Two wrongs don't make a right (the (ir)rationality of revenge) - also gun control

Thank you for cutting to the chase.The issue as I see it is that law-abiding, trained citizens should be allowed to have guns and convicted criminals and mentally deranged citizens should not.The problem with denying access to the criminal & deranged element of society is that it must be done with an inconvenience to the law-abiding sector - we must sacrifice some freedom for a bit of security (I know - deserving neither! ). Using background checks is one way to do it that seems to be the least objectionable, although the maintenance of a national database IS a major danger in the wrong hands. We could have tests similar to driving tests to show proficiency in handling guns. We cannot fall to the level of a Driver's License since driving is a privilege and not a right, but we can borrow from some of the methods developed for screening out bad drivers from driving.The question is: Forgetting the UK & Sweden and Somalia for the moment, what level of screening is acceptable to the USA? What loss of freedom are we willing to accept?So I'll start by saying there should be a criminal background check. There should also be a confidential psychiatric database that is double blind somehow for eliminating the nutjobs like Cho.Gun shows need to completely change their structure. Although I have zero interest in gun shows or even NASCAR, I will begrudgingly admit that they have a right to exist. But they need to be revised to prevent illegal weapon acquisitions.Maybe there should be (in high school?) some kind of training to get a feel for how dangerous firearms are when used improperly. They usually have some kind of huge thing about the dangers of drunk driving. But gun training is really best done with an actual gun, not watching some blood & guts propaganda movie in a class.

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- xongsmith

Well, I agreed with you until I read this: Sounds like you are stereotyping: the only people who like guns, like Nascar. And what I can infer from THAT, is you mean hillbillies/rednecks/farmboys.....country folk. Correct? Unless you have a different correlation between guns and Nascar.......Frankly, if you are so biased, I don't care one iota for your opinion, and don't think YOU deserve to voice it. So what are parents for, then? Edited by hooah212002, : No reason given.Edited by hooah212002, : No reason given.

Switzerland's gun control as compared with the US. I'm not advocating a position. Just trying to clarify things. Indeed - in your opinion. With pleasure: I was simply urging you not to mischaracterise your opponents position by projecting your opinions on the consequences of your opponents policies into statements about their beliefs. Vis: "[holding the] false belief that disallowing citizens to defend themselves will somehow be better for society.". That isn't what they said they believed. They believe that some options for defence create more associated problems than they solve. Not all items on the black market are out of the price range of the average consumer (pirate DVDs can be bought for a handful of cents, for example, drugs for only a few dollars). Nor does the average consumer purchase things in order to sell them for profit. Some people sell on the black market at a below cost (such as selling stolen items).A street dealer can buy drugs from his dealer at a price that you or I could afford, and sell those drugs to consumers to make a small amount of profit - enough to get by with. I doubt it is as simple as that. You might also make those that follow the law for the most part, less likely to kill someone they know in rage or despair. By making guns illegal you might be reducing the need for criminals to carry them in circumstances such as burglary. When you double the prison sentence of a crime if a firearm was carried by the perp' you also provide a deterrent.And that's the rub - there are upsides and downsides. Pretending that one or the other doesn't exist is not going to result in a meeting of minds. You know why.
The argument isn't that items that can kill should be outlawed. It is items that have a certain level of killing ability should be regulated or outlawed.
You agree that this is the case. You just disagree with what level is appropriate. Why must you ask such silly rhetorical questions? (irony intended) The cars argument has been addressed - the positive effects outweighs the negative. Can the same argument clearly be made in favour of firearms? You said that your opponents believed that removing the ability for citizens to defend themselves makes society better. Which is not what your opponents have said is their belief. Indeed, whose business if you have a minigun to protect your private property? Whose business that you have sarin gas? Dynamite, grenades, cluster bombs, nuclear weapons...What you can and cannot possess in your own home is society's business. No - you were making statements about my experience without knowing what my experience was and inferring my opinions on that from that guess about my experiences.

Aw, shucks, i was being intentionally ridiculous - BTW, it's called hyperbole. You can think what you like....and I'll defend to my death your right to think it & speak it & breath it.BUT - to the point - where are your suggestions of how to screen out the idiots that shouldnt have access to guns so they can go kill students at universities or high schools? I gave some suggestions in the spirit of advancing this thread forward instead of getting it fouled up in the barbed wire of accusations.You said you agreed until the gun show stuff. So you like the way they do gun shows now?

