Another Fucking Mass Shooting At US School

[Loren Pechtel]

You should be able to see the flaw in your test. If you can't:

You are assuming you can defend yourself against all crime. The reality is that most crime doesn't involve force in the first place and will thus be totally unaffected by how force plays out. Instead, let's look at a crime where force may be a factor and see how it compares:

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/nternational-Comparisons-of-Hot-Burglary-Rates_tbl1_5196898

Strange how it seems US burglars are considerably less likely to hit a house where someone is home.

Not strange at all. Who wants to deal with a problem- dealing with inhabitants- which does not require the inhabitants have a firearm.

Please read again. I was making a comparison. If it was just dealing with inhabitants why is there a big difference between countries?

 

[Derec]

And yet, bizarrely, I haven't bee a victim of crime even once, in the last two decades; And I have never been in a situation where I would have wanted a gun, nor do I know anyone who says that they would have avoided being a victim of crime if only they had a gun.

Just because that is your personal experience does not mean that there aren't many people who have defended themselves using guns.

it's almost as though your rebuttal has zero relevance to the real world, and guns are simply not necessary to prevent crime.

Because of your non-random sample of you and people you know?

 

[Derec]

How many of these self defense cases used AR-15s or other military style weaponry?

Of those that I cited? None. All used handguns. There have been cases of self-defense with semiauto rifles (although I disagree that civilian versions without selective fire count as "military style"). Most infamous is of course Kyle Rittenhouse who defended himself against some Antifa thugs.

But it does not matter what weapon was used. This was in reference to bilby's insistence that individual right to self defense does not matter since we are living in a society and that therefore gun possession for self defense should not be allowed. All guns, not just certain rifles.

How many of these defenders would have gotten a gun license and training if that had been required for them to own their firearms?

Impossible to tell. Also irrelevant to this subthread, as bilby thinks guns should not be allowed for self defense irrespective of any training.

The fact that people use guns for self defense does not mean there shouldn’t be reasonable gun regulations enacted into law.

I agree with that. Bilby's position goes way beyond "reasonable gun regulations" and that is what I was replying to here.

 

[Derec]

Otherwise, why would Derec keep bringing up his list of single incidents where (other kinds of) guns were used in self defense?

Because bilby kept insisting that individual right to self defense is not needed if you are living in a society.
Please do try to keep up with the thread and what statements a particular post is in reply to.

Bad faith discussion? Or more of the profound ignorance he has consistently demonstrated regarding firearms?

Ignorance is on your side.

 

[Derec]

By "kids" I thought @ZiprHead was referring to the huge number of child victims of gunshot.

Zipr made his statement in direct response to use of guns in self defense against things like armed robberies and carjackings.
So I naturally assumed he means "kids" who commit these crimes (perps of those types of crimes do skew young).

As to huge numbers, we already went over that earlier in this thread. Most minors killed with firearms are teenagers, esp. 15-17 year olds. They are more likely to be shot fighting with other teenagers, like the 17th street shooting in Atlanta, or as perpetrators of armed robberies and such, as in the cases I posted recently.

Like Columbine,

Note that this shooting happened during the supposed golden age while the so-called assault weapons ban was in effect.

Or kids killed by accident, due to poor safety procedures.

Yeah, I do think

Or my partner's grandson who offed himself with his daddy's gun.

That's horrible! How old was he?

Those are the kids I'm talking about. They are legion.
Tom

They may be legion (US is a big country; even a small risk results in big raw numbers) but far less than the cases of teens shooting each other over some corner beef or teens getting themselves shot trying to rob people.

 

[Derec]

Again, the Barney Badass With Guns complex hurts kids.

Existence of idiots with guns does not mean that we should disallow use of guns for legitimate self defense to everyone. Idiots in cars are even more numerous; that does not mean we should ban cars for private use.

The children are expected to recover from their gunshot wounds.

Well, that's at least one good news in that story.

