Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

motherjones.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–239 of 239 posts

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#231

Post by mikeash »

Cushman wrote: post #223
mikeash wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was posted elsewhere that the gun, while legal to manufacture and possess, is illegal to transfer to another person in any way. Given that, destroying it is perfectly reasonable if he didn't feel like owning a homemade AK-47 forever.

That's a good point, but it's not completely true as stated. It is illegal to manufacture a firearm for sale or transfer without an FFL (a Federal license). However if I'm reading this[0] right it is probably not illegal to manufacture a firearm for personal use, and later sell or transfer it to another individual. It would need to be a legal sale under CA law, meaning I guess it would need to be serialized and regis…

I think your example of book burning is the most interesting bit here.

Book burning used to be seriously reprehensible, because it was a potentially effective way to destroy or deny information. If you were burning Bibles in the 14th century or whatever, you were making it vastly harder for locals to find out what was in a Bible. A successful book-burning program could seriously alter the information available.

Today, though, book-burning is pointless except in some rare cases. It's definitely pointless to burn Bibles or anything else that exists in multiple copies. Yet we still find it to be reprehensible. Why?

I think part of it is just history. We remember that it used to be really awful, and we're slow to catch up.

But part of it is the symbolism. We know that it's not really destroying information or impacting anyone's access to it. But that's still the intent. By burning books, you're declaring that you want to deny people this information, even if you can't. Well, sometimes you are. Other times you're just disposing of paper and ink to no ill effect. It can be hard to tell them apart.

I think the AK-47 here is much like burning a widely available book. There are tons of AK-47s out there, so destroying one won't impact its availability in any meaningful way. It ultimately does nothing to destroy one. On the other hand, it may be symbolic, saying that you want to deny people to these guns, even if you can't. Or maybe it's just pragmatic. Hard to tell exactly which one applies here.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#232

Post by mikeash »

Cushman wrote: post #225
mikeash wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went back to double-check the article to make sure I hadn't missed some important piece, because I didn't recall any such implication that any of this was related to gun violence. I still couldn't find anything that implied such. So no, I don't find it misleading. I personally find the article to be very narrow and factual. It seems to go out of its way to refrain from implying much of anything , and just tells the…

If you disagree with this: > I think someone who didn't know a lot about the facts could easily read TFA and come away with the idea that there exists some connection between our gun violence problem and some or all of rifles, military rifles, AK-47s, kit-build rifles, bump-fire stocks, build parties, or armslist.com. ...then we likely don't have much to discuss. I agree that the article doesn't imply much of anythin…

Let me make sure I understand this properly. You're coming right out and saying that you object to factual, unbiased reporting because it doesn't go out of its way to make the implications that you personally feel it should, to advance your agenda?

If that's correct, then you're right, we don't have much to discuss. I cannot even remotely fathom that attitude.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#233

Post by mikeash »

hga wrote: post #210
mikeash wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, but given that public health is so important, fixing it would seem to be a top priority. If what you say is true, then the situation is far worse than just "some biased people use taxpayer money to criticize gun ownership", and I'm certainly not going to admire anybody who simply defunded one small portion of it to protect their pet issue while ignoring the rest.

You sound as unhappy as the fund raisers for Republican politicians have been since Newtown when I tell them I'm completely tapped out for political money this year, call me back next year....

Heh. You and I clearly have different approaches to politics. Anyone calls me asking for money gets hung up on. I never give money to politicians, because that's insane. The money would go to far better use if I give it to that homeless guy who spends it on crack cocaine.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#234

Post by hga »

mikeash wrote: post #233
hga wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound as unhappy as the fund raisers for Republican politicians have been since Newtown when I tell them I'm completely tapped out for political money this year, call me back next year....

Heh. You and I clearly have different approaches to politics. Anyone calls me asking for money gets hung up on. I never give money to politicians, because that's insane. The money would go to far better use if I give it to that homeless guy who spends it on crack cocaine.

Well, my approach to politics is in no particular order learning the issues and people, advocating for or against the former, donating money where I think it will do good, sometimes volunteering time, and of course voting. All of them have paid off enough times that I see no reason not to continue, and they hardly strike me as insane.

WRT to donations, I made 5 sets of political donations in the last year or so, and 3 of the 5 were "successful" in that the politician or cause succeeded, and in the case of the politicians they're doing exactly what I want ... aside from asking me for more money this calendar year ^_^.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#235

Post by mikeash »

hga wrote: post #234
mikeash wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh. You and I clearly have different approaches to politics. Anyone calls me asking for money gets hung up on. I never give money to politicians, because that's insane. The money would go to far better use if I give it to that homeless guy who spends it on crack cocaine.

