Gun control

fanaskin_sl said:

That's an absurdist possibility, In fact it's the root of ignorance to think in this fashion. everything has a history and the history has a direct influence on current and future affairs, this will never cease to be. Being ignorant of history does not mean it suddenly became irrelevant.

as von clauswitz noted (paraphrased)
"history is a vital check on erudite abstractions that did not accord with experience."

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Just saying "history is important" is incomplete. History is important because being aware of our past allows us to apply the lessons learned from the past to the present. But if the history you are harping about has absolutely no application to present day America, then what good is it ? I'm not ignoring history or being willfully ignorant of history. I just want you to apply that history to the lives that ordinary Americans live TODAY. You say guns have = political power in the past. Fine, assuming I buy that argument, how does it equate to political power today ?

And because arguing with Fanaskin is a lose/lose proposition, might as well add something new to the thread.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/19/us/nor...html?hpt=hp_t1

The asshole stored his shotgun loaded and it went off when he was unpacking it? That's just stupid. I hope he catches enormous shit.

Soysauceonrice_sl said:

Just saying "history is important" is incomplete. History is important because being aware of our past allows us to apply the lessons learned from the past to the present. But if the history you are harping about has absolutely no application to present day America, then what good is it ? I'm not ignoring history or being willfully ignorant of history. I just want you to apply that history to the lives that ordinary Americans live TODAY. You say guns have = political power in the past. Fine, assuming I buy that argument, how does it equate to political power today ?

And because arguing with Fanaskin is a lose/lose proposition, might as well add something new to the thread.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/19/us/nor...html?hpt=hp_t1

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Historically, having the state disarm its citizens leads to further disenfranchisement; it's a barometer for the "liberty" of a nation.

Today, guns are anachronistic in that you don't need one for protection or food, but as a litmus test for the "freedom" of a nation they still have relevance. The problem is that our modern mechanisms are waning against the emergence of reality. When the empire collapses, guns will help shape what emerges once the dust settles.

Agraza_sl said:

The asshole stored his shotgun loaded and it went off when he was unpacking it? That's just stupid. I hope he catches enormous shit.

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That story referenced 2 separate assholes and 2 separate incidences of accidental discharge. I know that there are plenty of gun owners who give guns the respect they deserve, but it is an indisputable fact that more guns in more hands will result in more instances of some idiot mishandling their gun resulting in an accident like that referenced above.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

Historically, having the state disarm its citizens leads to further disenfranchisement; it's a barometer for the "liberty" of a nation.

Today, guns are anachronistic in that you don't need one for protection or food, but as a litmus test for the "freedom" of a nation they still have relevance. The problem is that our modern mechanisms are waning against the emergence of reality. When the empire collapses, guns will help shape what emerges once the dust settles.

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They are anachronistic in some ways (you're not going to lead an armed revolution with your assault riffle, for example) but they are still absolutely viable for personal and home defense. I have no problems with people owning guns if they are responsible and give the guns the respect they deserve. But for reasons I can't explain, guns attract so many morons that it frightens me. All I have to do is look at some of the extreme overreactions to the proposed gun legislation in this thread and on Facebook; an assault weapons ban that's destined to die in the house and a bunch of executive orders that most sane people agree with anyways? /Yawn

Soysauceonrice_sl said:

They are anachronistic in some ways (you're not going to lead an armed revolution with your assault riffle, for example) but they are still absolutely viable for personal and home defense. I have no problems with people owning guns if they are responsible and give the guns the respect they deserve. But for reasons I can't explain, guns attract so many morons that it frightens me. All I have to do is look at some of the extreme overreactions to the proposed gun legislation in this thread and on Facebook; an assault weapons ban that's destined to die in the house and a bunch of executive orders that most sane people agree with anyways? /Yawn

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The uproar about "assault rifles" is absolutely unfounded. They are a lightning rod for lunacy, their ban being synonymous with decreasing gun violence and gun crime. No statistic anywhere backs up an AWB or banning semi-auto rifles outright yet the evil black rifle continues to draw the ire of the "THINK OF THE CHILDREN" vocal minority.

