And again... (Another US Shooting)

Tecumsehsbones

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Yeah, why bother? It's not like having rational practical discussion in a functioning democracy will do any good. It's just not worth the effort.

Besides, it's much more self-satisfying to jump on the internet and screech and complain about it, now that's progress.
It's not progress, but "having rational practical discussion in a functioning democracy," in point of fact, doesn't do any good.

I speak from experience. Assuming the U.S. is a functioning democracy.
 
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Decapoda

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It's not progress, but "having rational practical discussion in a functioning democracy," in point of fact, doesn't do any good.
Definitely not, especially if the discussion doesn't happen. So we just need to learn to live with this shit and stop complaining (not referring to you.)
Assuming the U.S. is a functioning democracy.
There you go identifying one of the problems...and you just finished saying this was a waste of time.

BTW, I'm not necessarily saying I think more debate will solve the problem, but I do think we'd all be better off and might actually make progress beyond petty tribal jousting if people just took some time to educate themselves, explore what the actual problems might be and take a position on the facts rather than simply blaming guns, and screaming & demonizing "the other side." The only people to gain from this are politicians.
 
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Tecumsehsbones

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Definitely not, especially if the discussion doesn't happen. So we just need to learn to live with this shit and stop complaining (not referring to you.)
The discussion has happened. Repeatedly since Columbine. And the only effect has been further relaxation of gun laws.
There you go identifying one of the problems...and you just finished saying this was a waste of time.
It is. "To save a fool from his folly, the gods themselves contend in vain."

I will say that, except on a purely abstract level, I really don't much give a shit if a bunch of little kids in Texas get lit up.
 

taxslave

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It's not progress, but "having rational practical discussion in a functioning democracy," in point of fact, doesn't do any good.

I speak from experience. Assuming the U.S. is a functioning democracy.
Your last sentence pretty much sums up the problem. I don't believe either of our countries have truly functioning democracies. About the closest we have gotten in quite some time is mob rule, which many assume means the same thing as democratic.
 

Serryah

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Yeah, why bother? It's not like having rational practical discussion in a functioning democracy will do any good. It's just not worth the effort.

Besides, it's much more self-satisfying to jump on the internet and screech and complain about it, now that's progress.

*sigh*

Okay. Fine, I'll 'play' again.

1. Background checks - if for ANY reason you should not have a gun, that's an instant "you don't get a gun". That includes Domestic abuse, threats of violence, threats of killing people, etc. If you've committed any crime with a gun before, at ANY age, you don't get a gun at LEAST until you're checked out and can prove you won't repeat that issue. If you have a history of mental illness, you don't get a gun because there is no guarantee that you will stay on your meds/are on your meds. Which leads to:

2. Mental illness - IF you have any kind of anti-social behaviour, have tried suicide in the past, have any kind of extreme illness like schitzophrenia or Bi-polarism, you don't get a gun because it's usually someone in those categories that tends to be violent.

3. Red Flag laws - Someone shows up as a 'red flag' in ANY state, they don't get to purchase a gun. If any of the above pops up on a computer in South Dakota about Joe Flow from Florida, they don't get to sell a gun to Joe.

4. Age - you can't legally get alcohol until you're 21, you can't rent a car until you're 25, and depending on the state getting your driver's licence as a teen requires more hoops than getting a gun does. So no more kids allowed to buy guns without a PROVEN parent/guardian being with them. (This new guy? According to his grandfather from what I read he was a FELON already, should NEVER have been able to touch a gun, but someone ELSE took him to get said guns, so...). IMO at LEAST 21 to actually be able to purchase your own gun. This also ties into:

5. How to get a gun - you have to jump through hoops galore to get a gun, in ANY manner. Online, in a store, at some sort of 'sale event'/convention or whatever, the most someone there at those events can do is take your name and 'stats' to check on you before you get anything in your hands. But you have to PROVE you are not a threat to society at large.

6. Licence - that is renewed just like anything else.

I could go on but this is enough for now, most likely?
 
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Tecumsehsbones

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Well, if you're gonna play, I can hardly stand on the sidelines, can I?

1. No further importation of foreign-made firearms. If their people can't have them, why should they make money from our blood?

