TheAgitator.com
Badass College Student Stops Would-Be Rapist-Murderers
Wednesday, May 6th, 2009The student pulled a gun out of his backpack, fatally wounded one attacker, and drove the other off.
The Brady Campaign says that when it comes to campus shootings, “It’s ridiculous to say someone with a gun” could “save the day.”
No, not all that ridiculous, actually.
Radley – note, this isn’t about a campus shooting. They’re college students who live in the ironically named College Park (ironic because there’s no college in town or even near it), and suffered from a home invasion. Different situation than a crossfire in a crowded lecture hall…
People protecting themselves, fuck yeah!
unreal! I wanna hear some more about this kid and the bad guys… this is like something out of pulp fiction!
Too bad he couldn’t drop the other would-be rapist/murderer.
Nothin’ like ‘improving the breed’. Or, as a line from an old SF novel long ago went, “Think of it as evolution in action.”
Oh, and for the curious, the origin of that phrase.
Good for them. They’re lucky to be alive and he managed to kill one of the assholes so we don’t have to worry about supporting him for the next decade.
The cynical side of me is wondering how much trouble this kid is going to be in when all the smoke clears. (pun slightly intended) I’m taking odds on how long it takes the university to suspend him for some violation of the student code. Protecting yourself? On university owned property? That’s a no-no.
Well, let’s just wait for the Brady folks et al to point to the one woman who got hurt by the gunfire as a reason this was BAD! Never mind that the bad guys had what seemed every intention of rape and murder. “She got shot by guns! And there wouldn’t have been a crossfire if someone hadn’t been playing Rambo trying to save people!”
It’ll be lame, but I won’t be surprised when I see it.
My concern is whether he is charged with some sort of crime. By marginalizing him as a criminal, those who champion gun control do not have to deal with cognitive dissonance.
One time a person uses a gun to save people. Great. Now how many times have guns been used to murder, assault, rob, and terrorize people. Well, in this one instance we have 2 guns used to terrorize, 1 gun used to save. In all instances I’m sure the ratio would be much more worse.
If there were no guns or if it was illegal and therefore much more difficult to get a gun, this situation would have never occurred.
I’m not saying that this warrants any kind of ban. But I also do not think that this one case proves that bans would not be productive. It proves the opposite.
Although originally from elsewhere, I have lived off and on in the south for the better part of two decades. I give the southerners plenty of flak sometimes, but at least here when a colleague finds out that I have a CC permit and am often making use of it, I’m generally regarded as a sane person exercising his right to self defense, rather than a bat-shit crazy potential mass murderer. Elsewhere I’ve had people who might be open to a theoretical right to carry, unless someone is actually doing it. Then that person is probably certifiable.
I sure hope the good kid told the cops “He said he was going to kill us. I believed him. This has been traumatic. Please contact my lawyer to schedule a interview.”
@ Hut: “It proves the opposite.” No it doesn’t.
gun owner 2 scumbags 0
He’s lucky they weren’t cops. I wonder how he could tell the difference.
“But I also do not think that this one case proves that bans would not be productive. It proves the opposite.” (Emphasis mine)
I was once told not to preface my remarks with that phrase, as someone was bound to point out that it’s evident the person who said it all too often…doesn’t.
It is quite evident that an armed citizen has stopped a potentially deadly crime against innocent people. It is also quite evident that had that person not been armed, he and the group he was with would have become another fondly quoted ‘statistic’ uttered by anti-gun groups. I’m quite sure the would-be victims would have preferred to still be breathing rather than a dead ‘statistic’ …and still do.
Criminals have always enjoyed the advantage in a disarmed society…and all too often, said criminals were minions of The State. A fact which The Founders understood all too well. And no amount of woolly-headed utopianist ‘thinking’ will dispel that.
Hut & M. Zinnen
Your notion that banning guns would have meant that the criminals would not have had them is, to put it mildly, very optimistic.
Criminals will always have guns. England has harsh gun laws and their criminals have guns. Even in the Old Soviet Union, the criminals had guns.
Banning guns only takes them out of the hands of non-criminals.
