Mega-Thread: Gun Control Thread

[Edge-]

What are you arguing for restricting then other than a 'mandatory wait period' from what I've seen?

Specifically? I'm mostly a "follow the data/experts" kinda guy and I can't remember all the reccomendations but they include things like -

Mandatory waiting periods, at least for first-time buyers (with some exceptions)
Mandatory licensing of all firearms sold moving forward in a central database so they can be tracked a la vehicles
Mandatory licensing and permitting (like vehicles if you want to legally operate them on public roads) including periodic renewals/retraining

Steps that most responsible gun owners might be mildly inconvenienced by but would otherwise not impact their ability to own firearms provided they remain law-abiding citizens.

I don't find it useful to restrict people's rights based on the fact that some use a particular tool to self-delete.

That's not the only reason, it's one of many.

The scenario we're discussing, y'all keep putting statistical data out about firearms related deaths and I refute with the validity of that in the conversation, but then respond with 'but mah data'.

You refute with a lot of feelings and vague arguments and appeals to generalities. If there was any data to support your aguments, like that firearms make people safer, surely you'd have shared it by now.

That you continue to be unable to present the data in support of your arguments is a very strong indicator that the data does not exist and your arguments are not supported by it.

I believe I've made my point quite clear, to include the legal precedent that justifies its constitutionality and why the latter points aren't.

Legal precedent is precedent until the law changes. There was legal precedent for slavery until we decided to make that Unconstitutional. These are vague appeals to hollow authority and history, not cogent arguments.

Y'all can discuss tangentially relevant facts on the topic all you'd like, but that doesn't refute the legal and moral nature of the argument.

You've made precisely zero moral arguments. If you did, one would imagine the moral argument would be to pursue the path that resulted in the least harm done overall, which would not be your positon.

That's okay and there are temperamental differences at play, and I hope y'all never get into the scenario that would convince you of the latter.

Believe it or not, some of us have been in "those scenarios" and you know what? We still have our opinions. This is the bad faith, "Well if you only had experience you'd agree with me." argument, that is made without ever bothering to see if the other person has had experience.

There are people in the US who need to push back against the 2A, since its not an absolute without restrictions just like the 1st amendment. If there was no one to push back against it, we'd probably have billionaires with suitcase nukes.

This is...not an accurate portrayal at all. This is so inaccurate it borders on the fringe of intentional dishonesty.

It's not billionaires arguing for fewer restrictions on firearms, it's "grassroots" groups like the NRA. It's not billionaires arguing that we should not place any limits on the Second Amendment, that's a number of Republicans.

The net negative of which is a restriction on a constitutional right, which does have a purpose in preventing tyranny.

This line really needs to die already. It goes hand in hand with, "TELL US THE LAST TIME THE US GOVERNMENT MARCHED US INTO CAMPS, THEN!" which is historically ignorant. Because the US government has done that before, both to Native Americans and more explicitly to Japanese Americans during WWII.

I missed where the proud, armed patriots stood up to the tyrannical government and used their Second Amendment rights in that part of history. One of the few times the Second Amendment would have actually been useful in protecting Americans from their government. There have been smaller, local affairs like the Tulsa Massacre as well, and largely it seems like the Second Amendment hasn't ever really been used by people for protection against the government. Contrarily, it seems that it's facilitated what is often essentially organized, psuedo-governmental gangs to oppress others, usually people of color.

Because the only other time I can think of where it was actually remotely relevant would be something like the Civil War which...yeah, not exactly a great look there given that the side that took up arms was all about protecting slavery and you know, rebelling against the United States.

With how powerful the US military is (speaking from experience), and the fact that the US military's combined capacity is almost equal to the total capacity of all other NATO countries put together, I argue that the only thing keeping the US government and other countries from opposing its people is the functional 4th branch in government, an armed populous.

This has as much merit as the a-historical argument that Japan didn't invade the US and only bombed Pearl Harbor because they were afraid of an armed populace. But this is largely just baseless paranoia, mostly.

