Another mass shooting in the USA - 10 killed

BattleCorp

Tell me how wrote: »

I would enforce the implementation of a gun registry for every gun sold in any location/venue. I would force the gun industry to pay for the set up and running of it and if they refused to do so, I would take away their license to produce/sell weapons. Hell, even let the NRA administer it, as long as it functions correctly and is auditable. Any existing state registers would be amalgamated in to the national register.
I would suggest that no gun can change hands until the new owner has been entered on the registry.
I would limit the sale of assault rifles to only those who can show themselves to be long term responsible gun owners or long term members of approved gun clubs.
I would have mandatory wait periods for all gun sales.

Some of these might be in place in specific states, to a lesser or greater degree. I would make it federal policy. I know it wouldn't change things over night, I know there would still be x number of guns in circulation, but this has been a growing problem for decades.

What would you do, if you were in the same position?

I don't disagree with any of those measures to be honest. Except for the gun industry and NRA paying for it. I would have some sort of law enforcement body running it.

AbusesToilets

salmocab wrote: »

The hammer is primarily a tool designed to hammer things in comparing it and a gun is absolutely ridiculous.

What's ridiculous is acting as though a gun has any agency of its own, and thus somehow more dangerous than any other object.

salmocab

AbusesToilets wrote: »

What's ridiculous is acting as though a gun has any agency of its own, and thus somehow more dangerous than any other object.

Guns are incredibly efficient compared to most other weapons, that’s why soldiers carry them and not cars.

Billy Mays

AbusesToilets wrote: »

What's ridiculous is acting as though a gun has any agency of its own, and thus somehow more dangerous than any other object.

F*cking hell :pac: :pac:

AbusesToilets

salmocab wrote: »

Guns are incredibly efficient compared to most other weapons, that’s why soldiers carry them and not cars.

That truck in Nice seemed pretty darn efficient at killing folks

salmocab

AbusesToilets wrote: »

That truck in Nice seemed pretty darn efficient at killing folks

Yes but that’s one incident, you’re cherry picking to make your argument, trucks are designed for moving loads, guns are designed to shoot. You know this already but will dig your heels in anyway.
Jumping off bridges is also efficient why not use that in future arguments too.

AbusesToilets

salmocab wrote: »

Yes but that’s one incident, you’re cherry picking to make your argument, trucks are designed for moving loads, guns are designed to shoot. You know this already but will dig your heels in anyway.
Jumping off bridges is also efficient why not use that in future arguments too.

Hardly an isolated one, just as their are many knife attacks,hammer attacks and so on.

salmocab

AbusesToilets wrote: »

Hardly an isolated one, just as their are many knife attacks,hammer attacks and so on.

Yes there are, that’s people misusing those things (apart from knives arguably). The argument seems to be lots of things can kill people so guns should be allowed when really shooting is the only thing a gun is for whereas most of those other things aren’t being used for their actual purpose

BattleCorp

salmocab wrote: »

Yes there are, that’s people misusing those things (apart from knives arguably). The argument seems to be lots of things can kill people so guns should be allowed when really shooting is the only thing a gun is for whereas most of those other things aren’t being used for their actual purpose

Guns should are allowed because they have many legal uses and the vast vast majority of gun owners use them lawfully. Guns have many other purposes other than shooting people.

Quantum Erasure

What's a legal use of a gun? Other than hunting, which the majority will never be used for

BattleCorp

Quantum Erasure wrote: »

What's a legal use of a gun? Other than hunting, which the majority will never be used for

Well, like you said, hunting is one.

Target shooting is another. Many different disciplines when it comes to target shooting.

Vermin control is another.

And if you are in the US, self-defence is a legal use for a gun.

I've several guns, most are used for target shooting. Completely legal use of a gun.

Manic Moran

Quantum Erasure wrote: »

What's a legal use of a gun? Other than hunting, which the majority will never be used for

Where I am (and the subject of this thread), shooting people (or animals in a non-hunting situation) as necessary and authorised by law.

Yes, guns are dangerous by design. That's exactly why I keep one handy. I'm not going to defend hearth and family with a pool noodle (or a truck). Some of you make it sound like it's a bad thing.

I would enforce the implementation of a gun registry for every gun sold in any location/venue.

Why? Not some generic answer like "so that we know who has what", the question is "what, specifically, will you do with this information and how will it achieve the desired endstate?."

But, OK, it's relatively harmless. Politically unacceptable, which is why it has never been seriously proposed at the federal level, but achieves little and causes resentment. Still, I could maybe see that in trade for interstate CCW reciprocity, for example.

I would force the gun industry to pay for the set up and running of it and if they refused to do so, I would take away their license to produce/sell weapons.

Not convinced that would be legal. However, it is almost certainly legal to have the purchasers pay for it (Licensing fee, as it were).

I would suggest that no gun can change hands until the new owner has been entered on the registry.

See question about the end use of this information. The reason I ask is that a convincing case must be made for it for compliance to happen.

I would limit the sale of assault rifles to only those who can show themselves to be long term responsible gun owners or long term members of approved gun clubs.

