Toronto Votes For A Total Ban On Handgun Sales After Mass Shooting
140 replies, posted
I was hoping for something like this and I really hope that everyone who advocates for gun rights also advocates for what you've said there. If gun peeps don't argue for those public programs (along with the means of implementing them) (or a valid alternative) are just spouting hot air imo.
It's sorta weird that the "socially progressive" politicians seem to want no guns whilst the "guns for toddler" types seem to want no public spending. I feel it'll stay that way because its politicised. Politicians exploit peoples attitude toward guns to boost their career without actually suggesting solutions. It's a shame that there isn't a bigger pro-gun/gun neutral progressive movement.
All that said I'm from the UK, I don't want guns being available here, I go shooting but I like being safe. We have knife crime, if guns were more common that knife crime would likely be gun crime. That won't work in the US coz of your borders + abundance of guns.
US is a special case, gun culture is deeply rooted and embed in United States. Not so much for other countries. Hence removing firearms in many places is more logical and easier than that of United States.
We had gun crime in the 50s and 60s, but given how my country is a small island, and strict, banning guns are an easy task. I'm happy with this rule of law here, and of course, its alot harder depending on your country's history and geography.
Its funny because we are one of the most heavily armed countries (well the army) for one with such strict rules and regulations. But you can still shoot, only at a range.
Until you get mugged by someone with a gun and can't defend yourself, you fucking idiot.
Handguns are already restricted in Canada. To own a handgun legally in Canada you need a restricted firearms license, and you generally need to be a member of a shooting club to even be eligible for a restricted license. And then restricted firearms can only be legally fired at ranges and you need permission from your provinces chief firearms officer to even legally be able to transport them. If that hasn't stopped criminals getitng their hands on handguns in Toronto neither will this.
Lmao find me someone with a gun in Singapore first.
Exactly, what we don't need is people from halfway around the world claiming to know everything about what happens here.
If someone's already pointing a gun at you it's kinda too late to pull out your own. In fact, they're probably more likely to shoot you the moment you put your hand in your pocket if they think you have a gun.
Fair enough. A bunch of people on the pro gun side have been suggesting things in the past though, such as CatBarf’s post a while back:
-Allocate the DoJ funds specifically for prosecution of straw purchase, the #1 source of illegal firearms, but which they currently lack the resources to pursue.
-Allocate the ATF funds specifically for prosecution of unscrupulous FFL holders, the #2 source of illegal firearms, but which they currently lack the resources to pursue.
-Raise liability on stolen firearms, or introduce safe storage laws.
-Further restrict handguns, the overwhelmingly most common weapons used in crime.
-Open the NICS to non-FFLs, then mandate background checks on all sales.
-Fix the broken interaction between state and federal databases (due to HIPAA) which often causes mental issues to not be reported to the federal background check system.
-Address suicide in some meaningful capacity. Address gang violence in some meaningful capacity. These are the social issues that are the most common root causes of gun violence.
The biggest problem is the loudest voices including the politicians themselves on both sides of the issue are being absolutely mind numbingly retarded.
The NRA attempts to protect gun rights, but also blindly supports the GOP’s dumb stances on social issues which will lead to exacerbating the problem with gun crime. On the other end, the social policies of the Democratic Party would naturally decrease the likelihood of gun crime, but they lose votes and support from constantly antagonize gun owners in every way imaginable and consistently wasting their political capital on attempting to pass bad anti-gun legislation which harms everyone and benefits no one.
If Democrats just shut the fuck up about guns they would have no problem winning elections.
Then they could institute social policies that would naturally curb crime without having to wage a proxy war against the second amendment.
End war on drugs, fix wage gap, fix wealth distribution, proper societal safety nets, normalize abortion, support an end to poverty, normalize mental health issues, proper universal healthcare that doesnt involve copays or deductibles, ect. The gun crime problem is an incredibly complex one, but its solution isnt easy and it doesnt involve getting rid of guns.
Only on Facepunch will you see people comparing gun rights to slavery. Slavery was never a right in the US.
Sometimes I think it's one of those Urban vs Rural divides, Democrats are urban and Republicans are rural. Urban folk have little care for firearms, even dislike for them because most people that use them are crooks. But then I remember Democrats just keep reintroducing the Assault Weapons Ban and that does absolutely nothing to stop inner-city crooks from shooting people. So either Democrats are shamelessly lying through their teeth about one of their most passionate issues, or they're actually just completely clueless about it. Either way, this makes them, in my opinion, completely unqualified for writing gun control legislation.
Well personally I don't think it's a coincidence that they continuously propose legislation that would be ineffective at significantly reducing firearm deaths.
