Moreover, I can't recall ever reading or hearing about an armed gunman who opened fire on a crowd and was promptly put down by a regular person there who also happened to be armed. Does this actually happen much at all?
Not really, no.
I seem to recall a couple instances where an armed bystander stopped somebody before they could actually start shooting, or something similar. But it's ridiculously uncommon. Partly because in much of the country, carry is in and of itself uncommon. Then, once you beat the odds and have a CCW holder (who is currently carrying) present, if they're smart their intent is to use that weapon to defend themselves. Like, as a last ditch effort. Not going out of their way to take him down. For both selfish reasons and many of the other common sense reasons already mentioned.
Why is it that gun ownership is apparently the only inalienable right that conservatives believe in anymore?
We limit freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression on a daily basis but even sneeze at a gun and you're a communist.
If the state has the power to mandate that each citizen has to have a certain kind of ID to vote surely the state can mandate safety classes or permits or even liability coverage in exchange for gun ownership.
Well, not so much since bribery became legal due to "freedom of speech" (/spit). Playing Devil's Advocate, voting did not start out as something people had a right to, and we've really had to fight as a nation to get it where it is, and we still have a ways to go.
I do wonder about them leaving out the part of the militia. Forcing gun owners into militias seems like a bad idea though.
We have militias. It's called the National Guard.
Yup.
If that were the intention of the amendment, then its inclusion was redundant, since the Constitution already makes allowance for the US government to provide for defense (which, given the meaning of the term at the time, is basically synonymous with "professional navy and army". Moreover, the abilities of states to keep and raise their own militias is already specifically allowed in the Constitution without the amendment.
The various National Guards still ultimately fall under the national chain of command. The purpose of the amendment is pretty much what everybody thinks it is: to let people arm themselves against the government.
For illustration, here was a proposed alternative version of the Second Amendment suggested by some at the time:
The people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and their own State, or for the United States, or for the purpose of killing game...
Now, it's thought by many that the reason the amendment wasn't ultimately quite phrased like that was because the drafters wanted to emphasize gun-ownership as a political right, and not a civil one (thus distinguishing between those rights that are necessary for political discourse but are not universal and can be taken away from individuals, and those which are inalienable).
Secondly, the right is conferred to the people, not the militia. The drafters didn't mix terms like these up. While it could be argued that "the people" might mean something closer to "the States", it would be a stretch to equate the term to the militias only (even the first reading is honestly a stretch considering that when they wanted to talk about "the States", they specifically did that too).
Finally, a bit of history: at the time of drafting, the sort of militia that we currently have with formally trained, paid volunteers would be considered what was called then a "select corps", and probably wouldn't be looked at much more positively than a normal standing army. The word "militia" used alone was basically synonymous with "all citizens capable of bearing arms". It's used that way throughout the Federalist Papers.
Why is it that gun ownership is apparently the only inalienable right that conservatives believe in anymore?
We limit freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression on a daily basis but even sneeze at a gun and you're a communist.
If the state has the power to mandate that each citizen has to have a certain kind of ID to vote surely the state can mandate safety classes or permits or even liability coverage in exchange for gun ownership.
I think it's possible to strenuously defend gun ownership without adopting all the other opinions of a stereotypical Fox News Republican.
I'm not attacking anyone in here, I'm looking for an honest answer to why we think that is a thing people think.
Because yeah, it's a stereotype but the same people who post shit like this:
*snip*
are the ones voting for people like Rick Scott.
Also, this really isn't hard. You're looking at people who very much define their world as "us" and "others." They dislike, or even fear, the "others." Those could be anything from simply the poor, to minorities, to immigrants, whatever. So voter ID laws are an attempt to keep the "others" from voting. Speech/assembly/expression is a tool of the "others" (and the liberals who support them) to try and undermine "our" culture. Or to take my hard earned wealth and give it to the "others."
And making it harder to get guns, in a world filled with "others" who want to steal my stereo and rape my daughters, is a threat to my peace of mind.
It has nothing to do with rights, really. They argue rights and founding fathers and such only as a means to the end, that end being to protect themselves and their way of life. It's about selfishness and fear. So no, you shouldn't look for logical consistency there.