Which brings us back to the earlier problem of definition, presuming you're referring to "assault weapons" and not "assault rifles" which are already quite restricted. Nobody has as yet managed to successfully describe an assault weapon in the US, some States have been trying for decades. Comes of being a political description, not a mechanical or industry one. Note, European style laws like "rifles which resemble..." tend to not fly in the US (US law does not like discretionary interpretations if at all possible, as it is based on the premise that someone needs to confidently know ahead of time whether or not they're going to do something illegal), which is why the assault weapons bans both past and present in the US have all utterly failed to actually ban the weapons that the enactors have been trying to prohibit. Then there's the problem that such rifles are responsible for an extremely small percentage of homicides in the US, so what are you going to achieve anyway and at what cost to lawful use?

I would have mandatory wait periods for all gun sales.

How long? What if you need a gun now? For example, you have just slapped a restraining order against your violent ex-boyfriend. Wouldn't be the first time someone was killed whilst waiting to take possession of their firearm. New Jersey went as far as to shorten their waiting period as a result of such a case.

What would you do, if you were in the same position?

To start?

Universal background checks. Not the daft way proposed in the past to require going through a dealer which has several problems, but on a person-to-person basis. One option is to give private sellers access to the same NICS system that firearms dealers use, but that could be open to abuse. Another suggestion I've heard, which makes sense to me, is an app-based system where both buyer and purchasor make a submission to the NICS and a transfer is only authorised after codes match. We're to the point that there's a mobile passport app for getting into the country, an authorisation app for a background check should be a piece of cake, and instant.

Mandatory firearms training in school. We teach kids sex ed because, whether we like it or not, they'll have sex. We teach kids driver's ed in school because we know they're going to have a driver's license, God help us all. This is the US, kids are going to soon have access to guns, we don't need them accidentally shooting themselves or each other because "guns icky so we won't talk about it." It is the exact same argument that conservatives use about sex ed, and is equally stupid.

Prohibit the broadcast of the identity and motive of spree shooters. They feed on notoriety. It would have to be a very carefully tailored law (Freedom of the press, and all that) to remain legal, but it is well acknowledged that the publicity causes copycats and incentive.

Focus on the question on why Americans are shooting each other in job lots. The really difficult thing here is it's impossible to achieve a result in a four-year election cycle. Much easier to pass a law and issue a press release. It requires a major emphasis on social and economic policy which American politicians have no desire or motivation to enact.

Tony EH

AbusesToilets wrote: »

What's ridiculous is acting as though a gun has any agency of its own, and thus somehow more dangerous than any other object.

Two objects...both as dangerous as one another. :pac:

Quantum Erasure

Target shooting/ target practice...,

practice for what?

Panrich

Quantum Erasure wrote: »

Target shooting/ target practice...,

practice for what?

To quote an old song:

Handguns are made for killing. They ain’t no good for nothin’ else.

joe40

Tell me how wrote: »

I would enforce the implementation of a gun registry for every gun sold in any location/venue. I would force the gun industry to pay for the set up and running of it and if they refused to do so, I would take away their license to produce/sell weapons. Hell, even let the NRA administer it, as long as it functions correctly and is auditable. Any existing state registers would be amalgamated in to the national register.
I would suggest that no gun can change hands until the new owner has been entered on the registry.
I would limit the sale of assault rifles to only those who can show themselves to be long term responsible gun owners or long term members of approved gun clubs.
I would have mandatory wait periods for all gun sales.

Some of these might be in place in specific states, to a lesser or greater degree. I would make it federal policy. I know it wouldn't change things over night, I know there would still be x number of guns in circulation, but this has been a growing problem for decades.

What would you do, if you were in the same position?

I have no idea why anyone would find those laws controversial.
It won't fully stop crime or shooting but even a slight reduction is actual lives saved.

Tell me how

Manic Moran wrote: »

Where I am (and the subject of this thread), shooting people (or animals in a non-hunting situation) as necessary and authorised by law.

Yes, guns are dangerous by design. That's exactly why I keep one handy. I'm not going to defend hearth and family with a pool noodle (or a truck). Some of you make it sound like it's a bad thing.

A 17 year old died in Georgia a couple days ago when she and her friends were playing with a gun that wasn't kept safe and secured. Maybe your version of handy accounts for this, but statistically, you are more likely to be injured killed through inadvertent use than in the midst of an incident in which a gun was deemed necessary.

Why? Not some generic answer like "so that we know who has what", the question is "what, specifically, will you do with this information and how will it achieve the desired endstate?."

Why is knowing who has what not a valid argument?
Every single package of prescribed medicine or medical device is stamped with unique identifiers which allow for it to be traced back to the exact manufacturing line and second in which it was produced. Given the harm guns do, why should knowing who has what not be a worthwhile exercise?

