The Great ILX Gun Control Debate

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The seeing a gun statement is kinda ridiculous. Sure, tell people to know what they're talking about. But this whole "have you SEEN a gun" thing is just silly. Like seeing it makes a difference.

And yes, I've "seen" lots of guns. My dad was military and my friend's mom had a shotgun to scare off bears because she used to live in BC (which I always thought was hilarious)

― Will M., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:45 (seventeen years ago) link

If the Constitution were a living document, Charlton Heston have shot the fuck out of it years ago.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:46 (seventeen years ago) link

*would have

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:46 (seventeen years ago) link

one of the teachers in my high school often brought a gun to school as a visual aide for his chapel sermons.

it seems kind of fucked up now, but at the time, i didn't think anything of it.

― Gukbe, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:47 (seventeen years ago) link

http://www.securitech.com/D02-mp-police-lock-4800-series.html

i find these to be beautiful pieces of machinery ^^^

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:50 (seventeen years ago) link

It's being reported that he bought the guns legally.

― Ben Boyerrr, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:50 (seventeen years ago) link

What housewives are actually packing heat? Maybe I don't hang out with enough housewives.

my sister-in-law, for one. she's sweet and funny and plays guitar and sings emmylou harris songs. and keeps a handgun in a fake book jacket in her truck. oh, and my mother-in-law. but she owns a skeet shooting range so it would be kind of hard for her to not own a gun.

i married into a very well-armed family.

― tipsy mothra, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:52 (seventeen years ago) link

Also, my mom, who is adorable and is a music therapist in an old folks home. Not exactly the "crazed fire-fight" type.

― John Justen, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:54 (seventeen years ago) link

The person you described is a grotesque stereotype.

He's also a real person. If he's a stereotype, then that's his doing: he rather revels in the whole redneck image. As such, he's the only person I've met who's preached about how awesome guns are, and it's become something of a family joke, especially after he built his own cannon.

― jaymc, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:54 (seventeen years ago) link

(xpost) skeet skeet skeet

― HI DERE, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:54 (seventeen years ago) link

in her truck? what about when the intruder smashes through her kitchen window at 2 in the morning?? i guess this is why people have multiple guns.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:54 (seventeen years ago) link

It's like me with multiple sticks of deoderant. Because I always forget and need it wherever I am. And it's 24 hour protection.

― Will M., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:56 (seventeen years ago) link

I'm curious why JJ's mom and JFM's sister-in-law own guns.

― jaymc, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:57 (seventeen years ago) link

I need to post pictures of the one deer my dad blew away -- it was hanging from the olive tree in the backyard. I was in fourth grade; I cried a lot. My mom and grandmother tried to distract me at the mall.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:57 (seventeen years ago) link

I wonder if gun owners are like me with my deoderant. I leave it around the house as visual clues so I put it on because I NEVER REMEMBER. And in case I forget I leave some in my work locker.

― Will M., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:57 (seventeen years ago) link

manalashi sounds like he rubs his guns all over his body.

― Gukbe, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 16:58 (seventeen years ago) link

I've hardly read much of this thread but felt compelled to add something...

I've handled lots of guns (primarily shotguns but also handguns, a Magnum .357, etc.), although I have never killed anything and don't ever want to.

That being said I completely support the wholesale banning of firearms from the hands of private citizens, and find the majority of arguments to the contrary to be highly specious (yr shotgun isn't gonna protect you from the gummint, yr more likely to kill yr family member than you are an attacker, fatal accidents with guns grossly outnumber incidents of guns being succesfully used for self defense ad infinitum).

The problem is all of the gun control options in America are bad ones. Nothing can be done to really get rid of the problem, because there are already so many guns in commercial circulation in the country. You can't just take them out of people's hands and melt them all down or something. If they were all outlawed the black market for firearms would have already have an ample supply of product and a devoted network to move through. Ostensibly the country's gun problem would become even worse than it is now. America manufactures the arms and floods the markets of the world with them - the genie is out of the bottle and there's no way to stuff it back in. At best all we can hope for is a modicum of regulation.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:00 (seventeen years ago) link

hahah "24-hour protection" .. one in the glove compartment, you get to the office, walk inside, open bottom-left drawer, there's your office gun, you give a smile of satisfaction and begin your day

the last time i saw somebody shooting a gun was last christmas, to get mistletoe down out of a tree

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:01 (seventeen years ago) link

(and yes I realize my position is a bit contradictory - basically I would like an America where firearms are completely illegal, but realize that this cannot be practically implemented)

x-post

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:01 (seventeen years ago) link

yeah, gun control options are limited at this point. i think most of the annoying problems that come from gun control debate are the people so obsessed with their right to own guns that banning any kind is wrong. reason gets thrown out of the window for a stupid ideology.

― Gukbe, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:02 (seventeen years ago) link

I saw a policeman with a gun (outside the US Embassy, where else?) but that's the only time I've ever actually seen one in real life

― Tom D., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:05 (seventeen years ago) link

That being said I completely support the wholesale banning of firearms from the hands of private citizens

*sigh*

― river wolf, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:06 (seventeen years ago) link

... talking from the UK that is (xpost)

― Tom D., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:06 (seventeen years ago) link

What's so "sigh" about that?

― jaymc, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:07 (seventeen years ago) link

i still say the world would be a much better place if guns were never invented though it's obviously some utopian bullshit notion (and a notion which would merely pave the way for the right to bear swords and machetes debate, too).

― rps, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:07 (seventeen years ago) link

xp No elk meat for you?

― jaymc, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:08 (seventeen years ago) link

There aren't any elks in Tufnell Park

― Tom D., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:09 (seventeen years ago) link

... more's the pity!

