Gun Control discussion

[DanteGabriel]

1 minute ago, aceluby said:

It's how the gun control act of 1968 was passed and supported by the GOP and NRA.

And signed by Noted Defender of Freedom Ronald Reagan!

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, DanteGabriel said:

UpI agree with TgftV's take on American culture being part of the problem, which is why I said something about our "casually vicious and irresponsible" culture.

The editor of Talking Points Memo recently resurfaced a reader comment from 2012 (just after Sandy Hook) that illuminated the gun culture problem. A person who had grown up shooting observed the dark turn of motivations for owning guns, and what kind of guns people were buying:

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/tactical-reality

The reason he noticed the change in culture is because of May 21-22,1977. Eurocommie friends who don't fully get America's current fixation on guns, please read this:

(teaser quote)

Quote

In gun lore it’s known as the Revolt at Cincinnati. On May 21, 1977, and into the morning of May 22, a rump caucus of gun rights radicals took over the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association.

The rebels wore orange-blaze hunting caps. They spoke on walkie-talkies as they worked the floor of the sweltering convention hall. They suspected that the NRA leaders had turned off the air-conditioning in hopes that the rabble-rousers would lose enthusiasm.

The Old Guard was caught by surprise. The NRA officers sat up front, on a dais, observing their demise. The organization, about a century old already, was thoroughly mainstream and bipartisan, focusing on hunting, conservation and marksmanship. It taught Boy Scouts how to shoot safely. But the world had changed, and everything was more political now. The rebels saw the NRA leaders as elites who lacked the heart and conviction to fight against gun-control legislation.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-nras-true-believers-converted-a-marksmanship-group-into-a-mighty-gun-lobby/2013/01/12/51c62288-59b9-11e2-88d0-c4cf65c3ad15_story.html?utm_term=.e37f08b86980

1 hour ago, DanteGabriel said:

If you think "nothing would change" if guns were somehow banned, you need to support that assertion somehow. Australia did enact a wide ban on guns, and things changed. (Note that my citation of this fact is not an endorsement of a "gun ban" nor a suggestion that such a ban could happen in our diseased and cartoonishly violent culture).

I agree, but there's two caveats. First, Australia simply didn't have the volume of guns that we do, so any reform similar to what they did would take a lot longer. Second, and more importantly, they didn't have the cowboy culture like we do here. I read an article several years ago, and I can try to dig it up, that traced the entirety of gun culture in America and it concluded that the wild wild West. and the lasting mentality it created, is why guns are perceived differently here in the U.S. than in other countries.

[maarsen]

1 hour ago, aceluby said:

It's how the gun control act of 1968 was passed and supported by the GOP and NRA.

I am old enough to remember the Black Panthers posing with their legal weapons, on the pages of major newspapers, and the state and federal governments having an absolute panic. I was young and naive then and wondered why.

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

2 hours ago, Darth Richard II said:

Eh, it seemed to work fine in Australia.

One place. I don't even know why I keep getting sucked in. England and Ireland both seen an increase in the begginning, then a drop, and now number are back up or higher than pre-ban numbers. 

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

3 hours ago, DanteGabriel said:

I didn't say anything about blood on your hands, MSJ. Your last post responds to absolutely nothing I said. I asked you to clarify what seemed like an illogical hypothetical and now you're acting like I've personally doused you in blood. Try harder to tell the difference between posters, because you are using my posts to rail against other people.

TgftV and I argued with your stance on considering suicide as part of the gun fatalities total and you're ranting about people trying to make you feel guilty. Lord, there's nothing more dangerous in the world than a white American bro with bruised feelings. 

The hypothetical is that those calling for a total ban, and there would be murders, which we all know there would be, would you then feel responsible (or those calling for the ban) for those murdered? No. I think not. As you just said. Yet don't you see the hypocrisy of out to g blood on the hands of those against a ban? Hell I don't own a gun, want tighter regulations and that was put on me.

My feelings aren't bruised bruh. I think it's ludicrous, propaganda and the bullshit the far-left spouts on the regular. No bruised feelings, I actually find it fucking hilarious.

