Study shows gun control would prevent mass shootings

[The Master Debater]

I would agree. Not impossible but they are doing a lot more than they should IMO. Their charter states they have no right to do anything on home soil.

But it's too complex and decisive.

Some support it because they don't know what it is, some support it because it benefits them (ie tech companies)

Excuse me? I'm not shutting anything down. I asked for want of knowledge. I would like to know his opinion.

Not talking to you. I was saying how Anon was blatantly baiting us with the definition.

No, I'm pointing out that when you interpret Constitutional language, the first step is knowing what it would have meant to the people who wrote it. There's nothing particularly arcane about that.

Please mr historian link me to the eldritch tomes of knowledge you speak of

 

[Marvin]

I would agree. Not impossible but they are doing a lot more than they should IMO. Their charter states they have no right to do anything on home soil.

Oh, absolutely. And they're pretty aware they're violating the law, en masse. They're just using the "national security, no peeking" excuse to dodge accountability.

Bruce Schneier wrote an essay I really like on the subject.

 

[The Master Debater]

I don't know what I said to provoke such complex and alien queries, as it seems one needs a time machine to participate in discussion.

Were we not discussing how to save lives?

It seems to have turned into pretentious questions of who knows more.

 

[Cthulu]

Oh, absolutely. And they're pretty aware they're violating the law, en masse. They're just using the "national security, no peeking" excuse to dodge accountability.

Bruce Schneier wrote an essay I really like on the subject.

Agreed. I'll have to read that. It looks interesting.

 

[Derbydollar]

Just going to leave this here to remind everyone what the Second Amendment says:

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

The intention of this was to facilitate an environment in which the government could not become an authoritarian state, as well as provide means for the people to protect themselves and their families.
It says very clearly that their rights shall not be infringed, full stop. The question then comes to what level of gun control equals infringement?

As for the effectiveness of gun control, it seems to miss the point to me. Guns are widely available, and even if guns were somehow heavily controlled bombs or knives would be used.
Ergo, it's only natural that decreasing the availability of guns would decrease shootings. But would it decrease mass killings?

A good example of this would be the Akihabara Massacre, where a guy stabbed a bunch of people and managed to kill 7.
Or the Tokyo Subway Saring Attacks, where 12 died from a batshit cult trying to gas everyone.
In a place with probably the tightest gun control laws in the world, mass murders (Massacres?) still happen.

Also, there was the 2011 Norway Attacks, coming from a country with much stricter gun control laws than the U.S.
69 were killed and 300 some were injured. The state in Norway apparently requires you to give a purpose for every gun purchase you make as well as the purchaser being "sober and responsible".

TL;DR: I don't think gun control is a very effective means of preventing mass killings, but maybe mass shootings.

 

[SpessCaptain]

Merged some posts.

 

[Cthulu]

It seems to have turned into pretentious questions of who knows more.

Partially my fault. I was cat fishing abit. (I was bored sue me faggot) but the last part was serious. The part where no one can do anything if you don't listen to the other side is dead serious. If no one can agree nothing will be done. Thank you gentlemen for an interesting discussion. @AnOminous I would like to hear your view on the free state part of the 2nd amendment.

 

[The Master Debater]

Partially my fault. I was cat fishing abit. (I was bored sue me faggot) but the last part was serious. The part where no one can do anything if you don't listen to the other side is dead serious. If no one can agree nothing will be done. Thank you gentlemen for an interesting discussion. @AnOminous I would like to hear your view on the free state part of the 2nd amendment.

I am at fault as well, however I wish to express my beliefs without the need to cite 8 sources per post.

 

[Shugo]

I haven't really argued for more. Why shouldn't I argue about background checks though? I mean, I know there are systems of background checks in place. From what I've seen, the general framework is in place. Things should be tightened up, but it's not like this is unprecedented.

If you're arguing for background checks and arguing that they aren't an infringement, you need to take the entire US' gun control laws, including the states, into consideration.

Talking on and on about how background checks are necessary when already implemented in many states yet many states with mandatory background checks still have mass shootings with guns purchased with a background check, I'm not sure what your goal is.

How do you define a success for gun control? When should gun control stop expanding? What should disqualify someone from being able to buy a gun?

Will the regulations on guns and gun owners granted in previous legislation be lifted? Legislation passed only as a part of a compromise where private sales, with no background checks, were specifically permitted?

And if I accept your "universal background check" proposal, will any other regulations involving guns be repealed? If not, why should I submit to further regulation of guns as gun crime has been in a downward swing for 25 years?

So far it sounds like your entire argument and understanding of the debate is "background checks sound like a good idea, and don't sound like an infringement." That's a very shallow understanding.