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- xongsmith

Sorry, my sarcasm detector is broken as of late. i am trying to get it working right as we speak. They already do background checks. Maybe a written quiz on firearm safety could be instituted before you are able to obtain certification. The weapon would then need to be registered in your name (some states already require registration, if not all), so a responsible owner would be held liable due to ballistics. I have already suggested annual certifications and an annual range time requirement. I see nothing wrong with gun shows.I feel that there is a misconception amongst some of you: you seem to think your average gun-toting Americans buy firearms to kill people. While you don't factor in the hobby aspect of it. it's fun to go out in the middle of no where and shoot shit. be it a can on a fence to test your aim, a target 300 yards away to test your Kentucky windage, or just to shoot. Shooting shit is fun.

Many states do not.When it comes to rifles and shotguns, most states don't require anything but the money to buy them. Here's a link to the gun laws in the USVery few require this, see link above.- OniEdited by onifre, : No reason given.

Really?

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The report shows the two-thirds of gun sales at gun shows are through licensed vendors. The others are sold through unlicensed vendors or private gun show attendees, who do not have to do background checks or file any paperwork. The study state that 85% of recovered crime guns have gone through at least one private party transaction following their initial sale by a licensed retailer.

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Hidden camera pictures in the report show dozens of private party or unlicensed gun purchases where no identification is requested or shown.

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"Illegal transactions were often conducted entirely out in the open," said Garen Wintemute, professor of emergency medicine at UC Davis School of Medicine and a leading researcher on firearm violence who authored the report. "The sense of impunity among sellers and purchasers in these cases was remarkable."

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The study also links gun shows to the neo-Confederacy movement and neo-Nazism.

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"Undocumented private party gun sale transactions account for as many as 40 percent of all gun sales," said Wintemute. "They are quick and convenient, and their anonymity attracts those who put privacy at a premium. These same attributes make private-party gun sales a principal option for a felon or other prohibited person."

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I see plenty wrong with gun shows.ABE: Utter nonsense. You've been watching too much CSI - you can only compare ballistics once you have the bullet and the gun. If you have the bullet and no gun, you have no way to find out who (if anyone) the gun is registered to.Edited by Rahvin, : No reason given.

My foot has been securely placed into my speaking orafice. Thank you.Let me rephrase then: there SHOULD be a registration requirement and they SHOULD do background checks.

Join the cause, dude. That's what gun control advocates are seeking in the US. Not the removal of guns or any Amendment rights. Just accountability for the weapons and a background check to avoid guns getting into the hands of those who shouldn't posses them.However, the biggest problem is that it has to be ALL states.- Oni

Maybe you should read what Oni has already posted.
Gun Laws in the United States20 years ago I ran a gun store in North Carolina. The laws are the same now as they were then. There is a requirement for a permit to purchase a handgun. There is no registration. The permits are handled by the county sheriffs. Each Sheriff can make his own rules for issuing a permit.
From link above.

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Because there are 100 different county sheriffs in North Carolina, there are different sets of rules and requirements for obtaining such a permit, which can be determined arbitrarily by the local sheriff.

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I had some customers that would buy 2-3 handguns a month. I am quite sure they did not keep them all.As a matter of fact I did not read the laws of all states, but I do not know any states that require registration. I am sure there are some but I am not familiar with them.Minnesota and Wisconsin do not. I know Massachusetts requires firearms owners to be licensed but I do not know if the firearms have to be registered.OK spent sometime looking, CT and NY require handgun registration. Maybe I missed some, but it isn't very many at all.ABE - Sorry did not mean to "pile on". I was researching some and I see ONI posted similar info while I was composing.Edited by Theodoric, : No reason given.

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Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts

