guns 101

[brianm]

In West Virginia the state is considering a bill that would require schools to offer gun safety classes to students as young as 10 years old. By law in West Virginia, you must be at least 10 years old to handle a gun (though, you can't buy a long arm until 18, and you can't buy a handgun until 21).

I'm not in favor of this measure, for the simple reason that if the kids are taught a class in this, and they pass, they may think it's OK for them to handle a firearm even if there are no supervising adults, and one of the very VERY first things my father taught me about guns (when I was a good bit younger than 10) was that I was to NEVER handle any sort of weapon without an adult to supervise (and this included BB guns).

I think gun safety is something EVERYONE should be taught if they are going to have a gun in their home (whether that gun is for protection, hunting, target shooting, or whatever). I also thing the proper venue for this is for the parents to attend a gun safety class WITH their kid (assuming they are not qualified to teach this, my father was a firearms expert as an Army Ranger, so I'm sure he felt qualified to teach us safety himself). Like many other things that are designed to keep kids safe (and for some reason, the distribution of condoms in schools comes to mind) the message can be mixed up and misinterpreted if the parents are not involved in an intimate way.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

[luns101]

Haha, you are really going to provoke a lot of people with this. Most of the people here from Europe already think that owning a firearm is terrible. What you should really do is ask them which is the worst sin possible according to a post-modern/socialistic worldview and have them rank them.

Something like this...What is the worst sin that the United States has committed:

1. Allowing its citizens to own guns
2. Cutting personal income taxes
3. Passing DOMA laws defining marriage as 1 man-1 woman
4. Electing George W. Bush
5. Defending itself against Islamic extremism
6. Not giving illegal immigrants free health care
7. Being patriotic
8. Allowing its citizens to worship Jesus, sometimes praying in public
9. Defeating the Soviet Union during the Cold War
10. Celebrating Columbus Day
11. Saying the Pledge of Allegiance to the American Flag
12. The Boy Scouts
13. Allowing private companies to say Merry Christmas to customers
14. Believing in natural law/natural rights
15. Wal-Mart

I'm betting it will be #4

[suggs]

For fks sake, just ban guns and join the civilized world.

[ignotus]

For fks sake, just ban guns and join the civilized world.

[Grooveman2007]

I think that public, manditory education on gun saftey would serve as a great reminder that guns aren't toys. Way too many kids get into firearms and injure themselves because they are ignorant. It should also be manditory for anyone who buys a gun to take a home firearms saftey class so they know proper ways to store and clean their guns, because it's the fault of the parent if their child gets into their guns. The number one thing I was tought when I became an NRA instructer was that ignorance kills. Nearly every accidental firearm related death is caused by ignorance and a law like that should be inacted in every state. Firearms can be great fun when handled properly, and I strongly belive in my second amendment rights, but I can't stand it when I hear about a child's death because someone didn't know what they were doing.

[brianm]

I have been reading the news coverage of the recent court ruling that has declared that Washington DC's ban on handguns is a direct violation of the second amendment, and it seems that the pundits on both sides have either not read their history books, or they are engaged in obfuscation.

For clarity, this is the EXACT wording, punctuation, and capitalization of the Second Amendment as ratified by the States.

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

You will note that 'militia' is not capitalized (thus, this is not as the liberals would say, a reference to a formal organization such as the national guard), and that 'People' is capitalized (which in the legal parlance of the time meant all legal citizens of a specific country, as opposed to 'people' which would be all human beings). This amendment has only been considered by the Supreme Court one time, back in the 1930's a case was brought before the Supreme Court concerning the legality of 'sawed off' shotguns. The ruling was that since sawed off shotguns have zero military application, they are not specifically covered by the second amendment (basically, the 'arms' the court viewed as covered would be military grade weapons).

That's pretty much it on the historical background of this amendment, it's worded in such a way that you have to be going out of your way to distort its meaning. It clearly states that if the country is going to be able to have any sort of militia (National Guard or otherwise) to call upon in time of war, that the People (it's legal citizens) must be allowed to own (and by implication, be familiar with) firearms. It is certainly an elegant line of reasoning to assume that a country's 'People' would be easier to train for military duty if they knew which end of a gun the bullet came out of than if they didn't.

