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Thats the thing, nothing happens, nothing has happend, nothing continues to happen

No effor because the conversation isnt allowed to even being started

"Now is not the time to talk about X" echoed over and over, its never the time to talk about it therefore nothing ever will get done since the conversation isnt allowed to exist at all.

So the status quo remains.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Did see a quote making the rounds on social media, which is actually proving quite true and quite sad

Something to the effect of

"In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over."

You won NRA and gun enthusiasts, you won. Hope you enjoy your victory, the 2nd amendment is clad in stone and mortared with blood.

Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

The Sandy Hook guy killed his mom and stole her guns. Stuff that's already illegal. More laws wouldn't have done a thing.

There is a difference between saying something is acceptable and saying something is unpreventable. If someone kills his mom and steals her guns, nothing could have stopped that.

If you want to reduce crazy people shooting places up, approach it from the mental health angle. Don't approach it from the gun angle. The gun angle isn't what caused the problem in the first place, and doing that only violates the rights of innocent people. Mental health is where liberals should focus their energy, not on trampling the rights of law abiding citizens.

 Ouze wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
"random checks" violates the 4th Amendment.

As an avid competition shooter I would be ok with:
*detailed background check, especially related to mental health. This background check has to be recertified annually. A background check includes a course on firearm safety and conflict de-escalation.
*making bumpfire stocks illegal (something to actually affect the recent crisis).
*making the background check go with the person.
*confirmation of said background check prior to any purchase, including private sales.
*locks with all purchases.
*the ability to require persons who are later adjudicated mentally not fit to temporarily be required to store their weapons with a different legal holder but not in the same domicile until that mental difficulty is fixed.

In return I want:
*Suppressors legal for hearing protection, as in other European countries.
*Nationwide CHL.
*A return of mental health's ability to involuntarily house mentally ill after apppropriate hearings. Prisons should not be where we house the mentally ill.
*Elimination of USPSA courses where one has to kneel or bend over when shooting as I am too old for that gak (sorry couldn't resist).

I'd be OK with all of that as well. I'd also like to see the ban on funding for gun violence research lifted.

I'd like to see a national education requirement and annual proficiency required for a concealed carry permit. You mentioned de-escalation specifically, and that seems smart. As you know but others may not, concealed carry regulations vary wildly by the state. In the state that I live in, to get my carry permit I needed to watch a 90 minute video on a youtube-like site and pass a test and a background check. The video mostly emphasized how to safely carry a gun, and where you could not in Iowa. The "test" was a 20 question multiple choice test that anyone who was not a moron could handily pass without watching the video. While I now know you can't carry a gun on a snowmobile in Iowa, there wasn't a single question regarding castle doctrine, de-escalation, or anything else about when to shoot and when not to - nothing even in that arena.

Unfortunately over the last 20 years, the NRA has made all of these things impossible. They've gone from resisting onerous legislation to functionally rejecting any legislation whatsoever, couching any gun control as an unendurable assault on the second amendment. The NRA has very much become part of the problem.

Our CHL required a twelve hour course including range test. This has more recently been substantially reduced. It was primarily about the Texas self defense laws, with some de-escalation. I would recommend a full day class on de-escalation alone, in addition to the law requirements. Now as noted I am for CHL reciprocity vs. one CHL nationwide, and also note that CHLs (at least in Texas) are almost never involved in crime. We're more law abiding than priests statistically (no joke).

 Hollow wrote:
Gun laws won't change in the USA because there is a strong, politically active minority in America who literally love guns more than their own children. They'd rather see the streets run red, with the blood of their fellow citizens, than admit to their addiction, their fetish, their muse. The pro gun rally, at heart, are scared. They're scared of government, of rapists and killers, of muggers and thieves. They're scared of immigrants, muslims and inner city gags. They're scared of urban centers and bears roaming rural retreats. They're homophobic, God fearing scaredy cats who cling to guns because they think they'll offer them some kind of protection when the boogeyman comes.

...Hollow, this isn't a helpful conversation...

