Second Amendment: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Pro-2A, for all who want to bear arms:
Rock, Flag, and Eagle!:
I can’t believe I screwed up a 3 word quote. Well, time to watch that episode again!
Why did you add a comma between “Arms” and “shall”?
Second Amendment: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
It is a direct quote from constitution.congress.gov website.
Source: https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-2/
Theres like an old smudge there, but it doesnt look like a comma to me, and I honestly dont recall a comma there when I learned it but that was years ago.
It’s grammatically correct, afaict.
Thanks for the picture!
If gunning down little kids with lunchboxes isn’t enough to make you dial the guns town a notch, then nothing will.
Sandy Hook survivors are in high school now and some are getting into activism.
Columbine happened when I was a kid and nothing of any substance has been done since.
The mass school shootings didn’t really take off off until the mid 2000s. So we are really just seeing the generation of constant mass shootings come into adulthood.
When columbine happened it was rare for that type of shooting to happen at a school. The actual rate of school shootings was rapidly dropping by the late 90s too. It is still much lower than it was, only these mass shootings has increased. So, with it being, at the time, a rare event, and shootings in schools on a rapid decline, it just didn’t hit the way it seems to have affected gen z/alpha.
We have too many guns, all you will do is take away guns from people that are not going to do anything wrong, and then make tens of millions of law abiding people into criminals.
I explained why you cant in a concise way and your response is the standard NPC mockery.
Short quips based on American exceptionalism get low effort responses ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Its not short quips its unsurmountable facts. It doesnt even start to get into deeper arguments about what people should or shouldnt be allowed. Its literally impossible to take away guns without huge country destroying impacts.
That’s so silly
Its silly if you dont know people with guns and how many they have. I really do think its a cultural thing and you just are not aware of the other people. Cue “I grew up around guns and…”
No, guns are for maiming and killing living things. I didn’t grow up in the bush or in a rural area, so there was no need to shoot anything.
Had my parents raised me around guns in suburbia then I would have categorised them as reckless fuckwits.
Because who in their right mind keeps guns anywhere near children? That’s absurd. To think that’s normal is institutionalised, cult-thought.
A lot of Americans do actually support some gun control measures. A lot of Americans also don’t actually know how insanely hard and effectively the NRA has organized and opposed any remotely reasonable gun control measure. They basically ensure that any hearing on the subject is flooded by their members to oppose it. They just go and many sane Americans don’t.
The ATF has no ability to have searchable records of firearm sales. To run a “trace” they need to use fucking microfilm or manually go through literal shipping containers full of receipts that are scarcely legible due to water damage. Article Measure to apply for funding for the CDC to study the effect of gun control on gun violence: no, because fuck them. Measure to impose some reasonable restrictions on the ability to purchase firearms for, say, known domestic abusers: no, because we just don’t fucking care.
I’m not American, but I actually support sane firearm ownership. I look at the lunacy over there and I am almost shocked. I really do think, from hearing about this as much as I do, that many Americans support sane measures. But the NRA is a huge problem. It prevents people from even being educated on this issue.
I’m going to get all kinds of negative votes for speaking up here. I’m not attempting to defend the various positions I outline below, just to explain why the gun folks see the current situation as the least bad alternative. If gun people in the US actually had their way the laws would be MUCH more permissive than they already are.
Again, I’m not attempting to defend the various positions, only to lend some context (and in the case of domestic abuse, to correct) the talking points above.
If the second amendment is explicitly designed to allow normal citizens to defend themselves against a tyrannical government, then allowing that same government to compile a registry of gun ownership makes no sense. Registration inevitably leads to confiscation, see Australia and New Zealand for recent examples.
(Note; It’s highly suspect that non-military ownership of small arms could effectively fight the US military. Years of attrition in Afghanistan might be the counterpoint here.)
The CDC was examining gun violence statistics in the past, but then ventured outside of the realm of science and into political speech. Most gun people are ok with making science based recommendations determined by facts. But they’re worried that a government entity funded for the purpose of science but controlled by unelected anti-gun bureaucrats will push policy based on politics.
(Note: Any gun policy has some base in science, the question is whether the policy controls the science, or whether science leads the way. Counterpoint: national COVID policy was marginally effective at great cost, both in lives lost and economically)
There are measures to keep “known” domestic abusers from purchasing or possessing firearms. If “known” means “convicted” or under indictment, then those folks are legally prohibited from firearm ownership or possession. This was recently confirmed by a notoriously pro-gun Supreme Court in United States v. Rahimi, by an overwhelming 8-1 majority. Even a restraining order for domestic violence is enough to prohibit purchase or possession.
