Although I agree with most of what you said, guns are inherently not safe.
We are talking about something that is 100% unsafe and needs to be carefully handled at all times. Simply goofing off with them can get you killed. And on top of that, they are being used to maliciously hurt innocent people and a tool for crime.
Yes, the shootings and accidental discharges are the outliers, but I never pretended any different. I’m saying those cases are enough to justify real bans, that the 99.9% of “safe” gun owners need to deal with it and accept the small sacrifice. There is a clear and direct link to how easily accessible guns are and the abnormal amount of shootings. If I was asked to give up my paintbrushes to stop school shootings, I would in a heart beat.
The few cases are enough to justify broad policy changes. Not everything is anecdotal fallacy just because it doesn’t happen often, that would make all our safety measures and precautions based on rhetoric.
I’m not gonna try to convince you because like I said, an argument on the internet is for the reader, not the participants.
If you truly believe that guns should be banned, people shouldn’t have them and recognize that most gun owners will refuse, have you considered how would be best to go about disarming the American populace?
Id ban all sale of them and offer generous buybacks. You can’t actually disarm a population, everyone just ends up saying they dropped their gun in a lake.
I’m guessing you have some thoughts on this, where do you think the line is? What regulations would you accept?
A generous but non compulsory buyback program would have the same effect as the nfa, disarmament of people in direct proportion to their wealth and income. Would it be alright with you if only rich people who weren’t swayed by the high prices on offer were armed? Currently in America that’s how ownership of fully automatic firearms, suppressors and rifles and shotguns with barrels shorter than 16” are handled.
How would your ban on sales apply to private party sales?
The rich can have more guns for a bit, it would only last a generation. Id outlaw all sales private or public, anybody inheriting a gun wouldn’t be permitted to use it.
The only guns would be state owned, for employees or to rent out at ranges and hunting grounds so people can still keep it as a hobby.
Basically phase out the private ownership of guns inside a generation or two. It’s not perfect and would definitely piss off a number of people, a lot of which would find workarounds but I don’t see a better way to do it.
How would inheritors of guns be prevented from using them? How would you prevent private, undocumented sales?
Are you saying you’d ban hunting on private land?
I’m not asking little “gotcha” questions to “get you”, but to try to slowly make it clear how big of a project a firearm ban in America would be. My hope is that you’ll recognize the high cost and low chance of success makes a firearm ban a worse way to approach stochastic violence than simply improving conditions for people who perpetrate it.
Not having a shooting every week is worth whatever we have to pay.
There’s no perfect solution but doing nothing is definitely the worst option. In any case, it’s easier to get rid of guns then to cure all mental health issues. Saying things like improve conditions as a solution is just hand waving in my opinion.
If you’ll indulge me, the lemmy markup for big text isn’t something I know so you’ll just have to imagine it’s a header:
Behold, the liberal vision for your future: it’s easier to disarm the poor than to improve their conditions!
It’s not as satisfying when the words are little.
The fundamental problem with your position is that it relies on outright dismissal of any possible improvements to American society.
If you approach any problem with the supposition that nothing can ever get better then of course your only course of action is to restrict people and no matter what complexity you’re up against that proposition of restriction will always be the best option. After all, a better world is not possible.
Society has always been improving, life’s a lot better than it was 20 years ago. Improving to the point where shootings stop is seriously heavy. Mental issues are way more complicated than blanket gun bans.
You are dismissing my solutions as being too hard and too costly, while not really being critical of your own offerings.
Mental health issues clearly needs to be prioritized more but you can’t wave a magic wand and ban depression. Not to mention that there are hundreds of different aspects that bring about a shooting. They all involve guns but the reasons that brought the person to the brink are always different. Sometimes, it’s literally just racism (which is arguably a mental health issue but you get my point).
What you are saying is the equivalent of “Don’t ban guns! Cure America of everything else instead”.
It’s such a tall order it’s literally meaningless. Im not saying society can’t improve but that the difference between our solutions is the difference between planting a tree to get out of the rain and buying an umbrella. And mind you, I’m super willing to try to improve society, but right now, we need an umbrella because we are getting covered in blood and it sucks.