That aside, I think having a registry would inculcate a mindset that these items are inherently dangerous and there needs to be accountability for how you deal with it. If people were aware that a gun which they recently owned had been used in a crime and the person who used it bought it from them on craigslist or the darkweb or wherever, it should also make people pause before making sales that they know are somewhat dubious. They might ensure that their guns are kept secure so thieves cannot easily access them and take off. It seems that for many gun owners, a gun is something that is kept in a handbag, glove box, desk drawer, night stand or wherever so that it is easily accessible should they need it. If it is easily accessible for them, it is easily accessible for others. That is not safe practice in my view.

I had previously said on here that was a gun found to have been used in a crime and the person who had legally held that gun had allowed it to come in the hands of the criminal through negligible behavior, that they should face a penalty for their action.

But, OK, it's relatively harmless. Politically unacceptable, which is why it has never been seriously proposed at the federal level, but achieves little and causes resentment. Still, I could maybe see that in trade for interstate CCW reciprocity, for example.

As long as we see some politicians railing against gun control in the same week that they or others from their party are passing or ignoring anti-voting legislation, I am going to treat the politically unacceptable argument with the contempt it deserves.

Not convinced that would be legal. However, it is almost certainly legal to have the purchasers pay for it (Licensing fee, as it were).

We are talking about bring in legislation, that is how something becomes legal.

Which brings us back to the earlier problem of definition, presuming you're referring to "assault weapons" and not "assault rifles" which are already quite restricted. Nobody has as yet managed to successfully describe an assault weapon in the US, some States have been trying for decades. Comes of being a political description, not a mechanical or industry one. Note, European style laws like "rifles which resemble..." tend to not fly in the US (US law does not like discretionary interpretations if at all possible, as it is based on the premise that someone needs to confidently know ahead of time whether or not they're going to do something illegal), which is why the assault weapons bans both past and present in the US have all utterly failed to actually ban the weapons that the enactors have been trying to prohibit. Then there's the problem that such rifles are responsible for an extremely small percentage of homicides in the US, so what are you going to achieve anyway and at what cost to lawful use?

This sounds like a deliberate act by industry players and advocates to make something hard to categorize, while demanding laws in which things are definitively categorized knowing that the end result will be that something falls outside the law when it comes to applying restrictions to its use.

I understand that a weapon identified as an 'AR-15' has been used in extensive mass shootings. If this is the case, whatever way the gun industry categorises this gun, start with applying stricter controls to the access and ownership of this type of weapon.

How long? What if you need a gun now? For example, you have just slapped a restraining order against your violent ex-boyfriend. Wouldn't be the first time someone was killed whilst waiting to take possession of their firearm. New Jersey went as far as to shorten their waiting period as a result of such a case.

I thought about this when writing my earlier mail. Maybe if someone informs the local police force in advance that they feel they need to purchase a gun immediately then the wait period can be shortened or waived entirely. I think a wait period of at least 7 days would be appropriate and that it applies to all guns, in all states with longer periods for 'niche' interest guns as mentioned above.

I don't see it as fixing all problems, but I see it as another step in communicating the narrative that gun ownership is not a decision to be taken on a whim.

To start?

Universal background checks. Not the daft way proposed in the past to require going through a dealer which has several problems, but on a person-to-person basis. One option is to give private sellers access to the same NICS system that firearms dealers use, but that could be open to abuse. Another suggestion I've heard, which makes sense to me, is an app-based system where both buyer and purchasor make a submission to the NICS and a transfer is only authorised after codes match. We're to the point that there's a mobile passport app for getting into the country, an authorisation app for a background check should be a piece of cake, and instant.

It might work though I think if cost is a concern in relation to a gun registry, that the development of a secure app which will not be open to false data being entered and will have all the necessary back end information, security and infrastructure then cost should also be considered in this respect also. But still, maybe the 2 ideas could come together where this sort of thing could work.

Mandatory firearms training in school. We teach kids sex ed because, whether we like it or not, they'll have sex. We teach kids driver's ed in school because we know they're going to have a driver's license, God help us all. This is the US, kids are going to soon have access to guns, we don't need them accidentally shooting themselves or each other because "guns icky so we won't talk about it." It is the exact same argument that conservatives use about sex ed, and is equally stupid.

Would be strongly against this. There are several other things which could and should be higher on a list of what needs to be thought in schools before bringing the conversation of guns in to the room.

You said it yourself that this being America, and kids are soon going to have access to guns. That is the problem, not that they don't know what to do with them although that is indeed the case. Virtually every other comparable country have less access to guns for its citizens and enjoy the benefit of less gun crime and incidents and less perennial fear as to what might happen because of someone finally snapping on any given day. Training kids in the use of guns is going to make it more likely that they will seek out guns maybe because they feel more confident in handling them but also maybe because that lesson on gun safety made them think that you have to have a gun now.
You mentioned education services like drivers-ed and sex-ed. Both are given that they will be encountered, guns should be something that ultimately only a small number of professionals, hobbyists and a few out of every 100 should feel they need to own for their personal safety in a safe society. That should be the goal, not effectively assuming that within 10 years of these classes starting, that everyone will have sought out access to arms.

Prohibit the broadcast of the identity and motive of spree shooters. They feed on notoriety. It would have to be a very carefully tailored law (Freedom of the press, and all that) to remain legal, but it is well acknowledged that the publicity causes copycats and incentive.

