Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
There are a lot of people who don't have driver's licenses because, for various reasons, they've lost their privileges to have one, could not pass a driver's test and other reasons. Thus, requiring a driver's license does screen out some potential bad drivers. Not all of them, but some. If we required potential gun purchases to jump through some pretty steep hoops in order to qualify for purchasing a gun, then we could similarly prevent some additional wackos from buying them. Not all, but some.
We already have hoops to jump through to buy guns. And if someone were intent on using a car as a deadly weapon, a lack of a license would not stop them.
Quote:
I just addressed this: bus man noted that guns are superior weapons compared to knives, cars and poison. That's why he didn't want to have to use those as a defensive weapon and wanted to use a gun instead. But guns' superiority as a defensive weapon also makes them superior as an offensive weapon ... which is precisely why people like me want to see them restricted.
But guns aren’t actually a superior offensive weapon. The worst school massacre in US history occurred in Michigan in 1927. 38 children and 6 adults were murdered. The perpetrator blew up a school. Explosives and arson are far more deadly than a single shooter, and yet you yourself said you would not restrict the sale of the these items. You need to research, and not just keep hyperventilating about guns.
There are a lot of people who don't have driver's licenses because, for various reasons, they've lost their privileges to have one, could not pass a driver's test and other reasons. Thus, requiring a driver's license does screen out some potential bad drivers. Not all of them, but some.
Most drivers who have killed someone had a legal drivers license.
I just addressed this: bus man noted that guns are superior weapons compared to knives, cars and poison. That's why he didn't want to have to use those as a defensive weapon and wanted to use a gun instead. But guns' superiority as a defensive weapon also makes them superior as an offensive weapon ... which is precisely why people like me want to see them restricted.
You are misinterpreting what I wrote. This is what I wrote:
Quote:
Originally Posted by bus man
Is this a serious question? Cars and knives and gasoline can be used as offensive weapons. They are much less effective as defensive weapons in almost every situation, especially when one is being opposed by someone with a gun.
Look again at the differentiation between offensive and defensive weapons. If you're coming at me with a knife or a can of gasoline, I'd want to have a gun to defend myself, mainly because I have a good chance of neutralizing the threat before you get too close to me to use your weapons against me. But if I wanted to kill a large number of people, I could do much, much "better" (i.e. worse) with a can of gasoline than with any gun. One single can of gasoline, and a match, killed 87 people in the Happy Land Social Club in New York in 1990. No gun attack, not even that horrible shooting spree in Las Vegas, has ever come close.
We already have hoops to jump through to buy guns. And if someone were intent on using a car as a deadly weapon, a lack of a license would not stop them.
I agree one already has to jump through hoops to purchase a gun, but as incidents like the one in Texas we're talking about, those are clearly not enough. IMO a more systematic licensing system with pretty stringent requirements for being able to buy a gun, plus the possibility of rescinding the license if the licensee were to violate some of the conditions, would do a better job than the current system.
Quote:
But guns aren’t actually a superior offensive weapon. The worst school massacre in US history occurred in Michigan in 1927. 38 children and 6 adults were murdered. The perpetrator blew up a school. Explosives and arson are far more deadly than a single shooter, and yet you yourself said you would not restrict the sale of the these items. You need to research, and not just keep hyperventilating about guns.
The fact you have to go all the way back to 1927 to find an example of a mass school shooting where the murder didn't use a gun disproves your claim. If explosives were such a superior weapon with which to conduct a mass murder, then we would see a lot more mass murders done with explosives, and a lot fewer with guns. But no ... the reason we don't see many mass murders done with explosives is because they're difficult and/or expensive to construct, and in fact you have to construct one in the first place at all, which most people don't have the skills for, and so on. Guns, on the other hand, are relatively easy to use, relatively inexpensive to purchase, relatively easy to purchase, you don't have to construct it yourself, you can target specific people rather than just causing general destruction of some area, and that latter point demonstrates something else: The guys that do this are sickos and probably part of their thrill is the firing of the gun and watching the people scream in terror. If you just drop a bomb somewhere it's a much more distant and dispassionate experience and probably not as much "fun" for the sicko as shooting up a bunch of people.
You are misinterpreting what I wrote. This is what I wrote:
Look again at the differentiation between offensive and defensive weapons. If you're coming at me with a knife or a can of gasoline, I'd want to have a gun to defend myself, mainly because I have a good chance of neutralizing the threat before you get too close to me to use your weapons against me. But if I wanted to kill a large number of people, I could do much, much "better" (i.e. worse) with a can of gasoline than with any gun. One single can of gasoline, and a match, killed 87 people in the Happy Land Social Club in New York in 1990. No gun attack, not even that horrible shooting spree in Las Vegas, has ever come close.
I'm simply going to repeat what I just wrote for calgirl:
If explosives were such a superior weapon with which to conduct a mass murder, then we would see a lot more mass murders done with explosives, and a lot fewer with guns. But no ... the reason we don't see many mass murders done with explosives is because they're difficult and/or expensive to construct, and in fact you have to construct one in the first place at all, which most people don't have the skills for, and so on. Guns, on the other hand, are relatively easy to use, relatively inexpensive to purchase, relatively easy to purchase, you don't have to construct it yourself, you can target specific people rather than just causing general destruction of some area, and that latter point demonstrates something else: The guys that do this are sickos and probably part of their thrill is the firing of the gun and watching the people scream in terror. If you just drop a bomb somewhere it's a much more distant and dispassionate experience and probably not as much "fun" for the sicko as shooting up a bunch of people.
