Like I said in an earlier post, the ultimate problem isn't the availability of the guns, but that American "Gun-culture" mindset.
So, what is your solution to said problem?
And so, we reach a goal that Congress can not fix. Has there ever been a time where lawmakers changed a culture through regulation? There's always a serious drawback (like in drug regulation), and I know a larger gun counter culture would be a lot worse than how things are now.
I like how I am considered a dimwit because I care about my family's safety. I am not some redneck gun owner. My gun is primarily just for shooting targets as a hobby. The fact is, if you break in my house with the intent of killing anyone who gets in your way, you deserve to die. I realize there are many flaws in owning a gun but with anything, you weigh the risks, if you find these risks acceptable, you take an action.
Yoshihiro Hattori wouldn't have happened if the person who shot would have realized, "Wow! this guy doesn't have hostile intent. He's some Japanese kid dressed like John Travolta. Maybe I should tell him to leave."
Well, the gun helps. Someone thinking ignorant thoughts in your general direction is annoying but not fatal. It is the disastrous combination of the two that leads to tragedy.
if you break in my house with the intent of killing anyone who gets in your way, you deserve to die.
When do you determine that that is what is happening? When it comes right down to it the guy who shot Yoshihiro Hattori was thinking the same thing to what you just stated. "I must protect my wife! I must protect my family!" How can you tell in the dark of night you would not make a terrible mistake?
The fact is, if you break in my house with the intent of killing anyone who gets in your way, you deserve to die.
How do you propose to this intent?
Yoshihiro Hattori wouldn't have happened if the person who shot would have realized, "Wow! this guy doesn't have hostile intent. He's some Japanese kid dressed like John Travolta. Maybe I should tell him to leave."
That's kind of the problem, you see. The shooter thought that Hattori had a bad intent. There's a certain amount of difficulty in divining intent under the type of stressful circumstances that usually surround a breaking/entering/shooting.
So there is clearly more to this than gun laws alone. I suspect that a lot of it is cultural. If guns are respected as tools for hunting and self defense, your crime rate is going to be low. If guns are viewed as an offensive weapon, then your rates are going to be high.
Aha, does A cause B, B cause A, C cause B and A or C cause B and D cause A? Basically, can you prove the link?
And for a home invasion defense, wouldn't a taser be a better if you were intent on defending yourself? nvm, tasers are no good if your target is moving fast in a cramped space.
I read about 100 police reports each day, five days a week, in a rather crime-rampant, semi-urban area. There are always gun assaults, people flashing guns, guns being confiscated by police -- none are legal and all have identifying marks scratched off. Last week, I covered a murder where the shooter used an AK-47. The way I see it, which could be wrong, I admit, is that gun laws only affect people who already obey the law. A War on Guns would be just as ineffective as a War on Drugs or a War on Terror.
Where there is demand, there will always be supply. And where there is money to be had, there is always demand.
I like how I am considered a dimwit because I care about my family's safety.
You are not a dimwit for that. You are a dimwit for how you presented your case. But, you can "shoot their dead ass", or at least try to. Good luck G.I.Joe.
I know a larger gun counter culture would be a lot worse than how things are now.
More anti-gun sentiment would make stuff worse than more pro-gun sentiment? What? How?
Anti-gun action by citizens is okay, but when it comes to regulation, the government is powerless to a nation's culture and a people's mindset. Imagine if Congress suddenly took a strong anti-gun stance, and passed some strong gun control legislation. The only result is more disobedience by gun nuts and more underground sales.
Basically, my point is the true solution lies in changing America's gun-culture, something that the government can't do. The true solution lies in anti- and pro-gun activists working together and compromising on things they can agree on: like safety and education.
Didn't Australia pass some very strong anti-gun legislation in the late 80's that resulted in gun collectors having to turn their guns over to be scrapped? I remember reading something about this in the early 90's. I don't know how much truth is in the scrapping claims because if I had some rare gun I would sell/hide it before I let someone scrap it.
I just found an article full of reactions to the SCOTUS ruling. It's funny because the people who are happy with the ruling are happy because they feel gun ownership is an enumerated right while those who are unhappy are using strawman arguments about gun violence. The gun violence they bring up is gun violence that occurs when criminals own guns!
"I think this is a long overdue decision; I don't think the precedent has been seriously reaffirmed in decades." — Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis.
"They (Supreme Court justices) live in safe neighborhoods. They don't have this. ... Until it's their family member, they're going to keep voting that way." — Annette Nance-Holt, whose son was shot in Chicago as he rode a bus home from school in May.
There are too many variables to say that owning a gun will in any way protect you from an intruder.
The same goes for a baseball bat, a kitchen knife, or any other weapon. Any scenario, gun or not, has a large number of variables in it. A gun is just one more variable added to the equation. With proper training, care, and preparation, it will most likely be a variable in your favor.
Please provide statistics to back up your claim that owning a gun increases safety.
This is an analysis of a study published in 1998, conducted by Kleck and Gertz. The study reports that there are somewhere between 2.1 and 2.5 million defensive gun uses (DGU's) per year in the US. The study was conducted over a period of two months in 1993.
Obviously, not having the Kleck-Gertz study on hand makes assessment difficult. Some cursory research shows a lot of research into this topic; the DoJ has conducted their own research which shows 1.3 million DGU's per year.
Make of that what you will.
