I'm for sensible gun laws - no assault rifles and hand gun and bolt action rifles should be regulated - as in, people who want to buy them should have to qualify by way of a written and practical test before a sale can be authorized. This will get rid of assault weapons and retain the ability for hunters and home protection people to keep their guns.
Gun control
- Thread starter ukbob
- Start date
I'm for sensible gun laws - no assault rifles and hand gun and bolt action rifles should be regulated - as in, people who want to buy them should have to qualify by way of a written and practical test before a sale can be authorized. This will get rid of assault weapons and retain the ability for hunters and home protection people to keep their guns.
No they wouldn't be accomplices, because they wouldn't be legally allowed to sell.
I am proposing that as an alternative because as you can see it is almost a pipedream to get a ban on selling assault rifles.
Not only is it a pipe dream, but it also doesn't address the approximately 2m AR15s in circulation in the present. And that's just one variety.
I know and it all honesty they have no business being in the hands of civilians anyways. Was almost 10 years in the police and I never had to use an assault rifle even though we had them. From what I've read and seen so far in US politics, a ban isn't likely to happen. Making them more expensive would keep them out of a few crazy hands atleast.
No court is going to approve locking up a gun salesman because one of this customers went crazy later down the line. And if, by some miracle, this does come into effect, gun stores would just shut down because no sane person would want to be held responsible for the actions of all his customers. So that basically becomes a complete gun ban. What you're proposing would be even harder to get through than a complete ban on assault weapons.
I think that is what some people wants to achieve. The beauty part is it does not impinged on the second amendment: Right to keep and bear arms.
Also, that means you still can sell, but you must ensure you have a good enough system, whatever it is, to prevent a mass shooting. The prerogative is on you if you want to earn that type of money. I see that as fair trade.
It is not so dissimilar to let's say the BP deep water horizon blowout case. You want to operate an oil and gas company, sure, just make sure there are no blow out. Intended or unintended, if an accident happened, you will be held accountable. It is up to you to have a system in place to prevent that from happening.
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I am sure De Vos' brother can offer a few weapons talented people who can guard these kids with a 50cal. Plus weapons talented school bus 'drivers'.
It would be so Trumpian a proposal.
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I don't think anyone is under the illusion that a complete ban on guns is possible at this stage.
You're talking as if you've found some brilliant loophole to get around the second amendment. It's like saying "let's keep the minimum sales price of all guns at 1 million dollars. It's not impinging on the second amendment as you still have the right to buy a gun; it's on you if you can't afford it".
However you want to dress it up, the end result would make it almost impossible to sell guns, which obviously would impinge on the second amendment. Not to mention the legal concept of a sale and the seller's own rights.
Just put this in the Florida Shooting Thread but thought it applied here too:
I can'tsee how teachers unions would accept this. I would expect to see mass walkouts and drops in people training to become teachers if this was implemented.
Also, surely any school that did this would have to report to parents in some way which teachers were armed. Would that not make it easier for potential shooters to target them in order to remove the issue of return fire?
Also, teachers desks are usually pretty close to the room doors. Even if the gun is in a holster, I would expect it to be clipped. What are the chances of a teacher, upon hearing a door being kicked open and someone walking in with a semi automatic, being able and composed enough to unclip, un-holster, aim and fire successfully before the shooter has already started opening fire (most likely at the teacher first).
I can'tsee how teachers unions would accept this. I would expect to see mass walkouts and drops in people training to become teachers if this was implemented.
Also, surely any school that did this would have to report to parents in some way which teachers were armed. Would that not make it easier for potential shooters to target them in order to remove the issue of return fire?
Also, teachers desks are usually pretty close to the room doors. Even if the gun is in a holster, I would expect it to be clipped. What are the chances of a teacher, upon hearing a door being kicked open and someone walking in with a semi automatic, being able and composed enough to unclip, un-holster, aim and fire successfully before the shooter has already started opening fire (most likely at the teacher first).
Imagine being a student, knowing the teacher is armed.
That's no longer a school.
That's no longer a school.
Won't be long before that substitute teacher everyone always picks on finally snaps and goes on a kill-crazy rampage.
You could also see many schools around the US filled with teachers horrified at the thought of carrying a gun then being forced to do it.
Ah the NRA have thought of that, each class will also have a pupil with a concealed carry. To stop the teacher just in case.
But that's not all, the school council will now be armed with m16's & roam the school looking for potential threats.
In all seriousness.
Guns in school, normalise guns even more.
Digging a deeper hole, which is not only going to cause more causalities but make it harder to prevent these causalities in future.
Then you have teachers been 'hired' for their experience with weapons over their ability to teach..
You got to remember that the Sec for Education, Betsy De Vos' brother used to happen to own Blackwater or whatever its reincarnation is now. No small coincidence here.
feck me this is insane. Scary as hell.
Think homeschooling is going to become the new trend over the next decade.