2. No further sale or transfer of any firearm capable of accepting a detachable box magazine. If you can't get the job done with a lever-action, a bolt-action, a pump-action shotgun, a semi-auto with a fixed magazine holding no more than 10 rounds, or a revolver, you're too bad a shot to own a gun anyhow.

3. Ownership and carriage of handguns at the discretion of the government, and available only to people with the equivalent background check to that of a Top Secret security clearance, or to members of the militia, defined as police officers, firearms-licensed security guards, or members of the state National Guard. Those persons pay for the privilege by being available for call-up as needed in cases of riot, civil insurrection, or natural or man-made disaster.

4. Ammunition kept in the home limited to 20 rounds. If you want to pop off 100 rounds, you buy it at the range and use it there. If you do the kind of hunting that requires 20+ rounds, you show a license and get special permission, limited in time. All ammo sales tracked via internet.

5. All illegal weapons seized by law enforcement at any level are to be destroyed, not auctioned off nor kept as keepsakes by the cops.

6. Mandatory training for all persons who wish to own a firearm. Two weeks, in residence, at the expense of the applicant.

7. Persons convicted of felonies of any kind or misdemeanors in which violence is involved lose all right to own a gun for life. (Exception for simple assault in a hand-to-hand fight, provided no weapons of any kind were used. Shows the right mindset.)

8. Seizure of weapons in any case of a mental-health hold or a civil case or application of a protective order where violence or a reasonable threat of violence is involved. Return of weapons at the discretion of the judge supervising the case.

And that's the lot. Keeps pissed-off teenagers from buying high-capacity weapons, reload times on the weapons permitted gives potential victims time to fight or flee, and sharply reduces handguns, which are used in 95% of firearms homicides in the U.S. Expensive? You bet. That's the point.
 
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Serryah

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Well, if you're gonna play, I can hardly stand on the sidelines, can I?

1. No further importation of foreign-made firearms. If their people can't have them, why should they make money from our blood?

2. No further sale or transfer of any firearm capable of accepting a detachable box magazine. If you can't get the job done with a lever-action, a bolt-action, a pump-action shotgun, a semi-auto with a fixed magazine holding no more than 10 rounds, or a revolver, you're too bad a shot to own a gun anyhow.

3. Ownership and carriage of handguns at the discretion of the government, and available only to people with the equivalent background check to that of a Top Secret security clearance, or to members of the militia, defined as police officers, firearms-licensed security guards, or members of the state National Guard. Those persons pay for the privilege by being available for call-up as needed in cases of riot, civil insurrection, or natural or man-made disaster.

4. Ammunition kept in the home limited to 20 rounds. If you want to pop off 100 rounds, you buy it at the range and use it there. If you do the kind of hunting that requires 20+ rounds, you show a license and get special permission, limited in time. All ammo sales tracked via internet.

5. All illegal weapons seized by law enforcement at any level are to be destroyed, not auctioned off nor kept as keepsakes by the cops.

6. Mandatory training for all persons who wish to own a firearm. Two weeks, in residence, at the expense of the applicant.

7. Persons convicted of felonies of any kind or misdemeanors in which violence is involved lose all right to own a gun for life. (Exception for simple assault in a hand-to-hand fight, provided no weapons of any kind were used. Shows the right mindset.)

8. Seizure of weapons in any case of a mental-health hold or a civil case or application of a protective order where violence or a reasonable threat of violence is involved. Return of weapons at the discretion of the judge supervising the case.

And that's the lot. Keeps pissed-off teenagers from buying high-capacity weapons, reload times on the weapons permitted gives potential victims time to fight or flee, and sharply reduces handguns, which are used in 95% of firearms homicides in the U.S. Expensive? You bet. That's the point.

Okay so here's a situation/scenerio for you TB.

Person with mental issues (Borderline Personality Disorder, Social Anxiety) convicted of a felony trespass (and made online comments about how it's "bad" they can't go wherever they wish, and thought the situation that required several enforcement agencies to apprehend the person was "funny"), has mental health history including suicide threats, wants a gun.

Should they have been able to get said gun?

IMO that should have been a hard no (but then I also personally knew the person so...)
 

Tecumsehsbones

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Okay so here's a situation/scenerio for you TB.