 

[Derec]

Yup. The hypothesis that guns are effective as a self defence mechanism, either directly or indirectly, can be easily falsified;

Wrong. The hypothesis that guns are ineffective as a self defense mechanism can be easily falsified with counterexamples where guns have been used as an effective self-defense mechanism.

When we compare the US and Canada, for example, we should, if this hypothesis is correct, see significantly higher crime rates in Canada.

You can't do that. Too many confounding variables. The two societies are not as similar as you pretend they are.
That is the problem in almost all so-called research in social sciences. Confounding variables are impossible to control in almost any observational study and you can't exactly run a controlled experiment on this issue.

My favourite ad-hoc "reasoning" is "you need a gun because the police cannot be everywhere all the time"; It's one of those ideas whose only value is its simplicity. Even an idiot can understand this argument. Indeed, only an idiot would think it a compelling reason to own a firearm.

It was an argument against your cockamamie notion that because we are living in a society, and police exist, that individual right to self defense is automatically superfluous. That police can't be everywhere to save you from an attack is sufficient to rebut your notion that individual right to self defense is not needed.

 

[bilby]

Existence of idiots with guns does not mean that we should disallow use of guns for legitimate self defense to everyone. Idiots in cars are even more numerous; that does not mean we should ban cars for private use.

But it DOES mean we should licence the people who use them, register the equipment they use, and require proficiency testing to get a license, which is forfeited for misbehaviour.

Again, no country in the developed world has banned firearms for private use. They just have strict licensing and registration requirements.

And nobody is talking about banning firearms from private use in the US.

 

[Shadowy Man]

And nobody is talking about banning firearms from private use in the US.

Derec thinks you are and that’s why this discussion is so muddled.

I just want the pro gun people to agree that reasonable regulations shutouts be in place and that firearms whose characteristics are more similar to weapons of war need not be trivially obtainable (if at all).

It seems they agree but then again nothing in USA is happening politically in that direction.

 

[laughing dog]

Please read again. I was making a comparison. If it was just dealing with inhabitants why is there a big difference between countries?

Different cultures, different times and different measurement of burglary and rates.

 

[Elixir]

And nobody is talking about banning firearms from private use in the US.

Derec thinks you are and that’s why this discussion is so muddled.

Derec intentionally conflates any advocacy for restricting the manufacture and distribution of certain types of long guns, with taking people's guns away, outlawing guns etc..
It's bad faith discussion. And too bad, since almost all of us, including Derec, seem to agree that requiring training, gun registration and licensing for their use, are good ideas. But since some of us see that as the beginning of sensible reform, Derec seems to view it as a slippery slope that would end in a gunless "nightmare".

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Of those that I cited? None. All used handguns. There have been cases of self-defense with semiauto rifles (although I disagree that civilian versions without selective fire count as "military style"). Most infamous is of course Kyle Rittenhouse who defended himself against some Antifa thugs.

Self defense away from home usually is limited by what you're carrying--and you can only conceal a handgun, nor are bigger weapons practical for everyday carry. Thus self defense is usually a handgun. I have never seen them separated by at-home vs away-from-home, I would expect the weapons used to be substantially different.

 

[atrib]

Well, you claim to have used an AR15, but you don't seem to know the difference between a .22 caliber rifle cartridge and the 5.56 NATO cartridge used by the AR15, so I thought I would post a picture.

I know the difference, but as I said, I did not want to go into too many details. I admit I should have been more clear.

Why belabor the point when I have already explained it? Are you trying to avoid the bigger point?