@ Hut:
“If there were no guns or if it was illegal and therefore much more difficult to get a gun…”
Becuase making things illegal just makes them go away right? Kind of like how it’s so difficult to get cocaine or weed right?
A black market for guns would prove even more difficult to control than a black market for drugs – guns don’t get “used up,” necessitating further purchases the way that drugs do. Sure, ammo gets used up, but not in addictive fashion. A single large ammunition purchase could last for years. Making guns illegal would only ensure that the criminally-inclined have them and no one else does.
Hut says:
“One time a person uses a gun to save people. Great. Now how many times have guns been used to murder, assault, rob, and terrorize people. Well, in this one instance we have 2 guns used to terrorize, 1 gun used to save. In all instances I’m sure the ratio would be much more worse.
If there were no guns or if it was illegal and therefore much more difficult to get a gun, this situation would have never occurred.
I’m not saying that this warrants any kind of ban. But I also do not think that this one case proves that bans would not be productive. It proves the opposite.”
Perhaps in your fantasy land guns can be ‘banned’, but not in the real world. A gun is just a metal tube that fires a simple brass cartridge filled with a powder that expands when ignited. Easily manufactured in any machine shop. Also easily imported or smuggled into virtually any country on the earth.
I’m sure in Kim Jong-il’s North Korea, a Totalitarian dictatorship, it would be possible to ‘ban’ things like guns by simply killing anyone even remotely suspected of having seen one, but not here.
My favorite brand of justice. Here’s to hoping our young hero gets a steak dinner and a bj from his girl. What a badass.
Some happy news finally. And in my home town no less. A lot of people fail to realize that 99% of all guns in America are not used in crime and a fair amount are used to stop crime.
Although the UK has no guns for civilians, they have knifings instead of shootings. Now they want to introduce knife control (not kidding). What’s next? Are they going to ban sticks and stones too? Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if they outlawed martial arts.
So has he been arrested yet for the willful and malicious wounding of the one student who got hit? Or at least had his property stolen? I mean, we’ve got to keep the campus safe, and all.
Hut, if there is any justice at all, you will be re-incarnated as a 5’2″ 100 lb woman in a society lacking the right to arm yourself. Working the late shift.
Then you’ll feel safe, right?
Hut,
Maybe you’ve noticed that drugs are also outlawed, but fairly prevalent in most parts of this country. Even drugs like cocaine that can’t be grown here, are easy to get in any city. What makes you think that outlawing guns will keep them from outlaws? I grew up in Germany. Even there, where guns are highly regulated and feared by a lot of the population, they still have criminals who use guns.
Guns and crime in the U.S. is a very complicated issue, and you would simplify it by disarming the very people who follow the laws. Not the best solution. Your arguments are very weak at best, and makes assumptions that fly in the face of conventional wisdom and available facts.
For me, the question is a simple one of personal freedoms. I accept responsibility for my own safety and that of my familty. I do my best to maintain a condition of readiness to respond to threats of all types.
Hut??? Get real.
Remember Archie bunkers response to Mike about gun killings, “Would you rather they was pushed outta windows?”
Here is a good link for you that Mattocracy touched on.
http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1646558/posts
It is interesting to note the increase of gun crimes since the gun ban was instituted.
Sorry, that may have been Gloria that Archie was talking to.
Hut – Since guns do exist, it’s unrealistic to expect they’ll all “just go away.” Just as it’s unrealistic to expect that criminals won’t do criminal things, like obtain guns if they’re banned. If anything, a gun ban in this instance would’ve led to a bunch of dead students and two criminals still wandering the street.
#8 SJE
One cannot deal with it – that’s why it’s called cognitive dissonance.
But I know what you meant. You’re right.
Yeah I’m gonna have to agree with JG. This happened in a private residence, not on campus. It’s not really evidence that more permissive policies re. guns on campus would help prevent/stop shooting sprees. For instance, the assailants in this case clearly had robbery and/or rape in mind. If they just started shooting people through the patio door, the story probably would have ended differently. Likewise, there’s a different set of issues involved with guns on campus vs. guns in the home. I would guess that most students and staff are not comfortable w/ their fellows hauling guns around in their backpacks. I would also guess that many gun advocates seriously mischaracterize the type of students who would be apt to carry; it’s nice to think that some brave, well-trained and upstanding young man or woman is going to be the one with the gun, but it’s just as likely (if not more likely) to be the paranoid and emotionally-troubled one looking for a sense of security or power. There’s a different dynamic at work with the staff, obviously.
