I don't get this gun culture

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It varies with the individual, but i like what Ben Shapiro said about this.

"People always ask the question of "What do Americans need?", but that's the wrong question. The right one is, "What does the Constitution say we have a right to?" If we're talking about accepting the government dictating our needs, then the U.S. now becomes Communist Russia."

One of the arguments that gun opponents use to counter claims that concealed carry laws reduce crime* is that the laws were passed in response to surges in crime. Their explanation is that crime naturally goes in cycles, with drops leading to lenient laws or lax corrections. Those in turn lead to an increase, which leads to laws and enforcement being tightened back up again. They argue that the concealed carry laws were passed when attitudes, legislation and enforcement were already set to lower crime, with or without concealed carry.

That applies to gun restrictions as well, though. I read a tiny bit about Australia's changes, and it sounds as though they had a pretty strong popular backlash after several shootings. In that case, the law may not be the only thing that changed (people's attitudes changed, too).

It also looks as though they didn't just ban "assault rifles." They banned most people from owning any semiautomatic rifle (any rifle that doesn't need the round to be manually fed into the chamber before each shot) or pump action shotgun, and restricted pistols severely. Most of the guns that were taken away were .22s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia

*It was in response to statistics showing correlation with a drop in some types of crime. It might have just been violent crime. I can't remember, and I need to get some sleep.

What I mean is if everyone can easily get/carry a gun, the criminals can easily get/carry a gun (same for other items).

That you don't see every other criminals having a bomb or machine gun proves the point, despite the pro-gunners keep uttering 'the bad guy always get the gun'.

With a lax gun law, you very probably your risk to be shot to begin with. The pro-gunners simply ignores the increased risk of the better armed criminals.

There are still different weapons that can be used for self defense, form tear gas to phaser to sulfuric acid. That in addition does not give as much advantage to the attackers. All those no gun = defenseless are just nothing but false dichotomy.

How can that mean different? How would someone 'come to' real guns if they separate games / movies form reality? Not only that, many of them are deliberately imitating what they are doing in the game. Last but not the least many still talk about 'good guy vs bad guy' and other similar Hollywood fantasies, no matter how much knowledge and training they (claim to) have. Your Freudian slip only corroborate the conclusion that many 'gun culture 2.0' people are just projecting their fantasies.

You know what. The serfs worked about 4 hours a day and have food and accommodation guaranteed to them. The average American minimal wage worker work double the time and would probably be starving without government help. Well :eyeroll:

This is where the argument against registration is the strongest. If it's not registered they don't know you have it. The current form 4473 only records a purchase from a licensed dealer and is not evidence of the gun's current ownership at a later date.

No it doesn't. Bombs are insanely easy to manufacture, and machine guns can be had too. The reason both aren't involved in crime is simple - they are more expensive, and substantially less useful when carrying out a crime.



But if you make it illegal for criminals to own guns, that should stop them, right?



Yes...it's so clear now. I'll just start going around town carrying around tear gas grenades, vials of sulfuric acid and sci-fi weapons. I'll be like batman!

If your attacked by an armed assailant, maybe your gun will deter him but maybe he thinks his gun will deter you? Maybe you can distract him with the flash, the bang and the hydrostatic shock but maybe he can distract you with the same. It seems like such advantages work both ways.

Bear spray will blow back into your face if you try to use it into the wind. Tasers only have one or two shots, and their barbs won't penetrate thick clothing.



Well, our gun laws are a lot more strict than our alcohol laws. A serial drunk driver who's already killed someone can walk into a liquor store and walk out with a keg and a liter of vodka. No background checks there.

Booze is just as much a relic of the past. When's the last time you were worried about your drinking water spoiling on a long sea voyage?

It's just as dangerous. Alcohol used to account for half of auto deaths. It took decades of M.A.D.D. activism and more focused policing to bring it down to a third, and that's still more than 10,000 people killed every year. It's also responsible for a lot of murders, including gun deaths. All three are probably low-ball because alcohol also causes permanent decay in small motor function (and driving ability) and impulse control. Add in liver cirrhosis, and the numbers get much worse.

