Guns

[Bonefish]

Apparently, you misunderstood me. So I'm going to try this again: our legislation regarding vehicles has been based on reality, on measurable data. Our legislation on guns, on the other hand is not. Hence me trying to make the metaphor there. That apparently confused the point I was making.

Banning high capacity magazines, or semi-automatic box fed rifles, or after-market modifications that simulate automatic fire, or proposing limits on ammunition purchasing(or a "watch list" of some sort for "unusual" purchases), or banning tannerite, or requiring insurance, will have no measurable impact on firearms homicides. Hence the "banning red cars, or cars with roll cages" line of metaphor. These are laws which, at best, will add additional burden to law abiding firearms owners, and at worse, will serve to produce more criminals as formerly law abiding citizens are now forced to break the law.

And no, it's not only the "bereaved" or whatever who are proposing gun bans. There isn't one time this topic is discussed that someone doesn't mention the "Australian" model, which is fundamentally a gun ban, and which has had no measurable impact on firearms homicides or suicides in Australia. The 1994 assault weapons ban, which is frequently brought up by the politicians and lobby groups that advocate for "common sense" gun laws, explicitly banned firearms for cosmetic features, not for the way they function. Again, these are laws that have meaningless impact on reality, but I guess they feel good. In this thread alone, banning "assault weapons" has been mentioned multiple times.

Even the wording used: "assault style", "military style", "weapons of war" is intended to conjure up images of the battlefield, of movie villains using automatic weapons(which have been illegal for 31 years now), using these weapons on our streets. The truth is, these are meaningless definitions. An assault weapon is whatever you want it to be: a mini-14 in it's classic wooden stock version is considered a "sporting rifle", but a mini-14 with an black synthetic furniture, an AR-15 style stock /w pistol grip, and weaver or pictanny rails is an "assault weapon". Functionally, the two are the same: semi-automatic rifles that are fed by a detachable box magazine. It's the difference between a red bronco being a Sport Utility Vehicle, and a black bronco with a roll-cage being a "Urban Assault Vehicle", i.e., no real difference.

When I see proposals that will have no meaningful impact on the illegal and improper use of firearms, but will only impede the legal and proper usage of firearms, I can assume two things: either the person suggesting them is ignorant of the subject, or they have another motive behind their proposal. The ignorance is something I can try to address, though it tends to fall on deaf ears. But the ulterior motive is something I cannot address, because it implies a level of dishonesty in the argument. And I can only assume that the ulterior motive is to make firearms ownership more difficult and restrictive, to gradually impose a wholesale ban of common use firearms.

And this is why I don't typically approach this subject with any degree of seriousness anymore. The people who are pro-gun are pro-gun, and the people who are anti-gun, are anti-gun. And that's not going to change. Mimekiller posed a great question earlier: why have gun homicides decreased, while the overall number of guns continued, and continues to rise? And I have asked a similar question: if gun ownership leads to more crime, why are the legal owners of guns least represented in crime statistics, both as victims and as perpetrators? Why is gun violence higher among communities with less gun ownership?

[Mike]

Gun deaths AND overall homicide rates are actually down significantly in Australia since 1996. That's easily verifiable.

http://www.factcheck.org/2017/10/gun-co ... a-updated/

Is it because of their 1996 gun laws (in whole or in part)? Maybe, maybe not. I would say it played a role, but many have argued not. Okay.

The better discussion is whether or not something similar could work in the U.S. I say probably not. Our situation is very different and requires a different approach.

By the way, Bill, I admire your approach to discussions on this board. You are a thoughtful voice of wisdom (to me at least). I appreciate and look forward to your replies.

[Bonefish]

[Mike]

You didn't say deaths increased, you said there was no evidence of impact while leaving out the fact that gun deaths and overall homicide rates did in fact decrease. I also said it's possible that the two were not related (correlation/causation).

I felt like you were intentionally leaving out mention of the decreases and obscuring it with the "no evidence of impact" line. So I quoted the facts while pointing out that they may not be connected. I wasn't assuming causation or drawing conclusions. I just put the fact out.

