58 Dead, 500 Plus Wounded

[Yorzhik]

You use an emotionally-driven-but-statistically-insignificant example to kowtow people.

No, I note that's what you call the mass murder of people. I don't agree with you. I doubt most people will. I don't even believe you do.

I care about all the dots, you care about just the red ones. I haven't used emotionally driven arguments because I don't need to make emotionally driven arguments like you do.

Each dot is homicide from 2016. The red ones from mass homicide incidents.
View attachment 26056

I've spoken to the problem of that chart. To sum, if you bundle enough you can hide a particular as easily as you can hide a hippo in a stream. I also noted that behavioralists have long established the truth of extinction events relating to the stoppage of any particular behavior you want to alter. It's fairly common to observe a spike before you see the move to extinction.

There is no doubt one can eventually pile enough laws/regulations on the people to get them to do any particular thing. But it's a bad way to run a country.

There were 13 instances of mass murder by firearm in Australia over an eighteen year period where five or more people lost their lives prior to a change in law there and the enacting of universal gun laws and restrictions there. In the more than twenty years since there have been none. Using the reduced, FBI threshold there have been 4. That's pretty dramatic.

The reason we don't use mass shootings to dictate gun policy is because basing policy on 13 incidents over an 18 year period in another country is too small a sample size.

 

[Town Heretic]

I care about all the dots, you care about just the red ones.

Rather, I proposed laws to significantly impact mass shootings and firearm violence, which is the topic and outlay. You, on the other hand, oppose doing what can be done on the point, even though you don't argue for the possession of all sorts of weapons. It's peculiar.

I haven't used emotionally driven arguments

Sure you have. I'll come back to this at the end here.

because I don't need to make emotionally driven arguments like you do.

Repeatedly declaring my approach emotional is no more true than it is objectively effective. What I've argued for is mirroring and learning from approaches that are demonstrably more effective at curbing gun violence and mass shooting injuries/fatalities.

I've set out objective data from other countries. I've noted that states here with better, tougher gun laws do appreciably better in terms of firearm death rates than states with lax laws. In fact, the only emotional component in my approach is found in noting your remarkable lack of it, found in your dismissal of mass murder victims as statistical outliers not worth altering the right to own an AR 15 over.

There is no doubt one can eventually pile enough laws/regulations on the people to get them to do any particular thing.

Or, in this case, change the law to significantly impact their ability to do a very damaging and specific thing. Thanks.

But it's a bad way to run a country.

No, reducing mass murder and the associated damage to the culture is a very good thing, no matter what you attempt to slather the effort in.

The reason we don't use mass shootings to dictate gun policy is because basing policy on 13 incidents over an 18 year period in another country is too small a sample size.

Except I didn't use the one statistic. I invited a comparison with every other Western democracy enacting tough and universal gun law. They have lower rates of gun violence AND mass shootings. I've even noted the impact within our country on the state level more recently, especially in an environment like Hawaii where you don't have contamination from lax contiguous states, a-la the wet/dry problem.

No, you began and continue to play emotional cards dressed as something else. To go back to the root in illustration:

If someone wants to buy an automatic, trying to stop them would be worse than letting the few people that want them have them. The current regulations against autos could be softened and little would change except that good people wouldn't be made into criminals just for possession of an inanimate object.

That's playing the fear card. Gun laws aren't safety measures, they're criminal conversion mechanisms. A repetitive note of yours.

Beyond that, all humans have a right to defend themselves, and guns are important to that right. Any weapon that can be directed at a single person should be available.

That's playing the emotional card too. Begin with a misleading declaration (no one is opposing the right to defend yourself) that alarms. Then tie it to any weapon to defend yourselves. You don't even mean it, but it's part of the extreme against extreme to buy the status quo. Your life is at stake people, for Pete's sake don't let the evil gun laws take away your ability to defend yourself. It's a familiar ploy on the part of the gun lobby.

now that we see the government salivating over registration so they can eventually take away every owner's gun

Appeal to paranoia. It's about taking your property and leaving you defenseless. All of these are intellectually bankrupt and emotionally driven attempts.

Sometimes there will be crazy people that shoot other people, but there will be less people killed if they are allowed to defend themselves.

No, not sometimes, frequently, and not just crazy people, but all sorts of people sane enough to face prosecution. Then wrapping it in the nutty notion that more guns is the solution, when we already have more guns than any people and less safety from them than any other Western democracy, all of which for some time have understood that access to certain types of weapons runs contrary to public safety and not in defense of it.
.

 

[Town Heretic]

People once had permission to own other people.

No, it was a right. One that took a Constitutional Amendment to rid ourselves of.

