The right to bear arms / Do we really need a survey to tell us this?

sneakypenguin

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Rooster Cogburn said:
If guns cause crime, and if that is a bad thing- we cannot let our governments have guns.
Especially since government is the biggest criminal organization out there:D

OP stats in the firearm debate are so easily manipulated they should almost be tossed out. Even if your more likey to get shot with a firearm(while in possession) that doesn't take into account training/senarios.
 

Sparcrypt

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AssButt said:
Sparcrypt said:
It's a pointless argument, it will never change in the US due to all the idiots who will jump up and down about their rights blah blah blah.

Yes, there are occasions where having a gun will help you... but it is much more likely you will end up in more trouble then you were already in.
There are a lot of cases, it's just that the media tends not to report them. The bottom line is that you are the only person responsible for your own well-being, do you want to use the least effective tool and hope for the best?
You are assuming that a gun in the most effective tool, as well as that the average person knows how to use it effectively and can do so under pressure - real life encounters like this are not like they get shown in the movies. Hell trained US soldiers managed to shoot plenty of friendly targets because funnily enough, being in any situation where you might get hurt is bloody scary and your judgement is impaired.

If someone enters your home to rob you and they are armed with a gun, then see YOU going for a gun the chances of them pulling the trigger just went up a very high amount despite them probably not having any intention of doing so in the first place.

I am very capable of looking after my well being both with and without a gun - something that requires more effort and dedication then walking down the road, buying a handgun, sticking it next to the bed and declaring myself 'safe'. But I guess its easier to say that guns are the answer rather then actually learning how to handle yourself properly.

Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.

Now say that assailant is your mate with the spare key who had some kind of emergency and came over. You just shot him dead in a panic.. I hit him with a phone and maybe hit his arm. He'll be pissed sure, but he should have called. Your mate it dead. Forever.

And I didn't miss, put a bullet through the wall and into someone in the next room. I dont have a weapon for my kid to find and shoot themselves with by mistake. Oh you lock yours up? If so, why do you have one for defense if you can't get to it?

Guns have their uses, but they are not the ultimate solution to home security or self defense. What they really do is take any given situation and make it one of life and death.

I am not anti-guns, not at all.. however something to remember is you can't call a bullet back. The general population does not have the training or experience required to use one properly and safely, yet they all have the 'right' to own one. This make sense to you?


So the real 'bottom line' is that self defense is not something you become able to do merely because you own a gun.
 

Davic

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I'm Australian, and because of the Port Arthur Massacre, guns are pretty restricted here.

I think people on this thread should lay of the US a bit. A good percentage of the posts just seem to be senseless rants about how "Americuh is schooped". The United States are not the only country in the world that allows civilians to carry firearms.

That aside, I think that gun-restriction is a good thing. I understand that a lot of US citizens believe in their right to bear arms, but I think the second ammendmant is fairly outdated. When the second ammendmant was written the most advanced weapon of the time was a single shot rifle that took a half-minute to reload. Even a standard semi-automatic pistol is far deadlier than that.

In a perfect world we could rely on ourselves to use guns (or for that matter, any weapon) responsably, but by the same token, in a perfect world we wouldn't need them. People are always going to try and kill each other, and I think that we shouldn't facilitate that.
 

Rooster Cogburn

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sneakypenguin said:
Rooster Cogburn said:
If guns cause crime, and if that is a bad thing- we cannot let our governments have guns.
Especially since government is the biggest criminal organization out there:D
You don't even want to go there with me. :) hehe.
 

Guitarmasterx7

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Mar 16, 2009
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Well no shit you're going to be more likely to be shot if you're carrying a gun. If you're carrying a gun either a) You're someone who people want to shoot or b) you're going to use it. It's probably less the fact that the person is carrying a gun and more relating to what kind of person would carry a gun.

Now, touching on this
thebrainiac1 said:
If I were a criminal, if someone counters my activities with a gun themselves, I will not be worried about shooting back at them. If no-one interrupts with a gun, no-one gets shot (hopefully). So the robbery still happens and someone has been shot, potentially fatally.
This is why American police have to carry guns, because all of the criminals carry guns and so they need to be able to properly defend themselves.
First of all, if you're robbing a bank, and I have a gun and plan to use it, you aren't going to see it. I, along with anyone else with a brain, would shoot you in the back when you weren't looking towards me. If EVERYONE in the bank had a gun, and you walked in there with a gun screaming "get on the ground" you would probably become some Swiss cheese like consistency within seconds.

