Gary Younge on America’s gun obsession

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Finally, someone said it! Take guns and huge pickup trucks with super bright headlights that allow you to see a raccoon's anus from 50 miles away but blind oncoming traffic, put two and two together...well, you get the idea. Especially in the southern and interior western states.

However, I can understand DFK's point about self-defense. I don't own any guns and don't plan to, but that would be the only justification people should have for owning one.

There’s a direct correlation with obesity rates. Obese men lose inches of their peen internally as their gut protrudes. Seriously.

That’s the thing though, people have been made to believe they’re safer having a gun for self defence but statistically they’re not. They just feel better and all those extra guns add to gun accidents, suicides, crimes etc.

Last edited by goldfish21 on 18 Jan 2023, 8:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Well I guess the Canadians have convinced me and people like my mom will just have to rely on the corrupt, racist, misogynistic American police for protection... the same police whom the progressives also wish to defund or abolish altogether. That outta make victims of domestic violence, rape, stalking, and people who live in bad neighborhoods where burglaries during the daytime are frequently common feel MUCH safer like Canada!

Exactly!

We also have rough neighbourhoods. Go to the random forum and read my thread about the worst street in North America - where I was last night.. where my friend was gripping a hatchet behind his door at 5:30am while neighbouring rooms were being home invaded & then there was a homicide discovered at 7am a few buildings down - possibly by the same couple guys.

Yet that neighbourhood is Not full of guns and there aren’t very many shootings because we just don’t have guns all over the place everywhere. There are Some guns and shootings, but because there are few guns there are few shootings. If everyone was packing there would be hella fun violence all the time like in many American cities. Simple facts.

Yeah, we would just have more stabbing or beating related deaths.

Oh my little Canadian there's so much you don't understand the human spirit it is a hard thing to kill.


...even with a chainsaw.

https://youtu.be/7eMK2lA1CMA

I'm not sure that reducing police budgets, limiting police to police work and using the saved money to hire other people to ensure police don't end up doing non-police work is going to make things worse.

Canada also has the same problems with police (minus the multiplier of American cops assuming everyone is carrying a gun). Somehow we manage to address those problems with different solutions; possibly related, we have far less issues related to heavily armed criminals, fewer mass shootings per capita, etc.

I know we all have autism and are all prone to this in some categories, but you're looking at it in a far too black and white manner. A state has to balance the self-defence and recreation aspects against public health costs. As a hypothetical, it would be nice if things could work the way ammosexuals insist (I say this as someone who was one 20 years ago); they just don't, at least not in the US (and I'm not sure that experiment would go better here either).

It's really not the average progressive who's after abolishing the police, certainly not in the short-term. Besides, it's not just progressives who would insist that one should try to operate within rule of law. That (for better or worse) means involving the state in one's disputes related to other's criminal behaviour against them vs. settling them on one's own. The more self-reliant people become in that matter, the more likely a society will devolve from rule of law to an honour society.

Honour societies exist where rule of law doesn't, but they can also cause make law enforcement become effectively impossible. Once vendettas and corruption become the norm it's really hard to eliminate how they impact a region's development. This is often a big factor in what makes a bad neighbourhood bad or why some countries seem to be unable to break out of lawlessness.

If you want examples of how it impacts a region, look at how bootleggers or other organized crime impact the communities they operate within. Now think of that, but instead of just the criminals, that's how most people seek justice.

I don't mean to present that as though it's a slippery slope, but only to remind you of why we still prefer such a clearly flawed institution over the alternative that would emerge in a vacuum. In order to abolish police another institution would need to be built before that can occur, ideally one focused on restorative and reconciliatory justice.

Stabbings and beatings take more effort and require a greater personal investment. Gun violence in media often reduces it to pew pew bad guys fall over and that probably plays a role in why spree killers choose self-loading carbines as their weapon of choice, when available. When they're not available, you typically have far fewer spree killers.

That's not inherently an argument for banning them though, just merely a cause and effect relationship. We had far fewer road accidents before automobiles, but that's not an argument to ban automobiles.

The problem isn't always the headlights themselves, sometimes they're poorly adjusted. Often the lift-kit is the real culprit.

Fist fights & beatings are rarely fatal. Gunfights on the other hand..

People don’t get into fist fights and then best people to death almost ever. Totally false to say that without guns in the equation that people just bludgeon each other to death with their bare hands. Fights/beatings happen, but then that’s the end of it - maybe ending with an injury or a maimed leg or whatever, but not typically with a hole through one’s body.

Try being a 100 pound female being beaten to death by a 250 pound man.

But seriously... WHY are you guys being so outright dismissive towards the fact that many women in this country like my own mom who have dealt with spousal abuse, rape, and stalking are not going to be safer regardless of what this idiot on youtube claims?

I'm starting to sense some serious misogyny here...

Who's dismissive of that? Where has that actually been dismissed?

Why do you seem so dedicated to dismissing all other concerns, as though that one concern by itself makes all others irrelevant?

You're all misogynists because you think American gun culture is an exceptional problem isn't really grounded in reality. You can do better.

Is a pathetic attempt at gaslighting me seriously the best you guys can come up with?

I'm getting to the point where I despise progressives just as much as I do the Cult of Trump. Because your plans for fixing my country are never based in reality either and you refuse to hear otherwise.

So, what's your solution?

How would you reconcile the various concerns in a realistic manner, because so far what I've seen is that with complicated issues you throw your hands up in the air, declare no solution exists and sink into misanthropy.

So, do you have a solution or do you just intend on complaining about proposed solutions with nothing more than dishonest personal attacks?

:ketchup chips:

Nothing much more to add that funeral hasn’t already said.

DFK is simply choosing to ignore the facts and statistics this thread is about.

Let people who are responsible with their firearms KEEP their firearms, and ignore progressives like you two.

Ooh yeah, I said it.

Last edited by magz on 19 Jan 2023, 2:20 am, edited 1 time in total.: offensive term removed