Firearms are for sporting and hunting

[Fast Eddie B]

Actually when you claimed, "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" you said something rather obtuse and have not offered a rational explanation for it.

As a single data point, most often while out and about I am armed. Usually a small 9mm in a pocket holster.

I can honestly say, as I go about my business, nothing looks like a target. I honestly don't even think about the gun in my pocket. If I am ever faced with an active shooter situation, at that point I think (hope?) that I will be able to fall back on my training and act appropriately. That will initially be finding cover and/or concealment from the threat, and only then coming up with a plan on what to do - which might possibly be nothing. But I think having options beyond just running or hiding is a good thing.

So, I think at least in my case, "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" is an untrue statement. Possibly just a projection of how the person saying it would see things if they had a gun.

 

[theprestige]

I carried a gun regularly during my military service. I don't recall much of anything looking like a target to me.

 

[Ranb]

So, I think at least in my case, "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" is an untrue statement. Possibly just a projection of how the person saying it would see things if they had a gun.

In my opinion some people are able (in their own mind) to actually know how the person (with a gun in their hand) thinks. Their ugly prejudices (which to them are virtues) are on display for everyone to see, but they get upset when challenged. This of course is true for both sides of the gun debate as we can see on this forum and elsewhere.

I can honestly say, as I go about my business, nothing looks like a target. I honestly don't even think about the gun in my pocket.

I was never comfortable with a gun concealed on my person. Which is why I hardly ever carry anymore, even openly at a rifle range. Having the "everything is a target" crap aimed at me is offensive especially on a forum that is supposed to know better.

 

[Hercules56]

Back to basics.

It's bad because it is very easily lethal, and it is very difficult to know post-hoc whether lethal force was necessary in any particular situation. And by the time it is used, it is too late. Dead is dead - you have ended someone's life and there's absolutely no going back from that.

A lot of people - especially in America, an otherwise-civilised country - seem to put a lot less stock in the inherent value of human life than I do, and I'm not okay with that.

This issue should be about facts and only facts.

One very important fact is that the VAST majority of legal gun owners, that is folks who purchased a gun legally and are allowed by the law to possess a firearm, NEVER commit crimes with such firearms.

Most gun crimes are committed by folks who could not legally possess a firearm and did not legally obtain a firearm.

I agree with having common sense laws for buying guns and selling guns, the types of guns folks should be able to own, and rules for handgun concealed carry.

But we shouldn't institute laws that literally punish the vast majority of legal and law abiding gun owners for the crimes of the very small minority of criminals.

 

[sadhatter]

As a single data point, most often while out and about I am armed. Usually a small 9mm in a pocket holster.

I can honestly say, as I go about my business, nothing looks like a target. I honestly don't even think about the gun in my pocket. If I am ever faced with an active shooter situation, at that point I think (hope?) that I will be able to fall back on my training and act appropriately. That will initially be finding cover and/or concealment from the threat, and only then coming up with a plan on what to do - which might possibly be nothing. But I think having options beyond just running or hiding is a good thing.

So, I think at least in my case, "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" is an untrue statement. Possibly just a projection of how the person saying it would see things if they had a gun.

To give a similar view, while I do not have a firearms permit I do tend to legally carry self defense items and have for most of my adult life. And I most certainly agree with your statement. If anything I have been more cautious with regards to avoiding possible violent confrontation. As I do not want to have to employ them.

 

[arthwollipot]

This issue should be about facts and only facts.

Why? It's an emotional subject. You're talking about peoples' lives. And the lives of their friends, mothers, sons and lovers. It's an emotional subject and you cannot divorce it from its emotional context. You are not Spock, and you shouldn't be Spock. Not that you could even if you tried.

One very important fact is that the VAST majority of legal gun owners...

Bla bla bla same thing that is repeated as a talking point by every "law-abiding gun owner" in America. If I had a dollar for every time I've heard these words on this forum alone I'd be a rich man. But simply repeating it over and over again doesn't make it any more valid as an argument.

Law-abiding gun owners must acknowledge that the same laws that make it so easy for them to legally keep and own guns also make it easy for criminals or those with criminal intent to get them. Every criminal was law-abiding at some point, and many of the crimes committed with guns were committed by a gun owner who was law-abiding right up to the point at which he pulled the trigger and shot someone.

Law-abiding gun owners are the very ones who must start taking responsibility for the gun culture in America that allows for the massively inflated gun crime rate compared to other developed countries. Until the law-abiding gun owners - those who have never committed a crime with a gun and never will - can find the courage to take a stand against gun crime, their friends, mothers, sons and lovers will continue to die by gun at a frequency that is frankly tragic.

 

[arthwollipot]

I was never comfortable with a gun concealed on my person. Which is why I hardly ever carry anymore, even openly at a rifle range. Having the "everything is a target" crap aimed at me is offensive especially on a forum that is supposed to know better.

I apologise for offending you. But my statement stands.

If you have a gun, you will use it in situations where you believe that you are justified in doing so. Situations where you consider the defense of yourself and your family to be more important to you than the life of the person you are defending yourself against. That's what it's for. Or rather, that's the purpose that a lot of people who own guns claim.