Well, my approach to politics is in no particular order learning the issues and people, advocating for or against the former, donating money where I think it will do good, sometimes volunteering time, and of course voting. All of them have paid off enough times that I see no reason not to continue, and they hardly strike me as insane. WRT to donations, I made 5 sets of political donations in the last year or so, and…

Where are you finding these worthy politicians? I've never seen one who was both worth supporting and had any chance of winning. I can't tell if I'm just really picky, in a bad area, not paying attention, or what.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#236

Post by hga »

mikeash wrote: post #235
hga wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, my approach to politics is in no particular order learning the issues and people, advocating for or against the former, donating money where I think it will do good, sometimes volunteering time, and of course voting. All of them have paid off enough times that I see no reason not to continue, and they hardly strike me as insane. WRT to donations, I made 5 sets of political donations in the last year or so, and…

Where are you finding these worthy politicians? I've never seen one who was both worth supporting and had any chance of winning. I can't tell if I'm just really picky, in a bad area, not paying attention, or what.

As for the donations, none of them are local. On the other hand, I now live in an area where the politicians are in general aligned with my positions. And then there are cases where one must absolutely be fired, and the people largely agree: https://www.google.com/search?q=rita+hunter+jasper+county

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#237

Post by ricardobeat »

MChristopherson wrote: post #222
ricardobeat wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A rifle with a detachable magazine. Are you intent on arguing that the most used assault rifle in the world is not an assault rifle? I'm not really into this kind of word play.

Was genuinely curious. The term kind of took over in the last couple decades, but I've come to realize that it's a very vague term, with not a lot of actual agreement as to what it means. To be quite honest, I've never been quite clear what the term means. For example, you mention the AK-47. I consider it to be a fully automatic, with selective fire, machine gun. You hold down the trigger, and the gun rapid fires unt…

Those are hunting rifles. Forget the 'assault' part or whatever, an AK47 is not something a civilian should have at home.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#238

Post by waps »

jorkro wrote: post #226
waps wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Above the united states in that rank (and by a LOT) is most of Europe. France, Belgium, Austria, most of Eastern Europe (and the Netherlands if you were to add "self" chosen euthanasia to suicide figures, bringing it up to over 20. Self between brackets since it's often not a choice, as medical treatments are stopped for elderly people in Holland, making euthanasia the only treatment that can offer hope to alleviate…

Being from The Netherlands myself, this is simply not true. Euthanasia is something that both the patient (and if the patient is no longer capable of deciding for himself, his family) and the doctor have to agree on. Stopping treatment or prescribing drugs that will shorten the patient's life is also being done in the US, so if you want to inflate the suicide numbers, you have to do it for all.

How can a patient -aside from a coma- EVER be incapable of deciding for himself ? Yet most often family decides ... For family, what you neglect to mention is that say "no, don't euthanize" often has a very high (monthly) cost (for the home + treatment), whereas euthanasia is free. And what happens when they say no, but don't pay ? All treatment, including very basic treatment like dialysis is stopped, leading to painful deaths.

Don't they have health insurance ? Well, yes, but the Dutch government unilaterally changed the terms of national health insurance to no longer cover any treatment that isn't likely to "significantly" extend life, on average, and measured in percentage (and not for a particular patient). Of course significantly extending life is measured as a percentage, and if you're 80 ... Basic cheap treatment like dialysis is stopped at ~69 years old. And while it is true that it's unlikely to extend a patient's life by 10% from that point, stopping that treatment will be fatal in ~48 hours in some cases, and it'll be a painful death.

Re: I Built This AK-47. It's Legal and Totally Untraceable

#239

Post by lifeguard »

hga wrote: post #145
lifeguard wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Talk is cheap. I never see gun nuts do anything promoting civil rights. EDIT: I did once meet a militia member at a non-gun civil rights event.

I guess you don't realize that we believe the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is a civil right? And in our view, no right is under greater attack than it (even after all the IRS abuse that has recently come to light)? And that therefore we're rather busy protecting it from people like you? And we're most certainly interested in other civil rights, ranging from freedom of speech ( Citizens United , McCain hates us with a…

I only hear you talk about ONE civil right, ignoring all the others. I think conflating guns and the right to a regulated militia, in the context of ignoring all other civil rights, indicates some other motivation. A motivation not influenced by rational thought.

Start standing up for porn, flag burning, video games, and pastafarians and I might take you for some one serious about civil rights. Liberty is not about being able to do the things you like, it is much bigger.

If you do stand up for the other civil right, thanks! But I see no evidence in tone or content of this.

Post reply on HN