It occurs to me now that I have only checked in on this discussion sporadically, so maybe someone else trotted out those numbers and you were merely responding. If so, then maybe I misread your intent.

Your vehement response to me though is upsetting. It seems to me that you don't think much of me and simply assumed the worst of intentions. But maybe I'm misreading you again. Wouldn't be the first time.

[bralbovsky]

Poverty, Crime, Racism, Sexual assaults, are really big, complicated issues. Controls for experiments are hugely challenging, and legislation that attempts, especially through the passage of a single law or set of laws can be pretty much guaranteed to fail.

To talk about crime in general, violent crime in particular, crime where guns are involved specifically, requires that we be careful of our data. Good data is hard to find. I'll remind everyone here, that gun data specifically, has been purposely made more difficult by legislation. This fact alone should be a red flag, but instead it provides the advocacy side with "insufficient data" as a legitimate reason to defeat any controls at all.

If Stephen Leavitt is to be believed, the single largest influence on the dramatic reduction in crime a few decades ago was not enforcement or dollars spent, or any of the crime legislation, it was the availability of abortion. Go figure. That's another thread.

To be specific, we are talking about - at least I think we are talking about - guns used in mass shootings specifically, with some bleedover into gun deaths in general. We all agree, I hope, that statistically, the US has a problem. Where we disagree are in the causes of that problem, and in how to respond.
Red cars, actuarially speaking, ARE involved in more enforcement events. Whether the police are more likely to stop a red car, whether folks don't see them as well, or whether they are driven more recklessly, it's hard to say. There are still red cars for sale. Nobody has suggested banning red cars. Some insurance companies charge more for them, just like they include your mileage, your proximity to a city, your car's attractiveness to thieves. They use data, lots of it, to arrive at these figures, whether they are fair or not.

Let's also agree, I hope, that it would be nice if the laws we had were enforced, or at least complied with by our public institutions (I'm looking at you USAF). Consistent enforcement would go a long way to reducing much of the friction of our lives. It would also prevent more cowardly shootings of black and brown people, of course, it would also be nice if really rich, really evil guys didn't always escape justice, so I'm not optimistic.

So, given that the present laws are likely to be enforced at the present nominal level, it is by no means an ulterior motive to make getting a gun more difficult. That's the point. As hard as it is to separate the sheep from the goats (Not a sheeple reference, a biblical one) we should try. There is, in my view, an appropriate difficut-ness that we should strive for, that balances the right to be part of a well-trained militia, and simultaneously impedes tragic use.
There are way too many prisons, and way too many people in them. If gun offenders were locked up with the alacrity that drug offenders are locked up, (This, by the way, is based on my first hand grand jury experience) we'd all be better off, and I'm generally against legalization. So please don't presume I want a punitive culture that doesn't generally let folks do what they want because I want it to be hard for psychotics to get bullets.

[Bonefish]

[bralbovsky]

It's become a perennially frustrating topic.

If only the cops had actually done their difficult job, we might not have had another tragedy this week.

Once again, I posit the attempt to compare pineapples to tangerines. Colt and Remington invented the idea of the way the west was won, and with which tools. That idea, and the romantic hardware that made it possible, became a unique feature of American culture, which Hollywood promptly attempted to export. Personally, I find offshore regulations interesting, but irrelevant. For starters, no Second Amendment, so no valid comparison either way.

Having said that, onshore, what data can we use? I'd suggest going back to cars because it's less inflammatory, and because I think on many levels it's a fair analogy.
It's disingenuous to claim that regulations have no impact. It's fair to be uncertain about their specific impact.
It's facile to cite bad or ineffective laws, like the ones in Chicago, and presume that there are no well-conceived ways to manage these things.

One fact that skews the data horribly, the limited data we have, is that a relatively small segment of the population owns most of the guns. It's not exactly parallel to the 1%, but to say that gun sales have increased, or to cite the number of guns vs the general population, is to pretend equal distribution, which there certainly is not.
We have only rough data on this, for reasons I've mentioned before, lots of estimates.

