this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
19 points (100.0% liked)
News
1751 readers
1 users here now
Breaking news and current events worldwide.
founded 1 year ago
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I knew I’d heard that name before:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Burchett
I mean, he's kinda right though. If someone is set on committing a crime, they're going to do it. Whether they get the weapon legally or not, they're still going to commit that crime. The only way to truly stop crime is to stop people from having free will, which is impossible.
That's not to say there should be zero protections. But take gun control in the US for example, there already are gun control laws, California being the strictest. And there are still crimes committed with firearms every single day. Even if you somehow (by actual magic because it would be actually impossible) banned sales of guns and confiscated every firearm the ATF knew existed, there are still so many firearms already in the black market, or smuggled across borders, or even 3D printed, that the criminal will still have access to firearms, conceivably forever.
I mean, look at fireworks. Most cities in California have banned fireworks, but every 4th of July the night sky lights up like a rave party. Or hacking groups that constantly cyberattack literally anything they can, just because they can. If people want to do something, it doesn't really matter how much red tape you throw at them, theyre still going to do that thing.
the problem with your argument is that it's a relatively short road trip into states that don't have strict gunlaws, where criminal organizations are buying cash at gunshows (and without background checks. "legally".) and smuggling them into california relatively easily.
In fact, i would suggest your making an excellent argument that GUN CONTROL LAWS WORK!
Also speaking as someone whose been into 3d printing for ages, I can go to homedepot or lowes or whatever other hardware store, drop around $30-50 dollars on plumbing and hardware and make something that's fully automatic... . The fact that people are not doing- and haven't been doing so- suggests either that it is easier to just buy it.
WHICH IS ANOTHER ARGUMENT THAT SHOWS GUN CONTROL LAWS WORK.
I mean think about it. It's easier and less risky for them to do a day trip into arizona or texas, or wherever, and buy it, than it is to anonymously buy a printer and sell them. (or they're just too dumb.) So clearly, a federal law mandating background checks (and a reasonable holding period to get that to happen,) and closing loopholes around BGC's seems like a no-brainer solution that would ensure firearms aren't going into straw buyer's hands, right?
As for cleaning things up, you are technically right, we're past it. But that's an argument of defeat: any gun control law is better than known. the statistics comparing similar populations internationally compared to US statistics make it blatantly obvious; moreover there are a number of countries that were as bad or worse, that managed it.
But, republicans seem care more about their guns than they do their children. Until that changes, nothing changes.
The California example doesn’t quite work, because you can effortlessly bring a gun in from a neighboring state. So the legislation is much less effective than a national law would be.
Moreover, so much gun violence has proved to be opportunistic. Someone goes into a rage and because a gun is conveniently at hand, they can do an awful lot of damage. If a gun killing had to be premeditated and planned, as in many other countries, it’s a significant obstacle to such crimes.
If we banned guns sales today (something only an extreme minority are asking for, btw) and it took 100 years to filter them out of society to the point the death rate by firearm in the US was similar to the EU--it would be better than doing nothing.
Something the "guns are inevitable" argument always seems to miss is that changes to the law have more of an effect on society than purely the immediate physical result. Even without removing a single gun from society, passing legislation like that, which would likely require an amendment, would be a huge sign to the entire country that the US as a country is going to be thinking about firearms differently than in the past.
There's no magical solution, but doing nothing is the most certain to have no measurable impact.
Yeah, there's no absolute protection but it does help to put up barriers. I watch a lot of true crime, and a ton of spree killers and gun killers are just lazy or stupid and they would actually be deterred at certain points. Others, well, nothing's gonna stop them but getting caught. Of course, a guy who gets caught on his first try doesn't get to become a serial killer at least.
Come to think of it, if a guy gets caught violating a gun control law... then he doesn't even get to actually become a killer, does he? I've seen them run down a couple of cases including one where the Alabama Department of Investigation (I think?) GAVE BACK a gun to a guy who was under a protection order that in that state actually did restrict him from having a firearm. A law against domestic abusers having firearms would mean that a lot of them could be off the streets before they could kill their victims.