You argued that we should not waste our energy trying to ban weapons like the AR15. To support this argument you made the following claims:

1. Handguns also kill people
2. Handguns kill more people than AR-15 type weapons
3. AR-15 type guns are very similar to other .22 caliber hunting rifles
4. An AR-15 should not be considered an assault rifle because it does not offer full-auto operation

Points 1 and 2 are true, but they don't tell the full story. As explained previously, AR-15 type firearms are designed to kill people. The guns themselves are available with a variety of options that make them more versatile against human targets - barrel lengths of 10.5 and 16 inches (although the 10.5inch barrel would technically make it a pistol), fixed or folding stocks, hand braces replacing the stock (in a pistol configuration), the ability to mount an additional handgrip on the breech to make it easier to handle as a machine pistol, very low recoil and so on. It is FAR easier to put your sights back on a target after you have shot an AR-15 as compared to a traditional handgun with a 4 or 5 inch barrel, and it is a lot more easier, even for novices, to put their shots on target (again, as compared to a handgun). The 5.56 NATO round is far more likely to cause severe injury or death than a 45acp or 9mmx19 projectile (popular handgun calibers in the US), especially in the hands of an inexperienced shooter. So while it is true that handguns can also be used to kill people, you load up the odds considerably against the potential victims by allowing private citizens to own AR-15 type guns.

Point 3 is patently false as I have explained previously. Most hunters use bolt or lever action guns for hunting for various reasons - the ability to control when and how the spent casing is ejected, fewer moving parts to keep clean, more reliable, cheaper price, and the fact that hunting rifles are built for a completely different mission that an AR-15, making hem more accurate and ergonomic over the ranges that the gun is built for. A typical hunting rifle with a 20 or 24 inch barrel is hard to wield in tight spaces and much more difficult to line up on very short range targets because they are not designed for such a mission.

Point 4 - I think the lack of a full-auto mode makes the AR-15 easier to use for the novice/casual user. It is harder to control the gun and line up the sights on a new target while fighting the recoil, and you use up more ammo than in semi-auto mode.

The US will not ban handguns in our lifetimes, but banning platforms like the AR-15 again is possible. And for the all the reasons I have talked about in this thread, I think this is a battle worth fighting, even if the end result is just a handful of young lives being saved.

Which is:
1. Rifles other than AR15-style rifles use .223R/5.56NATO cartridges and have the same firepower. Those rifles would not be affected by the so-called "assault weapons" ban.
2. Some rifles affected by this ban use different ammo, for example AK47, which including the semi-auto version uses 7.62x39. That is because the "assault weapons" definition largely go by what these weapons look like.

The AR-15 platform is very popular in the US, but the characteristics are similar across other platforms like the AK. So what I say about the AR-15 applies equally to other weapons that are designed to kill people and not for sport. As to what the weapons look like, form follows function, and you can clearly trace the lineage of the modern AR-15 from the earliest Armalite prototypes to the M4/M16 military guns. There is a reason hunting rifles look the way they do, and the AR-15 looks the way it does.

 

[Derec]

You argued that we should not waste our energy trying to ban weapons like the AR15.

And I stand by it. We should focus on people, not individual weapons.

1. Handguns also kill people
2. Handguns kill more people than AR-15 type weapons

It's not that they also kill people, or that they kill more people, they kill vastly more people than rifles or any type.

3. AR-15 type guns are very similar to other .22 caliber hunting rifles

So I should have said .223 riles. I already conceded that point. Why are you belaboring it?

4. An AR-15 should not be considered an assault rifle because it does not offer full-auto operation

It is not an  assault rifle. That term has a specific meaning, and civilian semiauto rifles are not included. That's why congresscritters had to make up the new term "assault weapons" when they wrote their misguided 1994 ban.

Points 1 and 2 are true, but they don't tell the full story. As explained previously, AR-15 type firearms are designed to kill people.

As if handguns were not designed for that purpose.

It is FAR easier to put your sights back on a target after you have shot an AR-15 as compared to a traditional handgun with a 4 or 5 inch barrel, and it is a lot more easier, even for novices, to put their shots on target (again, as compared to a handgun).

Handguns do have advantages too. They are more lightweight (and have a much smaller moment of inertia) making them more maneuverable. They are also easily concealable. I do not deny that semiauto rifles have advantages, but practically speaking the advantages of handguns predominate in close quarters like a typical school shooting. I think many school shooters choose AR15 style rifles for the cool factor, not because they are so much better than a Glock in a school setting.