Really? Then each and every self-defence situation that has ever happened or will happen is 'Cowboy vigilante justice', according to your reasoning.Someone attacks you and you punch them? oohhh...Cowboy vigilante justice there.
You see two guys raping a girl and you hit them with a crowbar?....careful now cowboy!
Someone runs at you with a knife and you stab them? You're being judge, jury and executioner.What a messed up world that would be, eh? What a load of bollocks. First of, *NO* crime in European countries and most US states is punishable by death, so that means that any situation where the victim kills their attacker is an 'over-reaction' according to you. Second, your eagerness to find the victim guilty of the thought crime of 'giving a death-sentence' whereas they are likely to be most concerned with saving their own life, is frankly sinister and terrifying.Based on this *perverse* reasoning I hope you never encounter the type of person who will cut your face until you give them your credit card PIN number while his mate sodomises your son. If you're tempted to use violence against them just remind yourself that the judicial sentence for torture and rape doesn't involve any Actual Bodily Harm. Your willingness to inflict pain or injury on them wouldn't match the sentence for the crime so you'd just be over-reacting. Right?I hope -for your sake- that this is just a temporary mental blur in the line dividing sanctimonious morality and the way you actually lead your life. Just lucky I guess. I've had three incidents involving myself and many more where I directly witnessed violence inflicted on others Physically: only a broken nose, cracked ribs and a broken finger. That was just luck, I could have just as easily been killed.
Mentally: I've suffered panic attacks, insomnia and ultimately the break up of my relationship to my girlfriend at the time. On two occasions, I had ample opportunity to shoot the attackers. If only I had had a gun. No I won't. If you seriously believe that there are any of Israel's neighbours who haven't been varyingly hostile towards it then I suggest you catch up on your history and geography classes. This isn't the place for pointing out historical facts. Irrelevant. It's a large Lebanese paramilitary group who have vowed to destroy Israel. Yes, because as much as they've tried they've failed to militarily defeat Israel. Irrelevant. They've repeatedly tried to destroy it and failed. Irrelevant. This isn't about how Israel can make friends or not, this is about how Israel has managed to survive that long surrounded by hostile neighbours: by the value of it's armed deterrent. I refuse to discuss this further because:
1) This thread isn't about Israel.
2) I'm unwilling to spend time and energy pointing out obvious, self-evident and universally accepted historical and political facts. Just as I would be unwilling to provide you with evidence that Great Britain is an island, or that the Holocaust really happened. Go look it up yourself. This is quite ironic given that the Arabs are only considering peace talks after having repeatedly failed to destroy Israel, due to the strength of its armed forces.It becomes even more ironic looking at Northern ireland: the only reason the NI peace process came to be was that both sides had enough after 30 years of armed struggle. Yes, it was the guns of the IRA that ensured that the British couldn't easily assimilate NI into the Union and it was the guns of the British forces that ensured that the Nationalists couldn't 'liberate' NI.Does this show that guns solve problems? No it doesn't, but this was never the supposition on this thread anyway. What it *does show* is that armed deterrence ensures that one's rights and liberties are not trampled by others.It works on an international level and it can work on a domestic one too!

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"We must respect the law, not let it blind us away from the basic principles of fairness, justice and freedom"

Hi Legend, Where we see that the devil can cite statistics to support his position, when you don't care about the validity of the statistics. Which has not been demonstrated.Which also would mean ignoring the evidence that shows that poverty is a major cause of crime: poverty, disenfranchisement, marginalization, discrimination and exclusionary policies turn people into anti-social behavior because they are rejected by the society. Then the strong relationship of crime to poverty is what the evidence shows, and no real correlation with crime and "armed deterrence" exists. Really? Curious, then that the proportion of violent crimes - as measured by assaults (whether involving guns or not) per 100 people - in the US, in Canada and in the UK are about the same, as noted way back in Message 57: (color for emphasis)This shows that the use of "armed deterrence" in the US has virtually no effect on the rate of assaults - for countries you agree are comparable on social grounds such that the effect of other factors (such as poverty) are minimized.Curious, then that the proportion of murders - the assaults that result in death - is much higher in the US than in either Canada or the UK (from Message 57 again): Assault is ~3x's more likely to result in death in the US than in Canada or the UK. Obviously the "armed deterrence" factor you wish to embrace is not functioning here.Curious, then that the proportion of murders - the assaults that result in death - involving firearms is ALSO much higher in the US than in either Canada or the UK (from Message 57 again): Assault with a firearm is ~5x's more likely to result in death in the US than in Canada and ~28x's more likely to result in death in the US than in the UK. Obviously the "armed deterrence" factor you wish to embrace is not functioning here either.Why would you want to import a system that results in more deaths per capita from the US to the UK? Shouldn't we be going the other direction?Or is your rational NOT based on the overall social good, but on your personal wish to render vengeance? Perhaps then we should just use the ones above?

• Overall assault numbers the same - no effect of "armed deterrence" demonstrated;
• Assault resulting in death (murders) higher in the US than in Canada or the UK - an inverse correlation to "armed deterrence" in the prevention of assaults; and finally
• Assaults with firearms resulting in death MUCH higher in the US than in Canada or the UK - an even greater inverse relationship to "armed deterrence" in the prevention of assaults.