Why would they need guns?
They should have simply called 911. And watched their effing language, of course.
I’m wishing I had more information about the assailants. I want to know if easier highs were available – like legalized prostitution or hard drugs – if these two guys would still find that this course of action was the easiest way to satisfy whatever they were trying to satisfy.
Wouldn’t it be great if the assailants couldn’t have gotten handguns in the first place? Without ready availability of handguns the home invasion would never have taken place as there would have been no way for the two assailants to subdue 10 students.
AND “One female student was shot several times during the crossfire. ” would never have happened.
I’m going to play Devils Advocate and say this story sounds a little too black & white to be 100% true. As written though, good for the student!
@#1 | JG |
College Park is a city bordering Atlanta near the airport. The city itself is less than 10 square miles and is within the 285 perimeter of Atlanta. It’s within a few of miles of quite close to a lot of campuses, namely every single school in Atlanta:
Georgia Tech (my alma matter, so I should know where it is)
Georgia State
Emory University
Spelman College
Morehouse College
Clark Atlanta University
Oglethorpe University
Devry!
bobzbob – This is America, 2009. Face reality, not wishful thinking. There are many guns out there in the real world, and too many are carried by criminals – not nearly enough carried by sensible people who merely want the ability to defend themselves or the people they care about.
It really does seem that most gun-control advocates (a) don’t trust people to be able to responsibly carry guns and at the same time (b) don’t encourage educational programs that would make people more confident and responsible in the use of guns.
Matt D.,
Your post is seriously flawd.
Laws preventing law abiding citizens from taking guns on college campuses do not stop the spree killers as there are no metal detectors, security “pat downs” and so forth. The laws that are restrictive do not prevent spree killings and may actually help the spree killers.
Maybe, shooting through glass is very tricky as it will dramatically alter the trajectory of the bullet, or so I’m told.
I used to work out at a place that had quite a few law enforcement and people who enjoyed shooting guns. Often in the changing room I’d watch guys pull out all sorts of handguns. I never once felt nervous. Of course I knew these individuals were responsible gun owners, which is an argument for gun safety courses not a blanket ban.
The paranoid and emotionally-troubled are a far, far smaller segment of the society. Thus, it is not clear that it is these individuals who are going to be carrying. Further, laws against those who have documented histories of such problems would prohibit them from owing such guns in the first place. A law preventing firearms on campuses on the other hand would make no such distinction since there is no enforcement mechanism save after the fact…i.e. after a spree killer has done his killing.
Epic fail Matt.
bcg,
Please, if you want to bust a nut you don’t into an apartment full of people and make sure you have enough ammo to execute everyone when your done raping the women. These aren’t your two average horny guys or duo looking for a high.
Matt D – exactly. It seems that most folks here haven’t bothered reading the article; again, this was a private residence not on (or anywhere near) a college campus. That they are college students (and live in a place called College Park) is completely coincidental to the events.
Also, as I live in the area, I can tell the nay-sayers one thing for sure: in Georgia, when there’s a home invasion and the invaders get shot (which seemingly happens a lot in metro Atlanta), there are almost never any charges against the shooter. If anything, it’s tacitly encouraged, and it’s extremely easy to get a gun in Georgia (as basic possession requires no license).
As far as gun possession on campus, Matt D hits it right on the head: if we could assume that everyone carrying a gun was well trained/experienced in the use of a firearm and would be extremely judicious in its use, then it would be well and dandy. But all it takes is one person exercising poor judgment and accidentally shooting up a bunch of fellow students in an attempt to “protect” them.
omar – I know all of that, as I live in Atlanta (well, suburban ATL) and work at the edge of the Tech campus! My point is that people are harping on college policies on guns, which are not relevant in this case.
