Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
I’ll echo Preacher, getting into the weeds of what an “assault weapon” or “assault rifle” is is a waste of time and a distraction. And intentionally so.
That said, for “AR-15” pattern weapons you are often talking about guns that use parts and accessories literally interchangeable with actual military M16/M4 rifles. The civilian rifles made by a ton of vendors are basically M4 rifles with slightly longer barrels (federal law dictates a minimum) and no burst fire.
And then the broader idea generally includes civilian variants (mostly just semi auto not burst/auto) of all your basic military rifles, from AKs to FALs to SCARs. The usual legal definition that AWBs focus on is a) detachable magazines b) semi automatic fire and c) pistol grips.
The first two are critical to how deadly these rifles are. Fast firing, quick reloads. The pistol grip thing will start arguments, but there’s a reason why that’s the feature they eliminate to make them AWB-complaint, it’s mostly cosmetic. It’s also what makes gun guys irate, because now their cool death stick looks stupid. Because thumbhole stocks on normally pistol gripped rifles look fucking stupid.
Edit: I’ll reiterate that none of this matters though, its all a distraction. But it does help if you know what you’re talking about, I guess. Pretty much any semi auto gun is the problem. All of them.
Hey folks, just to clarify, in case there was confusion, it's okay to discuss the potential political ramifications of this shooting, just please be careful with your language and potentially erroneous reads. Not everyone knows that referring to dead children as a "jackpot" is just a reference to a sci-fi trilogy and not, you know, the standard definition of the word.
"The jackpot", not a jackpot. Maybe ask if you need clarification on a term?
Dude, you sure you wanna sass a mod?
I'm not sassing a mod. It seems like there is a failure to communicate and people jumped to conclusions.
If a large portion of readers in a thread about dead children find a comment a bit ghoulish, a well actually defence of phrasing and terminology might not be the best choice, even if it's just so hard to admit that the original post wasn't a flawless wonder.
If you’re gonna use obscure jargon when talking about it don’t be surprised that we don’t all immediately understand what you’re on about
It’s on you to think about how your words are going to be taken, and the “sorry if you were offended, maybe you should have asked for clarification before jumping to conclusions” business is dumb
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
I’ll echo Preacher, getting into the weeds of what an “assault weapon” or “assault rifle” is is a waste of time and a distraction. And intentionally so.
That said, for “AR-15” pattern weapons you are often talking about guns that use parts and accessories literally interchangeable with actual military M16/M4 rifles. The civilian rifles made by a ton of vendors are basically M4 rifles with slightly longer barrels (federal law dictates a minimum) and no burst fire.
And then the broader idea generally includes civilian variants of all your basic military rifles, from AKs to FALs to SCARs. The usual legal definition that AWBs focus on is a) detachable magazines b) semi automatic fire and c) pistol grips.
The first two are critical to how deadly these rifles are. Fast firing, quick reloads. The pistol grip thing will start arguments, but there’s a reason why that’s the feature they eliminate to make them AWB-complaint. It’s also what makes gun guys irate, because now their cool death stick looks stupid. Because thumbhole stocks on normally pistol gripped rifles look fucking stupid.
Edit: I’ll reiterate that none of this matters though, its all a distraction. But it does help if you know what you’re talking about, I guess. Pretty much any semi auto gun is the problem. All of them.
The weeds matter when you get to the point of writing actual laws. It’s also reasonable to discuss in small group settings, like this forum. When building broad public support the weeds don’t matter, and it’s definitely a trap used by disingenuous geese in mass media discussions.
Abbot in particular has been just gross through this entire thing. He went to a god damn fundraiser. That night! After doing the press conference. How messed up do you have to be to be moved so little by such unbelievable tragedy? And all any of them that did that initial presser could think about is how to spin it for their personal politics and future presidential run.
You have two kinds of gentry, broadly speaking throughout history.
The kind who believe themselves duty bound to noblesse oblige
And the kind who think the plebs should just hurry up and get themselves into the gutter already.
Abbot is the latter
Clearly...but man, that man really went down to the crossroads to sell his soul.
I actually learnt the term “the jackpot” from these forums, I believe. It’s not an uncommon phrase I think.
E: not that I’m saying it’s wrong to misunderstand what was posted. I don’t know this dude so not that aware of his real angle, but his post made sense to me.
If we’re not proactively thinking about making things better in the future, all we’ve got is just pasting that The Onion article over and over again
Hey folks, just to clarify, in case there was confusion, it's okay to discuss the potential political ramifications of this shooting, just please be careful with your language and potentially erroneous reads. Not everyone knows that referring to dead children as a "jackpot" is just a reference to a sci-fi trilogy and not, you know, the standard definition of the word.