The question comes down to whether you are willing to accept the status quo of assaults with low mortality in countries with strong gun control laws, or whether you want to escalate the arms race between assaulter and assaultee so that the proportion of assaults resulting in death is higher.Assaults are a measure of the result of interactions of people. Burglaries, which would include incidents when nobody is home, and thus no opportunity to evaluate the benefit of gun ownership is provided, does not give an accurate measure of the effect of gun ownership on the interactions of people. In addition, burglaries are demonstrably reduced more by improved security systems than by "armed deterrence" - so guns are not the solution here either.Perhaps, if you think of this in evolutionary terms, you can see that arming one group causes the other to counter with more armament for their protection. Increasing armament will not reduce assaults, it will result in a higher proportion of assaults with severe bodily harm and death.Solving the social problems that lead to assaults and burglaries is the ONLY way to reduce the occurrence of assaults and burglaries.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.

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• • • Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click) • • •

Leaping from fallacy to fallacy Legend? Nope. Preemptively shooting someone when you are not in imminent bodily danger is. Killing someone to protect your CD's is. Every situation where the punishment you would like to inflict exceeds the punishment dictated by a court of law after due process is an over-reaction. Killing someone over a petty crime is an over-reaction. So now we are down from "at least a dozen" to three. So you got beat up instead of shot. Good thing they did not have access to guns eh? So says the person claiming to NOT want to use cowboy vigilante justice ... Or they you, if THEY had a gun. You want to make it easier for anyone to have a gun? Making guns easier to get just raises the level of arms on both sides and increases the likelihood that YOU are shot. So you can't even name one off the top of your head? I'll take that as an example of confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance in action: refusal to look at the evidence that MIGHT prove you wrong. Curiously, the relevance escapes you because you don't want to see the obvious: Israel's continued policy fuels the hostility, generation after generation after generation. It is even more ironic that after 60 years of absolute failure to beat the Arabs into submission, that Israel is considering peace talks in spite of the strength of its armed forces. This is because, like the hydra of greek mythology, every time a head was cut off another one took its place - generated by the act of cutting the head off. So then they FINALLY looked for AND FOUND a different solution. One that in the space of a FEW YEARS accomplished MORE than 30 years of fighting. So what do you think about Israels continued trampling of the rights and liberties of the Arabs? Do you think that is justification for the arabs to fight back by whatever means possible?Has Israels policy ensured the rights and liberties of the arabs?Do you think a solution that recognizes the rights and liberties of ALL the people involved would work better than continued warring and blasting away at each other?No, armed deterrence does NOT ensure that one's rights and liberties are not trampled by others, it ensures that the arms race will escalate until a different solution is tried.Consider instead the liberation of India from the English oppressors. There was a lot of fighting and bloodshed, but one man won the battle to have the rights and liberties of the Indian people, without using a single gun.Mahatma Gandhi - Wikipedia

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Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (Gujarati: મોહનદાસ કરમચંદ ગાંધી, pronounced [moːɦənˈdaːs kəɾəmˈtʂənd ˈɡaːndʱiː] ( listen); 2 October 1869 — 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and spiritual leader of India during the Indian independence movement. He was the pioneer of satyagraharesistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience, firmly founded upon ahimsa or total non-violencewhich led India to independence and has inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. Gandhi is commonly known around the world as Mahatma Gandhi (Sanskrit: महात्मा mahātmā or 'Great Soul', an honorific first applied to him by Rabindranath Tagore),[1] and in India also as Bapu (Gujarati: બાપુ bāpu or 'Father'). He is officially honoured in India as the Father of the Nation; his birthday, 2 October, is commemorated there as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday, and worldwide as the International Day of Non-Violence.

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Did you know that Gandhi was inspired by Henry David Thoreau? That both of them inspired Dr Martin Luther King? That the civil rights movement to have the rights and liberties of black Americans was WON by non-violent means in spite of the use of guns by the opposition?Does this show that guns solve problems? Nope. Does this show that guns force people to recognize the rights and liberties of others? Nope. It shows that people solve problems when they put away the guns and confront the problem.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.

