Question for supporters of the second amendment.

[ImmortalFlame]

It is the implication that said deaths would not have occurred otherwise. For instance, if I decide I want to commit suicide and a gun is available I might choose to use that, if a gun is not available I will choose another means. The use of the gun is ancillary to the decision.

Except the much higher death rates of countries with lax gun laws shows you're wrong. Fact is, if you want to kill yourself (or anyone else) a determining factor in your choice to do so is whether or not you have access to a means to so efficiently. If someone wants to kill or die, that decision becomes a lot easier to make when they remember they have a shotgun (i.e: a device intentionally designed for the ending of a life) in their house. If things were as simple as you suggest, we should see a uniform suicide and homicide rates across the board, but we do not.

Yep. The state government, not the federal. But that is not the point. The point is that you had a group of people, with guns, that at times followed police because of brutality against black people in the community. People with guns acted out and no jets were scrambled. It is ridiculously absurd to think that the U.S. government is going to magically poof into the Nazi party and all out war between them and the citizens will emerge.

You've got this magnificently the wrong way around. Gun ownership is intended to protect people from when the government (or some invading force) attempts to negate the people's rights by force. I never said that gun ownership would CAUSE the government to negate people's rights by force, and the example you provided was a perfect example of how and why the second amendment fails in its very intended function. A well-regulated militia emerged, using guns as a deterrent against a very real and genuine threat (police and public violence against them based on their race), and the government passed a law preventing them from carrying their firearms.

No, it is not irrelevant. While we have no draft right now, there is no reason why the draft could not occur. Armed citizens are likely better trained in shooting. Moreover, that a time could exist where the government needed to call upon the militia to assist in a time of need is always a possibility. That such a possibility exists is one reason why the framers put the ammendment in the constitution in the first place. And lastly, threats to our democracy occur when individuals commit crimes upon our democracy.

So what regulation should exist for such a militia?

If protection of our democracy is paramount to the second ammendment how much more paramount is the lives of all of our individual citizens.

Lives which guns cause the loss of far more than they save.

That is not true. It is demonstrably not true.

More Guns Do Not Stop More Crimes, Evidence Shows
Guns in homes pose greater risk to families than to intruders, data show
Injuries and Deaths Due to Firearms in the Home : Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...4-innocent-people-die/?utm_term=.9dcf0fe07a7c

Guns are used for self defense an attempt at limiting guns entails an attempt at limiting self defense.

Except it also limits criminal access to guns, and thus lowers the chance of death or the need for self defense.

I agree that you can still defend yourself without guns. I didn't say it was a negation of that right, I said it was a limitation on that right.

Except it isn't. No more than not allowing you a nuke is a limitation of your right to self defense.

If I said you could only eat and drink wine and cheese, I wouldn't be negating your ability to eat, but I would be limiting it.

Sure, but we're not talking about access to food, we're talking about availability of devices that are used far more to cause crime than prevent it. It's more like me limiting your choice to drink what you want by telling you you're not allowed to drink sea water or poison.

To your second point, there are compelling reasons why people cannot own nuclear devices. The laws that prevent such are narrowly tailored to those compelling reasons. (Though they needn't be, based on which federal powers they are rooted).

Just as there are compelling reasons to prevent or limit access to guns.

The point is if you do not think there is a compelling governmental interest in preventing you from owning a nuclear weapon, or you think the laws that prevent you from doing so are too broad, I would love to hear your argument.

Causing mass death.

Well that they serve no function in the protection of people is a lie.

See above. They cause more deaths than they prevent, that is a fact.

That they increase violent crime rates is unfounded.

See above.

And that they do not fulfill the originally specified function of the second Ammendment is murky at best.

How "well-regulated" can something be if mentally ill teenagers can get their hands on semi-automatic firearms?

 

[Curious George]

Except the much higher death rates of countries with lax gun laws shows you're wrong. Fact is, if you want to kill yourself (or anyone else) a determining factor in your choice to do so is whether or not you have access to a means to so efficiently. If someone wants to kill or die, that decision becomes a lot easier to make when they remember they have a shotgun (i.e: a device intentionally designed for the ending of a life) in their house. If things were as simple as you suggest, we should see a uniform suicide and homicide rates across the board, but we do not.

Except it is not that much. We have roughly 3 more homocides per 100k than Canada, 1 more per 100k than India, 22 less per 100k than Brazil, and 7 less per 100k than Russia.


List of countries by intentional homicide rate - Wikipedia

I can certainly pull up the suicide rates but it is really not that significant either. Case in point: Japan.

Perhaps, just perhaps, these issues are more complicated than "guns are the cause."