(Note: enforcement of gun confiscation from prohibited persons is spotty at best, but it’s arguable that this is a problem with policing as the laws are already on the books. The counterpoint here would be the ability in many states to conduct private party transfers without the involvement of a licenced firearms dealer or the requisite background check)
I’m not American,
Then your opinion is irrelevant.
The ATF has no ability to have searchable records of firearm sales. To run a “trace” they need to use fucking microfilm or manually go through literal shipping containers full of receipts that are scarcely legible due to water damage. Article.
Can’t they just scan them? I’ll read article meanwhile.EDIT:
Keyword searches, or sorting by date or any other field, are strictly prohibited.
Th-- wh-- how?!
Right?! I know. It’s so needlessly complicated. When I first learned about this my jaw legit dropped.
I’m not even necessarily proposing a registry but this is just fucking ridiculous.
I am personally against a central firearms data base, but thats for “I dont trust someone like Trump” reasons IE I dont trust some jackboot from causing trouble. But that aside the NRA needs to be dissolved and its leadership drawn and fucken quartered. They have done infinitely more damage to gun rights as a whole than any other organization, combine that with the classism and racism of said oraganization and I can say with compelte certainty that they deserve liquidation.
Fuck the NRA the traitorous Rusky puppets that they are.
America loves their school shootings. If they didn’t, they would’ve done something about it by now.
Yes, it’s horrible the gun situation in the US.
But knowing how to stop someone bleeding to death can be useful in other dystopian situations as well. Like industrial accidents from bad management and OSHA/child-labor violations. Or non-gun injuries from abusive adults.
Or just stupid stuff that kids and/or adults do to maim themselves, like avocado knife injuries.
Don’t knock the first aid training.
Do go after the guns.
Like industrial accidents from bad management and OSHA/child-labor violations.
Yes, which certainly we’d expect a kindergartener to encounter. /s
If you have a situation in your country where you’re regularly expecting kindergartners to perform first aid, you’ve failed them before you’ve even kicked off the lesson.
Rather than me copypasting a link, you Google
“Child labor slaughterhouses”
and pick a news source that works for you. (Because NYT works for me but might give you a paywall, whereas CNN pops up a bunch of irritating ads for me, for instance.)
The problem is the slaughterhouses hiring children, not that the children working there can’t moonlight as EMTs. 🤦
It was actually cleaning companies that worked after hour and used children in cleaning slaughterhouses. Which is of course terrible and dangerous. (Slightly less traumatic than actually killing the animals but still inexcusable.)
I’m not recommending it. It was what I was referring to as dystopian.
But even in my childish '60s childhood there was a bicycle accident where knowing something to do about stopping bleeding would have helped both the other kid and me.
Having been in life-or-death medical situations since then, it’s a lot less mentally traumatic if you know something you can do and focus on trying to do it right, instead of trying to figure out from scratch what if anything you could do.
Dude we’re discussing kindergartners.
A kindergartener having to even be in high trauma situations in the first place is a societal failing, and one that probably shouldn’t be papered over by giving them first aid training but instead be handled by addressing the reasons why you’re putting so many kindergarteners in traumatic situations in the first place.
Edit: I can see the case for this type of training in young adulthood, but kindergartners? GTFOH
I honestly can’t believe they haven’t tried to give shooting courses to kindergartners.
Kindergarten? Ridiculous. They gotta be at least 7.
You anti gun people are using the same argument as religious people talking about sex ed. “Should we teach kids how to be safe around guns? No! Just make sure they never ever encounter one!”
The one I linked specifically mentions shooting afterwards for kids as young as 7…
But yes if guns are at home they should be locked (and really locked, like a trigger lock plus a safe that’s set to something besides 1111, holy crap you’d be surprised at how cavelier some people are) and totally inaccessible to kids. Teaching single digit age kids about guns is not a substitute for that, but of course I’m not saying you shouldn’t teach your kids that they shouldn’t touch guns and what they can do.
And teaching kids about guns will not solve the serious gun problems in America. The gun problems unique to America that pretty much every other industrialized nation has figured out already. And it’s a horrible tragedy that stuff like “the heroes program” to teach preschoolers how to deal with active shooters is necessary in this country. All to please gun nuts.