EDIT: I say this as a ridiculously pro-gun person who is generally somewhat liberal. Have fun (as an example) arguing with the average gun nut as to why, if they're being ideologically consistent, illegal immigrants should have the same right to own a gun for self-defense as anybody else. It's always interesting.
Why is it that gun ownership is apparently the only inalienable right that conservatives believe in anymore?
We limit freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression on a daily basis but even sneeze at a gun and you're a communist.
If the state has the power to mandate that each citizen has to have a certain kind of ID to vote surely the state can mandate safety classes or permits or even liability coverage in exchange for gun ownership.
Well, not so much since bribery became legal due to "freedom of speech" (/spit). Playing Devil's Advocate, voting did not start out as something people had a right to, and we've really had to fight as a nation to get it where it is, and we still have a ways to go.
I do wonder about them leaving out the part of the militia. Forcing gun owners into militias seems like a bad idea though.
We have militias. It's called the National Guard.
Yup.
If that were the intention of the amendment, then its inclusion was redundant, since the Constitution already makes allowance for the US government to provide for defense (which, given the meaning of the term at the time, is basically synonymous with "professional navy and army". Moreover, the abilities of states to keep and raise their own militias is already specifically allowed in the Constitution without the amendment.
The various National Guards still ultimately fall under the national chain of command. The purpose of the amendment is pretty much what everybody thinks it is: to let people arm themselves against the government.
For illustration, here was a proposed alternative version of the Second Amendment suggested by some at the time:
The people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and their own State, or for the United States, or for the purpose of killing game...
Now, it's thought by many that the reason the amendment wasn't ultimately quite phrased like that was because the drafters wanted to emphasize gun-ownership as a political right, and not a civil one (thus distinguishing between those rights that are necessary for political discourse but are not universal and can be taken away from individuals, and those which are inalienable).
Secondly, the right is conferred to the people, not the militia. The drafters didn't mix terms like these up. While it could be argued that "the people" might mean something closer to "the States", it would be a stretch to equate the term to the militias only (even the first reading is honestly a stretch considering that when they wanted to talk about "the States", they specifically did that too).
Finally, a bit of history: at the time of drafting, the sort of militia that we currently have with formally trained, paid volunteers would be considered what was called then a "select corps", and probably wouldn't be looked at much more positively than a normal standing army. The word "militia" used alone was basically synonymous with "all citizens capable of bearing arms". It's used that way throughout the Federalist Papers.
This still leaves two questions - are there some weapons so devastatingly powerful that they should be restricted (and if so, which), and should concealed weapons be allowed (certainly, the wording of the amendment is rather silent on this).
To the first, I think that it's clear some weapons really are that dangerous (For instance - [urhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger]this[/url] is beyond overkill for civilian applications), and really do need their ownership restricted (The question then becomes which - the GAU-8 is clearly well into this class, which is why I picked it).
To the second, I'm not sold on the use of concealed weapons, but it's not as easy a point to argue (Compared to pulling out high-end military hardware).
I'm only arguing against the notion that the amendment only really concerns itself with military matters. It doesn't. It's placed right after the amendment that says we can peaceably assemble by basically saying "and if shit gets a bit intense between the Federal government and the people, both sides will know that the people are armed".
Gun ownership can most definitely be regulated under the amendment - like I said, it was framed as a political right, and those are regulated all the time.
How does not permitting 100 round magazines make anyone any safer?
Reload time, mainly.
When a gunman has to stop shooting, they are a target capable of being taken down by non-lethal force (tackle them, for instance).
If someone can fire 100 rounds off before they have to stop shooting, they have a much larger window of time in which to kill without challenge.
And the first person to say that "if someone else in the theater was armed..." gets punched across the internet by me.
wait
so we're discounting a person using a firearm to protect themselves in such a situation but saying we could tackle them?
tackle the guy with multiple weapons who is fucking indiscriminately shooting people???
are you serious??
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
yeah saying 'when they stop to reload they can be tackled' but then also saying 'but if when they stop to reload they get shot' is terrible and stupid and internet punch-worthy...
FYI, reloading a gun is extremely quick because it's largely designed to be. If you have the magazine ready, it takes all of a couple of seconds.
I actually considered what I would do if, as someone with a concealed carry permit, I had my gun on me in this situation (I hardly ever bring my gun to any kind of large gathering of people like a movie though.) The reality is, I'd probably just attempt to get as low as possible. Handguns don't really do much to people body armored and drugged up. The North Hollywood shootout showed that pretty clearly.