That's only because your interpretation of the right differs from mine, and from the Supreme Court's.

In point of fact though, almost no one is advancing the notion that the right to bear arms is unabridged, which means the rest of it is about where the line should be drawn and why. What was true in the founders days is no longer true. We don't need militias, having a standing army. And the nature of the weapons we produce can produce so much more harm to other members of the society comparatively that the field of consideration cannot reasonably be said to be the same.

To me, it appears that you only believe that peaceable, law abiding private citizens have the right to own single shot rifles and shotguns that don't accept a detachable magazine, and I'm not sure if you believe in the right to possess and carry any handguns at all, though if you're consistent, you must only believe in the right to handguns that also do not repeat.

I think we should take a hard look at all the other countries that do a remarkably better job of curbing gun violence and mass shootings and make laws reflecting that sober examination.

And I can't see where you believe that anybody has the right to carry such firearms. So you think you believe in the RKBA, but from where I'm standing, you don't believe that at all, not even a little bit.

Then you need to consider why you believe that, because I'm a gun owner and one who hasn't proposed the eradication of gun ownership by any stretch of the imagination.

Or are you preparing to turn them in, if your plans become reality? Are you a criminal in what you currently own, in the case that what you believe the laws should say manifests?

I can't be a criminal without a law and no law will pass restricting any gun without programs for collection and, I'd proffer, reasonable compensation. And, of course, collectable guns could be rendered ineffective as weapons, avoiding the problem for those who possess them for that reason.

My right to keep and bear arms is like my rights to life, and liberty, where it is absolute barring my own voluntary forfeiture through commission of crimes, and your right cannot interfere with mine, and vice versa.

See, you just put another caveat. Your right depends on what you do with it. It isn't free of restrictions. And as with your liberty it is subject to restriction.

Certain rights have age limits. Not life, but to keep and bear arms, to vote, and others, yes.

Even the fundamental right to be is subject to examination in light of behavior. And sometimes when the compact is threatened you can be forcibly placed in a position where your life might be forfeit in defense of others and the compact itself.

The Supreme Court disagrees with you.

They have, narrowly. They once disagreed with my position on owning people too. So this isn't really about that or we can just print the decision and move on, which would suit many, doubtless, but that's life for you. Abortion is the law of the land too.

The United States of America waged war against the United States of America, Town.

No Confederate believed that, Nihilo. They withdrew from the Union, believing they were entitled to in defense of a right to own people and to expand that right into new territories.

The topic is that you want to further erode our freedom to possess and to carry standard issue weaponry

No, the topic is whether or not we find preventable massacres preferable to the alteration of an arbitrary line in the sand in relation to what a person can reasonably use for hunting and in self-defense. Again, the weapons and the scale of lethality they present today don't remotely reflect what was reasonable and possible when the initial ideas were framed for protection under a differing set of needs and pragmatic considerations. It's time to stop acting as though this right wasn't a thing it demonstrably is, abridged, then get on with the reasonable job of making sure we make a more intelligent choice relating to that line.

 

[Stripe]

You think people had the right to own others? :AMR:

 

[Town Heretic]

Where are Vermont and Alaska on that ranking?

Alaska is on the low and weak end, 44th in terms of tough gun laws and with a gun death rate of 23.4 per 100k, or number 1 in terms of death rate. Pretty consistent. So they're tops in deaths and sixth off the top spot in weak gun laws.

Vermont is ranked 41st in gun law, sees 9.7 deaths per 100k, and is ranked 38th in gun death rate.

These two states are my No.s one and two in no particular order, so that means they should be No.s 49 and 50 for this organization, but they're not even in the "bottom five;" why would that be? They've misled you, and I wonder why they would do that.

No, they didn't. I just posted the top five strongest and bottom five weakest states in terms of gun laws and how that translated into fatalities. Both Alaska and Vermont are lining up about right in those regards.

In Switzerland

Laws are much tougher than here, but not as much as a good bit of the rest and they rank second to us in terms of gun violence, though that second is still single digit deaths as a rate.

Thanks for conceding it.

I can't concede a thing uncontested between us. But good to know we agree on something else.

Does anybody have the right to possess and carry an RPG or a bazooka?

They don't. And they shouldn't, even though they're weapons. Even though you can fire a bazooka the way you fire a rifle. Heck, you can aim an RPG too. And talk about self defense.

There is either a right, or there is not a right. It's not mine to either grant or deny.

Another point that isn't in dispute. The question isn't whether we have a right, but what constitutes the reasonable exercise of it and what doesn't.

That's not how rights are determined.

Didn't say it was. I noted it's how we go about balancing and restricting the reasonable exercise thereof.

No it doesn't, not at all.

