Guns v Liberty Issue

14 people just did.

 

They were killed by terrorists who used guns, not the gun by itself.

 

The holes in their heads and chests suggest otherwise.

 

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"There is no better man enhancer than a gun.
Well, okay, maybe a toupée.
Toupées don't kill people. People kill people -
when they jam them down other people's throats.

But you'd feel kinda silly fondling a toupée."​

 

Ready to ban Muslims?

 

Every man/society has its "price".

As people's loved ones are touched over time... things WILL change.

 

As with any bureaucracy, more authoritarian control of individuals. Beware of what you wish for.

 

I would like to know what happened to the "RIGHT TO LIBERTY" of all the people shot this year in the US. What happened to MY liberty to feel safe from gun fires when I walk in a US street? What happened to my kids' liberty to go to school without having to go through a metal detector, or without the fear of a crazy guy with a gun. . .or a tooth against one or the other "authority figure?"

What happen to the liberty of women wanting to receive health care (or even a legal abortion) from a female clinic (Planned Parenthood to name one organization) without being harassed OR EVEN shot?

What trumps one's liberty should be another one's liberty to feel safe. . .and MANY People feel a lot safer AWAY from guns than with a gun in a locker or in a "concealed" holder! If I ever see a person with a gun in a grocery store, I would leave IMMEDIATELY and NEVER set a foot there again (as I have never returned to Kroger in South Carolina, because the corporation allowed open carry in their stores).

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Well. . .bureaucracy and more authoritarian control of individuals seem to be exactly what the GOP wants!

Look at "control over women's uterus," and "control over people because of their religions (Trump and "special identification for Muslims)"

Tell me again who wants "smaller government?"

 

OMG, your wanting to "feel safe" does NOT trump my RIGHT to actually BE safe and free.

At least though I should thank you for admitting that what really drives you and those like you is nothing more then hoplophobia.

 

A much better idea, it'd be much easier and more effective.

 

Statistic show that your owning a gun puts you in MORE danger to die from a gun shot than my NOT owning a gun.

So. . .you are actually living in a FALSE sense of safety!

http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/160/10/929.full

 

You can use the same gun control arguments. If it saves just one life. Who would be against this 'common sense' law?

 

You mean two terrorists killed 14 people using illegal guns.

 

Oh absolutely, but is the proper response to then deprive 200 million innocents of their liberty as a means to force these shooters to walk down to the street corner and purchase their weapons from criminals (as they did in Belgium with the Bataclan shooting)? I answer emphatically in the negative.

In any case - all gun control is irrelevant which targets anything but handguns. Handguns account for the vast majority of gun crime, yet they will never be prohibited. A criminal will always be able to get a semi-automatic handgun with a detachable magazine. One of those in each hand is all you'll ever need for any sort of shooting. If they feel otherwise, they're always free to spend an hour looking for a black market AK-47 like the Bataclan terrorists did. Black markets aren't magically ineffective for guns - they're every bit as much in supply as drugs are. The gun war is just the drug war with a different target.

 

You are forming your opinion from emotion, and not from rational thought.

So, just taking this statement at face value; In order to preserve a relatively few people's liberty, we should infringe the liberties of 330 million others?

Again, there is ONLY ONE WAY to be sure that POTENTIALLY violent people cannot get a gun, and that is to allow our government the latitude to arbitrarily lock away those people it suspects might commit some violent crime at some time in the future. No longer will we be presumed innocent until proven guilty. No longer will we be able to confidently voice our dissent without fear of being stripped of our liberty after having committed no crime.

This is what I mean when I say that we must endure the occasional violent act as the price of our own liberty. Unless we are willing to allow our government to lock away people BEFORE they commit a crime, then we must (and should) wait for a crime to be committed. And, occasionally, that crime may be very violent.

But, lets say you got your wish, and that every avenue this heretofore law-abiding US citizen in California took to try to get a gun was, somehow, thwarted. Let's say he could not gain possession of a gun, no matter what he tried... no matter where he went. No gun. What do you think would have happened? Is it more likely he would just say, 'oh well... cant get a gun... bummer... I'll just have to jihad another day, I guess.' Or would he have gone ahead and used his garage full of pipe bombs and IED's instead? Maybe take that rented Suburban and make a big-ass truck bomb?

Obviously, access to guns are NOT the problem. And preventing access to guns only moves the violent on to potentially more violent means. Legislatively, you can only prevent a LEGAL, retail sale, anyway. This, in no meaningful way, prevents access, it only prevents a legal sale.

Yes, we are. Statistically insignificant numbers. You can argue from emotion that the violence we have seen, no matter what the number, is too much. But, we should not presume to legislate from emotion.

However, we absolutely CAN do more to mitigate and minimize violence in our society, but it seems we are such lovers of liberty, that we seem unwilling to do what needs to be done.

I propose that people who initiate violence should be segregated from peaceable society, forever. For as long as our revolving-door judicial system allows those who have DEMONSTRATED their violence in a criminal act, to be released back into my peaceable society, I will be inclined to keep and bear arms against them. And my right to do so shall not be infringed.

 

I thought they were killed by a car...the terrorists arrived in one...

 

Criminals are self-interested individuals - that they use guns by choice should indicate that they obtain some benefit from them over alternatives. The issue isn't that gun control pushes criminals to different means (that is to its credit), it's the means it uses to seek this end which I take issue with: treating all citizens as potentially guilty and depriving them of the right to make whatever the hell they want with their property until they individually coerce others. The collective guilt of others is not enough.