 Grey Templar wrote:


Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

And then there is this gem again. Why pass any law, criminals will ignore it. How am I the only one that doesnt thing this argument is completely ridiculous. Criminals ignore laws, thats what they do, should we abolish all law?

 Hollow wrote:
Do gun advocates think that everyone should be able to own a nuclear warhead? Should every/any body be able to buy a nuke from Walmart for a few hundred bucks?

Nukes are considered 'Weapons of Mass Destruction' and they are prohibited for civilians.

Just like the pressure bombs by that Boston massacre are considered to be WMDs... those are prohibited.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Thats the thing, nothing happens, nothing has happend, nothing continues to happen

No effor because the conversation isnt allowed to even being started

"Now is not the time to talk about X" echoed over and over, its never the time to talk about it therefore nothing ever will get done since the conversation isnt allowed to exist at all.

So the status quo remains.

That's demonstrably false. Every time there is a mass shooting it gets massive media coverage nationally and politicians always seize the opportunity to make speeches about it. It's not that we don't discuss it's that when we discuss it we find that many more people are far more accepting of the status quo then the vocal advocates for new gun control laws believe. We are also subjected to gun control proposals that are rooted in obvious ignorance of firearms and are easily proven to be ineffectual responses in regards to the goal of preventing the tragedy from recurring.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Did see a quote making the rounds on social media, which is actually proving quite true and quite sad

Something to the effect of

"In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over."

You won NRA and gun enthusiasts, you won. Hope you enjoy your victory, the 2nd amendment is clad in stone and mortared with blood.

Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

The Sandy Hook guy killed his mom and stole her guns. Stuff that's already illegal. More laws wouldn't have done a thing.

There is a difference between saying something is acceptable and saying something is unpreventable. If someone kills his mom and steals her guns, nothing could have stopped that.

If you want to reduce crazy people shooting places up, approach it from the mental health angle. Don't approach it from the gun angle. The gun angle isn't what caused the problem in the first place, and doing that only violates the rights of innocent people. Mental health is where liberals should focus their energy, not on trampling the rights of law abiding citizens.

Also note, since the Florida shooting, gun ownership by women and LGBTX has risen dramatically.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Thats the thing, nothing happens, nothing has happend, nothing continues to happen

No effor because the conversation isnt allowed to even being started

"Now is not the time to talk about X" echoed over and over, its never the time to talk about it therefore nothing ever will get done since the conversation isnt allowed to exist at all.

So the status quo remains.

That's demonstrably false. Every time there is a mass shooting it gets massive media coverage nationally and politicians always seize the opportunity to make speeches about it. It's not that we don't discuss it's that when we discuss it we find that many more people are far more accepting of the status quo then the vocal advocates for new gun control laws believe. We are also subjected to gun control proposals that are rooted in obvious ignorance of firearms and are easily proven to be ineffectual responses in regards to the goal of preventing the tragedy from recurring.

I dont believe more people are accepting of the status quo than the vocal minority that comes up, they've just kindof given up at this point after so many incidents with no real effort made or conversation started.

That and our lawmakers are pretty much ineffective and ignorate at any legislation passed, they know about as much about guns as they do about healthcare

 WrentheFaceless wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

And then there is this gem again. Why pass any law, criminals will ignore it. How am I the only one that doesnt thing this argument is completely ridiculous. Criminals ignore laws, thats what they do, should we abolish all law?

I assume your goal is to reduce people getting shot. There is zero evidence that stricter gun laws do anything to reduce shootings like this. In-fact, in the US it clearly shows the opposite. Stronger laws = more gun violence. So why is it acceptable to trample on people's rights for no gain?

This particular shooting also couldn't have been stopped anywhere in the world. This guy was a multi-millionaire. No law would have been a barrier to him.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

And then there is this gem again. Why pass any law, criminals will ignore it. How am I the only one that doesnt thing this argument is completely ridiculous. Criminals ignore laws, thats what they do, should we abolish all law?

