As for the rest it would seem to me something like a knife is ubiquitous and to be found in every household in America. Likewise with blunt objects (surely there is something heavy to bludgeon someone with in most homes). Strangulation/asphyxiation can also be achieved pretty much anywhere if even just your bare hands which most people have.
So, since the means to kill someone is at hand pretty much anywhere I am not averse to thinking having a gun makes getting around to killing someone more likely. There are fewer guns than kitchen knives out there but more gun killings. How else do you parse that?
That guns are really good killing machines? Your statistic has no impact on the claim that people who are angry and have access to guns are more likely to use them. If someone gets mad and wants to kill someone, they will, regardless of a gun being available. If someone gets mad and does not want to kill a person, they’re not going to, even if they were surrounded by an arsenal. To say that the availability of a firearm turns someone from an angry individual to a murderer is ridiculous, to say the least.
The line “If someone gets mad and wants to kill someone, they will, regardless of a gun being available” contradicts your own point, which is that if someone gets mad and wants to kill someone, their success is strongly dependent on a gun being available.
The difference the gun causes isn’t the difference between an angry person and a murderous person. It’s the difference between a murderous person and a successfully murderous person.
But the gun only aids in what their original intent was, which was to kill someone. That intent is independent upon whether or not they have a gun readily available. Regardless, this is all semantics. I’m just refuting the ridiculous quotation that an angry person with a gun is going to kill their neighbor, versus being angry without a gun resulting in nothing.
I disagree with you, BrandonR. I think that what I’m saying is a legitimate argument. It’s all too easy, in a fit of passion, during a heated argument, to pick up a gun and fire it at somebody in uncontrolled anger, which happens far more often than you, or many others care to believe. Moreover, most murders are crimes of passion that occur among people who know each other, and the fact that the United States has the highest rate of murder via handgun per capita in the Western Hemisphere says something right then and there. Our gun laws are far too lax, which also enables pretty much anyone to go to a gunshow in any state of the United States and purchase a gun, with no questions asked. Illegal sales are often made in this way, with excuses such as “Oh, there’s no way I’ll pass a background check”, or “Oh, my friend’s coming in later to do the paperwork for me”. Those two things indicate that an illegal sale of firearms is going on, and, while some gun dealers are ethical enough to halt such a sale right then and there and not go through with it, many, if not most of these gun dealers aren’t so ethical.
Hunting, especially for dinner when the money runs low, is one thing. However, I stand by my position that a handgun is all too easy to use in an armed robbery or other crime, and one is far less likely to kill somebody using martial arts as self-defense than a gun.
Imho, this:
“a firearm is an equalizer for that kind of thing, as it depends so little on the physical attributes of the wielder. The downside is that it equalizes things for the criminal as well, of course.”
Both of the items you are stating are already felonies with a big F if perpetrated by a FFL dealer. No new legislation is needed. Re-read Bloomberg’s claims and you will see that the only people actively breaking any laws in his latest headline grab was by his own agents attempting to buy handguns outside of their states of residence. That too is illegal, and even those laws didn’t stop Bloomberg’s crew. If you think you have the best ideas for even more gun control, open a new thread.
I’ll agree with the others, it’s mostly semantics. I agree that it is easier and far less personal to kill someone with a gun. I disagree that a gun somehow changes an angry person with no murderous intent into a cold blooded murder if that is the argument that you are making.
What I think people are saying is
Person with murderous intent + access to gun = killer
Person with murderous intent + no access to gun = someone that has to work very very hard to be murderer and cannot generally achieve their aims.
Much the same way that you can’t drive drunk if you dun have access to a car or you can’t do a bombing if you don’t have access to explosives etc etc…
The point that is trying to be made, and that the gun advocates are trying to stick their heads in the sand about is that having access to a gun turns a person from someone that WANTS to kill a person to someone that CAN kill a person.
Having access to a handgun (in the general sense) is not going to make a great deal of difference IMHO in whether or not someone reaches the stage of murderous rage.
Certainly someone will get to a murderous rage on their own regardless of what weapons are available to them. The question is once there I think the weapon choice available to them can make a notable difference on whether they act on their impulse.
