It might be somewhat hard to find studies and stats to support, but you are almost certainly correct that the changing/changed nature of society, local community, and family play a huge part in all of this, as does the advent of the internet and rise of social media.
Or maybe that just a “talking point”.
This is the best run down on gun violence excluding suicide I have ever found.
The article compares the issue of gun violence to a disease. Pointing out that incredibly small populations of the country make up the vast majority of gun violence. This really is a must read.
Whatever you’re doing that force-wraps text to < 80 columns is kind of bizarre and is annoying to the reader.
If you can sell something to the civilian market that has ~95% commonality with what you sell to military/law enforcement customers, that makes for cost savings to both markets. The feature set that makes a good military rifle is also desirable in the civilian market, even if they’re not out on the 2-way range.
And for all the hysteria over the AR-15, “assault weapons”, “weapons of war”, “military style weapons”, and other loaded terms, rifles - of which the AR-15 is a subset - are a drop in the bucket when it comes to homicide figures:
The encouragement to “go out on rampages” has factors well beyond weapon availability. The media could stop sensationalizing things … if only there weren’t such strong incentives to do so as I implied in a previous post here.
The UK, EU, Japan, {name a country} may well have more restrictive gun laws and lower levels of violence, but they also have markedly different societies.
In those countries that have ratcheted up their gun laws, the effects are typically the same as they are here in the US - the trends that predated the change in the law was either unaltered or changed in such a subtle fashion that the effect of the law is all but impossible to determine.
When I look at countries like the UK, Australia, Canada, Japan, I see societies with levels of social and cultural cohesion we just don’t have in the US. They’re not utopias by any stretch and far from being unified to the point of being monolithic as they might be widely imagined, but there seem to be fewer seams, fewer cracks, fewer glaring faults experienced by their citizens. They have their classes and regions and factions like we do, but they seem to believe in their country in ways that Americans do not. The sense of destructive despair that so many Americans experience seems to be either missing or greatly reduced.
It would be the work of a generation to try to re-create that here in the United States - only we don’t have anything close to a consensus on what that vision of America should be.
The narrative every time there’s outcry for a “national conversation” about “sensible gun control measures” triggered by a sensational tragedy is that gun owners should gleefully surrender a chunk of an enumerated right, and that their intransigence is the dominant - if not single - reason these tragedies keep happening. One can convincingly argue that access plays a role in these events, but even back-of-the-napkin analysis shows that most measures proposed wouldn’t prevent a number of these things; and that assumes these perpetrators are rational people with typical human planning horizons that extend indefinitely when we know that they usually don’t.
Another question that’s never answered for gun owners is what do they get in return other than a vague promise that society will get better? Some of the more extreme proposals include confiscation … confiscation of valuable property, without compensation. If you want to make that bitter pill a little easier to swallow and markedly easier to implement, offer up something close to pre-prohibition market value. Even blocks on the transfer/sale of suddenly-prohibited items amount to confiscation.
There are of course numerous avenues outside of gun control that could address the issue of violence in America - even these tragic mass shootings - but they’re rarely discussed because they’re not wrapped up in culture war. We could make our schools stop sucking - both primary and secondary. We could wind down the prison-industrial complex. We could end drug prohibition. We could stop encouraging the cannibalization of the economy. We could stop stigmatizing mental health. None of these are sexy and none of them are bumper-sticker solutions. But they would all pay dividends well beyond just this one narrow issue.
That was a good article, proving that meter long write-ups don’t necessarily have to be ridiculous and inane.
And it’s a nice example of the clarity that good data, statistics, and analysis can provide. Unfortunately, just the type of clarity that the ideologues and demagogues that comprise our policymakers and legislators find anathema.
Well said…
Skipped reading. Too long.
While I remember reading that violent video games don’t increase gun violence, I do think that they drive instances like this. The games give this specific kind of individual – mentally disturbed, looking for a way to strike back – a idea of how to cause the most grief.
Are you inferring this is a problem? Are you a criminal felon not allowed to get one? Or are you a citizen with all the rights to own one?
I’m assuming you are not a felon and are not barred from getting one, but you feel that you shouldn’t be able to go and get one tomorrow if legally can?
At least one person who wrote an article on how easy it is, and bailed out before the NiCS would have written a different story if he had actually gone through NICS, as he had felony convictions, and would have been denied. How long NICS takes depends on how common your name is, and if you are willing to provide your SSN. Of course in Texas you can avoid NICS if you have your background check processed in depth every few years to carry a LTC. And as evidenced by the stats collected by the state, Texas LTC holders are far less likely to commit criminal activity than the general population.
That hasn’t happened on this thread, at least; if I am wrong please point to where it has happened, specifically. All that has happened here is you getting called out for bad assumptions, sloppy logic, and incorrect assertions (like the quote above).
And, of course, a severe case of logorrhea.
This IS the main problem I have with this kid and with your logic that you presuppose that it SHOULD be difficult to purchase a defensive weapon for anyone’s personal protection. People who are afraid of guns have always tried to limit citizens their rights to easily purchase and own one. That’s what the problem is. You and this kid come from a viewpoint that I and every other citizen should somehow not be able to purchase one easily.
Do you now see the horizon?
Your arguments have fallen short in logic and nuance. Then you ignore the responses by others explaining the nuances for which your arguments are lacking. Lastly, you follow that with defection tactics of claiming the other comments are either blindly spouting insidious political talking point or ascribing a insidious political viewpoint to you.
Exactly.
Nobody ever argued that guns are harmless and nobody ever said they were. Matter of fact, WE don’t want them to be harmless. If attacked by someone meaning harm to us, we would very much like the gun to cause harm. Not for the wrong reasons either, but to stop the ATTACKER!! So this is another one of your strawman arguments.
I got stories about cars too. Have you seen what cars can do to people that may or may not been irresponsible? Cars are not harmless, so please don’t argue that they are.
Let me ask you something seriously, when you make a comment like: “because, in truth, it is easy to get an AR15.” Are you making a judgement call? When you use the word ‘easy’ is this not a personal opinion that presupposes something? Therefore, never have I imagined out of bias or any other reason you can come up with about what you have been saying.
Does it make sense to you that on inanimate object cannot cause harm? I’m guessing you will agree and, if so, why would you make it harder to get a gun in order for someone to protect themselves, or target shoot for fun, or hunt, etc…?
The article is deceitful.
He did not purchase the firearm & he misleads by narrating information that had no bearing on whether or not he would be allowed to purchase.
Purposely leaving out the fact that the paperwork is the background check puts him in the “He’s full of shit” cubbyhole.
Which? 
Anything deceitful is fake or a lie, as it tries to pass itelf off as something it is not.
Thank you for proving the point.
Misleading, lies = fake.
If you know you’ve never changed a mind in a discussion like this, and you are claiming not to be pushing any argument forward, why push so hard? Honest question. What is being gained?