[Darth Richard II]

8 minutes ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

One place. I don't even know why I keep getting sucked in. England and Ireland both seen an increase in the begginning, then a drop, and now number are back up or higher than pre-ban numbers. 

Lol, you got any actual links to back any of that up, cause that seems contrary to just about everything I've read about the subject, ever.

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

6 minutes ago, Darth Richard II said:

Lol, you got any actual links to back any of that up, cause that seems contrary to just about everything I've read about the subject, ever.

Here you go.

The only thing that curbed rates in England was a huge flux in cops, but those numbers were still higher than pre ban numbers.

[Darth Richard II]

Ahahaha, I'll just post this from that sites about page, and then go slither off to someone more sane

Quote

 

Board of Directors

Edgar Browning — Professor Browning is one of the top public finance economists in the world and he is a professor at Texas A&M University.

Sheriff David Clarke — Sheriff for Milwaukee County, Wisconsin

Ted Nugent, Secretary — Musician, author, and outdoorsman

Brad Thor — the author of numerous New York Times bestsellers

Tracey Wyatt, Treasurer — a graduate of the Tuck Business School

 

 

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

23 minutes ago, Darth Richard II said:

Ahahaha, I'll just post this from that sites about page, and then go slither off to someone more sane

 

Ok, this is from a left based media source. 

Same thing

This is pure data of homicides occurred before and after ban. Doesn't matter where you check. 

[DanteGabriel]

2 hours ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

The hypothetical is that those calling for a total ban, and there would be murders, which we all know there would be, would you then feel responsible (or those calling for the ban) for those murdered? No. I think not. As you just said. Yet don't you see the hypocrisy of out to g blood on the hands of those against a ban? Hell I don't own a gun, want tighter regulations and that was put on me.

My feelings aren't bruised bruh. I think it's ludicrous, propaganda and the bullshit the far-left spouts on the regular. No bruised feelings, I actually find it fucking hilarious.

This is a terrible hypothetical and I am a little embarrassed for you that you cling to it as tightly as Trump does to Ivanka.

Okay. Let's say there is a genie who grants me a wish and I decide my wish is to "ban guns." Whatever the hell you think that means. There are way fewer guns in public hands, let's say on the level of the British. Will some people die who wouldn't have before my wish, because they won't have their precious guns to protect them from the scary people with guns? I suppose. I think that your belief that this would be some tragically huge number is part of the "tactical" fantasy world thinking I posted above, but let's take it as a given for your hypothetical that some significant number of such deaths would occur.

I think such deaths would be more than offset by people who didn't die because there wasn't a gun handy when they had a thought to kill themselves. And by people who didn't get shot by accident. And by people who survive muggings and robberies where the violence level wasn't escalated to lethality by the presence of a gun. And by people who don't get killed by some numbfuck who's scared of a noise outside their door at night, or in road rage incidents.

So no, my hypothetical wish-making self won't feel bad about other deaths that occur by gun after I get my wish granted.

And I'm not even the one making the "blood on your hands" comments at you. Take that shit out on someone else.

But you sure have convinced me, with your spluttering about something I never said to you, and your repeated unsuccessful attempts to drop this conversation, that you are totally chill and amused by this discussion.

[Xray the Enforcer]

33 minutes ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

Ok, this is from a left based media source. 

Same thing

This is pure data of homicides occurred before and after ban. Doesn't matter where you check. 

That is not a credible news source. Try again.

[DanteGabriel]

50 minutes ago, Darth Richard II said:

Ahahaha, I'll just post this from that sites about page, and then go slither off to someone more sane

 

What, they couldn't get one of the Trump spawn on their board too?

I'll bet, at least, that site does a good job tracking cases of cat scratch fever.

[SerHaHa]

Quote

Eh, it seemed to work fine in Australia.

Again - you can't use a negative to prove a positive future outcome regarding this issue.  I'm telling you and everyone else, again, that I can set up a simulation with cardboard targets on a 360 range in the desert or on safe crown land some place, with one of the LEAST "offensive" types of firearms allowed in Australia, and PROVE that any barely or untrained nut can create a mass casualty event.  I'm talking 50+ fatalities.  Easily.

