# Gun Nuts Attack Gun Nut **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 24, 2007, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494 "2007-02-24T09:42:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![T\_SQUARE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9de053/32.png) [@T\_SQUARE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/T_SQUARE)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2007, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/41 "2007-02-24T23:16:54Z")
[QUOTE=anamnesis] As a shooter, I’ve encountered each of these types at the ranges I’ve been to. They aren’t hard to spot amongst the booths. There are some nutters out there who bring semi-automatic, civilian versions of high-powered military rifles, shotguns, and machine guns to the range to obliterate paper targets. These weapons are certainly not meant for hunting. Under what circumstance will they use these weapons? I suppose a well-armed militia is our constitutional right, but has there ever been a need for the citizenry to be more thoroughly armed than our military? [/QUOTE] But they are using them. Shooting a machine gun at a range is a lot of fun. It’s like saying "under what circumstance would anyone use a go-cart?’ Just because you can’t drive it to the store doesn’t make it unuseful. ---
**Author:** ![kung\_fu\_lola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f4b2a3/32.png) [@kung\_fu\_lola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kung_fu_lola)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2007, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/42 "2007-02-24T23:43:21Z")
[QUOTE=SenorBeef] The former is not considered an “assault weapon” while the latter is. And in case you didn’t notice, I used the same words to describe each. Because they function identically - you get one round per trigger pull and you swap magazines, and they shoot the same rounds. They have the same capabilities. Either would be roughly equally effective in a killing spree. The only difference is cosmetic. And yet one is a menace to society and needs to be banned, and the other one is just a fun varmint hunting rifle. [/QUOTE] I understand and I agree with you. Thanks for the info. ---
**Author:** ![Tiamatpuppy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Tiamatpuppy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tiamatpuppy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2007, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/43 "2007-02-24T23:44:39Z")
[QUOTE=Steve MB] Realistically, “fighting the government” is not a matter of annihilating the government’s forces. It is a matter of making territory ungovernable until the government throws in the towel. You **have** been watching the news from Iraq, right? [/QUOTE] He shoots he scores! ---
**Author:** ![Tiamatpuppy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Tiamatpuppy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tiamatpuppy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2007, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/44 "2007-02-24T23:47:02Z")
[QUOTE=Quartz] Please engage your brain instead of your backside. One gun against the government is indeed useless; a thousand or a million is a different matter entirely. That F18 can’t fly if the pilot’s been killed. Even with a pilot, it can’t fly if the fuel truck’s been hijacked. Etc. Think of the French Resistance in WW2. Think of Iraq. Remember the Rodney King riots? Remember how a group of shopkeepers saved their shops from being looted by banding together and using their firearms? [/QUOTE] Again, brilliant! ---
**Author:** ![Unregistered\_Bull](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3da27b/32.png) [@Unregistered\_Bull](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unregistered_Bull)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/45 "2007-02-25T00:32:35Z")
[QUOTE=RedFury] Guess I’ll answer my own query: [U.S. Leads Richest Nations In Gun Deaths](http://www.guncite.com/cnngunde.html) [/QUOTE] We have more guns than European countries. Deaths involving them, either accidental or intentional, should be higher. A free society comes with certain risks. I find the high stats of some countries with stringent gun laws a bit surprising. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/46 "2007-02-25T02:32:16Z")
[QUOTE=silenus] Nope, the differences are in cultures. There has never existed a culture or expectation of private ownership of self-defense or militia weaponry in any of the countries you mentioned other than the US. [/QUOTE] Aren’t you forgetting the compulsory longbow practice that the English had to do? ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/47 "2007-02-25T03:09:49Z")
[QUOTE=Unregistered Bull] We have more guns than European countries. Deaths involving them, either accidental or intentional, should be higher. A free society comes with certain risks. [/QUOTE] It’s so sad that all those other first world democracies are not free societies. If only they had more guns and more gun caused deaths, they too could become free societies. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/48 "2007-02-25T03:18:06Z")
[QUOTE=Quartz] Aren’t you forgetting the compulsory longbow practice that the English had to do? [/QUOTE] OK…amend that to include the phrase “since the Hundred Years War.” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/49 "2007-02-25T03:32:42Z")
The authors of _Freakonomics_ pointed out that children were seven times more likely to drown in a backyard swimming pool than they were to be injured by a firearm. Does this mean that we outlaw backyard swimming pools? Those, after all, do not enjoy Constitutional protection. ---