Although I agree with most of what you said, guns are inherently not safe.
We are talking about something that is 100% unsafe and needs to be carefully handled at all times. Simply goofing off with them can get you killed. And on top of that, they are being used to maliciously hurt innocent people and a tool for crime.
Yes, the shootings and accidental discharges are the outliers, but I never pretended any different. I’m saying those cases are enough to justify real bans, that the 99.9% of “safe” gun owners need to deal with it and accept the small sacrifice. There is a clear and direct link to how easily accessible guns are and the abnormal amount of shootings. If I was asked to give up my paintbrushes to stop school shootings, I would in a heart beat.
The few cases are enough to justify broad policy changes. Not everything is anecdotal fallacy just because it doesn’t happen often, that would make all our safety measures and precautions based on rhetoric.
I’m not gonna try to convince you because like I said, an argument on the internet is for the reader, not the participants.
If you truly believe that guns should be banned, people shouldn’t have them and recognize that most gun owners will refuse, have you considered how would be best to go about disarming the American populace?
Id ban all sale of them and offer generous buybacks. You can’t actually disarm a population, everyone just ends up saying they dropped their gun in a lake.
I’m guessing you have some thoughts on this, where do you think the line is? What regulations would you accept?
A generous but non compulsory buyback program would have the same effect as the nfa, disarmament of people in direct proportion to their wealth and income. Would it be alright with you if only rich people who weren’t swayed by the high prices on offer were armed? Currently in America that’s how ownership of fully automatic firearms, suppressors and rifles and shotguns with barrels shorter than 16” are handled.
How would your ban on sales apply to private party sales?
The rich can have more guns for a bit, it would only last a generation. Id outlaw all sales private or public, anybody inheriting a gun wouldn’t be permitted to use it.
The only guns would be state owned, for employees or to rent out at ranges and hunting grounds so people can still keep it as a hobby.
Basically phase out the private ownership of guns inside a generation or two. It’s not perfect and would definitely piss off a number of people, a lot of which would find workarounds but I don’t see a better way to do it.
How would inheritors of guns be prevented from using them? How would you prevent private, undocumented sales?
Are you saying you’d ban hunting on private land?
I’m not asking little “gotcha” questions to “get you”, but to try to slowly make it clear how big of a project a firearm ban in America would be. My hope is that you’ll recognize the high cost and low chance of success makes a firearm ban a worse way to approach stochastic violence than simply improving conditions for people who perpetrate it.
Not having a shooting every week is worth whatever we have to pay.
There’s no perfect solution but doing nothing is definitely the worst option. In any case, it’s easier to get rid of guns then to cure all mental health issues. Saying things like improve conditions as a solution is just hand waving in my opinion.
If you’ll indulge me, the lemmy markup for big text isn’t something I know so you’ll just have to imagine it’s a header:
Behold, the liberal vision for your future: it’s easier to disarm the poor than to improve their conditions!
It’s not as satisfying when the words are little.
The fundamental problem with your position is that it relies on outright dismissal of any possible improvements to American society.
If you approach any problem with the supposition that nothing can ever get better then of course your only course of action is to restrict people and no matter what complexity you’re up against that proposition of restriction will always be the best option. After all, a better world is not possible.
Society has always been improving, life’s a lot better than it was 20 years ago. Improving to the point where shootings stop is seriously heavy. Mental issues are way more complicated than blanket gun bans.
You are dismissing my solutions as being too hard and too costly, while not really being critical of your own offerings.
Mental health issues clearly needs to be prioritized more but you can’t wave a magic wand and ban depression. Not to mention that there are hundreds of different aspects that bring about a shooting. They all involve guns but the reasons that brought the person to the brink are always different. Sometimes, it’s literally just racism (which is arguably a mental health issue but you get my point).
What you are saying is the equivalent of “Don’t ban guns! Cure America of everything else instead”.
It’s such a tall order it’s literally meaningless. Im not saying society can’t improve but that the difference between our solutions is the difference between planting a tree to get out of the rain and buying an umbrella. And mind you, I’m super willing to try to improve society, but right now, we need an umbrella because we are getting covered in blood and it sucks.