It’s a rational preventative measure. It may turn out that any human will commit a crime over an infinite timespan. (and we’d have abolished aging, of course). Hence, the only way to protect other human’s rights is something like this.
I’m not down with that sort of government control. I have no desire to be a borg drone.
More likely long before this point there will be Gattaca-style preconceptional screening and genes correlated with mental illnesses of numerous types will be filtered out.
… or you could just try for one integrated, universal healthcare system in which pre-emptive care and mental health are fundamental components. For about 2/3 the cost of whatever you currently have.
btw, mental health includes anxiety, propensity to panic, self-esteem concerns, etc. It’s well being.
Do you not have student mental health support in US schools?
It works because most people just want to share, for someone to listen, maybe to try and help.
Patient: I want to buy a gun
Doctor: Okay. How are you feeling today?
Patient: A little angry, confused.
Doctor: How come?
Patient: Life’s kind of getting me down, some people … you know
Doctor: Sure. How about you come back and see me 3 months. Here, take this prescription and see if it helps
Patient: I want to buy a gun
Doctor: Okay. how come?
Patient: I read on the news about home breakins and people held hostage by burgulars
Doctor: What side of town you live on?
Patient: Gives an address in the safest part of town
Doctor: I’m sorry sorry, but a firearm is contra-indicated. The side effects of suicide and homicide make this an irrational decision for you to make.
Doctors: Scribbles down some jargon.
I’ve seen this argument stated repeatedly in various ways, and I think it’s deeply flawed.
Suppose that, 50 years ago, my father was of sound mind, and owned a gun without any problems. Today, my father has developed severe dementia. Last night he tried to kill my mother with his gun because he thought she was an intruder.
It seems to me that the solution to this problem would certainly include removing any guns from his possession as a matter of urgency.
Similarly, if modern U.S. society is so dysfunctional that widespread easy access to guns is causing major problems, part of the solution (and probably the most urgent part) is to remove guns from our society altogether. The fact that easy access to guns did not cause problems in some past Golden Age is irrelevant.
And if that suggestion is what they call a “non-starter” in the political world, do you have any other ideas?
No. I don’t think there is any solution that does not include repealing the 2nd. Just as with America’s other blind spot, healthcare reform, saying that it’s a political “non-starter” is just another way of saying that that majority opposes adopting the obvious solution (or that they have been duped into holding that view).
If the majority in the U.S. do continue to favor keeping the 2nd Amendment and its current interpretation, this society with its gun violence is what they have chosen. I think at present, the focus should be to ensure that they own their decision and its consequences.
I think the conversation with a gun owner is simply this:
Nobody is suggesting that you, personally, would be irresponsible with a gun. And there are legitimate reasons to want to own a gun. But if guns are widely available, a certain number will get into the hands of criminals or mentally ill people. The only effective way to ensure that this does not happen is to remove guns from society altogether. Are you willing to give up your right to own a gun for the benefit of society as a whole?
At the moment, the majority would answer “no”, an opinion they are perfectly entitled to hold, if this is the society they want; or they would reject the premise. Over time, we just have to hope that more people can be educated to understand that the premise is correct, and that eventually hearts and minds can be changed so that a large majority will answer “yes”.
I don’t see any other solution. Until this happens, expect years of the same.
I am not really pro-gun, but I’m not really pro marijuana or booze either. I am against their prohibition due to the much greater social cost of the unintended impacts of those efforts.
How do you propose to remove 300 million guns from society, and as they are really trivial to manufacture and not much more difficult to smuggle how do you propose to control the black market?
Lets say you do manage to repeal the 2nd amendment and outlaw them, what will the social costs be due to groups like the alt-right gaining power for a longer period of time?
Heroin overdoses killed 12,990 people in 2015, and prescription pain relievers killed 20,101. One is illegal and the other is highly controlled yet the numbers are similar to Firearm homicides, is there a reason those issues are less important? All of these deaths could possible be helped with improved mental health and reduced social stigma for those seeking help.
While I can understand your sentiment there is no way that firearms are going to disappear from our society, and I would argue that far more directed gun control efforts would actually have a chance of being enacted which is a requirement for any benefit to be gained at all.
Don’t remove the guns you’ve got, just stop pouring more into the market for a couple of decades. If a gun is used in a crime, it’s destroyed. If it’s sitting in a closet, no problem. Wanna buy another? Take your pick, but it’ll be previously enjoyed.
Is this premise any different than wanting to bring back prohibition because of drunk driving deaths?
You have chosen to draw a parallel to a particular right (to drink alcohol) that most societies choose not to restrict, despite some cost to society, because the consensus is that the benefit of the freedom outweighs the cost.
Why is the parallel of alcohol more apt than other rights where most societies feel the balance falls the other way, and the law does restrict those rights?
You are not free to make/sell/use any drug you choose.
You are not free to have sex at any age.
You are not free to own many types of weapon other than guns.
Societies weigh the value of all individual rights against their impact on society as a whole, and always choose to restrict certain freedoms. In the case of guns, the vast majority of civilized societies have decided that the unrestricted right to own guns does not outweigh the cost. The U.S. has, uniquely, made the opposite decision, and is reaping the consequences.
Yes. And I chose that “right” (if indeed it is one) to demonstrate why I believe that a prohibition of gun ownership in the US is destined to fail. We tried to prohibit something that Americans love and it was a dismal failure.
I don’t know why Americans love their guns so much and I say that as a gun owner. But if prohibition or an Australian type buy back system were implemented and found to be constitutional, I’d comply because that’s what you do in a society of laws.
FWIW, Americans do not not have “the unrestricted right to own guns.” There are restrictions based upon age, past criminal convictions, mental health, drug use etc.
Have Americans “always” had easy access to semi-automatic rifles and high capacity magazines? Isn’t that a common factor in many of the recent mass shootings? Have their availability and prices not changed at all?
Also, haven’t Americans always had mental health problems?
At least over a hundred years for high capacity magazines, although I can’t comment on prices, not being experienced in purchasing such things.
I’ve mentioned it before, but that famous 2nd-amendment rights conservative scion, Michael Moore, made the point in Bowling for Columbine that it isn’t availability of firearms that can explain America’s gun violence problem. It may be a factor but it definitely isn’t the cause or Canada would have a gun violence problem.
Your politicians are so transparently “for sale” that the mental health problem will never get the funding it requires to be truly effective, and there is no way you’ll get rid of guns, or even put in place adequate gun control laws. Corruption is certainly not unique to the USA (my own province’s liberal party is a PRIME example of that), but too many of your politicians work for corporations, and not the people who elected them.
Unless identifying a mental illness increases one’s tendency to become a mass shooter, identifying and treating more people who need help probably are not changes that increases the number of mass shootings…
What if the big change in the mental health front since 1982 isn’t that there are more people being accurately labeled as mentally ill, but the effect of the 24-hour news cycle on those who are already mentally ill?
After this week’s school shooting there was a small rash of kids making threats at their schools (including a school not far from where I work) and it’s pretty obvious that the kids got the idea from the shooting being all over the news all day and night.
Kids aren’t the only ones who are vulnerable to outside influences. What if the fact that we now hear the news non-stop, not just at 6 and 11 like we did before the 80s, is having a detrimental effect on people who already have unhealthy thought patterns?