Don't know about this. Maybe that is the case, but maybe this notoriety is bring society to having a conversation that it needs to have about the presence of guns. To be fair, it could be said also that this notoriety is leading people to arm themselves which leads to more incidents.

Focus on the question on why Americans are shooting each other in job lots. The really difficult thing here is it's impossible to achieve a result in a four-year election cycle. Much easier to pass a law and issue a press release. It requires a major emphasis on social and economic policy which American politicians have no desire or motivation to enact.

But it isn't easy to pass a law. That's the point. It's incredibly difficult to do so. Obama was President when Sandy Hook happened and he spoke very strongly about the need for meaningful action.
One bill and one amendment were brought to congress in 2013 in response to the shooting. Both were defeated. Just a week before the recent shooting in Colarado, a court on Boulder blocked the implentation of a law which would have restricted the purchase of the type of weapon that he used in his attack.

We've both taken part in conversations on this platform relating to crime and policing elsewhere in America and how this is currently being targeted with increasingly militarised police and how that isn't necessarily resulting in safer communities. A central point to those conversations was the redirection of funds from some of these police forces so that mental health or social worker care structures could be put in place. That was vehemently pushed back on by at least one person (not you) in this discussion who in this instance is saying that mental health is what is needed to be targeted in order to reduce the incidents of gun violence.

If someone proposed classes on mental health to teach kids on the importance of this throughout their lives and how to use tools like mindfulness then I think it would have a much more positive effect than teaching them something about guns which would, in my view, come across more like the 'rifleman's creed' than it would result in keeping society safe. But how do you think much of America would react to the news that kids were going to be thought how to explore their feelings? When a country would likely react so vehemently against such a proposal, while probably supporting gun education amongst teens or pre-teens, it really should be asking is its society going in the right direction.

BattleCorp

Quantum Erasure wrote: »

Target shooting/ target practice...,
practice for what?

That's one type of target. There are many different types of targets for different competitions. Most of them aren't of the human torso. The one directly below is from the Olympics.



Not sure what this one is from. It's fairly similar to a 'Time and Precision 1' type target I shoot in competitions here in Ireland.



This is a Gallery Rifle Multitarget target.



The one below is for clay pigeon shooting.



There are loads of different targets, most of which aren't like a human torso.

AbusesToilets

Tell me how wrote: »

A 17 year old died in Georgia a couple days ago when she and her friends were playing with a gun that wasn't kept safe and secured. Maybe your version of handy accounts for this, but statistically, you are more likely to be injured killed through inadvertent use than in the midst of an incident in which a gun was deemed necessary.



Why is knowing who has what not a valid argument?
Every single package of prescribed medicine or medical device is stamped with unique identifiers which allow for it to be traced back to the exact manufacturing line and second in which it was produced. Given the harm guns do, why should knowing who has what not be a worthwhile exercise?

That aside, I think having a registry would inculcate a mindset that these items are inherently dangerous and there needs to be accountability for how you deal with it. If people were aware that a gun which they recently owned had been used in a crime and the person who used it bought it from them on craigslist or the darkweb or wherever, it should also make people pause before making sales that they know are somewhat dubious. They might ensure that their guns are kept secure so thieves cannot easily access them and take off. It seems that for many gun owners, a gun is something that is kept in a handbag, glove box, desk drawer, night stand or wherever so that it is easily accessible should they need it. If it is easily accessible for them, it is easily accessible for others. That is not safe practice in my view.

I had previously said on here that was a gun found to have been used in a crime and the person who had legally held that gun had allowed it to come in the hands of the criminal through negligible behavior, that they should face a penalty for their action.



As long as we see some politicians railing against gun control in the same week that they or others from their party are passing or ignoring anti-voting legislation, I am going to treat the politically unacceptable argument with the contempt it deserves.


We are talking about bring in legislation, that is how something becomes legal.




This sounds like a deliberate act by industry players and advocates to make something hard to categorize, while demanding laws in which things are definitively categorized knowing that the end result will be that something falls outside the law when it comes to applying restrictions to its use.

I understand that a weapon identified as an 'AR-15' has been used in extensive mass shootings. If this is the case, whatever way the gun industry categorises this gun, start with applying stricter controls to the access and ownership of this type of weapon.



I thought about this when writing my earlier mail. Maybe if someone informs the local police force in advance that they feel they need to purchase a gun immediately then the wait period can be shortened or waived entirely. I think a wait period of at least 7 days would be appropriate and that it applies to all guns, in all states with longer periods for 'niche' interest guns as mentioned above.

I don't see it as fixing all problems, but I see it as another step in communicating the narrative that gun ownership is not a decision to be taken on a whim.



It might work though I think if cost is a concern in relation to a gun registry, that the development of a secure app which will not be open to false data being entered and will have all the necessary back end information, security and infrastructure then cost should also be considered in this respect also. But still, maybe the 2 ideas could come together where this sort of thing could work.


Would be strongly against this. There are several other things which could and should be higher on a list of what needs to be thought in schools before bringing the conversation of guns in to the room.