― Tom D., Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:09 (seventeen years ago) link

"I saw a policeman with a gun (outside the US Embassy, where else?) but that's the only time I've ever actually seen one in real life

-- Tom D., Tuesday, April 17, 2007 8:05 PM (39 seconds ago)"

rly?!

i think i've even seen britishes cops w/ guns in the last few years. of course i have cradled an SA80 in my loving arms, taken it apart and put it back together, so am familiar with the inimitable smell of infantry small arms.

― That one guy that quit, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:10 (seventeen years ago) link

shakey mo most otm in thread

― and what, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:10 (seventeen years ago) link

From the AP:

One law enforcement official said Cho's backpack contained a receipt for a March purchase of a Glock 9 mm pistol. Cho held a green card, meaning he was a legal, permanent resident, federal officials said. That meant he was eligible to buy a handgun unless he had been convicted of a felony.

Fuckingfuckfucfuckfuckfuckfjfhjdfskahsdfh ldk sjafhsdjkl hjkls afhlsdfjh

― Ben Boyerrr, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:13 (seventeen years ago) link

I'm curious why JJ's mom and JFM's sister-in-law own guns.

well i dunno. sis-in-law is a sort of back-to-nature type. has a small chicken-and-goat farm. she slaughters her own animals. wants to get solar power so the homestead can be totally off the grid. i don't think she sees the gun as anything she's likely to need, but just as part of feeling that she can take care of herself in any circumstance. i guess. also almost everyone else in the family has a gun of some kind. when you grow up with them it's just sort of a normal thing to have around the house.

― tipsy mothra, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:20 (seventeen years ago) link

In all honesty, I think my mom would respond "Why not?"

― John Justen, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:22 (seventeen years ago) link

. when you grow up with them it's just sort of a normal thing to have around the house.

yup. I grew up in a hunting family in Michigan. Grandma had a rifle, grandpa had some shotguns, dad had both and a .22 pistol, I had a .22 rifle and a .410 over/under single-shot shotgun/rifle combo. My siblings & I all went thru hunter's safety classes when we were 12.

― kingfish, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:28 (seventeen years ago) link

The police on the other side of the gates on Downing Street have guns and you often see them at airports but outside of the capital (and airports) I don't think I've ever seen one.

― Ned Trifle II, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:33 (seventeen years ago) link

xpost obviously.

― Ned Trifle II, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:34 (seventeen years ago) link

army barracks in london have armed bastards outside. and of course i see them in rap music and in action movies all the time.

― That one guy that quit, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:36 (seventeen years ago) link

the genie is out of the bottle and there's no way to stuff it back in.t

Interestingly this is what most police officers I spoke to feared. They didn't want to be armed because they feared it would make them a target and once you got armed there was no going back.

― Ned Trifle II, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:37 (seventeen years ago) link

shakey mo otm re: stuffing the genie back in the bottle. but wanting to ban all guns everywhere is just sorta stupid and childish. handguns may have been invented to kill humans, specifically, but rifles and shotguns have practical, non-human-killing purposes.

and yeah, i'll bite: i'm uncomfortable with the thought of only cops being allowed to have guns.

― river wolf, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:52 (seventeen years ago) link

please to show me the last time a private citzen with a gun succesffully defended themselves against cops.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:54 (seventeen years ago) link

then again, i suppose if you banned guns, the cops wouldn't need to have them (cf europe), so that would just leave the military, and i'm not enough of a black helicopter watcher to really worry about that.

....yet.

― river wolf, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:55 (seventeen years ago) link

(ie, it DOESN'T MATTER if a private citizen is armed, the state makes it is business to be BETTER ARMED)

x-post

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:55 (seventeen years ago) link

("makes it ITS business" arrghh)

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:56 (seventeen years ago) link

then again, i suppose if you banned guns, the cops wouldn't need to have them (cf europe), so that would just leave the military, and i'm not enough of a black helicopter watcher to really worry about that.

The UK is the only european country i know of where the police do not routinely carry guns. There are, of course, armed policemen.

― Ed, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:57 (seventeen years ago) link

I'm not even talking about "successfully" defending yrself, Shakey; the cops will always win with bigger guns and sheer numbers. I'm just admitting that there's something creepy about the idea that the only people walking around with firepower would cops. Cops. Like, have you met these guys???

xp

― river wolf, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:57 (seventeen years ago) link

I hate cops. I figured this was common ILX knowledge.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:58 (seventeen years ago) link

Ed, you're right: I now remember as a kid seeing police in Italy walking around with submachine guns.

― river wolf, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:58 (seventeen years ago) link

me having a gun only makes it that much more likely that a cop is going to shoot me. it wouldn't protect me or make me feel more secure in any way.

x-post

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:59 (seventeen years ago) link

but rifles and shotguns have practical, non-human-killing purposes.

Go on.

― jaymc, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 17:59 (seventeen years ago) link

Sorry to be such a horse's ass, Ally, but exactly how many US localities are there where you need a concealed weapons permit to own an antique gun? Feel free to name lots of them.

(But I don't think it'll change my horse's-ass notion that there's a difference between appreciating guns as objects and carrying functional concealed weapons -- a difference this horse's ass is willing to bet is reflected in the laws of like practically every US locality. This was not meant to suggest anything at all about Alfred's father. It was a fairly simple statement that we should be careful about letting "I appreciate guns as objects" bleed subtly over into "therefore people should be allowed to carry them," because the one really doesn't have anything to do with the other.)

― nabisco, Tuesday, 17 April 2007 18:00 (seventeen years ago) link

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