"The jackpot", not a jackpot. Maybe ask if you need clarification on a term?
Dude, you sure you wanna sass a mod?
I'm not sassing a mod. It seems like there is a failure to communicate and people jumped to conclusions.
If a large portion of readers in a thread about dead children find a comment a bit ghoulish, a well actually defence of phrasing and terminology might not be the best choice, even if it's just so hard to admit that the original post wasn't a flawless wonder.
Including at least one person who knew exactly what "the jackpot" meant in context. It did not make that post seems any better and less ghoulish.
This theme of advertising bans like we did for smoking is sounding better and better to me tbh. This thread is the first I've heard of it and, and it seems like a great idea.
"In 2000, only 35 percent of Americans believed that having a gun in their home would make them safer; by 2014, that number had skyrocketed to 63 percent. Conversely, while in 2000 the majority of Americans believed that having a gun in their home made it a more dangerous place to be, that number had fallen to 30 percent by 2014."
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
So I guess I'll be That Dude by answering the question but
AR stands for Armalite Rifle, the company that manufactured the rifle in the 50s or 60s. It's kind of a Kleenex or Germex situation in that basically all "AR" style rifles aren't actually Armalites but it's become the standard nomenclature for that particular type of rifle.
AR-15's or AR style rifles are basically just semi automatic, magazine fed, full sized or carbine length weapons patterned off the military version of the M16s and later M4s. The only functional difference between the two is that an AR is not select fire, meaning you cannot select either semi automatic or fully automatic. Fully automatic weapons are banned in the US under the NFA unless you have a very specific and expensive license. Also, if I remember correctly, the ATF stopped accepting new stamps for fully automatic weapons at some point in the... 90s? 2000s? Meaning basically all the actual honest to God machine guns that you theoretically could buy under that license have been in the market for 20 or 30 years and carry price tags upwards of $5-10,000 USD.
But back to it, there are lots of basically civilianized "assault" rifles out there that aren't AR-15s. The common theme for any rifle like that though is
If you’re gonna use obscure jargon when talking about it don’t be surprised that we don’t all immediately understand what you’re on about
I mean it’s not that obscure; people have used it in D&D in the past, though I think typically in the climate change thread (given the nature of what a Gibsonian Jackpot is, where climate change is one of the contributing factors)
So no there is no actual / legal definition for "AR" style guns and anyone using that phrase is tossing out a red herring whether they realize it or not.
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
"AR-15 style" is a colloquialism. The closest legal category is "assault weapon."
The federal assault weapons ban was based on a California law, and both of those laws had a list of physical features (such as a bayonet mount and a pistol grip). If a firearm had a certain number of those features, then it qualified as an assault weapon.
I could track down those lists, or you could look them up.
But here's the important thing:
Most of those physical features didn't matter. A lot of them were cosmetic tacti-cool bullshit that ended up on the list because they looked scary. (Eg, bayonet mount).
The features that matter:
Semiautomatic rifle (one bullet fired every time you pull the trigger)
High magazine capacity (30 or more rounds)
Pistol grip (allowing for quick trigger pulls without losing grip on the gun)
There might be a few others that matter that I'm forgetting but those are the big ones.
These weapons don't comprise a large number of firearms used in crimes. (That unholy distinction goes to handguns.) But they do allow for a high body count in a massacre.
Rare event, but lots of fatalities when it happens.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
So no there is no actual / legal definition for "AR" style guns and anyone using that phrase is tossing out a red herring whether they realize it or not.
It's a very clear distinction of a semi automatic rifle with a large magazine.
The only people who think this matters are the ones who want to bog down any kind of gun control in discussion over semantics rather than removing them on a simple basis: If the military uses it to kill people, you don't need it.
And listen, I’m a new dad and this type of stuff scares the absolute shit out of me. I had a bit of a breakdown when news of this broke and I was just so goddamn grateful that such mass killings are less of a going concern here. I do have (un?)reasonable fear of ever returning to the US with my mixed-race daughter. It’s scary as fuck, but we have to keep trying to move the needle because the alternative is destruction
AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
edited May 2022
I had no fucking idea what he was talking about and assumed he was just being ghoulishly hyperbolic on purpose.
As for genuine anger inducing stupidity, absolutely everything is monstrous about this. SEVEN officers inside of the school and they are all terrified of one KID with an AR-15!! What were you fucking doing!?
Also I almost feel like one point of entry to this classroom and his ability to just… lock the door? Sorry I still don’t get that. But anyway, one point of entry that someone armed with a weapon very effective at firing many rounds per minute can hold easily seems…. I don’t know. Detrimental?