Yes, it does. I even told you how. But that was a lovely no, sans meat.

I proposed a number of ideas also. Banning very small, non-standard issue sidearms, would go a long way, because they are implicated disproportionately in crimes, accidental shootings, and suicides, each of which are types of gun related deaths.

I've noted that, but it's simply taking a flyswatter to bird problem.

 

[Town Heretic]

You were asked directly about how far you would go; what was your end game... and you deferred. You are being coy because your claim to have "reasonable" or "rational" or "sane" or "common sense" or "sensible" gun control doesn't sound so sensible when you lead with your real intentions.

That's just nutter nonsense, which is likely why you buried it without a quote that would draw me to see it.

But you should have been clear that you wanted to ban anything beyond a breech-loader for normal citizens.

I think it makes sense, though I began the thread with a call to simply consider what every other country like us was doing in consideration of the difference between their violence outcomes and our own on the point.

And further, a citizen would have to jump through hoops to get a breech-loader.

If that's how you characterize a mandatory safety course and registration.

And all these things must be universal because people that don't have the problem in their area must pay for the sins of those in areas where the problem exists.

Rather, universal because without it you reduce efficacy and the commiserate safety. And given all but four states have experienced mass shootings and murders within even as limited a window as the past couple of years, it's not just a neighbor problem. It really boils down to whether you feel owning that "cool" semi-automatic is worth the cost in injury and death, where you draw the reasonable line. That's the conversation.

So you lead with bans on bump stocks and high capacity mags. But that's disingenuous because this little bit of control is just the beginning, and you know it.

A thing is only disingenuous if you don't mean it or if you're hiding something. Neither of those can be rationally coupled to my advance or to my proffer that we consider the superior models in our cousin industrial and Western democracies.

It's just the beginning because you know it won't work.

In order, it depends on what most people think as time goes by. The nations I noted aren't police states with citizens being striped of freedom. And I believe the comparative data shows it can and will work.

You know there will be more emotionally-driven-but-statistically-insignificant events that, as Rahm Imanuel would say, should not go to waste. So you hide the results of your actions in cherry-picked stats that include only gun-related homicides and even only gun-related mass shootings.

None of that is true. I've been plain in considering anything short of eliminating the right. I've spoken to why and used a number of statistical comparisons, from nations to states. Given I'm only speaking to gun related homicides and violence (I've spoken to both at every level) I have no idea what you're up to with that.

We know it won't work because we already have a great number of bans and restrictions, and they, by your own account, aren't working.

Actually, I only just demonstrated that even with the problem of uneven law states with stronger laws do appreciably better than states with lax laws and that Hawaii, isolated from the poor law effect, has a pretty darn low gun violence death rate.

 

[Nihilo]

Alaska is on the low and weak end, 44th in terms of tough gun laws and with a gun death rate of 23.4 per 100k, or number 1 in terms of death rate. Pretty consistent. So they're tops in deaths and sixth off the top spot in weak gun laws.

Vermont is ranked 41st in gun law, sees 9.7 deaths per 100k, and is ranked 38th in gun death rate.

So really this list is just a ranking of suicides, by American Western democracy (IOW by state).

No, they didn't. I just posted the top five strongest and bottom five weakest states in terms of gun laws and how that translated into fatalities. Both Alaska and Vermont are lining up about right in those regards.

The argument is that somehow gun laws cause suicides, and you don't consider this dishonest? And to put a finer point on it, you're trotting out statistics that do nothing to advance your view that we should ban completely, and retroactively, the possession by peaceable, law abiding private citizens, of partially disabled standard issue SWAT and military long guns, with which I'm sure almost no suicides are ever committed?

Laws are much tougher than here, but not as much as a good bit of the rest and they rank second to us in terms of gun violence, though that second is still single digit deaths as a rate.

Suicides are in those data.

I can't concede a thing uncontested between us. But good to know we agree on something else.


They don't. And they shouldn't, even though they're weapons. Even though you can fire a bazooka the way you fire a rifle. Heck, you can aim an RPG too. And talk about self defense.

So again, what mechanism do you use to justify that the world's militaries, and all of them, do possess and carry RPGs and other destructive devices? Your summed answer so far on this question has been, "It's their job," or something like that. Do you want to answer afresh, or build upon this idea you've submitted already?

Another point that isn't in dispute. The question isn't whether we have a right, but what constitutes the reasonable exercise of it and what doesn't.

Well no, you've said you disagree with the Supreme Court's interpretation of that right, and they've said we do have the right, so that's not what this is at all. I am merely standing up for the right, and you are arguing against it. While we each hold our personal views for what the right to keep and bear arms (RKBA) means, there's only one of us who is in agreement with the Supreme Court.

