Another mass shooting in America

[duncs500]

Haha, how much is it?

I met a few 'muricans while travelling and went out to North Carolina to visit them where they were at college. We went to Walmart to buy ammo and fishing gear and went up into the hills where there was a (pretty ramshackle) range where we shot some guns and then went to a lake to fish. It was fun, but TBH guns are scary... I just fired a couple of shots on that was enough for me.

Quite a surreal experience though. Definitely felt like an insight into the way of life. There was a guy up there with a really ropey looking AK-47 which he was showing off to everyone as apparently it was illegal in that state, which seemed to be something he was proud of. Looked like it had been dredged up off the bottom of the sea or some such to me!

[jamcg]

Haha, how much is it?

[mik]

Haha, how much is it?

Several options for 9mm pistols below $500 on the site I looked at (recognisable (to me) brands like Glock). Ammo from $0.25 per round.

[Gavster]

The Serbian president has suggested massive gun restrictions after a couple of mass shootings, it's really not that difficult.

[dinny_g]

I had a long chat with an American friend who lives in the UK and although she is not a gun nut at all (Progressive, Left Wing Californian) some of what she said did make sense as to why it's not always as straight forward at it may seem.

She said the biggest challenge is relates to equality and treating people equally and the realities of living in the US compared to the UK make this a little harder to understand. It's often said "Just Ban all Guns" but in reality...

Millions of Americans live near animals that can kill them - Brown Bears, Black Bears, Mountain Lions, Wolves etc. We don't have anything like that here.
Millions of Americans live more than 45 minutes to an hour from the nearest Police- this is the case here too but in far fewer numbers

You can't just ban all guns because people in Washington State, Colorado, Alaska, etc NEED guns. So then you get into qualifying for a gun - what's the rules ? How close do you need to live to a bear to need or not need a gun ? What if you live in a city but regularly travel to the wilderness. you need a gun - in fact you need three - a Rifle, a back-up Rifle and a large Calibre Hand gun. So does you wife, so does your kids. Now you get someone who lives in downtown Metropolitan Denver who can demonstrate they need 15 or 20 rifles and the same of hand guns... There are 6k to 8k Black Bears in New York State ffs...

The realities of assessing millions of gun owners and continually determining and monitoring their need for a firearm is just not feasible.

There does need to be a lot more restrictions and controls on the types of guns that can be bought and owned but the idea that you can Ban Guns outright is never going to fly.

[ZedLeg]

I suggested elsewhere that banning semi auto weapons would be a good start. You can hunt perfectly well with a bolt action rifle and a revolver but you lose the ability to fire 30+ rounds before needing a reload.

[Gavster]

I had a long chat with an American friend who lives in the UK and although she is not a gun nut at all (Progressive, Left Wing Californian) some of what she said did make sense as to why it's not always as straight forward at it may seem.

I'm sure it would be easy to introduce fairly strict licencing for hunting rifles. Interestingly, those kinds of issues about remote residents, equality and wildlife present a trade-off that politicians can't mention for fear of the PR backlash, and progressive, left wing people are scared to acknowledge. Namely that it's better to have a few more people die from bear attacks if it prevents hundreds of schoolchildren die from mass shootings each year. A simplistic view of changes would be that any new policies should provide positive outcomes for all, despite the fact that a fundamental part of almost every single policy design is that there WILL be a bad outcome for some people. The best policies minimise those trade-offs as much as possible, but it's incredibly rare to have none.

[Swervin_Mervin]

I had a long chat with an American friend who lives in the UK and although she is not a gun nut at all (Progressive, Left Wing Californian) some of what she said did make sense as to why it's not always as straight forward at it may seem.

She said the biggest challenge is relates to equality and treating people equally and the realities of living in the US compared to the UK make this a little harder to understand. It's often said "Just Ban all Guns" but in reality...