**Author:** ![Unregistered\_Bull](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3da27b/32.png) [@Unregistered\_Bull](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unregistered_Bull)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/50 "2007-02-25T03:54:18Z")
[QUOTE=Muffin] It’s so sad that all those other first world democracies are not free societies. If only they had more guns and more gun caused deaths, they too could become free societies. [/QUOTE] They would certainly be more free in the aspect of gun ownership. And the ability to own that particular asset is a freedom and a Constitutional right in US. I’m sure that some of these other countries with draconian gun laws are more free than the US in other areas. I’m sure that there are added social costs, including related injuries and death, because of those freedoms. Even if draconian firearms laws were passed in the US, would gun crime and suicides actually subside? The UK passed extremely draconian firearms legislation, but it seems that there is an epidemic of criminal gun violence there. And they are in a place that wasn’t awash with guns like the US has always been. I had rather this been a pit thread about the _assholish_behavior of internet gun commandos who ruined this guys career with two companies that most of the internet gun commandos didn’t patronize any way over what is a fairly common opinion of lots of hunters/gun enthusiasts. ---
**Author:** ![Unregistered\_Bull](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3da27b/32.png) [@Unregistered\_Bull](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unregistered_Bull)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/51 "2007-02-25T03:56:50Z")
[QUOTE=phouka] The authors of _Freakonomics_ pointed out that children were seven times more likely to drown in a backyard swimming pool than they were to be injured by a firearm. Does this mean that we outlaw backyard swimming pools? Those, after all, do not enjoy Constitutional protection. [/QUOTE] Would we still be a first world democracy with a free society if we outlawed them? The government could still have them of course. So it’s not like swimming would be non-existent. But what about all the rivers and lakes??? ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/52 "2007-02-25T04:02:41Z")
Well, there you have it, folks. The freedom to go postal – if that isn’t a freedom worth dying for, I don’t know what is. At least now when the USA calls itself the leader of the free world, we will know what it means by “free”. ---
**Author:** ![lokij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/5e9695/32.png) [@lokij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lokij)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/53 "2007-02-25T05:01:07Z")
[QUOTE=straight man] Sure, but the thing is, in these modern times, having guns (even assault weapons) is fairly useless in fighting the government. How do you intend to take on an F18? How about artillery? How about an armoured vehicle or a tank? Hell, how about a fully-equipped, fully-trained Ranger? The original intent of having an armed populace (which is indeed the one you listed) is irretrievably gone, and in the meantime, all the guns really do is help non-governmental types kill other non-governmental types. [/QUOTE] In a full on civil insurgency you use your gun to acquire more and deadlier weapons or to safeguard yourself and family from other hostiles or infantry while you make contacts and organize for larger operations. If you’re in hiding and are in a rural or wilderness area, it can feed you as well. The gun buys you the time to get to the RPGs, explosives and mortars that will be far more effective against hardened targets. You can see this at work in Iraq. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/54 "2007-02-25T05:28:50Z")
[QUOTE=Hentor the Barbarian] So what do we do about that list (and I’m confident there are a few more similar isolated examples). Do we just tell the relatives of those people, “Sorry, them’s the breaks?” Do you say, “Thank you for paying for my rights with your life?” I’m honestly curious. How do you regard these incidents? Do you regard them as problematic? If not, why not? If so, do you have any thoughts about doing anything further to try to prevent such incidents in the future? [/QUOTE] It seems heartless, but essentially, yes, “that’s life”. You have to view this from a logical rather than emotional viewpoint. In a country of hundreds of millions of people, anything that happens once every few months (or years, we haven’t really had a Colombine since.. Colombine) is really statistically insignificant. Any attempt to alter policy to counter something which is statistically exceedingly rare is going to be heavy handed and have costs and/or downsides which are far more excessive than justified to counter the problem. How many billions of man-days of lawful, responsible gun ownership are there to every one of these incidents? Understand that the media circus surrounding these events - and let’s make no bones about it, the media types are absolutely thrilled when people get shot up by a scary looking rifle - blow the incident way out of proportion and you have to realize how statistically insignificant it is. It’s like plane crashes - they’re rare, affect very few people, and yet when one happens the media is all over it for a long time, and people, irrationally, become afraid to fly, because their exposure to the fear the incident invokes is far out of proportion to the actual danger they face from it. This doesn’t just apply to guns - any time where you have isolated incidents that are statistically insignificant should not be attempted to be rectified by large and heavy handed policy change. If we tried to legislate some kind of protection against anything a crazy person could do, we’d all end up locked in padded rooms for our own safety. Besides, is anyone going to not go on a shooting spree if they can only get access to a mini-14 instead of an ar-15? Or if they can only get access to a hunting rifle, handgun, or shotgun? Of course not. So now you’ve applied heavy handed policy change that affects no one but law abiding, responsible gun owners, and not actually accomplished anything. This is extremely typical of gun control. ---