Didn't say it was. I noted it's how we go about balancing and restricting the reasonable exercise thereof.

What's the reasonable exercise of the right to own people, that you mentioned above? And, saying you do agree with me and the Supreme Court, that the civil right to possess and carry standard issue weaponry is the Second Amendment's RKBA, what would be the reasonable exercise of that right? Not saying we would ever agree on this, but if we did, if you did the thought experiment, what would you propose as the reasonable exercise of this human right? I've said, among other things, but just to use an example, that laws against concealing dangerous weapons ought to be de-moth-balled, and that the carrying of long guns ought to be encouraged, and that perhaps we ought to require public schools to teach students about guns, and to "close the gun show loophole." What would your view, or some of your views be, if you were to just assent to the Supreme Courts' authorized interpretation of the Second Amendment's RKBA, as a thought experiment? I wonder if perhaps our difference is confined entirely to our differing view of the right.

Yes, it does. I even told you how. But that was a lovely no, sans meat.

No, it does not, and no you did not. You said registration would help law enforcement trace guns used in crimes. Mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war criminals die at the scene of their mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war crimes, tracing the gun doesn't undo the mass shooter shooting rampage domenstic terrorist mass murderer war crime or prevent it, while what I've proposed about shoring up the NICS FBI background check system would or at least could, while registration never could or can.

I've noted that, but it's simply taking a flyswatter to bird problem.

It actually stands a chance to affect those suicide numbers, accidental shootings, and felony murders, while your idea, to ban and retroactively, possession of blunted standard issue military and police style civilian versions weaponry, only could have prevented Paddock and Kelley from their mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war crimes, and them only. As Yorzhik keeps pointing out, only the "red dots;" and even then, only ones where the mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war criminal used a neutered civilian version of standard issue military and police long gun, and it wouldn't touch the "red dots" perpetrated by hand guns only, like the Virginia Tech mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war criminal, or the Fort Hood mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war criminal, the latter being a military man.

And, you would accomplish this only by further eroding and decaying the laws which already do a poor job of recognizing, affirming, and protecting the Supreme Court's authorized interpretation of the Second Amendment's RKBA, in which we are plainly instructed not to infringe it.

 

[Nihilo]

No, it was a right.

I reject that thoroughly. Rights are inherent to being human beings, and for those of faith, they are so because they are endowed to us by the Maker. He never gave anybody the right to own slaves like cattle. He permitted certain things, when He did, because of the hardness of our hearts; and since Christ, He hasn't once instructed us that He's endowed us with the right to own people like cattle. It sounds more like you think that we only have permission right now to keep and bear arms, like how slave owners back in the day had permission to own people like cattle. There was never any right to own people like cattle, the law didn't reflect a civil or human right to own people like cattle. You apparently think that rights are negotiable things, decided upon by lawyers and lawmakers.

One that took a Constitutional Amendment to rid ourselves of.

Something I said early on was that you're arguing for amending the Constitution to repeal the Second Amendment, and you denied that, but that impression to me remains. You mentioning this reminds me again.

In point of fact though, almost no one is advancing the notion that the right to bear arms is unabridged, which means the rest of it is about where the line should be drawn and why.

You deny that wrt the civil right to keep and bear arms, that "arms" refers to standard issue military weaponry, and apparently also you deny that it refers to partly disabled/semiauto-only "miltary-style civilian facsimiles" of those arms. You're not arguing abridgment/infringement, you're arguing against the right itself.

What was true in the founders days is no longer true. We don't need militias, having a standing army. And the nature of the weapons we produce can produce so much more harm to other members of the society comparatively that the field of consideration cannot reasonably be said to be the same.

Case in point. Of course the Supreme Court recently examined this issue, including the points you've proffered here. They decided against you. You're arguing against the existence of the right itself.

I think we should take a hard look at all the other countries that do a remarkably better job of curbing gun violence and mass shootings and make laws reflecting that sober examination.

And I agree with this, but you dodged my actual comment to you.

Then you need to consider why you believe that, because I'm a gun owner

'Means nothing, when you won't divulge which weapons you actually possess. Are you arguing that guns you own should be illegal, or not? You see how I don't have to even own guns to argue my point, but you need to provide this information if you're going to keep using it as evidence. We don't know how much skin you've got in this game that you're playing.

and one who hasn't proposed the eradication of gun ownership by any stretch of the imagination.

You keep saying that as if it's equivalent to believing in the RKBA as authoritatively interpreted by the Supreme Court, when the fact is that you disagree with that interpretation, so you not proposing "eradication of gun ownership by any stretch of the imagination" is a distraction, and a misleading one.