All I'm asking for is consistency of logic. Don't represent my position as something it's not. Don't scream that I'm coming to everyone's house to take their firearms. I won't declare that pro gun folks (except maybe LaPierre, who's laughing all the way to the bank) like these tragedies to occur or condone them or even shrug their shoulders collectively. They are, however, resisting solutions, and the rational discussion of solutions. Is it intransigence, selfishness, fear, apathy? That I don't know.

[Bonefish]

[Bonefish]

[bralbovsky]

The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law.

This is England, excluding Northern Ireland, circa 1800, from something allowing protestants to be armed in the 12th century. The "by law" part of that has been eroded or ignored as a "right" willy-nilly ever since. Pretty much every time rich people thought poor people whom they had just sent to fight a war had too many guns. It hardly exists in practice as a remotely inalienable right.

[Bonefish]

We have had a 39% decrease in gun violence since 1993. We are at historic lows for gun violence. For only 10 years of that historic downturn, have we had a restrictive policy on firearms. We continued to see declines in firearms violence after that law expired. And yet, we apparently need to "fix" something that is by all measures fixing itself.

[Bonefish]

[bralbovsky]

Clearly an error, my apologies. The order dates to Henry 8, and therefore 16th. I'll endeavor not to type without my glasses in the future.

I'm fatigued by trying to be patient with your tone.

[Phoebe]

I don't understand the argument that one result of firearms restrictions is, "formerly law abiding citizens are now forced to break the law." Who's forcing them to break the law? Can't they just decide to follow the law, if they're such law-abiding citizens?

I also don't understand the argument that gun restrictions have to meet some exceptionally broad burden of proof that they're going to be directly responsible for saving lots of lives. Why can't we make restrictions we think are common sense and may have some role in the complex of causes that leads to lives saved, assuming we judge those restrictions to be within the confines of the Constitution's prescription? What's dishonest or evil about that? People can be expected to disagree about every one of these factors but it doesn't seem inherently malicious to advocate for one or another position. Some people think that any restriction what so ever placed on gun ownership is a violation of the Constitution; others think you're okay as long as you get a musket or a non-govt. militia.

I don't have much stake in these debates. But I think if we're going to talk about illegal gun violence and saving lives, we might want to talk about where all the illegal guns come from. And if we're going to talk about public health in a broader sense, it would be interesting to know why our political system is being hijacked by one gun advocacy organization that invests millions of dollars in candidates that have to pass a very stringent litmus test. If the goal is really to save lives from gun deaths by making policy to invest in communities and human beings where illegal gun use is disproportionately prevalent, then one of the best things we could do is get the NRA the hell out of funding politicians.

[Bonefish]

If you make the possession of semi-automatic rifles illegal, then you either have a lot of people turning in those rifles(which are not cheap), or people continuing to illegally possess them. Hence the statement of making "criminals out of law abiding citizens". People who had, until that law was passed, done nothing illegal, would now be criminals by the stroke of the pen. That bothers me. Particularly, as someone who has a stake in both gun ownership and the realities of firearms homicides, I'm quite invested in this issue. My sons will eventually be young black men, who are the most at risk for firearms related homicides(something like 1 in 6 young black men are the victims of firearms homicides). I would like to decrease those odds, but I, for the life of me, cannot understand how me surrendering my legally owned firearms is going to stop them from being shot by someone who has no legal right to own a firearm.

I've listed the problems with "common sense" gun law proposals: they largely have nothing to do with the rate of firearms violence in this country, and will have negligible impacts on the subject. Which of course means, that when the next mass murder to catch the public eye comes along, the same people advocating for "common sense" gun laws will be out there, asking for... i guess more commoner sense gun regulations? And there's no compromise here, it's either "common sense"(and fundamentally ineffectual) gun laws, or "extreme right". Because "common sense" has become a way to paint what are attempts at banning particular classes of firearms based off cosmetic features as benign. They are not benign. They are proposing removal of my rights because... reasons.

