Are you considering purchasing a gun?

I grew up around hunters and was forced to hunt as a kid. Almost all of my coworkers hunt and a few stockpile guns. I'm not afraid of guns. I know an equal amount of people who hate guns and love them and it squarely follows party lines/who they voted for, at least in my experience. I do feel like it might be good to buy one in the future and I don't like that feeling.

guns aren't really mysterious nor does one need to learn how to shoot them in order to take them seriously

I don't know, every time guns come up her or in real life conversations at least some number of people who have never handled or fired one seem to see guns as scary/foreign/confusing/evil, like they're dark magic of some sort. And people who teach target shooting or hunter's safety, are, in my experience, incredibly concerned with safety and hammer safe gun-handling practices into students constantly.

every time guns come up her or in real life conversations at least some number of people who have never handled or fired one seem to see guns as scary/foreign/confusing/evil

Maybe because guns are scary?

they are for killing living things after all

Indeed, I mean, I'm not too fond of landmines either.

people are scared of what they do not know

also more and more people live in urban areas where they're scared of how a sausage is made

buddy charcuterie is huge around my way

This will sound simplistic and dumb but I want to live in a world where I don't feel like I need a gun.

― JacobSanders, Tuesday, November 22, 2016 5:59 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I have gotten along well without needing one for 38 years. I still do not really feel like I need one, but there is now a looming cloud of doubt.

Consume less media

Lol goole

If civil society breaks down and wild hoardes are after me I think I'd be cool with just dying

^^

Luckily none of that is happening folks

I have a family to worry about, just dying isn't an option. I'm not saying I think anything is on the horizon. But.

Wouldn't want family to be around for post apocalyptic hellscape either

Just gonna bump cormac McCarthy thread altogether ffs

The other day I was talking to my wife about who would not take orders if things got bad and my first instinct/thought was our military would never take orders against the people. Then I saw my step brothers postings on Facebook. Both are military lifers, one a navy seal medic and the other is robotics/army. Both are sympathetic to white nationalist ideas. It was a scary moment for me.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/65/Kent_State_massacre.jpg

People owning handguns is the second-most scary thing about the USA.

Go on

never owning a gun because the statistics say it's much more likely to be used on someone i care about/accidentally than against some fantastical bad guy, and anyone who owns one has to reconcile that. there is no moral case for owning a gun.

however i think it's possible (shows what i know?) to own a gun but store it offsite, at a range? i don't want one in the house.

I don't keep ammo at my house (not for any particular objection - I don't need it and) but I have a small safe bolted to the floor in a closet. It's about as secure as it could be if anyone broke in.

essentially my threshold for owning a gun is when i'm living in an active war zone

what on earth would I do with it? even in a nightmare scenario it wouldn't make me safer

or like if all civil society broke down and i had to defend my homestead against raiders

Is it interesting to ponder how ilx would view the type of discourse it has engaged in since trump's victory had it appeared on an equivalent right wing message board in an alternate universe where Clinton won

I'm stocking up on guns and bunkering up lads

druther muh kids were DEAD than living under this regime

Would Clinton supporters be painting "hang the capitalists" in schoolyards and parks, or stopping randos on the street to yell, "Your time is up, ofay?"

xpost to darraghmac - i don't think anybody has yet copped to buying a gun?

I know how to use a gun, I don't have any interest in owning one. Another expensive appliance to maintain, and mostly just to make it a lot easier for everyone in my house to commit suicide, apparently? Nah.

If someone comes into my home and threatens my family with a firearm, my chances of disarming and disabling them with random kitchen implements or my giant fuckoff t-ball bat sized maglite seem about even with the winning-a-gunfight scenario. I'll take shit I don't need a license to own for $0 / sunk costs, Alex.

Would Clinton supporters be painting "hang the capitalists" in schoolyards and parks, or stopping randos on the street to yell, "Your time is up, ofay?"

― and this section is called boner (Phil D.)

quit giving us ideas

seriously is there a white person in history who has ever been threatened by being called "ofay"?