So, it is likely that at some point in the future the Supreme Court is going to hear this case and decide if a law that prohibits 'People' from owning handguns is a violation of the Second Amendment. I can sort of see both sides, after all the law is only prohibiting handguns, other weapons such as rifles and shotguns are still legal to own (but rather clumsy to carry for personal defence...). Still, handguns are employed by the military (the US army employs a 9mm Baretta with a high capacity magazine as it's standard sidearm) so one might argue that military grade handguns should not be prohibitied (in other words, very small compact 'saturday night specials' could be banned, but a mil-spec weapon such as a Glock should not).

It will be interesting to see how this plays out, personally, I am against any ban that would prohibit personal defence with an effective firearm. DC has one of the highest gun violence rates in the country, and usually it's a criminal who is armed that kills an honest citizen who is prohibited from being armed. That just does not seem fair to me, given that there is no way for the police to be everywhere to protect honest citizens from thugs.

[unriggable]

Something like this...What is the worst sin that the United States has committed:

1. Allowing its citizens to own guns (because you can use guns for something that doesn't involve murder)
2. Cutting personal income taxes (because we don't need to get rid of the 4 trillion dollar deficit, or the education problem, or the poverty)
3. Passing DOMA laws defining marriage as 1 man-1 woman (because separate but equal works wonders)
4. Electing George W. Bush (because our voting machines were absolutely accurate)
5. Defending itself against Islamic extremism (because every other country takes islamic extremism in the ass the way america takes christian extremism in the ass)
6. Not giving illegal immigrants free health care (because everybody else in this country gets free healthcare)
7. Being patriotic (because everybody outside the US hates their country and wants to move to america)
8. Allowing its citizens to worship Jesus, sometimes praying in public (because every other country forbids christianity)
9. Defeating the Soviet Union during the Cold War (that happened 17 years ago, when we had a surplus)
10. Celebrating Columbus Day (because columbus landed in america)
11. Saying the Pledge of Allegiance to the American Flag (other countries forbid any kind of flag-salutations)
12. The Boy Scouts (because they let everybody join, except gays, girls and in some cases blacks and hispanics)
13. Allowing private companies to say Merry Christmas to customers (because all other countries would execute you for it)
14. Believing in natural law/natural rights (except when we need information)
15. Wal-Mart (because people are expendable)

I'm betting it will be #4

[unriggable]

Brian, when the 2nd amendment was written there were no police, and barely an army; the entire countryside was available to most, so hunting rifles were the norm.

[heavycola]

I think a large part of gun safety - maybe the most important part - is a) not owning them and b) melting them all down to make prams. Call me a crazy relatively-gun-free brit but there ya go.

[Grooveman2007]

I think a large part of gun safety - maybe the most important part - is a) not owning them and b) melting them all down to make prams. Call me a crazy relatively-gun-free brit but there ya go.

When handguns were banned in D.C., the violent crime rate went drastically up, because the criminals (who by no means would turn in their guns because a law says so) knew that no honest citizen, or should I say victim, was armed and able to defend themselves. A ban on guns would only make the problem of violent crime worse. As I said before, the most important part of gun saftey is education.

Here's proof of the D.C. rates
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyoLuTjguJA

[Snorri1234]

I think a large part of gun safety - maybe the most important part - is a) not owning them and b) melting them all down to make prams. Call me a crazy relatively-gun-free brit but there ya go.

When handguns were banned in D.C., the violent crime rate went drastically up, because the criminals (who by no means would turn in their guns because a law says so) knew that no honest citizen, or should I say victim, was armed and able to defend themselves. A ban on guns would only make the problem of violent crime worse. As I said before, the most important part of gun saftey is education.

That's because you ban guns when you spread them first. What a suprise that criminals didn't turn in their guns!

[got tonkaed]

Haha, you are really going to provoke a lot of people with this. Most of the people here from Europe already think that owning a firearm is terrible. What you should really do is ask them which is the worst sin possible according to a post-modern/socialistic worldview and have them rank them.

