Defensive gun ownership is a farce

boing
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(I wasn’t able to read everything here, so apologies if this argument has already come up.)

When there are more gun owners, the likelihood that someone will assume that you own a gun rises.

When an armed burglar enters a house in America, and discovers that the owners are not on vacation after all, he will shoot first. Because that’s the smartest course of action for the burglar at this point.

When an armed burglar enters a house in Austria, and discovers that the owners are not on vacation after all, he will run away. He will assume that the owners do not in fact own a gun. And even if they did, they’re probably aware that they could be charged with murder for shooting a burglar who hadn’t actually drawn his own gun. So the smartest course of action is for the burglar to just get out.

Likewise, when an American cop sees a suspected drug dealer reach into his pocket, he will assume he is going for “his gun” and shoot. When a racist Austrian cop sees a suspect reach into his pocket, he is more likely to assume that the suspect is trying to dispose of the drugs he was dealing and tackle him.

I remember reading a specific warning in a German-language travel guide about the US. It basically warned tourists to KEEP THEIR HANDS ON THE WHEEL when stopped in traffic by the police. And to never, ever, get out of the car without being specifically asked to.

I also remember being quite shocked by news images of evacuations after Hurricane Katrina - at gunpoint. Just because people were afraid that some of the evacuees might be armed.

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“I’m sorry, Mum. I shot Corbin.”

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I’d give you a ‘Like’, but it would seem so wrong … :frowning:

And that’s only one of about 80 firearm deaths every day in the USA. If the rate was the same as Oz or NZ it would be around 8 a day.

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Nope. 'Straya.

…but keep telling yourself that Americans are somehow different.

@Medievalist What makes you think that Australia didn’t have similar people to those in your story prior to us adopting sensible gun laws? What makes you think that there’s no survivors of the holocaust or their families in Australia?

You make the ownership of certain guns illegal, have a buyback of soon-to-be illegal weapons. People make the choice whether they want to continue possessing illegal weapons. If they are caught possessing illegal guns after the change in law they will forfeit them and if they decide to start shooting instead of forfeiting them then they’ve proven to be the kind of people who shouldn’t have guns and will find their asses in jail. There are thriving shooting and hunting communities in Australia and people who want to shoot still can: just under adequate protections so that the rest of society doesn’t have to fear being shot… like ever. That threat has never been a threat I’ve had to concern myself with.

will die rather than allow their self-defense weapons to be taken away

They’d rather die than give up the things that will supposedly protect them from death? Only if they’re fucking idiots.

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Seeing as how this is the first conversation on the topic, rather than inane screaming matches, I would love to weigh in on the subject. It’s always disheartening when the obvious middleground is so vehemently overlooked. I think I can take a crack at addressing @Medievalist 's challenge, while acknowledging the very real failings of the current approach. This is going to be a two part-er, so bear with me.

  1. First off; As an owner, operator, and ideological supporter of firearms, I must say I am a fan of community storage of them. This would require we actually enforce the second amendment we all love to debate. Somehow we have as a country lost sight of the actual intent and goals of said constitutional amendment. Nearly all the founding fathers STRONGLY warned against America ever having a standing, let alone offensive, army. Hence the opening statement "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…’’ . I propose this solution then(impossible as it may be); Dissolve the U.S., disarm American law enforcement, and place all firearms in the trust of local state militias. These militias would be independent of both state and federal government, and membership would be compulsory for all voting adults. Non-combatant roles would be available to all conscientious objectors. However, to participate in America’s democracy, one must participate in its defense. Civilian access to firearms would be preserved, and America could finally get back to not being global warmongering assholes.

  2. Second; All this, and the source topic, raises a rather uncomfortable question. Since when did subservience become so fashionable? While I agree my chances of ever using a firearm in self defense are miniscule, I fail to see why self defense as a whole is derided so harshly in “civilized” society. pacifism falls pretty flat once an entity or individual has determined to prey upon you. This minor debate really raises the larger, more uncomfortable debate about self sufficiency. Are we as a society and a species still able to govern and care for ourselves? There is a constant refrain these days to legislate our problems away. How is it a community can in one breath bemoan the brutality of a police state, while simultaneously demand broader reach for the same beast? Firearms in American have become the loathed child in a divorce between ancient ideals and modern convenience.

I think that’s about as much as I can offer on the matter, I hope this pushes the conversation toward a real balanced resolution. I appreciate the community here being aware enough to have a true discussion on this hot button topic. @Falcor willing, I hope I can keep the cumulative consciousness rolling forward.

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Hey, remember when the 9 year old accidentally shot her instructor in the head with an uzi?

That was pretty funny.

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“somewhat comparable”?

If the US had the same suicide rate as the UK then 2100 less people would have committed suicide every single year. Numbers get big when you have a population of 300m. 2100 people per year… no biggie, right?

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Just so you know, even in Australia where we have fairly strict gun ownership laws, if you are a farm owner then you are legally allowed to have legal guns without question. Guns are absolutely required on farms and no one anywhere is talking about taking shotguns or rifles from farmers.