[Endus]

The net negative of which is a restriction on a constitutional right, which does have a purpose in preventing tyranny.

You feel the same way about the 13th Amendment's banning of slavery, right?

Because that was also a constitutional right. So did banning slavery somehow help work against the "prevention of tyranny", in your eyes?

Or is this just complete fucking nonsense that doesn't actually hold up?

[Edge-]

A registry is already something that has been deemed unconstitutional. Its part of the legal battle against the NFA right now.

Welcome back to the discussion of "is" vs. "ought" that Endus recently mentioned. We're discussing "ought", yet you keep reverting back to "is" rather than addressing the "ought".

Curious.

There's no right to operate a motor vehicle on public roads unlike the constitutional right to keep and bear arms, so your 3rd point is unconstitutional unless we repeal the 2A.

See above. If you haven't been keeping up over our dozens of posts, yes, repealing the Second Amendment and making gun ownership a privilege remains my central argument of "ought". Do I think it's practical or realistic? No, very much not in my lifetime. Because people like you exist.

[Edge-]

The US until the abolishment of slavery did not treat all men as equal, slavery was fundamentally antithetical to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There's plenty of amendments that shouldn't have to exist but were necessary to correct inequities.

Slavery was not antithetical to any of those things. If it was, they would have explicitly written as much. This is historical revisionism at its finest.

Everyone wasn't treated as equal was the entire point, that was the design. Women not having equal rights? Very much intentional. Black people not having equal rights and existing as chattle property? Again, very much intentional.

You're now arguing amendments shouldn't have existed which stands in contradiction to your argument that the Second Amendments past existence justifies its continued existence. Weird contradictory position to take all of a sudden.

In 1776, 'men' was regularly used to define mankind, so it includes women as example.

It absolutely did nothing of the sort. This is both historically shown in the limitation of women's rights as decidedly unequal to that of men, and through contemporaneous diaries and letters at the time.

This is, again, historical revisionism.

At no point would anyone interpret that, nor did they interpret it at the time, that it excluded African natives sold into the slave trade.

Except that...they still existed as slaves. With literally no rights. What the literal fuck are you talking about?

The founders knew slavery was antithetical to the founding principles, and it unfortunately took almost a century for us to get rid of it.

Again, this is unsupported by the text of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, as well as the personal letters and diaries of founders at the time.

That goes for all the amendments except for the 16th amendment which should be abolished, but this isn't a place to discuss taxes.

rofl, go figure the one Amendment you don't like is the one on taxes. This is the least surprising thing you've posted in this thread.

[Edge-]

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. "

So apparently you think that blacks aren't 'men'? The principles set by founders were ahead of their time, they were hypocrites like the rest of us, but without 230 years of cultural and scientific evolution. Its not revisionism to say the word 'men/man' used in a general sense was referring to mankind, aka inclusive to women. It was all based on the principles of John Locke's natural rights, which wasn't exclusive to men as well.

YES. Because if they were they would have enjoyed like...you know...rights. And not have been chattle property who were counted as 3/5ths of a person for the sake of counting whole-peoples to determine Congressional representation and in terms of granting their owners additional voting power commensurate with that 3/5ths representation.

If women were equal, there wouldn't have been a need for something like the 19th Amendment but...there was. So there you go.

Again, this continues to be complete historical revisionism to the point of historical fiction.

This explains so much about your current views if your understanding of American history is this bad.

[Endus]

The US until the abolishment of slavery did not treat all men as equal, slavery was fundamentally antithetical to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights.

That's a obvious lie.

The Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights were all written with the intention and expectation that slavery would continue to be a core element of American society. When the Declaration says "all men are created equal", they literally only meant actual white men. Not blacks, not indigenous peoples, not women, etc. You really need to engage more critically with documentary evidence, rather than just blindly believing the most positive possible interpretation while studiously ignoring the actual, practical outcomes and actions of those who expressed it.