Most gun nuts aren’t too interested in education anyways:
https://www.thetrace.org/2022/01/which-states-require-firearm-safety-course-concealed-carry/
Assuming well monitored by adults letting kids shoot isn’t that big of a deal.
And teaching kids about guns will not solve the serious gun problems in America.
Ok but it’s still a pretty obviously good idea. Will definitely save lives. Children’s lives.
Teaching kids to use guns doesn’t save kids’ lives. If you want to teach em to stay away from guns, that they’re deadly, they shouldn’t touch it and should tell an adult right away go ahead.
Teaching kids to use guns in the name of gun safety is like saying you need to teach them how to drive in case they find some car keys lying around and decide to take it for a spin.
If you want to teach em to stay away from guns, that they’re deadly, they shouldn’t touch it and should tell an adult right away go ahead.
That IS gun safety education.
Also the first rule of gun safety: a gun is ALWAYS LOADED
Stop for one second, re read the conversation, and the link. I’m criticizing teaching 7 year old kids to shoot, not criticizing teaching actual gun safety. That was a straw man you set up to knock down.
Do you teach your kids to swim, or to stay away from water? Guess which is more effective at preventing drowning?
Source for preschoolers in “the heroes program”?
Already in the comment, click the links.
https://www.safekidsinc.com/hero-program-overview
Here’s where it goes through their curriculum per grade level including pre schoolers.
The 'heroes" program is not teaching pre schoolers to use guns, it’s teaching them about active shooter situations.
The other link was the one offering actual gun training (for 7 year olds and up so second graders potentially).
My comment was that it’s sad we apparently need programs to to teach pre schoolers about how to deal with active shooting situations now.
I don’t see the problem with teaching 7 year olds firearm safety. You’re throwing your credibility out the window by including that.
Beyond that though, it is sad, but it isn’t a gun problem. Yes, getting rid of guns would get rid of most shootings. However, it wouldn’t deal with the underlying problems causing these incidents, and it wouldn’t help the vast majority of violence in schools. Also, most school shootings, contrary to popular belief, are one or two people, not mass shootings. When our schools are a home to bullies, sexually abusive staff, racially segregated districts (yes, in the 21st century), economically segregated districts, republican defunding efforts, a loss of teachers especially during and immediately post-pandemic, and racially based gangs that perform regular violence against each other, it comes as no surprise, at least to me, that this violence is occurring. If it wasn’t a gun, it would be another weapon. We need to focus on the actual problems, not the ones that make us sad and grab our attention, especially when disarming the populace gives our already authoritarian police state even more power.
Re read, and stop setting up straw men. I criticized teaching seven year olds to shoot. Not teaching actual gun safety.
I seperately said it’s sad that we have to have the “heroes program” to teach pre schoolers about active shool shooters, because gun nuts don’t allow real gun controls or solutions.
https://www.theonion.com/no-way-to-prevent-this-says-only-nation-where-this-r-1848971668
People from other countries are shocked and horrified by everything in this thread.
And the “well if it wasn’t a gun it’d be something else” yeah guns aren’t necessary to kill but it sure makes it a whole lot easier and faster. I don’t think this guy could have killed 60 people in ten minutes with a knife:
I’m only half joking, because at this point the kids might as well be able to fight back rather than us doing fuck all while countless are fed to the golden throne.
Republicans, universal gun care and state mandated child control, but only after you’ve suffered 9 months against your will to bring them into this world if you even survive the experience.
Guns don’t kill children, I kill children
The only thing that can protect from a child killer, is a child killer killer. The solution is to have more killers. Stop trying to regulate killers.
As part of my pledge to halt or slow climate change, I support killing of any kind to reduce carbon emissions. Go get em tiger. Boil em, mash em, put em in a stew.
Why I send my kids off with a Browning M2. We ain’t playing
children are better suited for crew served weapons where teamwork and nimble hands mean faster belt reloads.
“BuT gUns doNt kilL PeoPle, PeoPle kilL PeoPle”
Then regulate fucking people’s access to guns! It’s not that hard.
Problem is, gun are useful.
They protect our children.
They protect our food supply.
They protect our freedom.And people have been killing each other for centuries before guns were invented. Thinking that guns are the reason for death is clearly propaganda. But you all know that. I’m just here to point out what actual reality looks like. Since none of you have ever touched grass.
I live in the Netherlands. No one I know owns a gun. Yet I have all the things you list in abundance. Added bonus: lack of school shootings and gun violence.