 

[Kangaroo Feathers]

Except it is not that much. We have roughly 3 more homocides per 100k than Canada, 1 more per 100k than India, 22 less per 100k than Brazil, and 7 less per 100k than Russia.


List of countries by intentional homicide rate - Wikipedia

I can certainly pull up the suicide rates but it is really not that significant either. Case in point: Japan.

Perhaps, just perhaps, these issues are more complicated than "guns are the cause."

TRy comparing like with like, maybe? Developed countries, for example.

 

[Curious George]

You've got this magnificently the wrong way around. Gun ownership is intended to protect people from when the government (or some invading force) attempts to negate the people's rights by force. I never said that gun ownership would CAUSE the government to negate people's rights by force, and the example you provided was a perfect example of how and why the second amendment fails in its very intended function. A well-regulated militia emerged, using guns as a deterrent against a very real and genuine threat (police and public violence against them based on their race), and the government passed a law preventing them from carrying their firearms.

I think it is you who got this wrong. I gave an example of governmental corruption and people responding in part with guns. This shows that A) governmental corruption does appear. And B) no one is going to scramble jets or drones. It was an example that was meant to cut off any attempt to make this conversation about the people uprising to take back the government. As I thought we agreed, such conversations are absurd.

 

[Curious George]

So what regulation should exist for such a militia?

Whatever Congress deems appropriate that is in-line with their constitutional authority. That is kind of a weird question to ask. Would you care to elaborate or clear it up so I can best answer with something relevant?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Except it is not that much. We have roughly 3 more homocides per 100k than Canada, 1 more per 100k than India, 22 less per 100k than Brazil, and 7 less per 100k than Russia.

List of countries by intentional homicide rate - Wikipedia

I can certainly pull up the suicide rates but it is really not that significant either. Case in point: Japan.

So you think it's fine that legal firearms cause more deaths than lives they save purely because "it's worse elsewhere"?

Perhaps, just perhaps, these issues are more complicated than "guns are the cause."

I never said that was that simple. I'm just getting you to acknowledge the fact that guns are making the problem significantly worse.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

I think it is you who got this wrong. I gave an example of governmental corruption and people responding in part with guns. This shows that A) governmental corruption does appear. And B) no one is going to scramble jets or drones. It was an example that was meant to cut off any attempt to make this conversation about the people uprising to take back the government. As I thought we agreed, such conversations are absurd.

So did you agree with the regulation the government enacted in that case?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Whatever Congress deems appropriate that is in-line with their constitutional authority. That is kind of a weird question to ask. Would you care to elaborate or clear it up so I can best answer with something relevant?

I'm not really sure if I can phrase it better. What steps do YOU believe would be positive steps the government could take in regulating guns that would not infringe (in whole or in part) on what you see as the fundamental right to own firearms?

 

[Curious George]

Lives which guns cause the loss of far more than they save.

More Guns Do Not Stop More Crimes, Evidence Shows
Guns in homes pose greater risk to families than to intruders, data show
Injuries and Deaths Due to Firearms in the Home : Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...4-innocent-people-die/?utm_term=.9dcf0fe07a7c

From your article:

"National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which is conducted in tens of thousands of households. It suggests that victims use guns for self-defense only 65,000 times a year."

Gun violence in the United States - Wikipedia

More uses of self defense than instances of death.

Furthermore this is not accounting for the people that would have killed people regardless or people that would have committed suicide regardless.

The numbers make your claim demonstrably false.

 

[Curious George]

Except it also limits criminal access to guns, and thus lowers the chance of death or the need for self defense.

That is questionable. Will criminals commit less crime because they lack guns? Certainly it will limit gun crime. But that isn't the same as limiting crime or even violent crime.

Except it isn't. No more than not allowing you a nuke is a limitation of your right to self defense.

Well it would take me quite a lengthy post to explain the distinction thoroughly. Do you really not see how possession of violating national security, violating treaties, and possessing a nuclear device is different than owning a semi automatic gun?

 

[Curious George]

Sure, but we're not talking about access to food, we're talking about availability of devices that are used far more to cause crime than prevent it. It's more like me limiting your choice to drink what you want by telling you you're not allowed to drink sea water or poison.

The analogy I used was to illustrate the the difference between extinguishing an ability and limiting that ability. That regulation or banning of gun ownership does not extinguish the ability for self defense does not mean it does not limit it.

If you take issue with the analogy to illustrate this point alone, please explain why. If you would to prefer to use your analogy because of the negative connotations that is fine too. Just as we are clear that regulating guns does limit self defense.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

From your article:

"National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which is conducted in tens of thousands of households. It suggests that victims use guns for self-defense only 65,000 times a year."

