Well done New Zealand!

[Draco-Onis]

Without commentary on what circumstances would potentially lead to an insurgency, I'll say that this is a woefully naive understanding of what domestic insurgency looks like in practice. I also find it pretty twisted how many people have fantasies of a totalitarian military that massacres domestic insurgents with missiles, but that's a whole other conversation.

I don't think that's unreasonable as long as people use the whole we need guns to protect ourselves from the government line, the only valid reasoning is for self defense and love of guns.

[Fahrenheit]

Without commentary on what circumstances would potentially lead to an insurgency, I'll say that this is a woefully naive understanding of what domestic insurgency looks like in practice. I also find it pretty twisted how many people have fantasies of a totalitarian military that massacres domestic insurgents with missiles, but that's a whole other conversation.

I agree. I don't think it'll come to that, I was being super hyperbolic. I think Americans have it way too well to pick up arms and threaten our relatively cushy lifestyle to live in the woods and forego the comforts of modern life to fight an insurgency.

[roboscorcher]

Congrats, the killer got exactly what he wanted. Luckily for us here in here in America, the cops wont come knocking to take guns, because they won't risk getting themselves shot.

I'm pretty sure the killer wanted the Muslims gone; which he is certainly not getting. And now it will be much harder for his fellow dirtbags to follow in his footsteps.

[Sezh]

Always?

Doesn't look like an impressive correlation.

If you don't trust it because it includes a bunch of high crime places, here's a more curated data set.

There is quite literally no correlation between the number of firearms and the homicide rate.

I'm not saying you can compare country to country in that way. I'm saying that if the US had fewer guns, there would be fewer deaths in the US. If Honduras had fewer guns, there would be fewer deaths in Honduras. If Norway had fewer guns, there'd be fewer deaths in Norway.

I don't think there's any way to prove or disprove this, but to me it's logical and I won't believe the opposite without good reason to.

[grexly75]

I'm pretty happy in my first world country where only the criminals have guns and the only people they shoot are other criminals. I wouldn't pick living in the US where school children are more likely to get shot than soldiers in war over a country with gun ban ever.

I am glad I don't live in your country if you have criminals running around waving guns at each other.. We here in Australia are bit more civilized than that, we learn the hard way back in 1996, after that the only people allowed to have guns are the Police, armoured security guards, farmers and those who are in who are members of sports shooting clubs..

[Setheria]

Always?

Doesn't look like an impressive correlation.

If you don't trust it because it includes a bunch of high crime places, here's a more curated data set.

There is quite literally no correlation between the number of firearms and the homicide rate.

Interesting link when you delve into it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ted_death_rate) copied for people who want more than the graphic.

Here are a list of countries with more firearms deaths than the USA per 100,000 people.

Honduras
Venezuela
El Salvador
Swaziland
Guatemala
Jamaica
Brazil
Colombia
Panama

The list for countries below the USA in terms of firearms deaths is slightly longer. It runs to 185 below compared to 9 above.

I mean, if you want your point of comparison to be 3rd world countries overrun with drug & gang violence, sure. Then yes, the USA does better than 9 nations. Given there's around 195 countries in the world, I don't think that actually correlates to anything good. Maybe if you divide the deaths by number of guns, but what kind of farcical statistic would that get you? You can even ignore suicide, or 'unintentional deaths' if you want. (as if that makes any difference to the toddler killed by another toddler). Still a pretty shitty and low bar for the USA.

The New Zealand government has acted decisively, and taken purely on a casualty basis, there is little doubt this will save lives.

None of this actually even relates to the kind of question broader gun control asks regarding the view of individuals to the state, and whether you trust the state to the be the sole arbitrator of violence. There are some states where I think it's a legitimate question. Not convinced New Zealand is one of them...

[ellieg]

Why do ppl talk about the military coming for citizens as if it's a hivemind. The military is made up of ppl like u and me. If an order were to come out that said "use these drones to kill citizens" they wouldnt all follow it. There would be plenty of infighting.