In 1776, 'men' was regularly used to define mankind, so it includes women as example.

Linguistically, I could understand that, but in this context, women could not vote and were not considered "persons" under the law that was established, not having the same rights as free (white) men. So no; that is not what the Founding Fathers were saying. We know this, because that's not how they wrote the laws of their time, or enacted the same.

At no point would anyone interpret that, nor did they interpret it at the time, that it excluded African natives sold into the slave trade. The founders knew slavery was antithetical to the founding principles, and it unfortunately took almost a century for us to get rid of it.

Absolute horse shit. You're lying to my face. The laws as written at the time in no way did anything of the sort, and while some founders may have expressed concerns over slavery as an institution, many of them (including Jefferson, Franklin, and Washington, but by no means limited to those) were active participants in enslaving people, themselves, personally.

Imagine trying to argue that one of the biggest slave-owning nations of its era was founded by people opposed to slavery. While a lot of the same themselves owned slaves. Pretty words mean a fuck of a lot less than actual behaviour. Saying you oppose slavery while serially raping one of your own slaves, as Jefferson did, just demonstrates you're a hypocrite and a liar, not that there's some deep goodness there.

[Mayhem]

I refuse to subscribe to the idea that the presence of a firearm is going to make someone more likely to be evil, or someone that intends to do evil more effective, since there's plenty of equally if not more effective means without nearly the regulations (that I've already discussed). Someone intent on harm or mass murder will do so either way, their ability to use a firearm for such being independent of that desire. Fortunately most of these people aren't that effective when they do so relative to what a capable person with a firearm can do, but unfortunately, we've created soft targets that let even an ineffectual evil-doer do substantial harm.

You are the first pro-gunner that refuses to subscribe to the idea that firearms are effective.

So why use them then?

[Endus]

So apparently you think that blacks aren't 'men'?

That's not Edge-'s point. His point is that most of the Founding Fathers didn't think blacks were "men".

Because they legally were not considered to be "men" under the law those same Founding Fathers wrote.

The principles set by founders were ahead of their time

Balderdash. Absolute fucking nonsense.

Here's the 1689 UK Bill of Rights, passed nearly a full century before the American one which intentionally modelled itself after the UK version;
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/17th_century/england.asp

Rights it enshrines which were later echoed in the USA's version, and the Amendments that later echoed them;

• Freedom of speech (1st)
• Right to bear arms (2nd)
• Free elections (not in the BoR, but is in the Constitution proper)
• No excessive bail, fines, or cruel or unusual punishments inflicted. (8th)
• Right to petition the government (1st)
• Right to jury trial (6th)

Are they precisely the same? Of course not. But if you're gonna sit there and pretend that the USA originated ideas like those listed there, particularly ideas like freedom of speech; you're pushing historically revisionist propaganda, not making an argument.

they were hypocrites like the rest of us, but without 230 years of cultural and scientific evolution.

Which is why everything and anything they said should be given a hairy eyeball, not blindly followed as gospel. Literally my point.

Its not revisionism to say the word 'men/man' used in a general sense was referring to mankind, aka inclusive to women. It was all based on the principles of John Locke's natural rights, which wasn't exclusive to men as well.

Look. At. Actual. Law.

It is revisionist to say that. The Declaration was pretty words that held no legal standing whatsoever and were, in many respects, directly and openly contradicted by the actual laws the Founding Fathers established for their new nation. The Declaration has never held any legal standing; if it had, slavery couldn't have existed and women would have had the vote from 1789 on.

Actions speak louder than pretty, empty words.

[unfilteredJW]

Holy shit.

How do you discuss something like this with someone that doesn’t even have a basic understanding of the concepts and history they are discussing?

[Captain N]

Holy shit.

How do you discuss something like this with someone that doesn’t even have a basic understanding of the concepts and history they are discussing?

You don't. His posts are clearly those of someone throwing shit at the wall and hoping something sticks. It's almost like dealing with a TehDerp sock puppet.

