I know that there is a big push to manufacture weapons, but sure, there have got to be practical limits of how many of a certain thing they can have.
If they want to build them anyway for the business, why not raffle them off to people?
DONāT YOU TELL ME HOW TO USE MA GUN! Now who wants a beer?
2 Likes
Hereās a comprehensive review of the risks and benefits of gun ownership. Bottom line is you are 45 times more likely to experience a negative outcome such as suicide, homicide or accident than you are to experience a positive outcome such as home defense.
11 Likes
But what if the King of England barges into my house and starts pushing me around?
6 Likes
No need for quite all that.
Iād suggest a musket-armed lunatic hostage-taking in their kids school a week before the proto-congresscritters did that 2nd amendment thing.
See how they sell the idea that unregistered guns everywhere is great after thatā¦
There are hundreds of alternatives. Your second scenario, as noted by others is total fantasy. Like most gun owners, you seem to think we live in some kind of Mad Maxx fantasy world. That would be cute if it wasnāt so dangerous.
Also, the point as I see it is not to ādecrease accidental gun deaths.ā From the statistics Iāve seen Iām much, much more concerned about intentional gun deaths, many of which are caused by people who consider themselves ālaw abiding citizens.ā
Thus, your first option is also worthless, because it does nothing to curtail intentional uses of guns, including those cited in the article.
As to options:
-
Outlaw handguns like most civilized countries. Your āGuaranteed failureā speculation is totally unfounded. Like the Mad Maxx fantasy, gun owners have a fantasy that Americans are super special wild west he-men while the rest of the world is filled with some completely different species of human. In the real world, what works in Australia or Japan or Finland will work perfectly well here.
-
Outlaw ammunition.
-
My second favorite: hold gun manufacturers liable for gun deaths, thus removing the externalities of gun ownership and putting those costs back on the owners and manufacturers. Why should society, hospitals, and families have to bear these costs? If people want to own guns let them pay the true cost.
-
My favorite: require liability insurance for gun ownership. Another way to internalize the externalities of gun ownership. Also has the benefit of creating a market price that demonstrates how dangerous gun ownership is, because the price of the insurance will be astronomical. If gun owners think guns are so safe and useful, they can try to prove it on the open market for insurance.
-
Sensible technological safeguards that the gun industry hates, like biometric trigger locks and traceable ammunition. Also has the benefit of driving up the cost of guns.
I could go on.
7 Likes
Those are some great ideas! I like the ones you marked as your favorites. Iāve suggested just taxing the hell out of ammunition. If you are going to fire a gun you better make sure its worth $10 a bullet.
3 Likes
That was Chris Rockās proposal too.
8 Likes
Wait - THAT is what you are concerned about? Thatās ludicrous. You are focusing on a very narrow number of people who have killed someone in self defense that turns out may not have been.
Of the 12,000 gun homicides a year most of those are by people intentionally causing harm during the act of a crime or for a planned or heat of the moment murder. Why on earth you would want to devote such energy to such a small segment of the problem? Itās like complaining about a splinter when youāre foot is cut off.
Again we have 100 million gun owners in the US. 800 people die from accidents. 12000 from intentional crime use. Most of what you suggest punishes the 100 million who user their guns safely for the sins of a small percentage. I am sorry it makes no damn sense to me. The argument for this just boils down to āRAWR! GUNS BAD!ā
2 Likes
Scary.
" understand that you have no reason to simply take me at my word when I say that you are in no danger from me. But the same is true for me. We both have to simply stay aware."
Huh? How does awareness help me?
If you are so responsible, are you willing to get liability insurance on your guns? Most people are responsible drivers and most people have taken driving safety courses and passed driving tests. And yet there are still tons of injuries and deaths caused by driving. How do we deal with that? In part by requiring liability insurance. The same should be true for guns, and if you really are a perfect gun owner who will never, ever make a mistake then you should not be afraid of purchasing such insurance. Or posting a bond of a couple million dollars for the potential havock you could cause if you decide to go postal one day. What do you say?
2 Likes
Most of these countries do not outlaw handguns or other firearms. If they did would be great! But instead they restrict them to a specific class of person, which is not great, it is inequitable.
Insurance is a complete racket - especially once some hierarchical body ārequiresā it - which equals instant captive market. They are like legitimized Ponzi schemes. Authoritarianism and coercion are never an acceptable solution to any problem. Also, not everybody believes in the value of the money you propose using to define the price of life and/or safety.
For some people, how they live is more important than how long they live. Living for ten or twenty years with the autonomy to live my life and further my civic responsibilities according to my values and with real agency is worth far more than living decades longer with no agency under some abstract āauthorityā which keeps me as a domesticated asset.
1 Like
Yeah, but itās going to take a lot of bear spray to make a rug. 
1 Like
While an amusing Chris Rock bit, the people who shot 50 or 100 rounds a weekend recreationally at the target range arenāt typically the people you need to worry about.
It is the people who only want 6 bullets at a time on rare occasions that you have to be very concerned about.
Even in extreme cases like the Aurora shooter fired off ~100 rounds. $1000 is substantially less than the cost of the three firearms used by the bastard.
1 Like
This is a dramatic misreading. @dan7000 said he was āconcerned with intentional gun deaths, many of which are caused by people who consider themselves ālaw abiding citizens.āā So first of all, he is concerned with exactly what you are telling him to be concerned about - all intentional gun deaths, he just makes a parenthetical note to go with it. Secondly, people who consider themselves law abiding citizens commit intentional murders.
Or, to put it another way, most of waht @dan7000 suggests asks a society to take action to try to reduce itās extremely disproportionate rate of violence.
And how is forcing people to have liability insurance when they have something dangerous a punishment? We do it with cars, is that a punishment for drivers? Where I live car insurance companies basically use their government enforced oligopoly to gouge, so thatās an issue. In particular, though, gun liability insurance would probably do a lot to keep younger people away from guns, and to keep people who have had accidents in the past from continuing irresponsible behaviour as their rates may become unaffordable.
4 Likes
Youād need an assault rifle to get me to eat there.
1 Like
Fellas, calm down, this joke isnāt worth arguing over.
1 Like
Sorry, I wanted to learn to split a topic. Felt this was an OK place to try.
4 Likes
Looks like weāve got an old-fashioned Mexican Standoff. Hope you all brought your assault rifles.
1 Like
5 Likes
