Is owning Guns good or bad?

[jmaster78]

Ditto. Well, obviously I can't carry it to school, but I own a smaller pocketknife as well, and I can assure jmaster I'm not some insane lunatic whose going to go kill someone with it on accident or whatever.

yes i'm sure many people thought that until they stabbed someone. Like people who own guns but never intend to use them, but some of them do!

 

[jmaster78]

Heya jmaster,
"remove all legal and illegal guns and it will be much harder for criminals to get their hands on them"
The United States is a very useful country for studying gun crime due to the variety of gun laws that have been adopted there over the years. Your plan rests on the assumption that there is a positive correlation between gun crime and gun law (ie the laxer the gun laws, the greater the gun crimes). However, this does not seem to fit with the facts.

It is true that we can see some cases where this seems to be the case. We have strict gun laws in the UK and we also have low gun crime. But we have always had low gun crime even when we did not have such strict laws. For example, the 1998 ban on hand guns has not resulted in a decrease in gun crime (in fact there has been a massive increase but this can be attributed to other factors).

So where are the facts to support your case?

my argument has nothing to do with gun laws, but simply fewer guns mean fewer gun related crime, regardless of how lax or strict that countries law is. Gun laws do not build a gun filled society, people who buy guns build a gun filled society.

 

[Fluffy]

Jmaster,
How do you plan to lower the amount of guns in a society without making the society's gun laws more restrictive?

 

[jmaster78]

Jmaster,
How do you plan to lower the amount of guns in a society without making the society's gun laws more restrictive?

There should be only one law regarding guns........illegal!

 

[jonny]

yes i'm sure many people thought that until they stabbed someone. Like people who own guns but never intend to use them, but some of them do!

I use my knife all the time. I used it today to open the packaging on some stuff I bought.

 

[Quiddity]

It's only bad if it's owned by someone irresponsible and with poor judgement.

 

[jmaster78]

what i find amusing is the amount of pro gun members on this thread, all claiming to be sensible responsible' citizens, (the opposite of criminals). yet so far i have read posts by 'law abiding' members who keep a gun in the glove box, yet a fellow pro gun member claims this is illegal, and 'law abiding' members who carry knives to school etc. some of these 'responsible' members seem to have a distinct lack of respect for the law which is a trait of.......criminals!

 

[lilithu]

what i find amusing is the amount of pro gun members on this thread, all claiming to be sensible responsible' citizens, (the opposite of criminals). yet so far i have read posts by 'law abiding' members who keep a gun in the glove box, yet a fellow pro gun member claims this is illegal, and 'law abiding' members who carry knives to school etc. some of these 'responsible' members seem to have a distinct lack of respect for the law which is a trait of.......criminals!

Has it occured to you that our laws might vary from state to state and what may be illegal in one state may be legal in another? We are the United STATES of America.

 

[Fluffy]

Jmaster,
If you agree that in order to put your plan into action you would enact a change to the law regarding guns (ie making them illegal) then you need to account for the failure of this act in the past to solve the problem that you have stated is the goal of your plan ie make it harder for criminals to get their hands on guns.

So for example, you need to explain why the ban on hand guns in the UK resulted in an increase in gun crime and why, despite this, you feel that a ban on guns in general will result in a reduction in gun crime.

Lastly, poisoning the well is not a valid debating tactic. I understand that it is a very easy tactic to use but I think you will find that debates are much more pleasant if you avoid characterising your fellow debators and concentrate on taking their arguments to pieces.

 

[jmaster78]

Jmaster,
If you agree that in order to put your plan into action you would enact a change to the law regarding guns (ie making them illegal) then you need to account for the failure of this act in the past to solve the problem that you have stated is the goal of your plan ie make it harder for criminals to get their hands on guns.

So for example, you need to explain why the ban on hand guns in the UK resulted in an increase in gun crime and why, despite this, you feel that a ban on guns in general will result in a reduction in gun crime.

Lastly, poisoning the well is not a valid debating tactic. I understand that it is a very easy tactic to use but I think you will find that debates are much more pleasant if you avoid characterising your fellow debators and concentrate on taking their arguments to pieces.

UK Gun crime figures from the home office web site for last 2 years.

