Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds • Hacker News Board

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#951

Post by brodouevencode » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 2:27 PM UTC

bitwize wrote: post #309

brodouevencode wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole argument that small arms are of no comparison to tanks and nuclear weapons are made by people who have no experience with firearms, fire fight and perimeter and assault tactics, or any type of military strategy. To even get to this point you would have to assume that the US would devolve into a civil war, in which you can also safely assume that many in the US military would be defectors (leaving a lot of e…

> To even get to this point you would have to assume that the US would devolve into a civil war, in which you can also safely assume that many in the US military would be defectors (leaving a lot of empty tanks and airplanes, if not turned to the "other" side). I hear this a lot from the right, and I think it's hogwash. The Biden administration has already begun ideological screening of military personnel. If the gov…

This notion is a meme for good reason.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#952

Post by leetcrew » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 2:38 PM UTC

jacobkg wrote: post #775

Bhilai wrote: post #279

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…

Is it a handgun? My understanding is that the best firearm for home defense is a shotgun because it has high stopping power, doesn’t require as much accuracy, and is less likely to penetrate walls. Therefore I don’t particularly take people seriously if their home defense choice is a handgun

shotguns do have more stopping power than your average handgun, but your other points are not really true. even with no choke, the spread from a shotgun at home defense ranges is negligible. you still have to point it directly at the target, though this is a bit easier with a longer firearm. ammo you would choose for defense against humans (ie, buckshot) will easily penetrate one or more walls in a typical dwelling.

the short barrel and relatively low power of a handgun does make it an inherently compromised platform. but the short barrel does have one big advantage: it is much harder for an adversary to take control of the weapon at close range. soldiers sometimes transition to their pistol when clearing structures for this reason, although this is less common now with short-barreled rifles.

but at the end of the day, the "best firearm for home defense" is the one you know how to operate and feel most comfortable using. if they train frequently, you should absolutely take them seriously.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#953

Post by NoImmatureAdHom » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 2:42 PM UTC

tonyarkles wrote: post #760

sillysaurusx wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I winced when you started the comparison with Brazil and Mexico. Those countries may be New World, but anybody who's visited Mexico knows not to go random places alone. In other words, if Brazil and Mexico are our points of comparison, we're... not in a situation I'd want to be in, to put it diplomatically. Reddit's running joke is that every gunfight happened in Brazil. In fact, I often wonder if most of the gunfigh…

> but anybody who's visited Mexico knows not to go random places alone Canadian here... isn't that true in most of the highly-populated areas in the US as well? And, to be honest, some parts of Canada as well; I definitely know a neighbourhood not to far from where I live where I'm highly unlikely to walk in the dark.

It's going to be true almost everywhere (not Japan? Switzerland?)

The real question is to what extent is it true? I think stumbling into such a place at night in the U.S. would be quite hard, Canada even harder. In Mexico, my feeling is you really ought to plan. You can't just drive from Point A to Point B across the country at night, whereas in the rest of North America you sure can.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#954

Post by kodah » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:05 PM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #657

gorwell wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"they're definitely not about to take up arms against the state, and if they think they would do that, then they're certainly LARPing and live in a fantasy world." Didn't the Taliban prove otherwise? That would suggest an armed citizenship can be a counter to tyranny.

I think these are two pretty different situations. If civilian gun owners in the US tried to overthrow the US government, the US military would crush them in a heartbeat. Hell, with the level of militarization of many local police departments in the US, it might not even take the US military. You can't really compare that to a reluctant, unpopular war fought in someone else's territory. The US was never going to comm…

> If civilian gun owners in the US tried to overthrow the US government, the US military would crush them in a heartbeat. Hell, with the level of militarization of many local police departments in the US, it might not even take the US military.

The US military you know is not allowed, by law, to fight civilians. Only the national guard can, and that'll be quite hit and miss. The national guard is also under state control. The military would likely disolve and fight for both sides of civil conflict.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#955

Post by Zababa » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:19 PM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #781

Zababa wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anyone who ever had a fire at their home, but I know a few people that were attacked on the street. Anecdotes are just that, anecdotes.

I've never had a fire in my home, but I have been attacked in the street. If I had been armed, I expect it would have gone a lot worse for me than it did. I might not be alive to write this post had I had a gun on me then. As you say, though, just another anecdote.

I think it's also important to highlight like you did that guns don't solve all problems and that with them you can end up in an even worse situation. Just like some people get killed by seatbelts in a way.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#956

Post by wittycardio » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:31 PM UTC

betwixthewires wrote: post #868

wittycardio wrote: post #838

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn't defeat the us military lol , there was just no political will to continue a war on the other side of the world with no real value to the American establishment. But in your scenario where the American establishment goes rogue and decides to launch a punitive campaign against its own population that won't be a problem

What exactly do you mean by political will? The US fought a war of attrition for 20 years and finally withdrew, their enemy being in a better position than before the invasion. You wouldn't call that a defeat? Why exactly do you think that a better armed and much larger force, one that is the economic backing of the military they'd be facing, would stand less of a chance?