I'm white, a pacifist and a vegetarian, and live in a country where a person like me would pretty much never need a gun for self-defense, so I've never ever considered owning a gun for any purpose. I'm also absent-minded and have butter fingers, so I don't think it'd be even safe for me to be around one.

Finland does have a lot of guns (as do the other Nordic countries, based on that Wikipedia link above all except Denmakr are in the top 20 for private gun ownership), but the majority of them are for hunting. Gun violence against humans is rare, and in most cases it's happened when someone's gone crazy and targeted their family or school or workplace.

As in most of Western Europe, racism and xenophobia is on the rise, so I'm a bit afraid about that, because they are more prominent in rural areals and impoverished industrial towns, where I think gun ownership is also more common (due to the fact that hunting is more common there). Here in Helsinki I've never met anyone who'd own a gun.

Sorry, I'm not sure why I put "Western Europe" there, since it feels like racism is on the rise pretty much everywhere in Europe.

I take it that non-US respondents to the poll would just be adding noise?

for me personally no, I couldn't, but as a lifelong "fuck all guns" dude it was an unusual feeling this week to find myself agreeing wholeheartedly with the specifically gun-related stuff I used to struggle with in 60s black radical theory/texts -- about how black people should arm themselves and vigorously defend themselves, using firepower when necessary, against the violent, racist police state

like when I used to read that stuff I'd think "I hear you but that's only going to make shit worse" and my feeling now is "no, it won't, people should protect themselves and their families and it's moral and righteous to kill people who're coming for your family"

I take it that non-US respondents to the poll would just be adding noise?

No, I don't think so. Clearly gun culture, if it exists, is very different in different countries; it's somewhat interesting to see if current events have spurred these thoughts in the minds of people who live in countries where guns aren't really A Thing most citizens think/worry about.

Obviously not in the US etc etc. Definitely get why it might be an impulse even for people who had been anti-gun previously. Not just because of fear - viscerally I want to fight the forces of bigotry, the seeds of fascism as well as the actual fascism rising across the west. I want to destroy it, to be more precise, and I'm prepared to acknowledge the role violence can play in that.

The reason I've never thought about a gun, aside from cultural differences, is that this form of protection seems to be for retreating into one's home and one's nuclear family. But solidarity is absolutely imperative if you want to fight, imo - going out to connect with other people resisting and bringing what you can to them, not just defending you and yours.

This is probably also coloured by how useless I find the concept of the nuclear family.

re: protecting your nuclear family, one thing my sister-in-law talked semi-seriously about in the wake of the election was the proliferation of militia culture and how overwhelmingly white it is. For about 24 hours, moving out to the woods and starting a black militia seemed... not reasonable, but not entirely far-fetched, either.

(point being, there is a specific US-centric context built into the Constitution and its current interpretation that puts gun ownership in a more communal context than just "I must protect the people who live with me")

I’ll eventually upgrade my rifle. I’d really like this:

http://14544-presscdn-0-64.pagely.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/anschutz_1827-fortner_review_1229101.jpg

but I doubt it’d offer much protection.

it's somewhat interesting to see if current events have spurred these thoughts in the minds of people who live in countries where guns aren't really A Thing most citizens think/worry about.

No chance. There aren't any guns here for a start. Thank God.

Nothing to hunt here!

also less of a desire to protect yourself from people w/ guns

Because there are hardly any people w/ guns.

right

it's weird how that works, huh

like when I used to read that stuff I'd think "I hear you but that's only going to make shit worse" and my feeling now is "no, it won't, people should protect themselves and their families and it's moral and righteous to kill people who're coming for your family"

― though she denies it to the press, (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Wednesday, November 23, 2016 8:26 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah i'm reminded of some huey newton essays and i get the mindset but unless you sincerely believe we are at an endgame where people are "coming for your families" i still find it to be some pretty shaky calculus

I mean yeah if you are actually gonna form a militia you will wanna get some guns

For anything else tho (leaving aside schoolyard shootings & the like) aren't you basically just going "yeah yeah facts statistics whatever" and is that ever a good idea when it comes to incredibly dangerous shit