Can we please just admit that maybe gun control is a good idea finally?

I find this particular shooting more horrific is because all of the victims were women and young children. There is a reason why when a disaster happens we try to save and evacuate women and children first -- they are our lifeline to the next generation. To be brutally honest, men are expendable to society. This is why we send young men to fight wars and try keep women and children safe to keep the population growing.

The shooter was a goddamn coward going after children who couldn't defend themselves. He shot them multiple times with an AR-15, which its .223 cartridge does devastating damage to flesh (it doesn't go right through cleanly but rather spins and tumbles in the body). The female teachers and principle were unbelievable braver (more braver than I could be) when they tried to rush the gunman to somehow stop him.

I am both a social progressive and a gun enthusiast. I understand why my left-leaning friends on Facebook want more gun control in the US but I also try to explain to them logically (rather emotionally defensive) proper gun terms (for example, the media keeps wrongly using terms like "machine guns" and "assault rifles") and what gun control is like in Canada.

I know I left out the whole "goatee/mirror universe" part of it, no need to get defensive.

What I don't like about this attitude is that it's self-fulfilling and seems quite ahistorical. Gay marriage was being advocated in what, the 70s? At almost any time since then you could say exactly the same thing about the rejection of gay marriage. Yes there's a point at which that no longer becomes true, when progress is clearly feasible, but that point is reached off the back of people who advocated when it seemed hopeless, often for decades. Democracy itself is undermined if people only advocate for what seems pragmatic at the time.

Clearly, "go fuck yourself" is offensive, not defensive.

I think I fired a photon torpedo that hit too close and, in response, you put up your shields making your remarks defensive to my first offense.

Or something. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings I'm sorry.

As pointed out in this ongoing thread, your arguments for this are weak.

Sensible firearm ownership laws should always be on the US agenda.

The following measures will reduce access to firearms by disaffected minors and young adults:

1. Full registered firearm ownership.
2. All automatic and semi-automatic weapons are banned from civilian ownership.
3. Ownership of a registered firearm should only be allowed for genuine needs and not for self-defense.
4. Mandatory secured storage of registered firearms in a locked gun cabinet or on the premises of a licensed shooting range.

The government needs to make these tough decisions however unpopular.

I have no shields, pure hull tank with my armor reppers, come at me bro cause your energy weapons just tickle.

(I haven't played Eve Online in literally years, but I hope I'm doing it right.)

I don't have the attention span to play that game, like Dwarf Fortress.
I do however enjoy reading about the game's goings on, like Dwarf Fortress!

Ignoring that I really do not get where you guys are so totally convinced gun removal is going to accomplish want you want in the first place - gay rights did not eventually happen as a result of a coordinated push on the left for gay marriage laws - and nothing else - starting in the 1970s. If you want to change minds, change minds. While you're doing that over the next 30 years, incrementally push for changes you can actually get.

It's harder to kill people if it's harder to get guns. We can debate actual consequences, of course, but I cannot fathom why you seem so bemused at why people think this.

I don't buy the distinction you seem to be making, really. Advocacy for gun control is inseparable from advocacy for stricter gun laws. It's tautological. I don't have a clue what it means to "change minds" without talking about legislation.

As a Canadian gun owner I can only address this from the Canadian stand point:

1. We have that here in Canada. Firearm gun licenses (Possession & Acquisition License) are a federal matter. All Restricted firearms (all non-prohibited pistols, shotguns with a barrel shorter than 470 mm, and some rifles, like the AR-15 class) are registered with the Canadian Firearms Program. As of April 5, 2012 Non-Restricted firearms (most shotguns and rifles with barrels over 470mm/18.5") no longer need to be registered.

2. In Canada, fully automatic firearms are prohibited to civilians unless they have a very rare prohibited firearms license or have fully automatic firearms registered before December 1, 1998. In the US, from my understanding, fully automatic firearms are highly regulated and need special (and expensive) permits.

Banning semi-automatic firearms is banning A LOT of firearms (which includes most modern pistols and rifles). Firearms unaffected would be those with pump-action, lever-action, bolt action, revolver pistols, break-action, and single/double/over-under barrel shotguns, which essentially knocks back firearm technology to the 19th century..

