted. My point stands. Insure guns (through a government agency) and tax bullets. So, if we are comparing Switzerland, then we need to do many other things to emulate them, namely start providing health-care and free education and tax the rich to pay for it. Switzerland does not foster an underclass and then try to arm them to prevent crime.

62

“He’s got the ball… he dribbles… he shoots… he misses! Total air-ball! Did you see how poorly he missed? He was off by a mile! You could kill fifty people of hyperventilation with that much air!”

“11 times the murder rate” is nothing, pal. Especially when you consider that Australia has a murder rate of less than 2 per 100,000 people. In other words, 2/1000s of 1% of the population of Australia gets murdered. Conversely, 22/1000s of 1% of the population of America gets murdered.

This is a difference of 2/100s of 1%. In other words, Statistically Insignificant! If you want to twist stats.

Second, we weren’t comparing “Murders only”… we don’t think like Kellerman around here. We were comparing CRIMES in GENERAL… in which case, the US only has a few more crimes per year than Australia… or at least it did in 1995, at which point the crime rate in Australia had been climbing and the crime rate in America had been declining.

You had made the claim that Australia had a much lower crime rate than America. This is blatantly false. I have proved it to be false. It cannot be any more false. It is as false as false can be. Do you admit your error with regards to making this claim, yes or no?

We concluded that long before you showed up on the scene, Little Child.

Why? Show me where I said that you said that guns needed to be outlawed. Show me where I said that you said that guns “cause” crime.

You made claims. Claims that you were asked to back up. You have failed miserably to back them up. Subsequently, your claims have been thoroughly debunked.

Whether or not you “believe” guns “facilitate” crime, stop crime, start crime, take a bite out of crime, or fly pink daisies to the Moon is completely immaterial. The fact remains that your claims are baseless and false.

I’m done with this thread. There’s only so much “Duurrrr…” I can stand coming from someone who doesn’t know the meaning of the word “cite”.

63

Wow, statistically insignificant. 11 times the murder rate. Rapes and robberies too? So, all crime is the same now. Get murdered, get punched in a bar, that’s the same thing! Its a crime! Well, someone might ask, what about the penalties, the money spent on investigations, the levels or degrees of differences written in the law? Still the same amount of crime? I think we have a clear massive case of slippery slope here, right off the edge of reason.

This is why I don’t want to be a pro-gun camp even though I support the 2nd Amendment, its too embarrassing to be lumped with people who are afraid of improvement, it might make them look bad. When people that support the NRA use Switzerland to illustrate a good gun law country, and then omit the fact that they are more regulated, then we are dealing with lies and liars.

64

Brian:

Could you possibly, without going to the pit, be any more offensive?

65

I just kinda read through all of this and only have one thing to say. Tank, Spoofe… I REALLY like you guys:) We gotta get together sometime for a beer :wink:

66 
 So... first you claim that nobody owns guns....

 Then... You claim that you knew all along that they do.

Why are you even here? Oh… That’s right. You are here to simply do whatever you can to offend people. How many times have you made derogatory statements about gun owners and carriers? How many times have you made the claim that the NRA is all but a religion with bad ideas and blind followers? How many times have you refused to prove your claims of utter nonsense? It is clear to me that you are simply a very bored person with nothing better to do than stir the pot in a thread that you find amusing. I am very confident in stating that you either have no stand on the issues you support, or that you do, but simply are doing all that you can to play devil’s advocate, in what is quite possibly the worst example of underworld advocacy that I have EVER seen. Pick a side and stay with it, or acknowledge where you have erred. I for one am now finished with this thread. I refuse to take a gun to a knife fight. (hard to believe I know, seeing as how I’m an uneducated redneck who is a danger to society, and relishes the idea of taking another’s life… at least according to the bunny). See ya all in more intelligent conversations :slight_smile:

67

In the OP mangeorge said;

Boy Howdy, guess I asked for it, didn’t I? :smiley:
Anyway, Mike came up to me the other day and said that maybe he got a little carried away in our conversation about stray bullets.
What he meant was, that if he was in a dire situation, he couldn’t take time to be absolutely sure that no one was in any peril. He uses those whachamicallit bullets mentioned here that don’t penetrate so much.
I believe him, I guess. Mike’s really not the kind of guy to spray the 'hood with bullets.
It is hard to “preview” your statements when involved in a heated conversation.
About New Year and the 4th. Try as I might, I couldn’t find anything about people being injured by falling bullets. Not much anyway. Some property damage. But I still think it’s a idiotic practice.
Ah, hell. I’m going to bed.
Peace,
mangeorge

68

Mangeorge: be careful what you wish for.

