Communities around the U.S. have seen shootings carried out with weapons converted to fully automatic in recent years, fueled by a staggering increase in small pieces of metal or plastic made with a 3D printer or ordered online. Laws against machine guns date back to the bloody violence of Prohibition-era gangsters. But the proliferation of devices known by nicknames such as Glock switches, auto sears and chips has allowed people to transform legal semi-automatic weapons into even more dangerous guns, helping fuel gun violence, police and federal authorities said.

The (ATF) reported a 570% increase in the number of conversion devices collected by police departments between 2017 and 2021, the most recent data available.

The devices that can convert legal semi-automatic weapons can be made on a 3D printer in about 35 minutes or ordered from overseas online for less than $30. They’re also quick to install.

“It takes two or three seconds to put in some of these devices into a firearm to make that firearm into a machine gun instantly,” Dettelbach said.

  • catloaf
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    3 months ago

    Gun violence is a symptom of socioeconomic inequality and a lack of mental health care. We could ban all guns today and while I’m sure there would be a reduction in violent events, people wanting to cause harm would switch to bladed weapons (see knife crime in the UK and axe attacks in China).

      • Billiam@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        And even if he were right, when was the last time you heard of someone in the UK stabbing a hundred people at a concert, or thirty kids in an elementary school?

      • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Yeah no it’s not. You’re try to compare a place with social safety nets to a country that doesn’t have any.

        Trying to compare the EU to the USA for anything gun wise is pointless.

          • Billiam@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Gun control works as surely as antibiotics do.

            If there’s one thing the last four years have taught us, it’s that there’s an overwhelming number of Americans who disagree with both sides of that analogy.

            • ThePyroPython@lemmy.world
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              3 months ago

              Antibiotics? You mean vaccines. Two very different things. If anything, those Americans are into antibiotics too much to the point that they thought taking them would stop COVID.

          • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Lol no it’s not. The UK has no where near what we have when it comes to civ gun ownership. There are more guns in civ hands than all armies combined basically. When Australia did their forced buyback they had a 60% turn in rate…they had 1mil in civ hands at that time. Do you know what 40% is of 450 million firearms? Still more than all other nations that allow their citizens to even look at a firearm.

            We have a very small sub set of people who commit gun violence. Do you think they’ll be the ones to turn them in? No. Because most legally cannot own them now.

            Gun control works great if you have safety nets already in place so people don’t turn to crime to survive.

            Also the NRA can fuck off… it’s always hilarious when you think you’re arguing with some Republican NRA dipshit.

              • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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                3 months ago

                What bullshit did I spew? The NRA just says mental health and gun control doesn’t work. You listed a link to fucking Harvard which is known to directly make studies to say what they want. This isn’t news.

                I’ve stated that safety nets in countries with less crime in general isn’t because they have less guns. It’s because their citizens are taken care of. Are you really going to sit there and say this isn’t true?

                Suicides…guns do not magically make people more prone to suicide, this is and has always been false. Japan is one of the strictest countries on the planet for access to firearms. Yet they have a suicide rate that is far greater than ours. Are you suggesting their miniscule amount of suicides is related to their access to firearms?

                  • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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                    3 months ago

                    Man you got me I’m a minority hillbilly who follows the NRA and watches faux news. Got me.

                    You apparently have an issue with reading comprehension, what part of fuck the NRA did you not get?

                    The studies from Harvard are well known flawed. Their DGU study assumed that for a DGU to happen a shot had to be fired, this is just single example of shit data. Most DGUs the firearm is never even drawn, usually it’s shown and that’s enough to de-escalate the situation.

                    I’ll ask you, how do you plan on banning and getting rid of 450+ million firearms? You going to collect them all?

                    The CDC used to do legit studies, but since the whole “we’re going to make a link that proves guns are bad” a lot of their shit has gone down hill. The level of pressure from Bloomberg “stop and frisk” and his ilk create a lot of bullshit studies that are designed to say one thing.

                    https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5214a2.htm

                    During 2000–2002, the Task Force on Community Preventive Services (the Task Force), an independent nonfederal task force, conducted a systematic review of scientific evidence regarding the effectiveness of firearms laws in preventing violence, including violent crimes, suicide, and unintentional injury. The following laws were evaluated: bans on specified firearms or ammunition, restrictions on firearm acquisition, waiting periods for firearm acquisition, firearm registration and licensing of firearm owners, “shall issue” concealed weapon carry laws, child access prevention laws, zero tolerance laws for firearms in schools, and combinations of firearms laws. The Task Force found insufficient evidence to determine the effectiveness of any of the firearms laws or combinations of laws reviewed on violent outcomes.(Note that insufficient evidence to determine effectiveness should not be interpreted as evidence of ineffectiveness.) This report briefly describes how the reviews were conducted, summarizes the Task Force findings, and provides information regarding needs for future research.