Something like this...What is the worst sin that the United States has committed:

1. Allowing its citizens to own guns
2. Cutting personal income taxes
3. Passing DOMA laws defining marriage as 1 man-1 woman
4. Electing George W. Bush
5. Defending itself against Islamic extremism
6. Not giving illegal immigrants free health care
7. Being patriotic
8. Allowing its citizens to worship Jesus, sometimes praying in public
9. Defeating the Soviet Union during the Cold War
10. Celebrating Columbus Day
11. Saying the Pledge of Allegiance to the American Flag
12. The Boy Scouts
13. Allowing private companies to say Merry Christmas to customers
14. Believing in natural law/natural rights
15. Wal-Mart

I'm betting it will be #4

it could be number 3.

[got tonkaed]

anyway back to the point of said thread....

since we certainly wont be repealing the second amendment any time soon...

train them all, do it in a public setting and make it young. Personally i like the idea of educating people about things, even things i dont necessarily agree with. Ideally if you did it in a public setting, you could get indivudals who have the requisite qualifications to teach the children, instead of situations where some kids get good training from responsible gun owners and some people dont.

about the handgun ban....

i think theres more mental gymnastics being done than youd like to admit. Frankly the amendment is not talking about individual self defense, though that is part of having a free state, it is rather talking about arming people to prevent things like invasion or governmental abuse. If it had meant individuals in self defense it would have said Persons, not the collective People. Also the notion of people is clearly related in connection to the notion of militia, which by in large is impractical today, though groups like the michigan militia still certainly exist.

anyway, i have rarely, in fact i havent come across anything that seems to approximate to evidence that if people had guns crimes would stop. That type of common sensical evidence has proven just as relavant as liberals like myself claiming if we didnt let anyone have guns we wouldnt have a problem. Continuing to claim it as if it is a truth, doesnt advance the issue anywhere for anyone.

[Neoteny]

As much as I dislike guns, I have a bit of experience with them, and teach people (currently my girlfriend) how to use them whenever I get a chance. I would love to eliminate firearms from general use, but, as tonka says, that's highly unlikely. So, I realize that the best preventative measure would be education. If my girlfriend is confronted by a situation with a gun, which would be shitty, I'm happy knowing she will know how to handle it. The best-case scenario in this situation is definitely not digging in one's heels and polarizing the situation.

[SolidLuigi]

Banning guns won't do much. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. There is something inherently violent about our country, I don't know what it is but it's there.

Grooveman pointed out the stat on the rise in crime rate, another factor in that is that most of the guns used for violent crimes are illegally acquired through arms dealers and the black market, so the law wouldn't be able to control those anyways because it can't as it is now. So banning guns just takes away one of our rights, and only really hinders the law abiding citizens from buying them for protection, sport or hobby

[unriggable]

Proof that in the long term, gun control works:



http://www.guncite.com/cnngunde.html

ATLANTA -- The United States has by far the highest rate of gun deaths -- murders, suicides and accidents -- among the world's 36 richest nations, a government study found.
The U.S. rate for gun deaths in 1994 was 14.24 per 100,000 people. Japan had the lowest rate, at .05 per 100,000.
The study, done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is the first comprehensive international look at gun-related deaths. It was published Thursday in the International Journal of Epidemiology.
The CDC would not speculate why the death rates varied, but other researchers said easy access to guns and society's acceptance of violence are part of the problem in the United States.
``If you have a country saturated with guns -- available to people when they are intoxicated, angry or depressed -- it's not unusual guns will be used more often,'' said Rebecca Peters, a Johns Hopkins University fellow specializing in gun violence. ``This has to be treated as a public health emergency.''
The National Rifle Association called the study shoddy because it failed to examine all causes of violent deaths.
``What this shows is the CDC is after guns. They aren't concerned with violence. It's pretending that no homicide exists unless it's related to guns,'' said Paul Blackman, a research coordinator for the NRA in Fairfax, Va.
The 36 countries chosen were listed as the richest in the World Bank's 1994 World Development Report, with the highest GNP per capita income.
The study used 1994 statistics supplied by the 36 countries. Of the 88,649 gun deaths reported by all the countries, the United States accounted for 45 percentb, said Etienne Krug, a CDC researcher and co-author of the article.
Japan, where very few people own guns, averages 124 gun-related attacks a year, and less than 1 percent end in death. Police often raid the homes of those suspected of having weapons.
The study found that gun-related deaths were five to six times higher in the Americas than in Europe or Australia and New Zealand and 95 times higher than in Asia.
Here are gun-related deaths per 100,000 people in the world's 36 richest countries in 1994: United States 14.24; Brazil 12.95; Mexico 12.69; Estonia 12.26; Argentina 8.93; Northern Ireland 6.63; Finland 6.46; Switzerland 5.31; France 5.15; Canada 4.31; Norway 3.82; Austria 3.70; Portugal 3.20; Israel 2.91; Belgium 2.90; Australia 2.65; Slovenia 2.60; Italy 2.44; New Zealand 2.38; Denmark 2.09; Sweden 1.92; Kuwait 1.84; Greece 1.29; Germany 1.24; Hungary 1.11; Republic of Ireland 0.97; Spain 0.78; Netherlands 0.70; Scotland 0.54; England and Wales 0.41; Taiwan 0.37; Singapore 0.21; Mauritius 0.19; Hong Kong 0.14; South Korea 0.12; Japan 0.05.

