# Violent Criminals Owning Guns **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 12, 2020, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306 "2020-01-12T13:26:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2020, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/101 "2020-01-14T22:37:32Z")
> [@Kovitlac](#): > > I feel that’s the right take-away. While I’m not saying the dude should have lied about anything but, assuming everything played out the way he says, he should NOT have trusted his wife to admit to attacking him, first. Maybe he did say that and the cops dismissed it, in which case, he didn’t really have much of a chance if they already chose who to believe. If he didn’t seek any sort of council at all, that was definitely a huge mistake on his part. He confessed to hitting his partner, and even the one-sided story from him seems questionable. He says that he slapped her in self-defense, which seems hard to sustain to me. Hitting someone or holding them to stop them from attacking you do seem like something you do to defend yourself, but slapping someone is the kind of thing you do to intimidate someone you don’t actually think is a threat to you, you’re hurting someone who you don’t think will hurt you back. While some people seem to be arguing that a slapping around a partner is ‘not as bad’ as punching, to me the fact that he was slapping her around argues that he was acting to hurt her and not to stop her from hurting him, so undercuts the claim that he was actually acting in self-defense. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2020, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/102 "2020-01-14T22:42:08Z")
> [@Kovitlac](#): > > If it somehow came out that she didn’t attack him, he threatened to shoot her, etc etc, not a single person here would argue against him having his gun rights taken away. This is not true. People here have argued that misdemeanor domestic violence, that is that your case of ‘hitting his domestic partner not in self defense,’ should not be considered justification for being disallowed from owning firearms. And not in the sense of having specific arguments with where the exact line is drawn, but disagreement with the fundamental concept of the law. ---
**Author:** ![Isosleepy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/isosleepy/32/479_2.png) [@Isosleepy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isosleepy)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/103 "2020-01-15T00:10:42Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Thank you. I’m glad someone agrees with me. It’s hard being a God-fearing American Patriot in this liberal hive. This shtick is getting old. The range of how funny you are and how funny you think you are, encompasses both Richard Pryor and Mike Pence’s nutsack. Besides that, for something to be satire, doesn’t it need to be just a little cleverer than this? Last, at what point does stating opinions you don’t in fact hold become actual trolling? Maybe It’s like right about now, when it appears some dopers apparently read it straight. ---
**Author:** ![atimnie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atimnie/32/11_2.png) [@atimnie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/atimnie)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/104 "2020-01-15T01:50:06Z")
Straight or trolling, libtard still needs to be taken out of it. And I’m not entirely convinced it was trolling, the guy might actually be schizophrenic. If it is trolling, the humor in it has long faded. Just state your point without _pretending_ to be an asshole. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/105 "2020-01-15T06:12:55Z")
> [@pkbites](#): > > This kind of thing happens to cops as well as military members. > > The thing I don’t like about the law is the word “misdemeanor”. An act that removes someones civil rights permanently should be a felony. Lautenberg, in my opinion, was just another way to make more and more people ineligible to own firearms. Next it will be someone convicted of OWI, then shoplifting, etc… > > BUT…it is the law right now even if we hate it, and **FoieGrasIsEvil** intentionally lied on a federal form and possessed a firearm when he had prior knowledge he was prohibited from having one. ANY conviction of DV, including Disorderly Conduct DV, does invalidate ones legal ability to own a firearm. The burden of knowing whether or not one can own one is upon each of us, not a BATFE agent knocking at our door. > > All the anti-gun zealots on these boards clamoring for more and more gun laws ought to be appalled at his actions. Hell, look at all the shit I got for posting I’d more than likely not give a fellow officer a citation for a minor traffic offense. This is 2 felonies were talking about (actually 4 as he could be charged both state and federally). > > Then, to be so stupid as to post this stuff online. Duh!:smack: > > I used to like reading some of **FoieGrasIsEvil** posts. But I’ve completely lost respect for them. And for any gun control advocate that isn’t giving him grief! That’s cool man. I will have to post again here tomorrow when I have more time. I never said I was right or wasn’t up to the slings and arrows I knew I would face. Call me stupid all you want, wish imprisonment and multiple felonies all you want. It’s cool. I knew it was coming. I do believe that it was worth it, just for the multiplicity of opinions we are seeing. I thought awhile before posting, trust me. But I’m also a heart on his sleeve kinda guy for better or worse. I may or may not have something to share tomorrow after some events unfold. Should be interesting at any rate. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/106 "2020-01-15T10:15:30Z")