I can't be a criminal without a law and no law will pass restricting any gun without programs for collection and, I'd proffer, reasonable compensation. And, of course, collectable guns could be rendered ineffective as weapons, avoiding the problem for those who possess them for that reason.

Another dodge, you didn't answer my question.

See, you just put another caveat. Your right depends on what you do with it. It isn't free of restrictions. And as with your liberty it is subject to restriction.

I have no right to commit a malum in se crime, as I've maintained. You're calling that a restriction, which still doesn't advance your position, because possessing a standard issue military long gun, or even a bunch of them, is not a malum in se crime anyway, and neither is carrying them. You're trying to argue that my rights are intrinsically bounded by malum prohibitum crimes, and that in no way holds any water, since, by analogy, how could someone justly forfeit their right to life over a malum prohibitum crime? That's rather extreme of you to propose.

Even the fundamental right to be is subject to examination in light of behavior. And sometimes when the compact is threatened you can be forcibly placed in a position where your life might be forfeit in defense of others and the compact itself.

I think the quote is "Give me liberty, or give me death," not, "Give me the compact or give me death." But this does reveal a little bit more about where you're coming from, that you'd word it in this way.

They have, narrowly. They once disagreed with my position on owning people too. So this isn't really about that or we can just print the decision and move on, which would suit many, doubtless, but that's life for you. Abortion is the law of the land too.

'Looks like an apple and orange cart just overturned in the street here. There's never been any right to own people, laws permitting abortion fail to recognize, affirm, and protect the right to life, and the civil right to keep and bear arms is intrinsic to being a human being.

No Confederate believed that, Nihilo.

Of course not, Town. That just goes to the point I was making. It was the federalists, chiefly President Lincoln, who in waging that otherwise hostile war against a non-belligerent peaceful neighbor, believed that the Constitution has no valid exit door or escape clause or possibility.

They withdrew from the Union, believing they were entitled to in defense of a right to own people and to expand that right into new territories.

And the United States invaded them, only validly, morally, and legally, under the federalists' position that the Constitution is irrevocable.

No, the topic is whether or not we find preventable massacres preferable to the alteration of an arbitrary line in the sand in relation to what a person can reasonably use for hunting

Hunting is way off topic.

and [reasonable use] in self-defense.

You're not reasonable about this, and every military on earth disagrees with you, and agrees with me, because they outfit their lowest ranks with weapons that you are hellbent against any private citizen ever possessing, or carrying, and they outfit them so, because these weapons are judged by all of them as reasonable for use in self defense, and in defense of the common.

Again, the weapons and the scale of lethality they present today don't remotely reflect what was reasonable and possible when the initial ideas were framed for protection under a differing set of needs and pragmatic considerations.

And just as again, the Supreme Court considered all this and made their ruling in the light of it. You disagree with them.

It's time to stop acting as though this right wasn't a thing it demonstrably is, abridged, then get on with the reasonable job of making sure we make a more intelligent choice relating to that line.

Nobody has a right to commit malum in se crimes. You call that abridgment of a right, I just don't include that in any right.

 

[Nihilo]

You think people had the right to own others? :AMR:

He did say that, yes.

 

[Yorzhik]

You think people had the right to own others? :AMR:

Huh? He can't possibly think that.

 

[Town Heretic]

So really this list is just a ranking of suicides, by American Western democracy (IOW by state).

No. That's not it at all, though certainly suicides are disproportionately committed by people using firearms.

you're trotting out statistics that do nothing to advance your view that we should ban completely, and retroactively...partially disabled standard issue SWAT and military long guns, with which I'm sure almost no suicides are ever committed?

Retroactively? It's not time travel. I'm setting out gun violence statistics in relation to laws and noting that countries with universal and strong gun laws do a much better job of safeguarding their citizens.

So again, what mechanism do you use to justify that the world's militaries, and all of them, do possess and carry RPGs and other destructive devices?Your summed answer so far on this question has been, "It's their job," or something like that.

Pretty much. The same reason fire departments have firetrucks and I don't.

Well no, you've said you disagree with the Supreme Court's interpretation of that right, and they've said we do have the right, so that's not what this is at all.

That's not a "well, no". Or you're jumbling a bit. Yes, I disagree with the Court's holding. And yes, I'm proposing a new line in the sand, one based upon the approach of the rest of Western democracies that do a great deal better at holding down gun violence and mass shootings.

I am merely standing up for the right, and you are arguing against it.

No, you're standing up for a different line in the sand. It's essential that we differ honestly or there's no point in a conversation. I've been straight forward in noting I am not arguing against the right to bear arms. I'm speaking to rational restraint within that exercise, something common to any right.