We have to remember that any institution designed to solve a problem benefits most when the problem continues to exist, and politicians need energized voters to obtain office and remain there. Look at the massive rallies and marches and protests all supporting increased gun legislation that won't actually solve anything but makes the people protesting feel good about "doing something" (even though the only thing accomplished would be a reduction in freedoms). When the only gun legislation proposed is quantifiably trash but it's the only proposal, people will vote for it because they see it as the only solution in front of them (the """common sense""" solution). All those people are passionate and are likely going to vote democrat because of the gun violence issue. If the democrats actually passed something that significantly reduced gun deaths, regardless of how it impacted freedoms and liberties, then it would hurt the democrats in the long run because now the gun violence issue isn't as significant and therefore will not energize people to go vote for them. Because of this, it is in the democrats best interest to not solve the gun violence issue.
I think its a combination of both. Some of them want ineffectual policies to undermine the 2A for idealistic reasons, and others genuinely want to help but are just completely misguided and misinformed on the subject.
I dislike both parties to be honest. That idealistic fortitude so many democrats are proud of hurts their party more than it helps, and the misinformed ones have absolutely no excuse to be lacking on a subject during the most prolific access to information in human history. Both of those groups genuinely suck at should reevaluate their standing in their parties.
Perhaps it's more about gun culture than gun ownership.
If you look at countries like Switzerland, yes there's a large amount of guns but they're much more tightly regulated and generally has less of a gun culture.
The fact that America has areas with levels of poverty unheard of in other developed countries doesn't help either, I imagine.
Quit perpetuating this gun culture boogieman. Gun culture is just gun proliferation, thats literally all it is. So either say you incorrectly think that gun proliferation causes death or state otherwise. Quit blaming a boogieman you have no concept of.
Switzerland has a gun culture as prolific as the US does. They have government sponsored programs to get children into shooting sports, not even the US has that. They have some of the most active shooting competitions in the world, and you're gonna say theres no gun culture there? Yea OK dood.
Poverty does not attribute to the problem of gun crime, it IS the problem.
But no, please, keep perpetuating the lie that hobby culture is what causes people to die.
And Switzerland has a very different gun culture from the US.
Quit using Switzerland as a model to defend US's gun culture.
The guy who shot a bunch of people from his hotel wasn't poor and neither are most of those school shooters, granted mass shootings are a minor part of gun crime but they are a very visible part. So mental stuff is also worth considering instead of just poverty.
Personally I think "culture" does come into it, not people hobby shooting or collecting; but the idea of a gun being associated with power, independence and arguably masculinity (of the toxic variety).
Not using Switzerland to defend anything, merely pointing out that Switzerland has a gun culture and it's just as much an issue as the US' gun culture; see: none. Again, quit forcing this boogieman idea when you have absolutely no perspective on the issue. You very clearly proved yourself unqualified to discuss this issue with your very first post in this thread. Maybe go do some actual reading beyond news headlines.
Do you focus on the visible part thats less than 1% of an issue, or the invisible part thats 99% of an issue? I don't know about you, but I'm not worried about marketing when it comes to gun crime. Poverty is a bigger part of violent crime than mental health is, unless you bring up suicides.
None of those people who are affected by ~toxic masculinity~ end up as mass shooters or just shooters in general. The vast majority of gun crime is gang driven or gun driven. They're not done because of a power trip and because a man feels independent, they're done for other more sinister reasons.
And again, gun culture is merely gun proliferation. Things like powertrips and toxic masculinity exist outside of the borders for what can be considered gun culture.
Because people are attacking the "gun culture" ghost, I'm gonna repost my piece on it from a while back:
I just really disagree with you here, maybe that perspective seems true to you from an outsiders pov gleaning their information from biased media, but honestly gun culture isn't just a bunch of macho men. We just want people to defend themselves from dangerous people and enjoy independence - full stop. Machismo has nothing to do with it. Obviously there are exceptions and we laugh at those exceptions within the community because it's kind of pathetic, for instance [URL="http://static.thefrisky.com/uploads/2012/12/17/bushmaster-ad1-600x450.jpg"]this advertisement here[/URL] was passed around and laughed at by many gun owners. But that's just a company trying to tap into every demographic possible to increase sales including the emasculated demographic. But honestly, if you go to a gun store, they aren't going to give a damn who you are. [URL="http://www.pinkpistols.org/about-the-pink-pistols/"]Ever heard of the pink pistols?[/URL]
If you care about freedom and self preservation, people in the gun community will treat you great and you can shoot with anyone no matter what you look like or act like. Taking responsibility for protecting yourself isn't a "macho trait" nor is it incompatible with liberal society, it seems to me incredibly liberal and liberating to say that you can defend yourself and enjoy the hobbies you want to enjoy. Gun culture is independence, history, geeking out about modifications, shooting competitions, and having a nice day at the range. That is gun culture in it's modern American form, although CNN would love to tell you otherwise. Please don't let some uninformed trash lead you to believe that American gun culture is "typically macho" or incompatible with some idealized society.