The thing is, in our society where we pay a lot of money for police, we shouldn't NEED guns for self defense, and yet, we do.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

The thing is, in our society where we pay a lot of money for police, we shouldn't NEED guns for self defense, and yet, we do.

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Unless you live in a police station I can't see how having police protects you. Normal response time for an urban area is 10-15 minutes. When some asshole is coming to rape your dog and your wife seconds count. I know a lot of LEOs and they all say the same thing - their job is crime cleanup, they can't protect you while your on the phone with 911.

Zodiac_sl said:

Unless you live in a police station I can't see how having police protects you. Normal response time for an urban area is 10-15 minutes. When some asshole is coming to rape your dog and your wife seconds count. I know a lot of LEOs and they all say the same thing - their job is crime cleanup, they can't protect you while your on the phone with 911.

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On paper, having the kind of police force we pay for should prevent crime from happening altogether. Our heavy handed and liberal use of incarceration on paper should prevent people from committing crime. We all know the real world is different though.

Which was the point of my previous post; for the wealth that we allocate towards the police in America, we shouldn't need guns. In plainer speak, we shouldn't spend as much on police because there's such a massive diminished return on the money we spend. If we need to have guns for personal protection, then society has not done its job. I agree that the role of police is more for finding "who dunnit" rather than responding to real time crime, but we spend a lot of money for their services.

I'd like to see a massive reduction in the police force, as well as the "defense" budget, but that's just tilting windmills.

Police force is all relative. I live in a county with 6,000 people and it's approximatley 60 miles from one end to the other. We have 2 police offers, a sheriff and a part time deputy and a game warden who helps on drug bust as mandated by the state. It's the kind of police force before the introduction of a strong castle law in the state they instructed you to drag the offender into the house after you shot them and then clean up in case the state police had to investigate the shooting for some reason (this was also before a lot of forensic evidence was collected on site obviously). Where my other house is located by not my legal residence a homeowner shot am unarmed guy running away in the back that was wanted by the police. I saw several articles online about how bad it was going to be for the guy and he would be charged (guy being shot lived). The sheriffs office gave him the reward money and no charges were filed.

All that is probalby pretty foreign to people who live in a metro area, but out here the police respond after a crime and they really expect you to take care of business first. I've talked to the DA here several times about it and it confirms my belief that the biggest factor deciding if you wil be charged has more to do with who your DA is rather than what the law says. Also he states because gun ownership here is high they have never requested a warrant for a no knock warrant because he said it would not end well for the police.

It doesn't. Investment into education and other social programs might help though.

Borzak_sl said:

Police force is all relative. I live in a county with 6,000 people and it's approximatley 60 miles from one end to the other. We have 2 police offers, a sheriff and a part time deputy and a game warden who helps on drug bust as mandated by the state. It's the kind of police force before the introduction of a strong castle law in the state they instructed you to drag the offender into the house after you shot them and then clean up in case the state police had to investigate the shooting for some reason (this was also before a lot of forensic evidence was collected on site obviously). Where my other house is located by not my legal residence a homeowner shot am unarmed guy running away in the back that was wanted by the police. I saw several articles online about how bad it was going to be for the guy and he would be charged (guy being shot lived). The sheriffs office gave him the reward money and no charges were filed.

All that is probalby pretty foreign to people who live in a metro area, but out here the police respond after a crime and they really expect you to take care of business first. I've talked to the DA here several times about it and it confirms my belief that the biggest factor deciding if you wil be charged has more to do with who your DA is rather than what the law says. Also he states because gun ownership here is high they have never requested a warrant for a no knock warrant because he said it would not end well for the police.

