I can understand Messrs Gun-Nut A and Gun-Nut B:
Gun-Nut A: “My neighbors all got Glocks. I needs me a AR-15 just to have a chance if they gang up on me!”
Gun-Nut B: “My neighbors is all fine good ol’ boys. My AR-15 isn’t for them; it’s to take out them Muslim terrorists racing across from Tijuana where you liberals tore down the Wall.”
I may not agree with them, but in their minds God’s finger wrote the Second Amendment on Mount Sinai to save Christian lives.
And I do like to have fun. I sometimes caroused at the disco till 5 am when it was legal to do so.
But I find it incrongruous to imagine that the controversial Second Amendment is there so your buddy can have fun with his grenade launcher. Again, I’m all for fun! Bring back brothels and cocaine! Legalize pot! But God gave us the 2A to have fun? Pull the other one!
Because people are assholes. I’m conceptually OK with a double barrelled shotgun and a pump action, your 3 round semi auto is not remarkably different. However, if you allow one semi auto shotgun, the assholes will make sure it’s not just that gun, but other guns that are far more dangerous being allowed. Because to them, the law is a game and guns are toys.
I was asked for a threshold, and the one I prefer is bright line and based on functionality. There is value in having a bright line rule, there should be no question what weapons are on either side of the line. The rule isn’t based on cosmetics or perception, it’s strictly functional. There are naturally going to be some weapons that are close to the line, but there is no question what side they are on.
We Americans are very attached to our property. As a nation, we feel it is justified to kill a person who is on our property attempting to steal our belongings.
Now, I think most folks the world over feel it’s reasonable to kill someone if they are trying to kill you… it’s just, we here in the Shining City on the Hill like Things more than we like most human beings. Probably more even than we like ourselves.
Fair enough. I think most people would have that initial flash of anger.
But how is that reconcilable with “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state”? That might argue for some sort of regulation and inspection by your National Guard, or something like the Swiss approach.
Make what ok? The fact that some criminals shot 60 times and managed to kill one other. What law would you see passed that would stop that from happening?
The kicker: A law that doesn’t punish law abiding citizens.
No one wants to discuss ‘dangerousness’ with you or anyone else for the simple fact that if you legislated on that. We wouldn’t have cars, or electricity, or pools, or a whole host of things.
Guns are only as dangerous as their owners. They are a tool, like a hammer, bat, or a knife. You don’t like them, so to you they are extra dangerous but that doesn’t change the fact that they are still just a tool.
Here’s the thing, let’s say 30,000 people a year die from having their heads caved in by a hammer. Let’s also say that a country, a fully functioning modern country* with 1/5th our population, has about 50 people a year die via hammer.
Would that suggest to you that maybe we need to rethink how we deal with hammers? Would we all be gnashing our teeth with worry because someone might not be able to own a particular type of hammer anymore**? Would be we “punishing” law abiding hammer owners by striving to cut hammer deaths by 25,000+ per year?
*Seriously, they can hang pictures and build houses and stuff even though they have restrictive hammer laws.
**You can have my 20oz milled face framing hammer when you pry it from my cold dead hand.
Ok, let’s continue: You now ban the favored version of the hammer that was seemingly used to perform all the dastardly deeds. How does the next version of the hammer differ from the first? Smaller, lighter, less handle length?
Does it perform the same duties as the other one (not the killing, but the actual duties it was designed for?)
I can’t say how exactly it differs from other hammers, but it does in fact perform the same necessary duties. I know that because there are a couple dozen countries that have “safe hammer” laws. These are fully functioning countries, whose residents live full, enjoyable lives with their modified hammers or whatever they have to replace hammers.
Will there be jobs that the new hammers don’t do well? Of course, but the people of these countries have lived for decades under safe hammer rules and their buildings haven’t fallen down due to there being no hammers to fix them with. They actually seem to survive just fine, there are no pro-hammer riots, no serious arguments that they really need to go back to the other hammers, they are reasonably content with their hammer situation, and hammer deaths are very unusual.
See post#23. Personally I think that given guns are for the express purpose of deadly force, saying a gun can be too dangerous is like Daryl Singletary’s song “Too Much Fun”:
However this thread has given me insight to where others are coming from: minimizing body count in a shooting incident. I still might not agree that gun restrictions are a good idea but at least I see a rational principle beyond banning “the thing that goes up”.
When my wife was still teaching she saw two of her students killed as innocent bystanders (one was actually inside her house) in gang-related shootings.
As for what law I want, I noted it upthread. Only single-action revolvers, bolt-action rifles and pump-shotguns for civilians. Guns that prevent the shooter from laying down a stream of bullets.
I don’t think that “punishes” law-abiding citizens, but if you do how do you feel about the NRA coming in and teaching every kid in the inner city how to use guns safely and responsibly? That way all the criminals will have been taught from childhood how to aim and not waste their ammunition and nobody’s punished just because they want to own a gun.
I’m afraid I don’t follow all those extrapolations from the safe hammer without the necessary differences. What caused the favored hammer to be useful in killing someone that the second or third iteration of hammer didn’t do?
I would absolutely love gun safety to be a real and regular thing, taught in every school across the USA.
Do you really think that would fly?
I am laughing as I type this, people would lose their shit.
Bottom line, there are too many on the gun regulation side that just don’t “get” guns, they don’t understand them, they don’t see the need for them, they are scared of them, and they just want them gone.
You really need that detail for this hypothetical “guns are just tools” discussion? Fine, whatevs.
The new hammers have circuitry that causes the head to pop off harmlessly if it is coming into contact with a living object. Kind of like SawStop but for a hammer. It becomes REALLY hard to kill a guy with a hammer if the head pops off, but gee whiz you can still drive in a nail.
Or, if you don’t like that one, the new hammers are palm nailers, your hammer choices are now 5oz or less steel hammers (too light to be effective weapons) palm nailers for intermediate nailing jobs, rubber mallets of any weight and 5 pound or heavier sledge hammers (too soft or heavy to be effective weapons).
I “get” guns, I understand them and I agree that some civilians need a firearm for protection. I even “get” why some people want a gun for hunting or sport shooting.
I made my proposal. Do you have any suggestions? Is the current mishmash of gun laws okay? Do you want to see them rolled back? Is there anything we’ve overlooked that you want to see?
I don’t know. It doesn’t much matter though because interest balancing is not a viable way to determine what rules are allowable.
If we look at police encounters, there’s lots of available data. About 25-40% hit ratio, and about 3 hits to stop a threat. The math means that a 10 round magazine capacity is very possible to be insufficient in an encounter with greater than 1 target. Combine that with the fact that most police carry 17 round magazines in their service pistols and it’s quite obvious that there is positive utility with more ammo capacity.
I understand there may be some disagreement, but I consider police to be civilians.
Why not? Presumably there is some non zero self defense utility, in certain scenarios, for mines, or grenades, or fully automatic crew served weapons, etc. Why is it not logical or reasonable to use the same reasoning that restricts access to those weapons, for magazine sizes, or caliber and barrel length, or other features that are particularly useful for mass shootings?
Because you are making a similar argument that Breyer made in Heller which was rejected. Breyer argued that the limits are not that great, and the benefits were worth those limited restrictions. The court responded:
Most things that are useful for defense will also be useful for offense. When police start routinely carrying mines, grenades, crew served weapons, then I’d say I should be able to have them too. I adopt all reasons they advance in favor of their arms layout.