Gun control

I would have thought keeping them at a gun club is 'safe'. But I agree with what you say.

And the so called pain in the arse laws...are probabaly worth it for people who like to use such weapons at gun ranges. I have no problems with that.

with a combination of background checks..without exception and such laws as you say....perhaps we can eventually tighten up the indiscrminate use of these weapons.
 
Red Dreams said:
I would have thought keeping them at a gun club is 'safe'. But I agree with what you say.

And the so called pain in the arse laws...are probabaly worth it for people who like to use such weapons at gun ranges. I have no problems with that.

with a combination of background checks..without exception and such laws as you say....perhaps we can eventually tighten up the indiscrminate use of these weapons.
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Yeah, initially storing all guns at a range seems sound but when you think about it, it's more risky.

Up here most gun owners think that the authoization to transport should be included in the licence. The transport regulations are ok with most of us but making it a seperate document seems redundant.

I think it would be best for the US to apply the CCW laws to a general licencing system.
 
Sent to me, interesting.

According to the FBI annual crime statistics, the number of murders committed annually with hammers and clubs far outnumbers the number of murders committed with a rifle.

This is an interesting fact, particularly amid the Democrats' feverish push to ban many different rifles, ostensibly to keep us safe of course.

However, it appears the zeal of Sens. like Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) is misdirected. For in looking at the FBI numbers from 2005 to 2011, the number of murders by hammers and clubs consistently exceeds the number of murders committed with a rifle.

Think about it: In 2005, the number of murders committed with a rifle was 445, while the number of murders committed with hammers and clubs was 605. In 2006, the number of murders committed with a rifle was 438, while the number of murders committed with hammers and clubs was 618.

And so the list goes, with the actual numbers changing somewhat from year to year, yet the fact that more people are killed with blunt objects each year remains constant.

For example, in 2011, there was 323 murders committed with a rifle but 496 murders committed with hammers and clubs.

While the FBI makes is clear that some of the "murder by rifle" numbers could be adjusted up slightly, when you take into account murders with non-categorized types of guns, it does not change the fact that their annual reports consistently show more lives are taken each year with these blunt objects than are taken with Feinstein's dreaded rifle.

Another interesting fact: According to the FBI, nearly twice as many people are killed by hands and fists each year than are killed by murderers who use rifles.

The bottom line: A rifle ban is as illogical as it is unconstitutional. We face far greater danger from individuals armed with carpenters' tools and a caveman's stick.

And it seems fairly obvious that if more people had a gun, less people would be inclined to try to hit them in the head with a hammer.
 
Why are they only considering rifles?

Why not handguns and shotguns as well?

Proportionately, how many people who own an hammer commit murders in comparison with gun owners?
 
Arruda said:
Why are they only considering rifles?

Why not handguns and shotguns as well?

Proportionately, how many people who own an hammer commit murders in comparison with gun owners?
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Because (black) rifles, like the AR-15 look scary to some people.
 
Well that's a totally pointless mail whose only purpose is derailing the subject. You can't ban fists. You could ban hammers, but then they would come back at you with a stone.

Basically what they're saying is that since people will always find ways to kill each other, why not make it easier for them to do it.
 
Things like "hammers & knives kill people too" are irrelevant arguments. They're tools & utensils used for practical purposes that CAN be used for killing. You could try and ban knives, but then no one would be able to cut their food or open annoying plastic packets.

Guns were invented, and are explicitly used for the purpose of killing or harming living things. The only things equatable with them are other things with this purpose. Like bombs or poison.
 
Mockney said:
Things like "hammers & knives kill people too" are irrelevant arguments. They're tools & utensils used for practical purposes, besides killing. You could try and ban knives, but then no one would be able to cut their food or open annoying plastic packets.

Guns were invented, and are explicitly used for the purpose of killing or harming living things. The only things equatable with them are other things with this purpose. Like bombs or poison.
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For me the point, although it is never explicitly put in those references, is that people are the problem, not the tool or how easy it makes it to kill someone. Killing a person is a choice made by another person or people, not by the various implements used to do it.
 
They are sexy indeed and I reckon I'd love to try and shoot one.

That said if I had the choice to have one or have it universally banned I'd definitely opt for the later.
 
Dr. Dwayne said:
For me the point, although it is never explicitly put in those references, is that people are the problem, not the tool or how easy it makes it to kill someone. Killing a person is a choice made by another person or people, not by the various implements used to do it.
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Cop out though. If that's the only logic we should use then we might as well let everyone keep their own little tub of Anthrax or give everyone of sound mental health the nuclear codes. The easier it is to kill someone/something, the more people/things will get killed.
 