Also note on their detailed timeline are absent some facts. When did the police yell to see if a kid needed help, get a response and that kid got shot? It’s notably absent from their timeline there. We know it happened as other survivors described what happened.
Also why do I feel there is tons of audio as to what exactly was happening in there.
This theme of advertising bans like we did for smoking is sounding better and better to me tbh. This thread is the first I've heard of it and, and it seems like a great idea.
The difficulty is the consumer protection basis for advertising laws. Generally, truth in advertising is to protect the consumer of the product/service from undisclosed hazards/lack of value. That’s not like “cigarettes will make you cool and get you sex (but we won’t tell you about how it gives you cancer and makes you die).” The people dying from the “fuck yeah adrenaline alpha top dog protector guy” gun advertising are not the buyers
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
So I guess I'll be That Dude by answering the question but
AR stands for Armalite Rifle, the company that manufactured the rifle in the 50s or 60s. It's kind of a Kleenex or Germex situation in that basically all "AR" style rifles aren't actually Armalites but it's become the standard nomenclature for that particular type of rifle.
AR-15's or AR style rifles are basically just semi automatic, magazine fed, full sized or carbine length weapons patterned off the military version of the M16s and later M4s. The only functional difference between the two is that an AR is not select fire, meaning you cannot select either semi automatic or fully automatic. Fully automatic weapons are banned in the US under the NFA unless you have a very specific and expensive license. Also, if I remember correctly, the ATF stopped accepting new stamps for fully automatic weapons at some point in the... 90s? 2000s? Meaning basically all the actual honest to God machine guns that you theoretically could buy under that license have been in the market for 20 or 30 years and carry price tags upwards of $5-10,000 USD.
But back to it, there are lots of basically civilianized "assault" rifles out there that aren't AR-15s. The common theme for any rifle like that though is
1. Semi automatic
2. High capacity magazines
I'd also add fancy rails for mounting all manner of kit and all sorts of tacti-cool bolt ons. Really though the only AR-15 in most of these guns seems to be the receiver.
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
"AR-15 style" is a colloquialism. The closest legal category is "assault weapon."
The federal assault weapons ban was based on a California law, and both of those laws had a list of physical features (such as a bayonet mount and a pistol grip). If a firearm had a certain number of those features, then it qualified as an assault weapon.
I could track down those lists, or you could look them up.
But here's the important thing:
Most of those physical features didn't matter. A lot of them were cosmetic tacti-cool bullshit that ended up on the list because they looked scary. (Eg, bayonet mount).
The features that matter:
Semiautomatic rifle (one bullet fired every time you pull the trigger)
High magazine capacity (30 or more rounds)
Pistol grip (allowing for quick trigger pulls without losing grip on the gun)
There might be a few others that matter that I'm forgetting but those are the big ones.
These weapons don't comprise a large number of firearms used in crimes. (That unholy distinction goes to handguns.) But they do allow for a high body count in a massacre.
Rare event, but lots of fatalities when it happens.
Here's a list shamelessly copied from Wikipedia:
Semi-automatic rifles able to accept detachable magazines and has two or more of the following:
Folding or telescoping stock
Pistol grip
Bayonet mount
Flash hider or threaded barrel designed to accommodate one
Grenade launcher
Semi-automatic pistols with detachable magazines and two or more of the following:
Magazine that attaches outside the pistol grip
Threaded barrel to attach barrel extender, flash suppressor, handgrip, or suppressor
Barrel shroud safety feature that prevents burns to the operator
A manufactured weight of 50 ounces (1.41kg) or more when the pistol is unloaded
A semi-automatic version of a fully automatic firearm.
Semi-automatic shotguns with two or more of the following:
Folding or telescoping stock
Pistol grip
A fixed magazine capacity in excess of 5 rounds
Detachable magazine.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
I had no fucking idea what he was talking about and assumed he was just being ghoulishly hyperbolic on purpose.
As for genuine anger inducing stupidity, absolutely everything is monstrous about this. SEVEN officers inside of the school and they are all terrified of one KID with an AR-15!! What we’re you fucking doing!?
Also I almost feel like one point of entry to this classroom and his ability to just… lock the door? Sorry I still don’t get that. But anyway, one point of entry that someone armed with a weapon very effective at firing many rounds per minute can hold easily seems…. I don’t know. Detrimental?
Also note on their detailed timeline are absent some facts. When did the police yell to see if a kid needed help, get a response and that kid got shot? It’s notably absent from their timeline there. We know it happened as other survivors described what happened.
Also why do I feel there is tons of audio as to what exactly was happening in there.