[Santti]

Holy shit.

How do you discuss something like this with someone that doesn’t even have a basic understanding of the concepts and history they are discussing?

They like their stories. Whether it's the awesome founding fathers being ahead of their time, or the gun-toting hero protecting his family, stopping the bad guy with a gun.

That's the gist of it. They are too wrapped up on the story and are in wanton denial over it.

[Grinning Serpent]

Holy shit.

How do you discuss something like this with someone that doesn’t even have a basic understanding of the concepts and history they are discussing?

Welcome to American public education.

[unfilteredJW]

Welcome to American public education.

I might not agree with anything you've typed in this thread but you at least approach the conversation with severity.

So thank you for that.

[Cthulhu 2020]

Wild that once a term enters the conservative sphere, it tends to get overused and beaten to death. I don't think I've seen the term "gaslighting" used more liberally nor more incorrectly than I have in the last 5 pages of this thread. But every conservative and Russia bot on Twitter is overusing it as well, so why am I not surprised that it's the conservative term du jour for gun misinformation?

[Endus]

Not all men could vote either, voting in the US hasn't always just been 'white men', it was generally limited to property owners, which were almost always men back then.

If you had even a little self-awareness about all this, you'd realize you're backing my point up with additional ways the Founding Fathers and their views were kind of shit, not making any kind of counterpoint.

Yes; they were also classist dickbags. But let's recall that 99.99% of those property owners were white men, so pointing out additional injustices doesn't actually contradict the injustices I mentioned.

- - - Updated - - -

I find it amusing that some people cringe at the idea that a man becomes capable of violence to stop unwarranted violence, aka 'hero protecting his family', yet the fundamental drive of most video game narratives, especially one highly relevant to this forum, is all about 'being the hero and saving the day'.

And a lot of movies, too. And stories we've told around campfires.

That's fiction. If you're seriously telling me you can't understand the difference between fiction and reality, well . . .

Kinda telling on yourself, there.

So the people who created the most successful political system and nation to ever exist weren't ahead of their time?

It's more that the USA is by no means the "most successful political system and nation to ever exist", in the first place. Doesn't even come close. Just off the top of my head, the Roman Republic, Imperial England, Imperial Spain, Han or Tang dynasty China, ancient Egypt, or the Ottoman Empire, in no particular order, all at least as influential as the USA is today, as much or more of an economic powerhouse of their time, and all of them survived longer than the USA, and most were far more militarily successful to boot.

You're pushing open, empty, bullshit propaganda, here.

Edit: Oh, and the USA didn't even become particularly successful until the 20th Century, when it got to capitalize off being a contributor to two World Wars whose production capacity didn't get destroyed in either, unlike most of its competitors in Europe. Which A> was an accident of geography that had fuck-all to do with politics, and B> came after a whole lot of what the Founding Fathers laid out had been rewritten or changed, like the banning of slavery for a really obvious one.

[Mayhem]

Firearms take time and training to become effective with, but my definition after years and +10k rounds of training might be different than the people's on this forum. Regardless of military service.

Nice selective boldening, leaving out 'someone more likely to be evil'.

so you think an untrained person can't be more effective with a gun than a person without a gun? interesting

that's not selective boldening, I agree with the first part of the sentence I don't think that people are magically becoming more likely to be evil than they already are just because a gun was put in their hands, I strongly disagree with the latter part and so does every army ever all around the world since the invention of weapons.

[Elegiac]

Relevance? Again, slaves were also seen as right and of being ownable, but then oopsie that was revoked (although prisoners are seen the same way, apparently the US just REALLY loves slave owning). Using this as a slam dunk that shit is just peachy the way it is now ignores shit like the US being the only developed nation to have mass-shooting epidemic, higher than normal suicide and homicide rates with regards to firearms right? Also, easily ignorable as an appeal to authority, which is basically what all your posts can be rejected upon: You don't bring any new or thought-provoking arguments to this discussion, just more "bad guys with guns are beaten by good guys with guns", "mental healf" and "slaveowners and racists are good people".