JXJohns alluded to this with, “I agree that it is easier and far less personal to kill someone with a gun.”
Think of it as a continuum. On the one end there is a calm person with no intent to harm. On the other is a person in a rage so profound they will try to kill no matter what is available. They’ll use their bare hands if they have to. At various points along that line people tip over to acting on their impulse.
I believe the bar is lower if you have a gun available and think the stats above bear this out. Knives are more easily obtained than guns yet guns far outstrip the use of knives in murders. Why? Because it is “easier and far less personal.” A person may be in a murderous rage but with only a knife at hand they may not tip into acting because it is a more personal act (not to mention a potentially more dangerous one for the attacker although not sure if murderous rage people make that calculation) and a more difficult act. However, if that same person has a gun at hand they may well decide to try and kill the other person.
If we go with premeditated murders and not crimes of passion then it still holds true. The best weapon is the one with the highest chance of success with the least risk to the user. A gun fits that bill the best. A person premeditating murder might not have the gumption to risk themselves and take the more up close and personal route of using a knife or bat. A gun however enables them to achieve their goal more easily such that they now might act.
Again that is not to say people will not use a tire iron, just that it has a higher barrier to entry in its use as a murder weapon, so to speak.
I think proximity is probably also a factor - to bludgeon / stab / strangle someone you need to be within a few feet - so you have to catch them first, for a handgun it can be done from some distance away.
If the “victim” sees me pick up a brick and start making my way towards them, they have every opportunity (and probably a 50 / 50 chance) of outrunning me (more if bystanders are willing to intervene) If I pull out my gun, who can outrun a bullet? And how many bystanders will be willing to physically intervene when I hold a gun?
BTW - I have physically restrained someone who was chasing a third person with a kitchen knife - had this person had a gun on them, what might have happened? Who knows - but to me the chances of a horrible outcome would have been far greater
1)Who would that person be? It’s certainly not me, so how about you debate me instead?
How did you ascertain what the risk is? What evidence you use in coming to this conclusion? I don’t believe anybody knows what the risk is, least of all you.
Who the hell are you to tell me what risks must be acceptable for me to enforce on my family in my own home?
No, they are not dreams, they have actually happened. We provided the references. Did you even bother to read them?
And how do you know this? That’s right, because anybody whose weapon is grabbed by a kid doesn’t wear a kilt.
Right. And they are much more likely to drown in a pool than to shoot themselves with an unsecured firearm. So if you have a pool you’re obliged to have unsecured firearms lying around the house as well?
You have posted at least four times since then, and every time you efuse to answer my questions.
If it’s so clear and concise, why have you studiously avoided the most basic questions?
Sheesh, if your questions are really so important as to awaken a soon-to-be zombie thread, fine.
Huh?
Because it’s pretty obvious that not a lot is going to happen when someone is carrying a firearm that no one else knows about. You can sit there and dream up ridiculous scenarios where someone falls asleep on a couch and a child discovers and takes the firearm, but they’re not based in reality when someone properly carries their concealed weapon (that is, firmly attached to a holster on their body).
Jesus man, for the fifth or sixth (or seventh, or eighth…) time, I would respect your position that if you don’t want guns in your house, fine, no guns. To steal another’s argument though, I’d also respect your position if you said you didn’t want blacks or Mexicans in your house either (because it’s your house and your rules), but that doesn’t mean your reasoning isn’t illogical or based in irrationality.
The risk from someone carrying a properly concealed weapon is still so slight you really should be spending your time worrying about other things. How do I know this? Because reality agrees with me. 40+ states allowed concealed weapons, and how often do you hear of your ridiculous situation of children discovering/disarming concealed weapons? That’s becuase they don’t have to – irresponsible gun owners who leave loaded guns in the open (or “hidden”) easily take care of most of the gun-related fatalities that involve children. Concealed weapons aren’t the thing you should be freaking out about.
