Lots of antis aren’t against folks getting shot. They just want somebody else to do it. Calling the cops is just calling a hired gun. If you wouldn’t pull the trigger over the situation, why are you so comfortable calling the cops knowing they may pull the trigger?
I expected some sort of rebuttal to Esox’s over-the-top post there, instead we get enthusiastic support. OK then.
Because they have more training, more experience with dealing with violent criminals, and most importantly, there will always be more of them than there are of any threat I can imagine. I am not interested in a fair gunfight with an intruder. I want overwhelming force.
Yeah…all that AND you are comfortable with a cop killing or getting killed in your place over something you manifestly don’t consider worth your own life.
That’s right. It’s called civilization, where we pool our resources to hire and train a police force to keep the peace and apprehend criminals. Yes, I agree, they are paid guns, hired to risk their lives so I don’t have to. I wouldn’t have it any other way, including a fully armed populace with all the attendant carnage from accidents and intentional mayhem.
Antis…their belief they hold the moral high ground gets more hilarious every day. So, the cop’s life is basically worth less than yours because civilization. You really are an egregious piece of shit says this former LEO and son of an LEO.
I pity you. So much fear and anger.
Ha, just like I said. You get a sense of moral superiority from guns. That’s why you fight tooth and nail against gun control while thousands get slaughtered. You’d be lost without guns, wouldn’t you?
And thanks for confirming my post, guys. I guess I owe you one.
Isn’t that sweet? Gun owners rubbing their smug superiority in law-abiding citizens’ faces. Is that how you warriors defend freedom? By ridiculing the freedom of others?
You’re the kind of cop they’re trying to weed out of the system now. Lucky you, you got out before they kicked you out.
If guns in homes are a bad thing, why would you want to hide that yours is gun-free?
Would you be willing to put up a sign that read “GUNS STORED HERE”, to let people know that you have firearms to steal when you aren’t home?
Let me see if I got this straight. As an LEO, you prefer that the portion of civilians carrying guns increase. Do I understand correctly?
I wouldn’t mind a sign identifying my house as the home of a gun owner; although most of them are too aggressive for my taste.
Right. In addition, all the effort it must take to maintain a warped world view to justify the trouble.
Gun fanatics are essentially Doomsday Prepper Lite.
That’s not what he said, but I recognize your motivation to claim so.
Guns in homes end up harming the homeowner a good deal of the time. That’s a big part of why I’d discourage it.
The sign just puts you out as a target. One doesn’t have to like guns to not want to entice criminals. Would you hang a sign that says “I have jewelry and cash, but its in a safe so don’t bother”? Better yet, since you support gun rights, would you list how many guns you have in your home on a sign outside? After all, you’re not afraid right? If somebody comes to steal your guns, you’ll just shoot them. So what are you afraid of? Don’t you think it’ll make you less of a target to taunt criminals?
How? Declaring your house a gun-free home doesn’t advertise valuables; I’d like to hear how a gun-free home is an enticement.
Why does putting up a “gun free zone” sign at my house do for me? I don’t give a shit if people know, but I don’t know why I’d bother. I’m not really a bumper sticker kind of guy.
That sign would be redundant for me. I have a “God-free home” sign to indicate I don’t believe in God, Allah, Yahweh, Guns, or any other god.
There was a little discussion of the literature on guns above, and steronz made an important distinction. On the one hand, lit from Kleck focuses on defensive gun uses. This comes from asking gun owners how many times they defended themseves with a gun. Not surprisingly, this method is fraught, and most dgus are actually illegal acts and/or are incidents started by the gun carrier himself. In these surveys as well, most of the incidents come from a small handful of reporters reporting unbelievably high numbers of dgus (e.g., in a survey in the link below, 3 individuals were responsible for 68% of all the dgus in the data.)
A newer study shows that those who report having used a gun in self defense end up with the same frequencies of outcomes as those who use another type of weapon (e.g., equal rates of physical injury, of having stuff stolen…).
On the other side of the ledger are studies using actual data to address a somewhat different question. These studies show that you are more likely to die from homicide or from suicide if you have a gun in the house. A recent meta-analysis of **16 ** such studies confirmed this:
Anglemyer, A., Horvath, T., & Rutherford, G. (2014). The accessibility of firearms and risk for suicide and homicide victimization among household members: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Annals of internal medicine, 160(2), 101-110.
There’s simply no equivalence in the nature of the empirical literature. Having a gun in the home is like putting a huge pile of cinder blocks on a homemade wooden shelf over your front door. Sure, there’s a chance it might fall on a “bad guy” and protect you, but it’s more likely to fall on family or friends.