[Politics]The Right to Arm Bears in a Crowded Theater

[Kaelik]

Kaelik,

There's no reason to be so upset. If almost all gun owners aren't harming anyone, why are you so against their continuing not to harm anyone?

Almost all countries with Chemical Gas weapons do not use them to harm anyone. It does not follow that I think any country that can pass a couple tests should be allowed chemical gas weapons, vastly increasing their availability so that lots of other people can get them who do use them to fucking kill people.

Because some people having the ability to own the ability to kill lots of people and not use it is not a countervailing interest that overrides the more important interest minimizing deaths.

I want to stop allowing the vast majority of people who aren't harming people from continuing to exist as a source of guns for people who fucking are.

Assuming you didn't have the 2nd amendment (so pesky, that), you could do the following:
1) Require all would-be firearm users to complete a safety course and test.
2) Require background checks (something that I'm fairly sure is already being done.)
3) Require a psych check of some sort, and have to pass one every x years to maintain your license. Probably have to pass another practical exam, as well.
4) Require 'reasonable' storage regulations for firearms in order to help stop thefts and accidental deaths.
5) Make the Eddie Eagle-style education more widespread. That will help save lives.
6) Require anybody with a Concealed Carry permit to be able to pass a safety course and exam. (I'd best most CC people can shoot better than the average cop, but accuracy isn't necessarily training.)


I suppose you could continue to make full-auto weapons only possible for the rich to own, but their impact on crime is next to none, since basically nobody can own one anyway.

Or you know, we could just ban all the fucking guns, because that would decrease the number of actual fucking deaths more than doing all those half ass things and the only thing it would cost is that some dumbshits would no longer posses the ability to fucking murder lots of people but graciously not do it.

[Meikle641]

Well, there's clearly no way we're going to come to an understanding or compromise on this. Honestly, you're comparing chemical weapons to firearms as if there is a real comparison? You are an idiot, Kaelik.

[Whipstitch]

I'm not sure what you expected given that your positions are irreconcilable and you posted your question in about the most passive aggressive and disingenuous manner possible.

[Kaelik]

Well, there's clearly no way we're going to come to an understanding or compromise on this. Honestly, you're comparing chemical weapons to firearms as if there is a real comparison? You are an idiot, Kaelik.

Yes. Instruments of murder with basically no other valid use are a real comparison to instruments of murder with basically no other valid use.

But I want to agree with whipstitch that you should in no way be surprised by not coming to a compromise, because you are unwilling to accept any compromise that doesn't include people being allowed to own the ability to kill other people for the sole purpose of sport by wielding their person killing device.

I support the NFL making rules that might make football less "fun" in exchange for making it more safe, why the fuck shit would I not also support laws that might make the "sport" of shooting deathsticks less fun (because you know, now when you shoot at targets you lose the visceral joy of knowing if a person was there you would have killed them) in return for drastically decreasing the number of murders.

[RobbyPants]

Well, there's clearly no way we're going to come to an understanding or compromise on this. Honestly, you're comparing chemical weapons to firearms as if there is a real comparison? You are an idiot, Kaelik.

What is the difference between them?

You can recreationally use guns but not chemical weapons? See Kaelik's and DSM's previous posts on recreational firearm use and alternatives.

One has a long history of tradition? Not an actual argument.

Something else? Seriously, I'm not seeing it. The comparison seems apt.

[Meikle641]

Well, how about this: chemical weapons are Weapons of Mass Destruction. If you can't tell the difference between a WMD and a gun, I have to wonder.

[Kaelik]

Well, how about this: chemical weapons are Weapons of Mass Destruction. If you can't tell the difference between a WMD and a gun, I have to wonder.

Do you understand the concept of an analogy? No one said that they are identical in every respect. In fact, if you want to be so stupid to not understand the concept of analogies, you should be throwing more of a fit about how I compared countries to people. Countries are far more different from people than chemical weapons are from guns.

But frankly, chemical weapons aren't even necessarily weapons of mass destruction. Some of them are only capable of killing large groups of people when used in massive quantities, where you could also just shoot all those people.

No dumb shit, chemical weapons are not identical in all respects to guns. But they are identical to guns in the relevant respects here:

1) The "right" to have them has absolutely no redeeming qualities of any kind.

2) Giving them to lots of people who aren't going to use them increases the quantity available to the people who are going to use them.

3) Their sole fucking intended purpose is to kill people. (They can be used for the unintended purpose of killing things that are not people.)

[erik]

I'm not sure what you expected given that your positions are irreconcilable and you posted your question in about the most passive aggressive and disingenuous manner possible.