Because tens of millions of gun owners don't want to be subject to punitive new laws that negatively impact their lives and do nothing to prevent the mass shootings that is their supposed reason for passing the new laws. I've done nothing wrong but now I can't own my AR15 because you think it's scary, yeah that's not going to be tolerated.

 whembly wrote:

 Hollow wrote:
Do gun advocates think that everyone should be able to own a nuclear warhead? Should every/any body be able to buy a nuke from Walmart for a few hundred bucks?

Nukes are considered 'Weapons of Mass Destruction' and they are prohibited for civilians.

Just like the pressure bombs by that Boston massacre are considered to be WMDs... those are prohibited.

Which is unconstitutional, since it infringes "the right to bear arms", yet the US as a nation is completely fine with such a ban.

 Albino Squirrel wrote:
Do_I_Not_Like_That, I just want to say that I appreciate your reasonable and sane understanding of the United States and it's history/culture. A lot of people from around the world seem to have some really bizarre notions about what the United States is like. I wish I knew where they got some of their strange ideas.

I do hope we get some kind of motive determined in this particular shooting, because on the face of it the perpetrator seems extremely atypical.

Obviously everyone wonders why we have these mass shootings. It seems like we have some ideologically motivated ones (pulse nightclub shooting), but those aside the common thread seems to be mental illness. Perhaps we have more mental illness here than in other places, or maybe we are worse at treating it. I will say the treatment seems to normally be prescribing medication which often seems to do more harm than good.

We do unfortunately seem to have this belief that through the miracle of modern medicine everything can be cured with a pill. Seems like any treatment that requires effort or lifestyle change is often ignored, even if those would give the best results.

Thanks for the kind words.

I'll be honest and say when I was young, I viewed the world in simple black and white terms and the gun debate was no different. As you grow older, you discover that life is a lot more complicated than simple black and white thinking.

Americans are like any other group of people on Earth: you get good people, and you get idiots and evil people. That's true of every nation and culture.

As somebody who enjoys military history, I watch American gun channels on youtube to see old muskets getting fired

In an ideal world, every American gun owner would be like Hickok45, or forgotten weapons/inrange or military arms channel. Sensible, law abiding gun owners.

And we wouldn't have a problem with guns. I suspect the vast majority of gun owners in the USA probably haven't had so much as a parking ticket in their lives.

As another example, I've met a lot of Muslims in my life, and 99% of them are good, decent, honest people, but idiots like ISIL ruin it for everybody.

There is always a small minority of people who ruin things for the rest of us, be it guns, alcohol, religion, whatever.

It's human nature that's the problem here.

@WrentheFaceless

In the context of this thread. what law could of possibly stopped this from happening?

edited by Manchu, Rule 2

Prestor Jon wrote:

nfe wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
"random checks" violates the 4th Amendment.

1) A check that would be a requirement of your holding a license wouldn't be an unreasonable search or seizure.
2) I don't care, anyway.
2.1) Written constitutions are stupid.

If you're already resorting to "I don't care" and "written constitutions are stupid" then you really aren't bringing much to the discussion. You can deal with the reality that exists or not, but you're just wasting your time with posts like that.

Resorting?

For clarity:

1) is the actual response.
2) is my being flippant because the nature of written constutions means that ambiguous statements like 'unreasonable search or seizure' hamstring entire leilsatures for decades.
2.1) see point 2.

To the topic: evidently the GF is still in the Philippines. Thats interesting.

How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Russia or Russians have no room to talk about gun control and its efficacy. You're why a whole bunch of us are armed.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Within the US, areas which have very strict gun control laws have the worst gun violence. Areas with few restrictions and high gun ownership have the least.

Violence in general is also correlated with poverty more than anything else. So if you truly cared about reducing violence then you should focus on poverty and mental health. Guns are basically an entirely unrelated issue.