Millions of Americans live near animals that can kill them - Brown Bears, Black Bears, Mountain Lions, Wolves etc. We don't have anything like that here.
Millions of Americans live more than 45 minutes to an hour from the nearest Police- this is the case here too but in far fewer numbers

You can't just ban all guns because people in Washington State, Colorado, Alaska, etc NEED guns. So then you get into qualifying for a gun - what's the rules ? How close do you need to live to a bear to need or not need a gun ? What if you live in a city but regularly travel to the wilderness. you need a gun - in fact you need three - a Rifle, a back-up Rifle and a large Calibre Hand gun. So does you wife, so does your kids. Now you get someone who lives in downtown Metropolitan Denver who can demonstrate they need 15 or 20 rifles and the same of hand guns... There are 6k to 8k Black Bears in New York State ffs...

The realities of assessing millions of gun owners and continually determining and monitoring their need for a firearm is just not feasible.

There does need to be a lot more restrictions and controls on the types of guns that can be bought and owned but the idea that you can Ban Guns outright is never going to fly.

That's just making excuses for doing nothing. If that was the only issue then it's very easily resolvable. There are many countries in the world that manage the same issues. Hell even Aus managed to do a complete about turn on gun ownership and control.

As Zed says, starting with some level of gun control would start to help. The degree/reach of any gun control could evolve from there over time to a happier medium.

[dinny_g]

Hell even Aus managed to do a complete about turn on gun ownership and control.

True but there are far fewer large predators in Aus (Crocs only I guess) and most country folk still own a gun.

An Assault rifle isn’t the best option against a spider…

[duncs500]

I'm not sure the dangerous animals argument makes sense. Guns are perfectly legal in this country too under the correct licencing.

If it's an admin concern, everyone seems to be able to administer driving licenses, passports etc etc for millions of people. It can't be that hard, and certainly worth the effort to save a great many lives. It won't stop all shootings, but it massively reduce it, and it will start shifting perception, reduce circulation, and generally start them on the path.

Oh, and yeah, can anybody claim to seriously need an assault rifle?

[Carlos]

Dinny, your mate sounds conditioned. There's no way do a family need 3 guns each to walk in the country!

As self defence, shirley a shotgun would be more suitable!

[dinny_g]

Dinny, your mate sounds conditioned. There's no way do a family need 3 guns each to walk in the country!

As self defence, shirley a shotgun would be more suitable!

No she isn't at all - proper west coast liberal. The argument isn't about animal control, strictly speaking. She was talking about how a UK person, looking at Guns and a US person looking at guns (in general) might do so through a different prism, that's all. Similarly, ALL of my friends who live in South Africa have guns at home and carry them in the car. Makes zero sense to a UK resident but is deemed necessary in their country.

At the end of the day, She (and I) are all for more controls, restrictions, bans on certain types of Automatic weapons.

Your point about needing guns to walk in the country. Depends on the country. You don't need a seat belt to drive a car but when things go wrong, it's handy to have one And a shotgun is useless against a Bear Attack

[Mito Man]

Yep this is BS Dinny, there’s brown bears, pissed off moose and wolves in Scandinavia - I don’t remember my parents arming to the teeth when we went on short breaks to the wilder parts there

[dinny_g]

Hey, not my argument...

I guess I watch too many Survival programs...

[ZedLeg]

All you really need against a bear is a noise maker. Unless you have a very big gun or are an amazing shot the chances of you dropping a bear before it fucks you up is practically zero, your best bet is to make a noise and startle them so they run away.

[IanF]

NSFW

[duncs500]

So senseless isn't it. I read the story, apparently he was disgruntled because of the way his mother's estate was being handled. Yeah, totally worth killing your brother and yourself over. Money from the estate is no good to you now, is it moron?

[240PP]

Had to laugh at this comment: ‘Time to ban brothers’

[jamcg]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-67225016

Gunman on loose in Maine- 16/22 dead depending who you ask, over 50 injured.

Suspect was a firearms trainer with the army, has spent time in mental health centre, and threatened a mass shooting while there

[V8Granite]

Yep this is BS Dinny, there’s brown bears, pissed off moose and wolves in Scandinavia - I don’t remember my parents arming to the teeth when we went on short breaks to the wilder parts there

My Norwegian friends have a lot of guns, AR15s and pistols etc.

It’s surprising how many do have them.

Dave!