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This is getting very close to the problem that over-polices it's populace: Police are an extension of a community dynamic not Judge Dredd. Mega cities throw more money and people at a problem that can't really be solved by either. Selling our freedom for a one-size-fits-all fix. I am appalled by society's indifference to no-knock warrants and the scale of domestic surveillance. Our police are closer to political kommissars than peace keepers; towing the political line and enforcing policy over humanity. The modern militarized police force is wildly outside the scope of what the framers thought should be within the control of the executive branch; they are essentially a domestic army under the control of the POTUS. Once you cross the Rubicon, you open Pandora's box. I think this is getting back to police being tasked with the wrong role.

Getting back to gun control, I think civilians should have access to the exact same weapons that police use. A civilian police force doesn't need military weaponry to enforce policy. Banning civilian access to semi auto rifles has no footing in reality and only serves to placate a rabid minority. Where I get concerned is with the simultaneous disarming of society coupled with the aggressive build up in police weaponry and use of military tactics. Sending a Bradley APC full of lil army guys with helicopter support to bust a home grow op is past excessive.

Instead of banning guns, we need to look at the individuals themselves and ascertain why they did it. Sounds pretty simple to me.

Magic Numbers_sl said:

It doesn't. Investment into education and other social programs might help though.

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100%. Instead of looking at the apparatus, look at the person using it. Guns are no more to blame than the shoes, clothes, car, inhaled air or chewing gum the criminal uses to commit a crime. Our society wants a soundbite fix. There isn't one, so in its place, we go with most knee-jerk, reactionary response we can. Pretty soon, it will just be a choice of "like" or "dislike" in response to social issues. Huxley was dead on.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

... Guns are no more to blame than the shoes, clothes, car, inhaled air or chewing gum the criminal uses to commit a crime. ....

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You are unlikely to get reasonable people to take your posts seriously if you continue to use these types of examples. On the other hand, fana and ricesauceonoil will probably be happy to engage you on the intricacies of the examples you used.

So, carry on.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

100%. Instead of looking at the apparatus, look at the person using it. Guns are no more to blame than the shoes, clothes, car, inhaled air or chewing gum the criminal uses to commit a crime. Our society wants a soundbite fix. There isn't one, so in its place, we go with most knee-jerk, reactionary response we can. Pretty soon, it will just be a choice of "like" or "dislike" in response to social issues. Huxley was dead on.

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Two things.

First- tools used to commit crimes need to be valued on efficiency of killing and ease of use. Clearly I could kill you with a shoe and even chewing gum in the right scenario. However neither is efficient or easy to do. Guns are. I am not saying all guns are bad, I am simply saying your analogy falls flat.

Second- it isn't just the great herd of sheep that is knee-jerking this issue. That is a disease that exists in all of us, we live in a society of NOW, ANSWERS, SOLUTIONS. When there is simply no quick fix to any part of this problem. People are fucking stupid and they (we) don't think- further multiplied by what I already mentioned, people living in our digital age of 'must have it now.'

All of this is part of a much larger cog in the machine. I don't have answers. The only truth I know is that I don't know.

Fyro_sl said:

Two things.

First- tools used to commit crimes need to be valued on efficiency of killing and ease of use. Clearly I could kill you with a shoe and even chewing gum in the right scenario. However neither is efficient or easy to do. Guns are. I am not saying all guns are bad, I am simply saying your analogy falls flat.

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Banning guns doesn't do anything to curb or understand the problem though; it just compounds the issue. Guns just make it easier to do something we've always been good at: killing each other. Banning them just kicks the can down the road to when guns are obsolete and we have deathrays and laser guns. We can ban those and death stars, bfgs and every killing apparatus man can conjure, and it does nothing to stop man from killing man. The best shot we have at curbing this action is understand why it happens in the first place. The gun is never the reason, it's the tool used.

Fyro_sl said:

Second- it isn't just the great herd of sheep that is knee-jerking this issue. That is a disease that exists in all of us, we live in a society of NOW, ANSWERS, SOLUTIONS. When there is simply no quick fix to any part of this problem. People are fucking stupid and they (we) don't think- further multiplied by what I already mentioned, people living in our digital age of 'must have it now.'