**Author:** ![bdgr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a87d85/32.png) [@bdgr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bdgr)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/55 "2007-02-25T06:01:35Z")
someone wants to go on a killing spree in a mall they can use a molotov cocktail or a pipe bomb just as easy. Getting rid of the guns isn’t going to solve anything and lots of recreational crap that is legal in this country kill people. Alchohol comes to mind. I’d bet beer kills more people than guns every year. ---
**Author:** ![straight\_man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/straight_man/32/3027_2.png) [@straight\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straight_man)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/56 "2007-02-25T06:38:00Z")
[QUOTE=Quartz] Please engage your brain instead of your backside. One gun against the government is indeed useless; a thousand or a million is a different matter entirely. That F18 can’t fly if the pilot’s been killed. Even with a pilot, it can’t fly if the fuel truck’s been hijacked. Etc. Think of the French Resistance in WW2. Think of Iraq. Remember the Rodney King riots? Remember how a group of shopkeepers saved their shops from being looted by banding together and using their firearms? [/QUOTE] Think for a moment. You are proposing that a group of people can, armed only with what is constitutionally protected, take on the United States government _and win_. Further, it seems unlikely that, even in a completely hijacked democracy (an almost impossible notion in the US as it is anyway), uprisings could be universal, instead of, say, regional. After all, a regional conflict would eliminate the French Resistance-style threat. To **lokij** , I would only point out that arms were literally lying around in Iraq. It was just a question of beating the looters to them. AFAIK, that isn’t the case in the United States. That and, it must be said, in a scenario of that seriousness, how much more difficult would it be to smuggle in guns than to take heavy weapons with them? Anyway, I’m out of this thread, since a) everyone else here seems to be getting overly pissed off (I guess it is the pit…) and b) it seems to be attracting almost entirely anti-gun control posters, and I don’t feel like getting dogpiled today. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/57 "2007-02-25T07:00:33Z")
The consensus isn’t generally in my favor, but this thread covers my opinion on the subject of a a US resistance movement: > **[US Army v. A bunch of gun-toting rednecks](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=198939)** > > In various threads, this one as a random example, the assumption is made that the US Army would naturally trounce any popular uprising because of it’s advanced technology. I think such assumptions are too simplistic. Before I start, I realize that... ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/58 "2007-02-25T07:45:18Z")
Hunting with guns is for women. If one must augment his bare hands it should be done with a hand axe or, at most, a short spear and knife. Killing anything from Quite a Long Way Away doesn’t impress me. ---
**Author:** ![Lizard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@Lizard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizard)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/59 "2007-02-25T08:55:33Z")
[QUOTE=SenorBeef] But military-looking rifles _look_ scary, and the military uses them, so they must be only good for killing people, right? [/QUOTE] Ain’t that the truth. There are few subjects about which more misinformation is deliberately spread than guns. Everytime I see some dipshit on TV talking about someone using an Uzi to “spray a neighborhood with bullets” I want to call them up and ask “Pray tell, where exactly can _anyone_ buy such a weapon?” I do recall a rare demonstration of perspective on a show like 20/20 or somesuch, where they showed a guy popping away at a watermelon with a semi-auto AK-47, putting nice little holes in it. Then another guy stepped up with a bolt-action 7mm Magnum and obliterated the melon with one shot. Everyone who thinks AK-47s are so friggin dangerous should see that video. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2007, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494/60 "2007-02-25T09:05:10Z")
[QUOTE=lokij] In a full on civil insurgency you use your gun to acquire more and deadlier weapons or to safeguard yourself and family from other hostiles or infantry while you make contacts and organize for larger operations. If you’re in hiding and are in a rural or wilderness area, it can feed you as well. The gun buys you the time to get to the RPGs, explosives and mortars that will be far more effective against hardened targets. You can see this at work in Iraq. [/QUOTE] I think the gun lobby has convinced me that banning guns is as pointless as the war on drugs, but whenever I read comments like the above it just brings home how emotionally stunted and pathetic gun-nuts appear to be. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gun-nuts-attack-gun-nut/393494.md?page=4)