Selective quoting doesn't really help. Here's the fuller context (emphasis mine):

"The frequency of self-defense gun use rests at the heart of the controversy over how guns affect our country. Progun enthusiasts argue that it happens all the time. In 1995 Gary Kleck, a criminologist at Florida State University, and his colleague Marc Gertz published a study that elicited what has become one of the gun lobby's favorite numbers. They randomly surveyed 5,000 Americans and asked if they, or another member of the household, had used a gun for self-protection in the past year. A little more than 1 percent of the participants answered yes, and when Kleck and Gertz extrapolated their results, they concluded that Americans use guns for self-defense as many as 2.5 million times a year.

This estimate is, however, vastly higher than numbers from government surveys, such as the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which is conducted in tens of thousands of households. It suggests that victims use guns for self-defense only 65,000 times a year. In 2015 Hemenway and his colleagues studied five years' worth of NCVS data and concluded that guns are used for self-defense in less than 1 percent of all crimes that occur in the presence of a victim. They also found that self-defense gun use is about as effective as other defensive maneuvers, such as calling for help. “It's not as if you look at the data, and it says people who defend themselves with a gun are much less likely to be injured,” says Philip Cook, an economist at Duke University, who has been studying guns since the 1970s."
SOURCE: More Guns Do Not Stop More Crimes, Evidence Shows

More uses of self defense than instances of death.

But that's not including all the guns that are used in violent crime, robbery and abuse cases that don't result in homicide.

Furthermore this is not accounting for the people that would have killed people regardless or people that would have committed suicide regardless.

Which would statistically be a much smaller number of people killing a much smaller number of victims.

The numbers make your claim demonstrably false.

Only if you deliberately misrepresent them, like you just did.

 

[Curious George]

How "well-regulated" can something be if mentally ill teenagers can get their hands on semi-automatic firearms?

Sounds like most armed forces around the world.

Are you concerned with the regulation of people?

 

[ImmortalFlame]

That is questionable. Will criminals commit less crime because they lack guns? Certainly it will limit gun crime. But that isn't the same as limiting crime or even violent crime.

When people have more access to firearms, they are more likely to commit violent crime.

The Relationship Between Gun Ownership and Firearm Homicide Rates in the United States, 1981–2010
http://www.cjcj.org/uploads/cjcj/documents/jpj_firearm_ownership.pdf

Well it would take me quite a lengthy post to explain the distinction thoroughly. Do you really not see how possession of violating national security, violating treaties, and possessing a nuclear device is different than owning a semi automatic gun?

Oh, I see the difference, but I see them only as differing degrees of regulation.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

The analogy I used was to illustrate the the difference between extinguishing an ability and limiting that ability. That regulation or banning of gun ownership does not extinguish the ability for self defense does not mean it does not limit it.

So you admit that limiting "a right" isn't inherently a bad thing, right?

If you take issue with the analogy to illustrate this point alone, please explain why. If you would to prefer to use your analogy because of the negative connotations that is fine too. Just as we are clear that regulating guns does limit self defense.

Only inasmuch as limiting people's right to feed their children bleach is limiting their right to feed their children. Guns don't serve the function of self defense any more than feeding a child bleach serves the function of providing a child with nutrition.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Sounds like most armed forces around the world.

Armed forces are heavily regulated and trained. At least, I assume most of them are. Maybe I'm naive.

Are you concerned with the regulation of people?

I'm concerned with the ease with which weapons designed to kill people in the double-digit figures can get into the hands of teenagers with a history of mental health problems.

 

[Curious George]

So you think it's fine that legal firearms cause more deaths than lives they save purely because "it's worse elsewhere"?


I never said that was that simple. I'm just getting you to acknowledge the fact that guns are making the problem significantly worse.

No I don't think it is fine that they cause more deaths because it is worse elsewhere. But is 1-5 per 100k more deaths per year really caused by guns when the actual deaths fluctuate quite a bit? I think that you might be confusing deaths with gun deaths....

 

[Curious George]

So did you agree with the regulation the government enacted in that case?

The state regulation?

 

[Curious George]

I'm not really sure if I can phrase it better. What steps do YOU believe would be positive steps the government could take in regulating guns that would not infringe (in whole or in part) on what you see as the fundamental right to own firearms?

I do not believe that regulation of firearms will affect the crime or violent crime rate (including murder rate). I believe that these rates will only decrease when we better address the fundamental needs of the our citizens.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

No I don't think it is fine that they cause more deaths because it is worse elsewhere. But is 1-5 per 100k more deaths per year really caused by guns when the actual deaths fluctuate quite a bit? I think that you might be confusing deaths with gun deaths....

Nope, I've been very careful about mixing up my statistics.