School shooting Florida

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Darat said:
It's also sensible if your aim is to reduce the number of deaths and injuries from guns in the home. I'm sure someone has posted a few times the statistics that show in the USA the highest probability of you dying by way of a gun is from the guns in your own home. The idea of needing it for self-defence may have a strong emotional appeal but statistically such a choice puts you in more danger.
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People here may recall an "amusing" case a year or two back in the US where a woman who was very actively pro-guns, and who iirc had posed for photographs with all her family holding a range of high-power guns, and who was locally very well known as campaigning for gun rights etc., was driving in her car to the local shops and she had her young 3 or 4 year old child on the back seat of the car ... she had also put her bag on the back seat with her loaded handgun in it ... the child found the gun an accidentally pulled the trigger with the result that he shot his mother through the back of the drivers seat!! ... iirc the woman was able to drive herself to the nearby hospital and she did recover, though it was a serious wound and she was lucky to survive ...

.... though apparently none of that has stopped her from continuing to demonstrate and campaign for "open carry" and the right to shoot people dead on the streets if she thinks they are about to attack her or if they appear to be stealing her car etc.
 
JoeMorgue said:
"Nobody's saying we should ban all guns."

No, not in so many words. But I do think there are a not statistically insignificant number of people (no I'm not gonna sit here and define some X percent of Liberals or whatever) that are not comfortable with any level of private gun ownership and absolutely would push for a total gun ban (or something functionally equivalent) if it was politically viable.
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I think there are very few people who literally want to ban private gun ownership. However, there are a lot of people who would so severely restrict private gun ownership to the point where guns were ineffective as self defense items. They might believe

1. No semi-autos or other "assault weapons".
2. No loaded guns in the home.
3. Some (all?) guns have to be stored at gun ranges or sporting facilities
4. Trigger locks and unloaded at home mandatory.
5. Almost impossible to get a gun carry permit (concealed or open).

Some people would make an exception for single shot rifles and shotguns typically used for hunting

The big challenge for gun control advocates right now will be to collectively decide how far they want to go toward that goal.
 
Belz... said:
I know. I provided you with the complement. ;)
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Gotcha. :thumbsup:

I'm just saying I can see some people basically going:

"I'm not saying we should ban all guns. You can have one single shot .22 caliber rifle, it has to have an 87 inch barrel, and you have to have a steel and concrete bunker buried 20 feet below the ground with separate voice print, fingerprint, retina scan, DNA sampling locks to store it in. You would have to have PhD in Firearm Sciences from MIT, complete Navy SEAL Hell Week, and have a Yankee White Security Clearance. But I don't want to ban guns, let's not be silly."
 
Disbelief said:
Yet the automotive industry is taking it upon themselves to work towards autonomous vehicles to drastically reduce traffic deaths. Over 90% of deaths are caused because of human error, not the car, yet the industry is stepping in to reduce human input. It will take decades to come to fruition, but it has started. Better gun regulation will take time as well, but let's get started.
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So far the government has been an obstacle when it comes to encouraging smart guns to reduce deaths. New Jersey passed a law which would require smart handguns only be sold after a certain date to the little people in their state. There was opposition, as expected. The NJ legislature let years go by before attempting to amend the law; in the end the new bill which would require smart guns be sold along side of standard guns was vetoed.

There is a market for so-called smart guns, if the states require it be adopted by law enforcement, civilians will probably be more likely to accept it.
 
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Belz... said:
Then I don't understand, or you don't understand. If guns are part of a technological evolution that has made us happier and healthier, then it seems like going back to a time before guns would make us more miserable. Since presumably your wish would be to make us _less_ miserable, that would seem counter-productive.
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You do not understand.

I am not convinced that a higher percentage of people in the world today are living longer, happier, healthier lives, than was the case back in the days before guns were possible. That you say this is true does not make it so.
 
IanS said:
Whenever these US shooting incidents occur, the pro-gun side always says that the problem is not actually the guns, but instead the fact that the killer was said to be mentally ill, or psychologically disturbed, or that they obtained the guns illegally without the right permits etc. And then they say that hence the correct solution must be to stop mentally ill or criminal people from being given a license to buy guns .... but it's very obvious why that can never work to reduce the problem ...

