NRA released video praising AR-15s just 3 days after Orlando mass shooting

[doop]

@EntropyWorks

I believe we should start re thinking about stopping an ‘active shooter’ before they become a ‘mass shooter’.

@RichZellich

Nope, you’re talking about the outlier cases, a very few shootings played up big by the media because it’s news specifically because it’s rare

Maybe you two can just fight it out between yourselves.

[anon68952647]

@RichZellich

There are “rifles” and there are “machine guns”, and the AR-15 is just “a rifle”

Holy fuck you think that matters, don’t you?

[tw1515tw]

I know it’s not about duck hunting. It was to ensure the southern states could retain their slave patrol militias.

[CarlMud]

@RichZellich

Nope, you’re talking about the outlier cases, a very few shootings played up big by the media because it’s news specifically because it’s rare, and because a large segment of the media is blatantly anti-gun and they’ll sensationalize anything they can to make it look like it’s a huge problem.

I’m actually talking about all cases where guns have been used to take innocent lives. There are no outliers in the total number of unnecessary deaths.

@RichZellich

You’ll notice they never play up the two to three MILLION cases a year where the mere presence of a gun, usually with having to fire it, stops or prevents a violent crime

It’s quite possible those millions of cases aren’t played up because they’re a fiction pushed by the NRA to push the sale of guns. Please provide a citation from a neutral party that cites its research on how many of such cases there are because the NRA’s quoted number has been challenged several times. And if the presence of gun prevents a crime by someone else using a gun, it doesn’t support the argument that we need more guns, rather that we need fewer guns in the hands of criminals, which we can’t accomplish without having fewer guns in the hands of civilians who have no reasonable need for firearms.

@RichZellich

Nobody wants to see kids, teachers, or anybody else killed

But you seem perfectly willing to accept multiple deaths of innocent people as collateral damage for the mere “right” of just about anyone to posses firearms. That doesn’t seem sociopathic to you? “I like to shoot targets and hunt, so it’s okay that other people die.” If frisbees killed as many people as guns despite generally being “safe,” I’d be perfectly willing to give up my ultimate frisbee league if it was necessary to reduce frisbee deaths in this country. Why can’t the same be said for devices that are actually designed to injure and kill people?

@RichZellich

such as the Korean shopkeepers defending their stores/home during the LA riots when the police abandoned the area and left them to the tender mercies of the hordes of rioters/looters.

Speaking of outlier cases…

[LDoBe]

@CarlMud

It’s quite possible those millions of cases aren’t played up because they’re a fiction pushed by the NRA to push the sale of guns.

Or it could be that they don’t take statistics for that. Since the CDC is under threat of losing its funding if they actually do public health analysis regarding firearms. Because the NRA cares more about money than it does about human life. Obviously.

[RichZellich]

I’m not going to bother to reply to the rest of your nonsense, but the 2-3 million cases of defensive gun use a year comes from multiple, repeated every couple of years, Federal government sponsored studies. And of course the health “industry” with says “only” 800,000 cases. Isn’t 800,00 enough for you to admit there are more defensive than offensive uses of guns by “civilians”?

[robulus]

@RichZellich

Nope, you’re talking about the outlier cases, a very few shootings played up big by the media because it’s news specifically because it’s rare, and because a large segment of the media is blatantly anti-gun and they’ll sensationalize anything they can to make it look like it’s a huge problem.

@RichZellich

There are “rifles” and there are “machine guns”, and the AR-15 is just “a rifle”, despite what the professional anti-gun organizations and the anti-gun (and generally firearms-ignorant) media are trying to get you to believe.

And it’s time to close my Boing Boing browser window…

[CarlMud]

Yeah, I’m going to still request a citation even for 800,000 per year. I’m not finding any sources for numbers that high except from pro-gun websites.

@RichZellich

(and this includes mass shootings - some of them have been stopped by a Good Guy With A Gun).

More citation needed.

@RichZellich

And, of course, they’re commonly-used military arms, which is exactly what the Founders intended to guarantee with the Second Amendment - the 2nd isn’t about duck hunting. For the Founders’ ideas on the matter, see the collection at: What The Founders Thought About People's Militias And Bearing Arms

Those quotes don’t help your argument because they indicate that the founding fathers opposed the formation of a standing army. Since we have a standing army and national guard and state militias, we don’t need average citizens wielding weapons of war. Times have changed. Weapons have changed. The likelihood of the government instituting national martial law is extremely insignificant. Yes, the government can be overbearing and wasteful and stupid, but short of random cops killing random innocent people, our government on the whole isn’t very close to needing to be overthrown. And the government has drones and tanks and aircraft, so even a fully automatic machine gun isn’t going to save you in a real fight with this hypothetical tyrannical government that decides to use military force on the bulk of the civilian population (and the military just goes along with it…?)