Funsworth comes from an activist and protest background where he’s had, if memory serves, had to deal with a lot of right wing assholes accosting and threatening folks exercising their rights, so he’s coming at this where his perspective is being informed by what a lot of the more aggressive set of the right has been pushing for. As well as a history of interacting with older activists from the civil rights movement, and the kind of threats they faced.
So not exactly hyperbolic; just more plugged into the reality of violence that the American Right has historically wielded and is threatening to wield again as they’re moving more and more towards seizing political dominance in the country.
It’s not fun shit! But it’s a real and dangerous threat, and they use tragedies like this to bolster that grip and entrench their footholds (see Rupar’s thread I linked earlier for the ways at the NRA conference where they’re already trying to use this to push their own fascist agenda of more guns, a stronger carceral state than already exists, and essentially turning our lives into heavily shriveled police state)
The right wing is already working towards using this tragedy to accomplish an agenda of oppression and violence. We need to use it to work towards an agenda of liberation and peace, free from the threat of mass murder at the end of a smoking barrel
The Pulse Massacre is a particularly egregious example of how an "assault weapon" enables a high body count. The shooter fired 200 rounds in five minutes, resulting in over 100 people shot, half of whom died.
(To be clear, the shooter had two weapons and was able to switch between them, but I'm not sure how much that matters.)
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
This theme of advertising bans like we did for smoking is sounding better and better to me tbh. This thread is the first I've heard of it and, and it seems like a great idea.
The difficulty is the consumer protection basis for advertising laws. Generally, truth in advertising is to protect the consumer of the product/service from undisclosed hazards/lack of value. That’s not like “cigarettes will make you cool and get you sex (but we won’t tell you about how it gives you cancer and makes you die).” The people dying from the “fuck yeah adrenaline alpha top dog protector guy” gun advertising are not the buyers
The complaint I linked above states that gun companies say their products make you safer, when having a gun in your home is a good way for you or someone in your family to get shot by that gun. I think this bypasses this issue. https://firearmsaccountability.org/FTCPetition.pdf
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
So I guess I'll be That Dude by answering the question but
AR stands for Armalite Rifle, the company that manufactured the rifle in the 50s or 60s. It's kind of a Kleenex or Germex situation in that basically all "AR" style rifles aren't actually Armalites but it's become the standard nomenclature for that particular type of rifle.
AR-15's or AR style rifles are basically just semi automatic, magazine fed, full sized or carbine length weapons patterned off the military version of the M16s and later M4s. The only functional difference between the two is that an AR is not select fire, meaning you cannot select either semi automatic or fully automatic. Fully automatic weapons are banned in the US under the NFA unless you have a very specific and expensive license. Also, if I remember correctly, the ATF stopped accepting new stamps for fully automatic weapons at some point in the... 90s? 2000s? Meaning basically all the actual honest to God machine guns that you theoretically could buy under that license have been in the market for 20 or 30 years and carry price tags upwards of $5-10,000 USD.
But back to it, there are lots of basically civilianized "assault" rifles out there that aren't AR-15s. The common theme for any rifle like that though is
1. Semi automatic
2. High capacity magazines
I'd also add fancy rails for mounting all manner of kit and all sorts of tacti-cool bolt ons. Really though the only AR-15 in most of these guns seems to be the receiver.
So, yes but also kinda no
The actual attachments that most people slap on their rifles really wouldn't increase the weapons effectiveness in this particular situation. Most of these mass shootings take place in very small, confined spaces where things like optics, grips, flashlights or the odd laser don't matter.
The one standout here would probably have been the Vegas shooting because the guy was hanging out of a way high up window from a few blocks over and presumably had his shit set up to shoot from range. But even then he had a bump stock, all he really had to do to inflict all the carnage he did was point the muzzle at the huge crowd of people and pull the trigger.
What I'm getting at is I can slap a foregrip, laser, red dot sight and 3 point sling on my old 3 shot bolt action hunting rifle but I'm not really increasing its effectiveness at killing. It comes down to rate of fire and ammo capacity.
So no there is no actual / legal definition for "AR" style guns and anyone using that phrase is tossing out a red herring whether they realize it or not.
Just whip up a list of features and accessories to ban.
This theme of advertising bans like we did for smoking is sounding better and better to me tbh. This thread is the first I've heard of it and, and it seems like a great idea.
