Nope. Bring it back. If I can get my front door kicked in for smoking weed, you should too for drinking a much more harmful and addicting gateway substance.
I have to disagree on this. There are simply too many of them out there. To simply limit access to new guns would do nothing, at least not for a very long time. Anybody who wanted to do anything with a gun could still get one extremely easily.
Yes, murder by suicide would be another area that would see a deep drop in occurrence if handguns became illegal. That was a point I had forgotten. Thanks
Always love the mental gymnastics people pull off to convince themselves the existence of guns has no bearing on gun crimes
Drugs are cheap to buy and manufacture. Illegal guns would be neither. drugs are also addictive, guns are not. just stop with this comparison.
Yeah, but there were eight knife-wielding assailants. That, and you pretty much have to take into consideration that practically everything is more deadly in Asia.
If we could get past that first 10 years I think it would be potentially something I'd support. I think the spike in crime in years 1-X would be disastrous and an almost impossible sell - Yes, crime will increase, but jut wait 10 years and it will be so much better! also, a gun in the house is only one way a gun can be used for self defense. The fact that criminals fear guns is something I'd liek to hear addressed. What happens to criminals when you remove that fear? also - An American woman has a 25 to 26 percent chance of being raped in her lifetime (1 in 4). (Greenberg, Bruess and Haffner, 573; Horowitz, 413; Lips, 233). 1 in every 36 homes is burglarized in the US every year. If you are responsible with a weapon, any weapon not just a gun, you greatly reduce the adverse risks of owning that weapon. Owning a gun on the off chance that something bad might happen seems strange, but you wear a seat belt, you lock your doors, you get the instructions on what to do in a plane accident, etc. You take tons of precautions against things that are very unlikely to happen every single day. Having a gun is a precautionary measure. You hope you never need it, but if you do, you have it. What's the saying - I'd rather have a gun and not need it than need it and not have it.
I wouldn't' think new guns entering the system would be where people would get illegal guns. They'd already be there, so no need to manufacture. Over time the total number would decrease, but ho much time? 3D printing of guns would skyrocket also, making them A) cheap and B) easy to manufacture. As cheap as a $5 bag of weed? No., But it wouldn't be $4K to get a gun. How does addiction have anything to do with it? There are plenty of illegal things that are not addictive that people purchase. I will not stop.
Why would crime spike in years 1-x? Criminals fear guns? I'm no criminal, but I would guess that they'd fear being caught more than anything and that's why ideally they try to burglarize when no one is home. Harder to steal the flatscreen TV if the family of four is watching a Disney movie. The risk of a gun as a precaution is a lot higher than the risk of something going wrong because you locked your door or wore a seatbelt. Another thing I don't get is the relationship between guns as protection vs responsible gun ownership. If you have your gun locked away can you even get to it when three armed men break into your house? Seems like you almost need to have it lying around for it to be of any use.
It would spike because criminals would be more willing to commit crimes without the threat of being shot (which according to the inmate interviews is a real fear, a greater fear than the police). Thinking like a criminal, if you have a nation of armed people, then you remove their guns, don't you love that idea? Doesn't that make it easier for you to commit crimes? Or no? Especially if you, as a criminal, keep your gun. I'm speaking to the idea that it's silly to take a precaution against something very unlikely to happen. If you take it a step further and think the risk of a gun offsets that, I get it, but you can't say you don't understand taking a precaution. Often a gun can be put in a lock box, or gun vault. they make quite a few that are either designed to fit in a nightstand drawer, or on a side wall in a closet, etc. Biometric locks make access fairly quick.
You are correct that a locked up gun isn't much use if you cant get to it when you need it. Most people keep their home defense weapon in their bedroom because the most likely time you will get a home invasion when you're home is during the night when you're in bed. I keep my pistol in a biometric gun safe within reach of my bed. If in the unfortunate event that you are home during a daytime home invasion you're pretty much screwed unless you can get to your weapon. In CT there is no castle doctrine anyways, so you have to do everything you can to avoid confrontation which means leaving your own house or barricading yourself in a room (ideally the bedroom). If a home invader then tries to break into the room you've locked yourself into or a room that family members are in, then you are able to defend your family and yourself.
you have to do everything in your power to avoid harming the criminal who just broke into your house. brilliant. In Ohio we can just shoot em. Also, if you can't get to your gun, then what? Now you are in the exact same situation all non-gun owners are in. It's not like you are at a disproportionate disadvantage by having a gun and not being able to get to it vs. not having a gun at all.