JG and Matt, I understand your skepticism, but laws allowing people to carry firearms have not resulted in the scenarios you describe. The same arguments you’re using could be applied towards legally preventing this particular student from having had a gun at all. In which case, the result would have been much, much worse.
Individuals should have the right to protect themselves from criminals.
“Wouldn’t it be great if the assailants couldn’t have gotten handguns in the first place?”
Of course it would. It would also be great if we could go back and uninvent the nuclear bomb. But such thoughts are irrelevant.
I had a buddy that used to work for the military simulating attacks on the United States. One of the key things that made this country so hard to take and hold was the fact that every little machinest shop in every podunk town has everything they need to make guns and ammo. Simulations that placed foreign armies against our civilians (the scenario started with all branches of military just disappearing into thin air so it was the enemy soldiers against our civilian population only) always came out with us winning. Because we have guns, we have ex-military/police/hunters that know how to use them and can train the rest and we have the capability to make whatever we need in our garages.
You cannot ban that. It is a no win situation. Like the drug war. All you can do is create a gigantic and highly profitable black market for guns.
What you can do is greatly increase the jail time for using a gun while committing a crime. If a basic armed robbery was 25 years with a life sentence for second offense it would reduce the people willing to use a gun during the crime. Or get them off the street for a lot longer than this 5 years out in 3 crap we have now.
Of course, the prisons are already over-crowded. I wonder if there are a class of ‘criminal’ clogging the system, who have committed victimless crimes and don’t deserve to be incarcerated, that are preventing us from using the prison system to its maximum extent on actual violent offenders?
Maybe, shooting through glass is very tricky as it will dramatically alter the trajectory of the bullet, or so I’m told.
With two gunmen firing into a crowded room of people, I doubt it would make a difference.
I used to work out at a place that had quite a few law enforcement and people who enjoyed shooting guns. Often in the changing room I’d watch guys pull out all sorts of handguns. I never once felt nervous. Of course I knew these individuals were responsible gun owners, which is an argument for gun safety courses not a blanket ban.
Well, that’s you. I doubt that same level of comfort exists among college students living in a campus population in the hundreds or thousands.
The paranoid and emotionally-troubled are a far, far smaller segment of the society. Thus, it is not clear that it is these individuals who are going to be carrying. Further, laws against those who have documented histories of such problems would prohibit them from owing such guns in the first place.
A smaller segment but one which, I would wager, is more likely to feel the need to carry on campus. Anyway, what sort of documented history is a 19 year old college student going to have?
A law preventing firearms on campuses on the other hand would make no such distinction since there is no enforcement mechanism save after the fact…i.e. after a spree killer has done his killing.
I wasn’t saying a total ban was the most effective way to prevent spree killings. I was saying that schools have to balance all the concerns. The chances of such a shooting occurring are slim to begin with, and the likelihood that an armed student is going to be in the right place at the right time and make the right call to stop it is slimmer still. That has to be balanced against the likelihood that some students will abuse the right to carry, that many students and staff will be unnerved by the knowledge that there are armed students on campus, that there may be other incidents which occur specifically because more people are carrying, that the school will be subject to a lawsuit because of any or all of these issues, etc.
What has been overlooked here is that the student did not automatically reach for the gun when the bad guys barged in. In fact, they remained docile and allowed themselves to be culled. It was only after they were sure of being killed, that is, NO OTHER FRICKIN OPTION, that they opted to use a gun. Had they had a chance to dial 911, they probably would have. This is as basic a defense of gun ownership there is: There was no other option.
JG and Matt, I understand your skepticism, but laws allowing people to carry firearms have not resulted in the scenarios you describe.
I appreciate the good faith, but I’m not sure how you can say that. Most workplaces have rules against guns for precisely the reasons I’ve outlined. Gun control laws are fairly popular. Accidental shootings and misunderstandings obviously happen. Legal owners commit crimes with their guns, or do stupid things with them in the heat of the moment that they may not have done otherwise. I’m pretty certain that all of this occurs more frequently than mass killings, and that’s in a general population that’s going to be more stable and responsible than your average college student (and which also isn’t packed into dorm rooms or lecture halls on a regular basis).