I ask for the reasons, and I don't get an honest answer. I'm told that we have a statistical problem with "mass murders", that we have too much homicide in comparison with other nations. We don't have a statistical problem with mass murders: we're right in the middle of the pack, internationally. The rate of mass murders/active shooters has increased, somewhat dramatically since the 2000s. It's also done that internationally, even in countries with far more restrictive gun policies. Our homicide rate is high, but it's not particularly high for the Americas as a region, and is closer to European average than it is to the American average. Our homicide rate is the lowest it's been in about 60-70 years, and is generally trending downwards.

Proposing assault weapons bans, or magazine capacity bans, or no fly-no buy, or any of the proposals that have been currently suggested on the legislative front, those are not addressing the problem of violent homicide in this country, they're not addressing the disproportionate incidence of homicide among young black men, they're not addressing a confusing and difficult to understand patchwork of gun laws, they're not doing anything except making it harder for normal, law abiding citizens to acquire firearms. Thus, they are attempts to "take away guns" or to make it harder to acquire them(which is, really, the same thing) for people who should have that legal right. If you want to take away guns, or make it harder for people to legally acquire them, then say that, explicitly. Don't imply that you don't want to do those things, then advocate for the same thigns you're claiming not to advocate for. That's intellectually dishonest.

And the NRA is not some shadowy organization that gets it's money from shadowy places. The NRA gets it's millions of dollars that it uses for political contributions from it's members, who are the law abiding gun owning and using people of this county who want to retain their rights. We haven't been "hijacked", we're expressing our desires to have our interests considered on a national level, before we get some silly bullshit law that we have to deal with for 10 years or so, or before we go down a permanent route that we find dangerous(say... mexico or the majority of American countries) and ineffectual.

[Bonefish]

This is legally a "pistol". You have to be 21 years of age, have a pistol purchase permit, etc to buy this. But it's a "pistol"



This is a Short Barreled Rifle, which is a National Firarms Act restricted item. To buy one, I need to be 18, send a copy of my fingerprints and it's serial number to the ATF, along with a $200 dollar chec for a tax stamp(i will have to pay this every year), have it registered, and get approval or have a class III federal firearms license(which would also allow me to make machineguns and own them.

Functionally, the two are identical. But if I took the stock off the bottom one and put it on the top one, then I'm breaking the law. Common sense, right?



This is a ruger mini-14, which was 100% legal under the 1994 Assault Weapons ban.



this is ALSO a ruger mini-14, with aftermarket modifications. This would be illegal under the provisions of the 1994 Assault Weapons ban. Common sense, right? They are both the same gun: a semi-automatic, gas powered rifle that feeds from a detachable box magazine, with the same operation and capabilities. The bottom one isn't any more a weapon of war than the top one, but the bottom one "looks" scarier. Because of cosmetic feature changes. Really, they're more like ergonomic and modularization changes: pistol grips are easier to hold than traditional one piece stocks, the telescoping stock allows for one to adjust the fit of the rifle's length of pull to their own preference, the rails allow one firearm to be configured in multiple ways, such as mounting a bipod for hunting or target shooting, changing the optic depending on what you're going to do, adding a light or laser sight, adding a forward grip, etc. Common sense tells us though, that the bottom gun is more dangerous.

Hell, the top gun is legal to own in california, with a few modifications, while the bottom gun is illegal(with those same modifications). What sense does this make?

And the majority of firearms homicides are commited with something that looks like this: . Which isn't an "assault weapon" and is california legal(including the 10rnd magazine!).

[Phoebe]

I'm not really sure who all of this argument is directed toward. I wanted to know what "common sense" gun regulation would look like. A lot of different ideas, some probably good and some probably bad, have been tossed out in this thread and were worth pondering. If a proposal to restrict guns won't be effective at making anyone's life safer, then I doubt the people HERE proposing it would really want it. Maybe there are people all over who just lie and cheat and manipulate facts and whatever it takes to get the guns banned, and by the way they're doing a terrible job and have been a total failure at that effort! So why so worried about those people, who are not here, who are not trying to think of common sense regulations that actually make lives safer?