... at the time when the person obtains a licence, they may indeed be able to show (at least on the application forms) that they are not currently on health records or criminal records as mentally ill or psychologically disturbed etc. But people change ... things happen in their lives which can, and often do, cause them to change their attitudes & behaviour very quickly ... people develop mental illness or serious psychological problems etc. … things happen in their lives which produce those dangerous changes (divorce, death of a loved family member in some seemingly unfair circumstances, being sacked from a job causing serious financial problems, or being expelled from school or college, or they may become obsessed with the idea of combating different ideologies such as Islamic terrorism, or things they regard as seriously unfair in the society around them, etc. etc.) …

… just because the person can get a licence one year, does not mean that by the next year that same individual will not develop some psychosis or illness or obsession that turns them into a lethal danger.
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NJ does this, but without the annual renewal (which I think there should be). I recently applied for a change of address on my 30 yr old firearm purchaser ID. Took three months to process, with criminal and mental health background checks. To purchase a handgun, a separate permit is required for each, takes forever to get and is valid for 90 days after issuance. Of course, no open or concealed carry in Jersey at all. Wal-Mart doesn't sell guns or ammo in the state, either.

I don't understand the argument against registration. It would effectively numb out the gray and black markets, resulting in less illegal weapons on the street, and at no significant inconvenience to the owners.
 
Thermal said:
I don't understand the argument against registration. It would effectively numb out the gray and black markets, resulting in less illegal weapons on the street, and at no significant inconvenience to the owners.
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I my neck of the woods, it's "Once the government knows who has guns, then the next step is that they will come get them, or target gun owners in some other way."
 
Plenty of people on the pro-gun side do demand access to all portable weapons (and some ask for tanks, too)
So the only rational position for advocates of more gun control is to demand a total ban of all firearms.
Otherwise, they have nothing to give up during negotiations.
 
Dread Pirate Roberts said:
I my neck of the woods, it's "Once the government knows who has guns, then the next step is that they will come get them, or target gun owners in some other way."
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Yes, there are paranoid conspiracy theory types on the loose who would think that. But I don't get the reasonable owners (who I assume are the majority) having a serious objection. Slippery slope, maybe? I would think that a law-abiding owner would want to encourage measures which keep firearms in the hands of the law-abiding.
 
Thermal said:
Yes, there are paranoid conspiracy theory types on the loose who would think that. But I don't get the reasonable owners (who I assume are the majority) having a serious objection. Slippery slope, maybe? I would think that a law-abiding owner would want to encourage measures which keep firearms in the hands of the law-abiding.
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There are people who do want to take them away. They are telling you that on this forum.

I'm not secretly running a troll farm called analytics stress test based in Hungary that planting them here to say that using money I received from a mining oligarch.
 
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JoeMorgue said:
Because that's what (some) liberals sound like when they say "I don't want to ban guns."
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They might sound like that, but I think liberals who want to ban guns or impose very, very serious restrictions really are a tiny minority of liberals.

I've been following this issue very closely since I was a teenager in the mid-1980's. I have had countless discussions with probably hundreds of people who support gun control. Very, very few supported a full ban. Most understand that target shooting and hunting are a thing. Most understand that private security often needs to be armed. Most understood that some people face much greater risk in life and have reason to have guns for self-defense.

I've never met anyone, ever, who said that the police and military should not have guns (unless that is what Mike in the thread is arguing). In the days since the Florida shooting, I've seen that specific strawman pop up often, it reeks of desperation and fear.

The thing is, it is easy, very easy, to find Republican politicians who thinks and will openly state that all abortion should be illegal. On websites that allow comments, articles about the shooting or about gun control are full of comments by people who openly advocate banning all abortion. It's not a secret position, it is an overtly popular opinion supported by many conservative religious leaders and politicians.

It is impossible to find a Democratic politician who believes all guns should be banned - the gun lobby has been pounding that lie my entire life and it is just as much a lie now as it was then. They are NOT coming for your guns. Even the most restrictive (and overturned) gun laws in D.C. did not ban all guns, and existing guns were grandfathered in (nobody came for anyone's guns).

You can find people who want to ban guns. You can find people who think the earth is flat. You can find people who think that Obama is a lizard person and that Donald Trump is Jesus. You can find people who believe anything you look for, the internet is like that.

I see things like what you've written, and it makes me angry. It's like you've gone your life believing the "they're coming for your guns" lie, and you want to finally accept that its a lie, but you can't quite bring yourself to go the full distance.

They are not coming for anybody's guns. Very few want to ban them. That's been the case virtually forever.
 
BobTheCoward said:
Look at Steve in post 830. If Steve's side won the election, they would use the list to target gun owners.
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Well, I actually don't have a "side" in your election, seeing as I am not a US citizen. My country is, however, one of those that has reasonable restrictions on gun ownership. The time periods between mass shootings here are usually measured in years rather than days. I think this is a good thing.
 
Newt Gingrich says that every school should have a minimum of 6-8 armed teachers who are trained in the use of firearms and are prepared to defend students.
 
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