Mockney said:
Things like "hammers & knives kill people too" are irrelevant arguments. They're tools & utensils used for practical purposes that CAN be used for killing. You could try and ban knives, but then no one would be able to cut their food or open annoying plastic packets.

Guns were invented, and are explicitly used for the purpose of killing or harming living things. The only things equatable with them are other things with this purpose. Like bombs or poison.
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think if we narrow down the use of assault rifles to purely target practice enthusiasts like Dwayne here...we actually will be able to get our arms around the problem.

I actually think a no loop holes background check law combined with laws Dwayne speaks of and a requirement of doctors having to inform if someone applying to buy a gun is under his care for mental issues, we may actually get somewhere.

Not sure how they will enforce the last part.
 
For sure, nothing in a country as gun mental as America can be done wholesale. And certainly not immediately, it'll take slow, careful measures over decades, but the whole "people kill people" thing winds me up no end. It's an argument even rational people like Dwayne, who love their guns, fall back on in cognitive dissonance whenever their precious right to own a deadly thing they really like comes into question.

How many times - even on this forum - have you thought about responding to something aggressively, and then given it time and realised that would've been silly? Or how many times have you done it and regretted it later!

Exprapolate that to crimes of passion, arguments that get out of hand, or suicide attempts - which make up the bulk of gun deaths fwiw - and the idea that "having something that makes it really easy to kill people freely available has no impact" suddenly falls away into the pile of bullshit it is.
 
It's still a tool for killing Red_Dreams.

Is it that uncommon that "upstanding citizens" lose their head and do something stupid? How many of these spree killers had a criminal record?

You can have a meticulous past without even a parking fine, get home to find your wife sleeping with another man and shoot them both. I'm all for making this guy's action a bit more difficult. He might chose to stab them, or punch them to death, but either of these things will require a lot more cold blood than pulling a trigger, and it's a lot less likely to succeed.

I have absolutely no criminal record. And was never violent towards anyone. But at some point in my past, I think if I had a gun available I could have killed myself. I'm very happy I didn't.
 
Mockney said:
Cop out though. If that's the only logic we should use then we might as well let everyone keep their own little tub of Anthrax or give everyone of sound mental health the nuclear codes. The easier it is to kill someone/something, the more people/things will get killed.
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Poison and bombs are much more lethal, though (i.e lethality on a larger scale). Hyperbole aside, they also require plenty of training in proper storage, handling and use.

Interestingly enough, when proper training regarding the storage, handling and responsible use of firearms is given, deaths from firearms drop dramatically.

While we undoubtedly disagree on the scope and severity of gun control laws required, I think it's fair to say we'd both agree that the US needs more stringent rules in place than it currently has to counteract what Red Dreams referred to as the indiscriminate use of firearms.
 
Mockney said:
For sure, nothing in a country as gun mental as America can be dont wholesale. Certainly not immediately, but the whole "people kill people" thing winds me up no end. It's an argument even rational people like Dwayne, who love their guns, fall back on when their precious right to own a thing they really like comes into question.

How many times on this forum have you thought about responding to something aggressively, given it time and realised that would've been silly. Or how many times have yu done it and regretted it later!

Exprapolate that to crimes of passion, arguments that get out of hand, or suicide attemps - which make up by far the bulk of murders fwiw - and the idea that "having something that makes it really easy to kill people freely available has no impact on it suddenly falls away into the pile of bullshit it is.
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excellent example. think we give in to the occasional 'rant' because the worse that can happen is ban of sort.

but there is no point regretting once that round has left your gun....
 
Dr. Dwayne said:
Poison and bombs are much more lethal, though (i.e lethality on a larger scale). Hyperbole aside, they also require plenty of training in proper storage, handling and use.

Interestingly enough, when proper training regarding the storage, handling and responsible use of firearms is given, deaths from firearms drop dramatically.
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Oh I'm sure. And I agree that in the US, proper use should be one of the first port of calls. Though things like "proper storage" are only an issue when you have guns lying around in the first place. Evidently.
 
Arruda said:
It's still a tool for killing Red_Dreams.

Is it that uncommon that "upstanding citizens" lose their head and do something stupid? How many of these spree killers had a criminal record?

You can have a meticulous past without even a parking fine, get home to find your wife sleeping with another man and shoot them both. I'm all for making this guy's action a bit more difficult. He might chose to stab them, or punch them to death, but either of these things will require a lot more cold blood than pulling a trigger, and it's a lot less likely to succeed.

I have absolutely no criminal record. And was never violent towards anyone. But at some point in my past, I think if I had a gun available I could have killed myself. I'm very happy I didn't.
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fair point mate.

but the genie is out of the bottle :(


EDIT:
I don't see an Assualt Weapon ban passing the House...even if we had a Democratic majority...that is the true tragedy.