Australian, Canadian, British, etc, firearms legislation and regulations are NOT enough.  I'll grant that at least they are a start, but that's all they are, and the illusion that they protect the population is exactly that - an illusion.

More drastic action is going to be required.  The next event that happens in Canada, Australia, what have you, anyplace held up as a "safe" example nation due to their laws, I"ll bump/link this.  I wish I'd never have to, but it's inevitable.   Regarding Canada, the very semi auto rifle that started our firearms act legislation back in 1989, bill C17 that came into force after the Ecole Polytechnique mass shooting by Gamil Gharbil/Mark Lepine, is still a NON restricted firearm.  See what I mean?

[Darth Richard II]

I didn't know any firearms were still legal in Oz, I should look into that more.

I'm not sure I understand your first sentence there.  What do you mean by using a negative, exactly?

[DMC]

3 hours ago, Xray the Enforcer said:

That is not a credible news source. Try again.

Seriously.  The author's twitter feed reveals a Trumpian penchant towards self promotion.  Not to mention the the article is terribly "researched."

[all swedes are racist]

3 hours ago, SerHaHa said:

Again - you can't use a negative to prove a positive future outcome regarding this issue.  I'm telling you and everyone else, again, that I can set up a simulation with cardboard targets on a 360 range in the desert or on safe crown land some place, with one of the LEAST "offensive" types of firearms allowed in Australia, and PROVE that any barely or untrained nut can create a mass casualty event.  I'm talking 50+ fatalities.  Easily.

Australian, Canadian, British, etc, firearms legislation and regulations are NOT enough.  I'll grant that at least they are a start, but that's all they are, and the illusion that they protect the population is exactly that - an illusion.

More drastic action is going to be required.  The next event that happens in Canada, Australia, what have you, anyplace held up as a "safe" example nation due to their laws, I"ll bump/link this.  I wish I'd never have to, but it's inevitable.   Regarding Canada, the very semi auto rifle that started our firearms act legislation back in 1989, bill C17 that came into force after the Ecole Polytechnique mass shooting by Gamil Gharbil/Mark Lepine, is still a NON restricted firearm.  See what I mean?

no, i don't 

Quote

US homicide rates were 7.0 times higher than in other high-income countries, driven by a gun homicide rate that was 25.2 times higher. For 15- to 24-year-olds, the gun homicide rate in the United States was 49.0 times higher. Firearm-related suicide rates were 8.0 times higher in the United States, but the overall suicide rates were average. Unintentional firearm deaths were 6.2 times higher in the United States. The overall firearm death rate in the United States from all causes was 10.0 times higher. Ninety percent of women, 91% of children aged 0 to 14 years, 92% of youth aged 15 to 24 years, and 82% of all people killed by firearms were from the United States.

http://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(15)01030-X/fulltext

[Hereward]

9 hours ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

Here you go.

The only thing that curbed rates in England was a huge flux in cops, but those numbers were still higher than pre ban numbers.

Follow the link at the bottom of that graph. The graph doesn't exist in the original paper. There is a graph which looks similar in the official statistics from the government, but it is not, as your source claims, the "firearm homicide rate", its the number of murders per year. As the number of murders in the UK is so low (roughly 400-500 a year, compared with about 16,000 in the US), unusual events can cause spikes. In this case, the apparent big post-ban spike (from one very, very low rate to a very low rate) is down to the recording of 172 victims of Dr Harold Shipman, none of whom were killed by firearms.  

The other graph which looks similar is one on the number of firearm offences. The vast majority of these involve air rifles. It is obvious that there would be a rise in offences after an almost total gun ban and a crackdown on the possession or use of any kind of firearm, as things that weren't illegal before became so. The subsequent decline is probably down to the huge fall in the number of firearms in circulation as the ban took effect and people became more used to the more stringent rules on firearms, such as shotguns and air rifles, that were still permitted. 

