Sorry, I should clarify that statement: I haven’t suddenly turned into a gun-control advocate; I was thinking in terms of the actual non-existence of guns, which I believe is never going to happen. If somehow by magic guns simply couldn’t exist, then by definition there’d be less gun violence. Given that guns are here, I do think more lawful carry would be a good thing.
So you think that more guns in the hands of citizens would make society a safer place?
I’ve often said we’re currently in the worst of both worlds: criminals and psychopaths have little trouble obtaining guns, while few if any of their targeted victims are armed. Either extreme- the non-existence of guns or ubiquitous guns- would be better than what we have now.
The devil is in the details of course. I have written in the past that I would like to see something like the revival of militia duty in a modern form, in that anyone choosing to own guns would be obligated as a public duty to undergo training and education classes.
A few more coordinated attacks on police officers and law enforcement, and we won’t be having these pointless discussions. We won’t need to worry about convincing impressionable NRA members and 2nd amendment cultists about the need for background checks and closing loopholes. We won’t need to worry about our semantic choices. Gun control will just be a fait accompli. You know it, and everyone reading this knows it. Once people fear anarchy, guns are gonna get good and banned. You had your chance to compromise – oh wait, excuse me for my “non-standard” use of the English language. I meant “concede”. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: Yeah, uh, anyway, you’re running out of time.
Who gives a shit what you or anyone else wants? Most people don’t want to be militia members. It’s 2016, not 1816. Most people just want to work at Best Buy or Google or somewhere in between. They don’t dream of living in Montana and toting a rifle. We need to be more European and impose strict gun control laws.
Yeah, lawful carry would be a good thing…why? This animal struck down 12 heavily-armed officers. He did it in a state where open carry and concealed carry are both allowed. No heroes came out to stop the carnage. Most people ran. The cops who ran toward the gunman got shot. Five of them died. Just like what happened in Colorado, where an officer got killed at an abortion clinic.
In all fairness to Lump and Damuri Ajashi, I’m not gonna change anyone’s mind. Nobody changes their minds on these threads. It’s just an epic rant versus rant. Feel free to counter-rant and insult my intelligence.
The people who say THAT are making assumptions about what criminals would do if they knew the general populace was unarmed. It is CLEAR that there are some deaths that could be avoided if guns were banned. Many of those gun accidents would disappear. Many of the murders committed by people who legally own guns would disappear. But there may also be an increase in in the use of criminal activity when the criminals realize that all the civilians are unarmed. I don’t know which number is higher, murders avoided with a gun ban or murders increased as a result of a gun ban. We all have instincts that tell us the answer goes one way or the other. we all have anecdotes support our instinct. We don’t really know which way things will go here.
Some people say this but it is not established that a gun ban would reduce deaths. Your instinct tells you it would but the only gun deaths you can possibly avoid (in the short to medium term at least) is that minority of gun deaths that are the result of lawful gun owners going bad and accidents. It would take several generations to get the guns out of the system and that assumes that criminals never take metal shop in high school.
It REALLY depends one who has those guns. If all you do is disarm the general population while leaving the criminals with their guns, then less guns may or may not equal less violence.
I don’t necessarily agree. 1000 guns in the hands of criminals probably results in more violence that ten times that amount in the hands of law abiding citizens. It really depends on who has the guns.
If you are going to pass laws to take guns away from people, it really depends on whose guns you are taking away.
I’ll believe that when Hillary makes banning guns part of her stump speech. She has an almost insurmountable lead against Trump. I bet someone “leaks” a photo of her duck hunting or some bullshit like that before election day.
After the Sandy Hook Shooting, almost the entire Democratic establishment came out in favor of all sorts of gun control. You know who didn’t? The Clintons. They lost congress to the Republicans over that one issue in 1996 and I doubt Hillary is eager to do that again, not for guns she isn’t.
Take a look at the swing states. Very few of them would support a gun ban.
Perhaps Trump can come to your rescue, after all, who knows WTF he thinks.
So you are in favour of completely disarming police. As you point out, the cops were shot and they were armed, not just with guns but mace and batons and tasers as well. Therefore police carrying weapons for self defence is exactly as useless as civilians carrying weapons.
So by this argument police need to be completely disarmed as well.
What a ridiculous argument. It’s precisely as stupid the same as saying that my aunt died of an infection despite being administered antibiotics, therefore antiobiotics are useless in all circumstances and we should outlaw antibiotics.
Well, that’s not true. After Sandy hook, several minds on this board were indeed changed. The support for an assault weapons ban on this board went from relatively strong support to almost no support. Every time the topic comes up it seems like there are a few more posters who didn’t realize how retarded an assault weapons ban would be until they are forced to try and argue for one. Then they realize how retarded these bans are (and realize that the gun control lobby is either lying or stupid when they push an assault weapons ban) and their kneejerk support for gun control disappears. They may still like the idea of gun control but they don’t jump on every bandwagon that comes down the road just because some liberal proposed it.
I agree, but there ARE countries where there is strict regulation of guns. Japan and England come to mind. And there are other countries where strict regulations on guns HAVEN’T curbed death due to guns. Which country would you like to be compared to?Maybe we should do studies to see which number is higher, instead of relying on instinct? Studies that show data instead of anecdotes that support either side?
Exposing the ridiculousness of *yours *is certainly an argument. Claiming it’s actually a personal attack is *not *an argument. Clear now?
Come back when recognize problem, and your responsibility for it.
Well, do you care about homicide? Because the US does have a homicide rate significantly higher than any other developed country, despite all the protests of “Ban guns and the bad guys will just use knives / make their own / etc”
You do realize that the rate of knife murders is actually higher in the US than most other countries gun death rate (or their entire murder rate for the year), right? IIRC, it’s well over a thousand per year (in most other countries the gun death rate per year is in the double digits…some in the low triple digits), though like gun deaths it’s slowly declining over time. The US just has a higher rate of homicide from all types of weapons, period, including guns than most other ‘developed’ countries, plain and simple.
Texas’s reputation not withstanding, probably few civilians there were carrying, and running for cover is always a good idea when under fire. As for the police who were killed, I would point out that anyone can be ambushed, and to think that it could have been prevented by making guns unavailable is a fantasy.
Please reread “modern form of”- as in, you wouldn’t have to show up for muster and drill at arms. The modern version would be something like the following: if you aren’t exempted (and anyone who doesn’t want to own a gun would be exempted), you’re required to show up at a training center one day every so many years and prove that you (1.) have decent aim, and (2.) know about gun safety, the relevant laws about self-defense, etc. If you do, fine. If you don’t you have to keep coming back once a month until you pass (or decide owning a gun isn’t worth the hassle). If you own a gun clandestinely and are found out, a civil penalty or a misdemeanor conviction would be for not reporting to militia duty.
South Africa, Columbia, Mexico, Brazil, Russia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Peru, etc are not "developed countries?:rolleyes::dubious:
Yes, the USA is higher than Western Europe.
I expect there would be fewer armed robberies, muggings and rapes, but more fistfights escalating into gunfights. I suppose overall, I’d say maybe a *little *safer. But not significantly.
I expect that there would be many more arguments escalating to death; many more deadly road rage incidents; many more incidents of people being shot for ringing doorbells, being wrongly suspected of being a burglar or a mugger, or being suspiciously black; and many more suicides or combination murder suicides.
As far as armed robberies, I suspect you’d end up with lots of shootouts in stores with people (not always the bad guys) killed as opposed to money taken and bad guys caught later or insurance paying off. In fact robberies in general, rather than starting with “stick em up” may start with killing the victim before they even know anything’s happening.