Neither of us is looking to abolish the right to own a firearm.

While we each hold our personal views for what the right to keep and bear arms (RKBA) means, there's only one of us who is in agreement with the Supreme Court.

That's what many who believe in abortion rights would say to me or could. It wouldn't change my answer. Once we recognize that no one is arguing for the right to bear any arms the conversation becomes clearly what it is, discourse over where the appropriate line in the sand should be.

I've said, among other things, but just to use an example, that laws against concealing dangerous weapons ought to be de-moth-balled

I tend to agree.

and that the carrying of long guns ought to be encouraged

And to disagree.

and that perhaps we ought to require public schools to teach students about guns, and to "close the gun show loophole."

And I've said the first isn't strong enough and agreed on the latter.

What would your view, or some of your views be, if you were to just assent to the Supreme Courts' authorized interpretation of the Second Amendment's RKBA, as a thought experiment?

I don't see the value in that. I'm unconvinced there is a way to retain semi-automatic weapons and the means to make those automatic and in any meaningful sense impact the gun violence and mass murder problem we face as a nation.

No, it does not, and no you did not.

I did. You should have just asked where. Here it is again:

Early on I noted that gun safety courses and registration could make us safer from unintended gun violence (aka accidents) and make it easier for authorities to track weapons used in crimes. Registration could also be used as a red flag for potential problems, putting people who suddenly stockpile weapons on the radar screen. Given that can correspond with deteriorating mental capacity, as appears to be the case with the Vegas shooter, it might very well impact the issue.

Now back to our regularly scheduled...

It actually stands a chance to affect those suicide numbers, accidental shootings, and felony murders, while your idea, to ban and retroactively, possession of blunted standard issue military and police style civilian versions weaponry, only could have prevented Paddock and Kelley from their mass shooter shooting rampage domestic terrorist mass murderer war crimes, and them only.

Are you seriously under the impression that only those two instances of the nearly 400 mass shootings involved weapons and modifications like those found in Las Vegas and Texas? That's completely wrong.

As Yorzhik keeps pointing out, only the "red dots;"

That's also completely wrong for the reasons given in rebuttals prior to him on the very point. If you haven't read it then I'd point you there.

And, you would accomplish this only by further eroding and decaying the laws which already do a poor job of recognizing, affirming, and protecting the Supreme Court's authorized interpretation of the Second Amendment's RKBA, in which we are plainly instructed not to infringe it.

So abortion is a settled issue for you then? And you'd have been fine and dandy with slavery?

That's just a long sentence that essentially underscores what I noted about your position prior. You believe we should be wallking about like citizen soldiers. I believe we have more guns per person than any of the places that safeguard their citizens from gun violence dramatically better than we do. But I appreciate the engagement and clarity. We draw very different lines.

 

[Town Heretic]

I reject that thoroughly. Rights are inherent to being human beings, and for those of faith, they are so because they are endowed to us by the Maker. He never gave anybody the right to own slaves like cattle.

Actually, the Bible does support slavery, just not the variety of it that we cooked up in the West. But again, it took a Constitutional Amendment to end slavery for all time and establish the right of a people to be recognized as people. I'll leave that there.

It sounds more like you think that we only have permission right now to keep and bear arms

Unless you don't understand Amendments you believe that too (See: slavery, the right to vote, etc.). Things can change, by degree or entirely, but only when the Republic speaks with a remarkably uniform belief on the point.

You apparently think that rights are negotiable things, decided upon by lawyers and lawmakers.

I think that once women didn't have the right to vote, that many people were considered chattel, and that now neither of those is the case. I think that because it's demonstrably, objectively true. You're free to think what you like.

Something I said early on was that you're arguing for amending the Constitution to repeal the Second Amendment, and you denied that

Probably, it not being true and all. That sounds like me.

but that impression to me remains.

You should try another impression. I'd recommend Christopher Walken. That's a good one if you can pull it off.

You're arguing against the existence of the right itself.

Well, no. Nothing like that, honestly. So when you repeat that, you're nothing like honest. I'd prefer to think you're better than that, but if you keep insisting you aren't at some point I'm going to take your word for it.

...you dodged my actual comment to you.

No, dodging is intentional. I may have missed it or you may have put it poorly. What was it? Sometimes your usage gets problematic. Try again. I'll do my best.

'Means nothing, when you won't divulge which weapons you actually possess.

Suffice to say that if I own a weapon that would be banned I'd present it and keep the law. If you need to know more than that you'll have to justify the need beyond satisfying your personal curiosity.

We don't know how much skin you've got in this game that you're playing.

We don't know if you have any. And it doesn't matter until you make it matter by some rational construct. I can't bear a child, but I still have an interest in the abortion issue, by way of example.

