First of all, who are these hunters who you claim are shooting cows, and if you “see” them frequently, why aren’t you reporting this both to the cow owners and game management agencies?
Second, the gun owners who are “showing up with guns at political rallies to threaten their opponents…talking about fighting a civil war against their government,” are a very small but exceptionally vocal, and more to the point, “newsworthy” (in the most yellow sense of the word) contingent of gun owners. Most gun owners would not consider this to be anything like a reasonable position. While you may find it threatening (certainly it is inconsiderate of social norms) to attend a rally while visibly armed, anyone showing up at a political rally, threateningly brandishing a firearm would very likely be arrested in short order. So you are engaging in the complement to hysterical hyperbole that you accuse of gun owners.
Having and handling a firearm certainly increases the risk of injury as compared to being nowhere near a firearm, but as with many other hazardous tools and chemicals (most of which are available without any kind of registration or training) a modicum of good sense and caution will prevent all but the most obtuse negligence. The possession, display, and (if necessary) use of a firearm can be effective in deterring or stopping crime, and the benefit of that should be weighed against the mitigable hazards of possessing a firearm. Violent felons surveyed in prison consistently state that the two things that make them significantly less inclined to attack someone or enter a residence is the presence of a large dog or a firearm.
I know none of this relates to the OP and my original follow-up but you have probably been the most polite person I’ve ever had this debate with. It has been a pleasure.
Honestly? Cars. I’ve gone for large periods of my life without a car; didn’t even get a license to drive one until after I turned 21. Cars, to me, are mobile death machines that shouldn’t be owned by 90% of the people who have one. They are too easy to obtain (you don’t need a license to get one), too poorly tracked and really unnecessary. You don’t need to live 2 hours away from where you work; there is housing right there in the city that’s fine and along public transportation. You can drive a motorcycle where the greatest threat of poor operation is to yourself and anyone dumb enough to ride with you. There are options other than resorting to a car and I wish more people would explore them. Pollution, dependence on foreign oil, drunk driving and other road deaths, hit and runs (especially people running over kids, a common thing around here) - to use your own phrase sort of “the aggregate of these things outweigh, to me, any benefit cars have particularly in an urban environment”.
And no ------- I am not kidding. Copies of my mass transit tickets and passes can be provided on request. Of all the things sometimes held up for possible prohibition - guns, drugs, alcohol - about the only one I would actually support would be a ban on cars. We aren’t a car society; that only developed after WW II with the suburbanization of this country. It is probably the newest of our “evils” and should be the one easiest for us to shed. That is it would be if shedding evils was something we really wanted to do.
Guns? That’s another story. I’ve never known a time in my life when I haven’t had at least one firearm of some description handy. I’ve read about places where civilian ownership of guns is basically unheard of; their kind of society doesn’t appeal to me very much.
Haven’t convinced you to sell your car, huh? Didn’t think I would.
Because, like me with firearms, you want a car. You like owning a car. Call it a need for power or whatever you want to call it, its there and you enjoy it in a way I never will. And if we humans want something bad enough, we can justify it. Societal good or benefit has little to do with the why. Both our likes have both benefit and cost.
And while we may never admit it, probably both have more benefit to society than we would care to admit to each other.
To complete the quote “when attacked I will defend myself”. That seems to be more rare than ever in this country - people today figure government or some unnamed “other” can and will protect them. Ask anyone who has been a victim; it doesn’t work that way. And, as I already illustrated, that defense I promise need not be a firearm unless that is the appropriate response. I have a lot of options a good upbringing and even better training provided.
I find this a very common personality trait among those against the private ownership of firearms. They twist words and selectively quote people in an attempt to exert control over them. They like to reference how they have no need of firearms and are only thinking of society’s good when it all comes down them wanting others to think as they do. It’s almost unfailing. But then again, it’s also just human nature.
I don’t have a problem with guns although I don’t own one. I’ve fired rifles, pistols, and a few submachineguns on ranges and I learned proper gun safety at summer camp and in the Boy Scouts. So that’s what I’m about when it comes to guns.
That said, the difference between guns and all the other items you mentioned is that a firearm packs a whole lot more lethality into a much smaller package and they are activated with much less effort. Unless you are mindnumbingly stupid, it is very difficult to kill yourself or someone else with any sort of household cutlery. Sure you might give yourself a nastly gash if you aren’t careful but it’s not likely to be lethal or even serious. Power tools are generally inert if not plugged in and they tend to be heavy. And cars are large and generally don’t move without permission.
A gun, especially a pistol, only needs to be pointed in the wrong direction, have something accidently pull the trigger and a small metal ball of death will go screaming at whatever it happens to be pointed at.
There is a great sense of power holding a gun. When I fired a MAC-11 (the 9mm version of the MAC-10, it occured to me that I could conceivably kill every person on the range with this thing in a matter of seconds if I wasn’t careful (and sane).
I don’t think people should be afraid of guns. At least not in the sense of where you see people gingerly picking them up as if it were a crazed cobra. That’s probably just as unsafe as handling them carelessly. But you should give them the same healthy respect you give any potentially dangerous tool.