The president himself has said that the same criminal background check system used to bar people from buying guns is flawed, but only in the context when people are denied employment due to faulty criminal records in the system. Why should I embrace such a system when the FBI and ATF's funding is at an all time high? Will pouring more money into these agencies fix the false entries into the system they let happen?

If the issue is big enough for the President himself to call out that people are wrongfully entered into the criminal record system maintained by the FBI and denied employment, can you imagine how many people are denied their right to buy a gun by the same system? How is that not an infringement already by the background check system?

"Tightening" a background check system is not a very clear course of action to me.

 

[AnOminous]

@AnOminous I would like to hear your view on the free state part of the 2nd amendment.

Such purposive language, like that in the preamble, is rarely directly given weight. It's somewhat less important now, in light of the fact that the Supreme Court currently views the right as an individual right belonging to all free adults. In fact, the current interpretation of the Bill of Rights as also applying to the States further undermines it, as previously, the states were in charge of regulating firearms. It was that right of the states to regulate firearms, such as for instance by seizing the firearms of demobilized soldiers (as Virginia and other states did at the conclusion of the Revolutionary War), that was in part protected against the federal government.

States and the colonies that preceded them also had a long history both before and after the Second Amendment of restricting firearm ownership by, among others, slaves, Catholics, and those refusing to swear allegiance to the state. If we still used the "clear" interpretation of the Second Amendment that prevailed during that time, the states could preclude any and all forms of gun ownership to the extent state law (including the state's own constitution) permitted it.

So it's somewhat against the "clear" language of the Amendment for the federal government (in the form of the Supreme Court) to be able to prohibit a state government from imposing laws relating to gun ownership, as it did in McDonald v. City of Chicago in 2010, the first application of the general principle of D.C. v. Heller to a state. (The District of Columbia has a special relationship to the federal government and the general principle was the interpretation of the Second Amendment as representing an individual rather than a collective right.)

It's interesting to note that exact language, though:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State. . ."

For a long time, the courts viewed that as limiting language, that is, the Amendment as only protecting that which actually promoted a "well regulated Militia."

 

[Cthulu]

It's interesting to note that exact language, though:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State. . ."

For a long time, the courts viewed that as limiting language, that is, the Amendment as only protecting that which actually promoted a "well regulated Militia."

Yes it is interesting to argue the language. If I read that right do agree with the Courts? Or your stating the law?

 

[Shugo]

It's pretty much the same thing as tightening any other system. Identify faults. Institute penalties for people/groups who fuck up. Automate as much as possible. Repeat.

Why has the system been failing as the FBI gets a bigger and bigger budget each year? I still don't understand how you plan to fix the system. Allocate more agents to work on it? What penalties should be imposed on people working on the system? Pay cuts? Losing their job? What about for honest mistakes? How many strikes?

Automating a bureaucracy with entries of dozens of millions of people does not turn out well.

When are the other regulations going to get repealed when I accept your proposal of background checks at the sale of every single gun? You're not taking into account the huge array of other regulations of guns in the country. The NFA, the GCA, the Gun Free School Zones Act, the countless state regulations.

I don't think you realize how many regulations have been added year after year after year and why so many people are resistant to even more regulation, like what you are suggesting.

Arms regulation never stops. It just goes further and further until all arms are outlawed. The proponent of "universal background checks" like you support has said she wants to have door-to-door confiscation of guns, and she would implement it the moment she has enough votes in congress.

Am I supposed to trust these people when it comes to settling with "just" background checks?

 

[Cthulu]

Why has the system been failing as the FBI gets a bigger and bigger budget each year? I still don't understand how you plan to fix the system. Allocate more agents to work on it? What penalties should be imposed on people working on the system? Pay cuts? Losing their job? What about for honest mistakes? How many strikes?

Automating a bureaucracy with entries of dozens of millions of people does not turn out well.

When are the other regulations going to get fixed when I accept your proposal of background checks at the sale of every single gun?

I have to agree bigger government is bad. How would the solution you see be done without that?

 

[AnOminous]

Yes it is interesting to argue the language. If I read that right do agree with the Courts? Or your stating the law?

The law subsequent to Heller and McDonald, that is, as it currently stands, interprets the Second Amendment as protecting an individual right that can be upheld against the state as well as the federal government, for the first time.

If you're interested in the actual language, how it came to be that way, and why it should be interpreted this way, Eugene Volokh has written a lot about it. For instance, The Commonplace Second Amendment: http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/common.htm (the Supreme Court actually subsequently cited this article).

Volokh in general is a good source on the current interpretation of the Second Amendment, as he essentially presaged the Court's reasoning on it well before Heller.

 

[Cthulu]

How about an off the wall solution? How about the gun manufacturers with funds from our tax dollars keep reccords of the guns. Not allowed access but with a warrant from a judge. With background checks and a waiting period? I know the argument about waiting but would that work for both sides? It seems reasonable.