How many ppl in the military do you actually know and talk to multiple times a week? I'm guessing not many. The government might try to fuck you, but there is no way there would be an organized military attack to wipe out millions of revolting civilians. Plenty of military members would join in on the revolt against the government.

[roboscorcher]

But before I get involved in a gun control debate ( which I will not in this thread ) , it is New Zealand, their country, their laws. They have no constitution which guarantees the citizens the right to keep and carry arms, so it is easy to pass such a law.

I know you don't want a debate, but...your argument here is that an ancient law is preventing the US from doing the same. If the law does not make sense, you should change it. The 2nd amendment is itself an amendment. Amend it back so that only qualified, sane people can own a gun. They are killing tools, designed only for that purpose. Wielding them should be earned, no?

[Sezh]

I am glad I don't live in your country if you have criminals running around waving guns at each other.. We here in Australia are bit more civilized than that, we learn the hard way back in 1996, after that the only people allowed to have guns are the Police, armoured security guards, farmers and those who are in who are members of sports shooting clubs..

We have the same rules here. But you have to be pretty naive if you think not a single criminal in Australia has guns.

[Bodakane]

Can someone explain how citizens having commercially bought weapons and ammo, are supposed to deter the world's largest and most advanced military?

[Ghostpanther]

I know you don't want a debate, but...your argument here is that an ancient law is preventing the US from doing the same. If the law does not make sense, you should change it. The 2nd amendment is itself an amendment. Amend it back so that only qualified, sane people can own a gun. They are killing tools, designed only for that purpose. Wielding them should be earned, no?

We have a procedure for amending our constitution. It is not a matter of just changing it on a whelm. This applies to all parts of it. And it is not done simply by popular demand. We are the United States of America. Out of over 11,000 attempts to amend our constitution, it has only been done 28 times. So is it possible? Of course. Is it likely? No.

[Spectral]

Interesting link when you delve into it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ted_death_rate) copied for people who want more than the graphic.

Here are a list of countries with more firearms deaths than the USA per 100,000 people.

Honduras
Venezuela
El Salvador
Swaziland
Guatemala
Jamaica
Brazil
Colombia
Panama

The list for countries below the USA in terms of firearms deaths is slightly longer. It runs to 185 below compared to 9 above.

I mean, if you want your point of comparison to be 3rd world countries overrun with drug & gang violence, sure. Then yes, the USA does better than 9 nations. Given there's around 195 countries in the world, I don't think that actually correlates to anything good. Maybe if you divide the deaths by number of guns, but what kind of farcical statistic would that get you? You can even ignore suicide, or 'unintentional deaths' if you want. (as if that makes any difference to the toddler killed by another toddler). Still a pretty shitty and low bar for the USA.

The New Zealand government has acted decisively, and taken purely on a casualty basis, there is little doubt this will save lives.

None of this actually even relates to the kind of question broader gun control asks regarding the view of individuals to the state, and whether you trust the state to the be the sole arbitrator of violence. There are some states where I think it's a legitimate question. Not convinced New Zealand is one of them...

The second link is telling if you want to look at first world countries.

The United States is a weird outlier that shouldn't really be treated as an instructive data point when it comes to policy. Relative to other wealthy countries, the homicide rate is off the charts, but there's little reason to believe that's primarily driven by the number of firearms, given that there's essentially no historical relationship between the number of firearms (which has climbed without interruption for decades) and the homicide rate (which has trended down, with a couple zig zags). Other wealthy, high gun countries (Switzerland, Canada, Norway, etc.) exhibit no particular proclivity towards high homicide rates.

Instead, the primary drivers of the high American murder rate seems to be a combination of racial demographics and economic inequality. If the driver were firearms, we'd expect the native-born white murder rate to be extraordinarily high given that whites are ~50% more likely to own firearms than blacks and more than twice as likely as Hispanics (Pew data). Instead, American white murder rates are basically in line with the murder rate of countries like the UK.