If you have a gun, you will consider its use justified in more situations than you would if you did not have a gun. People here have said "I'd rather have a gun and not need it than need a gun and not have it" but there will be more times that you perceive you will need a gun if you have one, than if you don't.

In previous threads, I have questioned some people who always carry a pocket knife on them as to the uses to which they put it. And every one of them has rattled off a list of situations they find themselves in where they find an opportunity to use their knife. I don't carry a pocket knife, but that doesn't mean that I don't find myself in those situations. It's just that those who do carry a pocket knife see more opportunities to use it than I do. Hence their justification for carrying one while I see no such justification.

Similarly, a person who always carries a gun will see more opportunities to use it than a person who doesn't. If I'm at a bar and a drunk guy is coming at me with a broken bottle, if I am carrying a gun, I will use it in self-defense. I would not carry a gun for self-defense and then not use it. That would be absurd.

So while the statement "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" was indeed a rhetorical exaggeration, the point I was trying to make with it is still a valid one. You carry a gun for self-defense. And you will use it in those situations where you feel that its use is justified. And you will feel that its use is justified in more situations than if you weren't carrying it, simply because it is there and you have the option to use it.

And this is true despite the other thing that I have been saying, which is that the number of defensive gun uses in the US is vastly exaggerated by gun proponents. And it still has nothing whatsoever to do with making armchair mental health diagnoses.

 

[Hercules56]

Why? It's an emotional subject. You're talking about peoples' lives. And the lives of their friends, mothers, sons and lovers. It's an emotional subject and you cannot divorce it from its emotional context. You are not Spock, and you shouldn't be Spock. Not that you could even if you tried.

Bla bla bla same thing that is repeated as a talking point by every "law-abiding gun owner" in America. If I had a dollar for every time I've heard these words on this forum alone I'd be a rich man. But simply repeating it over and over again doesn't make it any more valid as an argument.

Law-abiding gun owners must acknowledge that the same laws that make it so easy for them to legally keep and own guns also make it easy for criminals or those with criminal intent to get them. Every criminal was law-abiding at some point, and many of the crimes committed with guns were committed by a gun owner who was law-abiding right up to the point at which he pulled the trigger and shot someone.

Law-abiding gun owners are the very ones who must start taking responsibility for the gun culture in America that allows for the massively inflated gun crime rate compared to other developed countries. Until the law-abiding gun owners - those who have never committed a crime with a gun and never will - can find the courage to take a stand against gun crime, their friends, mothers, sons and lovers will continue to die by gun at a frequency that is frankly tragic.

Sorry bro, but if you are going to try to limit the Constitutional rights of hundreds of millions of people, facts matter.

You better have facts on your side if you are going to tell hundreds of millions of people "you can't own that".

Your "bla bla bla" comments suggest you want this issue decided by emotion and not facts.

And the fact is most gun crimes take place in large urban areas, where gun laws tend to be much stronger.

 

[Hercules56]

Be advised: I support strong gun laws. But I also support SMART gun laws, that are based on facts and not purely uninformed emotion.

 

[Ranb]

So while the statement "when you have a gun, everything looks like a target" was indeed a rhetorical exaggeration, the point I was trying to make with it is still a valid one....

Indeed. How long did it take to finally admit that? Try making the same kind of statement about women (or any other group) and see how it works out. On an anti-gun forum like this one you don't get very many people objecting; see how that broad brush works for other subjects.

 

[arthwollipot]

Be advised: I support strong gun laws. But I also support SMART gun laws, that are based on facts and not purely uninformed emotion.

Yes, good. I also support smart gun laws. But I recognise the importance of the emotional context in emotional subjects, and the impossibility of divorcing the emotional subjects from their emotional context.

And you'll notice that I never advocated basing anything on uninformed emotion. It's not a binary choice - facts or emotions. The one can inform and provide context for the other, and cannot be cleanly separated.

 

[Hercules56]

Yes, good. I also support smart gun laws. But I recognise the importance of the emotional context in emotional subjects, and the impossibility of divorcing the emotional subjects from their emotional context.

And you'll notice that I never advocated basing anything on uninformed emotion. It's not a binary choice - facts or emotions. The one can inform and provide context for the other, and cannot be cleanly separated.

The ban on assault weapons is based purely on emotion and not facts.

These guns are responsible for maybe 1% of all murders in the USA, and yet THEY get the attention and handguns do not.

This is an example of laws being based on emotion and not facts, and such laws are not a good thing.

 

[arthwollipot]

Indeed. How long did it take to finally admit that?

Yes, you beat me down with your incessant and repeated nagging about it. I otherwise considered it not worth spending time on.

You scored a point. Good work.

 

[Giz]

Rapiers were designed for poking holes in people. I guess anyone who does fencing has the same secret agenda as target shooters.

Historical reenactors want to go on Viking rampages.

Martial artists want to bludgeon people senseless.

Risk players want to be hitler.



It's a terrible world (but gun owners are the worst).