OK – this is getting back to where I was when I read the OP. By the illustrations provided here, there is a certain difference in this phobia compared to other. If one is afraid of spiders or heights, there is a certain consistency to it. One is afraid of all spiders; not just the dangerous ones. One is afraid of any tall places. One is afraid of the number 13 in any form or context.
With firearms it is different. It isn’t the firearm that is feared so much as the possibility that someone could own one - the linking of an object with a specific broad class of person. I had a friend who had no problem traveling on a military base where he knew armed people were around him. He had no problem visiting a museum there where about the only things on display were weapons of war and killing. I don’t know that he was a fan but these things didn’t bother him. When he learned that I owned firearms and that there were some under the same roof that he was (he was visiting me at home at the time), he broke out into a physical shake and sweats, left, and we have only spoken once since that time - even though he had known me for ten years or more.
Somewhere something is different. You are right, you never know what is in someones background. But my having access to explosives wouldn’t cross your mind. Me having access to toxins probably would occur to you or evoke any fear.
Look - I don’t expect to find the answer here. The actual phobics are hard to talk to about it; the closest any of us can usually come is people like you who have a much more understandable apprehension. I went all the way to my Masters and never got a good answer. But I will always remain curious about it and any glimpses I can get inside it all.
Okay, I can understand and agree when you talk about the creepy innuendo and unnecessary bravado that some people engage in, but I think it’s a bit unfair to malign somebody just for suggesting that “deadly violence is an option.” Surely you wouldn’t argue that deadly violence would not be an option for you if you or your loved ones were in immediate danger? :dubious:
Guns strike me as different from those other dangerous household items in two specific ways:
-They are (or are derived from) a class of objects that are explicitly designed to kill.
-They can be used to kill quickly, at a distance.
(Remember, I’m just trying to explain what I perceive to be the reasons for the fear) - so they may be perceived as items that people possess with some intent or willingness to do harm, and it may be perceived that this harm, once intended, is difficult to escape.
Well, for all you know I’m a Quaker, or a follower of Gandhi. It is possible to adopt a stance of deliberate nonviolence in one’s life.
But even if I’m not, isn’t there a bit of a difference between (1) acknowleding that in such an extraordinary circumstance, then yes, I’d do whatever I’d have to do; and (2) thumping my chest and anticipating such an extraordinary circumstance? Now, probably for some folks the very circumstance of owning a gun does not necessarily translate into (2) – but wouldn’t you agree that there are enough chest-thumpers getting involved in every single discussion of this topic, that some non-gun-owners assume that it’s common enough?
ETA: furthermore, if I see you down at the Piggly Wiggly buying milk and you have a holstered handgun in view – or concealed, but I get a peep at it as you’re leaning over the counter – you may not be thinking of violence at all, and could be the most peaceful guy around. But do you blame me for interpreting your carrying around a gun like that as at least an implicit statement to the contrary?
You forgot the most important one. They can kill easily. Just point and click*.
*I am aware that if proper gun safety is practiced, it takes a few more steps. Still much easier than killing with a knife or club. And I have no assurance that the gun carrier will be practicing gun safety.
None of that is to say that other objects aren’t dangerous, or to be feared, of course.
And I guess I have to add another one to the list: Guns may be perceived as dangerous or to be feared on account of the fact that some people who own them appear to view them as ultimately benign - the fact that you (the generic ‘you’) don’t comprehend why anyone would fear guns, freaks me out.
Well, so long as we feel free to paint with a broad “common personality trait” brush: in addition to the implicit statement of “deadly violence is an option with me”, I find a common attitude of pro-gun chest-thumpers is “I have reservations in my acceptance of a civil society, and regard those who do put their faith in the law as inferior sheeple.”
I can’t say I blame you, especially if your experience is mainly of chest-thumpers, but the typical feeling among gun owners I know personally is “regardless of what my feelings on violence are, I am prepared in case someone else brings violence into my life that I can’t stop any other way but in kind”. Subtly different but I think it matters a lot.
Juxtaposed against their perceived dangerous nature, their broad availability could be a factor in people’s fear of them.
It doesn’t necessarily make them different from the other objects, but might play a part in the equation of fear.
I have never operated a sewing machine or a sailboat, but I am not afraid of them. And while I am not afraid of guns per se (eg in a museum), I am concerned that they have a major role in America’s staggering crime rate.
How much crime?.. Over here they used to have classes on how to safely travel to America… ie “you can’t park your car and leave the keys in the ignition like you do here at home” sort of thing.
America’s crime problems go way beyond the availability of guns. There are a hell of a lot of other factors involved. Why is it that the cities in America with the highest crime rates tend to also have extremely restrictive gun laws? Why is it that the states with the fewest restrictions on guns (Alaska, Vermont) have some of the lowest crime rates in the country?
Criminals are always going to get guns. You want to stop crime, the best thing to do is change America’s drug policies.
But you don’t seem like one of the people who are irrationally afraid of guns. You seem to at least have a reasoning behind it. I know some people who if you tell them you own a gun, they act like you’re a child molester. “OhmyGOD…he has a GUN!!!” The vast majority are female. (Most of the big anti-gun activists in America also seem to be female. Brady, Hillary, McCarthy, Feinstein - it’s a real girl’s club.)
Please at least read the posts you’re replying to.
The fact that anyone can get a gun does not make a gun different from other dangerous household items, because anyone can also get other dangerous household items.