Frankly I'm sick of hearing anecdotes

[Sheepshank]

Little one time events being used to shut down the gun safety conversation. The attempt to define that all attempts are futile because........................

No more. No more unverifiable anecdotal strategies to shut down the attempt at reducing gun violence. We need numbers, stats, and policies that have worked...providing back up numbers. Something, anything to start this ball rolling down the hill, is a good start. Reduce accessibility to certain types of firearms. Create penalties/require insurance and reduce premiums for safety. I don't care what. I'm in for the long haul, not necessarily looking for finality tomorrow.

[samsingh]

1. and the apples to oranges comparisons

like:
sure there are more gun deaths in the US than the UK, but there's less violence at football games than their soccer games.

[Walk away]

7. Ah yes! That makes sense violent Americans have gun because they make it easier....

to be violent. Less violent British people don't need guns because they don't want to kill as many people.

[Fresh_Start]

2. The GOP and NRA shut down research into gun violence

years ago.
Its what the scientists were complaining about earlier this year.
I like the University of Pennsylvania study that shows that you are 400% more likely to be injured or killed with a gun if you carry a gun.
Thats a real safety bonus isn't it?

[randome]

4. That should be broadcast everywhere.

[randome]

3. Hopefully, Biden's task force will come up with workable suggestions.

Whatever it turns out to be, it won't 'solve' the problem of mass murder but it may make it less frequent an occurrence.

[upaloopa]

5. They have stats. They can give you stats till

you've had toiler fill. Every stat in history points to one conclusion. Only gunner anarchy will make us safe.

[hedgehog]

6. Agreed 100% - we play the odds with everything else!

For example - there are plenty of anecdotes of someone surviving because they were thrown from the car before it burst into flames - but I'm wearing my seat belt anyways because my odds are better that way. Having a gun increases your chances of being shot with a gun!

BTW - I'd really, really like to see the odds of home invasion!

[The Magistrate]

8. Most Of Those Are Fantasy Anyway, Sir

And many that are not fantasy are really mis-readings of a situation, in which a person brandished a fire-arm and someone else wisely baked away from the cray fuck with a gun he displayed for no reason.

As a general rule, when someone on a message board says he has used a gun in self defense, he should be viewed as making up a story, and sharing his fantasy life, sort of like a person writing a letter to Penthouse....

[Earth_First]

9. So 'a death here' and 'a death there...' those are simply trivial inconveniences to you?

Until we have a massacre every...what, two three days; only THEN can we be heard?

[Sheepshank]

10. point....

now you are making up shit to prove my point...admit it

[Earth_First]

11. "Little one time events..."

Those are your words; not mine.

[Sheepshank]

12. little words you choose to take out of context...I would call that a fabrication or a lie.

No where did I say I was ok with a random shootings or killings. Little re-reading on you part, or perhaps even a little request for clarification (rather that wearing yourself out jumping to conclusions) may have been in order.

[Fumesucker]

15. To the people involved these events are neither little nor one time

Yours was not a good choice of words, people suffer for a lifetime over an action that took but a moment.

[Sheepshank]

20. re-read...the victims were never call such...

why do you insist on twisting the op? Pretty much everyone else understood, that the little anecdotes refered to those that are finding ways to shut down the attempt at any form of regulation with the ...."but one day xxxxxxx happened so that law won't work" Perhaps a step away from the fumes...just while you read the post?

[Fumesucker]

23. I dealt with your words and didn't get personal

Why do you feel the need to escalate things and get personal?

[Sheepshank]

24. I was wrong to make this personal...n/t

Last edited Fri Jan 11, 2013, 06:13 PM - Edit history (1)

[Fumesucker]

13. Open carry only, no concealed carry

Let social pressure do the job, make concealed carry a mandatory automatic year in prison for a first time offense but open carry quite legal.

Something like this for your vehicle if you have a gun in your car, otherwise you get the automatic year.

[sofa king]

14. Then perhaps a different approach is necessary.

Rather than focusing on the tool used to commit the crimes, perhaps we need to look at other emerging data.

Poverty and income inequality appear to be the most significant contributors to violent crime. Taking guns away won't make poor, desperate people less poor or less desperate. It will merely make people who have guns, or are thought to have guns, the first victims.

http://sfbayview.com/2012/violent-crime-analysis-the-cause-is-poverty/

Environmental factors now seem sure to be included as a major contributor of violent crime, as the correlation between tetraethyl lead (once used in gasoline) and violent crime is surviving peer review and some mechanism of causation seems sure to be described soon.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-link-gasoline

Fear of violent crime is a powerful and lucrative motivator, particularly well suited to fleecing ignorant conservatives. That is why, even though the experts beg them to stop, news broadcasts about rampage shootings always start with wailing sirens and lights, and always show full-screen pictures of the shooter rather than the victims. The use of fear as a sales and electoral tool is well established; the relationship between that fear and the violent crimes that these same sorts of people commit is sure to be better described soon.