Are you really arguing that there is no thing whatsoever we could do to change our gun policy to make lives safer? Come on. Where do the illegal guns come from? This is one I happen to know for reasons, well, I can't say but I know this one. Mainly they come from "law-abiding gun owners" not being law-abiding at all, insofar as they go and buy a gun on behalf of someone who isn't supposed to have one. Or they come from "law-abiding gun dealers" being really, really non-law-abiding and engaging in all sorts of shady practices to juice their profits and help distribute guns to people who shouldn't be buying them, and who are not Jane Q. Public with her hunting rifle, personal protection handgun, or whatever.

I don't know about the rest of the people here, but you're talking to someone who at least in theory might be a gun owner, and most people in my family are gun owners, and some of them shoot competitively, and some of us have or are trying to obtain concealed carry permits, and so on. This audience over here, on my end, is not an anti-gun audience. I know the difference between types of guns, and watch in dismay after every mass shooting as half my friends on social media get upset about guns, and the other half give a patronizing lecture about the ACTUAL difference between assault rifles and other guns, as if semantics and definitions are a completely insurmountable obstacle to enforcing effective gun regulation. How about we start REALLY pursuing and prosecuting the people who are the sources of all the illegal guns? Thefts account for a small number relative to other sources, but what if we demanded that you have insurance for your guns just like your car, in case they wind up being involved in an accident? Are you telling me people's constitutional rights are violated by the set of extremely effective hoops we make them jump through to get a concealed carry permit, and that we couldn't do something like that for all gun owners? Does everyone need a bazooka or is there literally no limit to the amount of firepower and personal weaponry that can be owned? The natural response of NRA supporter to that question is to give a mini-lecture about bazookas, as if that's the point. If people are funding the NRA, which in turn funds extreme right wing politicians who are doing jack shit about the social problems in this country that encourage gun violence and deaths, then those people are part of the problem and should own it. They're the ones fixated on false solutions, instead of focusing their investment of resources on actual solutions. What has the NRA done lately about drug trafficking or gang violence? They don't do shit that is helpful, period.

[Mike]

We don't make people criminals "with the stroke of a pen". They are only criminals if they choose not to comply within the 6 month or 12 month grace period or whatever it is.

As far as I'm concerned I'm not worried about taking anyone's guns away. I say give everyone one calendar year to get themselves properly licensed to own/use/carry a firearm and properly register their weapons. And if it were me setting it up, I would also include a buyback option for anyone who wants to get rid of their firearms for any reason, but I wouldn't make it mandatory.

I'd also make sure that tracking of firearms starts at the factory and follows through wholesalers and dealers out to the ultimate consumers.

[Phoebe]

I don't know how other people would respond to this, but my response would be that it is way too difficult to try to extract all these guns from the tiny percentage of gun owners who have such a mass supply of them. The main thing I'm worried about it's not those people who hoard guns giving them up; rather, the goal is starting to make a glacial shift in the society by setting policy for the future. Why do people need to buy those weapons now? Why do people need to buy them without training or without licensing or without insurance or without tracking? Why aren't we enforcing provisions related to illegal gun sales? What if people knew there was a strong likelihood they would be severely punished for helping someone obtain a gun - what do they call that, straw sales? - for the gun dealers who Skirt the Rules would not just face some form of sanction but would actually be criminally liable? Then you're not dealing with the cold dead hands people in some sort of direct confrontation over giving up a thing they already have. I don't have any sympathy for the argument that legislation would "force" them to violate the law, any more than that happens in other situations. Fireworks legislation has caused me to choose not to violate the law. And we can go on with examples from there. But I do have sympathy with the idea that it's impossible to try to extract these weapons from people at this time. There would need to be a major cultural shift and a bunch of other things happening, and at that point it might not be worth while.

[Bonefish]