Do you believe in the 2nd amendment?

That's not an equal analogy. Two different guns that can do two different things shouldn't be governed the same way. .50 BMGs aren't civilian weapons for a reason: they're militaristic in a different way than a pistol or small sidearm is. As for speech, it's an action the same way no matter what way you say it or write it. The way you can possibly murder a person or persons is different based on what weapon you're carrying that day. And that's what needs to be taken into account.

 

You just took one of the bluest states in the U.S., looked at their gun control legislation, saw multiple bills have been passed, and then proceeded to apply it to the entire U.S. Again, state legislatures are HEAVILY dominated by Republicans and attacks on gun control has been overwhelmingly ineffective.

So let me correct myself, not passed legislation.

 

In my opinion, all rights are available to all citizens. However, there are exceptions. Your rights do not extend to infringing on the rights of others, and do not extend to actions that threaten the safety of others. That is why things such as verbal abuse are not covered under the freedom of speech.

It doesn't directly transfer to gun rights, I suppose. With speech rights, you always have it as long as you don't abuse it. However, with gun rights, certain people are losing their rights completely. However, I do believe gun control is justified. If you cannot be assessed to own a rifle and have the training to use it safely, you may be limited to owning a pistol. More powerful guns should require more safety training, or else you may very well be an endangerment to yourself or others.

On the topic of background checks, I do believe that if you have a significant criminal record, then you can be labeled as a significant endangerment by owning a firearm, therefore your gun rights may be stripped.

However, how lenient or strict the background checks and safety assessments are, are up for debate. But I do believe they should exist. There's a lot of "howevers". Gun control should be a thing in my opinion, but it's still very subjective.

 

Your argument is completely nonsense. Your speech online has the ability to reach order of magnitudes more people and you can more easily get people to join your cause. It is clear that terrorists have a much easier time recruiting with the internet than by spoken word. Therefore the speech on the internet is completely different than speech not on the internet and that needs to be taken into account.

See? Your argument isn't an argument at all.

 

Of course I chose a blue state? Just because a majority of states are red does not mean that the minority is not passing gun control laws and is not weakening the 2nd amendment every time they do.

 

It should not be subjective at all. Why should we legislate on feels and not facts? The facts are that more than 2/3 of all gun deaths in the US every year are suicides. Most of the murders by guns are drug or gang related and hardly anyone is killed by long guns compared to pistols.

My owning a gun does not infringe on your rights in any way. My owning a gun is not a danger to you in any way.

You also have it completely backwards. It is effectively outlawed in many parts of the country to own a handgun while it is perfectly ok to own a rifle. Why? Because the vast, vast, vast, vast majority of gun crimes are committed with pistols. And if you are a felon you already likely can not own a firearm as that is already law (in many places, if not all).

It is clear you have no idea about firearms at all and we shouldn't base laws around people's flawed understanding of firearms.

 

Please name a part of the country where it is illegal to own a handgun. In the strictest areas allow citizens to purchase handguns with a FOID. And in what world does a criminal owning a weapon not endager the safety the others? And in what world does owning a gun, let alone anything dangerous, without any idea of how to use it properly, safe to the person using it and the people around them? In that case, if owning something dangerous doesn't affect safety, let's let everyone has grenades. Hell, let's let everyone have nukes? Where do you draw the line? I draw the line before guns.

In Maryland, you need to take an HQL. It's a really simple assessment of gun safety. If people can handle it, they can own one. If not, then they shouldn't. If they can't even operate it correctly, then it's less helpful to them anyway.

It doesn't matter what percentage of gun murders is the result of people illegally obtaining guns. It doesn't matter what percentage of gun murder is drug/gang related. The only thing that matters is the number of lives that we actually can save. Especially since safety assessments hardly affect anyone with an understanding of firearms. That's why it's subjective because nobody knows how strict or lenient we have to be in order to save lives without taking guns away from people that deserve them.

 

I didn't expect an example from one state and a very blue state. California as a control group hardly represents the usual dealings of state legislatures; hell, they just passed very comprehensive gun legislation yet you don't see this occuring all over the country (or anywhere in the country for that matter).

When you present the issue of gun control legislation as passing state houses all the time and that gun owners are under attack, a certain pretense is set. A minority of states attempting to pass gun control legislation is very different than the implied idea that this is something festering all over the government at federal, state, and local levels.

Let us be realistic, practically no republican controlled house is going to let gun legislation through. With this, there are 7 states in which Democrats control governorship and their respective state legislatures (and 23 states in which Republicans control theirs). This alone provides insight into Republican control of state legislatures. Nearly half of the states in the U.S. are fully controlled by Republican legislatures. I don't know how it is possible to argue that the second amendment is under attack (specifically by legislatures) when gun control legislation cannot get through Congress and when it is highly unlikely nearly half of the states would even consider such legislation. This brings me back to my original point, this attack on gun control in very much more so media driven than legislation driven.