Your propaganda argument is nothing but you sticking your head in the sand. That, or you are a successful troll.
I knew two people from Ukraine who had guns. Now I know only one. Another died from COVID.
But how do you deal with the horrors of all that communism?
Is it not a terrifying wasteland with less… consumer goods? I would die without my Kit Kat flavored Trix cereal.
This comment history is a neat little museum of bad takes.
oof, no kidding. lotta branworms in that museum.
I like when they surprise me. “Capitalism perfect, guns good, diversity bad,” builds up a sort of caricature. Then that is completely broken with the weird digression, “HTTPS is bad and imperfect, throw it all out.”
Cars are useful. Cars protect children in many situations. Cars are among the things that majorly contribute to even having a food supply. Cars freedom patriotism eagles liberty-gasm!
Yet it is still possible to have cars serve those functions without giving in to the lobbies that wish to make it mandatory to get paid for shoving a car down the throat of every loony who wants one to hurt others with. Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
Usually for those inside, not outside
Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
While this is debatable, the regulation of cars is still a useful allegory for gun regulation.
I have had to say this many times lately, just because something is propaganda, doesn’t automatically make it false.
The best propaganda is the truth.
Since you clearly have no idea of how propaganda works.
Problem is, gun are useful.
Problem is, people are stupid.
Which is evidenced by both your shitty grammar, and tired argument.
Guns don’t protect children. They’re the leading cause of death in children.
I have no idea what you’re talking about with protecting food…hunting? Not how most people get their food. Most people get food from a grocery store…where they’re increasingly likely to get shot.
If the freedom line was in reference to the military, there’s hardly a vet alive who’s done that… they’re all dead from old age. The only wars we’ve been fighting were for revenge or resources. I say that as a vet.
If you’re talking about protecting us from our government…as far as I know, nobody has even won an armed confrontation with the police or feds over freedoms. Guns made Waco worse. Guns made Ruby Ridge worse. I guess the Bundy’s protected their “right” to steal from taxpayers by grazing their cattle on public land without paying for it like they should have. That feels like a less important right than “life” to me personally.
Guns don’t protect children. They’re the leading cause of death in children.
Fucking THANK YOU!
They’re the leading cause of death in children.
Uh…WHAT? Ain’t no fucking way. *checks statistics*
…😳 what the actual fuck. Y’all doin alright down there?
Not for several decades, no.
Graph in article shows that until around 2019 most children died from cars.
fuckin biden making gasoline too expensive /s
It does give the impresson that grand theft auto is a realistic simulation.
Since none of you have ever touched grass.
you really are deranged.
Guns don’t protect shit. Get that through your fucking melon.
People with weapons protect countries. They’re trained and equipped just for that purpose, we call it a military, you bellend. Probably couldn’t pass an asvab, obviously you’ve never been in the mud. Touch grass? JFC…
deleted by creator
Fund mental health institutions and make it easier to involuntarily commit people before they buy weapons and go on rampages?
Case after case, you see more red flags than a May Day Parade, but none of it legally actionable or reportable on a background check.
