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Although this thread does not function under the same strict guidelines as the USPMT, it is still a general practice on TL to provide a source with an explanation on why it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion. Failure to do so will result in a mod action. |
On August 30 2014 07:12 Millitron wrote:
Why not ban alcohol then? Its used for fun, as a hobby, nothing bothersome. Yet it kills ~33% more people than guns.
Banning alcohol has largely been proven to be ineffective because black markets can easily distribute alcohol. You can't just start brewing a gun in your basement. Also alcohol, when consumed privately, is primarily dangerous to yourself (although that's not always true) and obviously at certain activities where alcohol has proven to be a big threat, like driving a car, or at public places or events, alcohol is already banned.
So the comparison doesn't really make sense. A weapon's only use is to shoot other stuff with it, that's not exactly what drugs do.
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On August 30 2014 08:08 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 07:40 ZenithM wrote:Why not ban alcohol then? Its used for fun, as a hobby, nothing bothersome. Yet it kills ~33% more people than guns. Is that the real number? If it is, it speaks for how dangerous guns are, considering way more people use alcohol than guns (at least I would imagine). Edit: Ok, I've made a quick check myself, apparently those are numbers from 2011: Motor vehicle traffic deaths Number of deaths: 33,783 All firearm deaths Number of deaths: 32,351 Pretty impressive. That's really unimaginable in European countries. I know those are the car accident numbers, but they are widely considered to be the most important cause of death of young people in our countries, so it's relevant to compare that. And in the end what is to be legal or not comes down to a trade off between usefulness/enjoyability/etc and danger. In the case of driving, it's obvious that allowing people to drive cars is worth the risk. However, with guns, it's not so obvious. Ok so let me clarify a few things. That firearm death statistic includes about 19,000 suicides. If we're counting self-inflicted firearm deaths, we should also count all the self-inflicted alcohol deaths, i.e. people who ruin their liver, alcohol poisoning, and drunks accidentally getting themselves killed. Alcohol kills ~75000. Drinking alcohol has no serious uses. Guns have pest control, self defense, and hunting, on top of how they can be a lot of fun. So guns are more useful, and kill less. Yet you're cool with alcohol.
My main point was that you have to relate those numbers with the size of the population of "users". That's the only point you didn't address :D
I would think many more people drive cars or drink alcohol than own guns. Yet, the death counts are comparable.
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United States24754 Posts
On August 30 2014 08:34 ZenithM wrote:
I would think many more people drive cars or drink alcohol than own guns. Yet, the death counts are comparable.
Can you quantify this guess? Twice as many? Ten times as many? If it's like a 30% difference your point here isn't very strong.
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On August 30 2014 08:32 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 07:12 Millitron wrote:
Why not ban alcohol then? Its used for fun, as a hobby, nothing bothersome. Yet it kills ~33% more people than guns.
Banning alcohol has largely been proven to be ineffective because black markets can easily distribute alcohol. You can't just start brewing a gun in your basement. Also alcohol, when consumed privately, is primarily dangerous to yourself (although that's not always true) and obviously at certain activities where alcohol proves a big threat, like driving a car, or at public places or events, alcohol is already banned.
And you somehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
https://www.google.com/search?q=homemade guns&client=firefox-a&hs=CAs&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=sb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Hw4BVOrWLMvGggSIkICIDw&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=2287&bih=1136&dpr=0.9
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On August 30 2014 08:35 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:34 ZenithM wrote:
I would think many more people drive cars or drink alcohol than own guns. Yet, the death counts are comparable. Can you quantify this guess? Twice as many? Ten times as many? If it's like a 30% difference your point here isn't very strong.
A quick search gave me this:
According to figures from the Census, in 2009 there were 211 million licensed drivers in the United States, and according to MSNBC, there are about 6 million gun permit holders in the U.S. That gives us 1 permit-holder for every 35.2 licensed drivers.
from http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2012/05/bruce-krafft/comparing-car-and-gun-fatalities-is-misleading-and-irrelevant/
I can't vouch for source quality (and the article is biased, of course), I mean, it was a guess after all, I don't really want to get into a real argument, as I'm sure this point has been rehashed over and over again over those last 550 pages.