                    Additionally, firearms studies often fail to note potential biases associated with measurement of outcomes not directly associated with the law in question (e.g., using victims rather than agents of violence in the assessment of CAP laws). In conclusion, the application of imperfect methods to imperfect data has commonly resulted in inconsistent and otherwise insufficient evidence with which to determine the effectiveness of firearms laws in modifying violent outcomes.

                    The ivory tower you sit in is so bright no one is able to look at it…

        • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          3 months ago

          Trying to compare the EU to the USA for anything gun wise is pointless.

          Actually, to that point, EU v US is a better comparison than “a country the size of Michigan” v US.

          • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            The Czech Republic does as well. Mexico doesn’t really count, it’s basically impossible to get a firearm as a civ and the cartels have basically all the weapons

    • girlfreddy@lemmy.caOP
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      3 months ago

      Which leads to hundreds/thousands of people not dying every year due to being shot.

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        3 months ago

        Even if it’s only one life saved, that’s great. But can’t we want to fix the systemic problems that lead to gun violence as well? It also fixes a lot of other bad things that don’t lead to gun violence, like homelessness, depression, preventable deaths, inadequate health care, etc.

        What I’m saying is that guns aren’t the problem. They make the problem worse. I’d like to see us try to fix both instead of a half measure of different gun laws.

    • nikscha@feddit.de
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      3 months ago

      You’re not completely wrong. But (1) guns make it sooo much easier to cause a lot of harm, and (2) a gun gives you so much more confidence than a knife. Also: you can run from a knife, you can’t run from a gun

      • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        3 months ago

        you can run from a knife, you can’t run from a gun

        Ahh, not handicapable, I see.

        But unintended ableism aside, you’d also be surprised, if you can get upwards of 25yrd away from the shooter, they probably can’t hit you for shit (doubly so if they have a glock switch, they reduce accuracy). Most criminals don’t train at all, much less for distance.

          • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            3 months ago

            No, there’s a reason most people who get shot, especially with handguns, are closer than 75ft: it’s harder than you think. To me it’s delusional how many people seem to think aim assist is real.

            • nikscha@feddit.de
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              3 months ago

              I wasn’t referring to that, I’m aware of the inverse square law.

              I guess I miss interpreted your previous comment for pro-gun, my bad.

    • Eezyville@sh.itjust.works
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      3 months ago

      A knife battle sounds kinda better. I’ll have a greater chance to survive and some bad-ass scars.

        • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          3 months ago

          Buddy of mine (alright, coworker, but he was cool) decided to try and break up a bar fight one night, one of the guys ended up slicing his stomach right the fuck open. Like REALLY open. Was fucking wild, dude spent a long time in the hospital and never came back to work, but I did hear he was doing better so he at least did live.

          Still though, point is, knife attacks are a lot more brutal than those who advocate for knives think.

      • KuraiWolfGaming@pawb.social
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        3 months ago

        Keep thinking that. Meanwhile most people here wouldn’t be able to fight off someone with a knife.

        It takes size and muscle, shooting the attacker takes a single trigger pull.

        You may not like to hear it, but guns aren’t going anywhere. Maybe if we stop making out gun owners to be some raging lunatics. Then they may be more likely to give them up.

        This is all pointless anyway.

    • mctoasterson@reddthat.com
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      3 months ago

      Its more like there are already hundreds of millions of guns in the US. Criminal element and the scum of society would keep theirs while the law abiding surrender theirs. Society would get worse and less safe.

    • spyd3r@sh.itjust.works
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      3 months ago

      I’d say its a symptom of our police and justice system being completely ineffective at cleaning up our cities and locking away violent offenders to keep them out of society. They’re more interested in milking the taxpayers for stupid shit that doesn’t require any effort like traffic tickets or massive amounts of overtime for doing nothing. There’s too many violent people out there and no one is doing anything to neutralize the threat to law abiding society.

    • uienia@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Pure and unadulterated bullshit.

      (Also the US has more knife crime than the UK as well).

    • harderian729@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      I totally agree. The anti-gun crowd is just a bunch of useful idiots who refuse to tackle problems at their roots.

      They’re also usually city-folk who don’t understand that people living in rural America only have guns to defend themselves. No cop is going to protect their farmhouse from robbers, lol.

      • SkippingRelax@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        So the pro gun in the US are just farmers that need to defend their farmhouse from robbers? You might want to sit down and think who the useful idiot is here.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          Not too long ago here on Lemmy, someone told me that we need guns to protect ourselves from attacks by bears, mountain lions and rattlesnakes. Even in cities. They showed me a link about a bear harmlessly roaming around some suburb as proof of this necessity.

          My pointing out that there have been 180 fatal bear attacks in all of North America since the 18th century, and many of those were bears in captivity, didn’t help.

          What’s funny is that I don’t ever see any “sensible” gun owners telling these people to stop helping.