This is something I honestly don’t understand, Matt D:
“That has to be balanced against the likelihood that some students will abuse the right to carry, that many students and staff will be unnerved by the knowledge that there are armed students on campus, that there may be other incidents which occur specifically because more people are carrying, that the school will be subject to a lawsuit because of any or all of these issues, etc.” [emphasis added]
These exact same students and staff presumably, at least sometimes, leave campus, and in any case have not spend their entire lives there. In many if not most states, in most other places they go there could very well be armed people walking around in their midst. Rules that prevent concealed carry on campus make campus different from the norm. Are these kids supposedly uncomfortable all the time?
I tend to agree with LOLcat @ #29. Something about this story doesn’t pass the sniff test. It takes some pretty stupid criminals to bust in on a house of 20 people under the guise of a robbery and then think that you are gonna rape one of the women in a different room while the other 9 women apparently stand by docile and cowed. And then to top it off with a mass murder? Why not just come in shooting?
I have no beef with the outcome of the story and generally think that competent even-keeled people ought to be allowed to concealed carry but this story sounds like the players involved worked out the corroborating details a bit too thoroughly.
JG – Yes, it’s a different situation, but that different. Crowded room, cross-fire, and an armed college student. The only thing missing is the shooter’s element of surprise. It’s a much better analog to a campus shooting than 20/20′s “simulation” which had a shooter who knew which (barely trained) student was armed… and the armed student was hampered by bulky gloves and a mask! And this was taken as proof that concealed carry on campus would do no good.
Absence of proof is not proof of absence… until campuses allow students to arm themselves in class the chances of a spree shooter running into an (illegally) armed student are too slim to provide a test case.
I don’t think regulation of firearms, even fairly strict regulation, is such an outrageous idea.
For an on-going list of how guns have saved lives, check out
http://gunwatch.blogspot.com/
“There are many guns out there in the real world,”
Just because the horse has left the barn doesn’t mean we shouldn’t debate whether or not shutting the barn door is good practice. Lets just hypothesize there are NO handguns yet in the country – wouldn’t it be a good idea to ban them BEFORE they became ubiquitus?
I would point out there are bans on personal ownership and use of all kinds of weapons – and that these bans appear to be effective. Or do you know anyone with their own nuke?
They’re still bad reasons.
Yes, many wrong-headed ideas are popular.
You almost make some good points re: the costs of more widespread gun ownership potentially out-weighing the benefits. That sounds good, but the stats say that gun owners with CC licenses commit very few crimes. Florida, for instance, has issued nearly 1.5 million CC permits since 1987, and only 166 have been revoked because the holder utilized a gun in a crime.
“unreal! I wanna hear some more about this kid and the bad guys… this is like something out of pulp fiction!”
Exactly. Count me for those that are skeptical that it happened the way Action! News! says it did. But maybe so. Never discount the idea of strange things happening the United States.
Personally, I’m probably what you’d call far left in most everything but I’m not big on gun control. There’s simply so many guns in this country that it’s not practical, even if I was convinced it was a good idea.
And it’s certainly unconstitutional to do anything much beyond what we do now, unless you’re going to amend the constitution, so I’ll try to steal you guys’ freedom in other ways.
Funny that, bans on things that are extremely expensive and/or hard to build seem to work well. Guns, on the other hand, are essentially pipes with one end welded shut.
I would love to see guns banned. I hope government is as successful at ridding our streets of guns as they have been at ridding our streets of drugs!!!
Chance, lover of freedom, has spoken. Glad that’s settled, then.
A black market for guns would be much different than a black market for drugs are now. Your average person can’t grow or make a gun, so therefore they would be priced much higher making it harder for criminals to obtain. Not impossible, but much more expensive and difficult. I think you would have a lot fewer people involved in the trade of guns too, which would also make it more difficult.
Some here are saying: good guy 2, bad guys 0 – or some form of that argument. That is a really selective use of statistics. I think if you look at this overall it would be more like: good guys 100, bad guys 14,000 (each year in the US). Thats just a guess, but I bet its pretty close to accurate.