Politicians ran on the promise of getting the troops out of Afghanistan. They chose to leave , the Taliban didn't force them to. You're imagining a situation where the government is choosing to bully the population into submission. There are tools far more powerful than guns that they have at their disposal. Cutting off food / water / electricity / internet is a far easier way to threaten a population than attack them with guns. Likewise the real complex work of standing up to authoritarianism requires organization , thought and planning more so than just guns. Your idea of a militia standing up to a government is essentially historical cosplay.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#957

Post by orangepurple » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:36 PM UTC

_carbyau_ wrote: post #825

orangepurple wrote: post #777

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A firearm used for self defense needs to provide a balance of bullet energy transfer (correlated with threat cessation effectiveness), ease of use, ability to make attempts to fire on target successfully given extreme stress, little or no notice to prepare, and operating while thoroughly disoriented due to surprise. Bullets which do not halt upon impact with the body but go through it with minimal damage do not stop…

Thank you for the detailed response. I guess my dreamed up scenarios were more vague "shooter/assailant in the area" whereby I figured I'd want to "make myself less desirable to bother with while I exit the area". Hence small caliber, lots of noise/attempts and if - god forbid - anything connected it would still hurt/slow them. I never really contemplated a "someone intent on killing you" scenario. It isn't something…

In general most people simply won't ever encounter that scenario. There are parts of the US where the people who commit crimes against you won't think twice about "eliminating eyewitnesses," especially if they are a protected class with favorable treatment by the judiciary in their particular jurisdiction. Court systems vary immensely around the US in prosecutory discretion and rulings. For this reason it is more acceptable to defend yourself with firearms when in Texas than in the Northeast.

Additionally, 9-1-1 simply does not work in many parts of the country. In rural areas, response times are on the order of half an hour or longer. In cities like Washington D.C., 9-1-1 can take FIVE MINUTES to pick up the phone. I could not believe it until I needed to use it. I was put on hold by 9-1-1, LOL. I was able to run away from the threat and hide in that case. I was attacked unprovoked near a dark wooded area while walking down the street. I got lucky then. The stories about Rock Creek Park disappearances are true.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#958

Post by Zak » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:42 PM UTC

sharklazer wrote: post #87

ryandvm wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strange take. In 40+ years, I've never needed a gun to defend myself. Nor do I even _know anyone_ that needed to use a gun to lawfully defend themselves. So why should we all have something that A) the lawful uses of such are exceedingly rare, and B) ends up involved in a lot of unlawful or unintentional killings.

1. Most people don’t even understand how a gun mechanically functions. It lives in the realm of magic for most people, despite being mechanically very simple. This base ignorance of the function of a firearm is one of the biggest reasons why firearm-related accidents happen. You might not want a gun, and fine—that’s your stance—but you should know how it works and how to use it. 2. We don’t nuke each other all the ti…

> Also, guns in the US are used nearly a million times a year to prevent violence (CDC, https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/firearms/fastfact.htm...)

I don't see that number on that site. Instead, I see:

> The report Priorities for Research to Reduce the Threat of Firearm-Related Violenceexternal icon indicates a range of 60,000 to 2.5 million defensive gun uses each year.

That's equivalent to saying we have almost no idea how often guns are used defensively.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#959

Post by tablespoon » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 3:49 PM UTC

MagnumOpus wrote: post #921

tablespoon wrote: post #833

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's doubly ironic because of course a large swath of the guns in what is bordering on civil war in Mexico are supplied by the US, made possible through the (lack of) gun ownership regulation. If the cartels can ship large amounts of highly illegal cargo transnationally and setup infrastructure like their own private cellular networks, I think they'd be able to acquire all the guns they need even if the US had stri…

> the cartels "The cartels" is not a single organisation. Yes the largest best-organised gangs could build firearms factories - or more realistically just bribe some soldiers or cops to "lose" a few truckloads of weapons, just like they do with automatic weapons right now. But there is a huge difference in a weapon being available by the dozens to the highest tier of the top 2-3 cartels (like machine guns or rocket l…

You know, if there's a market, the cartels might step in to fill it...just like they have with illegal drugs.

Re: Women are nearly half of new gun buyers, study finds

#960

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Sep 17, 2021, 4:13 PM UTC

grecy wrote: post #517

GiorgioG wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The murder rate varies widely by state/area. Chicago's murder rate is significantly higher than its suburbs. The murder rate in the town (37k residents) I live in (in the south) is effectively zero. I wouldn't doubt that all of my neighbors around me (most of us are originally from a northern state) have guns and we've managed not to kill each other. Do you think the French revolution didn't require violence?

> The murder rate varies widely by state/area Everytime I see this line of reasoning I'm utterly shocked at the lack of understanding. What you said applies equally across any other country too. So France's 1.2 is an average of the entire country. Yes, half of any country is below the average!

[deleted]