And while I haven't ever been hard up for water on a sea voyage, I've been attacked or credibly threatened a few times. The one person who came close to killing me was a classmate in second grade, and he used a 4" metal scissors that he got from the copy room. It was just as deadly as the tactical knife that I sometimes carry (both can reach the carotid), but nobody advocates banning them. Heck, even I don't.

Good answer but the wrong question.

I'm speaking about the "serf mentality"; you know what this means, right? It has nothing to do with how long a serf worked (works) and everything to do with the attitude serfs can't be trusted and must be commanded. If you like to be thought of, or think of yourself, as a serf, then I say "do what makes you happy."

Serfs are designed and created to obey the bidding of their lords and masters. This is the historical way. In the United States we have a different set of laws, a Constitution which is backed up by a Bill of Rights. Under U.S. law no one is obligated to be another's serf. This is why the argument still rages.

In England and Australia, both countries without strong "anti-serf" constitutions, the government has taken away anything they feel the people can not be trusted with. I'm sure this makes many feel "warm and fuzzy" having their governmental "big daddy" watch over them, but this is the kind of "royal over reach" that forced many to escape the tyrannical rule of their historical "masters" and brave the voyage to a new and better land.

And yet, there are still many in this country that would throw away their liberty and independence and that of their children and neighbors for what they discern (rightly or wrongly) as a little safety. I believe I read somewhere: "A frightened populace is easy to govern." Would you agree with that?

The difference is that criminals use weapons to unequalize a conflict in their favor. They plan on attacking people who do not have weapons of their own - and the realization that their opponent is armed is often enough by itself to force their retreat.

Carrying a weapon in self-defense means that you're presuming that, at the very least, the situation in which you are employing a weapon is one where your opponent has - and is employing - the ability to end your life. You train and live with that mindset - so the presence of a weapon by your adversary isn't a shock.

Just curious... do you live in a gang dominated neighbourhood? No joke intended but it sounds like you live in the wild west. Do you really, personally, witness or experience so much crime or is everyone just paranoid of being mugged by armed assailants?

None of the above. But if you could carry a device not much bigger than a cell phone that could potentially save your life one day - why wouldn't you?

I have to ask where you live, because your apparent ignorance of urban societies baffles me.

I live in a very rural area. I could be unarmed because crime rarely happens (most are crimes of opportunity where someone will steal your mower because you are not home to stop them). However, if someone came to my door with ill intent, there is zero chance of the authorities being near to protect me, so I keep arms. Someone comes up my drive I'm not expecting, I keep an eye out.

If I lived in the city, crime is higher, and it isn't hard for a criminal to stage a "hit and run" where they could do something and be gone before the police arrive...even if the neighbor called 911 as soon as the bad guy showed up at my door. Again, a reason to keep arms.

You make this "wild west" comment, but the truth is that the modern "west" is more civil than most cities on the eastern seaboard. "Home invasion" robberies where the criminals raid a house in gear emblazoned with "POLICE" on it are too common.

None of this is the product of a "gun culture." These criminals can get guns without abiding any of the legal safeguards in place to curb gun violence. If you could magically take away their guns, they'd just show up armed with aluminum baseball bats/clubs and do what they wish...relying on larger numbers to intimidate their victims.

I lived 45 years in various towns/cities in England and the last 8 years in rural France. I've never been the victim of a mugging and never witnessed one. I've never seen anyone with a gun (other than police or farmers hunting - I used to own a shotgun for that purpose myself). The only violence I've seen was 30 odd years ago and that was just fist fights between drunks at pub closing time. I'm not saying that the UK and France are free of muggings and violent crime but I haven't led a particularly sheltered life which leads me to think that violent crime must be much more prevalent in America than the UK or France. It is something that never occurs to me while I'm out and about or at home - I similarly don't think about the possibility of a plane hitting my home or being killed by a falling tree. We must live in different worlds.

In reality - probably not. While I believe violent crime is higher in US on a macro level, on a micro level I don't think it affects the individual probabilities of being involved in a specific violent crime on a micro level.

Having said that, I carry a gun not because I *expect* to be the victim of a violent crime, but because I want to be prepared if it happens. It's the same reason I carry a tool chest in my car with tools to fix car issues, computer issues, and wiring issues. I don't expect to take a drive out to a friends house and have to fix a computer, but I have the tools available in case I do.