Second, I'm inferring that the argument you're making is that guns should be illegal. if you're going to commit a crime and get away with it, you're not going to use a legally processed weapon. You're going to buy something on the black market so your bullets can't be traced back to you, and last I checked illegal weapon sales don't disappear when weapons become illegal.

The problem isn't so much the legality of guns as it is the existence of guns. Are they cool? Yes. But they've caused way more problems than they've solved. However, now that they exist the only countermeasure to a gun is another gun, meaning the only way a country will be safe is if either nobody has guns or everybody has guns, and the former is an impossibility. That being said, given its current status outlawing guns in the US probably wouldn't do much to the crime rate.
 

Slotteh

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The debate here is how are you going to protect yourself from a gun-toting mugger if you meet one without a gun, in the event that guns are banned.




Here's a clue. If guns are banned, that mugger doesn't have one too.
 

AssButt

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Aug 25, 2009
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Sparcrypt said:
AssButt said:
Sparcrypt said:
It's a pointless argument, it will never change in the US due to all the idiots who will jump up and down about their rights blah blah blah.

Yes, there are occasions where having a gun will help you... but it is much more likely you will end up in more trouble then you were already in.
There are a lot of cases, it's just that the media tends not to report them. The bottom line is that you are the only person responsible for your own well-being, do you want to use the least effective tool and hope for the best?
You are assuming that a gun in the most effective tool, as well as that the average person knows how to use it effectively and can do so under pressure - real life encounters like this are not like they get shown in the movies. Hell trained US soldiers managed to shoot plenty of friendly targets because funnily enough, being in any situation where you might get hurt is bloody scary and your judgement is impaired.

If someone enters your home to rob you and they are armed with a gun, then see YOU going for a gun the chances of them pulling the trigger just went up a very high amount despite them probably not having any intention of doing so in the first place.

I am very capable of looking after my well being both with and without a gun - something that requires more effort and dedication then walking down the road, buying a handgun, sticking it next to the bed and declaring myself 'safe'. But I guess its easier to say that guns are the answer rather then actually learning how to handle yourself properly.

Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.

Now say that assailant is your mate with the spare key who had some kind of emergency and came over. You just shot him dead in a panic.. I hit him with a phone and maybe hit his arm. He'll be pissed sure, but he should have called. Your mate it dead. Forever.
So the real 'bottom line' is that self defense is not something you become able to do merely because you own a gun.


And I didn't miss, put a bullet through the wall and into someone in the next room. I dont have a weapon for my kid to find and shoot themselves with by mistake. Oh you lock yours up? If so, why do you have one for defense if you can't get to it?

Guns have their uses, but they are not the ultimate solution to home security or self defense. What they really do is take any given situation and make it one of life and death.

I am not anti-guns, not at all.. however something to remember is you can't call a bullet back. The general population does not have the training or experience required to use one properly and safely, yet they all have the 'right' to own one. This make sense to you?

Sparcrypt said:
AssButt said:
Sparcrypt said:
It's a pointless argument, it will never change in the US due to all the idiots who will jump up and down about their rights blah blah blah.

Yes, there are occasions where having a gun will help you... but it is much more likely you will end up in more trouble then you were already in.
There are a lot of cases, it's just that the media tends not to report them. The bottom line is that you are the only person responsible for your own well-being, do you want to use the least effective tool and hope for the best?
You are assuming that a gun in the most effective tool, as well as that the average person knows how to use it effectively and can do so under pressure - real life encounters like this are not like they get shown in the movies. Hell trained US soldiers managed to shoot plenty of friendly targets because funnily enough, being in any situation where you might get hurt is bloody scary and your judgement is impaired.

If someone enters your home to rob you and they are armed with a gun, then see YOU going for a gun the chances of them pulling the trigger just went up a very high amount despite them probably not having any intention of doing so in the first place.

I am very capable of looking after my well being both with and without a gun - something that requires more effort and dedication then walking down the road, buying a handgun, sticking it next to the bed and declaring myself 'safe'. But I guess its easier to say that guns are the answer rather then actually learning how to handle yourself properly.

Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.

Now say that assailant is your mate with the spare key who had some kind of emergency and came over. You just shot him dead in a panic.. I hit him with a phone and maybe hit his arm. He'll be pissed sure, but he should have called. Your mate it dead. Forever.