The alternative to one gun in a safe in your bedroom is multiple guns hidden randomly throughout the house. I don't really have the money to have more pistols to properly cover the house. At least with a gun in the bedroom, a second floor room I can't escape from, I have a way to defend myself, especially if I'm woken in the middle of the night. I'm not quite as concerned about a break-in during the day when I am awake and most likely somewhere I can get out of my house from. Also CT is a terrible place to live for gun owners.
I keep a handgun in a safe by the bed, one buried in the sugar jar on the kitchen counter, one behind the toilet, one taped to the back of the gun safe, a shotgun in my golf club bag, a crossbow under the crib in the nursery, and a knife sewn into the left couch cushion.
I meant it in that it just doesn't make sense to spend all the money to have every corner of your house covered. If you would read the rest of my post you would see that doing so isn't much of a concern to me. You don't put a fire extinguisher in every room, you put it where you are most vulnerable. I'm sure there's plenty of people who have guns all over the place, but they're usually the assholes you hear about on tv where a kid found an unsecured gun and shot someone.
Responsible Gun Owner #1 Responsible Gun Owner #2 - Police Officer Responsible Gun Owner #3 Responsible Gun Owner #4 - Yikes
An unloaded firearm in a night stand for 15 minutes seems like a much better idea than leaving it in my car in a parking lot I'm not terribly familiar with.
And this is exactly why there are so many illegal guns available on the market. Someone bought them legally at one point.
I was listening to NPR this morning and apparently the U.S. is pretty much average against other wealthy nations in regards to almost all types of crime, except the murder rate which is seven times higher and gun murder rate which is 20 times higher.
Sometimes, I really think that we should split up into 3-4 different countries. Take the most divisive issues and provide relocation budgets to everyone who wants to move into the part of the country where everyone agrees with them.
the country with all of the guns would quickly rule the other 3. We sort of have that with the states. but the most divisive issues are typically the ones that are decided on a national scale.
Right, and that's one of our problems. Not only do I want the freedom to do whatever the hell I want, I want the freedom to live wherever the hell I want while doing whatever the hell I want and I want everyone else who lives there to do the same.
ha! It's funny that you believe that. Aren't each of our countries goign to have a military? How do you think I thought all of us sovereign citizen michigan militias were going to march into neighboring countries with out glocks and bushmasters take them over?
this is not real. right? British Police Call On Nation To ‘Save a Life, Surrender Your Knife’ As ‘Knife Violence’ Continues November 14, 2014 12:48 pm· The news out of the United Kingdom almost reads like a satire piece from The Onion. But as strange as it may sound to people around the world, and especially in the United States, the British police push to ban knives is no joke. The new “Save a Life – Surrender Your Knife” program is in full swing and police are telling us that they have joined forces with an already growing trend in the United Kingdom to ban “pointy” knives. Lancashire Police tell us that an “amnesty” program began at the end of August, and “more than 800 knives have been handed in across the county – including swords, machetes and commando knives.” “The amnesty was extended for a further week owing to its success,” Lancashire Police representatives explained. The Lancashire department explains that their “officers have now given their backing to a national initiative designed to raise awareness of knife crime and encourage the surrender of dangerous weapons.” In spite of the amnesty ending this week, police tell us that “people can continue to hand in any knife at any police station with a front counter as well being able to drop them into the designated bins.” Those bins will be in cities all over the U.K. as this call for people to turn in pointed knives continues. “We are keen to raise awareness of the devastating impact of knife crime and to reduce the number of families affected so we have decided to keep the knife bins indefinitely,” Detective Chief Inspector Steve Dowson said. “While projects encouraging the surrender of knives are not a single solution to violence, they have an important role to play in inspiring communities to get behind education and preventative measures,” he added. “Such campaigns show a desire to address local concerns and Lancashire Police is keen to throw our weight behind them in support. “We’ve been delighted with the response so far, but our communities have told us that they want an end to knife crime and that they want to work with us to make that happen.” A call from the British Medical Journal was published several years ago, arguing that “many assaults are committed impulsively, prompted byalcohol and drugs, and a kitchen knife often makes an all too available weapon,” according to the BBC. Researchers “consulted 10 top chefs from around the UK, and found such knives have little practical value in the kitchen. None of the chefs felt such knives were essential, since the point of a short blade was just as useful when a sharp end was needed.” Again, we remind our readers outside of the UK, that this is not satire, just another example of the government claiming they are here to protect us from ourselves. In the UK, the rate of knife violence is approximately one in every 374 people victimized, compared with a rate of one in 750 people victimized by gun violence in the United States. (Article by Moreh B.D.K.)