Obviously I need to either make my schtick funnier or abandon it altogether. I’ll attempt the latter. But first let me explain my purpose. On an intelligence scale from 1 to 10, where Buttigieg and Klobuchar are 9’s, most Dopers are 7’s or 8’s, and a moldy bale of hay is a 1, the typical American gun nut is about 3.3. Trying to get through to a 3.3 with reason is futile — you’ll end up wanting to smash sense into their heads with a baseball bat and just end up breaking the bat. The American gun nut can learn nothing from rational thought. Even Americans who are otherwise intelligent become spluttering turds of idiocy and hatred when the subject turns to guns. So I “hold up a mirror” to the imbeciles by pretending to be a gun nut with 3.1 intelligence. Since rational discourse is of no use, I try to jog them out of their nightmare by imitating a gun-idiot just slightly stupider than them. I hope they’ll think “Well, at least I’m not _that_ stupid” and perhaps introspect a little. If my caricature helps them shift from 3.3 to 3.5 on the intelligence scale, I’ve done a service. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/107 "2020-01-15T11:06:39Z")
> [@Chisquirrel](#): > > And I’m ok with violent assholes not being allowed guns. Especially given that there is an accepted avenue for them to appeal said decisions even after the sentence is finished. Just like the racists are ok with an accepted avenue to maybe eventually allow voting again. I bet they love this law too, as it’s perfect for anyone scared of black people owning guns. If someone is too dangerous to rejoin society, then they shouldn’t rejoin society. We’ve no evidence that’s the case here, just irrational fears. But if you want to just ban the damn things outright, it’s no skin off my back. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/108 "2020-01-15T13:47:50Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Hitting someone or holding them to stop them from attacking you do seem like something you do to defend yourself, but slapping someone is the kind of thing you do to intimidate someone you don’t actually think is a threat to you, you’re hurting someone who you don’t think will hurt you back. While some people seem to be arguing that a slapping around a partner is ‘not as bad’ as punching, to me the fact that he was slapping her around argues that he was acting to hurt her and not to stop her from hurting him, so undercuts the claim that he was actually acting in self-defense. Can you elaborate on this? Because I can’t see how the shape of one’s hand when hitting someone says whether or not you think they can hit back. I find it easier to slap at things than to punch them, and while I’ve never thrown a punch, I have slapped to defend myself–slapping away the arms. Granted, I’ve never been in a real fight, which is part of why I never learned to throw a punch. I’m just thinking about when someone hit me or looked like they were going to hit me, both of which would count as self-defense, if I understand correctly. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/109 "2020-01-15T13:53:14Z")
> [@](#): > > If he didn’t seek any sort of council OK, just because I’ve been seeing it not only here but in other places: \*counSEL \* > [@Kovitlac](#): > > Always lawyer up, kiddos. Always. Sure, the system is set up to impress upon you that _“you’ll only make it harder for yourself if you make us work for it”_ but at the very least if you’re gonna fold, fold with full knowledge of what you’re doing. And needless to say, then stick to the terms you have accepted. As mentioned, you take an even bigger risk by failing to do that. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/110 "2020-01-15T14:00:36Z")
> [@pkbites](#): > > I used to like reading some of **FoieGrasIsEvil** posts. But I’ve completely lost respect for them. And for any gun control advocate that isn’t giving him grief! Oh no. Gun nut doesn’t respect the majority of Americans. For the record, I lost confidence in you [when you talked about how you go swimming while armed with a pistol.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=18957658&postcount=66) I mean, what the fuck. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/111 "2020-01-15T14:22:25Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > If someone is too dangerous to rejoin society, then they shouldn’t rejoin society. We’ve no evidence that’s the case here, just irrational fears. No one was advocating preventing anyone from ‘rejoining society’, but instead banning them from a specific activity (posessing firearms). Jumping from ‘restrict people who have a history of using violence inappropriately from owning tools extremely useful for violence’ to ‘ban them from society’ doesn’t seem like a reasonable leap to me. > [@](#): > > But if you want to just ban the damn things outright, it’s no skin off my back. I probably qualify as a gun nut to at least 80% of the people on this board, ‘ban the damn things outright’ is hilariously far from anything I’d want. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/112 "2020-01-15T14:30:43Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Can you elaborate on this? Because I can’t see how the shape of one’s hand when hitting someone says whether or not you think they can hit back. I find it easier to slap at things than to punch them, and while I’ve never thrown a punch, I have slapped to defend myself–slapping away the arms. Slapping someone is simply not effective fighting compared to punching, kicking, elbowing, wrestling, etc. This is especially true when we’re talking about slapping someone in the face vs flailing around trying to push someone’s arms away, and the former is what the situation described for the OP sounds like. “I slapped her” has a lot of connotations, and I’m not going to pretend that those connotations don’t exist, and I’ve already written more words explaining my interpretation than the original statement has. > [@](#): > > Granted, I’ve never been in a real fight, which is part of why I never learned to throw a punch. I’m just thinking about when someone hit me or looked like they were going to hit me, both of which would count as self-defense, if I understand correctly. I’m pretty sure that the person in question had been in a fight before, and I’m pretty sure that what they called a slap was not just flailing away at someone’s arms to push them away from him. ---