The difficulty is the consumer protection basis for advertising laws. Generally, truth in advertising is to protect the consumer of the product/service from undisclosed hazards/lack of value. That’s not like “cigarettes will make you cool and get you sex (but we won’t tell you about how it gives you cancer and makes you die).” The people dying from the “fuck yeah adrenaline alpha top dog protector guy” gun advertising are not the buyers
The complaint I linked above states that gun companies say their products make you safer, when having a gun in your home is a good way for you or someone in your family to get shot by that gun. I think this bypasses this issue. https://firearmsaccountability.org/FTCPetition.pdf
It’s a good argument but it doesn’t bypass the issue.
Been skimming the petition since you posted it. Y’all, go look at pages 9-10 of the document. Those ads for guns for kids, “just like mom and dad”. Wtf!
The idea that only the mentally ill can be mass murderers needs to be seriously fought against.
It has way too much traction on the left.
Yeah that’s the convenient narrative that a lot of people want to believe. That there has to be something physically wrong with these people, instead of it being a factor of marketing and cultural entitlement to deadly weapons.
The most defining and consistent feature of an AR-15 is probably the spec for how the two halves of the receiver are joined. Since almost all AR upper/lower receivers are compatible with one another, that's one thing that's usually pretty consistent.
I know they're ubiquitous and an obvious target for legislation, but really I don't think it's valuable to get bogged down in the ins-and-outs of what it would take to narrowly define one basically open source platform.
Especially when the political will required to restrict access to all semi-automatic firearms is approximately the same as that required for restricting just AR-15s. Why split hairs at that point.
The Pulse Massacre is a particularly egregious example of how an "assault weapon" enables a high body count. The shooter fired 200 rounds in five minutes, resulting in over 100 people shot, half of whom died.
(To be clear, the shooter had two weapons and was able to switch between them, but I'm not sure how much that matters.)
As I understand it having the extra gun would have been benefiicial for dealing with cooling, since over firing a gun would cause the barrel to warp and potentially self destruct; this was the achilles heal of the MG42 (AKA "hitlers buzzsaw") which had a massive 1200 rounds per minute which actually had to come with spare barrels in order to allow it to fire more frequently.
The most defining and consistent feature of an AR-15 is probably the spec for how the two halves of the receiver are joined. Since almost all AR upper/lower receivers are compatible with one another, that's one thing that's usually pretty consistent.
I know they're ubiquitous and an obvious target for legislation, but really I don't think it's valuable to get bogged down in the ins-and-outs of what it would take to narrowly define one basically open source platform.
Especially when the political will required to restrict access to all semi-automatic firearms is approximately the same as that required for restricting just AR-15s. Why split hairs at that point.
The most consistent feature is using. .223 or 5.56 nato round intended for militaries.
Correct me if I’m wrong is there a single reason you’d want a round like that aside from hunting like bears?
And now we have NBC News reporting that federal officers entered the school and engaged the shooter not because the Uvalde police finally let them, but because they could not abide not doing something any longer, and carried out entry to the school of their own volition.
And now we have NBC News reporting that federal officers entered the school and engaged the shooter not because the Uvalde police finally let them, but because they could not abide not doing something any longer, and carried out entry to the school of their own volition.
Because they were human fucking beings with empathy, unlike the Uvalde police apparently
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AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
And now we have NBC News reporting that federal officers entered the school and engaged the shooter not because the Uvalde police finally let them, but because they could not abide not doing something any longer, and carried out entry to the school of their own volition.
Does anybody know the proper pronunciation of "Uvalde" ?
Is there an actual / legal definition for "AR(-15) style" weapons? Like, I know what's being referred to, I'm just wondering if there's an actual / official / legal term that applies
So I guess I'll be That Dude by answering the question but
AR stands for Armalite Rifle, the company that manufactured the rifle in the 50s or 60s. It's kind of a Kleenex or Germex situation in that basically all "AR" style rifles aren't actually Armalites but it's become the standard nomenclature for that particular type of rifle.
AR-15's or AR style rifles are basically just semi automatic, magazine fed, full sized or carbine length weapons patterned off the military version of the M16s and later M4s. The only functional difference between the two is that an AR is not select fire, meaning you cannot select either semi automatic or fully automatic. Fully automatic weapons are banned in the US under the NFA unless you have a very specific and expensive license. Also, if I remember correctly, the ATF stopped accepting new stamps for fully automatic weapons at some point in the... 90s? 2000s? Meaning basically all the actual honest to God machine guns that you theoretically could buy under that license have been in the market for 20 or 30 years and carry price tags upwards of $5-10,000 USD.
But back to it, there are lots of basically civilianized "assault" rifles out there that aren't AR-15s. The common theme for any rifle like that though is
1. Semi automatic
2. High capacity magazines
I'd also add fancy rails for mounting all manner of kit and all sorts of tacti-cool bolt ons. Really though the only AR-15 in most of these guns seems to be the receiver.