Obama would never have brought even the current proposals if the newton murders had happened before the elections.

the reality is the huge amount of propoganda dollars spent by the NRA has shifted opinions in the wrong direction...and to fight an election on guns is to lose all the 'bigger issues' facing the country.
 
Mockney said:
Even that was a rant, that I instantly feel a little bad about aiming specifically at Dwayne.
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Also Dr. Dwayne, doesn't it bother you this kind of deference from other people because you're an armed man? Wouldn't you prefer to garner Mockney's respect by being a sensible and friendly poster?
 
Mockney said:
For sure, nothing in a country as gun mental as America can be done wholesale. And certainly not immediately, it'll take slow, careful measures over decades, but the whole "people kill people" thing winds me up no end. It's an argument even rational people like Dwayne, who love their guns, fall back on in cognitive dissonance whenever their precious right to own a deadly thing they really like comes into question.

How many times - even on this forum - have you thought about responding to something aggressively, and then given it time and realised that would've been silly? Or how many times have you done it and regretted it later!

Exprapolate that to crimes of passion, arguments that get out of hand, or suicide attempts - which make up the bulk of gun deaths fwiw - and the idea that "having something that makes it really easy to kill people freely available has no impact" suddenly falls away into the pile of bullshit it is.
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Well, for the record my "right" is in fact a privilege granted by the state but in the US that would be applicable.

Limiting access to firearms greatly reduces these sorts of instances. The idea behind safe storage is that by the time you get to your gunsafe, open it, take of the trigger lock, load it, rack it and get back to get down to killing, you'll likely realize that you are over reacting. It sounds silly but it seems to work up here. There is more to it than that so please read on...

Arruda said:
It's still a tool for killing Red_Dreams.

Is it that uncommon that "upstanding citizens" lose their head and do something stupid? How many of these spree killers had a criminal record?

You can have a meticulous past without even a parking fine, get home to find your wife sleeping with another man and shoot them both. I'm all for making this guy's action a bit more difficult. He might chose to stab them, or punch them to death, but either of these things will require a lot more cold blood than pulling a trigger, and it's a lot less likely to succeed.

I have absolutely no criminal record. And was never violent towards anyone. But at some point in my past, I think if I had a gun available I could have killed myself. I'm very happy I didn't.
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Once again, limiting access to firearms reduces suicide by firearm. Many males commit suicide when they are teens. If you can't get a gun you might try something else or not bother at all. I've found that once you do own a firearm, and have a good idea of what it is capable of the thought of using it to do yourself in becomes nearly impossible.
 
Arruda said:
Also Dr. Dwayne, doesn't it bother you this kind of deference from other people because you're an armed man? Wouldn't you prefer to garner Mockney's respect by being a sensible and friendly poster?
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I'm an admin...forum equivalent of armed to the teeth. :D

With great power comes great responsibilty, et cetera.

I don't mind these discussions because it gives me an opportunity to add my experience as a pretty responsible owner to the debate.
 
Arruda said:
It's still a tool for killing Red_Dreams.

Is it that uncommon that "upstanding citizens" lose their head and do something stupid? How many of these spree killers had a criminal record?

You can have a meticulous past without even a parking fine, get home to find your wife sleeping with another man and shoot them both. I'm all for making this guy's action a bit more difficult. He might chose to stab them, or punch them to death, but either of these things will require a lot more cold blood than pulling a trigger, and it's a lot less likely to succeed.

I have absolutely no criminal record. And was never violent towards anyone. But at some point in my past, I think if I had a gun available I could have killed myself. I'm very happy I didn't.
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You could have jumped off a bridge.

I'm glad you didn't, by the way.
 
adexkola said:
You could have jumped off a bridge.

I'm glad you didn't, by the way.
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I'm not saying I would have done it, just that it crossed my mind sometimes. And if I chosen to do so, I think the level of hesitancy would be lower with a firearm at arm's reach than driving all the way to a bridge (of which there weren't any on my island at that time) and facing my fear of heights.

Dr. Dwayne said:
Once again, limiting access to firearms reduces suicide by firearm. Many males commit suicide when they are teens. If you can't get a gun you might try something else or not bother at all. I've found that once you do own a firearm, and have a good idea of what it is capable of the thought of using it to do yourself in becomes nearly impossible.
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I don't think many disagree that control is better than no control. If I was to live in a country where firearms were legally available I'd much prefer it to be Ontario-like laws than most American states counterparts. No issue with that.

That said, >50% of suicides in the US are committed with a gun. I suspected this even before I double checked it.
 
