The God Damned Gun Control Thread

[MATTHEW'S_DAD]

Which is completely irrelevant to whether it was designed to kill people.

You never answered my earlier question.

What is your goal and how would you achieve it?

[Darth Crater]

See that red bar on the graph I made, where something like 3 per 100,000 Americans are killed by guns every year?

I want to get rid of that red bar. I also want to get rid of the blue bar, raise standards of living, and generally do the most good for the most people. But getting rid of that red bar is something that's clearly possible.

How to achieve it? I don't really know how best to do it. I can only look at the data we have and guess at the consequences of particular policies. I don't think blanket gun bans will do all that much, but they'll probably do something. Tightening existing laws will do something. Restricting types of weapons will do something. There are plenty of other things we can do to reduce violence, but maybe a good step in the process would be reducing the availability of dedicated human-killing devices.

I'm also carrying on a relatively unrelated argument, also intended to reduce that red bar, saying that owning a gun is more likely to hurt you than to help you. I have yet to see anything remotely resembling a convincing counterargument.

[Duel of Fates]

I love graphs. Crater, do you think you could find the graph that contains all of the unnecessary deaths in every country. Not just deaths related to firearms, but drunk driving, suicide, stabbings, beatings, rapes, physical abuse, drug overdoses, poisonings, hit and runs, arson fires, negligence, medical malpractice, lynchings, stonings, beheadings, honor killings, and abortions. Just to name a few. Also, which of the gun deaths were justified? Self defense? Police officers in the line of duty? I mean, the graph is nice and all, very colorful. But I dare say that it is woefully inadequate to come to conclusions you come to.

I am all for not killing. I hope I never have to. But if my family, neighbors, friends, or myself are threatened, I will not hesitate to defend myself or others.

[Darth Crater]

... The graph is just an illustrative tool. The only thing I'm getting from it is this. "We have a lot of gun murders, maybe we should see if we can do less of those."

The rest of the things you listed are bad too (with the possible exception of the "abortion" you stuck in there... but that's for a different thread). We should try to eliminate those too.

By the way, I'm not in favor of immediately doing something like a full gun ban. It might be moderately effective, but at the cost of being incredibly politically toxic. I definitely prefer "raise standards of living" as a way to reduce crime, but for some reason every time it comes up people start going on about "handouts"...

[Duel of Fates]

I merely listed a few other ways that humans are killing other humans, besides using firearms. Abortion would have to be included.

[11_Panama_]

Any measure that is imposed on the law abiding American citizen, means nothing to the criminal element. You restrict or ban any weapon, the criminal element will always have what you're not supposed to have. How are law abiding citizens supposed to counter that? Relying on the police is not always the best solution. Yes, they are for killing, that's the point of owning a gun. To stop a threat, by all means necessary. I'm going to bore you all with the best quote the NRA has... "guns don't kill people, people do". It is true in it's simplicity. I would love a safe nation where I don't have to worry about my family's welfare, but we will always have the "wackos" that will abuse the right(s) we have. But wether is guns, knifes or sticks, a wacko is a wacko... he's going to do his thing with whatever he's got. Limiting the responsible citizens of self protection only helps the bad guy. This is my opinion... not an argument.

[Dad]

Crater, did you know that those gun related death stats include cops shot by criminals and vice versa?

[MATTHEW'S_DAD]

See that red bar on the graph I made, where something like 3 per 100,000 Americans are killed by guns every year?
I want to get rid of that red bar. I also want to get rid of the blue bar, raise standards of living, and generally do the most good for the most people. But getting rid of that red bar is something that's clearly possible.

How to achieve it? I don't really know how best to do it. I can only look at the data we have and guess at the consequences of particular policies. I don't think blanket gun bans will do all that much, but they'll probably do something. Tightening existing laws will do something. Restricting types of weapons will do something. There are plenty of other things we can do to reduce violence, but maybe a good step in the process would be reducing the availability of dedicated human-killing devices.

I'm also carrying on a relatively unrelated argument, also intended to reduce that red bar, saying that owning a gun is more likely to hurt you than to help you. I have yet to see anything remotely resembling a convincing counterargument.

And you won't because you choose not to see it.
Crater, throwing [poo] at the wall to see what sticks is not a path to a solution. There have been posts made by Kren and MC that are both are well thought out with clear direction.
Kren's post... viewtopic.php?f=17&t=4940&start=20
MC's post... viewtopic.php?f=17&t=4987&start=40
also from MC...

I support common sense gun control.
Limit the number of guns someone can buy at one time or in a month - this would cut down on the tens of thousands of guns sold to criminals every year.
Background checks with no loopholes

That's about it - I don't think limiting the type of gun, clip, etc would do much.
I support efforts to dry up the supply of guns for criminals and make illegal guns harder to come by and therefore more expensive.
There are ways to do that without taking away anyone's guns.

I certainly don't agree with their views, but I understand what they want and why. They offer closed ended solutions, not open ended solutions. NEVER, NEVER EVER allow our lawmakers to have a open ended laws that they can "interpret" later down the road as they see fit.

And FWIW Crater, nothing personal in these discussions, I really do enjoy this with you. You're my Yang.

[(SWGO)Minas_Thirith]

A few things here.
Trying to compare the USA's murder per 100000 people to a third world country.....yea no, it's quite insulting

I agree that things like drunk driving are an issue, however this is a gun control thread, not a full death control, or alcohol control thread and by that i mean that this should be related to guns.
And i agree, guns were intended to kill people with, knives were invented to cook with and later on applied as weapons, people can live without guns, i doubt cooks could live without knives.

MT

[Darth Crater]

Crater, did you know that those gun related death stats include cops shot by criminals and vice versa?

I figured those were included, but wasn't sure. I'd like to get rid of those too. Dead cops for obvious reasons. Dead criminals because it's not particularly humane.

And you won't because you choose not to see it.

I'm actually trying to see it. It certainly feels to me like having a gun should make you safer. The problem is that I'm fully aware that my brain and "feelings", like everyone's, are relatively untrustworthy. Thus, I look for statistics, and the ones I've found say that feeling is wrong.

Crater, throwing [poo] at the wall to see what sticks is not a path to a solution. There have been posts made by Kren and MC that are both are well thought out with clear direction.

Yeah, I didn't spend as much time on the examples there as I should have. Sorry about that - as I said later I'm not actually in favor of "ban all guns" at the moment. MC's post you quoted is something I agree with, something you should agree with (limits criminal gun ownership with minimal effects on legitimate owners), and is much better than blanket bans.

EDIT:

"guns don't kill people, people do"

And yet, in an identical situation, there are times when a person with a gun will kill someone, and a person without a gun won't. For example, wars, home invasions, and suicides. Thus, guns cause deaths.