Examples:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uvalde_school_shooting
“Ramos’ social media acquaintances said he openly abused and killed animals such as cats and would livestream the abuse on Yubo.[132] Other social media acquaintances said that he would also livestream himself on Yubo threatening to kidnap and rape girls who used the app, as well as threatening to commit a school shooting.[131] Ramos’ account was reported to Yubo, but no action was taken.[131][133]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkland_high_school_shooting
“The Florida Department of Children and Families investigated him in September 2016 for Snapchat posts in which he cut both his arms and said he planned to buy a gun. At this time, a school resource officer suggested[92] he undergo an involuntary psychiatric examination under the provisions of the Baker Act. Two guidance counselors agreed, but a mental institution did not.[93] State investigators reported he had depression, autism, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, psychologist Frederick M. Kravitz later testified that Cruz was never diagnosed with autism.[94] In their assessment, they concluded he was “at low risk of harming himself or others”.[95] He had previously received mental health treatment, but had not received treatment in the year leading up to the shooting.[96]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting
"In a 2013 interview, Peter Lanza (Adam’s father) said he suspected his son might have also had undiagnosed schizophrenia in addition to his other conditions. Lanza said that family members might have missed signs of the onset of schizophrenia and psychotic behavior during his son’s adolescence because they mistakenly attributed his odd behavior and increasing isolation to Asperger syndrome.[155][162][169][170][171] Because of concerns that published accounts of Lanza’s autism could result in a backlash against others with the condition, autism advocates campaigned to clarify that autism is a brain-related developmental disorder rather than a mental illness.[172] The violence Lanza demonstrated in the shooting is generally not seen in the autistic population[173] and none of the psychiatrists he saw detected troubling signs of violence in his disposition.[155]
Lanza appears to have had no contact with mental health providers after 2006. The report from the Office of the Child Advocate stated: “In the course of Lanza’s entire life, minimal mental health evaluation and treatment (in relation to his apparent need) was obtained. Of the couple of providers that saw him, only one—the Yale Child Study Center—seemed to appreciate the gravity of (his) presentation, his need for extensive mental health and special education supports, and the critical need for medication to ease his obsessive-compulsive symptoms.”[165]"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Buffalo_shooting
"In June 2021, Gendron had been investigated for threatening other students at his high school by the police in Broome County.[20][60][66] A teacher had asked him about his plans after the school year, to which Gendron responded, “I want to murder and commit suicide.”[67] He was referred to a hospital for mental health evaluation and counseling but was released after being held for a day and a half.[20][66][68]
Gendron told police that he was merely joking; however, Gendron later wrote online that this was actually a well-executed bluff.[65][69] He was not charged in connection with the incident since, according to investigators, he had not made a specific enough threat to warrant further action.[66][69] The New York State Police did not seek an order from a state court to remove guns from Gendron’s possession.[69][70] The mental health evaluation was not an involuntary commitment, which would have prohibited him from buying guns under federal law.[69]"
Sure; maybe it’s also a mental health problem, but it’s definitely 100% a gun problem.
Then I ask this: School shootings simply never happened when I was a kid in the 70’s and 80’s. We had far less regulation*. Any asshole could buy a gun, get it delivered to their doorstep, and they were cheap. Yes, even AR-15s.
This shit all started with Columbine. Want to suicide and go out the most horrific way possible? Shoot up a school!
So no, it’s not the guns. Nothing has really changed on that front. So what happened?
* One exception: Conceal carry laws were nothing like today, far more restrictive. I’m leaving that out because criminals and mass murderers hardly give a shit about carrying illegally. Would that stop you if you were intent on murder? Also, at the same time, the laws around transporting guns generally became more restrictive.
Weren’t the 70s and 80s the peak of violent crime in the US? Including armed violent crime?
In general yes but this discussion is a out mass shootings.
This discussion is about gun violence. Saying there weren’t a lot of school shootings back then is about as helpful to the root issue discussion as saying that cyberbullying wasn’t an issue before the 90s anyways.
Almost all comments in this chain, and indeed the immediate one you replied to mention “school shooting”.
Beyond that, schools and dangerous guns existed before 1980.
Edit even the original meme is about a school shooting
School shootings aren’t a part of gun violence?
Violent crime has pretty consistently dropped for the past century in the US with a small blip in the 90s often attributed to the prevalence of leaded gasoline and the higher propensity for violence that people exposed to it often had.
School shootings still weren’t a big/common thing back then tho so I fail to see your point.
The point is that an all time peak in violent crime and violent gun crime would indicate you’re not disproving gun crime you’re just hiding it in dark numbers that you’re hoping we won’t think matter.
Also that peak is statistically referred to as happening between the 70s and 90s, specifically quadrupling vs rates prior in the 60s and 50s, before declining afterwards, so you were kinda right.
Sorry what context were we talking about? Oh yeah, school shootings. Also that’s still the point; it being a clear relationship. I don’t understand what your point is. You posed a whataboutism. They’re two different arguments.
If you want to talk about gun crime and reform broadly we can. First, in the case of things like mental health checks, how do we decide what makes someone fit to get a firearm? How do we decide who gets to make that decision? How are we going to regulate firearm sales? How do we make it possible for private sales to exist while enforcing background checks and without causing undue burden. Btw you know you already need to get a backhround check to get a firearm except in a few circumstances, right?The American pseudo-left is often frothing at the mouth for reform on this issue and has poorly formed (if any) ideas about what should actually go into place. It doesn’t help that most people are controlled by fear mongering more effectively than facts, especially those that don’t know much about guns.