EDIT: In any event, the implications of such numbers would mean that the US is a very violent place. I would suspect the prison system is a very big part of that problem.
In the end, a person who is properly trained in the usage of firearms and firearm safety can use a firearm to defend themselves quite effectively. If you're trained properly, a firearm is the ultimate equalizer in a self-defense situation. The key is "properly." Making firearms illegal keeps them out of the hands of law-abiding citizens; if someone has decided to, say, shoot 32 students at a tech school in Virginia, I doubt they very much care about some pesky concealed-carry laws. The only way such laws could be effective is if we instituted mandatory checkpoints and random firearm searches. Not a big fan of waving Constitutional rights, myself.
It took place at a university in Virginia. A student with a grudge, an immigrant, pulled a gun and went on a shooting spree. It wasn't Virginia Tech at all. It was the Appalachian School of Law in Grundy, not far away. You can easily drive from the one school to the other, just take a trip down Route 460 through Tazewell.
It was January 16, 2002 when Peter Odighizuwa came to campus. He had been suspended due to failing grades. Odighizuwa was angry and waving a gun calling on students to "come get me". The students, seeing the gun, ran. A shooting spree started almost immediately. In seconds Odighizuwa had killed the school dean, a professor and one student. Three other students were shot as well, one in the chest, one in the stomach and one in the throat.
Many students heard the shots. Two who did were Mikael Gross and Tracy Bridges. Mikael was outside the school having just returned to campus from lunch when he heard the shots. Tracy was inside attending class. Both immediately ran to their cars. Each had a handgun locked in the vehicle.
Bridges pulled a .357 Magnum pistol and he later said he was prepared to shoot to kill if necessary. He and Gross both approached Odighizuwa at the same time from different directions. Both were pointing their weapons at him. Bridges yelled for Odighizuwa to drop his weapon. When the shooter realized they had the drop on him he threw his weapon down. A third student, unarmed, Ted Besen, approached the killer and was physically attacked.
But Odighizuwa was now disarmed. The three students were able to restrain him and held him for the police. Odighizuwa is now in prison for the murders he committed. His killing spree ended when he faced two students with weapons. There would be no further victims that day, thanks to armed resistance.
Has anyone actually read the opinion? Governments can still restrict sales and ownership. The DC statute was particularly draconian and went too far for Scalia. It is just an example of what governments cannot do.
I just found an article full of reactions to the SCOTUS ruling. It's funny because the people who are happy with the ruling are happy because they feel gun ownership is an enumerated right while those who are unhappy are using strawman arguments about gun violence. The gun violence they bring up is gun violence that occurs when criminals own guns!
"I think this is a long overdue decision; I don't think the precedent has been seriously reaffirmed in decades." — Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis.
"They (Supreme Court justices) live in safe neighborhoods. They don't have this. ... Until it's their family member, they're going to keep voting that way." — Annette Nance-Holt, whose son was shot in Chicago as he rode a bus home from school in May.
Please explain how this is a strawman argument. I notice this more and more lately. Everyone is saying everyone else is using a strawman argument. Not every argument you happen to disagree with is a strawman argument.
Comments
Yoshihiro Hattori wouldn't have happened if the person who shot would have realized, "Wow! this guy doesn't have hostile intent. He's some Japanese kid dressed like John Travolta. Maybe I should tell him to leave."
Guns don't kill people, ignorance kills people.
And for a home invasion defense, wouldn't a taser be a better if you were intent on defending yourself?
nvm, tasers are no good if your target is moving fast in a cramped space.
When I have a house, I am so fitting shock tiles.
I read about 100 police reports each day, five days a week, in a rather crime-rampant, semi-urban area. There are always gun assaults, people flashing guns, guns being confiscated by police -- none are legal and all have identifying marks scratched off. Last week, I covered a murder where the shooter used an AK-47. The way I see it, which could be wrong, I admit, is that gun laws only affect people who already obey the law. A War on Guns would be just as ineffective as a War on Drugs or a War on Terror.
Where there is demand, there will always be supply. And where there is money to be had, there is always demand.
Basically, my point is the true solution lies in changing America's gun-culture, something that the government can't do. The true solution lies in anti- and pro-gun activists working together and compromising on things they can agree on: like safety and education.
This is an analysis of a study published in 1998, conducted by Kleck and Gertz. The study reports that there are somewhere between 2.1 and 2.5 million defensive gun uses (DGU's) per year in the US. The study was conducted over a period of two months in 1993.
According to statistics from the Department of Justice, there were about 600,000 crimes involving guns committed that year (1993).
Obviously, not having the Kleck-Gertz study on hand makes assessment difficult. Some cursory research shows a lot of research into this topic; the DoJ has conducted their own research which shows 1.3 million DGU's per year.
Make of that what you will.
EDIT: In any event, the implications of such numbers would mean that the US is a very violent place. I would suspect the prison system is a very big part of that problem.
In the end, a person who is properly trained in the usage of firearms and firearm safety can use a firearm to defend themselves quite effectively. If you're trained properly, a firearm is the ultimate equalizer in a self-defense situation. The key is "properly." Making firearms illegal keeps them out of the hands of law-abiding citizens; if someone has decided to, say, shoot 32 students at a tech school in Virginia, I doubt they very much care about some pesky concealed-carry laws. The only way such laws could be effective is if we instituted mandatory checkpoints and random firearm searches. Not a big fan of waving Constitutional rights, myself.