• 16% reduction in the use of handguns
• 9% reduction in robberies involving firearms
• 6% reduction in serious injuries from firearms offences

If you take out the 55% rise in offences using immitation firearms, there was a decrease in gun crime not an increase. But if you think gun crime in the Uk is on the up, and you think a complete ban is wrong, then maybe you could venture your own proposal to fix the problem?
if all guns were illegal, then it would be easier to track, identify and seize weapons as there would be no confusion. As for poisonimg the well, could you explain exactly what you mean? If i have done so it was not my intention.

 

[SoyLeche]

If you take out the 55% rise in offences using immitation firearms, there was a decrease in gun crime not an increase.

I'm curious - why would you take out this 55% rise? Are they not gun crimes???

 

[darkpenguin]

If the population of the herd overgrows the food source the deer will die anyway. Hunting is highly regulated. You can't just go out and shoot anything you want whenever you want. You have to get licenses and there are limits in locations and by animals or fish. If you want to hunt a deer, you have to pay to get in a lottery. They draw the number of tags based on the number of animals in the population. Also, there are limits on the sex of the animal that you can shoot - they don't want to kill off all the does, for example. In Idaho, they are begging hunters to shoot wolves because they are killing off other animal populations (there are too many). When the population gets down to a mangeable level, they will restrict the hunting again. There are also lakes where fish were introduced illegally that they use fisherman to get rid of the unnatural fish population.

The money used to purchase guns and licenses supports the environment. All these items have taxes on them used for sustaining and supporting the animal population and the environment where they live.

As for there being too many deer...we have herds of them, yes HERDS running through our yards and neighboorhoods. There is no shortage of deer, at least not here.

Well that makes hunting ok then doesn't it?
As I said, should we start killing each other to keep our population down and to stop us affecting the animals enviroment even more?

 

[SoyLeche]

what i find amusing is the amount of pro gun members on this thread, all claiming to be sensible responsible' citizens, (the opposite of criminals). yet so far i have read posts by 'law abiding' members who keep a gun in the glove box, yet a fellow pro gun member claims this is illegal, and 'law abiding' members who carry knives to school etc. some of these 'responsible' members seem to have a distinct lack of respect for the law which is a trait of.......criminals!

An example of poisoning the well.

 

[SoyLeche]

Well that makes hunting ok then doesn't it?
As I said, should we start killing each other to keep our population down and to stop us affecting the animals enviroment even more?

We'll let the deer do that. After all, we're monitering their population, the least they can do is return the favor.

 

[SoyLeche]

I also agree that if laws were passed that have extremely severe penalties for carrying out a crime with a gun so that even the utter idiots might just think twice before doing so. Otoh, police currently have the right to "shoot to kill" anyone brandishing a weapon who does not obey their direct orders to disarm. Maybe something like penalties following a standard jail term are served of 10,000 hours of community service is in order. In theory, one could be compelled to do community service for the rest of their natural lives. Perhaps at some point they just might realize it is far more satisfying to help people than it is to try to hurt them.

Aside from that, I certainly don't have the answers.

I agree with this. I would love to see tougher penalties for gun crimes.

 

[jmaster78]

An example of poisoning the well.

why? because people arguing from the same side make contradictory comments?

 

[jonny]

Well that makes hunting ok then doesn't it?
As I said, should we start killing each other to keep our population down and to stop us affecting the animals enviroment even more?

Just make sure and eat everything you kill.

 

[SoyLeche]

why? because people arguing from the same side make contradictory comments?

It's an ad hominem. Actually, from the link AE gave in another thread I believe it is an ad hominem Tu Quoque.

Discussing the actions of the person giving the argument doesn't shed any light onto the argument itself - it just muddies the water.

 

[jonny]

what i find amusing is the amount of pro gun members on this thread, all claiming to be sensible responsible' citizens, (the opposite of criminals). yet so far i have read posts by 'law abiding' members who keep a gun in the glove box, yet a fellow pro gun member claims this is illegal, and 'law abiding' members who carry knives to school etc. some of these 'responsible' members seem to have a distinct lack of respect for the law which is a trait of.......criminals!

Carrying around a knife in your pocket isn't illegal - this of course depends on the size of the knife and type (switchblades, for example, are illegal).

 

[jonny]

why? because people arguing from the same side make contradictory comments?

I already have provided a link where you can see the different laws in different states. They are also different within the state depending on the city and county you are in. The US government doesn't pass blanket laws on all the states for every little situation.