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Likewise in the UK and here in NZ. I live in a rural area and would have no problem getting a licence to own firearms for hunting myself. I’ll even admit to being tempted, but many of the (admittedly small number) of shootings here are hunters whose friends mistook them for deer. Which puts a serious damper on my nascent enthusiasm for the sport. :wink:

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Go hunting rabbits. I assume you are not that small. :stuck_out_tongue:

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Let’s not forget, Dick Cheney “mistook” his “friend” for a “pheasant” and shot him in the face. Then the “friend” “apologized” to Dick Cheney.

If we take it at face value, I’d say there should be a licensing test for people who wish to buy firearms that not only includes, let’s say 40 hours of safety training and range time, but also general vision testing. After all, if you want to drive a car, you have to at least prove you can see a stop sign. Shooting someone in the face is way more illegal than blowing through a 4-way stop.

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On the other hand, that case was Dick Cheney.

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You suppose incorrectly. However, unfortunately I don’t read Latin. I try to but it feels like I’ve got a massive splinter in my eye…

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OK, tell me if this is the same milieu as Australia, then.

I was at a surprise birthday party for a friend last Saturday in the mid-Atlantic USA.

Although my friend was not one of them, at least a third of the people present were wearing attire that in some way referenced guns. There was a “cold dead fingers” shirt, at least half a dozen jackets with shooting range logos, a .45 ACP shirt, several gun-shaped belt buckles, etc. I would guess about half the people in the house were legally carrying concealed (my friends parents often carry in their own house, just like you or I would carry our car keys in our own houses).

The paterfamilias is a non-Zionist Jew who fought in WWII for the US Army. He is over 90 years old and target-shoots pistol 3 times a week. He proudly showed me his latest range targets, one of which had ten 9mm shots passing through a single hole that was smaller than my pinky fingernail within a millimeter or two of the target center. He holds a number of state records in pistol shooting for specific age groups and is a registered arms dealer, licensed for full auto among other things. He’s sold dozens of AK-47s that I personally know of, and at least one Armalite.

The younger generation of the family have all been shooting since they were old enough to take the kick from a .22 short. None of them have ever been involved in any accidental firearms discharges or shootings, and all of them have won matches at some point. There is a firing range in the basement of the family home although it is seldom used since the kids grew up and moved out - the parents generally shoot with the local pistol club instead of at home.

All but one member of this family will cheerfully tell you that when the government comes to take their weapons away, they will resist. Some of them do expect this to happen, and have already made some preparations for the event. If necessary, they will resist with lethal force, and will die rather than allow their self-defense weapons to be taken away. They’ll tell you that the family learned a lesson during WW2 and the ones that didn’t learn that lesson burned in the ovens. My belief, based on my personal interaction with these people, is that they will never willingly give up their guns. I can’t tell you how that relates to Australia because I have never been there, but I can tell you that here at least one family would bloodily resist, and I don’t find it convincing when people who have never met them tell me they know how they will react better than I do, because 'Straya. It doesn’t make any sense.

Nonetheless I am still willing to be corrected. Tell me how, exactly, these people will be peacefully disarmed, and kept disarmed, in the real world of today’s US gun culture. I haven’t heard anything yet that didn’t sound like pure fantasy based on fear and wishful thinking, but maybe there is a way…

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I don’t know if human beings could ever care for themselves. We aren’t a species of individuals, we are a social species and that is how we got where we are today. From that perspective it’s fantastic that we have some members that haven’t lost some of the basic knowledge and, in the event of catastrophe, we won’t have to do things like re-discover how to make and control fire. But actual self-sufficiency? I think we fundamentally need one another.

As for the police state, I’d like to point out that in developed countries I think America is the closest to being a police state. Other countries that have weaker rights don’t have illegal secret kills lists and small town cops with tanks. If America’s individualism is supposed to protect it from the police state, it is an empirical failure.

But here’s the problem with that thinking. Suppose in your lifetime there are death camps in America, who is going to be in them? It’s almost certainly Muslims or people who “look” Muslim. (Maybe indigenous people if things go that way, that’s who my money would be on for the camps in Canada) And they will be in the camps because the people watching FOX News (which are over-representative of people who like their guns) vote in a government that does it, maybe even a government that promises to do it. And those people will not be using their guns to defend themselves against being taken to the camps, they’ll be using their guns to join posses to round up the people to be taken to the camps. If we adults in Germany in the 30s, it’s more likely we’d be the Nazi’s than the people hiding Jews in the attic.

Obviously I don’t know your friends, and maybe they would be hiding Muslims in the attic. Maybe they would be using those guns to have a shoot-out with the cops who came to get the people in their attic because there is no way they are going to let the government do that to their fellow Americans. I’m sure among America’s 300+ million citizens there are people who are like that.

But the idea that they will be defending themselves against the government? Unless they are part of one of the top one or two most reviled minorities, it just isn’t going to happen. The Nazi-inspired American government wouldn’t be coming to get the guns of the citizenry, it would be turning the guns of the citizenry upon the citizenry, and it would work.

Again, that’s not an argument for gun control laws, I know it reads like one because as @BryanOBlivion says, it seems like the go-to solution for all problems is legislation. I think America over-legislates to an insane degree. It’s an argument that the whole discussion around gun control is full of crazy rhetoric that I think props up a violent society. People who think they need guns to defend themselves are more likely to be killed by their own guns or to use their guns aggressively than to defend themselves. Defensive gun ownership really is a farce.

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