You keep saying that as if it's equivalent to believing in the RKBA as authoritatively interpreted by the Supreme Court, when the fact is that you disagree with that interpretation, so you not proposing "eradication of gun ownership by any stretch of the imagination" is a distraction, and a misleading one.

That's irrational. I neither agree with the line drawn by the Court nor favor abolition of the right to bear arms. There's no internal contradiction in that and no distraction unless you have an attention deficit.

Another dodge, you didn't answer my question.

Same answer. Try a short, clear inquiry. I have no reason to dodge you or your part absent missing it or it being buried in an attempt to communicate that fell short for some reason.

I have no right to commit a malum in se crime, as I've maintained.

No one has a right to commit a crime. For those wondering at the inexplicable introduction of Latin into the mix, he means a thing that is evil in itself, like murder.

You're calling that a restriction, which still doesn't advance your position

What? I'm calling the lack of a right to commit a malumin se crime a restriction? See, this is probably the sort of thing you'd walk away feeling dodged over, but it's just a construction issue.

, because possessing a standard issue military long gun, or even a bunch of them, is not a malum in se crime anyway, and neither is carrying them.

I've never suggested that owning a gun is evil in itself. I haven't suggested that owning a bazooka is evil in itself either.

You're trying to argue that my rights are intrinsically bounded by malum prohibitum crimes

I know that your right of exercise is restricted by law. In this case, I believe we have the right to possess firearms. I believe some firearms and aids we currently possess shouldn't be legal and that if they weren't we could have firearm deaths and injuries much more in line with every other Western democracy. I believe that the trade in human life and destruction isn't justified and that the right had a context that has markedly altered over the years since. I've noted that we no longer need militias and that the weapons in use at that time by soldiers were the same sort men used from necessity, beyond the need to summon an army. See? I didn't need a bit of Latin to make the point.

and that in no way holds any water, since, by analogy, how could someone justly forfeit their right to life over a malum prohibitum crime?

You aren't forfeiting the right to bear arms when you can't bear every arm. And the crime only exists after you fail to meet the obligation of law.

That's rather extreme of you to propose.

There's nothing extreme or convoluted in my position/distinction, which remains one of degree and not kind.

I think the quote is "Give me liberty, or give me death," not, "Give me the compact or give me death."

I believe it's "We, the people," and not, "Me, the person."

There's never been any right to own people

Yes, there has, your recognition notwithstanding. Now you could say that there was a right to own chattel and that what we now recognize as people we confused with chattel for generations, but who would really believe that to be true?

You're not reasonable about this, and every military on earth disagrees with you, and agrees with me, because they outfit their lowest ranks with weapons that you are hellbent against any private citizen ever possessing, or carrying, and they outfit them so, because these weapons are judged by all of them as reasonable for use in self defense, and in defense of the common.

Soldiers are trained and armed to serve. Largely that entails being ready to kill the enemies of their country. That truth is why those countries don't similarly arm and train their firemen, whom are no less valuable and who have as much right to defend themselves, but who aren't charged with the soldier's obligation.

 

[Ktoyou]

I care about all the dots, you care about just the red ones. I haven't used emotionally driven arguments because I don't need to make emotionally driven arguments like you do.

Each dot is homicide from 2016. The red ones from mass homicide incidents.
View attachment 26056


There is no doubt one can eventually pile enough laws/regulations on the people to get them to do any particular thing. But it's a bad way to run a country.


The reason we don't use mass shootings to dictate gun policy is because basing policy on 13 incidents over an 18 year period in another country is too small a sample size.

I agree with what you are saying here. Mass gun killings does not demonstrate a need to make laws on general population gun control. I shows a need to better scrutinize past mental illness.

Where I do see a need for some gun control is the criminal killings, which happen far too often.

What I believe needs to be done is better background checks and tighter control of private gun sales.

We have to meet the liberals to some degree or we may lose our basic rights to bear arms, unless one is a member of a state recognized militia. This is because the best of lawyers see how the Second Amendment might be interpreted such.

 

[Town Heretic]

I agree with what you are saying here. Mass gun killings does not demonstrate a need to make laws on general population gun control. I shows a need to better scrutinize past mental illness.

I'm fine with the mental illness angle, but respectfully disagree that mass shootings, which are killing and injuring thousands each year in this country, shouldn't be sufficient to cause a response at law, even without the additional connection I've noted to the larger problem of gun violence. The right to possess a particular form of firearm that has no particular claim at being more effective as a means of self-defense than it's less broadly lethal cousins set against that death and destruction? What math justifies it?