The mental health angle is the ideal angle to approach. America has finally started to treat drug addiction as a medical condition rather than a crime, and I think the same revolution of ideas can occur in the way the public views mental health, mental illness, and violence. However, this would require adequate funding for clinical studies, new treatments, and and integration of modern ideas into the American health care system. This would require our politicians to recognize that mental illness is preventable and that there are people who are not fit to own weapons, and that tighter gun control laws are not the best way to go. I don't have a whole lot of faith in either party to own up as a whole to the issue.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 Hollow wrote:
Do gun advocates think that everyone should be able to own a nuclear warhead? Should every/any body be able to buy a nuke from Walmart for a few hundred bucks?

Nukes are considered 'Weapons of Mass Destruction' and they are prohibited for civilians.

Just like the pressure bombs by that Boston massacre are considered to be WMDs... those are prohibited.

Which is unconstitutional, since it infringes "the right to bear arms", yet the US as a nation is completely fine with such a ban.

The public at large is fine with such a ban because owning nuclear weapons is a practical impossibility for 99% of the people so the law just reflects an established reality. Making it illegal to own something that I can't own anyway isn't going to ruffle a lot of feathers.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Within the US, areas which have very strict gun control laws have the worst gun violence. Areas with few restrictions and high gun ownership have the least.

Violence in general is also correlated with poverty more than anything else. So if you truly cared about reducing violence then you should focus on poverty and mental health. Guns are basically an entirely unrelated issue.

Australia also doesnt have to deal with land boarders between other countries or its own differing states.

I for one blame Canada.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Did see a quote making the rounds on social media, which is actually proving quite true and quite sad

Something to the effect of

"In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over."

You won NRA and gun enthusiasts, you won. Hope you enjoy your victory, the 2nd amendment is clad in stone and mortared with blood.

The issue is, just as in the case of Sandy Hook and Orlando, what sort of legislation, short of confiscation, would have any impact something like this? We routinely see a rash of legislation proposed in response to events like this...but seemingly none of it actually crafted to have any effect whatsoever.

More Background checks? No-Fly-No-Buy? Paddock appears to have been clean, Lanza stole his weapons after murdering the legal owner, and Mateen was cleared as a licensed armed security guard and investigated by FBI, so probably not.

Assault Weapons Ban? At least as such have been implemented over the last 30 years, probably not, as they don't actually address the killing capability of weapons, are easily bypassed by changing things like grips or muzzle devices, and they don't catch all sorts of weapons with equivalent killing capabilities (e.g. Mini14 vs AR15, both throw the same round out with the same rate of fire at roughly the same accuracy with similar potential magazine capacities, but Mini14's are banned under no AWB that I can recall), and there's already millions of these weapons in circulation.

Locking/Storage requirements? Only possibly relevant in Lanza's case, but he lived in the home, was familiar where things were, and was clearly willing to kill and was determined to do what he did, so probably would not have had any impact.

Waiting periods? Again, Lanza stole the weapons, Paddock had these weapons for a while seemingly, and Mateen waited longer than most waiting periods anyway before going off on his spree (another day or two to match the longest waiting periods probably wouldn't have made a difference).

That's the big problem we keep running into. Everyone says "we need to do something", but then nothing they propose would actually have done squat to prevent something like this. It just becomes an excuse to push legislation for its own sake, without regards to its efficacy on the issue that spurred it.


Ultimately it boils down to this: Most proposed legislation would do nothing to stop these events. Really, as long as such weapons are available, the possibility is there and largely unchanged, and that ship has long since sailed. Thus, do we attempt to post-facto legislate and restrict things from 300 Million+ people, stuff thats not registered or tracked and are plentifully available and widespread, for something that has lotto level odds of actually occurring to any particular person? If so, on what basis can we reasonably devote the resources required for such and effort that wouldn't save dramatically more lives if devoted to healthcare and economic development and infrastructure?

 Desubot wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Within the US, areas which have very strict gun control laws have the worst gun violence. Areas with few restrictions and high gun ownership have the least.

Violence in general is also correlated with poverty more than anything else. So if you truly cared about reducing violence then you should focus on poverty and mental health. Guns are basically an entirely unrelated issue.

Australia also doesnt have to deal with land boarders between other countries or its own differing states.

I for one blame Canada.

