Gun Control

[One Brow]

I read that half of gun deaths in the U.S. are from suicides. Does anyone know if that's a legit stat? I don't think those cases should be included in the numbers used in the gun debate unless people really want to argue about how to prevent suicides and think taking away gun rights is justified on the grounds of reducing suicide, which I don't think will fly.

How about we meet half-way: we should only include the difference in successful suicide rates between those who use guns and those who use other methods?

 

[One Brow]

I think guns are a more surefire (pardon the pun) method, but that's not a gun control argument in my opinion. I'm typically not in favor of laws that protect people from themselves and that's exactly what gun control to prevent suicides would be.
...
But I think this current push is focused on diminishing America's gun culture, not in reducing mass shootings or gun crime in general. One Brow has expressed that ideology time and time again: less guns = less gun death. And that's the bottom line. He doesn't care if many of those gun deaths are suicides, or gang vs gang shootings using illegally obtained and possessed firearms. Eventually, by arbitrarily reducing legal gun ownership, illegal gun usage will fall.

And I thought liberals didn't believe in trickle-down economics.

The myth of the always rational person. While sometimes people who choose suicide are rational (and those that are tend to be more successful with any method), most are not. They take too many pills, or too few, because they don't do research on the subject. The noose doesn't get tied correctly, the garage isn't fully sealed, etc. However, guns are highly efficient even with no research and no effort. My mother had an extra 20 years because she didn't use a gun. She became the primary daycare provider to three of her grandchildren because she didn't use a gun. She would have been the first person to tell you her suicide was a mistake, and that she was not thinking rationally.

So, every time you say that you're "not in favor of laws that protect people from themselves", you're supporting people actively acting against what would be rational, due to mood swings, loneliness, desperation, etc. Do you support letting every irrational person out of mental hospitals?

As for what I believe in regarding economics and similar issues, I believe in doing what works, whether it goes by the name "liberal" or "conservative".

 

[One Brow]

YES! Guns are used constantly to deescalate potentially dangerous situations.

From Bronco's statistics, there are 2-3 unintentional gun deaths every day, in addition to the 37 homicides and 25 suicides that would not have been deadly if guns were not available. So, do you have any reason to think your depiction happens 55 times a day in the US?

 

[Stoked]

The cry of the unenlightened individualist. What's really ironic is that, if I thought every gun owner would act as responsibly as you describe yourself acting, I would see no need for gun control at all. The reason you would not be allowed to do, or not do things like carry on a university, is completely unfair to you.

Ah, the cry of the self deluded enlightened one.

Most gun owners are as responsible as I am and the facts prove it. Even factoring in suicides and deaths in self defense cases the overwhelming number of gun owners are responsible owners.

You are trying to create laws based on what you think might happen. That is a poor, crappy reason to enact laws and I reject it.

 

[Stoked]

I read thru here and I have to admit that I admire One Brows level of trolling/self delusion. That **** is impressive.

We have the "unelightened individualist", "the myth of the always rational person" and other zingers.

Haha, **** is gold.

 

[Bronco70]

As one of the former A students who was also one of the surly kids at times, I find your ableist story to be the perfect example of the type of dichotomy that I was complaining about in the post I linked to. You can't divide the kids into separate groups of "A students" and "surly kids". If you reverse that, and allow only the A students onto the playground, you'll still get fights.

Wow and wow. You either completely missed the point of that analogy, or you blatantly chose to disregard and derail it.

I'll offer the same replay: laws the limit access have an effect on everyone, even those who are law-abiding;

That's right. They can limit a person's ability to protect himself.

How about we meet half-way: we should only include the difference in successful suicide rates between those who use guns and those who use other methods?

So gun related suicides are the only unacceptable kind? Got it.

 

[PearlWatson]

and just which universe is it that you live in?

We've had every kind of tyranny we can think of in this one. When are you going to wake up and smell the coffee? The whole thesis of your world view consists of the dogma that those who know best should have power to tell the rest.

Hasn't anybody ever been able to tell you anything? You're sitting on a pile of your own ****, and you think you've got it all figured out, principally because someone has been able to convince you they know it all.

Until you can make yourself comfortable with questioning authority, you won't be open to questioning yourself, or smelling your own stuff. . . . and you won't really be OK with letting human beings be free, either. Yah, I know you're hung up on a version of history and a world view that claims "progress" consists of certain ideals, all dressed up in the claim that these are the good ones.

But they are the same ideals that have been claimed by virtually every tyrant there ever was. This isn't progress. Human liberty would be progress, but authoritarian top down rule is not.

The reason why there is a Bill of Rights is because everyone who has ever had unlimited power has abused whatever human beings they had power over. And no, there is no "strong argument" for giving more tyrants more power, or to disarm the people.

While some people will use weapons to kill others piecemeal, one by one or maybe even whole schoolrooms of kids, as abhorrent as that is, it is nothing on the scale governments have done to their own citizens when the citizens were powerless to deter a tyrant. "Right Wing" dictatorships have killed thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, but idiological marxists and socialists have killed millions just in the past century.