And I didn't miss, put a bullet through the wall and into someone in the next room. I dont have a weapon for my kid to find and shoot themselves with by mistake. Oh you lock yours up? If so, why do you have one for defense if you can't get to it?

Guns have their uses, but they are not the ultimate solution to home security or self defense. What they really do is take any given situation and make it one of life and death.

I am not anti-guns, not at all.. however something to remember is you can't call a bullet back. The general population does not have the training or experience required to use one properly and safely, yet they all have the 'right' to own one. This make sense to you?


So the real 'bottom line' is that self defense is not something you become able to do merely because you own a gun.
A responsible individual knows to avoid trouble whenever possible but sometimes that isn't enough. And yes, it does make sense that you don't need training to own a gun. I'm not sure where people are getting the notion that accidental gun deaths are a big issue but the mortality rate from negligently handling guns falls somewhere between drowning and choking. If you're afraid of your kid gaining access to your gun, then keep it on your person. This is assuming that you didn't teach your kid safe gun handling.

Also, how is throwing a phone at an assailant going to incapacitate him? You're more likely to anger him by doing so resulting in him beating/stabbing/shooting you.

As for you mistakenly shooting your roommate, if this does happen, it means that you've violated all four rules of firearm safety which most gun owners have ingrained in them. It does happen on occasions but it isn't fair to punish everyone else because of this. Do you have a problem with police carrying guns? It's also worthy of mention that police officers are around five times more likely to misidentify someone as a suspect than a civilian because police are almost never around when the crime happens. It is also not uncommon for police to be less trained than the average civilian. Police officers not interested in guns often fire their weapon only once or twice a year during qualification.

Also, you've probably heard the statistic that over 80% of self-defense doesn't involve a single shot being fired, hardly life and death. Criminals often run at the sign of (effective) resistance because their number one priority is to survive and there are a lot of other easier prey.

Aside from this, I agree with the rest of your post and that is very important to remember. Situational awareness trumps self-defense because self-defense is only damage control whereas situational awareness avoids the problem all together. However, if you are unlucky enough, self-defense may be your last resort.
 

Rooster Cogburn

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Sparcrypt said:
Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.
Sparcrypt, although you point to armed defense as Hollywood fiction, I don't find your scenario here any more plausible. I don't think you can be even reasonably certain of this scenario- I don't think your average marine could do this. I'm imagining myself throwing a telephone and then getting bludgeoned to death with a pipe. You may be tough, but I'm not.

Don't get me wrong, I'm of the opinion that no one should own any firearm they are not trained to use and maintain (as in, they shouldn't buy it- I wouldn't prevent them from doing so). You make an extremely important point about self defense and the tools thereof, but I don't think your conclusion follows from that point.
 

The Potato Lord

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While the U.S. has more gun crime, countries with stricter control over them typically have more knife crime, so its just a difference of whether you want to be stabbed or shot. I could write some long winded rant for either side but half of you wouldn't read it, and the other half wouldn't care. These threads never accomplish anything anyway, they just become long lists of opinions until everyone gets bored and goes to a religious thread to argue.
 

AssButt

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Percutio said:
Rooster Cogburn said:
Sparcrypt said:
Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.
Sparcrypt, although you point to armed defense as Hollywood fiction, I don't find your scenario here any more plausible. I don't think you can be even reasonably certain of this scenario- I don't think your average marine could do this. I'm imagining myself throwing a telephone and then getting bludgeoned to death with a pipe. You may be tough, but I'm not.

Don't get me wrong, I'm of the opinion that no one should own any firearm they are not trained to use and maintain (as in, they shouldn't buy it- I wouldn't prevent them from doing so). You make an extremely important point about self defense and the tools thereof, but I don't think your conclusion follows from that point.
I say offer free weapon training classes for (also) free licenses to qualify you for ownership of a certain weapon type (General categories, rifles, pistols, shotguns, basically to make sure you can operate that type of firearm). Then we slightly increase the responsibility of the owner and gun owners get useful learning from it.

But that would cost the government time, money, and effort. Which is probably not going to happen. Besides, many would complain about the classes wasting time even if it loosened other requirements.
An even better solution would be to teach gun safety in school.
 

matrix3509

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Sep 24, 2008
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Yeah too bad every argument NewScientist makes is completely voided by their agenda-pushed bullshit and bias.

Seriously, must we have an anti-gun thread every week? You aren't going to convince anybody.

Not to mention this whole experiment/study is methodically flawed in the first place.