69

Oh, I see. So it’s totally unreasonable to compare the murder/gun violence rates in the U.S. with those of other countries. I have to compare CRIME IN GENERAL. And then I have to disregard murder as a CRIME IN GENERAL.

Except all those “insignificant” murders.

I’ll take my odds against a knife- vs. gun-wielding assailant any day.

Except shootings and murders, which are less common in the UK, because, as you admit, “there are less guns.”

I would change your statement to “Crime levels are products of economic and social factors AND what weapons are available (and how they are regulated).”

70

**

Take a second and think about your attitudes towards people. If you didn’t think people were bloodthirsty why would you worry about society being armed?
Marc

71

Citizens in Switzerland own guns privately and publicly. I would guess that the public ownership far outnumbers the private ownership. Your confusion is evident, possibly deliberate. We can’t make an assertion about Switzerland having lots of guns and then conveniently try to assume that it is either/or, as you are attempting to do. If the Swiss government issues most guns, then we assume they are not owned and they cannot be used to bolster claims of gun ownership prevents crime since they are trained and responsible to them. Also, the private handguns are registered, and they are responsible to them. And to make matters worse, I hear that they generally think American guns laws are absurd, according to one Swiss gun-owner I know.

Also, Turbo, I don’t have to pick a side, I was dead in the middle, a moderate, and you can’t deal with it. You want the extreme or nothing at all. You want a communist to argue with to make your extremism valid. All I ever asserted was that specific guns facilitate needless crime, and there are simple ways to discourage it. Gun insurance is the same as registration, but makes more sense, making people more responsible. I’m talking handguns here and assault rifles, etc.

Tank, Spoofer, et al,

We are talking about crime in relation to guns. If we assert that less guns means less crime, it is implied to mean less crime that could be committed or prevented with guns. Rapes, robberies, and murders are on top of the list and is why people go to prison as a danger to society. If countries that regulate handgun sales and ownership have much less gun crime, then the logical conclusion is that more regulation contributes to less crime, and the American idea of “more guns less crime” is disproven worldwide. It is such a fantastically absurd claim, that only Americans would believe it.

72

After reading all this, I have to put my .02 in.

If the world could be made a better place by eliminating guns, great, I’m all for it. But guns are not the issue as far as reducing crime. Never were. It’s about doing the little feel-good things that people respond to, kinda like taking aspirin for a headache. Let’s go with some facts, since you guys are big on those.

Fact: PEOPLE kill PEOPLE. That they do it with guns is irrelevant. They could hack people apart with broadswords and those people will be just as dead.

Fact: I have the right to defend myself. If guns did not exist, I can assure you that murders would increase. Why, you ask? Well, think about it. A truly sociopathic personality avails himself/herself of any and all means to kill someone. They have no qualms about using knives, ropes, etc. On the other hand, we have the average Joe Schmuckatelli. Is he gonna be able to defend himself in a knifefight? NO, NO, most emphatically NO. He’s gonna be hamburger.

Fact: Most people who use guns are responsible. That is an indisputable statement, I trust.

Fact: There is NO SUCH THING as reasonable gun control. If the feel good measures don’t work, let’s take more rights away until we can virtually guarantee that only criminals will have guns, right? In this scenario, if I have a gun, simply by virtue of possession I am a criminal, right? How do I defend myself against the REAL criminal that doesn’t care what the law says?

Hey, I’m not a psycho. I in NO way condone murder, rape, etc. I’m just an average guy trying to live one day at a time. I just think that guns are the best way to defend you and yours. If we went back to medieval times, where there were no guns, just broadswords, I’d love that. But we can’t.

Remember, once the genie is out of the bottle, there is no way to cork that bitch back up.

73

DoorsRule wrote:

Fact: Most people who use guns are responsible. That is an indisputable statement, I trust.