So while it is true that handguns can also be used to kill people, you load up the odds considerably against the potential victims by allowing private citizens to own AR-15 type guns.

That is falsified by the fact that handguns kill so many more people than AR15 or AK47 style weapons.
So why are Dems so gung ho about those rifles? I think it has a lot to do with the stereotypical user of each. When you think AR15 you think of somebody like Rittenhouse.

When you think of a Glock you think of urban black gang members. Hell, there is even a rapper calling himself 9lockkNine. He is in prison for weapons possession.

Dems don't want to upset their constituency.

A typical hunting rifle with a 20 or 24 inch barrel is hard to wield in tight spaces and much more difficult to line up on very short range targets because they are not designed for such a mission.

You can't really beat a handgun for ease of wielding in tight spaces and shooting at very short range targets. Which is why urban thugs like Daunte "Prince of Brooklyn Center" Wright prefer handguns when they rob women off their rent money.

Point 4 - I think the lack of a full-auto mode makes the AR-15 easier to use for the novice/casual user. It is harder to control the gun and line up the sights on a new target while fighting the recoil, and you use up more ammo than in semi-auto mode.

Hell, even in the military "spray and pray" is discouraged for those reasons. But real assault rifles (again, words have meanings) are selective fire. They are not always in full auto mode.

The US will not ban handguns in our lifetimes, but banning platforms like the AR-15 again is possible. And for the all the reasons I have talked about in this thread, I think this is a battle worth fighting, even if the end result is just a handful of young lives being saved.

It is a dangerous way of thinking that even a small hypothetical benefit justifies heavy handed government action to ban stuff. What's next? Banning sports cars because they are theoretically faster even if most traffic fatalities are due to regular cars?

The AR-15 platform is very popular in the US, but the characteristics are similar across other platforms like the AK.

Except the caliber. AK47 uses 7.62x39.

There is a reason hunting rifles look the way they do, and the AR-15 looks the way it does.

Hunting rifles look very much like infantry rifles used during most of WWII.

AR15/AK47s look the way it does because of influence of StG44, first popular assault rifle (oder "Sturmgewehr" auf gut Deutsch).

 

[Shadowy Man]

You argued that we should not waste our energy trying to ban weapons like the AR15.

And I stand by it. We should focus on people, not individual weapons.

Can you name any bills proposed by pro-gun politicians that attempt to address gun violence by focusing on people?

Are there any Republican mental health initiatives? Anything else?

It’s easy to say this and not want to address the weapons but it’s another thing to back up that talk with action.

 

[ZiprHead]

I agree with Derec. Ban handguns too.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You argued that we should not waste our energy trying to ban weapons like the AR15.

And I stand by it. We should focus on people, not individual weapons.

Can you name any bills proposed by pro-gun politicians that attempt to address gun violence by focusing on people?

Are there any Republican mental health initiatives? Anything else?

It’s easy to say this and not want to address the weapons but it’s another thing to back up that talk with action.

These days neither side can come up with anything sane.

The gun nuts want to do away with reasonable protections. Look at Texas with Constitutional Carry--and arrests for carry-related offenses are skyrocketing. The gun grabbers don't want to settle for reasonable and want to push reasonable ideas to unreasonable limits (for example, exactly what sort of "transfer" requires a background check.) Any sensible measure will be attacked from both sides.

 

[Oleg]

Any sensible measure will be attacked from both sides.

'Cause it's not really about doing anything reasonable. It's about hurting your political opponents.

 

[ZiprHead]

Any sensible measure will be attacked from both sides.

'Cause it's not really about doing anything reasonable. It's about hurting your political opponents.

You wish.

 

[Elixir]

Any sensible measure will be attacked from both sides.

'Cause it's not really about doing anything reasonable. It's about hurting your political opponents.

You wish.

Here, Ollie - I fixed it for you

'Cause it's not really about doing anything to promote liberty or freedom. It's about hurting your OUR political opponents with fearmongering stories that make them think they need the ability to kill hundreds or thousands of subhumans to protect their ignorant godfeerin' children.