Largely a new thing. When I first joined the Army, most units still had the old rifles, with M16s that had no fancy rails and M4s that only had rails for the one sight…none on the grips. And I remember friends’ dads who had AR-15 rifles back then were also generally not “tacticool” versions. They were normal plastic hand guards, normal stocks, mayyybe a scope on a single rail on the receiver.
I really feel like it was a feeding frenzy when the AWB expired to sell all this mall ninja shit to Dodge Ram drivers. Even when I deployed, most of us had iron sights and one rail. That’s what the real military had. We had guys actually buying uppers and optics and shit out on the civilian market to take overseas with them. Our unit armorer’s position was “give me back what I gave you, don’t give a shit do what you want.”
That’s the kind of crazy situation these companies created. That’s where they make their money. War fantasies. Fat goateed desk jockeys buying gear actual soldiers don’t have. Which is exactly why cosmetic restrictions are so unpopular; they break the fantasy.
The most defining and consistent feature of an AR-15 is probably the spec for how the two halves of the receiver are joined. Since almost all AR upper/lower receivers are compatible with one another, that's one thing that's usually pretty consistent.
I know they're ubiquitous and an obvious target for legislation, but really I don't think it's valuable to get bogged down in the ins-and-outs of what it would take to narrowly define one basically open source platform.
Especially when the political will required to restrict access to all semi-automatic firearms is approximately the same as that required for restricting just AR-15s. Why split hairs at that point.
The most consistent feature is using. .223 or 5.56 nato round intended for militaries.
Correct me if I’m wrong is there a single reason you’d want a round like that aside from hunting like bears?
Ostensibly, there is a plethora of game that a round like that could be good for putting down; Things like Bears, moose, feral pigs, big horn sheep... all of them would benefit from a round that can penetrate through the skull of something that big and potentially dangerous.
Thing is though, you don't *need* an AR15 for that; you can get a bolt action rifle that can be chambered for that and probably do a better job since the system doesn't allow for rapid fire.
Posts
I’ll echo Preacher, getting into the weeds of what an “assault weapon” or “assault rifle” is is a waste of time and a distraction. And intentionally so.
That said, for “AR-15” pattern weapons you are often talking about guns that use parts and accessories literally interchangeable with actual military M16/M4 rifles. The civilian rifles made by a ton of vendors are basically M4 rifles with slightly longer barrels (federal law dictates a minimum) and no burst fire.
And then the broader idea generally includes civilian variants (mostly just semi auto not burst/auto) of all your basic military rifles, from AKs to FALs to SCARs. The usual legal definition that AWBs focus on is a) detachable magazines b) semi automatic fire and c) pistol grips.
The first two are critical to how deadly these rifles are. Fast firing, quick reloads. The pistol grip thing will start arguments, but there’s a reason why that’s the feature they eliminate to make them AWB-complaint, it’s mostly cosmetic. It’s also what makes gun guys irate, because now their cool death stick looks stupid. Because thumbhole stocks on normally pistol gripped rifles look fucking stupid.
Edit: I’ll reiterate that none of this matters though, its all a distraction. But it does help if you know what you’re talking about, I guess. Pretty much any semi auto gun is the problem. All of them.
If a large portion of readers in a thread about dead children find a comment a bit ghoulish, a well actually defence of phrasing and terminology might not be the best choice, even if it's just so hard to admit that the original post wasn't a flawless wonder.
It’s on you to think about how your words are going to be taken, and the “sorry if you were offended, maybe you should have asked for clarification before jumping to conclusions” business is dumb
The weeds matter when you get to the point of writing actual laws. It’s also reasonable to discuss in small group settings, like this forum. When building broad public support the weeds don’t matter, and it’s definitely a trap used by disingenuous geese in mass media discussions.
Clearly...but man, that man really went down to the crossroads to sell his soul.
E: not that I’m saying it’s wrong to misunderstand what was posted. I don’t know this dude so not that aware of his real angle, but his post made sense to me.
If we’re not proactively thinking about making things better in the future, all we’ve got is just pasting that The Onion article over and over again
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
Including at least one person who knew exactly what "the jackpot" meant in context. It did not make that post seems any better and less ghoulish.
https://brandequity.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/advertising/advocacy-groups-ask-us-to-crack-down-on-gun-industry-ads/90726719
https://firearmsaccountability.org/FTCPetition.pdf
This is the actual complaint to the FTC. It's a "fascinating" look at how gun companies lie in their ads.
"In 2000, only 35 percent of Americans believed that having a gun in their home would make them safer; by 2014, that number had skyrocketed to 63 percent. Conversely, while in 2000 the majority of Americans believed that having a gun in their home made it a more dangerous place to be, that number had fallen to 30 percent by 2014."