[/quote]

[Sir. Ricco]

Rule 1 - Aim to kill

[MeDeFe]

Banning guns won't do much. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. There is something inherently violent about our country, I don't know what it is but it's there.

Grooveman pointed out the stat on the rise in crime rate, another factor in that is that most of the guns used for violent crimes are illegally acquired through arms dealers and the black market, so the law wouldn't be able to control those anyways because it can't as it is now. So banning guns just takes away one of our rights, and only really hinders the law abiding citizens from buying them for protection, sport or hobby

Honestly, do you need a machine gun for self-protection or hunting? Hardly. Is it really that much fun to shoot with one? I don't think so, and I speak from experience in case you're wondering.
The only people who really need a handgun are those who compete professionally, they are only marginally useful for self-defense since you'll be lying face down in the gutter before you even know what's happening.
If you're man enough to kill an animal, skin it and eat it there is a variety of hunting rifles for all kinds of game.

So do you really need that vast supply of all kinds of firearms, oftentimes sold at legal auctions, where anyone can buy and noone asks any questions, like "Have you ever been convicted of a crime?". If you look in the right places you can legally acquire a firearm that noone will know you possess. "Black market" my ass, the only weapons you need a black market for in the USA are RPGs and up.

[Neoteny]

Rule 1 - Aim to kill

I thought it was "don't talk about fight club..."

[Grooveman2007]

Banning guns won't do much. Guns don't kill people, people kill people. There is something inherently violent about our country, I don't know what it is but it's there.

Grooveman pointed out the stat on the rise in crime rate, another factor in that is that most of the guns used for violent crimes are illegally acquired through arms dealers and the black market, so the law wouldn't be able to control those anyways because it can't as it is now. So banning guns just takes away one of our rights, and only really hinders the law abiding citizens from buying them for protection, sport or hobby

Honestly, do you need a machine gun for self-protection or hunting? Hardly. Is it really that much fun to shoot with one? I don't think so, and I speak from experience in case you're wondering.
The only people who really need a handgun are those who compete professionally, they are only marginally useful for self-defense since you'll be lying face down in the gutter before you even know what's happening.
If you're man enough to kill an animal, skin it and eat it there is a variety of hunting rifles for all kinds of game.

So do you really need that vast supply of all kinds of firearms, oftentimes sold at legal auctions, where anyone can buy and noone asks any questions, like "Have you ever been convicted of a crime?". If you look in the right places you can legally acquire a firearm that noone will know you possess. "Black market" my ass, the only weapons you need a black market for in the USA are RPGs and up.

If you're alert when you are walking through the bad parts of town (hopefully we all are), then you should have ample time to defend yourself. In many cases, armed citizens have only had to reveal the fact that they were armed to save their lives. If handguns were banned, and you were attacked or robbed, you could call the police, and they would come and photograph your body. Thankfully, in the US people can defend themselves with lethal force. And that has saved many innocent lives.