You said it yourself that this being America, and kids are soon going to have access to guns. That is the problem, not that they don't know what to do with them although that is indeed the case. Virtually every other comparable country have less access to guns for its citizens and enjoy the benefit of less gun crime and incidents and less perennial fear as to what might happen because of someone finally snapping on any given day. Training kids in the use of guns is going to make it more likely that they will seek out guns maybe because they feel more confident in handling them but also maybe because that lesson on gun safety made them think that you have to have a gun now.
You mentioned education services like drivers-ed and sex-ed. Both are given that they will be encountered, guns should be something that ultimately only a small number of professionals, hobbyists and a few out of every 100 should feel they need to own for their personal safety in a safe society. That should be the goal, not effectively assuming that within 10 years of these classes starting, that everyone will have sought out access to arms.


Don't know about this. Maybe that is the case, but maybe this notoriety is bring society to having a conversation that it needs to have about the presence of guns. To be fair, it could be said also that this notoriety is leading people to arm themselves which leads to more incidents.


But it isn't easy to pass a law. That's the point. It's incredibly difficult to do so. Obama was President when Sandy Hook happened and he spoke very strongly about the need for meaningful action.
One bill and one amendment were brought to congress in 2013 in response to the shooting. Both were defeated. Just a week before the recent shooting in Colarado, a court on Boulder blocked the implentation of a law which would have restricted the purchase of the type of weapon that he used in his attack.

We've both taken part in conversations on this platform relating to crime and policing elsewhere in America and how this is currently being targeted with increasingly militarised police and how that isn't necessarily resulting in safer communities. A central point to those conversations was the redirection of funds from some of these police forces so that mental health or social worker care structures could be put in place. That was vehemently pushed back on by at least one person (not you) in this discussion who in this instance is saying that mental health is what is needed to be targeted in order to reduce the incidents of gun violence.

If someone proposed classes on mental health to teach kids on the importance of this throughout their lives and how to use tools like mindfulness then I think it would have a much more positive effect than teaching them something about guns which would, in my view, come across more like the 'rifleman's creed' than it would result in keeping society safe. But how do you think much of America would react to the news that kids were going to be thought how to explore their feelings? When a country would likely react so vehemently against such a proposal, while probably supporting gun education amongst teens or pre-teens, it really should be asking is its society going in the right direction.

It's not a zeros sum situation, with respect to education. I've proposed" Gun Ed" previously, and think it would serve a valuable purpose. One could frame it around safe handling and what to do if one comes across a gun unexpectedly. The child in the home scenario. It doesn't have to be a shooting class or the like.

I would be firmly in favor of requiring training to purchase a firearm, as long as that wasn't used as means to deny access. Given it's an enumerated right, that's a difficult line to walk.

Tell me how

AbusesToilets wrote: »

It's not a zeros sum situation, with respect to education. I've proposed" Gun Ed" previously, and think it would serve a valuable purpose. One could frame it around safe handling and what to do if one comes across a gun unexpectedly. The child in the home scenario. It doesn't have to be a shooting class or the like.

I would be firmly in favor of requiring training to purchase a firearm, as long as that wasn't used as means to deny access. Given it's an enumerated right, that's a difficult line to walk.

First point in bold. Absolutely not. American education needs funding in several of the basic ways, diverting money for a purpose such as this would be absolute madness.
How would you feel about training on mental health techniques or on the benefits of diversity or on consent? Which do you think would result in the greatest benefit for society, these types of classes or gun training?

Second point in bold, what else would 'requiring training to purchase a firearm' be doing if it wasn't denying access without that training?

Given your view that access to a gun is an unalienable right in your opinion, what is your view on the several steps conservatives have taken to make it more difficult for people, largely democrat voting people, to vote in future? You have responded to a number of my posts at this point in which I have mentioned this but you haven't commented yourself on the matter.
Why are conservatives so enamored with the 2nd amendment but so blase about the right to vote which the 15th, 17th, 19th, 24th and 26th amendments are concerned with?

AbusesToilets

Tell me how wrote: »

First point in bold. Absolutely not. American education needs funding in several of the basic ways, diverting money for a purpose such as this would be absolute madness.
How would you feel about training on mental health techniques or on the benefits of diversity or on consent? Which do you think would result in the greatest benefit for society, these types of classes or gun training?

Second point in bold, what else would 'requiring training to purchase a firearm' be doing if it wasn't denying access without that training?

Given your view that access to a gun is an unalienable right in your opinion, what is your view on the several steps conservatives have taken to make it more difficult for people, largely democrat voting people, to vote in future? You have responded to a number of my posts at this point in which I have mentioned this but you haven't commented yourself on the matter.
Why are conservatives so enamored with the 2nd amendment but so blase about the right to vote which the 15th, 17th, 19th, 24th and 26th amendments are concerned with?

Education needs better funding period. That's a separate issue from saying that firearms education would be of value.

The issue with requiring training is whether the availability, or lack thereof, would be used as a method to deny people access to firearms. Not the training itself. Similar to the issues surrounding CCWs, and how many states changed the rules from "May issue, to shall issue" for Sheriffs.