So the solution, it seems to me, is to BE BETTER FUCKING DEMOCRATS, GOD DAMN IT! We don't need to take away peoples' guns, we need to make them less poor, more healthy, and less afraid, which is exactly what we always seek to do.

So, you want to fix the gun problem? Start by running a Republican out of office. That is the real solution.

[bongbong]

18. You said it!

> It will merely make people who have guns, or are thought to have guns, the first victims.

That will certainly make people think twice about carrying a gun. Exactly what we Democratic people want to do.

You make a good point.

[ip5683]

16. You need to get out more.

The "anecdotes" you speak of usually contain a link to the newspaper that reported it. Take it up with the newspapers. Then there's the DOJ which, in its 2010 report stated that people use guns 2.5M times a year to successfully defend themselves. In 98% of the cases, just showing a gun makes the bad guy run away. There was an attempted theater shooting several days after Sandy Hook. An off-duty cop shot the guy. Funny how that type of thing never seems to get reported.

We criticize the Right for being dishonest and overly general. Let's not do that ourselves. There are 310 million guns in the U.S. -- a supply that will last at least another 200 years. Reloading ammo at home will similarly supply rounds for another 200 years. 3D printers are already creating usable guns that last at least 100 rounds and they are getting more durable all the time. Guns are not going to be banned anywhere outside of deep blue cities -- approx. 1% of the country. We would do far better to be even-handed even when such atrocities as Sandy Hook occur. Obama has already stopped talking about a gun ban by executive order -- there is no such authority for the president outside of the Executive Branch. It's a cinch one won't pass Congress. Biden's group will thrash and posture and then quietly let it die. Every mass shooting since 2007 has been done by someone who was first prohibited from owning a gun because of age, criminal record, or mental illness. Wouldn't we be far better off in stopping such people from accessing other peoples' guns?

[bongbong]

19. Games with numbers

> In 98% of the cases, just showing a gun makes the bad guy run away.

How many of those were due to the gun? I mean EXCLUSIVELY to the gun? Meaning, if the person had done exactly the same thing, but without a gun, how many of those "bad guys" would've run away?

Until we have details and specifics, the NRA data is worthless.

Color me surprised.

[Sheepshank]

21. ...and here you are with no link.

not even a link to the off duty cop story...so that the full story can disclose the actual events. I'm pretty sure that sotry was debunked here recently.

Interesting attempt at telling me to get out more lol.

[Recursion]

17. OK. Stop focusing on features of particular weapons and focus back on handguns and transfers

The reason I'm so against attempts to renew the AWB is that it's based on anecdotal thinking like that: some high-profile mass shooting uses this or that weapon, so we need to ban weapons that look like that.

I'd prefer we keep focused on the guns that kill people every day, one at a time: cheap handguns. And we have ways of keeping them out of people's hands. Focus on requiring a background check for every single transfer of a firearm, not just transfers by licensed firearms dealers. Unfortunately the "ring of fire" gunmaker scum seem to be coming back, so do to them what we did in the early 1990's and take them down on product safety grounds.

[The Magistrate]

22. Regarding Handguns And Transfers, Sir, We Would Seem On Common Ground

[Recursion]

25. I'm glad to hear it

It's hard to have a party you disagree with on one issue (though even there, my disagreements are technical and tactical). That's why finding common ground is important.

[The Magistrate]

27. One Point, Sir

While I agree that 'assault weapon' bannings are mostly cosmetic, I do not think cosmetics are necessarily unimportant or ignoreable. I think a lot of people do view them as exactly what whole-hog 'Team NRA' types say they are: a first step to more, a sort of 'gateway drug' of gun laws, to get people off the dime and used to the idea that a law can be passed. The view we take of handgun-centered measures would be a tricky one to start off with, I expect, in form of actual legislation. A bit of softening up in preparation is needed before the main assault....

[Recursion]

28. You're one of two posters I respect highly who make that argument

That the cosmetics are part of the problem. I can say I'm still thinking about that, and while I'm not yet persuaded I'm not denying it, either. More thought is needed.

[Nye Bevan]

26. The best anecdote is the one about the UK's murder rate being one quarter of that of the US.

Perhaps it's not gun control. Perhaps the Brits are just nicer people.