The law subsequent to Heller and McDonald, that is, as it currently stands, interprets the Second Amendment as protecting an individual right that can be upheld against the state as well as the federal government, for the first time.

If you're interested in the actual language, how it came to be that way, and why it should be interpreted this way, Eugene Volokh has written a lot about it. For instance, The Commonplace Second Amendment: http://www2.law.ucla.edu/volokh/common.htm (the Supreme Court actually subsequently cited this article).

Volokh in general is a good source on the current interpretation of the Second Amendment, as he essentially presaged the Court's reasoning on it well before Heller.

I asked as well what you believe

 

[Marvin]

I still don't understand how you plan to fix the system. Allocate more agents to work on it? What penalties should be imposed on people working on the system? Pay cuts? Losing their job? What about for honest mistakes? How many strikes?

So, I don't know much about the NICS process, but I would assume it's fairly user friendly to the firearm dealer? Like, he just calls someone up, gives a name and some other identifying information, and a few days later he receives a yea or nay?

This article gives me the impression that a lot of the actual process of executing the background check just consists of some guy calling up the police departments asking for records. Dylann Roof fell through the cracks because of some bureaucratic mistake involving jurisdiction.

That is a completely goofy mistake to happen. I mean, it's not anyone's fault. But it's definitely something that can be improved. One place to start is for states (and then from the state level down to the county level) to provide this sort of info in a standardized format.

Automating a bureaucracy with entries of dozens of millions of people does not turn out well.

I disagree. I think we already do provide lots of these types of records publicly and online. It's just that the types of systems they use vary from state to state.

Like, looking up Chris' court case in Virginia is a huge pain in the ass. You can't bookmark it, there's some kind of POST method that means you have to manually dig through the site every time. However, in Pennsylvania, Nick Bate's court docket page is just a normal page that you can bookmark and refresh.

 

[Shugo]

Dylann Roof fell through the cracks because of some bureaucratic mistake involving jurisdiction.

Dylann Roof fell through the cracks because the police that booked him failed to report him to the FBI to put him into the NICS. The NICS had nothing to do with it: it was a failure of the police department to report him as charged with a crime that would prohibit him from buying a gun until his trial. How is pumping more money into the FBI going to fix that? Pump more money into the Charleston Police Department, or wherever they picked him up at?

more specifically:
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/p...ames-comey-regarding-dylann-roof-gun-purchase

The arrest record for Dylann for his pending drug charge was not on his criminal record sheet. This had nothing to do with the FBI or any national agency: a police department failed to pin it on his rap sheet.

When are the other regulations going to be lifted if I accept your increased regulations? We have had countless regulations added every decade. Why should I accept your regulations too? What am I getting out of supporting and expanding the background check system? When are regulations on arms ever going to stop?

You won't get any support if you don't answer those questions.

 

[AnOminous]

Automating a bureaucracy with entries of dozens of millions of people does not turn out well.

Actually it's about the only thing with even the possibility of turning out well. Doing it by hand certainly won't.

 

[Cthulu]

Actually it's about the only thing with even the possibility of turning out well. Doing it by hand certainly won't.

I like the direct democracy idea. It's great in theory. How to apply it is the issue.

 

[Some JERK]

I believe that the 2nd Amendment is an individual right. It doesn't matter to me that it took 200 years for it to be interpreted that way. That doesn't seem all that relevant unless they were overturning a previous interpretation. But I'm not an attorney, and I don't know all of the case law, and I doubt that I'd truly understand it even if I had it all right in front of me.

I grew up around firearms. I own them. I carry a firearm. I live in California, probably the most restrictive state for concealed carry, yet I have a CCP. I'm not at all going to say that the process was easy or short (it took nearly a year.) or that there are no modifying circumstances in my case in particular, but it is possible. I think California even had to give up some of its bureaucratic process for firearms because it was ruled a de facto infringement on the 2nd amendment. My point there is that even in a place like California, we're leaps and bounds away from the fear that the government is going to start going door to door confiscating weapons.

What really sucks is that it seems nearly impossible to have a conversation about this subject anywhere without it devolving into hostility. I understand that people's opinions about this subject are severely polarized to two very important concerns. On one hand you have those who are concerned that their right to defend themselves from crime and tyranny is in jeopardy due to a reactionary public and political agendas, on the other hand you have those who are concerned about innocent people being murdered en masse with weapons that are easily obtained and designed to kill or injure multiple people efficiently at range. Those concerns are both dire, and don't really lend themselves to compromise, but I wish people on both sides could find a way to approach this subject with their vitriol dialed down a couple of notches. Otherwise it's not a conversation that's ever going to go anywhere, and I think it really needs to.