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On August 30 2014 08:38 ZenithM wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:35 micronesia wrote:On August 30 2014 08:34 ZenithM wrote:
I would think many more people drive cars or drink alcohol than own guns. Yet, the death counts are comparable. Can you quantify this guess? Twice as many? Ten times as many? If it's like a 30% difference your point here isn't very strong. A quick search gave me this: Show nested quote +According to figures from the Census, in 2009 there were 211 million licensed drivers in the United States, and according to MSNBC, there are about 6 million gun permit holders in the U.S. That gives us 1 permit-holder for every 35.2 licensed drivers. from http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2012/05/bruce-krafft/comparing-car-and-gun-fatalities-is-misleading-and-irrelevant/I can't vouch for source quality, I mean, it was a guess after all, I don't really want to get into a real argument, as I'm sure this point has been rehashed over and over again over those last 550 pages.
Too bad you don't need a permit to own a gun. Those permits are typically concealed or open carry permits. There might be some handgun permits in some jurisdictions, but they're in the process of being overturned. The Supreme Court ruled Chicago's and Washington D.C.'s handgun bans unconstitutional already, the rest are living on borrowed time.
There are 310 million civilian-owned guns in the US. There are 253 million cars and trucks.
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On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them.
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United States24754 Posts
On August 30 2014 08:38 ZenithM wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:35 micronesia wrote:On August 30 2014 08:34 ZenithM wrote:
I would think many more people drive cars or drink alcohol than own guns. Yet, the death counts are comparable. Can you quantify this guess? Twice as many? Ten times as many? If it's like a 30% difference your point here isn't very strong. A quick search gave me this: Show nested quote +According to figures from the Census, in 2009 there were 211 million licensed drivers in the United States, and according to MSNBC, there are about 6 million gun permit holders in the U.S. That gives us 1 permit-holder for every 35.2 licensed drivers. from http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2012/05/bruce-krafft/comparing-car-and-gun-fatalities-is-misleading-and-irrelevant/I can't vouch for source quality (and the article is biased, of course), I mean, it was a guess after all, I don't really want to get into a real argument, as I'm sure this point has been rehashed over and over again over those last 550 pages.
I was talking about alcohol VS guns. Also, 'permit holders' may not be the best statistic as not all gun owners have permits (it is not required in some places, depending on the type of gun).
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Congrats then, you have something which can kill as many people as alcohol and cars AND I lost the argument.
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On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them.
Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S.
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On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S.
Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. Not starting to talk about how many crimes are potentially prevented by not having access to firearms. It's pretty hard to rob a bank with a baseball bat.
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On August 30 2014 08:42 ZenithM wrote:
Congrats then, you have something which can kill as many people as alcohol and cars AND I lost the argument.
Our way of thinking is just way different (personally I think just a number of years ahead, but that's just me personally). At one point in time America will have to change their policy, it'll go too far one day. Guns are NOT illegaly distributed as freely as alcohol or weed is here. They recently upped the age to 18+ here for even low alcohol amounts. Something I disagree with, because who wants to drink is gonna drink anyway. (You can consume at home by the way, just not have it with you or buy it.) It's not like that with guns. Maybe the very hardcore gun-nuts can get their hands on guns but if they were to ban guns today or tomorrow, guns will slowly go out of circulation and they'll get harder to come by every day, and people will stop wanting them because it's too much of a hassle (we're talking pistols and actual army weapons here, not hunting rifles of course, they're legal here and pretty much everywhere else granted you passed the non-retard test and use it for recreational purposes.) Again. heavy duty guns are not as easy to come by illegally as other illegal products such as soft drugs or alcohol (for young people.) The prime of example of this is the entirety of europe.
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On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively.
It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own.
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On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own.
Exactly. Once you start it it's very hard to stop. A vicious cycle almost, but it has to happen at one point. It has to be broken. It doesn't exactly help that you've got a (technically) third world country right at your border that has massive drug and gun trade going on.
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On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own.
Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea
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On August 30 2014 09:00 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own. Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea
Actually they are enforcing the borders every year.
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On August 30 2014 09:00 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own. Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea
Its too bad securing the border has become synonymous with being racist. "If you want to secure the border, you must hate Mexicans. You're a bigot hurrdurr."
I totally agree we need to secure the southern border, and in fact, if we did you'd see gun violence fall, and we'd both be I happy. Pro-gun people would get to keep their guns, and everyone gets to enjoy a huge drop in crime.
On August 30 2014 09:07 Thalandros wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 09:00 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own. Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea Actually they are enforcing the borders every year.
There's very little actual effort. Most of what they call enforcing the border is deporting illegals who get caught committing some other crime. Relatively few are caught crossing the border.