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• • • Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click) • • •

Hello razd The Middle East crisis is pretty complicated, but here are a few of the nations that have been hostile to Israel;Iraq
Jordan (not anymore officially)
Syria
Egypt
Iran (I'm not sure if they ever fought Israel, but they are not kissing cousins)
Saudi Arabia.
LebanonI belive Turkey is fairly friendly with Israel, having a military alliance nowadays. That's a neighbor that's not so hostile. Morocco recognizes Israel diplomatically, but they are a long distance away from Israel. America's nuclear deterrent kept us from the threat of a Soviet invasion. If we had an exchange, we would still die, but we would have died free, not in chains."Better to die on your feet that live on your knees."
Emilio Zapata, Mexican freedom fighterDoes an armed deterrent always work? No, but it has worked in the past;American Revolution
Texas Revolution
Civil War
World war 2.However the issue of guns used as deterrents for crooks is likewise complicated. A gun is a good deterrent but it wont stop everyone from trying to break into a home, just as the death penalty will not stop all from killing another human being. Its human nature to take risks and act stupid. However i'd rather have some form of home defene for when the stray guy tries to break into my house. You dont have to have a gun to defend yourself (i mentioned a few other ways in my last post on this thread), but you should consider home defense, just in case.

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"The Nephilim where in the Earth in those days..." Genesis 6:4

Has anyone else ever mentioned to you that your posts are too long and is often redundant? The comparison is made to show the backlash that would occur and otherwise futile attempt should gun rights be severely diminished.This isn't a segue into the War on Drugs. In theory one might expect this. However, the reality is often the inverse.How do you explain why gun violence decreased when the SCOTUS shot down the unconstitutional ban in Washington D.C. or why Australia's gun rate versus homicide increased when they disarmed their citizens? Then it would behoove the federal authorities, spearheaded by the ATF in particular, to crack down on illegal arms sales. That still does nothing to overshadow the basic premise of the Bill of Rights. You still are missing the gigantic elephant sitting in the room. To purchase a handgun, one must first pass a criminal backround check, the serial number is documented to the owner/purchaser of the weapon, etc. The barrels of handguns are so unique with their lands and grooves that the forensic evidence left behind on a bullet is as damning as any biophysical evidence (semen, fingerprints, blood, etc).In fact, ways to circumvent this is through shotguns (sawed-off shotguns in particular) which you seem to think is fine for sporting reasons. They leave no discernable way to trace the weapon of origin in a homicide quite the same way as with a handgun.Many criminals are quite aware of how easy it is to be caught now or days with the forensic sciences so advanced. It would be suicide to buy a serialized handgun in your name and murder somebody with it.So what does that mean? That means the people who do purchase weapons used in homicides most often buy off the black market, which is exactly what the laws you promote don't do anything against.Again, your laws only hurt the average consummer who is by all accounts a law-abiding, responsible gun owner. You keep bringing up firearm homicides, most of which are committed by common street criminals who don't purchase weapons in stores 1. because they can't pass a background check, 2. they are aware of how a fiream can lead back to them even supposing they could.So, much like criminals in other nations they do resort to imported weapons already, in which case, again, you affect law-abiding, responsible gun owners and NOT the criminals. Agreed. Fear on the side of gun owners who risk having their rights stripped from them, and fear on the side of gun control advocates of even seeing a gun. Exactly my point a few pages ago... By your rationale we should stop driving vehicles because they're so darn dangerous. That really is of little consolation to the victims and their families, now isn't it? Immaterial. What kind of odds was it that a plane would have been hijacked and flown in to important nationally symbolic buildings? Maybe 1 in a googleplex? but hey, it happened. However, unlikely you think it is, again, doesn't overshadow the fact that not only does it happen, but it is also a right in the United States that shall not be infringed upon.According to you, you were burgled. So much for the game of odds to minimize the situation. Besides, you're further undermining your own premise by saying that it's all so unlikely. If it's just all so unlikely then why are you so concerned with gun violence? WTF? Look if you want to cower in a corner somewhere, that's on you. But don't take away my right to defend my home in the legal manner I see fitting. That's all I'm saying. You don't want guns, don't buy any. But I'm afforded that right and would like to continue enjoying a simple, personal freedom. Depending on the subject's actions, it very well could be for the simple fact that you have no way of knowing whether or not the intruder is there to rob you, rape you, torture you, or kill you. Even if they are there to rob you, you also have no idea what they would resort to in the event that were discovered. A simple B&E could turn in to homicide. It's "irrational" and "exaggerated" to defend yourself in your OWN home?!?! I can't even believe the absurdity of your logic. It's time to stop the tea party and put down the Barbie dolls, Mary, and let your testicles finally descend the way nature intended. Well, then let it be a lesson would-be criminals everywhere. Stay in your own fucking house and you won't run the risk of being shot! I'm scared to hear what your advice to rape victims would be. "Just let him finish what he came here to do!"The rest of the post is just far too long to respond piecemeal. Edited by Hyroglyphx, : No reason given.

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"The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." - Samual Adams