Problem 1: Outfitting a bunch of random people with guns will obviously result in more violence because a group of people chosen at random will automatically have a majority of people who aren't properly trained to use guns. When you give somebody a gun who isn't trained to use it, you are inviting more violence. Anybody who knows anything about the scientific method knows that this study from the very beginning was biased.

Problem 2: Instead of picking random people to carry guns. How about you pick people who already have a license to carry a gun, and thus have already received the proper training? You will find that violence will be reduced (except in obvious self-defense cases of course).

Seriously though people, stop fucking making an anti-gun threads every week. Its getting tiresome.
 

AssButt

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Aug 25, 2009
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Percutio said:
AssButt said:
Percutio said:
Rooster Cogburn said:
Sparcrypt said:
Example... do you think you could grab a gun from your nightstand, ready it to fire (cause if you KEEP it ready to fire you really are an idiot), identify the threat, make the choice to aim, fire and kill someone in less time then I could say, grab a phone or other object from said nightstand, throw it at my assailant while throwing myself out of bed at disabling them? I doubt it.
Sparcrypt, although you point to armed defense as Hollywood fiction, I don't find your scenario here any more plausible. I don't think you can be even reasonably certain of this scenario- I don't think your average marine could do this. I'm imagining myself throwing a telephone and then getting bludgeoned to death with a pipe. You may be tough, but I'm not.

Don't get me wrong, I'm of the opinion that no one should own any firearm they are not trained to use and maintain (as in, they shouldn't buy it- I wouldn't prevent them from doing so). You make an extremely important point about self defense and the tools thereof, but I don't think your conclusion follows from that point.
I say offer free weapon training classes for (also) free licenses to qualify you for ownership of a certain weapon type (General categories, rifles, pistols, shotguns, basically to make sure you can operate that type of firearm). Then we slightly increase the responsibility of the owner and gun owners get useful learning from it.

But that would cost the government time, money, and effort. Which is probably not going to happen. Besides, many would complain about the classes wasting time even if it loosened other requirements.
An even better solution would be to teach gun safety in school.
That would piss off parents though. It would be sweet, but it would also be teaching a group who aren't going to be able to legally buy a gun anyways so it might be excessive.
In some states you can buy guns from private transfers as early as 16 (maybe younger, I don't remember). We teach safe sex and drug use in school, I don't see why this would be any different.
 

Rooster Cogburn

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May 24, 2008
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AssButt said:
An even better solution would be to teach gun safety in school.
That's a great idea. Experienced firearm owners know education is everything. Can't get enough of it.
 

Amoreyna

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Jan 12, 2009
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thebrainiac1 said:
Hey Guys.

Today in my email I received this [http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17922-carrying-a-gun-increases-risk-of-getting-shot-and-killed.html?DCMP=NLC-nletter&nsref=dn17922] article.

For those who can't be bothered to read it, it's a New Scientist article about how the likelihood of being shot increases more than fourfold when you carry a gun than when you don't.

First of all, I think that this shows how stupid it is for normal people to get hold of a license to carry a weapon so easily in America, when all it does is increase levels of gun crime and related fatalities.


Secondly, I can't believe that we need a survey to tell us this. If I were a criminal, if someone counters my activities with a gun themselves, I will not be worried about shooting back at them. If no-one interrupts with a gun, no-one gets shot (hopefully). So the robbery still happens and someone has been shot, potentially fatally.
This is why American police have to carry guns, because all of the criminals carry guns and so they need to be able to properly defend themselves.



What are your thoughts?
I have a question - why are foreigners so interested in US policies and laws?

You don't live here, so your opinion really doesn't matter and I fail to see why this issue would be interesting to you.

There are tens of thousands responsible, gun-owning Americans in this country, I happen to be one of them. I've been around them my entire life and learned gun safety at an early age. I've used firearms on ranges for sport, hunted with them (yes, for actual food, not sport) and have trained/carried them for work. And quite frankly I am sick of seeing foreigners ***** on and on about American gun laws.

You never hear about the people who use weapons responsibly, only about those who don't - and for every person you hear about using a weapon irresponsibly there are many Americans who don't.

BTW, banning weapons hasn't worked for the major US cities that have tried it. Gun crime has nothing to do with the second amendment, which allows people to legally obtain firearms. Your local criminal isn't going to register a firearm, because it's going to be traced back to him. Illegal weapons is where the problem resides, not in the legally owned ones.