My favorite bit of his irreconciliabilities was this gem:

Did it stop mass shootings? Sure, for now. Hopefully stays that way. But it hasn't stopped criminals from killing people with them, given that 30 of the 262 homicides in Australia in 2009's data were done with firearms. (On a side note, that is a rather envious total. Wish Canada's murder numbers were that low)

Stopping mass shootings and stopping murders aren't the same thing.

So Australia has an enviable lower amount of murders in no small part due to gun control... but preventing mass shootings doesn't prevent some murders.

'On a side note'? The whole point is in the side note. No guns = lower murder rate.

[RobbyPants]

Well, how about this: chemical weapons are Weapons of Mass Destruction. If you can't tell the difference between a WMD and a gun, I have to wonder.

But why does that matter? Both are made to kill people, and there is literally no reason to have either unless your intention is to kill people.

Do you disagree? If so, give a reason why as opposed to vague dismissals.

[Essence]

If almost all gun owners aren't harming anyone, why are you so against their continuing not to harm anyone?

The gun ownership rate in the US is actually greater than the car ownership rate in the US per capita. By your logic, the fact that most drivers don't kill people on a regular basis means we should get rid of driver's licenses and traffic laws.


That's fucked up, dude.

[Josh_Kablack]

A personal perspective from a fellow gamer:

http://www.connecticutmag.com/Blogs/On- ... ourteenth/

[Essence]

Damn, Josh...just damn. That guy reminds me of me so much that I feel like someone just punched me in the spleen.


Thank you.

[Meikle641]

If almost all gun owners aren't harming anyone, why are you so against their continuing not to harm anyone?

The gun ownership rate in the US is actually greater than the car ownership rate in the US per capita. By your logic, the fact that most drivers don't kill people on a regular basis means we should get rid of driver's licenses and traffic laws.


That's fucked up, dude.

Really? I said I am in favour of revising gun laws, but what I am against is a gun ban. I am in favour of sensible regulations, ideally similar to the ones I have to follow up here in Canada. So no, I don't agree with your comparison.

[Korgan0]

If almost all gun owners aren't harming anyone, why are you so against their continuing not to harm anyone?

The gun ownership rate in the US is actually greater than the car ownership rate in the US per capita. By your logic, the fact that most drivers don't kill people on a regular basis means we should get rid of driver's licenses and traffic laws.


That's fucked up, dude.

Really? I said I am in favour of revising gun laws, but what I am against is a gun ban. I am in favour of sensible regulations, ideally similar to the ones I have to follow up here in Canada. So no, I don't agree with your comparison.

You have provided literally no good arguments in favour of your position. None. You're trying to concern-troll yourself as some kind of moderate "hey guys we can just institute these controls and let people have their deathsticks," but the simple fact of the matter is that you have provided not a single reason that allowing gun ownership is in any way beneficial enough to justify the thousands of murders and suicides that come about as a direct result of gun ownership. Those dead children are dead, right now, because advocates of gun ownership insist on holding on to their weapons. It doesn't matter how rigorous the screening procedures are: eventually someone will slip through the cracks. And then there'll be Christmas presents in that will never reach their intended recipients, and unnecessary funerals, flags at half-mast, and orphaned children. If you're actually trying to claim that even one murdered person is worth being able to hunt your own venison or shoot at a paper target, then you are an utterly reprehensible human being.

[Meikle641]

Here's how it is. I support forming gun laws to be sensible in effect and the safe use of firearms. I do not support blanket gun bans. My views are fairly close to the views in point 11 . I think that making big decisions like this should be done with a level head, rather than made rashly. Just look at the Patriot act, something passed when the nation was mad with grief.

tl;dr "I think new regulation can be good, but bans are bad."

No, I'm not budging. Bring on the personal attacks. I'm done on this topic for now.

[Username17]

The idea that gun ownership isn't harmful is just really weird. There is no basis in statistics to back that claim up. The gun deaths per hundred thousand people in the US are 10.1. The car deaths per hundred thousand people in the US are 10.4. The death rate for cancer (all types combined) is 173.2.

But here's the thing: while 89% of households own a car, only 47% of households have a gun. Less than half the population is putting up death numbers that are fully comparable to all motor vehicles in the country that are being used every day to transport hundreds of millions of people.

If you compare gun ownership not to all cancers, but simply to specific cancers, the comparison gets pretty close. Guns kill almost as many people as breast cancer in the United States and when you consider that 51% are female while only 47% of people live with guns, the numbers are almost the same. Gun owners are as harmful as breast cancer. They are way more harmful than mere brain cancer, because everyone has a brain but the death rate is less than half that of guns - making the total fatality rate for firearms more than four and a half times that of brain cancer. They are not innocent, they are not harmless law abiding folks. They are literally a cancer in society. And not a minor one, a genuine top five killing people cancer.