3. In Canada, civilian use for firearms is not for self-defense. A number of gun owners have been charged for using their firearms when defending themselves and their properties from burglars and attackers. Only in an immediate threat to one's life could a firearm be used for self-defense in one's home. Canadian gun owners own guns for hunting (you need a hunting license and tags when in season) and/or sport target shooting (owners of Restricted firearms must be a member of a government recognized gun club).

4. By law all firearms must be secured and unloaded when stored, minimally with a trigger lock for Non-Restricted firearms and Restricted/Prohibited firearms stored in a safe/vault. All Restricted firearms must unloaded, trigger locked and enclosed in an opaque and lockable case during transport. Restricted and Prohibited firearms are only allowed at government recognized gun ranges. Non-Restricted firearms have no limitations but gun owners are smart enough not to carry their unloaded and non-concealed shotguns or rifles in a (sub)urban environment, even though technically they're legally allowed to.

As such, we rarely see or read about accidental shootings in gun owners' homes because gun safety is mandatory by law and failure to do so is an arrestable offense (and your firearms confiscated).

I might be inclined to agree with you (or I might not), but there's already 280 million guns in circulation in the USA. Advocating gun control now is very much locking the barn door after the horses have escaped.

The only way gun control advocates will get their way is if they make possessing a gun socially unpopular (like smoking). And good luck on that...living in the South, I can tell you that NOT having a gun is the socially unpopular stance. Otherwise, it would be like trying to restrict alcohol consumption if everyone already had a secret still in their backyard.

Banning guns in the US would be as effective as banning alcohol. We all know how well Prohibition went.

Instead of the left screaming for banning all guns, how about starting off slowly like mandatory gun safety courses and storage, something that the pro-gun lobby shouldn't, ideally, have a problem with. At least with proper gun safety and storage there will be less accidental shootings.

When I got a hunting license in MN I was required to go through a firearms safety/certification course. Its even an endorsement I have now on my drivers license.

I know other states have similar requirements for getting a hunting license, I don't think it would be unreasonable to have that expanded to any ownership of a weapon.

I'm bemused because the literature appears to show a strong correlation between gun ownership and violence, but the literature showing causation on murders, much less mass murders, is very tentative.

On the distinction, people here love their guns in the way really without parallel elsewhere. Many consider them - either for self defense, recreational usage, or hunting, a core part of their personality. "Gun control" policies that are implemented elsewhere with little controversy here run into a solid wall of enraged opposition unless they're very carefully designed around edge cases or specific categories like mental illness, tracking criminal usage, etc., and even then there's pushback because the suspicion is that they're a stalking horse for just taking them later on. The wikipedia article is a very broad overview.

Personally I don't get it, but whatever; that's what a very large number of people think like and want. On top of that, substantial numbers believe the reverse of what you do, and what's common outside the US - that larger numbers of guns actually make people safer from either active defense or a deterrent effect.

"Let's just get rid of the guns; please give us yours" is pointless grandstanding in this context; all it does is piss off the people who need to convince if you want to do anything. Regardless of what the actual effect of gun ownership is on murders or mass murder events, it's the single most politically difficult route to take.

TL/DR; you cannot steamroll gun owners in the United States to get policy changes by telling them they're wrong, suck it; you have to make them at least not object much, if not actively in your coalition.

I don't buy this. In the first place I'm not advocating banning all guns. Secondly a scaling back on legal ownership of firearms can take place over years if necessary. Australia, admittedly on a much smaller scale, did a buyback scheme, and I assume the UK had some similar process. Just because it would be a difficult process doesn't make it untenable.

I wonder if the resistance to any gun control is because of the word "control." As a Canadian, it seems to me that Americans have a thing against government authority, as evident by the rise of the Tea Party and libertarian GOP.

Its also the constitutional issues with it we have here that other countries do not. Like it or not its very well established constitutional law that americans have a right to own guns.

What are the odds of Clinton's Federal Assault Weapons Ban be resurrected by President Obama? A lot of the gun-related Youtube channels I subscribe to have been fearing of Obama taking away their guns or at least bringing back the assault weapon ban since he got elected.

