681–690 of 1001 posts
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Yeah, I cannot fathom the carnage and full blown civil war in Northwestern China if Uighers had guns.
Or maybe nothing would have happened because the CCP would have chosen not to use concentration camps on an armed population.
i live in the american south, where everybody owns guns. i own a gun for hunting. but for self defense, i have pepper spray and bear spray instead of guns because i don't want to kill somebody regardless of their intentions. i'd be curious to see the stats of self-defense/firearms, because it seems like self-defense gun owners are LARPing over imagined intruder situations. they're definitely not about to take up arms…
It sounds like lower estimates indicate about 55 000 - 80 000 uses of self defense with a gun per year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_gun_use But it sounds like it really varies source to source. The problem is that a lot of the time it is just an estimate. Not all self-defense uses of a gun are reported as often someone doing a criminal action is not going to self-report it. And the person with the gun may…
That changes the calculus even more.
[1] https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/firearms/fastfact.htm...
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For decades I have lived deep in the heart of some of the densest cities in the country (SF and NYC). These are places with serious and obvious crime problems that I have seen up close and personal, day in and day out. Yet to me, despite these experiences, the entire concept of "personal security needs" involving firearms is absolutely absurd. It sounds like a Monty Python sketch. Silly to the point of absurdity. But…
You live somewhere with strict gun laws, and in your own words, serious and obvious crime problems. You think the people living in much safer places have a viewpoint that’s “silly to the point of absurdity”. Yet, they’re the ones living somewhere with much lower crime and murder rates. How is this an argument for the efficacy of your preferred policies?
For those focused on the theoretical inability of the American populace to fight their government with small arms, I present the Taliban. They just won a 20 year war against the US government with Kalashnikovs. Perhaps the Vietcong were on to something?
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>terrorist attack on January 6th Are you seriously comparing what happened on January 6th to 9/11? How about the Oklahoma City bombing? Lockerbie bombing? Get some perspective dude.
Yes, whenever people storm the Capital, calling for the VP's head - that's totally not a big deal. Maybe in the 3rd world that's just another Wednesday, but in the U.S. it was a very big fucking deal.
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> But the U.S. murder rate is not all that remarkable, really The US is at 4.96/100,000 for 2012. For reference, Angola is better at 4.85. Bulgaria and Romania, the poorest countries in the EU, are at 1.3. France is at 1.2. If by not remarkable you mean 3 as bad as other developed countries, sure. The numbers are only for intentional homicide, not even counting accidents and suicides which are also made worse by the…
Agreed with all of the above, but it addition, isn’t it obvious gun owners in the United States are much more likely to support any likely authoritarian government? They are mostly right wing, and the right wing in the US increasingly leans authoritarian.
No, it isn't.
> They are mostly right wing, and the right wing in the US increasingly leans authoritarian.
No, it doesn't.
i live in the american south, where everybody owns guns. i own a gun for hunting. but for self defense, i have pepper spray and bear spray instead of guns because i don't want to kill somebody regardless of their intentions. i'd be curious to see the stats of self-defense/firearms, because it seems like self-defense gun owners are LARPing over imagined intruder situations. they're definitely not about to take up arms…
It shows an astonishing lack of historical awareness to imagine that gun ownership in private hands will be default mobilized "against tyranny" - like tyranny is always going to be some sort of sneering baddies that the public is 95% against. There are obviously some genuine libertarians among gun owners, but there's also a pretty large contingent of authoritarian right wingers (or people who are libertarian only in respect to their own freedoms).
A friend of our family recently bought a gun and that made me ask them why. Their response was of course personal safety at which point I asked them some more questions and turns out they keep the gun in a gun safe and bullets in another location so as to not cause any accidents as they have kids. But this practice seemed utterly useless if their home was being actively being robbed/attacked since they wont have the…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For decades I have lived deep in the heart of some of the densest cities in the country (SF and NYC). These are places with serious and obvious crime problems that I have seen up close and personal, day in and day out. Yet to me, despite these experiences, the entire concept of "personal security needs" involving firearms is absolutely absurd. It sounds like a Monty Python sketch. Silly to the point of absurdity. But…
> Even though they mostly live in vastly, vastly safer zip codes. Do they though? Not sure where you got this information from. And are we talking legal gun ownership or guns in general? Because even in the "hood" and the "projects" it's quite common for people to be "strapped". Those guns may often not be legal, but they are also still carrying them for self-defense in most cases. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if…
Unless you're suggesting that walking around obviously armed acts as a deterrence, but I'm not sure I buy that either. I think it's equally possible that could draw more attention to you.
(I do agree, though, that the parent seems to have some weird ideas as to what is and isn't safe, and what guns may or may not protect someone from.)
There's something admirable about the idea that a government would not take away all the guns. The idea that people should not have to give up all of their ability to fight. The idea that people should not be entirely dependent on police for their defense. And the idea that physically weaker people (often women) can defend themselves against the strong. Does this idea work? Surprisingly well. If you had to guess the…
> But the U.S. murder rate is not all that remarkable, really The US is at 4.96/100,000 for 2012. For reference, Angola is better at 4.85. Bulgaria and Romania, the poorest countries in the EU, are at 1.3. France is at 1.2. If by not remarkable you mean 3 as bad as other developed countries, sure. The numbers are only for intentional homicide, not even counting accidents and suicides which are also made worse by the…