Another pr9blem people have with gun control regulation is that it allows an authoritarian government to more easily defeat the populace. In every modern war, guerrillas, especially in urban areas, have the upper hand against modern militaries due to the need to project soft power and retain international support. If you think it’s never gonna happen here then you clearly haven’t been paying attention and if you’re gonna be one of those people that goes “bubut the military had bombs and jets” don’t even bother replying as you clearly haven’t been paying attention modern history and the successes across the world of resistance movements.
And it’s all great to say that the 20,000 people a year that die from guns (mostly suicide followed by active gang members engaged in gang violence, both activities prone to causing deaths regardless of accessibility to guns, but likely reduced) are a price that’s worth it to pay but there’s no realistic way that you’re disarming the American populace, only preventing new sales. This means that there will still be a huge amount of guns available for criminals, and as we’ve seen with drugs, banning something that people desire just causes a crime-ridden black market. Not to mention the immeasurable good that they could do against a tyrannical government.
On top of that, you can literally 3d print firearms now. It at least used to take some knowhow but now any scmuck can get into it with just a little bit of searching and a very minor investment. In that way, the cat’s out of the bag, and if the US gun market fails to supply criminals, especially organized crime, we know exactly what they’re going to do.
The key is building up social services in impoverished areas and removing the factors that push people towards crime. Improving our mental health infrastructure and social safety nets such that we have a violent crime rate that resembles other developed nations. Reducing the needless/baseless criminalization and overpolicing of poor and minority communities to reduce the trauma of communities growing up without fathers. Getting a handle on race relations, even between different poc groups, such that gangs become an unnecessary method of association. Not just zeroing in on the scary but useful tool that is the firearm, especially as it is the only true equalizer in society. “God created man but Samuel Colt made them equal”.
Not to mention how they allow women especially to stand up to violence they would otherwise have no chance against. Don’t give me the pepper spray and stun gun bs btw, I pity the person that thinks that will stop a large, angry man. If you’re truly interested in nonlethal means of self defense however, I believe the foaming/gel bear sprays would definitely stop an attacker, but they tend to be quite large and annoying to carry. Also, if you think armed self defense is unnecessary it’s only because you’ve never been in a situation where you wanted or tried to defend yourself but couldn’t. I don’t carry a weapon, but I’ve experienced things that make me feel like maybe I should’ve been and things would’ve gone differently.
Sorry for the long flow of consciousness style comment and I apologize if I attacked you at all I can sometimes get heated abt this subject.
School shootings are a miniscule issue though by the statistics. The problem is that we spectalize them with the 24 hour news cycle because it makes people angry and upset. This spectacle is also exactly the reward these murderers are seeking out. If the news was required to spend a proportionate amount of time on different subjects by how much they negatively impact your health on average (let’s say by how much they reduce the life expectancy of the average person), we should be banning cigarettes, alcohol, and added sugars long before guns. Why are we so focused on the guns? Why aren’t we focusing on reducing our ridiculous overweight and obesity rates? Because school shootings make you sad, like the WWF panda or the aspca commercial. Don’t get me wrong, they get me sad too, but our deeply damaged society is to blame, not guns.
To go point by point,
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I disagree that they should be considered as separated statistics, while school and mass shootings are an especially violent expression of gun violence, they are still acts of gun violence. As for how we decide, let’s start with “not on the domestic violence frequent fliers list” and work our way out from there. Ironically, by refusing so vehemently to participate in good faith, gun owners raise the odds that the discussion of what else should disqualify someone, it raises the odds of it becoming an overreach problem. Most gun owners agree not everyone should have a gun, talk to the rest of society about what makes you guys snatch a rifle out of someone’s hand at the gun shop or on the firing range.
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You’re vastly overestimating the ability of the average American gun owner to participate in a guerilla war meaningfully, the vast majority of firearms are owned by super buyers that have made guns their entire identity the same way they’d probably insist queer americans do when you ask them why they’d need that many. Not to mention how even those people have the guerilla discipline of a daddy’s money safari shooting club that hasn’t noticed the hippo stalking them yet.