Yeah, chances of a CCW holder being able to stop this situation is pretty much 0. Armor piercing handgun rounds are illegal, and the chances of getting a lethal hit on a target that was armored like him, in a PERFECT target environment is highly unlikely. We are talking 3+ hits in the same location to defeat the body armor, unless he had a trauma plate as well, then forget it. In that theater? No way, no how.
Cop, armed guard, CCW holders, nothing would have mattered. Unless the cop was toting his AR in with him...
Which you should probably hope they are not just chillin' at the movie theater with.
That's not to say that a CCW holder couldn't stop a mass killing. This just happens to not be one of those times. This guy could have gone into a theater with 40 armed cops and it probably wouldn't have made a difference. The North Hollywood guys were shot an absurd number of times and only a small number of bullets penetrated through the body armor. Frankly, I'm shocked they took this dude alive and without resistance.
How does not permitting 100 round magazines make anyone any safer?
Reload time, mainly.
When a gunman has to stop shooting, they are a target capable of being taken down by non-lethal force (tackle them, for instance).
If someone can fire 100 rounds off before they have to stop shooting, they have a much larger window of time in which to kill without challenge.
And the first person to say that "if someone else in the theater was armed..." gets punched across the internet by me.
wait
so we're discounting a person using a firearm to protect themselves in such a situation but saying we could tackle them?
tackle the guy with multiple weapons who is fucking indiscriminately shooting people???
are you serious??
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
Why not? In what way would limited magazine/clip/etc sizes harm anyone?
You seem to be confused about the nature of the argument you are trying to draw the analogy with. The problem is not that someone else carrying a gun couldn't help, it's that encouraging that behaviour has other downsides. Downsides people often feel outweigh the potential gain.
What are the downsides to limited clip/magazine/etc sizes?
shryke on
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
How does not permitting 100 round magazines make anyone any safer?
Reload time, mainly.
When a gunman has to stop shooting, they are a target capable of being taken down by non-lethal force (tackle them, for instance).
If someone can fire 100 rounds off before they have to stop shooting, they have a much larger window of time in which to kill without challenge.
And the first person to say that "if someone else in the theater was armed..." gets punched across the internet by me.
wait
so we're discounting a person using a firearm to protect themselves in such a situation but saying we could tackle them?
tackle the guy with multiple weapons who is fucking indiscriminately shooting people???
are you serious??
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
Why not? In what way would limited magazine/clip/etc sizes harm anyone?
Well, if we're basing restrictions of things on how they aren't going to harm anyone, the list could get pretty long. I'm not sure that's the right way to frame this.
The Ecole Polytechnique shooter stopped to reload pretty early in his spree. Has having to reload ever stopped a shooting spree?
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
How does not permitting 100 round magazines make anyone any safer?
Reload time, mainly.
When a gunman has to stop shooting, they are a target capable of being taken down by non-lethal force (tackle them, for instance).
If someone can fire 100 rounds off before they have to stop shooting, they have a much larger window of time in which to kill without challenge.
And the first person to say that "if someone else in the theater was armed..." gets punched across the internet by me.
wait
so we're discounting a person using a firearm to protect themselves in such a situation but saying we could tackle them?
tackle the guy with multiple weapons who is fucking indiscriminately shooting people???
are you serious??
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
Why not? In what way would limited magazine/clip/etc sizes harm anyone?
Well, if we're basing restrictions of things on how they aren't going to harm anyone, the list could get pretty long. I'm not sure that's the right way to frame this.
The Ecole Polytechnique shooter stopped to reload pretty early in his spree. Has having to reload ever stopped a shooting spree?
Giffords shooting, less than 2 years ago.
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Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
Downsides to magazines being smaller? For a good shooter, there really aren't any if your goal is to defend yourself from an assailant. For the police, it comes in handy with regards to any potential shootout because of the nature of covering fire resulting in you purposefully shooting areas where the gun person isn't to keep them from firing out at you.
I love the idea that there are people who think owning a few handguns keeps them safe from a $700 billion/yr military. Newsflash tinfoil hat wearers, this isn't 1786, if your government decided to turn on you they aren't going to send a phalanx of musket men to advance on your house. They have smart bombs.