Again, not advocating for gun bans, but lets at least get the fact right here so we can have an intelligent conversation. The argument for gun rights does not lie in the selective cases such as these. These kind of cases can be used by both sides, they just polarize the debate. The argument needs to be made on a constitutional and a limited government grounds. Thats where it makes sense.
The argument that guns might wind up in the wrong hands is interesting, as it is exactly the paranoid loner type who gets a gun and uses it despite the law.
The need to use a gun against a school shooter would of course be rare. The need to use a gun is thankfully rare in any case. Even many law enforcement officers go their entire careers without ever needing to draw their sidearm. Having a gun is for those instances, just like the one in this story, where all else has gone to &^%$#!!
As for the balancing of possible accidents, etc… caused by more people being armed on campus. I don’t know. I did find some interesting stats at the Center for Disease controls website.
http://www.cdc.gov
In 2004 the ’10 Leading Causes of Injury Death…’
1: Unintentional MV Traffic = 43,432
2: Unintentional Poisoning = 20, 950
3: Unintentional fall = 18,807
4: Suicide Firearm = 16,750
5: Homicide Firearm = 11,624
6: Suicide Suffocation = 7,336
7: Unintentional Unspecified = 6,173
8: Unintentional Suffocation = 5,891
9: Suicide Poisoning = 5,800
10: Undetermined Poisoning = 3,455
Source:
ftp://ftp.cdc.gov/pub/ncipc/10LC-2004/JPEG/10lC-unintentional.jpg
I dug up a number for 2004 for accidental discharge of a firearm, I may be getting this one wrong but it looks like the total number was 129 for the year. Nowhere near the causes above.
Source:http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/dvs/LCWK10__2004.pdf
Of course there are lies, damned lies, and statistics, but it seems accidental deaths by firearm are waaaaay down the list of dangers we face in our day to day lives. I also looked at their non fatal injury top 10
ftp://ftp.cdc.gov/pub/ncipc/10LC-2004/JPEG/10lc-2004-nonfatal.jpg
Firearms did not make the top ten. I could not find any more in depth info.
Hut
‘Your average person can’t grow or make a gun, so therefore they would be priced much higher making it harder for criminals to obtain.’
You might want to look into the history of ‘Zip’ guns and other improvised firearms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Improvised_firearm
@#15 Aresen
“Hut & M. Zinnen
Your notion that banning guns would have meant that the criminals would not have had them is, to put it mildly, very optimistic.
Criminals will always have guns. England has harsh gun laws and their criminals have guns. Even in the Old Soviet Union, the criminals had guns.
Banning guns only takes them out of the hands of non-criminals.”
I guess you didn’t do it before you lumped me in with Hut, but please try actually reading my comment (#10). Then, please explain to me where I advocated banning guns (was it before or after I said that I have a concealed carry permit and make use of it?).
“A black market for guns would be much different than a black market for drugs are now. Your average person can’t grow or make a gun, so therefore they would be priced much higher making it harder for criminals to obtain.”
Your average person cannot, and does not, grow or make heroine or cocaine. But there is a huge business, with lots of competition, that keeps prices inflated but affordable to the target buyer, exactly where it has been since the ban took place.
While I pointed out how easy it would be to make guns and ammo here in the states, there is no reason why the black market would. Good quality, factory made guns would stream across our borders like the drugs do now. I see no reason to think that your assumption that guns “would be priced much higher making it harder for criminals to obtain” holds any water at all.
See, there will be no gun ban. There will be a War on Guns. It will go on forever. It will further militarize our police and victimize us as citizens. It will cost us billions that could have been spent actually improving lives. And it will not work. Gun related deaths will remain steady. We won’t be safer, just poorer and with less freedom.
It is unbelievable that people cannot see this for themselves. Why are people so willing to throw away their rights for a worthless promise that has been proven over and over again to be nothing more than outrageously expensive snake oil? Bans Do Not Work.
If you want to reduce gun crime, you don’t make it a crime to own a gun in your home. You increase the penalty for criminal activity with a gun. Increase it to the point that it is not worth having the gun along when you commit the crime.
Just to be clear, I’m not arguing against gun ownership – in fact, my wife and I are in the process of obtaining a gun for the very purpose of protecting our home (I should say, saving some money and looking into classes, because I could walk out of my office and probably purchase a gun before quitting time today). The fact is that gun prohibition isn’t going to happen, and besides it wouldn’t erase the millions of handguns in circulation in this country.