The "historical precedent" argument also falls particularly flat when one remembers that D.C. v. Heller was adjudicated in 2008 and largely made up out of whole cloth by a right-leaning Supreme Court.

But hey I'm sure that little fact isn't going to stop people from trying to claim that the system designed to cater to the moral outlook of upper class slaveowners in the 18th century remains the pinnacle of representative government in the 21st while simultaneously insisting that same group of upper class slaveowners cannot be judged by a 21st century ethical lens.

[Edge-]

Biggest problem I'm seeing with this discussion is there's plenty of people here who have a pessimistic lens on the founding of the US and I seem to be the only one with an optimistic lens. Yes the founders owned slaves, yes they weren't 2023 defined upstanding people, yes they created the best self-governing system to date.

No, we're realists. You're the one spinning historical fictions to justify your current world-views. We're taking realistic views of the founders, good, bad, and ugly, rather than basically deifying them as they have historically been treated in US history.

A well regulated Militia (individual per DC v Heller), being necessary to the security of a free State (including firearms necessary for proper regulation of a militia per US v Miller), the right of the people to keep and bear Arms (including carrying handguns at the home and in public per NYS v Bruen), shall not be infringed (apparently this is ambiguous).

Why do y'all keep citing the text of the Second Amendment, and sometimes cases like you have, as an argument that the Second Amendment should exist? In a discussion of "oughts", as we've been having, the "is" is fairly irrelevant. Yet you seemingly keep reverting to the "is", and even the descriptive "is" rather than an actual argument.

The text of the Second Amendment isn't an argument for its continued existence.
SCOTUS rulings affirming the Second Amendment, especially some questionable ones more recently, aren't arguments for its continued existence.

Show us some actual arguments that don't rely on, "I'm terrified everyone is going to shoot me, and also I need to fight military tanks and jets with my personal arsenal, and also the only alternative to a Second Amendment is banning all guns even though that's not true."

[Endus]

Yet that's not the case in 2023. Applying the moral virtues of today to people in the 1700s is unreasonable. The theory of evolution wasn't even out until the Civil War period, let alone the industrial revolution.

And? We absolutely can judge the moral failings of people in the past. Are you gonna extend the same "courtesy" to Adolf Hitler, or Caligula, or Vlad the Impaler? It is in no way "unreasonable" to do so. It may be that it was standard practice in their era to behave execrably, but then we judge their society as a whole by the same extension. Same way we condemn the practices of the Salem Witch Trials, the Spanish Inquisition, Nazi Germany, etc.

It's a weird-ass argument and those who offer it never actually apply it evenly. It's just a weak-ass hypocritical defense of past evils.

Moral relativism is not the idea that people of the past cannot be judged. It's that morality as a framework is fundamentally predicated on a particular standpoint. From the standpoint of today, there are gross moral failings to be clearly seen among many of the Founding Fathers. If you want to argue that they wouldn't have been seen as immoral in their own era, you have to acknowledge that this was an era that saw black people as more akin to cattle than people, and that leads us to question that era's moral framework itself.

Biggest problem I'm seeing with this discussion is there's plenty of people here who have a pessimistic lens on the founding of the US and I seem to be the only one with an optimistic lens.

The problem is you're pushing a propagandized view of the USA's founding, lionizing flawed people who believed pretty shitty things, to argue that their words and thoughts were without flaws and that they originated all the ideas modern society is predicated on, like freedom of speech, which is categorically false. It has fuck-all to do with optimism/pessimism; it has to do with your position being untrue.

Yes the founders owned slaves, yes they weren't 2023 defined upstanding people, yes they created the best self-governing system to date.