 

[Ktoyou]

I'm fine with the mental illness angle, but respectfully disagree that mass shootings, which are killing and injuring thousands each year in this country, shouldn't be sufficient to cause a response at law, even without the additional connection I've noted to the larger problem of gun violence. The right to possess a particular form of firearm that has no particular claim at being more effective as a means of self-defense than it's less broadly lethal cousins set against that death and destruction? What math justifies it?

Like I was saying, I am willing to come to the table on this gun issue. My message is to all the younger persons who care to own firearms. I am now 76 years old and really do not care about hunting anymore; that was my husband's big interest, just like football and all sports, yet I am still watching football, I do not really care anymore about guns, as long as I have one wheel-gun for protection, mainly home protection, as I am not out at night, or in dangerous neighbourhoods anymore.

Bear in mind, we had most guns for hunting; I come from a hunting culture and that just isn't the focus today.

I agree on some restrictions, which might offend some of my old friend members; however, if they will not come to the debate table and meet halfway, then they will, eventually, lose more than they will, if they compromise now.

 

[Stripe]

Actually, the Bible does support slavery, just not the variety of it that we cooked up in the West.

Liberals hate finishing sentences.

The Bible supports an institution called slavery, therefore, something... :idunno:

It took a Constitutional Amendment to ... establish the right of a people to be recognized as people.

Nope.

People can be recognized as people regardless of what regulations lawyers invent.

I'll leave that there.

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[Town Heretic]

Liberals hate finishing sentences.

If you spent as much time thinking about the issue as you appear to spend thinking about me you might have something to say on it worth reading. And you might even get a thing right, unlike your offering there.

The Bible supports an institution called slavery, therefore, something...

Like you, I'm not responsible for what you understand, but the thought wasn't incomplete.

People can be recognized as people regardless of what regulations lawyers invent.

That's what Jefferson thought. Well, it's what he wrote at any rate. So once upon a time, in this country, some people could be bought and sold. They were considered chattel. And white men had the legal right to trade in them. And the S. Ct. supported it.

I'll leave that there.

I doubt it.

 

[Town Heretic]

Like I was saying, I am willing to come to the table on this gun issue.

And I believe you. Just setting out a different starting point while noting some agreement.

My message is to all the younger persons who care to own firearms. I am now 76 years old and really do not care about hunting anymore; that was my husband's big interest, just like football and all sports, yet I am still watching football, I do not really care anymore about guns, as long as I have one wheel-gun for protection, mainly home protection, as I am not out at night, or in dangerous neighbourhoods anymore.

Bear in mind, we had most guns for hunting; I come from a hunting culture and that just isn't the focus today.

We come from the same cultural background. I was given my first shotgun, a 410, by my grandfather when I was still a boy. He taught me to track and field dress and to respect both the game I hunted and the gun I used to hunt them. That's how it went where I lived. Fathers and/or grandfathers did that and we learned those things as part of a right of passage.

I agree on some restrictions, which might offend some of my old friend members; however, if they will not come to the debate table and meet halfway, then they will, eventually, lose more than they will, if they compromise now.

I think that's exactly right. Hand on to conversion kits to make automatic weapons and large clips to fire like Rambo and the next generation won't distinguish between the respectful tradition and the worst of it.

 

[Ktoyou]

And I believe you. Just setting out a different starting point while noting some agreement.

We come from the same cultural background. I was given my first shotgun, a 410, by my grandfather when I was still a boy. He taught me to track and field dress and to respect both the game I hunted and the gun I used to hunt them. That's how it went where I lived. Fathers and/or grandfathers did that and we learned those things as part of a right of passage.


I think that's exactly right. Hand on to conversion kits to make automatic weapons and large clips to fire like Rambo and the next generation won't distinguish between the respectful tradition and the worst of it.

OK
I will say this, I was the oldest and my father made me go hunting and shoot rabbits and squirrels. Then I got a 30-30 and went on to hunt deer. My father was a hunter but Bob, my husband, was much more into going out west, after big bears and Elk and we made some trips to Alaska, hunting Dall sheep, Caribou, and to Africa, some serious big game.

They both hunted Dove Pigeon, and other water game like ducks.

My father was just a small town attorney who had a farm; he did not see hunting as a big sport like Bob did.

Neither of those men would have ever owned an assault style rifle. To my father, a 30-30 was good enough, and for Bob we had some very exotic rifles in very large calibres.

 

[Stripe]

You might have something to say on it worth reading.

You haven't responded sensibly to a single thing I've said. :idunno:

The thought wasn't incomplete.

We know. :idunno:

That's what Jefferson thought.

Who?

I asked you.

You think owning people was a right.

Presumably you also think murdering babies is a right.

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