You persist with these gotcha attempts re: The Republicans. As a cursory read of my posting history would show, I'm very much in favor of electoral reform. Not really sure what point you're driving at.

Tell me how

AbusesToilets wrote: »

Education needs better funding period. That's a separate issue from saying that firearms education would be of value.

The issue with requiring training is whether the availability, or lack thereof, would be used as a method to deny people access to firearms. Not the training itself. Similar to the issues surrounding CCWs, and how many states changed the rules from "May issue, to shall issue" for Sheriffs.

You persist with these gotcha attempts re: The Republicans. As a cursory read of my posting history would show, I'm very much in favor of electoral reform. Not really sure what point you're driving at.

Pointing out the hypocrisy in conservative positions with respect to the sanctity of the constitution and its amendments is not an attempt at a 'gotcha', it is as definitive example of political hypocrisy as you could find and deserves to be called out as such.

AbusesToilets

Tell me how wrote: »

Pointing out the hypocrisy in conservative positions with respect to the sanctity of the constitution and its amendments is not an attempt at a 'gotcha', it is as definitive example of political hypocrisy as you could find and deserves to be called out as such.

Wow, Republicans in being hypocritical shocker. I'm amazed at this new and never before articulated perspective on US politics. Do you feel better now, have you accomplished something with this public calling out?

Tell me how

AbusesToilets wrote: »

Wow, Republicans in being hypocritical shocker. I'm amazed at this new and never before articulated perspective on US politics. Do you feel better now, have you accomplished something with this public calling out?

Wouldn't say I feel better, but it is useful to remind people about it.

And given we are discussing selective focus, how about this question I asked previously but still didn't get an answer to.

How would you feel about training on mental health techniques or on the benefits of diversity or on consent? Which do you think would result in the greatest benefit for society, these types of classes or gun training?

Thoughts?

AbusesToilets

Tell me how wrote: »

Wouldn't say I feel better, but it is useful to remind people about it.

And given we are discussing selective focus, how about this question I asked previously but still didn't get an answer to.



Thoughts?

I'd have no issues with classes on mental health and wellness. The other ones less so, seem rather prone to being agenda driven nowadays. I'd think the gun education would be of more value.

Manic Moran

Tell me how wrote: »

A 17 year old died in Georgia a couple days ago when she and her friends were playing with a gun that wasn't kept safe and secured. Maybe your version of handy accounts for this, but statistically, you are more likely to be injured killed through inadvertent use than in the midst of an incident in which a gun was deemed necessary.

Perhaps. But if I or someone in my family is injured or killed with one of my firearms, it’s my own bloody fault and I have nobody else to blame, do I?
I would also submit that that incident is an exhibit in favor training kids basic firearm safety. Of course, it’ll never be 100% successful, much as Driver’s Ed hasn’t eliminated road death due to driver negligence, but it should help and there are no downsides.

Why is knowing who has what not a valid argument?

The object of the exercise is not supposed to be the exercise itself. Task and purpose. If you want to get buy-in on something, you need to explain why it is a good thing.

Every single package of prescribed medicine or medical device is stamped with unique identifiers which allow for it to be traced back to the exact manufacturing line and second in which it was produced.

And most guns (not all, granted, but certainly the overwhelming majority. Certainly all my ones) have serial numbers, manufacturer name and location allowing authorities to trace back where and when it was produced.

Given the harm guns do, why should knowing who has what not be a worthwhile exercise?

It costs money, for starters. Canada’s long gun registry cost over CDN $2bn before they gave up on it. You may or may not agree with the Chief of the Ontario Provincial Police when he said the following, but the argument does deserve addressing.

We have an ongoing gun crisis including firearms-related homicides lately in Toronto, and a law registering firearms has neither deterred these crimes nor helped us solve any of them. None of the guns we know to have been used were registered, although we believe that more than half of them were smuggled into Canada from the United States. The firearms registry is long on philosophy and short on practical results considering the money could be more effectively used for security against terrorism as well as a host of other public safety initiatives

Maryland took it one stage further. They decided that every gun sold would be test fired with a round kept for comparison. You know, the old CSI thing of putting two bullets side by side under a microscope to see if they matched. All they needed to do was retrieve a bullet from a body, compare with the database, and see who owned the gun. Easy, right? Database started in 2000.

Come 2015
“In the fall of 2014, state police issued a report that showed the program had solved no crimes and was costing more than ever.”

The scheme was abandoned on 2015. The MD Attorney General at the time was a Democrat. Quoting him:
"If there was any evidence whatsoever — any evidence — that this was helpful in solving crimes, we wouldn't have touched it," Zirkin said. "The police came in and said it was useless. No one contradicted that."

If you are going to pass a law to cause the expenditure of time and money, I think the citizenry ought to know what they are getting for it.