That is maybe the reason they're pushing this? Especially since pvt schools will opt out...Decimating public education like this, would not be beyond them. Side bonus of increasing guns and people who rely on guns, and general militarisation of society.
Mad Max style.
Private seller loophole. Its how a lot of guns are sold with zero tracking let alone background checks as the video shows, Its a massive mechanism for how legal guns become illegal guns. Until there is serious effort to close that loophole there is zero chance any other controls will work.
The Sandy Hook shooter used his mum's guns. Didn't even have to buy any himself. When guns are so ubiquitous there's 0 chance of restricting access to them to anyone who sets his mind on getting one.
Imagine if we said here in the UK that we want to restrict sales of sharp knives to criminals or mentally ill people or whatever, to reduce the number of stabbings. And we put checks on the supermarkets. Checks that btw find 99.9% of the population fit to own them. Meanwhile every kitchen drawer in every house already has 3-4 sharp knives that could be used for stabbing. How in depth could such tests be and how difficult would it be for anyone with malicious intend and no permission to get his own, to actually acquire one.
It'd be piss easy, it's a pointless exercise. That's why this makes no sense whatsoever. You can't have more guns among civilians than you have civilians and then expect to effectively restrict access to them. No stupid background check would achieve that.
The only real way would be to ban them and force people to hand existing stock over to the government for destruction. And it would still take years until the stock of hidden/illegal guns decreased significantly enough that it would actually make it difficult for people to get their hands on them. No way would the gun lobby ever allow such extreme measures to be taken.
He wrote an article in the NYTimes arguing for privatization of the peace-keeping effort in Afghanistan. Mercenaries. So yeah, makes sense.
Or more realistically, starts pistol-whipping an annoying brat.
Are you trying the "if not guns then knives or trucks" card?
If you are saying "ban all guns and confiscate or do nothing at all" then I'm afraid nothing would get done. As much as we might all like to see a seemingly simple solution, the political and legal reality of the States means that your ban all and confiscate is not viable.
Well there are more than 300 million guns in the US in civilian hands. Add in the number of guns with military people. And it's doubtful any meaningful restrictions on assault weapons and semi automatics will happen now. That means even more production of guns by US gun manufacturers.
Is that what you got from that, or are you being sarcastic?
Nothing will get done. Nothing that is in any way effective at reducing the likelihood of such incidents. Gun culture is too ingrained in America and they're not willing to part with it. They are happy, on average as a Nation, to pay the price for their love of guns. Even if the price is that of a school shooting every quarter of the year. Seems harsh, but it's simply the truth.
Is that what you got from that, or are you being sarcastic?
Nothing will get done. Nothing that is in any way effective at reducing the likelihood of such incidents. Gun culture is too ingrained in America and they're not willing to part with it. They are happy, on average as a Nation, to pay the price for their love of guns. Even if the price is that of a school shooting every quarter of the year. Seems harsh, but it's simply the truth.
You're not wrong. I think the answer is to move the societal cost of gun violence to gun owners. There is no reason why the non-gun-owning tax-payer has to shoulder the cost of health care, police work, and criminal investigations driven by gun violence. Imagine requiring all gun-owners to carry liability insurance, similar to what we have with cars. That will disincentivize some from owning guns. Which drives a vicious cycle that starts to cut into the percentage of Americans that own guns.
That's actually a good idea and an idea that capitalists will like too.
That's actually a brilliant idea. It should be per gun too, just like with cars.
That’s my state for ya
I'm surprised the idea hasn't got more traction yet.
Aye. If you can't afford paying a high premium for 10 guns, then sell them off or dispose them at your local police department.
I think that’s a good idea, but...
In states like mine, how are you going to enforce that when the state has no idea who owns guns, how many they own, etc.?
This is where it gets tricky. Is making gun ownership without insurance illegal, a violation of the 2nd amendment? Opponents could argue that this restricts that right, but felon laws and other restrictions indicate that government can impose reasonable restrictions without backlash.
Ranges take down names and serial numbers? That might help a little.
Either way, nobody knows what I own at this point, how would they ever find out?
It would work for new purchases, but the unknown number already owned in South Carolina would remain unknown.
No insurance company will touch this. For a car, the damage is quantifiable as in cost of damages, replacement etc and value of premiums are tailored to factor in age, vehicle type, driver quality etc. None of those are available for guns. Also imagine families of victims lodging a claim on insurance company for value of lives lost....how does one even put a monetary value to that?
You can consider something like a Gun tax or something. If already exists, then may be hike it drastically. I just looked it up and an AR-15 seems to sell for about $500 average. Have a 25% of value tax for all small guns (hand guns etc) and increase it to 50% if it's a higher class of gun (semis, AR15s etc).
Mandatory disclosure to ensure each gun is insured. After a certain date the gun becomes an illegal firearm should you be caught with it.
They do that with people driving with an expired tag or license.
That's a big problem whether you ban guns or not, that's why I think you are kind of doomed. Just think about what it means for criminals.