So, as I said, yes, guns are a superior weapon. For the same reason you'd prefer to have a gun as a defensive weapon, murderers would prefer to have a gun for an offensive weapon. They are more precise, easy to carry and conceal, very quick and easy to use, and so on. If they weren't superior weapons with which to commit mass murder, there wouldn't be so many mass murders done with guns, and there would be more mas murders done with explosives or other devices.
I agree one already has to jump through hoops to purchase a gun, but as incidents like the one in Texas we're talking about, those are clearly not enough. IMO a more systematic licensing system with pretty stringent requirements for being able to buy a gun, plus the possibility of rescinding the license if the licensee were to violate some of the conditions, would do a better job than the current system.
Why do you always want to unfairly burden law abiding mentally stable people?
We need better mental health care, not more laws.
If laws were actually useful, we would only need ONE law, against murder.
Quote:
The fact you have to go all the way back to 1927 to find an example of a mass school shooting where the murder didn't use a gun disproves your claim. If explosives were such a superior weapon with which to conduct a mass murder, then we would see a lot more mass murders done with explosives, and a lot fewer with guns. But no ... the reason we don't see many mass murders done with explosives is because they're difficult and/or expensive to construct, and in fact you have to construct one in the first place at all, which most people don't have the skills for, and so on.
Lawdy, but you can’t see the forest for the trees. I “didn’t have to go all the way back to 1927”; that was the deadliest school massacre in history and no guns were used. That is the point.
168 people were killed by the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. By contrast, 50 were killed in the Orlando nightclub shooting. More people can be killed quickly by bombings…
…and by the way, bombings are a method of choice in Europe and the Middle East, you know where it’s all safe because guns are restricted (/s).
Why do you always want to unfairly burden law abiding mentally stable people?
If they're mentally stable and law abiding, they should not object to jumping through some additional hoops if the existence of those additional hoops means that some nutcases will be unable to buy a gun, and in turn, that some people's lives will be saved.
Quote:
We need better mental health care, not more laws.
It is impossible to find and screen out every single nutcase. Some of these nutcases haven't even set off that many alarms other than maybe being a bit of a loner. Do we force every loner to submit to psychiatric care? How would we do that? We have a hard time getting a lot of people to get a friggin Covid shot, imagine the uproar that will ensue if we start trying to force every loner to go get a psychiatric examination? Plus, the great majority of loners are harmless.
The fact is, it's easier to place restrictions on who can buy a gun than it is to try to identify every person who might be a bit off psychologically and thus a potential mass murder threat.
Quote:
If laws were actually useful, we would only need ONE law, against murder.
You're again suggesting the bizarre mantra of don't make any laws if they can't be 100% effective.
Quote:
Lawdy, but you can’t see the forest for the trees. I “didn’t have to go all the way back to 1927”; that was the deadliest school massacre in history and no guns were used. That is the point.
168 people were killed by the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. By contrast, 50 were killed in the Orlando nightclub shooting. More people can be killed quickly by bombings…
…and by the way, bombings are a method of choice in Europe and the Middle East, you know where it’s all safe because guns are restricted (/s).
You've completely avoided my point about the relative frequency of the two methods: Why aren't mass murders with explosives more common than mass murders with guns, if indeed explosives are a superior killing method? If there's 1 mass murder with explosives every 10 years or whatever, and that kills an average of 30 people each ... for every one of those there are 50 mass murders with guns that kill an average of, like, 5 or 10 people. So in 10 years you get 30 people killed by explosives, but at least 250 killed with guns. Or on that order. So it is the guns which are really more deadly in aggregate.
Once again, the relative frequency of the two methods tells you that guns are the superior mass murdering method.
Abd BTW, the murder rate in most of Europe is lower than in the US, so you've proven my point.
It is impossible to find and screen out every single nutcase. Some of these nutcases haven't even set off that many alarms other than maybe being a bit of a loner. Do we force every loner to submit to psychiatric care? How would we do that?
Well, that’s our government’s approach to airplanes. Little kids and little old ladies have to take off their shoes and go through full body scans because they might be terrorists. Better search my suitcase in random checks and throw out my makeup that was .2 ounces over because it might actually be a bomb.
We should be looking for terrorists, not assuming everyone wants to blow up a plane because they have a too big of a tube of toothpaste.
Anyway, yes, some people need to be committed. Why are you making excuses for not having better mental health care?
Quote:
You're again suggesting the bizarre mantra of don't make any laws if they can't be 100% effective.
Don’t roll your eyes at me. We have gun laws already. We have laws against murder already. We have laws against illegal drugs and illegal entry and robberies. We’ve added hate crimes.
How is that working out?
You know the saying about insanity, that it is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. That is what you are proposing.
Quote:
You've completely avoided my point about the relative frequency of the two methods: Why aren't mass murders with explosives more common than mass murders with guns, if indeed explosives are a superior killing method? If there's 1 mass murder with explosives every 10 years or whatever, and that kills an average of 30 people each ... for every one of those there are 50 mass murders with guns that kill an average of, like, 5 or 10 people. So in 10 years you get 30 people killed by explosives, but at least 250 killed with guns. Or on that order. So it is the guns which are really more deadly in aggregate.
Once again, the relative frequency of the two methods tells you that guns are the superior mass murdering method.
Oh please. Now you are just making stuff up.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