Don't we all, just hanging out up there waiving around its maple syrups at everyone like that.

No evidence? See Australia and most of Europe.

 Desubot wrote:
@WrentheFaceless

In the context of this thread. what law could of possibly stopped this from happening?

At this point the guns are the sacred cow, regulate the sale of Ammo. Guns cant shoot when they dont have ammo or if its severely restricted.

Mexico has strict gun control laws, yet is the 2nd most violent place on earth now.

nfe wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

nfe wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
"random checks" violates the 4th Amendment.

1) A check that would be a requirement of your holding a license wouldn't be an unreasonable search or seizure.
2) I don't care, anyway.
2.1) Written constitutions are stupid.

If you're already resorting to "I don't care" and "written constitutions are stupid" then you really aren't bringing much to the discussion. You can deal with the reality that exists or not, but you're just wasting your time with posts like that.

Resorting?

For clarity:

1) is the actual response.
2) is my being flippant because the nature of written constutions means that ambiguous statements like 'unreasonable search or seizure' hamstring entire leilsatures for decades.
3) see point 2.

1) is an ignorant response, being required to do something doesn't give the authorities probable cause to do random checks, it's illegal to carry weapons in NYC but stop and frisk police searches are unconstitutional, the fact that it is illegal to possess drugs or guns while walking the streets of NYC doesn't give the NYPD the right to randomly stop and search people, that kind of fishing expedition is expressly illegal in the US
2) if you're going to brush off the constraints of the parameters of the legal system and societal norms then you're not going to bring anything worthwhile to the discussion
3) flippancy doesn't hide the flaws in the response, every law is written down and it's not stupid by any definition of the term because words are how we define meaning and written laws can still be changed through legislation and can be reevaluated by subsequent judicial reviews, writing it down doesn't make it permanent or inviolate

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Within the US, areas which have very strict gun control laws have the worst gun violence. Areas with few restrictions and high gun ownership have the least.

Violence in general is also correlated with poverty more than anything else. So if you truly cared about reducing violence then you should focus on poverty and mental health. Guns are basically an entirely unrelated issue.

I definitely agree that a focus on poverty and mental health would be a good strategy to reduce violence, but I don't think any area in the US can have strict gun control. What use is there in having gun control if you could just get a gun in the state next door? The point of gun control is to make it harder for people to get access to a firearm so that someone with violent intent won't be able to get one without a lot of work and proper connections, and therefore will be more likely to resort to a knife, sword or axe instead (and thus significantly reducing casualties). Gun control would only work if it was nationwide.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
How can you guys know that gun control will not prevent mass shootings? The US has never had strict gun control, so you can't say that.
In other countries, like Australia, I hear that mass shootings also used to be a problem, but haven't been ever since Australia introduced strict gun control laws and offered to buy back people's guns.

Russia or Russians have no room to talk about gun control and its efficacy. You're why a whole bunch of us are armed.

I thought that was the British?

 WrentheFaceless wrote:

Spoiler:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Not really. At best, maybe more people realized that gun control doesn't do anything to stop gun crime. It only serves to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens.

And then there is this gem again. Why pass any law, criminals will ignore it. How am I the only one that doesnt thing this argument is completely ridiculous. Criminals ignore laws, thats what they do, should we abolish all law?

I assume your goal is to reduce people getting shot. There is zero evidence that stricter gun laws do anything to reduce shootings like this. In-fact, in the US it clearly shows the opposite. Stronger laws = more gun violence. So why is it acceptable to trample on people's rights for no gain?

This particular shooting also couldn't have been stopped anywhere in the world. This guy was a multi-millionaire. No law would have been a barrier to him.

No evidence? See Australia and most of Europe.

 Desubot wrote:
@WrentheFaceless

In the context of this thread. what law could of possibly stopped this from happening?

At this point the guns are the sacred cow, regulate the sale of Ammo. Guns cant shoot when they dont have ammo or if its severely restricted.

So restricting the rights of everyone, doing something that would not have stopped anything. Got it.