That sidesteps the fact that guns are often obtained without a permit. How many murders would be acceptable to you?
Kind of like you not sidestepping but completely ignoring mass casualties by truck. 100% of stolen guns used in crimes are obtained w/o a permit. Using your logic of "how many murders", every single person that has a gun intends to murder someone. That's illogical.
Here's one for you, the annual death rate from mass shootings, comparing European countries to the US and Canada:
US must be #1 with a bullet, right? <John McLaughlin>WRONG!</John McLaughlin>
The US ranks #11 for deaths per million, behind such "safe" places like France and Switzerland.
http://crimeresearch.org/2015/06/comparing-death-rates-from-mass-public-shootings-in-the-us-and-europe/Gun haters love Australia. No need for stats on that one. I suggest visiting Hawaii as well, even though they have carry permits on paper there, not one has been issued in recent years, and all guns must be registered.
Here are some more fun facts for your paradise of Australia:
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=17847Even Australia's Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research acknowledges that the gun ban had no significant impact on the amount of gun-involved crime:
In 2006, assault rose 49.2 percent and robbery 6.2 percent.
Sexual assault -- Australia's equivalent term for rape -- increased 29.9 percent.
Overall, Australia's violent crime rate rose 42.2 percent.
What does any ban do, be it alcohol, drugs, or guns? It creates a black market for the product. We tried an alcohol ban here last century. It failed miserably. The drug war is another failure, albeit a costly one in money as well as the lives of our police- similar to the lives of our military squandered in foreign wars. Do you really think a war on guns would have success?
Irregardless of any of the above, one of the Bill of Rights in the US involves fundamental self-defense: being able to keep and bear arms- something that came about due to how the English treated the colonies. It must have been significant as it was #2 on the amendment list, topped only by things like freedom of the press, speech, and religion.
But Americans are so afraid of violence that their solution is to have EVEN MORE guns, in the hands of even more people, supposedly for "protection"?? What kind of sense does that make?
Again, only about 6% of adult Americans have a gun permit. If you watch movies like
Miss Congeniality ("This is Texas, everyone has a gun") or the pilot episode of
Miami Vice (judge, court reporter, and court clerk all have guns in court, total BS then and now), you'd think everyone has a gun. In fact at any given time in large cities there are more criminals illegally possessing guns than there are citizens lawfully carrying them. Look for any news reports of gun violence, and about half the time it's a convicted felon who usually stole a gun, or illegally obtained a stolen gun. Very rarely are they stopped by a lawfully armed citizen. The times they are stopped the lawful gun saved a life. How many murders by illegally armed criminals are acceptable to you?
Ignoring politics doesn't mean politics will ignore you.
-Pericles paraphrased in <100 characters
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!!!deleted!!! (5715013)
7 years ago
Kind of like you not sidestepping but completely ignoring mass casualties by truck.
Are trucks designed to be weapons of murder? No, they aren't. What about guns? Are guns useful for anything else but shooting at something or someone, the latter of which is very likely to kill them, or at least cause serious injury? Do you see the difference?
I'm told that the Green Berets used to learn how to kill someone with a rolled-up newspaper. Should we ban newspapers so they can't be used as weapons? Of course not. Because newspapers aren't MEANT to kill people like guns are.
How many murders by illegally armed criminals are acceptable to you?
NO murders are EVER acceptable, whether the gun is obtained "legally" or not. NOBODY should have them, outside of law enforcement -- but even for them, it should be tightened up a lot more, when idiot cops are shooting unarmed black men in the back, even though they pose no threat whatsoever.
And if guns weren't so easy to get, there wouldn't be ones around for people to STEAL. Did you think of that?
What human being needs an AK-47 or an Uzi, anyway? Any store that's selling those should be put out of business immediately.
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darkavenger77
7 years ago
Are trucks designed to be weapons of murder? No, they aren't. What about guns? Are guns useful for anything else but shooting at something or someone, the latter of which is very likely to kill them, or at least cause serious injury? Do you see the difference?
I do see the difference. Likewise, I'd hope you see the value of a lawfully carried gun in saving lives. You've arrived at the correct conclusion that if someone really wants to kill someone else, they'll figure out a way to do so. Scott Pelley of CBS news said when talking about gun violence in the US that there are good arguments on both sides of the issue, and that if someone really wants to hurt or kill another, they'll figure out a way to do it. Cain used a blunt object, terrorists used airplanes and are now using trucks.
Guns are used for sporting purposes. While I'm not a hunter, it's an accepted fact that hunting balances animal population- and provides more government revenue via permits. Target practice is something many people enjoy. While researching a scene from another show involving an unlikely handgun shot, I watched a video recently of a man that used a 9mm handgun to pop a balloon at 1K yards.
NOBODY should have them, outside of law enforcement -- but even for them, it should be tightened up a lot more, when idiot cops are shooting unarmed black men in the back, even though they pose no threat whatsoever.
So no guns for the Army-Navy-Air Force-Marines?
Even in this utopia, criminals will still have guns. Hundreds are lost or stolen from police each year. Ditto the military, where corruption has resulted in the loss of weapons. Again, look at drugs. The US has a federal agency dedicated solely to drug enforcement, and states spend billions on the drug war. Despite all of this effort, drugs are still on the streets. Why? Demand. So long as there is a similar demand for guns (or anything else the government tries to ban), they will likewise exist. Of course in the case of guns, the Constitution establishes arms as a right. You have about as much of a chance in changing that as I do convincing Democrats and Republicans to abide by the other 9 in the Bill of Rights.
Having served in police work for a number of years, IMO the problem with "idiot" cops is a problem with our society's downward moral spiral. Cops are not created in a lab, they are hired from among our society. As morality declines, respect for life and the rights of others declines. As the pool of those with respect for life and rights declines, at some point you have to lower hiring standards. Lowering hiring standards ultimately results in employing people that make bad decisions.
It's delusional to think that no one outside of law enforcement or the military will ever have a gun in the US. It's like saying no one will ever have any nuclear weapons- look at what is happening there between Russia and the US again. Same principle.
What human being needs an AK-47 or an Uzi, anyway? Any store that's selling those should be put out of business immediately.
Who needs a car or motorbike that can go 100 MPH? It's about personal responsibility. A gun is a tool that can be used for defensive or offensive purposes. This is the key difference between murder and justifiable homicide.
Ignoring politics doesn't mean politics will ignore you.
-Pericles paraphrased in <100 characters
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kbarada
7 years ago
I like what you say here D. Avenger. In regards to guns or any other cruder weapon, the genie has long been out of the bottle. There would have to be a fundamental change in who we are as humans to make any difference in how our world works. We are the product of a long evolution. We will probably destroy ourselves before that would ever happen.
In any event, since each generation must deal with the current realities of life and the hope of evolutionary change is way beyond our lifespans, we are left to deal with the world we have, not the world we wish for. Guns or anything that can be used as a weapon will never go away given our murderous human condition. Like I said, only a fundamental change in who we are as humans would accomplish that. If the past is any guide to the future, that evolutionary process may take tens or hundreds of thousands of years and may or may not ever happen.
That's my philosophical view. That's not to say that some days I want to go out and shoot someone that needs shooting. Its just my (our) nature.
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