It’s been a while, but are you still going on about your two silly examples? The one about a lady putting a gun in her purse and leaving it sitting around, and the other where a guy fell asleep with a loaded gun on himself? The ones I already refuted as not happening under my stipulations of someone properly carrying a concealed firearm? Yeah, I’m still waiting for examples of children disarming a properly concealed firearm and going haywire with it, which seems to be what you’re hinting at. But I won’t be holding my breath…
:dubious:
Oh please, now you’re just reaching desperately. While you’re minimizing every other miniscule risk in your home, why not prevent fat people from entering your home since they’re clearly at a higher chance of having a heart attack inside your home? Why not get rid of electricity since there’s the risk of electrical fires? Why not get rid of a gas stove since that gas could leak?
This is the last time I’m going to say this: the risk of someone properly carrying a concealed weapon is minimal. First of all, it’s concealed, meaning no one is going to see it or even know it exists (unless a situation that requires its usage comes up, at which point the risk of it being there is greatly outweighed by the situation requiring it). Second of all, it’s properly holstered so it’s not going to fall out when you sit on the couch, and a kid isn’t going to grab it (especially since they have no clue its there anyway). You can dream up all the ridiculous scenarios your imagination dreams up, but it’s an exercise in creativity rather than in reality. If you want to straight-up ban firearms in your house, that’s perfectly fine, after all it’s your house and you’re free to make up all the irrational rules you want.
Am I saying I would allow anyone to carry a firearm in my own house? No! All of this is based on the assumption that you know the person well enough to know if they’re capable of “properly” carrying a concealed weapon. I fully concede that is where the challenge is. I’ve said this since the beginning, that if there’s a reasonable debate, it’s knowing how to determine whether someone is capable of properly carrying a concealed weapon, not the risk from doing so.
BrandonR, you keep dodging a terribly important point–how the hell is Joe Firearms-Illiterate going to tell whether or not someone’s carrying properly? Or for that matter, if grandma’s carrying in her purse until Junior roots where he’s not supposed to and finds it. From Joe’s point of view, he can’t assess the risk (being firearms-illiterate in the sense of doesn’t know and doesn’t need to know proper handling procedures) so he has to go with the worst-case scenario.
You’re arguing theory. Welcome to the real world. I would be very surprised to find that you could even find a credible statistic saying what percentage of gun carriers are doing so “properly”.
I’m not dodging it, I’ve addressed it in virtually every single post I’ve made, including my last one:
I’ve always said that the difficult part of the problem here is determining whether someone is responsible with their firearm or not, something you could only determine from knowing the person personally. **Don’t know the person? Fine, tell them not to carry in your house. **IF you know the person and have deduced that they have superior firearm handling skills, then you really don’t have any good reason to prevent them from carrying a concealed weapon into your house (but you can still tell them not to, given that its your property). The issue here is with determining whether the person is responsible with firearms, not the minuscule risk of a responsible person with a firearm. It’s a small difference, but one that a lot of gun-fearing folk on these boards don’t seem to get.
Of course there’s not going to be statistic of that. It’s like asking what proportion of the population is “hot.” The only thing you could do would be to determine the number of gun owners versus the negligent accidents that occur and say the ones that don’t have accidents must be responsible enough to not have accidents (which is a terrible thing to do statistically, but there’s no other way to quantify it).
Well, what gun-lovers here seem to not get is that most people don’t want to have to deal with figuring out whether someone is a responsible gun owner or is carrying safely. I don’t have any need to learn any of this because I’m not a gun owner nor am I planning on becoming one.
That’s perfectly fine, and it’s actually the point I’ve been trying to reach for some time now. If you want to say “no guns,” the least you can do is back it up with a rational reason, which most definitely includes “I don’t know you well enough to determine if you’re a responsible gun owner.”
I only entered this debate because a lot of people were doing the immature, inane “Because I said so!” logic for banning guns in their homes. That might work for telling kids why they have to eat their broccoli before getting dessert, but it don’t cut it here.
If I want to say “No guns in my home”, the least you can do is respect my wishes and my house rules and let go of your “tool” for a couple hours. I have no need to explain my house rules, and I would hope you have the proper manners to realize this.
I mean, that is the claim from some of you, isn’t it? That your gun is merely a “tool” that serves a valid function?