That aside, I think having a registry would inculcate a mindset that these items are inherently dangerous and there needs to be accountability for how you deal with it. If people were aware that a gun which they recently owned had been used in a crime and the person who used it bought it from them on craigslist or the darkweb or wherever, it should also make people pause before making sales that they know are somewhat dubious. They might ensure that their guns are kept secure so thieves cannot easily access them and take off. It seems that for many gun owners, a gun is something that is kept in a handbag, glove box, desk drawer, night stand or wherever so that it is easily accessible should they need it. If it is easily accessible for them, it is easily accessible for others. That is not safe practice in my view.

Though I disagree with the idea that I need a registry to know my firearms are dangerous items, I do agree with the latter part. There are two possible solutions, both of which are in force in some parts of the US. One is a consequences law, such as “if your child commits an offense with your gun, you are held responsible”, another is a safe storage law, such as “when the house is empty, firearms must be secured”. To that end, for example, every firearm sold in California comes with a lock. I would also submit there should be an education campaign showing the various ways a firearm can be secured whilst still being quickly accessible, to whatever various level is appropriate for your home (Eg a home with kids may have differing requirements to one with adults only). I suspect a lot of people don’t realise that there are cheap ad effective ways of securing their firearm, so that’s part of the reason many of them leave the things in drawers etc.

I had previously said on here that was a gun found to have been used in a crime and the person who had legally held that gun had allowed it to come in the hands of the criminal through negligible behavior, that they should face a penalty for their action.

I suspect that if negligent behaviour occurred, liability (at least civil, criminal may depend on the exact circumstances) already exists. Certainly as per the consequences law example above similar does already.

As long as we see some politicians railing against gun control in the same week that they or others from their party are passing or ignoring anti-voting legislation, I am going to treat the politically unacceptable argument with the contempt it deserves.

Well, you can treat it with contempt, but ignoring the problem doesn’t make it non-existent.

We are talking about bring in legislation, that is how something becomes legal.

I’m sorry, I should have said “constitutional”. There is a fair bit of case law in the US surrounding what sort of expenses and fees are permitted to be associated with the exercise of a Constituional right. Requiring an individual to make a payment of an administrative fee equal to (but no greater than) the actual cost incurred by the government, as long as it is not burdensome, is Constitutionally acceptable. Requiring manufacturer expenditure for certification for sale is also acceptable (Eg providing a few sample guns for safety testing), it is not burdensome. Requiring manufacturers to shell out millions to operate a database is a little more burdensome.

This sounds like a deliberate act by industry players and advocates to make something hard to categorize, while demanding laws in which things are definitively categorized knowing that the end result will be that something falls outside the law when it comes to applying restrictions to its use.

They didn’t make it hard to categorize. The things are categorized as semi-automatic, magazine fed, center fire firearms. They have always been categorized as such. If you want to go Australian and ban all such rifles, then at least it makes sense from a mechanical and legislative perspective. There are only two catches. The first is that doing so will ban -all- such semi autos, from grand-dad’s hunting rifle to the very latest in military rifle derivatives, which leads to the politically acceptable problem. The second is that it would require a Constitutional amendment (Or a Supreme Court reversal of itself). Given neither is remotely likely, there’s a reason why such proposals have never gone anywhere, even in the most gun-unfriendly States like California.

I understand that a weapon identified as an 'AR-15' has been used in extensive mass shootings. If this is the case, whatever way the gun industry categorises this gun, start with applying stricter controls to the access and ownership of this type of weapon.

You make it sound so easy. As I said, people have been trying to ban “just AR15s” since at least the Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989. Because there is no practical mechanical difference between an “assault weapon” and a “traditional” rifle, attempts to ban the one but not the other have consistently failed. Even the term “assault weapon” had to be invented for the legislation, because they were trying to legislate a distinction which does not exist.

If you cannot adequately define what it is you want to restrict, good luck getting effective legislation passed which actually achieves the intent.

It might work though I think if cost is a concern in relation to a gun registry, that the development of a secure app which will not be open to false data being entered and will have all the necessary back end information, security and infrastructure then cost should also be considered in this respect also. But still, maybe the 2 ideas could come together where this sort of thing could work.

According to the DoJ, the National Instant Check System processed some 40million background checks in 2020. I did some maths on that. At 4 minutes per telephone call (I never actually timed the salesman, but it sounds about right), assume the staff at the other end are running 8 hour shifts, five days a week, 48 weeks a year, that is nearly 7,000 people employed in federal call centers to do nothing but background checks. If we want to add person-to-person on top of that... Honestly, I think they should look at replacing dealer background checks with an app based system as well, I suspect that manpower expenses will make app development work its money back soon enough.

Training kids in the use of guns is going to make it more likely that they will seek out guns maybe because they feel more confident in handling them but also maybe because that lesson on gun safety made them think that you have to have a gun now

This is pretty much the exact argument that conservatives use to object to sex education in schools. If that’s what you believe, then we’re just going to be on opposite opinions on this one.