So I guess I'll be That Dude by answering the question but
AR stands for Armalite Rifle, the company that manufactured the rifle in the 50s or 60s. It's kind of a Kleenex or Germex situation in that basically all "AR" style rifles aren't actually Armalites but it's become the standard nomenclature for that particular type of rifle.
AR-15's or AR style rifles are basically just semi automatic, magazine fed, full sized or carbine length weapons patterned off the military version of the M16s and later M4s. The only functional difference between the two is that an AR is not select fire, meaning you cannot select either semi automatic or fully automatic. Fully automatic weapons are banned in the US under the NFA unless you have a very specific and expensive license. Also, if I remember correctly, the ATF stopped accepting new stamps for fully automatic weapons at some point in the... 90s? 2000s? Meaning basically all the actual honest to God machine guns that you theoretically could buy under that license have been in the market for 20 or 30 years and carry price tags upwards of $5-10,000 USD.
But back to it, there are lots of basically civilianized "assault" rifles out there that aren't AR-15s. The common theme for any rifle like that though is
1. Semi automatic
2. High capacity magazines
I mean it’s not that obscure; people have used it in D&D in the past, though I think typically in the climate change thread (given the nature of what a Gibsonian Jackpot is, where climate change is one of the contributing factors)
"AR-15 style" is a colloquialism. The closest legal category is "assault weapon."
The federal assault weapons ban was based on a California law, and both of those laws had a list of physical features (such as a bayonet mount and a pistol grip). If a firearm had a certain number of those features, then it qualified as an assault weapon.
I could track down those lists, or you could look them up.
But here's the important thing:
Most of those physical features didn't matter. A lot of them were cosmetic tacti-cool bullshit that ended up on the list because they looked scary. (Eg, bayonet mount).
The features that matter:
Semiautomatic rifle (one bullet fired every time you pull the trigger)
High magazine capacity (30 or more rounds)
Pistol grip (allowing for quick trigger pulls without losing grip on the gun)
There might be a few others that matter that I'm forgetting but those are the big ones.
These weapons don't comprise a large number of firearms used in crimes. (That unholy distinction goes to handguns.) But they do allow for a high body count in a massacre.
Rare event, but lots of fatalities when it happens.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
It's a very clear distinction of a semi automatic rifle with a large magazine.
The only people who think this matters are the ones who want to bog down any kind of gun control in discussion over semantics rather than removing them on a simple basis: If the military uses it to kill people, you don't need it.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
As for genuine anger inducing stupidity, absolutely everything is monstrous about this. SEVEN officers inside of the school and they are all terrified of one KID with an AR-15!! What were you fucking doing!?
Also I almost feel like one point of entry to this classroom and his ability to just… lock the door? Sorry I still don’t get that. But anyway, one point of entry that someone armed with a weapon very effective at firing many rounds per minute can hold easily seems…. I don’t know. Detrimental?
Also note on their detailed timeline are absent some facts. When did the police yell to see if a kid needed help, get a response and that kid got shot? It’s notably absent from their timeline there. We know it happened as other survivors described what happened.
Also why do I feel there is tons of audio as to what exactly was happening in there.
The difficulty is the consumer protection basis for advertising laws. Generally, truth in advertising is to protect the consumer of the product/service from undisclosed hazards/lack of value. That’s not like “cigarettes will make you cool and get you sex (but we won’t tell you about how it gives you cancer and makes you die).” The people dying from the “fuck yeah adrenaline alpha top dog protector guy” gun advertising are not the buyers
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I'd also add fancy rails for mounting all manner of kit and all sorts of tacti-cool bolt ons. Really though the only AR-15 in most of these guns seems to be the receiver.
Here's a list shamelessly copied from Wikipedia:
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
It has way too much traction on the left.
Thank you
Funsworth comes from an activist and protest background where he’s had, if memory serves, had to deal with a lot of right wing assholes accosting and threatening folks exercising their rights, so he’s coming at this where his perspective is being informed by what a lot of the more aggressive set of the right has been pushing for. As well as a history of interacting with older activists from the civil rights movement, and the kind of threats they faced.
So not exactly hyperbolic; just more plugged into the reality of violence that the American Right has historically wielded and is threatening to wield again as they’re moving more and more towards seizing political dominance in the country.