If the US didn't have a gun culture, you wouldn't see ads for them all over the place like i do in the south, people buying loads of them for hobbies, or gun clubs out the ass. Saying its a "boogie man" or "ghost" doesn't make it go away, America has always had a huge hardon for guns and violence. Just look at American action movies from the 70s-today. Not that i'm trying to paint it in a negative light, just calling it nonexistent is just plain wrong.
I think a major difference between switz gun culture and American is solely government backed vs commercialism.
Literally nobody is saying gun culture doesn't exist. People are saying that gun culture is not a villain, boogieman, evil creature, ect. It exits but it's completely mundane and neutral. As I've said previously, gun culture is just the proliferation of guns, not the proliferation of violence.
Using action movies as evidence of gun culture violence is just dumb. Most gun nerds dislike those movies because of the gross misrepresentation of guns, and sometimes gun owners overall, in those movies.
If you want to say that America has a culture for violence, I'd disagree with you but fine, but don't lump it in with gun control.
But guns and violence goes hand in hand obviously. To me American gun culture is extremely toxic compared to other nations due to how we treat them. A lot of nations see them as mainly a weapon with the benefits of target shooting as a side benefit. Here people are more than willing to just say its a hobby first and defense second. Thats mainly due to the commercial aspect with fear, strength, nationalism being a really great source for advertising compared to the drab black and white government backing.
Btw movies made by a nation often tell the culture of said nation. You can absolutely look back on American film and see gun/violent culture in media.
If you knew anything about the subject you would know thats not true. Theres between 300 million and a billion guns in the US, and 30,000ish are used in crimes every year, and 10,000 of which are violent murders instead of suicides. Are you really going to claim that guns are violent when .0000333_% to .000001% of said item are used in crimes a year? You could of course get statistics for people shot instead of outright murdered if you wanted to get a marginally larger sub-1% number, but the point stands.
Guns are no inherently violent weapons. It seems like the obvious conclusion, but when the vast vast vast vast vast majority of firearms in a nation are used in a non-violent manner, you cant really say that.
I would argue that guns are mainly bought for self defense and hobby shooting secondarily.
I dont think Ive ever read of a gun manufacturer going to a movie or video game to ask that they show off their product. I've also never heard of a video game paying a firearms manufacturer to produce their fictional firearm for resale.
Guns are a tough thing to advertise for because of how polarizing they are. You dont tend to see ads for them unless youre on a gun/hunting specific website or TV channel. You certainly dont see it in movies or video games.
Are you fucking serious?
No inanimate object is violent dude.
Don't fight too hard on that, because it's not something you'll win.
I didn't say the guns themselves are violent.
Your initial post before the edit is just shock that someone doesn't agree with you that guns are violent objects
Guns aren't violent objects.
Yes, they exist for violent purposes. Oh well. That doesn't bother me, and isn't really in and of itself, the issue.
The issue is the prevalance of violence due to certain issues causing the violence. I'm far more worried about the cause of the illness than the symptoms.
Gun Violence is an issue, but it is one that has been on the decline for decades. It however, doesn't seem that way because the media feeds us a line of absolute horseshit on this story constantly.
Gun Violence has seen a dramatic reduction over the last few decades. No piece of legislation is responsible for this.
I got into this with someone in the last big gun thread. You can get much deadlier weapons in Switzerland much much easier and guns are not much harder to purchase in Switzerland than in the US, easier in some ways even. Switzerland is the proof that readily available guns and frequent violence do not go hand in hand and no, it isn't some magical exception to a rule, either.
I don't think gun culture is responsible for the vast majority of gun deaths, and banning guns isn't going to stop gun crime completely, but surely it would have some effect when random joe blow can't easily acquire one.
But "My hobby is more important than even the slightest reduction in gun crime, we should try to address the more important issues that will take vastly more time first" seems to be the popular opinion here
There's a lot of areas in which you can hobble individual freedom for a slight positive impact on any number of statistics. Where do you draw the line when you start doing this? Joe Blow legally buying a gun and using it to blow away his drinking buddy for banging his wife is head over heels less common than poverty-motivated stickup-turned-murders.
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