I'm not saying there are no good reasons to keep guns, but if that's your justification for having no gun control at all, I'm surprised you don't accidentally put your pants on your head each morning.
The argument to counter that is typically pointing out insurgent movements in the middle east and such.
And the counter argument to that point is that those insurgencies usually use AKs, RPGs, and vast amounts of high explosives, not pistols.
Also, the conspiracy theories regarding this did not long to pop up.
Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment.
A lot of gun trainers like working on revolvers because it makes you feel like you have to be a bit more careful with your shot (there's also other ergonomic reasons.) When you see these mass killings, it's less about them targeting, and more about just firing indiscriminately. My guess is that this guy was largely just firing blindly (hence you have a 4X injury rate compared to deaths.) All the same, someone like this, who is largely just looking to do mass carnage will likely find a way to do mass carnage. It's hard to legislate to the craziest people amongst us.
So we get stiff once in a while. So we have a little fun. What’s wrong with that? This is a free country, isn’t it? I can take my panda any place I want to. And if I wanna buy it a drink, that’s my business.
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
Well, like I said, Canada has the limit on magazines being 6 rounds. Would that be satisfactory?
Do you think that would come anywhere close to passing in the US?
Even if the first answer is yes, it is a total nonstarter in the US, so is a pipe dream. It would end the career of any politician who attempted it.
I'll put it like this.
CALIFORNIA allows 10rd magazines.
So no, 6rd is a nonstarter, unless it's .45ACP or a revolver.
If any federal Democrat tries to do this, it'll sink the Democratic party for a while. And no Republican would ever do anything to limit the proliferation of firearms.
How does not permitting 100 round magazines make anyone any safer?
Reload time, mainly.
When a gunman has to stop shooting, they are a target capable of being taken down by non-lethal force (tackle them, for instance).
If someone can fire 100 rounds off before they have to stop shooting, they have a much larger window of time in which to kill without challenge.
And the first person to say that "if someone else in the theater was armed..." gets punched across the internet by me.
wait
so we're discounting a person using a firearm to protect themselves in such a situation but saying we could tackle them?
tackle the guy with multiple weapons who is fucking indiscriminately shooting people???
are you serious??
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
Why not? In what way would limited magazine/clip/etc sizes harm anyone?
Well, if we're basing restrictions of things on how they aren't going to harm anyone, the list could get pretty long. I'm not sure that's the right way to frame this.
Just because the list could get long doesn't mean this specific element isn't a good idea.
There's nothing but upsides to the idea.
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JacobkoshGamble a stamp.I can show you how to be a real man!Moderatormod
I think this thread was conceived very vaguely and has careered from topic to topic ever since. "A news item happened; discuss it" is insufficient.
Posts
Not really, no.
I seem to recall a couple instances where an armed bystander stopped somebody before they could actually start shooting, or something similar. But it's ridiculously uncommon. Partly because in much of the country, carry is in and of itself uncommon. Then, once you beat the odds and have a CCW holder (who is currently carrying) present, if they're smart their intent is to use that weapon to defend themselves. Like, as a last ditch effort. Not going out of their way to take him down. For both selfish reasons and many of the other common sense reasons already mentioned.
If that were the intention of the amendment, then its inclusion was redundant, since the Constitution already makes allowance for the US government to provide for defense (which, given the meaning of the term at the time, is basically synonymous with "professional navy and army". Moreover, the abilities of states to keep and raise their own militias is already specifically allowed in the Constitution without the amendment.
The various National Guards still ultimately fall under the national chain of command. The purpose of the amendment is pretty much what everybody thinks it is: to let people arm themselves against the government.
For illustration, here was a proposed alternative version of the Second Amendment suggested by some at the time:
Now, it's thought by many that the reason the amendment wasn't ultimately quite phrased like that was because the drafters wanted to emphasize gun-ownership as a political right, and not a civil one (thus distinguishing between those rights that are necessary for political discourse but are not universal and can be taken away from individuals, and those which are inalienable).
Secondly, the right is conferred to the people, not the militia. The drafters didn't mix terms like these up. While it could be argued that "the people" might mean something closer to "the States", it would be a stretch to equate the term to the militias only (even the first reading is honestly a stretch considering that when they wanted to talk about "the States", they specifically did that too).