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Laziness and gullibility aren't diseases. If people would arm themselves with healthy does of information, logic and reason, we wouldn't be in the mess in the first place. But diseases they are not. That alleviates us the burden of fixing them. I still feel that this silly anti-gun rhetoric is coming from a small minority of liberals and will die down once the next hot-button issue comes to the fore.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

Banning guns doesn't do anything to curb or understand the problem though; it just compounds the issue. Guns just make it easier to do something we've always been good at: killing each other. Banning them just kicks the can down the road to when guns are obsolete and we have deathrays and laser guns. We can ban those and death stars, bfgs and every killing apparatus man can conjure, and it does nothing to stop man from killing man. The best shot we have at curbing this action is understand why it happens in the first place. The gun is never the reason, it's the tool used.



Laziness and gullibility aren't diseases. If people would arm themselves with healthy does of information, logic and reason, we wouldn't be in the mess in the first place. But diseases they are not. That alleviates us the burden of fixing them. I still feel that this silly anti-gun rhetoric is coming from a small minority of liberals and will die down once the next hot-button issue comes to the fore.

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No one said shit about BANNING guns. Jesus Christ. The first sentence out of your mouth invalidates your entire point. The goal is REGULATION, and how to do it right without infringing on our constitutionally guaranteed rights.

Edit: Cutting out the fat

Soysauceonrice_sl said:

No one said shit about BANNING guns. Jesus Christ. The first sentence out of your mouth invalidates your entire point. The goal is REGULATION, and how to do it right without infringing on our constitutionally guaranteed rights.

Edit: Cutting out the fat

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The NY bill is a ban of ar-15 type rifles. That's a straight up ban bro.

Why do we need any regulation outside of delineating the difference between military and civilian? Or a caliber limit where you can get a waiver for target and hunting? The types of REGULATION that our inept turd factories at the state and federal level come up with are "BAN THE SCARY GUN" or "BAN ANYTHING BUT SINGLE SHOT" which speaks nothing to the gun's purpose or use. If sound regulation could be overheard among halls of DC, I would put some stock in it, but in reality, nothing of the sort will come to the surface, let alone get voted into law.

The "goal" is moderate regulation of outlier weapons and accessories. Or weapons used in homicide (hint, not rifles). Again, we both know that there is a sensible approach to tackling this issue, but sensible is too hard to pronounce for FOX, CNN and for both the House and Senate. They want to slay the evil black dragon because it makes for better drama.

Beef Supreme_sl said:

The NY bill is a ban of ar-15 type rifles. That's a straight up ban bro.

Why do we need any regulation outside of delineating the difference between military and civilian? Or a caliber limit where you can get a waiver for target and hunting? The types of REGULATION that our inept turd factories at the state and federal level come up with are "BAN THE SCARY GUN" or "BAN ANYTHING BUT SINGLE SHOT" which speaks nothing to the gun's purpose or use. If sound regulation could be overheard among halls of DC, I would put some stock in it, but in reality, nothing of the sort will come to the surface, let alone get voted into law.

The "goal" is moderate regulation of outlier weapons and accessories. Or weapons used in homicide (hint, not rifles). Again, we both know that there is a sensible approach to tackling this issue, but sensible is too hard to pronounce for FOX, CNN and for both the House and Senate. They want to slay the evil black dragon because it makes for better drama.

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It's a straight up ban on one type of gun. It still isn't banning guns. May sound like a nitpick, but when it comes to guns, you can't be too cautious on the rhetoric.

Don't get me wrong, I think the idea of an assault weapons ban is stupid, but really, who cares ? If New-Yorkers want their representatives to ban assault riffles, so be it. Let them fight it out amongst themselves. The only AWB I'm worried about is one that comes from Congress and signed by Obama. But we all know that shit will never fly in a million years -- it's DOA in the House.