Gun violence close to home

[Hixter]

The arguments I hear from the anti gun control crowd seem to be focused on the idea that if new restrictions aren't going to solve all or most gun crimes, then it's not worth the effort.

First of all, background checks aren't new. They are already required -- I went through yet another one two weeks ago.

 

You're uttering the same "if it saves even one life it's worth doing" motto that our politicians are using to justify their new laws. I'd agree 100% if we lived in a perfect world and laws cost nothing to enforce.

[uncool2pillow]

1. Gun check are mandated for ALL gun sales??

2. I never said, if it saves one life, but more than the slightest difference, which was your argument.

 

I work for a public school system and work with kids at my church as a volunteer.  In both cases, I submitted to background checks at about $40+/each paid by the school and the church.  That's pretty damned expensive, but I am pretty sure if you had kids @ my school or church, you'd be glad those background checks were performed.  I would feel a bit more secure knowing 100% of legal gun sales involved background checks. 

 

And, frankly, I wouldn't mind passing those costs on to gun dealers and purchasers.  We can tax booze and smokes and higher rates than other items, why not guns? 

 

And WTF is with LaPierre and the NRA changing their tune on this from back in '99?  Because the NRA represents gun manufacturers and dealers way more than it represents gun owners.

[Hixter]

1. Gun check are mandated for ALL gun sales??

Yes, with the exception of individual-to-individual sales. Such sales can be divided into 2 types:

 

1) Nice Guy buys gun from other Nice Guy and would willingly comply with a background check, if required by law.

 

2) Bad Guy buys gun from other Bad Guy on the street. No background check required.

[uncool2pillow]

All LEGAL gun sales require background checks?  Even at gun shows??  That's my question.

[Hixter]

Gun show sales are considered individual-to-individual sales.

[uncool2pillow]

And therein lies the problem.  Can't we admit that it's an incredibly stupid loophole.

[Hixter]

I wasn't talking about people who sell guns for a living at shows; as far as I know they have to perform background checks if selling guns is their profession. It's not a loophole because most of the sales are by an individual to an individual. It's the same as if I sold a rifle to my neighbor -- it would be ridiculous for the government to expect me to run a background check on him.

[uncool2pillow]

I have no problem with the government regulating person-to-person sales of guns.  They are deadly weapons.  Just like I may appear to not be a pedophile (I generally do not wear trench coats, Members Only jackets, or glasses with large frames), I may be.  Therefore, the school ran a background check on me to see if there I had any criminal record suggesting I might be.  You may sell a gun to someone who doesn't look like a sociopath (the Aurora, shooter, e.g.) but I bet you or any other "responsible" gun owner, would've sold to that L.A. cop now on the lam.

[Hixter]

Just like I may appear to not be a pedophile (I generally do not wear trench coats, Members Only jackets, or glasses with large frames), I may be.  Therefore, the school ran a background check on me to see if there I had any criminal record suggesting I might be. 

And yet you could molest a child tomorrow, so what would keep things like that from happening in the future? Politicians would insist that more laws would need to be written to "save" us.

 

 You may sell a gun to someone who doesn't look like a sociopath (the Aurora, shooter, e.g.)

I would never sell a firearm to the crazy-eyed guy with the kooky orange hair. To be honest, I wouldn't sell to anyone I didn't know personally. To be even more honest, I wouldn't sell my guns. 

[Ghost of Electricity]

Would you give them up if they became illegal?  Would you sell them to the government as part of a buyback scheme if they did?

 

Anyway, it's no use preaching to the unconvertable on this issue.  I would advise those of you who DO think rationally to save your breath for people who agree in theory but can't be motivated to get off their butts to do anything about it.  

 

here's a link to an online petitionsponsored by "The Nation" to suppport the bill: http://salsa3.salsalabs.com/o/50923/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=9267

[uncool2pillow]

To be honest, I wouldn't sell to anyone I didn't know personally. To be even more honest, I wouldn't sell my guns. 

Excellent. Some common ground. Also background checks minimize, don't eliminate, risk.

[Magnetized]

I ranted on a similar topic earlier and I won't repeat myself here, but I will just say that this quibbling over the fine points of gun registration, etc., seems to me like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The whole culture of gun worship/fascination seems inexplicable to me. They're instruments of death! A dark, miserable manifestation of the meanest, ugliest side of human nature.

 

There are bad people with bad motivations who want guns, and we have law enforcement agencies who need similar weapons to protect the rest of us from them. Quite frankly, that's about where I personally think any interest in guns should end. I'm sure there are some legitimate exceptions, but I honestly can't think of what they are right now. I know people like to hunt, but I say fuck 'em.

 

This fetishizing of guns is almost uniquely American. Other cultures find it quite curious and think of us a a whole nation of drive-by shooters, cowboys and gangsters. Not to mention, being comfortable around guns gives unstable, depressed, desperate people an efficient means to inflict the maximum harm on themselves and others.

 

It sickens me to even talk about this!

[Ghost of Electricity]

Write your representatives in Washington and tell them that.  We need the 2nd Amendment repealers to come out of the closet.

[Tweedling]

"I know people like to hunt but I say fuck 'em"

Really?