Finally, a bit of history: at the time of drafting, the sort of militia that we currently have with formally trained, paid volunteers would be considered what was called then a "select corps", and probably wouldn't be looked at much more positively than a normal standing army. The word "militia" used alone was basically synonymous with "all citizens capable of bearing arms". It's used that way throughout the Federalist Papers.
Also, this really isn't hard. You're looking at people who very much define their world as "us" and "others." They dislike, or even fear, the "others." Those could be anything from simply the poor, to minorities, to immigrants, whatever. So voter ID laws are an attempt to keep the "others" from voting. Speech/assembly/expression is a tool of the "others" (and the liberals who support them) to try and undermine "our" culture. Or to take my hard earned wealth and give it to the "others."
And making it harder to get guns, in a world filled with "others" who want to steal my stereo and rape my daughters, is a threat to my peace of mind.
It has nothing to do with rights, really. They argue rights and founding fathers and such only as a means to the end, that end being to protect themselves and their way of life. It's about selfishness and fear. So no, you shouldn't look for logical consistency there.
EDIT: I say this as a ridiculously pro-gun person who is generally somewhat liberal. Have fun (as an example) arguing with the average gun nut as to why, if they're being ideologically consistent, illegal immigrants should have the same right to own a gun for self-defense as anybody else. It's always interesting.
This still leaves two questions - are there some weapons so devastatingly powerful that they should be restricted (and if so, which), and should concealed weapons be allowed (certainly, the wording of the amendment is rather silent on this).
To the first, I think that it's clear some weapons really are that dangerous (For instance - [urhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger]this[/url] is beyond overkill for civilian applications), and really do need their ownership restricted (The question then becomes which - the GAU-8 is clearly well into this class, which is why I picked it).
To the second, I'm not sold on the use of concealed weapons, but it's not as easy a point to argue (Compared to pulling out high-end military hardware).
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Gun ownership can most definitely be regulated under the amendment - like I said, it was framed as a political right, and those are regulated all the time.
You do know this actually happens right?
Like, the Gabriel Giffords shooter was taken down in exactly this way.
And on occasion I believe that someone who was carrying has taken down a shooter. But we should not be basing anything on the expectation that this will happen.
not really following that line of thought
Which you should probably hope they are not just chillin' at the movie theater with.
That's not to say that a CCW holder couldn't stop a mass killing. This just happens to not be one of those times. This guy could have gone into a theater with 40 armed cops and it probably wouldn't have made a difference. The North Hollywood guys were shot an absurd number of times and only a small number of bullets penetrated through the body armor. Frankly, I'm shocked they took this dude alive and without resistance.
SteamID: devCharles
twitter: https://twitter.com/charlesewise
Why not? In what way would limited magazine/clip/etc sizes harm anyone?
You seem to be confused about the nature of the argument you are trying to draw the analogy with. The problem is not that someone else carrying a gun couldn't help, it's that encouraging that behaviour has other downsides. Downsides people often feel outweigh the potential gain.
What are the downsides to limited clip/magazine/etc sizes?
Well, if we're basing restrictions of things on how they aren't going to harm anyone, the list could get pretty long. I'm not sure that's the right way to frame this.
The Ecole Polytechnique shooter stopped to reload pretty early in his spree. Has having to reload ever stopped a shooting spree?
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Here's the story
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
SteamID: devCharles
twitter: https://twitter.com/charlesewise
Well, like I said, Canada has the limit on magazines being 6 rounds. Would that be satisfactory?
Do you think that would come anywhere close to passing in the US?
Even if the first answer is yes, it is a total nonstarter in the US, so is a pipe dream. It would end the career of any politician who attempted it.
And the counter argument to that point is that those insurgencies usually use AKs, RPGs, and vast amounts of high explosives, not pistols.
Also, the conspiracy theories regarding this did not long to pop up.
SteamID: devCharles
twitter: https://twitter.com/charlesewise
I'll put it like this.
CALIFORNIA allows 10rd magazines.
So no, 6rd is a nonstarter, unless it's .45ACP or a revolver.
If any federal Democrat tries to do this, it'll sink the Democratic party for a while. And no Republican would ever do anything to limit the proliferation of firearms.
Just because the list could get long doesn't mean this specific element isn't a good idea.
There's nothing but upsides to the idea.