However, I do think that there’s a large difference between shooting someone who is invading your home for the purposes of hurting its occupants versus engaging in a gun battle in a public space, especially if (as in the Northern Illinois shootings) that space is a large classroom with 100+ students in it. I’m not even saying that I absolutely oppose allowing students and staff to conceal-carry (provided they have conceal-carry permits, of course), because I can see a lot of the arguments for it.
However, I’m skeptical that the average college student can guarantee they’d be able to retaliate with gunfire and be 100% sure they’re not going to hit anyone by accident. The notion of being in between two people firing at each other with handguns is not exactly appealing.
bobzbob (#47) – The fact that you responded with a hypothetical question indicates that you probably missed my point completely.
As far as banning other weapons, I oppose ANY ban on ownership of ANY weapon. This may seem extreme, but to me there is a clear, bright line between OWNERSHIP and USE. In a free society, which this country (the US) was according to my elementary school education, people would be encouraged to be responsible and take pride in that fact. Law abiding citizens ought to have the right to own any damn thing they make or trade for.
I doubt that I am the only commenter here who feels this way.
@#52 Hut said
“I think if you look at this overall it would be more like: good guys 100, bad guys 14,000″.
I wonder what the actual statistic really is when both are armed. I think it’s only 100 good guys to 14,000 bad guys when the good guy is unarmed. Without a doubt, when a bad guy goes up against a unarmed good guy (or woman, or little old lady), the bad guy in almost all cases is going to win. I’m an overweight middle aged guy. There isn’t any way I could win in a hand to hand exercise with a 20yr old thug.
I live in a small town with a pretty good ratio of police to population. Even here, the average response time is several minutes. The local police dept is pretty good, too. They’ll get there, rope off the crime scene, gather data, and probably find/convict the bad guy that committed some horrible crime against me. But, they will not be here at my office at 10pm when I go out to my car after work. They won’t be in my yard if a neighbor’s pit bull breaks his chain (ok, I know, that’s not a bad guy vs good guy situation, but it was in something I recently read where a CCW holder saved his life and dog’s life with a concealed pistol). And they won’t be in my living room if someone breaks down my door and invades my home.
Hut
‘I think if you look at this overall it would be more like: good guys 100, bad guys 14,000 (each year in the US). Thats just a guess, but I bet its pretty close to accurate.’
For the official US gov answer for how many times a gun is used in defense I found this info from 2002 at:
http://www.ojp.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/hvfsdaft.txt
Average annual number of victimizations
in which victims used firearms to defend
themselves or their property
________________________________________
Attacked Threatened
Total offender offender
________________________________________
All crimes 82,500 30,600 51,900
Total violent crime 62,200 25,500 36,700
With injury 12,100 7,300 4,900
Without injury 50,000 18,200 31,800
Theft, burglary,
motor vehicle theft 20,300 5,100 15,200
Comparing defensive use with total homicides with a gun seems to run about 10 to 1 in favor of the good guys.
Of course total crimes where a gun was used ran about 667,000 so that would skew the numbers waaay back in favor of the opposing team.
Of course, other methods of determining defensive handgun use put the numbers much higher. See the work of Gary Kleck on the subject, who feels there are around 2 million defensive uses each year. I will link a good digest of this information which has some of Kleck’s input on the subject as well as links to other sources, but since it is a VERY pro gun site so Caveat Emptor.
Hut – Perhaps it matters more where you live when considering how bad the black market for guns might be. I live close to a route that’s commonly used to traffic in drugs up from Mexico. Those drugs, oddly, come from other countries…sort of ruining the “people can make their own drugs” thing, but I digress. Getting guns through that route would not be that difficult. Given that a lot of those drugs end up in more depressed parts of the country, I would expect that guns coming through the same routes would as well. Again, people that don’t care about the legality would still have access to firearms.