Frankly, I don't think it is weakening the second amendment at all because as my initial post stated, I don't find it applies to civilians; however, let us presume it does apply (until Heller is eventually overturned which I think it will be).

Deducting from your post, all gun control laws weaken the second amendment? May I ask how the likes of nationwide background checks would weaken the amendment? How about testing for firearms use? Not even limiting firearm access, rather, making it so you have you prove your competent enough to own one.

How do such reforms weaken the second amendment? Unfettered access remains as long as you're not a criminal and are competent enough to use a device that has the ability to indiscriminately kill.


Edit:
I saw one of your other posts in response to another person and I just want to make my position clear. I am not anti-gun, but I find the current ease-of-access very disturbing. I myself own two firearms and my problem lies mainly in the likes of AR-15s and other military-style guns.

I am aware of the statistics regarding actual gun murders, but I do not like the killing efficiency of military-style weapons being in the hands of civilians and I am particularly cognizant of mass-murder style events; furthermore, looking back at ease of access, I think it is far too easy to purchase a gun.

 

The second amendment is supposed to protect the citizens from tyranny along with other things. although i dont believe there should be that many stipulations in order to get the weapon. at this point, its getting out of hand. anything could be used as a weapon, and some people even live off their guns for food and such. i could go on, but im trying to summarize it the best i can.

 

Well obviously people who live off there guns would have no trouble getting certified for gun use. You already need license to hunt, so it doesn't affect those people at all. People who can't or won't use guns properly for things like self-defense and hunting are the ones that shouldn't have guns.

 

With your logic, by law you should only be allowed to drive a Smart Car because anything bigger than that is an assault vehicle and can cause mass homicides.

 

You are exaggerating. Just as there are limits to the kind of guns that civilians should own, there are cars that are not street legal.

Some guns are too dangerous so we say civilians can't use them. Similarly, we say some cars are too dangerous so we say civilians cant use them.

We also require people pass a safety test to operate a vehicle and get a license. Similarly, getting a gun should at least require some assessment to make sure that the potential owner at least can safely and effectively operate a gun.

 

I agree completely. Because there's people who are legally able to own guns but shouldn't. I think requiring completion of a 40 hour course to get your concealed carry permit/buy a weapon. Something along those lines.. I'm prior service military & trust me, not all people with guns are the brightest.

 

NYC. Unless you are rich or politically well connected it is impossible to own a handgun. Just because they have a law saying you can own a handgun if you have a permit doesn't mean they actually give out the permits. They are banned in all but name.

Criminals are already banned from owning guns but they break the law so they still have them. Not sure what your argument is there.

Safety you say? A person killed more people in France with a truck than many people do with guns. Where do you draw the line? I draw it before cars. You aren't using any logic here.

All that matters is how many lives we can save? Ban alcohol then because it kills vastly more people every year than guns do. If you care about saving lives guns should be very low on your priorities list.

 

Some things can't be prevented. But we do have restrictions on cars to help prevent things like that. Like I said, you need to take a course and then take a test to get your license to use a car legally. And of course, requiring licenses for safe usage of different things isn't going to prevent every single instance of tragedy, but that doesn't mean it won't prevent any instances of tragedy. Your one or handful of cases of someone killing a bunch of people with a truck is/are irrelevant.

And you can't compare deaths by alcohol to death by shootings. What percentage of deaths by alcohol-related fatalities are intentional? I promise you it's much lower than the percentage of shooting-related deaths that were not accidents.

And in my opinion, alcohol purchases should require a basic course on safe consumption on alcohol. Almost all universities already require such a course for their students.

So therefore, yes, I still do believe gun ownership should require training of the safe and effective operation of a firearm.

 

Of course some things can't be preventing which is why restricting my rights to own a firearm to prevent something that can't be prevented is asinine. I'm not against gun control. I'm against ineffective gun control and every suggestion I've heard would be ineffective. Safety training would not stop suicides. Safety training would not stop gang violence. Safety training would not stop mass shootings. Safety training is something that most legal, responsible gun owners have already done without the government forcing it. You are suggesting burdening my rights for absolutely no gain which is indefensible.