The word “use” is problematical. I think I know what you mean, but if you want to be technical, then I disagree. The vast majority of private citizens who “use” handguns are career criminals. However, if you drop the word “use” and substitute “own” then it loses its meaning, because most people don’t use their guns in an active sense, but in a passive sense, and those are the handguns that just sit around and wait to be used or misused. If you say that most people don’t abuse their guns, then this is probably correct. But by raising the issue, we need to establish what number of people who abuse their guns is tolerable. I really don’t concern myself with this approach, because there are better solutions that could make everyone happy.

My plan to insure certain guns was to prod people decide to own a gun responsibly, and make a small paper-work sacrifice for the right to have a listed threat to society (handgun, assault weapon) in their possession. I think the government has no right to ban certain assault rifles which are identical to many other guns when they could have insured them instead, but the elites don’t want to insure them. Why? Because they plan on banning them someday and insurance would guarantee their ownership forever (maybe that’s why they call it insurance).

And as for guns, I don’t think subtracting them from society is even an option, not with conservatives advocating mandatory sentencing and prisons–a police state. I’m not fooled for one minute by conservatives, who in my judgment always complicate a problem to make their final solutions more desirable. When I see conservatives using guns to build more prisons and make gun ownership the case for stiffer penalties, I know that that’s what they wanted to do all along, guns and drugs are convenient to this end. Conservatives orchestrate violence just like they do in the middle-east. They keep two groups fighting among themselves so the protected group is spared. Same with America. Keep everyone fighting among themselves, get the rednecks in the heartland to fear for their lives and jobs, and the elites own all of our asses coming and going.

When conservatives rule this country as a third-world has-been, in about a generation, they will turn against guns faster than you can comprehend. Drug dealers have rights too, such as protecting themselves from dangerous competition, but elites have no qualms about using guns rights against ALL THEIR RIGHTS. Think about it, and try not to think in a programmed way about it–that would prove my theory. My point is, this is isn’t about guns right now, its about using guns as an excuse for more cops, more gun laws that could elimated by insurance programs, and more prisons. The cost of guns to society is staggering, and the outcome only works in the favor of the elite, who can afford to leave the problem behind. When guns cost society this much and they are still sold in ghettos, then you can bet that someone has a master plan. Pardon my presumption, but every gun-owner here needs to quit thinking they are free just because they own a gun. That’s what they want you to think.

Also, bullets kill people.

74

Well spoken. Finally, someone who gets it (sort of) :smiley: .
By the way, long falls off of cliffs kill people too.

75

I’ve been reading this thread with a bit of bemusement, but this is a bit annoying:

These are assertions, not facts. Facts require some degree of documentation.

Well, may I be so bold as to point to a major item of relevance. Guns step up the ability to kill people quite a lot. There is, shall we say, a non-trivial difference in killing capacity between a Glock and a kitchen knife or even a broadsword.

That raises a legitimate issue in regards to guns impact on society. Where one stands on gun control etc. of course will depend, but it is both illogical and dishonest to make the above assertion.

Again this is assertion. (Well, the first is in some degree based in law, while the second clause does not logically follow from the first.)

Here again is assertion based on some rather weak premises: (a) murders stem from “sociopathes” – I guess we have to define this term
(b) sociopathes will be able to wreak more mahem w/o guns than with guns (see above: frnakly this seems more than slighly ludicrous. Perhaps it may be the case, but certianly can not be asserted a priori)
© average Joes in world w/o guns or controlled guns will be less able to defend self (ignoring I suppose effectiveness --or not-- of other responses).

This sort of argument is not a very good case at all.

I don’t know. Presumably, but at the moment its an assertion. However, given it is the most logical of your assertions so far let’s let it pass.

No, this is assertion based on your ideological premises. One really needs to define what is considered reasonable and on what terms even to respond, but in any case this point can never be a fact per se. I would suggest in order to make meaningful statements in this area you need some rigorous definitions, good comparative data, taking into account different ideas of crime and strictly defining where ownership or non-ownership should/should not have effects.

I snipped the rest of the assertions.

All in all this is just the sort of argumentation which leads nowwhere and adds nothing.

Bloody hell these gun debates are not terribly productive are they?

76

I am amazed, if you put “Fact:” before a statement, its a fact!

:slight_smile:

77

Collounsbury:

Nope. Try doing one on average of once a month.

For two years.