People owning guns is more deadly to the people around them than second hand smoke. It kills more people than drunk driving. If you could imagine a threshold by which anti-social behavior deserves to be regulated or banned due its measured harmful effects on other people in society, gun ownership has long passed it.

The whole idea that there is some tiny rotten core of gun owners that are giving everyone else a bad name is horseshit. Gun owners are dangerous and pointless as a cohort.

-Username17

[Kaelik]

I think that making big decisions like this should be done with a level head, rather than made rashly. Just look at the Patriot act, something passed when the nation was mad with grief.

No one is saying that we should make these decisions rashly. Everyone who is arguing against gun ownership was against gun ownership before this shooting. Before the batman one. In general. We are not rashly acting, we are talking about it because it is topical. Republicans are terrible people with terrible policies, and we always know that, but we talk about it more around elections. Because that is when it is topical.

All of us (except you) are aware that more guns equals more murder all the time. We are talking about it now, because it is topical in relation to the recent murders by gun wielders.

Here's how it is. I support forming gun laws to be sensible in effect and the safe use of firearms. I do not support blanket gun bans. My views are fairly close to the views in point 11 .

tl;dr "I think new regulation can be good, but bans are bad."

No, I'm not budging. Bring on the personal attacks. I'm done on this topic for now.

Here is the point: You are an idiot.

It was just pointed out to you that you have not at any point made even a single argument for why people actually should have guns. Literally none.

Your response is to reiterate that you are never going to compromise ever for any reason, but not to advocate even a single possible reason why people should be allowed to own guns.

Here are the crazy premises that we are operating under.

1) Owning guns provides basically no benefit to anyone, or an extremely negligible, easily replaced one.

2) More people owning guns equates to more people getting murdered.

3) People getting murdered is bad.

In order to have any possible argument that there should not be a total gun ban tomorrow you need to dispute one of those three premises.

I can think of lots of ways to dispute, frankly, all three of those, but fucking hell dumbshit, I agree with the conclusion, and think on balance that all of those are true.

You have steadfastly refused under any circumstances to give any reason to believe that any of those three things are false. Not even not given any reasons, you have refused to state that you believe one is false.

As far as I can tell, your argument for regulations instead of ban could just as easily be applied to literally anything, including number of times the government deliberately releases super viruses bent on destroying all human life.

So if you want anyone anywhere ever to respect you, you need to actually dispute one of those three premises before advocating for the continued availability of guns.

[Red Archon]

There are two arguments against gun ban.
1) Ain' no g-man tellin' me what to do. Strong advocates of this thinking usually include drunk drivers and parents who beat their kids.
2) I want to shoot my gun 'cause it makes me feel like Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction. People arguing this just don't care that they are cancerous to society, because shooting their murder-hurling instrument makes them feel like Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction and nothing else matters.

So either irresponsible or indifferent to the degree of being evil. Trying to reason with these personality types is an exercise in total rage-inducing futility.

[Whatever]

Where is Lago when we need a vitriolic rant against people who pick their political positions because they want to feel like a moderate and like the idea of being "reasonable", instead of actually evaluating both sides? Because fuck that noise. Sometimes one side is right, and the other side is wrong. When one side is against children dying, and the other side is for dead children, you don't get brownie points when you advocate a compromise solution!

[hyzmarca]

You have provided literally no good arguments in favour of your position. None. You're trying to concern-troll yourself as some kind of moderate "hey guys we can just institute these controls and let people have their deathsticks," but the simple fact of the matter is that you have provided not a single reason that allowing gun ownership is in any way beneficial enough to justify the thousands of murders and suicides that come about as a direct result of gun ownership. Those dead children are dead, right now, because advocates of gun ownership insist on holding on to their weapons. It doesn't matter how rigorous the screening procedures are: eventually someone will slip through the cracks. And then there'll be Christmas presents in that will never reach their intended recipients, and unnecessary funerals, flags at half-mast, and orphaned children. If you're actually trying to claim that even one murdered person is worth being able to hunt your own venison or shoot at a paper target, then you are an utterly reprehensible human being.

Perhaps it would be better to treat the actual cause of murder rather than remove the means to commit murder. If you have a society where people sometimes snap and kill other people, removing guns won't change that. At best, it's a stopgap measure that might reduce the number killed. The better solution is to find out why people sometimes snap and decide to kill other people and get rid of that, create a society where the stresses that drive people to commit murder simply don't exist.