The biggest difference between Europe and the US in terms of guns is mindset. I live in an urban area and I am an avid hunter, in fact most people I know hunt or have at least one gun. After all, in the US there are more guns than people. Now I can't speak from experence about Europe, but to my understanding, the gun control laws are so strict that people can't have a concealed weapon on their person, and it's so difficult to get a sporting rifle that most people don't even bother. Americans simply have grown up around guns and are used to them, and in some cases, comforted by them. While in Europe, they simply arn't an important part of the culture. Culture, that is why gun control will never happen in the US.

[SolidLuigi]

MeDeFe, I am a hunter, I've gutted a few deer in my time, I use a Savage Arms bolt action 30-06, and I have a muzzleloader for muzzleloading season. I agree automatic weapons wouldn't be fun to hunt with, and more importantly it wouldn't be true to the sport which is one of the reasons I hunt.

[Grooveman2007]

MeDeFe, I am a hunter, I've gutted a few deer in my time, I use a Savage Arms bolt action 30-06, and I have a muzzleloader for muzzleloading season. I agree automatic weapons wouldn't be fun to hunt with, and more importantly it wouldn't be true to the sport which is one of the reasons I hunt.

Agreed, automatic and even semi-automatic weapons take away from the hunting experience, but they are really fun to shoot.

[Neoteny]

MeDeFe, I am a hunter, I've gutted a few deer in my time, I use a Savage Arms bolt action 30-06, and I have a muzzleloader for muzzleloading season. I agree automatic weapons wouldn't be fun to hunt with, and more importantly it wouldn't be true to the sport which is one of the reasons I hunt.

Agreed, automatic and even semi-automatic weapons take away from the hunting experience, but they are really fun to shoot.

I'll second that. It's actually scary to me how fun they are. I love it...

[Iz Man]

You want to know what's fun to shoot?
I got to sink a couple Iraqi gun boats back in '91 with one of these.
25mm chain gun.... BOOYAH

I think I should be allowed to mount one of these bad boys on my back deck.
For ducks and such.......

[JACKAZZTJM]

I have been reading the news coverage of the recent court ruling that has declared that Washington DC's ban on handguns is a direct violation of the second amendment, and it seems that the pundits on both sides have either not read their history books, or they are engaged in obfuscation.

For clarity, this is the EXACT wording, punctuation, and capitalization of the Second Amendment as ratified by the States.

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

You will note that 'militia' is not capitalized (thus, this is not as the liberals would say, a reference to a formal organization such as the national guard), and that 'People' is capitalized (which in the legal parlance of the time meant all legal citizens of a specific country, as opposed to 'people' which would be all human beings). This amendment has only been considered by the Supreme Court one time, back in the 1930's a case was brought before the Supreme Court concerning the legality of 'sawed off' shotguns. The ruling was that since sawed off shotguns have zero military application, they are not specifically covered by the second amendment (basically, the 'arms' the court viewed as covered would be military grade weapons).

That's pretty much it on the historical background of this amendment, it's worded in such a way that you have to be going out of your way to distort its meaning. It clearly states that if the country is going to be able to have any sort of militia (National Guard or otherwise) to call upon in time of war, that the People (it's legal citizens) must be allowed to own (and by implication, be familiar with) firearms. It is certainly an elegant line of reasoning to assume that a country's 'People' would be easier to train for military duty if they knew which end of a gun the bullet came out of than if they didn't.

So, it is likely that at some point in the future the Supreme Court is going to hear this case and decide if a law that prohibits 'People' from owning handguns is a violation of the Second Amendment. I can sort of see both sides, after all the law is only prohibiting handguns, other weapons such as rifles and shotguns are still legal to own (but rather clumsy to carry for personal defence...). Still, handguns are employed by the military (the US army employs a 9mm Baretta with a high capacity magazine as it's standard sidearm) so one might argue that military grade handguns should not be prohibitied (in other words, very small compact 'saturday night specials' could be banned, but a mil-spec weapon such as a Glock should not).

It will be interesting to see how this plays out, personally, I am against any ban that would prohibit personal defence with an effective firearm. DC has one of the highest gun violence rates in the country, and usually it's a criminal who is armed that kills an honest citizen who is prohibited from being armed. That just does not seem fair to me, given that there is no way for the police to be everywhere to protect honest citizens from thugs.

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