Despite this thread and thousands like it, the odds of anything happening are proximately nil. How do these people jutify the "need" to own assault weapons? If it's to protect them when the black helicopters come over the horizon, then we are well and truly screwed.

What is an 'assault weapon'? Thats the issue, its such a nebulous term. Many hunting weapons could be considered assault weapons depending on how you define one.

Well, some hunters use ARs to hunt. (These rifles are useless for hunting in Canada since all AR-15 family of rifles are classified as Restricted firearms and can only be used at government recognized shooting ranges).



I own two AR-15s, which aren't assault rifles since they are semi-automatic (only the police and military are allowed access to fully automatic firearms in Canada).

From Wikipedia on "assault rifle" and "assault weapon":

A lot of Canadians own non-black rifles like the SKS, a Soviet-era surplus rifle (it was succeeded by the AK-47 primarily due to the AK-47's detachable magazine). The SKS, like the AR-15, use intermediate cartridges, which are fine against human targets within 200 meters/yards but no so great for longer ranges and/or large game. There are third-party stock that allow the SKS to accept detachable stocks.

Original surplus SKS with wood stock:


SKS with 3rd party polymer stock:


I'm sure that the general populace would be afraid of the tricked out SKS because it looks like an "assault weapon" even though none of the internal mechanism has been altered.

Whenever someone uses "assault weapon" I want them to watch this video of a San Jose police officer explaining the differences between the different types of rifles:

But the government is also explicitly granted the authority to regulate gun ownership. I don't think anyone here is advocating a total ban on firearms. But I think we could stand to be a good deal stricter in regulating how guns are obtained and used, and we could do it without throwing out the second amendment.

You would be wrong about that, several people have pretty much specifically said they wish to ban all private ownership of firearms, outlaw hunting, ect.

OH SHIT HERE IT COMES

I am not really a huge fan of that video. He neglected to pop open the receiver of the automatic, and that would have muddied the waters of his argument mightily, because it too would be more or less identical to the layman's eye. Besides which, the underlying suggestion that semi-automatics are relatively harmless, or that the hardware of a rifle is irrelevant to it's function is just plain wrong.

EDIT: He also mentions that semi-automatic designs are about a century old, neglecting to mention that automatic weapons were contemporaries, or more often than not a fork of the same design.

A fucked up gun culture in America?

Naw!

Why would he need to open up the rifles? He's just explaining the difference between fully automatic and semi-automatic. He explains the mechanical difference between the firearms shown to counter all the false claims and catchphrases the news media uses. It's like popping up the hood of a car to show mechanically the difference between manual and automatic transmission. My brother is a car fanatic and he would get upset if I call an automatic transmission car "stick" drive.

I don't see anywhere in the video where he implies semi-automatics are relatively harmless. He followed the gun safety rules -- he said he would put on his ear protection before shooting, he always pointed the firearms in a safe direction (either down range or up when handing over the firearms to his assistant), and he made sure the firearms were unloaded (he cleared the breach after removing the magazines).

Firearms ARE NOT harmless. This is why we have gun safety rules. And this is why hundreds of people die needlessly because they don't follow them. How can you expect there to be any sort of gun control when people on either side of the issue can't even discuss gun safety?

Nope, not even a little bit fucked up:

I'm a fan. He convinced me that we shouldn't just focus on fully automatic weapons. We should ban semi-automatic weapons too!

Like the one your avatar is holding?

They come in pink.

I'd be all for it.

God that is the saddest fucking thing ever. Feel emasculated, mens? Please consider this penis substitute!

There's really only one question I REALLY want an answer to but never get: what is the downside to better gun control?

And don't give me "The government will turn to tyranny" because if you think you with your precious penis extension can stand up to the government, or even make them pause to clean you out of their tank tracks, you're living in a gum drop world.

So what is this downside you're all so afraid of?

How about this: Buy all the guns you want. Hoard them and sit in your basement and feel like a badass, but lock them up. If your gun gets loose and hurts someone, you're going to be liable- whether it's your kid stealing it or a bum that broke into your house. It was your responsibility to keep it secured, now here's a negligent homicide charge.

Not sure that would have helped in this case.