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- You talk about the effectiveness of guerilla warfare against the US military but let’s look more closely at those efforts, the Vietcong were a superpower funded and supplied professionally trained military specializing in guerrilla tactics specifically because that was what was most available to them, and they fought the US voluntarily tying a hand behind its back because trying for actual millitary objectives would mean invading the north, which would mean risking a repeat of the Korean war. This resulted in a strategy of killing vietcong faster than more could be born, raised, trained and armed, something the US realized it was failing to do after nearly 20 years of involvement in the conflict. As for the Taliban, again we have confirmation of conspicuous funding and training (no not the war against the Soviet Union, the US trained Mujihideen went on to become the Northern Alliance that the US proceeded to ally themselves with when they came a knocking themselves), first by Pakistan, a nuclear power all its own, then by fanatical Wahab oil billionaires and their failson kids (hiya Obama bin Got’his’ass), and finally by Russia, who turned out to have been paying bounties for American heads like fucking game wardens. On top of that, again, the US wouldn’t attack the actual problem, that being Pakistan being allowed to exist despite being the singular worst ally ever in all of human history, ancient countries got the Genghis treatment for far fewer transgressions than the US has tried to ignore for Pakistan’s benefit.
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- Why do I highlight the professionalism, the adversarial funding and training, and the inability and/or unwillingness to strike where the problem is by the US? Because none of those advantages would be present in a gun owner’s insurrection.
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- Professionalism, inside the sum total of the guys who’d want to be taking up arms and “fightin’ da tyrants!” right now, we could generously estimate that half have any degree of professional military training, and they got that training almost certainly either from that millitary they’ll be taking up arms against, or from someone who did, or even worse, from the police, which, yeah American police have all the actual military competence of that guy who executed the mongol trade ambassadors. You can bring out as many videos of white dudes in tacticool doing drill as you want, doesn’t change that the second they take up arms for serious for serious they will not have the training collectively to put a fight up.
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- Adversarial funding, the only reason I won’t discount this one entirely is because Putin genuinely seems like he’s dumb enough to believe he can get the same results by funding the proud boys in a second civil war that the US is getting by providing the actual military of Ukraine requested arms and funds. Also China might toss some spare yen in just for the amusement of poking the US with their own citizens, and also they actually have money they could hypothetically burn on being silly.
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- Inability/Unwillingness to strike, brother, the problem isn’t going to be the US soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, coastguardsmen, and the countless more specialized auxiliaries they can call on getting bogged down and unwilling to strike at the heart of the enemy, the problem is going to be stopping all those folks from war criming the shit out of the rebels because whatever cause they might say they’re for those dudes necessarily started this fight by opening fire in even a tangential direction to the family and loved ones these people swore an oath to protect before shipping out overseas. These military personnel are going to be motivated, trained, and only held back from black flagging any insurrectionist cell that starts shit by higher officers not wanting to answer to a tribunal.
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Disarming the American public: The only people who are arguing for that are grieving families who just saw their loved ones die because of this problem, and the most Dutchess Satine tier pie in the sky pacifists in American politics who despise firearms as a matter of principle, anyone with a brain is proposing opt in disarmament for legacy owners via a rolling buyback and subsidized display rendering program. This isn’t about taking anyone’s guns, it’s almost entirely about making ownership safer for everyone in the proximity of the gun, including the owners themselves, subsidized lockers are pretty good at stopping little timmy from finding out whoever had the gun last forgot to remove the still shelled rounds before putting it away.
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3D printed firearms are to gun ownership what NFTs are for title ownership. Plastic made guns are a bomb that the user happens to spray shrapnel in the direction of where they were pointing before it finishes coating their entire front half in 3rd degree burns and shrapnel wounds if they got lucky. Ghost guns are another example of how the situation at hand doesn’t protect gun owners, it makes them feel secure in being unsafe.
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I agree whole heartedly that poor social services lead to increased social strife, but other countries with better laws have those problems too, and one mass shooting is usually regarded as an unprecedented national tragedy in those places, rather than a weekly stat/yearly news media red meat event like they’ve become in the US.
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I hate to burst the bubble here but procuring a firearm is actually one of the single most dangerous things a woman in harm’s way can do most of the time.
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- Most victims already know the person who will be attacking them, that person knows the gun is there and decided to go through with it anyways. Women who buy a gun for self defense more often end up specifically being killed by that gun specifically than successfully defending themselves against an attacker.
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- Also, in a street ambush scenario pulling a firearm is one of the worst moves you can make, it instantly raises the situation to life and death, and humans tend to choose the other person needs to die before they choose to back off. It’s the blowback effect only now that thug you were worried about is fearing for their life wrestling you for that gun to kill you before you get the chance to kill them.