It's a simple case of minimizing the whole range of risks, and those who ignore the risks governments pose against their own people are just not honest in their arguments.

So you're saying you won't respond if I call you SOB? I wonder if the filter here would even let me "engage Straw One Brow".

hmmm. .. . looks like the filter doesn't see that as a problem... . . . get Colton on it ASAP.

Look real One Brow, you're the man with the blog about the Universe, and I've watched you debate popular fiction about the meaning of everything pretty endlessly, and pointlessly. I do wonder who pays you to be on the internet for the amount of time you invest. . . . or how you actually earn your living. . . . but whatever.

I've seen in the immense volumes of your product where you actually look forward, like most "progressives" do, to the time when the UN's stated objective of absolutely no private people having any weapons is achieved, and "world peace" will be the result. . . . negotiated at the tables of unelected UN officialdumb to the complete satisfaction of statists worldwide. . . . . lol.

Until you recognize yourself for what you actually are, nobody can tell you any different from what you think. Besides believing in the promoted agenda of some the world's cleverest propagandists, which I suppose is a human right as well as self-defense. . . . . a lot of folks are as set in their ways as I imagine you are, in complete satisfaction with it all. But let me try one more time to unsettle you with some barbarous little pokes. . . .

do you or do you not realize that's it's just a waste of time to quibble about erudite distinctions in statistical categories of theoretical classifications of human beings? "reasonable citizens" don't exist in the minds of political strategists or government managers...... all citizens must be guided by the "reason" of the objectives of the statists. Anyone who doesn't agree with their agenda must be separated out, labeled as some kind of threat, and marginalized by the media somehow. . . . ignored. . . . called hateful slurs of some kind. . . . Even letting the government have the power to employ professionals to make those distinctions is going to result in horrific oppression.

No matter how airtight the psychiatric classifications can be made, the human who is completely predictable one day just might flip out tomorrow. And that goes for Presidents as much as for druggies behind the liquor store. No professional and responsible approach to management, imposed by the world's leading intellects, is going to be able to stop people from doing "wrong" when they decide to do it, nor stop them from inventing their own views and reasons different from what they're "told". History is replete with examples of tyrants and statists of every stripe who have gone over the deep end somehow, and become homicidal monsters on grand scales, or in unforseeable ways implemented forms of genocide within their own lands, and started senseless wars with neighboring realms. . . . . And that is why it's just a human right, to absolutely possess significant deterernce against the immediate threats to life, limb, or property.

An armed citizenry should be viewed as a civic duty, as the most convincing deterent we can ever hope for, against criminals, gangs of criminals, or governments gone wrong.

we will always have policemen who go bad, presidents or statesmen of any rank, kings and tyrants who go bad. We have scientists who go bad too. There is no place you can safely place your trust, and you have no legitimate business trying to tell other people where they should place theirs. . . .. speaking as an authority of any kind, that is. . . . it is nothing more than perhaps your opinion. God I hope it's your opinion, and not just something on your "talking points" sheet for the day.

And, finally, anyone who imagines a universe that is merely mechanical, or rational, or capable of being reduced to a mathematical equation, is just missing out on all the fun in life.

I loved reading these 2 posts filled with Babe's classic wit and wisdom.

I'm sure the rest of the ginormous thread is full of liberal ignorance I'm glad I didn't bother to read.

 

[Stoked]

I loved reading these 2 posts filled with Babe's classic wit and wisdom.

I'm sure the rest of the ginormous thread is full of liberal ignorance I'm glad I didn't bother to read.

While there is alot of that, many posters (GF, Salty, myself, bronco70...) have kept it honest.

 

[fishonjazz]

While there is alot of that, many posters (GF, Salty, myself, bronco70...) have kept it honest.

So the people on your side of the arguement? How convenient

 

[Stoked]

So the people on your side of the arguement? How convenient

He went of about liberals and not conservatives. If it was reversed one could say that One Brow, you, Jimmy eat jazz...

But hey you want to pretend to be offended so be my guest.

WOE IS ME! Someone said something edgy so I will pretend to act offended so they back down down. Well tuff ****. Each side serves to keep the other honest. If you don't like my stance then go pound sand.

 

[One Brow]

Most gun owners are as responsible as I am ...

I'll grant you 95% (even though I doubt it's quite that high), but the damage from the other 5% is huge. 95% of butchers would never sell contaminated meat, but the other 5% resulted in wide-spread food safety laws.

 

[One Brow]

We have the "unelightened individualist", "the myth of the always rational person" and other zingers.

If you're going to call me an egotistical, judgmental jackass, you better do it with a smile.

Of course, that's what you just did. I'm just letting everyone else know.

 

[One Brow]

Wow and wow. You either completely missed the point of that analogy, or you blatantly chose to disregard and derail it.

Because it couldn't possibly be that I reject the validity of the analogy and chose to attack it on that point. No, not possibly. I'm just too stupid or to narrow-minded to understand its marvelous explanatory value. Is that what you meant?

So gun related suicides are the only unacceptable kind? Got it.