It’s not fun shit! But it’s a real and dangerous threat, and they use tragedies like this to bolster that grip and entrench their footholds (see Rupar’s thread I linked earlier for the ways at the NRA conference where they’re already trying to use this to push their own fascist agenda of more guns, a stronger carceral state than already exists, and essentially turning our lives into heavily shriveled police state)
The right wing is already working towards using this tragedy to accomplish an agenda of oppression and violence. We need to use it to work towards an agenda of liberation and peace, free from the threat of mass murder at the end of a smoking barrel
(To be clear, the shooter had two weapons and was able to switch between them, but I'm not sure how much that matters.)
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
The complaint I linked above states that gun companies say their products make you safer, when having a gun in your home is a good way for you or someone in your family to get shot by that gun. I think this bypasses this issue.
https://firearmsaccountability.org/FTCPetition.pdf
So, yes but also kinda no
The actual attachments that most people slap on their rifles really wouldn't increase the weapons effectiveness in this particular situation. Most of these mass shootings take place in very small, confined spaces where things like optics, grips, flashlights or the odd laser don't matter.
The one standout here would probably have been the Vegas shooting because the guy was hanging out of a way high up window from a few blocks over and presumably had his shit set up to shoot from range. But even then he had a bump stock, all he really had to do to inflict all the carnage he did was point the muzzle at the huge crowd of people and pull the trigger.
What I'm getting at is I can slap a foregrip, laser, red dot sight and 3 point sling on my old 3 shot bolt action hunting rifle but I'm not really increasing its effectiveness at killing. It comes down to rate of fire and ammo capacity.
Just whip up a list of features and accessories to ban.
Pistol grip
Thumbhole stock
Collapsable stock
Foldable stock
Barrel shroud
Detachable magazine
Magazine or clip with capacity over 5 rounds
Semi automatic weapons
Flash suppressor
Muzzle break
Suppressor/silencer
Picatinny rails
Mounted Foregrips (vertical/angled/etc)
Mounted Lasers
Reflex Sights
Holographic Sights
Probably others I can't think of off the top of my head.
It’s a good argument but it doesn’t bypass the issue.
Been skimming the petition since you posted it. Y’all, go look at pages 9-10 of the document. Those ads for guns for kids, “just like mom and dad”. Wtf!
NNID: Hakkekage
Yeah that’s the convenient narrative that a lot of people want to believe. That there has to be something physically wrong with these people, instead of it being a factor of marketing and cultural entitlement to deadly weapons.
Yeah I was gonna say my list is much shorter but much more comprehensive
I know they're ubiquitous and an obvious target for legislation, but really I don't think it's valuable to get bogged down in the ins-and-outs of what it would take to narrowly define one basically open source platform.
Especially when the political will required to restrict access to all semi-automatic firearms is approximately the same as that required for restricting just AR-15s. Why split hairs at that point.
As I understand it having the extra gun would have been benefiicial for dealing with cooling, since over firing a gun would cause the barrel to warp and potentially self destruct; this was the achilles heal of the MG42 (AKA "hitlers buzzsaw") which had a massive 1200 rounds per minute which actually had to come with spare barrels in order to allow it to fire more frequently.
Also I suppose if one jams you have back ups...
The most consistent feature is using. .223 or 5.56 nato round intended for militaries.
Correct me if I’m wrong is there a single reason you’d want a round like that aside from hunting like bears?
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Because they were human fucking beings with empathy, unlike the Uvalde police apparently
https://www.theonion.com/tearful-uvalde-residents-thank-police-for-protecting-pa-1848982023/amp
Largely a new thing. When I first joined the Army, most units still had the old rifles, with M16s that had no fancy rails and M4s that only had rails for the one sight…none on the grips. And I remember friends’ dads who had AR-15 rifles back then were also generally not “tacticool” versions. They were normal plastic hand guards, normal stocks, mayyybe a scope on a single rail on the receiver.
I really feel like it was a feeding frenzy when the AWB expired to sell all this mall ninja shit to Dodge Ram drivers. Even when I deployed, most of us had iron sights and one rail. That’s what the real military had. We had guys actually buying uppers and optics and shit out on the civilian market to take overseas with them. Our unit armorer’s position was “give me back what I gave you, don’t give a shit do what you want.”
That’s the kind of crazy situation these companies created. That’s where they make their money. War fantasies. Fat goateed desk jockeys buying gear actual soldiers don’t have. Which is exactly why cosmetic restrictions are so unpopular; they break the fantasy.
Ostensibly, there is a plethora of game that a round like that could be good for putting down; Things like Bears, moose, feral pigs, big horn sheep... all of them would benefit from a round that can penetrate through the skull of something that big and potentially dangerous.
Thing is though, you don't *need* an AR15 for that; you can get a bolt action rifle that can be chambered for that and probably do a better job since the system doesn't allow for rapid fire.