[FFabian]

So you’re saying that we need more guns to prevent people with guns committing crimes?
Yeah sounds totally reasonable.

[CarlMud]

We definitely need more people who wield the power to usurp due process by killing anyone who in their own judgement deserves to be shot - even if it’s a misunderstanding, or road rage, or a non-violent crime, or a domestic dispute, or…

[LDoBe]

@CarlMud

but short of random cops killing random innocent people, our government on the whole isn’t very close to needing to be overthrown.

Careful now. We’ve not been short of that a long time.

[Melizmatic]

Holy fucksocks; this thread is a shit show…

http://imgur.com/JH19DV9

[LDoBe]

What did you expect? It’s about firearms regulation.

(I avoid saying “gun control” because gun is a term that will turn off anyone on the pro-gun side from listening to a word I say. So I try to at least use the correct terminology, if only to convince fence sitters.)

[robulus]

@CarlMud

Those quotes don’t help your argument because they indicate that the founding fathers opposed the formation of a standing army.

Not to mention the fact that the link is to the poster’s own personal website. Kind of undermines the credibility of the source.

[mewyn]

@aluchko

Oh, and the “good guys with guns” stopping active shooters is largely an action hero fantasy. I like to fantasize I’d just get a group to bull rush the shooter, almost no one ever does so I doubt I’d follow through, but I still think my fantasy is actually more plausible than yours since it doesn’t involve me trying to kill someone.

I am so sick of the “good guys with guns” bullshit. The only thing that putting more guns into more hands will do is increase gun deaths (and maybe the ego of all these gun nuts).

People, in general, are panicky, fearful, and full of loads of unrecognized bias. The last thing we need to do is put immediately dangerous weapons into the hands of everybody out there. If this power fantasy was played out we’d have shootings quite often where one of these good guys with guns would end up shooting another one of their ilk just because something felt off to them, and they thought they were in danger. Or maybe a stick or toy will be mistaken for a gun, and one of these good guys would be quick to shoot as they are supposed to be. Or in an active shooter situation they add to the chaos by also shooting, confusing authorities or other good guys with guns and leading to bullets flying everywhere, willy-nilly, leading to a much, much worse situation.

No, good guys with guns will totally fix all our problems. Totally.

[Richard_Kirk]

I wouldn’t know about the merits of the AR platform, or whether there is a definition of ‘assualt rifle’. But anyone bringing out a video saying the AR-15 is ideal for ‘preventing crime’ 3 days after Orlando is kinda tacky, no?

" When you absolutely, positively have to kill every gay in the room: AR-15, accept no substitute! "

[mewyn]

@RichZellich

but the 2-3 million cases of defensive gun use a year comes from multiple, repeated every couple of years,

I have several sources, all independent, proving that I have a unicorn in my garage; and the more I assert this fact, the more it will be true![1]

[1] - TOTALLY TRUE ASSERTION FROM ALL MY SOURCES.

[Enkita]

@RichZellich

hoplophobe

Interesting attempt to sound educated while confounding a member of an extremely well regulated militia with random gun owners.
You ought to educate yourself about democratic Athens. I’m going to try not to to turn this into a rant but:

1. The only hoplite projectile weapon was the javelin.
2. The hoplites were a voting minority of Athenian citizens, possibly under 10% of the people living in Athens at the time.
3. Athenians could vote to ostracise (i.e. exile) troublesome citizens.
4. People did not routinely go around carrying projectile weapons in Athens except on their way to and from military practice.

Perhaps more importantly still:

In the theatre, violence was never directly depicted on stage because it was considered too horrifying. Instead, a messenger appears to report that someone has been killed.

I am pro the UK armed forces. I know we need them. I’m proud of the fact that they were among the first such forces in the world to promote gender equality (and they’ve won awards from Stonewall for their LGBT support.) I’m the first member of my family in many years not to spend time in the Army or the Navy, though I have done military research. And you know what? I totally support our gun control laws, and so do those Services personnel who I’ve asked about it. We like our relatively peaceful country. Our soldiers come back from Iraq or Afghanistan and can go back to wandering around town with their families without worrying that someone might try to kill them. Our last two terrorist incidents resulted in two deaths and one serious injury.

Your attempt to contrast unrestricted gun promotion with fear of the armed forces is simply disgusting.

@Richard_Kirk

or whether there is a definition of ‘assualt rifle’

You know, when people start on nit picking distinctions, that’s because they don’t have a rational argument.
“This isn’t an assault weapon, this is just an ordinary gun that’s good if you want to massacre people in large numbers. Totally different.”

[frode_svendsen]

Here’s probably exactly what would happen if people tried stopping an “active shooter”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCI4bUk4vuM

Anything else is just power fantasies…

[MarcVader]