I don't know why you would take a discussion as to whether to count a successful suicide as being attributable to the presence of a gun as a judgment on how "unacceptable" it is. I hope we can both agree that every irrationally undertaken suicide is unacceptable (and not delve into a discussion on whether there are rational suicides, or whether they are acceptable). Guns make irrationally undertaken suicides more likely to be successful. Is that in dispute?

 

[Scat]

Guns make irrationally undertaken suicides more likely to be successful. Is that in dispute?

It is disputable. I have some stats to counter your statement. I don't have time to pull them up right now but will do so later today.

 

[Stoked]

I'll grant you 95% (even though I doubt it's quite that high), but the damage from the other 5% is huge. 95% of butchers would never sell contaminated meat, but the other 5% resulted in wide-spread food safety laws.

So were do you draw the line?

5% of people might drink drano, might run around stabbing people, might bury pets alive, might run peopel over with cars, might...see the point.

Legislating just because what someone might do is a foolish slope to be on.

There are already laws about illegal gun use, murder...

Why pass laws that will hit the 95% but not the 5% since they do not follow the law anyways? The premise that I have to surrender, or have limited in some way, my rights becasue someone else is irresponsible is itself irresponsible.

 

[Gameface]

I'll grant you 95% (even though I doubt it's quite that high), but the damage from the other 5% is huge. 95% of butchers would never sell contaminated meat, but the other 5% resulted in wide-spread food safety laws.

You do know what percentage of American's are gun owners, right? Yet you think more than 5% are irresponsible with their guns?

You clearly do not understand the reverence for the destructive power of firearms that is entrenched in America's gun culture. The most frustrating thing in this debate is that nearly every last supporter of increased gun control is willfully ignorant in regard to that which they seek to ban. It is easy to imagine boogeymen in the closet if you never actually look in the closet.

I know I've said this multiple times and no one seems particularly impressed by my analogy, but I think those legislators who pursue increased gun control measures are like Utah legislators who pursue increased restrictions on alcohol. In both cases the proponents of their agenda are proudly ignorant of the item the seek to regulate and they see that item as evil and unnecessary, therefore only good can come from even the most ridiculous law to suppress it. That despite those who are not ignorant pouring their hearts out to offer meaningful and effective alternatives based on directly observed realities. Yet those suggestions are ignored because, it seems, that they are viewed as simple tricks to thwart any effort to do away with that which is evil. The error here is not in the fact that those who are not ignorant do not want to completely do away with the item in question, but in the assumption by the ignorant that said items are evil in the first place.

Guns exist! So instead of trying to pretend that we can make them go away, let's try to learn the best way for them to exist in our society.

 

[franklin]

So were do you draw the line?

5% of people might drink drano, might run around stabbing people, might bury pets alive, might run peopel over with cars, might...see the point.

Is it* still wrong if I dug it back out shortly after?



*neighbor kid

 

[One Brow]

5% of people might drink drano, might run around stabbing people, might bury pets alive, might run peopel over with cars, might...see the point.

Legislating just because what someone might do is a foolish slope to be on.
...
Why pass laws that will hit the 95% but not the 5% since they do not follow the law anyways? The premise that I have to surrender, or have limited in some way, my rights becasue someone else is irresponsible is itself irresponsible.

Not because of what the 5% might do, but because of what they actually do. Such as the 5% of butchers that did sell contaminated meat before there was a law.

 

[One Brow]

You do know what percentage of American's are gun owners, right? Yet you think more than 5% are irresponsible with their guns?

I think there is a much higher percentage of people that are irresponsible with guns than there are people who experience gun accidents, just like most people who text while driving don't don't have collisions or most people who don't secure their cleaning chemicals also don't have poisoned kids.

You clearly do not understand the reverence for the destructive power of firearms that is entrenched in America's gun culture.

I accept that the part of gun culture you interact with, read about, etc. has deep appreciation for that destructive power. I wish that appreciation extended further into issues like careful licensing and screening for not just mental health, but the knowledge and willingness to maintain proper care, but that's difficult in a partisan discussion. However, you are not the only type of gun owner, and you don't represent nor experience the entirety of the gun culture. As you said, there are a huge number of gun owners; we shouldn't pretend this represents some monolithic group with a common gun culture.

The most frustrating thing in this debate is that nearly every last supporter of increased gun control is willfully ignorant in regard to that which they seek to ban.

I think that's true for many control advocates, but there are also many who served in the military, are hunters, etc. There is no more a single gun control culture than there is a single gun culture.

Guns exist! So instead of trying to pretend that we can make them go away, let's try to learn the best way for them to exist in our society.

First, that's not necessary, as many societies do just fine with far fewer guns.

However, I agree they are entrenched in US culture, and that will not change in my lifetime. Not once in this entire thread have I said we should or could try to remove guns from our society. We just disagree on what the best way entails.

 

[Stoked]

Not because of what the 5% might do, but because of what they actually do. Such as the 5% of butchers that did sell contaminated meat before there was a law.

So you are willing to let your rights be trampled becasue others commit crimes. Not only that but the laws being passed, or that people are trying to get passed, will not stop those 5%!