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Thanks guys! After reading this, you've answered my question of whether or not we should be allowed to own guns.
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On August 30 2014 08:08 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 07:40 ZenithM wrote:Why not ban alcohol then? Its used for fun, as a hobby, nothing bothersome. Yet it kills ~33% more people than guns. Is that the real number? If it is, it speaks for how dangerous guns are, considering way more people use alcohol than guns (at least I would imagine). Edit: Ok, I've made a quick check myself, apparently those are numbers from 2011: Motor vehicle traffic deaths Number of deaths: 33,783 All firearm deaths Number of deaths: 32,351 Pretty impressive. That's really unimaginable in European countries. I know those are the car accident numbers, but they are widely considered to be the most important cause of death of young people in our countries, so it's relevant to compare that. And in the end what is to be legal or not comes down to a trade off between usefulness/enjoyability/etc and danger. In the case of driving, it's obvious that allowing people to drive cars is worth the risk. However, with guns, it's not so obvious. Ok so let me clarify a few things. That firearm death statistic includes about 19,000 suicides. If we're counting self-inflicted firearm deaths, we should also count all the self-inflicted alcohol deaths, i.e. people who ruin their liver, alcohol poisoning, and drunks accidentally getting themselves killed. Alcohol kills ~75000. Drinking alcohol has no serious uses. Guns have pest control, self defense, and hunting, on top of how they can be a lot of fun. So guns are more useful, and kill less. Yet you're cool with alcohol.
Yeah numbers are great when you don't give all the info... Out of that 32,351 like you said around 19k are suicide and another 11k are gang on gang. so only around 2k of 32k are regular law biding citizens who die from firearms. No America wont change any time soon sorry.
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On August 30 2014 09:11 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 09:00 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own. Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea Its too bad securing the border has become synonymous with being racist. "If you want to secure the border, you must hate Mexicans. You're a bigot hurrdurr." I totally agree we need to secure the southern border, and in fact, if we did you'd see gun violence fall, and we'd both be I happy. Pro-gun people would get to keep their guns, and everyone gets to enjoy a huge drop in crime. Show nested quote +On August 30 2014 09:07 Thalandros wrote:On August 30 2014 09:00 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:53 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:49 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:44 Millitron wrote:On August 30 2014 08:41 Nyxisto wrote:On August 30 2014 08:37 Millitron wrote:
And yousomehow believe that the black market will not fill in the gap for guns?
You totally can just whip up some guns in your basement, any unscrupulous mechanic, like the guys who work for gangs to strip stolen cars, can do it. Guns, even fully-automatic guns, are not complicated to make
I don't need to believe this, given the fact that gun related crime rates in Europe are way lower than in the US(has been posted before) it actually seems to be a fact that people can successfully be prevented from owning guns and committing crimes with them. Europe also does not have a gang problem anywhere near as bad as it is in the U.S. Which is completely beside the point. 60% of homicides in the US are caused by the use of firearms. I couldn't find a Europe average but in Germany only 12% of homicides involved gun use. So apparently you can stop the bad guys from getting guns quite effectively. It's not beside the point at all. Gang violence accounts for a huge amount of the violent crime in the US. Since Europe does not have a gang problem to speak of (compared to the US anyways), you CAN get rid of guns and get rid of gun crime. We have a porous southern border letting cartels (and even our own ATF: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATF_gunwalking_scandal), bring guns into the country. We have a black market fueled by the drug trade, a multi-million dollar industry. If they can't get factory-made guns, they will make their own. Then I'd say securing the border and dealing with this should be a top domestic policy issue. Handing everybody a gun so they can fend for themselves doesn't sound like a very great idea Actually they are enforcing the borders every year. There's very little actual effort. Most of what they call enforcing the border is deporting illegals who get caught committing some other crime. Relatively few are caught crossing the border.
I don't think I have ever heard somebody say that securing the border is racist. Usually it is the crazy 100% deportation racial purification component of immigration reform that garners the "racist" label. Also the attempt to label illegal immigrants as largely malicious which is not just a lie but also does not align with most people's experience.
Really, there is a HUGE effort to secure the border all the time. The relatively low level of enforcement when compared to illegal immigration is representative of how daunting the task is rather than the effort given. Until we are willing to make our southern border look like the border between north and South Korea we are better off helping Mexico raise its standard of living to mitigate the tide of raw desperation that motivates illegals to escape to America or lead a life of crime.
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