I spent years working in a tiny community in very rural Alabama that is made up almost exclusively of white people. I work in pharmacy and would have never thought heroin existed in that community or even in the county. After getting to know patients that were in the process of taking Suboxone to get clean, they would tell me that they had been using heroin daily before entering the program because of the cost and how easy it was to obtain. I was very surprised. I thought that heroin was a problem of large cities, not remote, white trash towns.
I really wish the US would adopt the swiss system. constant training about gun safety. membership in groups that are adamant about proper gun usage and safety. background checks. psychiatric evaluations it should probably be harder to get a firearm than a driver's license.
I came here to post that mental illness was/is the underlying cause of the majority of these mass killings. To me, perhaps one of the more pressing issues that health care is currently facing is treating mental illness. I think that overwhelmingly the majority of the homeless deal with mental illness. I also think that the majority of these people that go on killing sprees have mental illnesses that are untreated. The problem with treating people with mental illness is that in most cases they are somewhat capable of caring for themselves. In most cases, they are extremely functional when they are medicated. When they are not medicated, they can be absolutely terrifying. Mental illness is responsible for so many issues in this country, but is not typically championed by the media or special interests. Truly treating people with these issues would solve many more problems than a shooting or two a year, but the costs and monitoring would be astronomically expensive and there are people that would say that a person has a right to be untreated even if they are a danger to themselves or others in that state. Of course, if guns were not available, no one could use them to kill anyone. However, banning guns is a slippery slope. How will the police protect us? How will the police protect themselves? Is there a possibility that the police or military would abuse power if they were the only people with firearm access? If you control access, what is to keep someone from stealing the weapon? This guy killed people with a handgun that is extremely common. Why can we not agree that some people just suck and make terrible choices. If we choose to ban guns what is next? Should we ban vehicles because some people operate them poorly and cause infinitely more deaths yearly than guns? Should we ban fertilizer and/or diesel fuel because in combination they can be used to kill hundreds or thousands as an explosive? Or is gun control just another issue that really does not effect a huge percentage of this country that is a hot topic in the US. Do we care about gun control simply because Republicans and Democrats use these divisive issues, along with abortion, gay marriage, marijuana legalization, etc, to force people to pick sides and to ignore the issues that truly alter the course of our nation like taxes and foreign relations? The gun is not the problem in every case, although I admit that in certain cases, it contributes. Ironically, most anyone on this board could take a bolt action 30.06 and the right setting (think any tower) and kill person after person until a sniper took them out. That is a gun that holds 3 rounds and will never be banned. Most anyone with remote knowledge of a firearm and a decent plan could easily kill 10 people. Most anyone with a sword/large knife could also kill numerous people. Thankfully, most people are not psychopaths or dealing with debilitating mental illnesses that cause them to act erratically.
Ignore statistics and hard evidence for slippery slope arguments and ridiculous rhetorical questions.
I think that statistics would support that the majority of people that commit mass killings are mentally ill. I know statistics would support that the percentage of gun owners that have actually killed someone in non combat or self defense settings is far lower than the percentage of vehicle owners that have killed a person. The gun control issue is based on a tiny percentage of gun owners committing a crime. The same argument ignores that the overwhelming majority of gun owners act responsibly. For the record, I completely support controlling fully automatic weapons. No one without extensive training should be allowed to own a fully auto. Those weapons are too capable to cause harm. Controlling AR's, handguns, hunting rifles etc. is not comparable.