 

The point is that legal, responsible gun owners go unaffected. Restrictions only affect people that are not legal, responsible gun owners. People who have licenses, people have done background check, people that have taken courses, they all go unaffected. The restrictions are for people that aren't labeled as "responsible gun owners". People who go to gun fairs or shops that purchase guns with background in responsible firearm usage. And safety training would affect all of those things that you said it wouldn't affect. Consider all suicides, mass shootings, gang violence that were a result of someone purchasing guns without and sort of background check or safety assessment. Many of those would be prevented.

You could argue (as I've heard) that people could still get guns from some sort of black market, which has truth, but that doesn't mean many scenarios wouldn't be prevented. A black market is a black market for a reason. The majority of civilians don't have access to them. Saying that these requirements are asinine and ineffective is incorrect. Saying that these requirements burdens the gun rights of legal responsible gun owners is also incorrect.

 

I think in the end, we both understand the "requirements" that are up in the air and the potential outcomes of the proposed limitations. We just have differing opinions on the value of the methods that are being proposed.

 

I disagree completely.

The only people affected by mandatory safety are legal, law abiding gun owners. People who kill other people won't be affected in any way. They are criminals so they are not going to follow the laws that are passed.

People commit suicide on the spur of the moment. Guns are only used so often because they already own them and they are easy. If they didn't have a gun they would just hang themselves. If you magically removed all guns from the world today the impact on the number of suicides would be minimal.

People who commit terrorism plan in advance. They will be perfectly happy to steal a gun or buy a black market gun or just go to the safety class and then buy the gun. The safety class does nothing to stop this at all.

Nearly all gang violence is done with illegal guns. They don't follow the current laws about carry permits or taking safety classes so why would passing another law requiring some more classes change their behavior?

You are just saying that safety classes will prevent all sorts of stuff without any evidence backing it up and common sense tells us it won't have any effect at all.

 

You didn't reply to my last post where I explicitly asked questions.

Anyway, no that's not the case. The argument of "well only law-abiding-citizens are effected by gun laws because criminals will break the law!!" is utter trash. The current system for firearm ownership allows for a massive black market trade; if the ability to purchase guns was limited, the guns on the market would be further limited, with the black market trade following. I myself would suggest a buy-back program, but lets ignore that.

Your average Joe who commits a mass shooting his just that, your average Joe. We can make arguments about their mental stability all-day-long, but an overwhelming majority of firearms used in mass shootings (I believe 89%, but that's off memory so don't hold me to it, it may be higher) are bought legally. These averages Joes - and they are average Joes albeit with whatever issues - are purchasing guns from their local gun stores. Can't purchase it from there? Well, shit. Navigating the black market isn't exactly easy, it isn't a location with some stalls and without some type of connection, (arguably) mentally unstable people are going to have a real problem getting their hands on guns. While not identical, such a scenario can be examined in the ease of access in countries such as Australia and the U.S. If you did have the connections to buy a high powered semi-automatic rifle illegally, the cost difference is astronomical. Your average 22 year old white male in all likelihood will not have thousands of dollars to drop on an AR-15 (opposed to $700). Ok, so what? They use pistols for their shooting spree instead? Well, we could implement laws to help prevent this, but let us say we don't. Pistols will in all likelihood be just a little bit less effective than a military-style rifle both in ammunition capacity, accuracy, and stopping power. Effectively saving lives.

"Guns removed from the world.. impact would be minimal." Again, no. Guns are chosen yes because they are there, but also due to how effective they are. You are much less likely to survive a suicide attempt via firearm than you are via pills. I would argue - and I am sure there are a variety of papers that do just that - that if guns are not in the household, there is a significantly higher chance of surviving a suicide attempt; therefore, a higher chance of getting past whatever is troubling the individual.

You make it sound so easy to steal a gun or buy a gun off the black market. Hmm.. let me go steal an AR-15.. well first I need to figure out where/who to steal it from, than devise a way to do it, then ensure I don't get caught, and then plan my attack. Even if it was easy, it would be an extra step - where someone could very well get caught - to committing a mass shooting and I do not see the problem with that.

Want to site a source or at least some statistics for your gang violence claim? What is nearly all? 90%? 51%?

To the contrary, classes will require responsible owners to purchase the weapons and common sense would hint that common owners not auctioning off their guns to the highest bidder... Safety classes would ensure individuals who own a gun know how to use it (God forbid). I'm not going to really try and make the argument it'll limit gun use in gangs and other similar situations, but that's why there could be other laws.. like hmm a universal back ground check, or perhaps limiting semi-automatic weapon ownership, or providing justification for owning certain firearms, or a variety of other possibilities.

Edit:
And responsible gun owners would be unaffected. Responsible gun owner? Awesome! You'll have no problem passing a mental health examination and a gun safety course. Sorry you had to set aside a few hours of your weekend to ensure you don't go slaughter individuals!