Person with mental issues (Borderline Personality Disorder, Social Anxiety) convicted of a felony trespass (and made online comments about how it's "bad" they can't go wherever they wish, and thought the situation that required several enforcement agencies to apprehend the person was "funny"), has mental health history including suicide threats, wants a gun.

Should they have been able to get said gun?

IMO that should have been a hard no (but then I also personally knew the person so...)
Hard no. Maybe the person you knew actually could be trusted with a gun, but we are not dealing with individual cases. Rules need to be made to the generic case. Fails on trespass and mental-health grounds.

Just out of curiosity, in what situation is trespass a felony? Was it "with intent to damage/harm?"

There will be deviations in the other direction too. Evil bastards who should never be allowed a gun will be able to get one if they manage to keep their crazy under sufficient control to not come to the attention of the medical/legal authorities for a while.
 

Serryah

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Hard no. Maybe the person you knew actually could be trusted with a gun, but we are not dealing with individual cases. Rules need to be made to the generic case. Fails on trespass and mental-health grounds.

Just out of curiosity, in what situation is trespass a felony? Was it "with intent to damage/harm?"

This was in Iowa and was given as a felony D charge. The person broke into a place and didn't think the owner would 'be there'. I don't know all the exact details though but what struck me is they found the entire situation funny so...

There will be deviations in the other direction too. Evil bastards who should never be allowed a gun will be able to get one if they manage to keep their crazy under sufficient control to not come to the attention of the medical/legal authorities for a while.

True and sadly those are what detractors of any gun changes use as a 'why bother' when it comes to the issue.
 

Tecumsehsbones

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This was in Iowa and was given as a felony D charge. The person broke into a place and didn't think the owner would 'be there'. I don't know all the exact details though but what struck me is they found the entire situation funny so...



True and sadly those are what detractors of any gun changes use as a 'why bother' when it comes to the issue.
Hunh. That's breaking and entering in most states. Terminology thing.

Yeah, I know all about the detractors. Knew a guy who wasn't usually a fool who talked about a guy who made a YouTube video where he put a dozen revolvers in a backpack, put it on backwards so the pack was on his chest, pulled two, fired them off, dropped them, pulled two more, etc. He presented this as "proof" that banning high-capacity magazines was no use.

Facepalm.
 

Serryah

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Hunh. That's breaking and entering in most states. Terminology thing.

Could be; it's been a while, it could'a been B&E though and I just remember trespassing for some reason.

Yeah, I know all about the detractors. Knew a guy who wasn't usually a fool who talked about a guy who made a YouTube video where he put a dozen revolvers in a backpack, put it on backwards so the pack was on his chest, pulled two, fired them off, dropped them, pulled two more, etc. He presented this as "proof" that banning high-capacity magazines was no use.

Facepalm.

FFS...
 

Tecumsehsbones

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Could be; it's been a while, it could'a been B&E though and I just remember trespassing for some reason.



FFS...
Yeah, just terminology. For example, there is no rape in Wisconsin. They revised their code, and now traditional rape is "first-degree sexual assault" out of five degrees. Has the same effect. By Supreme Court dictate, it's a "felony" if and only if the maximum penalty is a year or more in prison. Various types of B&E or "criminal damage" can meet that criterion.

As to the other part, it's intellectual dishonesty. It relies on the unstated assumption that anything that's not 100% effective is necessarily 0% effective. You can't argue with that kind of lying fool.
 

Ron in Regina

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The good news is the gun is likely to find a nice, comfy adoptive home and loving family.

(Many police departments in the U.S. auction off seized guns.)
Is that like a make work project? Guarantees future employment for law enforcement?

Up here I believe they get destroyed except for the ones that get “misplaced” & end up in private collections.
 
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Ron in Regina

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The traditional rule is "If you voluntarily intoxicated yourself, you are responsible for what you did while intoxicated."

The way to go is to stamp out the approximately-conservative "He was just drunk" excuse, not to allow intoxication to be an excuse.

Drunk? High? Addicted? Don't care. Unless you can prove, as an affirmative defense (which means the defendant must introduce it and the burden of proof is on the defendant) that you were involuntarily intoxicated (basically roofied or otherwise poisoned), no dice.
This is what is being referred to in This threads age back. Extreme intoxication resembling a state of automatism can be used as a defence for violent crime, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled in three cases involving the use of drugs that led to stabbings, beatings and, in one case, a death.
 
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