Like that. The USA is not the "best self-governing system to date". Your recent issues make that clear, the US Civil War makes that clear, the fact that it was a society rooted in slavery for decades after its founding makes that clear, the continued brutal racism even into the modern era makes that clear, and, to bring this back on topic, the wildly out-of-scale rates of gun violence and homicide make that clear.

Yet that's also detracting from the OP, which is about an 'assault weapons' ban. The detraction starting with a discussion about the 2nd amendment, which has legal precedent for such to be unconstitutional. If you wish to have that appealed to support such an 'assault weapons' ban, then contact your congressional representative (oh wait you're Canadian). Unless we're talking about Canada, which already has an extensive version of this type of legislation.

Again, resorting to "is" statements to respond to "ought" questions. You aren't making a case that the 2nd Amendment should exist, you're just saying "it's in the Constitution so fuck you, neener neener."

Slavery got brought up against that claim because it was also in the Constitution, until it was prohibited by amending said Constitution.

[Elegiac]

A toddler can be lethal with a firearm, but that doesn't mean they're effective. There's a reason why 'every army ever all around the world since the invention of weapons' has trained their people on becoming effective with those weapons, not only to increase lethality but also because that training makes them safer while handling said weapon. The Greenwood mall shooting being a recent example, where a non-professionally trained but capable individual engaged a mass shooter at 40 yards with a concealed handgun, something that is an incredible feat. He was even 'outgunned' by an 'assault weapon' and yet that lunatic with the element of surprise wasn't nearly as effective at committing evil as he could've been.

Engaging a target at 40yrds with a concealed handgun is miles more difficult than with a rifle, especially under stress. Its something that people like me who regularly concealed carry have trained on for years, but some handguns make it very difficult, especially landing 8 out of 10 shots without collateral. I've done most my training of sorts at 25 yards, which is already a difficult distance with handgun. 40 yards with any smaller concealable handgun is hard enough from a 'low ready' position, let alone concealed.

Proportionally, I can do 'low ready' drills with any rifle to 100yrds in less time. Yet I know this is a trained capability because I've taught several people where that's a neigh impossible task for them at far shorter distances, like 25 yards (with a rifle being). Something your average school shooter could probably only do from a seated resting position with infinite time.

The most effective way to combat violence is with violence, and the more effective someone is at dealing violence, the more control they can exert when using it. You see this not only with martial arts but also weapons like blades and firearms, someone highly trained not only is more capable/effective but also can exert better restraint. Someone more confident in their capabilities is more likely to use it justly, something you don't see with poorly trained police officers.

The cats been out of the bag with regards to firearms ownership since 1789 and its not going to change unless the 2A is repealed, so either get with the program or become a victim. Freedom has consequences, including the liberal firearm's policy the US has had proportional to every other country even close in capabilities. I personally think it should stay that way and I'd rather not dictate who can and cannot own firearms when its apart of their constitutional right to keep and bear arms fundamental to their natural right to life, liberty and property. Whether that's concealed handguns or 'assault weapons', they're both the most effective tools to such rights, especially against those who also use those tools for harm.

Not everyone is physically capable enough to be effective with a handgun, that's where rifles generally referred to as 'assault weapons' come in like the AR-15. Holding up a +7lb rifle for extended periods of time isn't something people are conditioned for, so a light, handy rifle chambered in a cartridge that's effective on flesh and unlikely to overpenetrate like 5.56x45mm/.223 in an AR-15 is a default choice for a reason.

Oh look, it's the "right wing fun bag of nonsense gun cult talking points" including but not limited to:

- The good guy with a gun fallacy
- Trying to mask the weakness of an ethical argument with technical jargon
- Not understanding why the state monopoly of violence became a thing in the first place
- "2A is currently the law, neener neener liberals" despite this being an 'ought' discussion
- A right that is somehow absent from most functional democracies is fundamental to the preservation of freedom

Endus has said this before, but if you really think your society is so utterly dangerous that you need to have every man and his dog armed to the teeth to protect themselves then your state has well and truly failed. So much for "the best self-governing system to date."