An excellent point, and as an owner of several guns I completely agree.
In a country where a child can get suspended from school for biting a piece of bread into the shape of a gun, I’m not holding my breath waiting for this to happen.
4 Likes
First, that’s ridiculously off-base. Small? Tell me again, Every American News Organization, about the numbers in gun violence:
According to the National Crime Victimization Survey, 467,321 persons were victims of a crime committed with a firearm in 2011.[1] In the same year, data collected by the FBI show that firearms were used in 68 percent of murders, 41 percent of robbery offenses and 21 percent of aggravated assaults nationwide. (Source: National Institute of Justice)
Moran, calling for stronger gun regulations, wrote "The U.S. gun homicide rate is 20 times the combined rate of other western nations."...If you compare the most recent data on the same group of nations, mostly based on 2009 statistics, the U.S. gun homicide rate is 15 times higher than the other countries. The number fell to 10 times as high when we defined the inexact term of “western nations” as countries belonging to NATO. (Source: Politifact)
With all this preliminary work in hand, the authors ran a series of regressions to see what effect the overall national decline in firearm ownership from 1981 to 2010 had on gun homicides. The result was staggering: “for each 1 percentage point increase in proportion of household gun ownership,” Siegel et al. found, “firearm homicide rate increased by 0.9” percent. A one standard deviation change in firearm ownership shifted gun murders by a staggering 12.9 percent. (Source: American Journal for Public Health)
And hey, I was robbed at gunpoint about two months ago. Wheeee! (Source: Me, fer fucks sake)*
And what can be done?
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (Source: NRA)
*And given how well the NRA (and their back-pocket jackholes in Congress) has influenced Congress to make gathering gun-related statistics a near-impossible feat, I’m willing to bet the overall numbers are low, if not entirely unreliable. (Source: Slate: “How Congress Blocked Research on Gun Violence”).
7 Likes
Do you believe we should have absolutely no licensing or inspection of cars or drivers, nor any Rules of the Road? Do you think life would would be more dangerous or basically the same if that were to happen?
And yet you’re comfortable maintaining that level of anarchy when it comes to guns.
5 Likes
BREAKING: Huggies introduces Pull-Ups with a reinforced waistband able to support the weight of a Glock.
4 Likes
I know you’re joking, but there are a lot of places where toddlers are banned now. It is possible that in at least some states there are more places where concealed-carry guns are allowed than toddlers.
4 Likes
When someone states facts and you see an emotional response, you are no longer capable of a reasonable, logical, and objective argument.
I live in the South, we have our own history and our own culture. If all you take from that is racism then please don’t visit.
Laws are effectively the manifestation of a large group of people surrendering a small portion of their autonomy to criminalize behaviors they on the whole do not like.
Like murder, unsafe workplaces, drunk driving, oh, uh gun control…
You may enjoy speeding in construction zones, too. That doesn’t mean society can’t a) pass judgement on you as a person, and b) work to enact laws that either make it harder and/or dramatically increase the consequences for your actions.
As far as guns go, it’s time we do both.
6 Likes
Not defending, just pointing out something.
I’ve been reading/posting on BB for like a decade. But if you click on my user profile it shows I joined in 2013, which is when the new comment system went up probably. I think I’ve had to re-register like 3 or 4 times over the years. Now it could be rare chance that a long time reader finally decided to jump in the mix, make an account and post, but yeah…
Nothing like a good solid chopper to scrape the marrow from an ungulate bone.
Ironically I’ve seen actual “ranch” flavored white sauce put on a pizza before…(imagine alfredo with ranch powder in it.)
I wouldn’t kill someone for ordering it, but I might smack them right hard if they expect me to eat it.
1 Like
Seriously? You think we need MORE dead people for this to be a problem? I think having more than one school shooting AND toddler shooting in a week is plenty.
2 Likes
I’m incensed about the gun debate, but its the Ranch Pizza idea that really makes me nauseous 
3 Likes
I’m not sure I’m well enough informed to opine on the racial characteristics of the “American melting pot” as it impacts our level of societal violence, so I’ll refrain from doing so.
But I will tell you this, and I have a high degree of confidence in saying it.
If our police forces were to start proactively and vigorously enforcing our existing concealed weapons laws in every jurisdiction, it would be a matter of days, if not hours, before the cries of “racism” would resound to the heavens.
2 Likes
So you’re saying that we can simply continue to pass more laws, and more laws on top of those, until the number of dead children reaches precisely zero??
1 Like
Whoa, hey, friendly fire! I appreciate your points and your endless attempts to try to talk sense to people who aren’t really willing to listen to reason or logic. Don’t call their attention to my swords!
Um, yeah, exactly right. It’s all about the sport! That’s the ticket!
Now, if I’m going to kill someone I prefer to use an axe or spear. The axe is a Real Man’s Weapon ™ and handy for splitting wood besides.
Nonsense. I’m too old now, but I have a cute little scar at the top of my left shoulder where the tip of a spatha ripped through it. It’s true most steel fighters use blunted weapons, but there’s still a significant subculture that uses the real thing at full speed… that is the top level of skill, of course, which is why I can no longer do it. Age conquers us all.
DO NOT DO THIS ANALYSIS. That is all.
1 Like
Well, Cap, if that’s what the country wants, more power to it.
Strangely though, those who want to seriously reduce gun deaths in the USA don’t seem to be organizing around this. If there is a significant (volunteers+fundraising) group out there, going state by state to generate support for a repeal or rewrite of the second amendment, I seem to have missed it.
Frankly I would welcome the opportunity to see how such an effort works out.
So you’re saying that because we cannot practically reduce the number of unjust gun deaths to zero, we shouldn’t try to reduce them at all?
3 Likes
As an aside, for many years running, on my birthday I would buy a pinata and all the guests would go after it with one of my swords. And I am the cruelest pinata master in the known universe. It is amazing noone got hurt 
2 Likes
I’m saying that with everything human beings try to do via legislation, there is a point of diminishing returns.
A corollary to that is that we should start by doing the things that are likely to produce the biggest positive change.
For example, having the police stop and frisk anyone whom they have reasonable cause to think is carrying a concealed gun without a carry permit, followed by an arrest and destruction of the gun if such is found, is almost certainly likely to reduce the number of gun deaths by hundreds if not thousands. It has the side benefit of requiring, in most localities, exactly zero new legislation. You up for it? I would be.
1 Like
I think there are a lot of small things that could be done, that would have outsized impacts. Yearly safety training. Inspection of firearms to make sure they are in working order (kinda like pressure cookers). Rebates on gun safes. Voluntary buybacks.
It doesn’t have to be one giant, monolithic thing. The US does have (the limited) ability to multitask.
7 Likes