But anyway, I certainly agree with @Ghostpanther that New Zealand can do what it wants and isn't obligated to share some value that another country may have. Maybe it'll even help them in some sense. I more or less doubt it, but it really doesn't matter what I think on the topic of what New Zealand's laws, which rather reminds me of how much it matters to me what Europeans and others tend to think of American norms, values, and laws.

[Pooti]

FTFY

Because, right now, especially with fukwit Senators and the President outright encouraging Civil War, I sure as hell don't feel very free ATM. >_<

What are you not free to do?

[lockybalboa]

Good stuff. Straight to the point.

[ellieg]

Can someone explain how citizens having commercially bought weapons and ammo, are supposed to deter the world's largest and most advanced military?

1. Vietnam
2. Because the full military will never attack. Most of the military are gun owners. If they get an order saying that these millions of civilians are revolting and need to be killed, most wont follow that order. You arent fighting a unified force. You would be fighting a few government loyalists. I can guarantee you that you wont see air strikes and tanks rolling around killing civilians.

[Charge me Doctor]

Why do ppl talk about the military coming for citizens as if it's a hivemind. The military is made up of ppl like u and me. If an order were to come out that said "use these drones to kill citizens" they wouldnt all follow it. There would be plenty of infighting.

How many ppl in the military do you actually know and talk to multiple times a week? I'm guessing not many. The government might try to fuck you, but there is no way there would be an organized military attack to wipe out millions of revolting civilians. Plenty of military members would join in on the revolt against the government.

just want to point out that military "aren't" people like you and me at least because they learn reflexes like shooting at human being, which isn't something that us, regular people, can do. Unless you are a psycho, you always hesitate before shooting (or beating someone to death after they gave up), people in military and police learn how to suppress this instinct to actually be able to do what they have to do (unlike people in 1900s iirc). I can't remember studies from the top of my head, but there were tests, like column of soldiers shooting at targets with 90% accuracy, but failing to hit human-like target with just 5% accuracy

[Spectral]

Can someone explain how citizens having commercially bought weapons and ammo, are supposed to deter the world's largest and most advanced military?

They're not - they're supposed to deter possible dictators and totalitarians that bleed like anyone else. Whether that works to do anything other than descend a nation into chaos is pretty questionable, but the notion that an insurgency consists of people shooting at fighter jets is so fucking stupid that I have a hard time believing anyone that's repeating that notion has thought about it much.

Edit - For clarity, I am emphatically not advocating violence against anyone in office or running for office.

[VladimirM]

Why would a civilian have these types of weapons in the first place?

[Kumorii]

just want to point out that military "aren't" people like you and me at least because they learn reflexes like shooting at human being, which isn't something that us, regular people, can do. Unless you are a psycho, you always hesitate before shooting (or beating someone to death after they gave up), people in military and police learn how to suppress this instinct to actually be able to do what they have to do (unlike people in 1900s iirc). I can't remember studies from the top of my head, but there were tests, like column of soldiers shooting at targets with 90% accuracy, but failing to hit human-like target with just 5% accuracy

Fairly sure his point wa sthat they are just like you and me and probably won't start to slaughter their own citizens mindlessly. It's not like the government have mind controlled them. Fairly sure that if government declared war on their own citizens and ordered the army to attack, most of the army won't and will turn against the government.

[Bodakane]

They're not - they're supposed to deter possible dictators and totalitarians that bleed like anyone else. Whether that works to do anything other than descend a nation into chaos is pretty questionable, but the notion that an insurgency consists of people shooting at fighter jets is so fucking stupid that I have a hard time believing anyone that's repeating that notion has thought about it much.

Our system its built to deter dictators. We do not need our guns rot defend ourselves form our government, if we did, then America is not great and we should go back to the drawing board.