Guns are here to stay. I know there are people who don't like guns but I say.... Sorry

I've never really bought into the whole belief that one day we'd have to fight the government to keep our guns but to see people speaking of repealing the 2nd Amendment I can see a possibility of some sort of bloody revolution. Gun owners tend to be proud people with a deep herritage of using guns for sport, hunting and recreation. There are generation after generation of families who cherish the unique right we as Americans have to own and operate guns. To mention taking that right away..... I don't like to think what could happen.

[Ghost of Electricity]

If your revolution will be bloody it will be my blood and it will be on your hands.

[uncool2pillow]

Write your representatives in Washington and tell them that.  We need the 2nd Amendment repealers to come out of the closet.

There aren't even close to enough of you.

[Hixter]

Would you give them up if they became illegal?  Would you sell them to the government as part of a buyback scheme if they did?

No and no.

 

 

I would advise those of you who DO think rationally to save your breath for people who agree in theory but can't be motivated to get off their butts to do anything about it.  

 

here's a link to an online petition sponsored by "The Nation" to suppport the bill: http://salsa3.salsalabs.com/o/50923/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=9267

My thinking is quite rational and that petition is full of crap. It claims that there are hundreds of deaths each day due to gun violence; the actual number is less than 25.

[Tweedling]

If your revolution will be bloody it will be my blood and it will be on your hands.

I hope neither one of us have anything to worry about.

[Magnetized]

For what it's worth, I wouldn't take up the cause of advocating for repeal of the second amendment. Talk about tilting at windmills! I can't imagine that could ever happen and it would just lead to more gridlock and polarization, as well as wasting time on an ultimately unwinnnable propostion.

[KevinG]

I wasn't talking about people who sell guns for a living at shows; as far as I know they have to perform background checks if selling guns is their profession. It's not a loophole because most of the sales are by an individual to an individual. It's the same as if I sold a rifle to my neighbor -- it would be ridiculous for the government to expect me to run a background check on him.

 

If I sell my car to my neighbor, I have to file that sale with the state.  There is a minimum a record of that sale.  If I sell a gun to my neighbor no one knows.  

 

If the same laws for cars were applied to guns (titling, registration, licensing of users, training of users) would that be a bad thing?  The back ground check would be done by the State.  would it keep every gun out of the hands of people who would do harm with said gun?  Does it inconvenience you as a gun owner?  Is that inconvenience limit your rights?  

 

I hate the argument, that gun laws don't stop criminals from getting and using guns.  Drunk driving is a serious problem in Wisconsin, we have several laws against dunk driving, but yet nearly weekly I see a story that some has been pulled over for their 4 or 5th OWI.  Apparently people are still going to drink and drive.  So by the pro-gun logic we should end enforcement of drinking and driving.  Obviously it is not working, right?

 

I am saying there is not a cultural problem with guns, this needs to be looked at, and it should be looked at and dealt with.  But that is not going to change over night.  Furthermore, it the political party who have aligned themselves most with the pro-gun people, who really do the littlest to try to solve the underlining problems of gun violence.  

[uncool2pillow]

Look at what a few laws and A HUGE SHIFT IN CULTURAL THINKING has done to the amount of smoking in the U.S.  Smoking hasn't been banned, but it sure has been reduced and ostracized.  The same thing can happen with guns.  We outlawed Joe the Camel, can we outlaw the marketing of guns that equate owning a particular gun with manliness?

[Ghost of Electricity]

No and no.

 

My thinking is quite rational and that petition is full of crap. It claims that there are hundreds of deaths each day due to gun violence; the actual number is less than 25.

gee there's a statistic to be proud of.  takes japan what, ten years to reach that noble number.  get a grip.

 

 

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/01/20/more-americans-have-died-from-domestic-gunfire-than-all-wars-in-u-s-history-is-that-true/

 

i liken the struggle to the civil rights struggle.  No, it won't be achieved over night.  These might be days of slavery, so to speak, but eventually it will happen.  The truth will eventually prevail, it always does.

[lost highway]

Maybe I can summarize:

 

There seems to be an effort to close some loopholes and reduce the statistical probability for violent crime using guns by a few percent, you know tens of lives a year.  Not sure what's threatening about it. 

 

There is also a more radical vision for a U.S. without guns.  I think all sides recognize it as a long-shot.

 

Then there is the radical pro-gun side.  Aside from quipping about how misguided a bureaucrat's view of an 'assault rifle' is, I'm seeing a counter argument as insane as the "defense against tyranny, American values, bald eagle" approach, or as shallow as the "dude I just like guns for fun, so no you can't take them away."  I realize these two caricatures are over-reaching and less than flattering- but I want to insight a clearer defense.  Strip away emotion, vague concepts about America, what is really so essential about the right to launch lead pellets with deadly force out of a metal barrel.  How valuable is that?

[Magnetized]

what is really so essential about the right to launch lead pellets with deadly force out of a metal barrel.  How valuable is that?

 

I love you, lost highway. You say what I was trying to say so much better and so much less emotionally than I do.

[Tweedling]

I enjoy shooting pellet guns too.