[Korgan0]

You have provided literally no good arguments in favour of your position. None. You're trying to concern-troll yourself as some kind of moderate "hey guys we can just institute these controls and let people have their deathsticks," but the simple fact of the matter is that you have provided not a single reason that allowing gun ownership is in any way beneficial enough to justify the thousands of murders and suicides that come about as a direct result of gun ownership. Those dead children are dead, right now, because advocates of gun ownership insist on holding on to their weapons. It doesn't matter how rigorous the screening procedures are: eventually someone will slip through the cracks. And then there'll be Christmas presents in that will never reach their intended recipients, and unnecessary funerals, flags at half-mast, and orphaned children. If you're actually trying to claim that even one murdered person is worth being able to hunt your own venison or shoot at a paper target, then you are an utterly reprehensible human being.

Perhaps it would be better to treat the actual cause of murder rather than remove the means to commit murder. If you have a society where people sometimes snap and kill other people, removing guns won't change that. At best, it's a stopgap measure that might reduce the number killed. The better solution is to find out why people sometimes snap and decide to kill other people and get rid of that, create a society where the stresses that drive people to commit murder simply don't exist.

Why the hell are the two mutually exclusive? Banning guns will mean that less people are dead. So will putting measures in place that prevent people from snapping and murdering people. One of those is simple. The other one is complex. Both will result in fewer dead people.

[Username17]

Perhaps it would be better to treat the actual cause of murder rather than remove the means to commit murder. If you have a society where people sometimes snap and kill other people, removing guns won't change that. At best, it's a stopgap measure that might reduce the number killed.

That probably sounded like wisdom when you said it in your head, but once you put it out loud into the world, it's fucking stupid. Think about what you just said for a moment. Just sit back and consider the implications. You just seriously contended that reducing the number of people being killed wasn't worth pursuing so long as anyone anywhere was still being killed.

For fuck's sake: people die. It's a thing that happens. It is a thing that has always happened and it is a thing that always will happen. But people can and do still die less and more. If you save a life, you save a life. If you save thirty thousand lives every year, well that's a lot of lives actually.

The rampage in Connecticut killed 27 people. The rampage in China seriously injured 24 people but didn't kill anyone. That is the difference between insane people going to a primary school on a mission of death with a gun and insane people going to a primary school on a mission of death with a knife. The person in question might be equally sick and is certainly beneath contempt in either case - but we're still talking about human lives being ended or not.

By your logic we might as well just close up all the hospitals, because everyone is going to die eventually of something. This is not wisdom. It's not even foolishness. It's wickedness. And the fact you thought it was a wise thing to say is pathetic and you need to rethink your priorities. If you think that the difference between children dying and children living is a triviality that you should wax philosophical about rather than addressing, you are a bad person.

-Username17

[Ted the Flayer]

If almost all gun owners aren't harming anyone, why are you so against their continuing not to harm anyone?

The gun ownership rate in the US is actually greater than the car ownership rate in the US per capita. By your logic, the fact that most drivers don't kill people on a regular basis means we should get rid of driver's licenses and traffic laws.


That's fucked up, dude.

The whole purpose of traffic laws and licensing regulations is to bury the very poor in fees and to keep them from bettering themselves. The DMV is a parasitic organization and it would be better to have it dismantled, all employees and traffic judges be given 20 lashes as a warning, and forgotten.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/spi ... 48747.html

[DSMatticus]

At best, it's a stopgap measure that might reduce the number killed.

You do realize that you are describing achieving the goal we want to achieve (reduce the number of people who get killed) as a stopgap measure? If we could do something today as a society that had no significant negative consequences and less people died tomorrow as a result, that would be good in and of itself, regardless of what other measures we could take in addition to that. When it comes to pursuing non-exclusive strategies for reducing the number of deaths (at least, the ones with no significant negative consequences), the responsible answer will always be "all of the above."

[Username17]

Frank, you're strawmanning hyzmarca's position. He's not arguing in favor of letting children die.

Yes he is. He totally said that reducing the number of people who got murdered was a "stopgap measure" and that we should do other things instead. Those are his actual words.

His literal and actual position is that reducing the number of people killed by changing homicides into attempted homicides is something that is not worth doing. It is a position which is simultaneously abhorrent and baffling. To remind you:

If you have a society where people sometimes snap and kill other people, removing guns won't change that. At best, it's a stopgap measure that might reduce the number killed.

Apparently the fact that anyone is ever killed by anyone else under any circumstances by any means is no reason to reduce the number of human beings who are killed. I'm not strawmanning, him. His actual position is equal parts innumerate insanity and callous wickedness.

-Username17