So pushing jihadists from guns to bombs would have some use, even if it's only slight. Does that justify the measure? If we murdered everyone on Earth there would be no more jihad, would that justify the measure? Of course not - we would merely be purchasing security with liberty. Security means nothing if you have to give up what you're trying to secure to achieve it.

 

I agree 100%. The salient point is that violent people are going to do violent things.... sometimes VERY violent things. And they will do so using whatever is at their disposal. We can only mitigate them by rejecting who we are and becoming a totalitarian nation that locks away dissenters along with jihadists and anyone else they suspect, or find politically dangerous, or for whatever reasons they want.

Their push for denying Citizens of their 2A rights based on the no-fly-list is a perfect example:

a) what criteria is used to be added to this list is a SECRET.
b) there is NO WAY to find out if you have been added to this list.
c) there is no procedure to get your inclusion reviewed, or explained to you.
d) there is no way to get yourself removed, even if your inclusion was in error.
e) there is no due process, therefore it is unconstitutional.

It would take a similar totalitarian dictatorship style law to prevent anyone from getting a gun in this country. The ONLY way is to allow our government the latitude to add them a no-gun list similar to the above and to LOCK THEM AWAY prior to them having committed any crime. It is NOT POSSIBLE to prevent potentially violent people from getting a gun unless you lock them away BEFOREHAND. Every attempt to do so only infringes the rights of The People to protect themselves.

 

Nope, they died from the two people using guns. The guns alone do nothing without the person aiming and pulling the trigger.

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That study lumps in suicide with other gun deaths. Also, it doesn't take into account the common sense variable that someone with a gun in the home often has a reason for it. And finally, it doesn't separate out criminals from law-abiding folks. Please find a more accurate study. That one says nothing about increased risk of homicide for a middle class law abiding citizen with a gun. It doesnt' separate out the variables.

 

Propaganda. Most gun owners I know say if they would have been there perhaps they could have stopped it before 14 people died. Or if one or more people out there in California had a gun on him, perhaps they could have stopped the shooters. I don't know if they're right or wrong. But the theory is good.

I would wager once the shooting started most people with a gun would cower just like the rest. That is unless they have been trained and that training resulted in immediate action against the shooters. Unless someone has been in that situation before, one never knows how they would react.

But all these gun laws in my opinion has done is deprive law abiding citizens of their gun rights. Criminals know where to get guns and they don't care what the law says or they wouldn't be criminals and the same goes for terrorist like those in California. Gun laws are not going to deprive those types of people from getting guns. Perhaps some mentally ill person, yes.

The best gun law would be anyone convicted of a crime using a gun gets 20 years added to the their sentence for their crime. Terrorist, if convicted automatic life at Gitmo if they live.

 

Yes it does. . .so what?
Does it make you feel safer to know that, if you own a gun, you (or someone in your household) might be more likely to commit suicide?
It certainly doesn't reassure me!

And if this study doesn't satisfy you. . .you will have the NRA to blame, as they have been fighting keeping accurate, precise records for years by lobbying congress.

Now that more specific records are kept, it will be a lot easier to differentiate the variable. . .but in the mean time, this study satisfy me well enough to determine a strong trend for household with guns. . .and it is NOT in gun owners' favor.

 

I don't buy it. Suicide rates in countries with strict gun laws are no lower (and often higher) than those in countries with lax gun laws. I don't feel that suicides are related to guns, other than as a method of opportunity.

All the information I've mentioned could have been gotten. The NRA's lobbyists haven't done a thing to stop gun research, other than the CDC. This study wasn't done by the CDC, so that is irrelevant.

My general observation is that gun murders are related to drugs and criminals for the most part. It's very rare that a middle class person is murdered, unless there is a drug involvement. When I hear about a home invasion, my first thought is that it's a dealer/user squabble of some sort. We should be concentrating on treating the mentally ill, and incarcerating violent offenders for as long as possible. That's a much better way to stop gun deaths than trying to hinder the law abiding from buying guns.

 

Dear, that "method of opportunity" is very significant where suicides are concerned! It takes NO thinking about it, and no preparation to grab a gun, load it and pull the trigger. . .an instant of depression, a let down, a life crisis, and it is done. . .and (what is even more important) is that a gun RARELY misses its target when the trigger is pulled this close to the "victim!"

It takes a lot more determination, thoughts, and preparations to hang oneself, or cut one's wrists, or almost any other common forms of suicide.

And, we just have to look at Australia and what happened after the "buy back" of firearms:

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If all the information you want can be accessed, as you state, why don't YOU provide them? If they contradict the study I provided, you will have made your point, right? I can't find them!

And, even if ⅔ of the death by firearms were due to crime. . .the ⅓ that could be avoided (including children shooting other children . . .or their parents or friends, preventable suicides if the person had time to THINK IT THROUGH, and homicides due to domestic disputes and other non-criminal incidents) would be worth putting in more regulations and attempting to change the culture of fear and violence that is so ingrained in America.

By the way, most mass shootings have been performs by "law abiding" gun owners. . .until the day they no longer abide the law!

 

The nation of Japan has an exceptionally high suicide rate, despite so few people actually owning firearms; sixty percent above the global average.

The nation of Australia never had an equal number of firearms as individuals living within the nation. They reduced their number of available firearms by twenty percent. A similar reduction in the united states would require removing more than sixty million firearms from private circulation.

The old claim of if it saves even one life, then it is worth it, correct?

By such logic is must be questioned why the opposite is not true. If widespread firearms ownership in the united states saves one life, then why is it not worth it as well?

Meaning that background checks are useless, and there is no point in attempting to apply them to private sales.

 

How does the fact that most gun deaths in the US are directly caused by victim in any way support a restriction on my rights?