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- Guns are not a personal defense equalizer, they are a “now you die” tool that should only come out when you are dead certain all other options are exhausted and are ready to immediately pull that trigger on whoever you’re pointing at. Any hesitation at all and you have failed the purpose of trying to defend yourself with a gun. You are either dead, traumatized for life having just killed someone in cold blood, or you just proved that you overreacted to the situation because nobody’s dead yet and de-escalation is now a REMOTE option for you to get out of this situation.
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Look getting heated about this subject is natural, what’s important is you were concerned enough about it to call it out for yourself, and I’ll do the same here too, sorry if this is at all perceived as an attack. The fact that we can trade at least the intent to have a productive exchange means we’re on a good pathway to actually getting to do it.
I disagree with the sentiment intended by sating that the statistics say this is a small issue. The odds you’d get rat anus in your sausage were probably pretty low before Teddy started up the food and drug admin, but having the peace of mind that you will 100% not be dining on rat anus at this year’s independence day festivities is probably something you’re thankful to Upton Sinclair for making such a stink to help achieve anyways.
My point is that a problem doesn’t have to be statistically significant for it to be absolutely disgusting and worth addressing on those grounds alone. Just because it’s one tiny past good hard boiled egg that’s stinking up the joint doesn’t mean it’s a waste of time to toss the egg, and that’s what this problem is, a very stinky egg that has done a good job of convincing people that tossing it will destroy the fabric of our home, when really addressing it would involve about as change to the fabric of the home as someone having to push their chair out from the table to get up and toss the egg in the trash.
Edit: reformatting because I remembered markdown exists and can make an effortpost like this a lot more understandable
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Yeah, it’s a social problem. Recognize that mass shooters are almost exclusively white males. The book Angry White Men by Michael Kimmel does a great job of profiling the person who does this sort of thing and why. There’s a lot that goes into it. Economics, masculinity, school culture, etc.
I feel 9/11 and faux news had something to do with fetishizing guns. Fear mongering kills.
Why doesn’t Canada see a similar per capita rate of shootings despite having more guns per capita than the US?
Probably because most of those Canadians actually have a fucking good reason to be armed, IE for hunting, defending against dangerous wildlife, competitive shooting
Cricket cricket
Maybe because their gun laws are a lot more strict? Kind of proves the point that gun regulation works doesn’t it?
My home country (Iceland) has the highest gun ownership in Europe. It’s not much compared to the US, but it’s interesting that we have almost no gun violence. The reason is that we have very strict gun control with thorough background checks, mandatory training and psych evaluations. In addition to that, we have a functioning healthcare system and low income inequality. All these things need to be adressed before the US sees a decrease in gun violence.
I’m not against regulations. It’s just something that came up in Bowling for Columbine that I’ve found interesting.
Pls automatic vs hunting stat per capita.
make it easier to involuntarily commit people
Yeah, that won’t ever be abused by malicious actors.
It really is easier to just regulate firearms (not take them away, mind you, just actually regulate and enforce said regulations), but politicians are too worried about pissing off the “but muh freedums” crowd.
Nah, involuntary psych hold definitely needs lower standards to help address the mental health crisis.
We’ve got a plan for most homelessness via housing first plans, but for folks that are homeless because they just can’t function for themselves we do genuinely need improved involuntary hold infrastructure.
We also need vastly improved care facility infrastructure for people who are docile but for whatever reasons medically or mentally incapable of surviving on their own and who don’t have family capable of providing for them.
You know the system’s broken when a common threat to coerce or emotionally attack elders is to put them in an elder care facility.
not take them away, mind you, just actually regulate and enforce said regulations
Regulations which will do what? Prevent people from getting guns.
From other countries that have regulations: prevent known criminals, known serious mentally ill people, known abusers, from having guns. Enforce gun lockers, and responsible ownership. Enforce education and training.
Most countries still have guns you know. Even just the gun lockers would prevent the us rampant murdering toddlers.
We teachers once has a “stop the bleed” training before school started (high school) a few years ago It was very sobering and traumatizing. We haven’t repeated it but we had to learn about using tourniquets, packing wounds, and stopping the bleeding after a school mass shooting. I’m for it led to teacher turnover.
It’s all so politicized now its just never going to happen. Half the country will literally lose their minds because they’re children who think owning a gun is a god given right
The NRA has spent a LOT of money to ensure this.
Most don’t even care about rights, god or children, it’s about owning the libs.
“No way to prevent this,” says only nation where this regularly happens.
Only Onion headline I can quote off the top of my head. Never gets old (unfortunately).
Unlike those kindergartens.
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Never gets old