[Rippounet]

18 hours ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

The hypothetical is that those calling for a total ban, and there would be murders, which we all know there would be, would you then feel responsible (or those calling for the ban) for those murdered? No. I think not. As you just said. Yet don't you see the hypocrisy of out to g blood on the hands of those against a ban? Hell I don't own a gun, want tighter regulations and that was put on me.

There is no hypocrisy.
No one expects regulations, or even a total ban, to be magical. Murders would still occur. Murders by firearms even. That's a given.
But we're talking about bringing the rate of death by firearms in the US closer to that of other developed countries (i.e. 25 times lower on average for homicides). We're not talking about saving everyone, but about saving the people who die because there are so many guns in circulation.
Not that this would happen quickly and magically, of course. Even with strict federal regulations it might take decades for them to have a significant impact.
Now to accuse anyone of hypocrisy, you have to start from the premise that guns could prevent murders. This is a claim often repeated by 2nd amendment supporters. The problem is, not only am I not aware of any statistics or study to support such a claim, but I don't see how one would even be possible. You might be able to find numbers for crimes that were prevented thanks to guns I guess, but you'd also have to take into account the crimes that were made possible because of guns as well.
 

Anyway, on a more serious note, the Gun Owners of America explains the heart of the problem rather well:

Quote

The Second Amendment says the right of the people to keep and bear arms “shall not be infringed.” Our rights are not privileges from the government that can be revoked at will. Rather, they are “unalienable”—or irrevocable—and come from the Creator, as stated in our Declaration of Independence. To support an infringement here will weaken our ability to oppose the next infringement that comes down the pike.

And this is why little can be done in the US. The Pandora's box that was open will not be closed in our liftetime.

[Week]

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/10/trump-gave-500-000-fugitives-the-right-to-buy-guns.html

Quote

The FBI has argued that anyone with an outstanding warrant is a fugitive, at least for the purposes of the Brady law. The ATF has insisted that only people with outstanding warrants who have crossed state lines to avoid prosecution are fugitives. Earlier this year, the Trump Justice Department took the ATF’s side — and drastically narrowed the category of suspected criminals who are legally barred from purchasing firearms.

This week, the the Atlanta Journal-Constitution obtained FBI records that document the far-reaching consequences of this administrative change:

Although the revision has only been in effect for six months, there has already been a noticeable dip in the number of gun sales denied because the potential buyer was a “fugitive from justice.” According to NICS data, there was an 80 percent decline, compared to the same period in 2016.

 

…The FBI records show that 518,670 names have been removed from the nationwide background check database, meaning those individuals would not automatically be banned from obtaining a gun.

Nationwide, there were 1,581 gun sales or carry permits sought by fugitives that were declined between March and August in 2016; 18 percent of all denials. This year, there were 321 denials based on entries in the “fugitive from justice” category in NICS, or 4 percent of all denials nationwide.

“I cannot believe this has happened,” Vernon Keenan, the director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, told the paper. “I told them this is a problem.”

 

[TerraPrime]

5 hours ago, Hereward said:

Follow the link at the bottom of that graph. The graph doesn't exist in the original paper. There is a graph which looks similar in the official statistics from the government, but it is not, as your source claims, the "firearm homicide rate", its the number of murders per year. As the number of murders in the UK is so low (roughly 400-500 a year, compared with about 16,000 in the US), unusual events can cause spikes. In this case, the apparent big post-ban spike (from one very, very low rate to a very low rate) is down to the recording of 172 victims of Dr Harold Shipman, none of whom were killed by firearms.  

The other graph which looks similar is one on the number of firearm offences. The vast majority of these involve air rifles. It is obvious that there would be a rise in offences after an almost total gun ban and a crackdown on the possession or use of any kind of firearm, as things that weren't illegal before became so. The subsequent decline is probably down to the huge fall in the number of firearms in circulation as the ban took effect and people became more used to the more stringent rules on firearms, such as shotguns and air rifles, that were still permitted. 

 

I seem to recall reading someone somewhere saying that we can't trust statistics because it's always manipulated to fit an agenda.

I wish I could remember who said that.