Mockney said:
Oh I'm sure. And I agree that in the US, proper use should be one of the first port of calls. Though things like "proper storage" are only an issue when you have guns lying around in the first place. Evidently.
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I have my CCW just because my wife wanted to take the classes required to get it so I took them with her. Neither one of us planned on getting the permit once we passed them because neither one of us will ever carry a concealed weapon but I ended up getting mine just because it makes it a lot easier when I do buy a new gun. I go in a shop, show my card, pay, and walk out with the gun. No background check.

To get that card I had to be interviewed by a sheriff, do seven sets of fingerprints to be sent to different LE agencies, and have an NICS background check that took three months to do cause the FBI digs real deep for this permit. This permit is tied to my name now so any government agancy that looks at my name knows I have it and could be carrying. If the police even run my license plates on any of my cars, they automatically know I have this permit.

I think anyone that owns guns should have to have this permit, along with proof that a person applying for it has a gun safe to store them in before it is issued.

I have a friend that has anger issues and shouldn't be able to own guns. Him and his wife were always fighting and one day she made a mess in their house and left for work without cleaning it up. My friend was a little upset about it and decided if she wasn't going to use the vacuum then they didn't need it, so he got a shotgun out and shot the vacuum in the middle of his living room. Neighbors heard the gun shot so they called the police. Because of his history, they didn't just go knock on his door and ask about it. They sent the SWAT team and surrounded his house and shot tear gas in through a window.
If a person has any kind of a violent history or any history of domestic abuse, they aren't able to buy or own guns here. Because of a technicality with what they charged him with, he can still buy them.

I am an extremely responsible gun owner but he is the reason I can't argue with gun control.
 
US CCW requirements, or at least those in your state, sound a lot like Canada's licencing system...minus the finger printing, Pimpmofo. I think expanding that to everyone who wants to own a gun would be a sound practice.
 
Dr. Dwayne said:
US CCW requirements, or at least those in your state, sound a lot like Canada's licencing system...minus the finger printing, Pimpmofo. I think expanding that to everyone who wants to own a gun would be a sound practice.
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I was in Canada last spring and went into a gun store just to see if the shops were the same as ours. When the guys working there found out I was American, they started crying to me about Canadian gun laws and how horrible they were. It seemed very complicated to me but the only thing I wouldn't want to deal with is the pistol laws. They said you can shoot pistols only at licensed shooting ranges. My family owns a lot of land and if it was in Canada, I wouldn't be able to legally shoot pistols on private land.

They were very happy about some registry that had just ended or was about to end, but I don't remember exactly what it was.
 
Pimpmofo said:
I was in Canada last spring and went into a gun store just to see if the shops were the same as ours. When the guys working there found out I was American, they started crying to me about Canadian gun laws and how horrible they were. It seemed very complicated to me but the only thing I wouldn't want to deal with is the pistol laws. They said you can shoot pistols only at licensed shooting ranges. My family owns a lot of land and if it was in Canada, I wouldn't be able to legally shoot pistols on private land.

They were very happy about some registry that had just ended or was about to end, but I don't remember exactly what it was.
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Yeah pistols and ARs are heavily regulated, it is a bit of a pain but not that bad. There are special circumstances (i.e. work related) where you are allowed to discharge somewhere other than an approved range (Armored car services and people who work in bear country for example).

We ended our registry of long guns (shotguns and most rifles) it really didn't do anything but make people feel safer for no reason other than the government said it would make us safer. The registry never conclusively stopped any shooting from happening. It cost between $1 and $2 billion dollars to set up and operate for a dozen or so years and did nothing but create a few jobs and probably a few monetary kickbacks for those involved.

There are a fair few up here who would rather we were exactly like the US but I'm reasonably fine with most of our laws. The licencing component especially.
 
Guns dont kill people, bullets do. Ban the bullets, everyone has the right to bear arms! If everyone has a gun then they can pistol whip someone being bad, but its the ammo which turns people evil!
 
Mockney said:
Extrapolate that to crimes of passion, arguments that get out of hand, or suicide attempts - which make up the bulk of gun deaths fwiw - and the idea that "having something that makes it really easy to kill people freely available has no impact" suddenly falls away into the pile of bullshit it is.
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I always try to explain this to people, it's something most pro gun people I know just don't want to accept. I don't understand how it doesn't make sense to them that owning a gun makes it that much easier for a normally sane and law abiding citizen to suddenly lose their temper and use guns for what they're made to do. Sure, you could argue the person could go grab a blunt object, but if they already have a gun strapped to their hip the actions are going to be much quicker and more effective.
 
Quinton Fortune said:
Guns dont kill people, bullets do. Ban the bullets, everyone has the right to bear arms! If everyone has a gun then they can pistol whip someone being bad, but its the ammo which turns people evil!
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If I hit someone on the head with a 40oz piece of metal it will kill them, probably faster than a bullet. :D
 
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