**Author:** ![margin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@margin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/margin)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/113 "2020-01-15T14:55:11Z")
> [@Chisquirrel](#): > > Not applicable to **FGE** , but it’s fairly obvious that someone could be abusing their SO those entire fifteen years, but never be charged or convicted, even so long after their initial conviction. Wait till the perennial “discussion” about whether sex offenders _ever_ re-offend comes around, because the same guys who believe all women lie about rape also believe that guys who’ve been convicted of sex crimes apparently always tell the truth when self-reporting. Because sex offenders would _never_ lie in a situation where telling the truth would get them put in jail. In these cases, “lack of arrests and/or convictions” is eagerly used as “proof of total and complete dewy-virgin-type innocence”, but women who are likewise lacking arrests and/or convictions (or men dislike) are just regarded as being too cunning to get caught, ergo evil. “Lack of arrests=innocent” only applies to men. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/114 "2020-01-15T15:14:43Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > If someone is too dangerous to rejoin society, then they shouldn’t rejoin society. We’ve no evidence that’s the case here, just irrational fears. There is evidence that our subject may not be an ideal gun owner. Admission of domestic violence with a child present. Admission of maintaining a close relationship with a violent person. Admission of alcohol abuse. This is not a person who needs to be incarcerated for the safety of everyone else, and he might otherwise be a productive member of society, but we don’t have to give him unfettered access to the most powerful handheld weapons humans have ever devised. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/115 "2020-01-15T15:29:49Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > This is not a person who needs to be incarcerated for the safety of everyone else, and he might otherwise be a productive member of society, but we don’t have to give him unfettered access to the most powerful handheld weapons humans have ever devised. … the _pen!!!_ ---
**Author:** ![Chisquirrel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6bbea6/32.png) [@Chisquirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chisquirrel)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/116 "2020-01-15T18:02:45Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > Just like the racists are ok with an accepted avenue to maybe eventually allow voting again. I bet they love this law too, as it’s perfect for anyone scared of black people owning guns. > > If someone is too dangerous to rejoin society, then they shouldn’t rejoin society. We’ve no evidence that’s the case here, just irrational fears. > > But if you want to just ban the damn things outright, it’s no skin off my back. Who is injured or murdered by a vote? ---
**Author:** ![Kovitlac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/2bfe46/32.png) [@Kovitlac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kovitlac)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/117 "2020-01-15T18:05:35Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > He confessed to hitting his partner, and even the one-sided story from him seems questionable. He says that he slapped her in self-defense, which seems hard to sustain to me. Hitting someone or holding them to stop them from attacking you do seem like something you do to defend yourself, but slapping someone is the kind of thing you do to intimidate someone you don’t actually think is a threat to you, you’re hurting someone who you don’t think will hurt you back. While some people seem to be arguing that a slapping around a partner is ‘not as bad’ as punching, to me the fact that he was slapping her around argues that he was acting to hurt her and not to stop her from hurting him, so undercuts the claim that he was actually acting in self-defense. And yet, though, all we have is his word, so that’s what people are basing their decision on. If new facts suddenly came to light, a lot of people here would feel differently, depending on those facts. But that won’t happen, as this is one person’s story and we don’t technically know if any of it even happened at all. So arguing details of a story that might actually be entirely fiction is, I feel, kind of moot. ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/118 "2020-01-15T19:01:22Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > For the record, I lost confidence in you [when you talked about how you go swimming while armed with a pistol.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=18957658&postcount=66) I mean, what the fuck. Why does that bother you? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/119 "2020-01-15T20:53:28Z")
> [@Kovitlac](#): > > And yet, though, all we have is his word, so that’s what people are basing their decision on. Some of us also have critical thinking, life experience, and common sense to draw on. You’re free to just believe whatever people post on the internet if you want, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2020, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306/120 "2020-01-15T21:02:59Z")
> [@pkbites](#): > > Why does that bother you? 😕 Because it’s hilarious that someone is so afraid, that they have to take a gun swimming with them? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/violent-criminals-owning-guns/846306.md?page=7)