As to the resources point, there need not be any expenditures of money by the school system. Contrary to popular belief, the NRA spends the overwhelming amount of its budget on training courses, and they have a program where any school can call and they will send someone out, for free, to give an age appropriate firearm safety course. At the youngest level it’s “if you see a gun, stop, don’t touch, find an adult”. At older levels, it’s “this is how to safely shoot”

You mentioned education services like drivers-ed and sex-ed. Both are given that they will be encountered, guns should be something that ultimately only a small number of professionals, hobbyists and a few out of every 100 should feel they need to own for their personal safety in a safe society. That should be the goal, not effectively assuming that within 10 years of these classes starting, that everyone will have sought out access to arms.

Do you really think there will ever be a time in the US where firearms are not very common? Even your own proposals such as registration, restriction on ARs, etc, will not change that.

But it isn't easy to pass a law. That's the point. It's incredibly difficult to do so. Obama was President when Sandy Hook happened and he spoke very strongly about the need for meaningful action.
One bill and one amendment were brought to congress in 2013 in response to the shooting. Both were defeated. Just a week before the recent shooting in Colarado, a court on Boulder blocked the implentation of a law which would have restricted the purchase of the type of weapon that he used in his attack.

Point. Ok, I rephrase. It’s much easier to advocate for a gun control law and issue a press release than engage in meaningful social and economic legislation. And in some jurisdictions, at the state and local level in particular, getting it passed is easy too.

notobtuse

Seems the media is only concerned with these type of events that can progress their gun-control agenda. Chicago, IL, home to some of the most restrictive gun laws in the US, alone saw 4,033 people shot in 2020. That's about 78 a week in the city, yet the media tends to mostly ignore it, probably because of the fact restrictive gun laws don't work. And now Biden is responsive for another surge in gun purchases due to his gun-control talk. The wife wants one now, but wow is ammo expensive these days if you can even get it, and the retailers can't even keep a lot of types of guns on the shelves. Took her to the gun range on Valentine's Day for a couple's special to try a couple out. I arranged it she first got handgun safety instruction from the instructor there. She turned out to be a pretty deadly accurate shot. She liked the Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield EZ Semi-Auto. I tried out my new 22LR revolver with 6 inch barrel I picked up recently to dispatch ground hogs, skunks and possums that are ravaging the property.

I got a kick out of the target that day... "Be mine" with valentine hearts.

Tell me how

notobtuse wrote: »

Seems the media is only concerned with these type of events that can progress their gun-control agenda. Chicago, IL, home to some of the most restrictive gun laws in the US, alone saw 4,033 people shot in 2020. That's about 78 a week in the city, yet the media tends to mostly ignore it, probably because of the fact restrictive gun laws don't work. And now Biden is responsive for another surge in gun purchases due to his gun-control talk. The wife wants one now, but wow is ammo expensive these days if you can even get it, and the retailers can't even keep a lot of types of guns on the shelves. Took her to the gun range on Valentine's Day for a couple's special to try a couple out. I arranged it she first got handgun safety instruction from the instructor there. She turned out to be a pretty deadly accurate shot. She liked the Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield EZ Semi-Auto. I tried out my new 22LR revolver with 6 inch barrel I picked up recently to dispatch ground hogs, skunks and possums that are ravaging the property.

I got a kick out of the target that day... "Be mine" with valentine hearts.

The media have done several stories on Chicago IL, I saw one flagged recently which showed how guns bought in neighbouring states are being done so specifically for the IL market. Link

The Dixie pipeline: Mississippi major source of 'crime guns' on the streets of Chicago

For close to seven years, a Mississippi man bought firearms in and around Natchez before sending them to contacts in Chicago, many of them family members he grew up with.

Once there, the weapons would find their way to the streets of some of the city’s most violence-plagued communities and be used in homicides, shootings and other crimes.

So in fact, those with gun control agendas are specifically interested in trying to resolve the issues you talk about, where as gun enthusiasts think that more uninhibited access to guns is the answer.
Where do you think this will all end?
What steps would you take tomorrow to reduce gun violence in America?

BattleCorp

Tell me how wrote: »

So in fact, those with gun control agendas are specifically interested in trying to resolve the issues you talk about, where as gun enthusiasts think that more uninhibited access to guns is the answer.

I'm a gun enthusiast and I'm not calling for uninhibited access to guns. I've said numerous times that everyone shouldn't have a gun. You are smearing all gun owners by saying gun enthusiasts think that more uninhibited access to guns is the answer. Most of us don't think that way.

Here's a question for you. How do you stop the guns getting into the hands of criminals without punishing law abiding citizens who want to own guns?

notobtuse

Tell me how wrote: »

The media have done several stories on Chicago IL, I saw one flagged recently which showed how guns bought in neighbouring states are being done so specifically for the IL market. Link



So in fact, those with gun control agendas are specifically interested in trying to resolve the issues you talk about, where as gun enthusiasts think that more uninhibited access to guns is the answer.
Where do you think this will all end?
What steps would you take tomorrow to reduce gun violence in America?

I think if you look further it will show you that the vast majority of these shootings in Chicago are fueled by illegal guns. So all the gun-control laws will not stop criminals from getting their hands on illegal weapons. Crazy to think criminals don't abide by the law, eh? But hey, why worry about the facts when you can take selective data to try and push an agenda.