posted
I am against Gun Control. Nobody wants to be controlled.
I am for Gun Safety. Everybody wants to be safe.
There are many gun laws on the local, state, and federal levels, and still there are issues with Gun Violence that are unacceptable.
I have a solution, but I don't think it will be approved by either side in the debate. Seeing as both sides would be against it, I think it may be correct.
1) Remove most gun laws. 2) Confirm in law that the person who fires a gun is 100% culpable for any damage, injury, and/or death that may occur. 3) To cover the possible cost of that culpability every gun owner must carry Gun Insurance. To use or fire a gun without insurance is a 3 year jail term for the 1st offense, and more for repeated offenses. (Guardians of minors who shoot without insurance face the same jail time. Or, those who allow the child to fire the gun face prison.) You are also still culpable for any damage done. 4) Insurance companies are allowed to charge what the market will bear for insurance, and encouraged to offer discounts where they have proof would save them from payouts.
In this way the market will decide how often going to the range, or what training would be the best for limiting collateral damage to gun ownership. The Government, or Gubermint, will have no access to the information on who owns what guns, but someone with a vested interest in making sure those guns are used safely will be able to retain whatever information they need.
Gun locks won't be required, but they will save you $$ on your gun insurance. Bio-locks will limit gun thefts. People on anti-depressants will have difficulty getting weapons as suicides will cost the insurance company.
Further, people accidently shot will have a place to get compensated for the lawful discharge of a weapon.
The only downside, this is an elitists plan. The poor will go un-armed because they won't be able to afford the insurance. I don't know a way around this heavy disadvantage.
Posts: 1941 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote:I am against Gun Control. Nobody wants to be controlled.
to be honest, let me put it this way just as a general thing to consider when talking about this sort of position:
this is like saying 'i am against vehicle operation control. nobody wants to be controlled.'
real answer forever is: "so what?"
it's flat-out irrelevant because any country that doesn't want to be a dysfunctional hellscape of twisted metal will still profoundly regulate and control nearly all aspects of vehicle use.
same thing with guns. same exact thing. nobody wants to be controlled? it's hard to care about that people 'don't want to be controlled' when an odd purity of rights pertaining to guns is pretty directly responsible for our absurdly high rate of gun deaths and mass shootings.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Sam, you need to see the two lines combined.
if we frame the arguments as Gun Control, it will be feared as "The government taking control by taking my gun."
If we take it as "I want gun safety." nobody can argue that they are against gun safety.
Even your argument above proves my point. Nobody has ever said, "We need car control, letting the government control who uses their cars and how they use them."
It has always been about SAFETY--the safety of the driver, the passengers, other drivers, and pedestrians.
We make the left turn from the left turn lane not because the Government is telling us where to go, but because its the safest way to use a vehicle. Similarly we need to have gun users take basic safety classes not to control the user, but to ensure everyone's safety. (And the vast majority of Gun users agree!)
Posts: 1941 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote:If we take it as "I want gun safety." nobody can argue that they are against gun safety.
I find this kind of charmingly naive.
It depends-- what's 'safety?'
I know a lot of gun owners who very strongly advocate for mandatory safety classes. An additional number are strongly against biometric firearm unlock devices.
Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Darth_Mauve: If we take it as "I want gun safety." nobody can argue that they are against gun safety.
They don't. They just repeatedly claim, no matter what evidence contradicts this, that we're safer if we have pretty much no gun laws and if people carry guns with them all the time to keep themselves safe, and that "the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"
in effect redefining 'gun safety' as "GUNS EVERYWHERE, LESS GUN LAWS"
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:.. an odd purity of rights pertaining to guns is pretty directly responsible for our absurdly high rate of gun deaths and mass shootings.
I disagree. The right does not generate the offense.
Before I go further with this particular line, I genuinely want to ask why you don't consider "the right does not generate the offense" to be startlingly irrelevant to what creates our gun problem.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote: I genuinely want to ask why you don't consider "the right does not generate the offense" to be startlingly irrelevant to what creates our gun problem.
You asserted that gun rights are directly responsible for gun violence. I disagree-- I think people are directly responsible for violence. Along the line of responsibility are other things like poverty, desperation, carelessness, poor education, failing social support, etc.
The right to bear arms is WAY down on the list of things that are responsible for gun violence.
(Keep in mind that I don't object-- much-- to laws that regulate gun ownership. I don't have a problem with requiring gun owners to get a permit or license to carry; I don't mind a national database of guns and their owners. I support the 'well-regulated' language of the 2A.)
Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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posted
You're shrugging, but I'm genuinely trying to understand: what makes these classes mandatory in any sense?
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote: I genuinely want to ask why you don't consider "the right does not generate the offense" to be startlingly irrelevant to what creates our gun problem.
You asserted that gun rights are directly responsible for gun violence. I disagree-- I think people are directly responsible for violence. Along the line of responsibility are other things like poverty, desperation, carelessness, poor education, failing social support, etc.
Ok. So if I was a legislator who single-handedly got all the laws against violence and murder removed from the books, what's the worth in saying "well, sam's not directly responsible for the resulting catastrophic explosion in death and strife."
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:if I was a legislator who single-handedly got all the laws against violence and murder removed from the books, what's the worth in saying "well, sam's not directly responsible for the resulting catastrophic explosion in death and strife."
The worth is that when the mob of your relatives comes to burn me at the stake for shooting you in the face, I'll be disinclined to shy away from my responsibility in your death. Knowing that it was my choice, and mine alone, I will face them with a solemn acceptance of my fate.
No bartering. No moaning. No fabrications.
My dignity will inspire your beloved friends and relatives-- even as they murder me-- to reestablish civilization and law in my image.
Thus, I with my martyrdom, will heal the insanity which you tyrannically thrust upon the world.
posted
No gun laws? I'm getting a vehicle mounted, belt fed automatic grenade launcher and a Vulcan mini auttocanon
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Scott R: If you want to purchase a gun from a retail gun shop, it's mandatory you prove you've had training on how to handle a firearm.
It's not really my position, by the way. I don't own a gun.
Prove to whom? The guy who wants to sell you a gun? Do they have to have some sort of certification? Do they have to keep a record of you proving your training?
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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Well, maybe it shouldn't have walked through the bad part of town at night, with no means of self-defense.
quote:The poor will go un-armed because they won't be able to afford the insurance.
Not sure this is true. You are proposing a very nearly free market in insurance; we have no data on that and don't know that the premiums would necessarily be high. Per gun in the US, there are not that many killed per year. That said, it's probably true that most deaths would be from uninsured guns.
quote:offer discounts where they have proof would save them from payouts.
Why require proof? Let them guess, and figure it out by trial and error. Much faster and requires way less administration of what counts as "proof".
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Darth_Mauve: If we take it as "I want gun safety." nobody can argue that they are against gun safety.
They don't. They just repeatedly claim, no matter what evidence contradicts this, that we're safer if we have pretty much no gun laws and if people carry guns with them all the time to keep themselves safe, and that "the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"
in effect redefining 'gun safety' as "GUNS EVERYWHERE, LESS GUN LAWS"
Not to mention redefining "gun regulations" as "they're trying to take away our guns."
Posts: 3735 | Registered: Mar 2002
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