While a story of someone using their firearm to save a bunch of lives perhaps shouldn’t be the cornerstone of the pro-Constitution (you know, that pesky 2nd Amendment) debate, neither should the story of one person doing something wrong…or a lot of people doing something wrong, be the cornerstone of the government restricting Constitutionally ratified rights.
JG – In terms of accuracy while shooting a firearm… My experience has been that your average civilian firearms owner tends to shoot more frequently than your average law enforcement officer. Certainly the scores I’ve seen at the range tend to demonstrate more accuracy on the part of a civilian shooter than a LEO. While nobody can guarantee 100% that nobody unintended would get hurt, especially in stressful situations with the physiological effects that kick in, I would rather have someone there that can respond immediately than wait for LEO to assemble and make entry.
Oops, I meant to link this site:
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdguse.html
In my reply to Hut above.
Again, it is a pro gun site but they seem to have a pretty good digest of the relevant links, at least from the pro perspective ;)
I am not saying that guns would be able to be made by individuals or that guns could be smuggled. I am saying that prices would go up and that would make it more difficult and therefore guns would be less prevalent and gun crime would go down. I don’t think any of those statements are debatable.
All of that to say that if you are wanting to argue for gun rights, citing cases where people defend themselves with guns seems pretty foolish. There are hundreds of thousands more cases where people use guns for bad purposes every single year.
Jay – when there are tens of thousands of cases of gun deaths and hundreds of thousands of cases of gun assaults and even more gun crimes every single year, that is worthy of a cornerstone. You can disagree with that cornerstone, but it convinces a lot of people and we live in a democracy. That is how many laws have come to be, rightly or wrongly.
Hut
“I am saying that prices would go up and that would make it more difficult and therefore guns would be less prevalent and gun crime would go down. I don’t think any of those statements are debatable.”
LOL, Ok buddy. Then I guess those statements aren’t debatable, because you have decreed it to be so.
I am going back to work. I am saving up for some drugs, but since they were banned they are so hard to come by and are prohibitively expensive. That is why only rich people have them. And that is not debatable.
Hut
‘gun crime would go down. I don’t think any of those statements are debatable.’
In England gun crimes actually increased after the 90′s tightening of gun restrictions.
‘London’s Evening Standard reported that armed crime, with banned handguns the weapon of choice, was “rocketing.” In the two years following the 1997 handgun ban, the use of handguns in crime rose by 40 percent, and the upward trend has continued. From April to November 2001, the number of people robbed at gunpoint in London rose 53 percent.
From this reason article:
http://reason.com/news/show/28582.html
Or here is a link to The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2000/dec/31/ukcrime.ukguns
So, tighter restrictions, gun crime goes up. You can debate the cause but it does puncture the certainty that tighter controls on guns would lower the gun crime rate.
#43 newerner: “It takes some pretty stupid criminals to bust in on a house of 20 people under the guise of a robbery and then think that you are gonna rape one of the women in a different room while the other 9 women apparently stand by docile and cowed”
Pithy response: “Crime makes you stupid”
– Detective Pendelton
“Homicide: Life on the Street”
Yeah it would be pretty stupid. And brazen. Maybe some violent criminals take it for granted these days that people will just stand around and cooperate and let them get away with anything. There is certainly past precedent for this (just watch one of those “caught on camera shows.” Perhaps these stick-up men have never faced real resistance from citizens before and got a little too arrogant. Well this time they bit off more than they could chew, and one of them paid with his life. Se la vi, mother fuckers!
Whether you are for or against gun control, liberal, conservative, libertarian or whatever, here is the main lesson people should learn from stories like this: YOU are the first line of defense. The second line of defense consists of family, friends, acquaintances, co-workers, and your fellow citizens. Law enforcement (or non-sworn campus security officers like me) is, at most, the third line of defense. How far you go to defend yourself is totally up to you. Ask yourself, is it practical? Are you in good enough physical condition to fight back? Are there others around who might back you up? Can you run away? If you can stop the threat yourself, go for it. If you can get help, scream, use the phone or do whatever. But always remember that YOU need to take primary responsibility for the safety of you and yours. Crime is often an impulsive act. If you are mentally prepared for (but not seeking) confrontation, you may just suprise the offender.
Stay safe out there.
I got bored the last time I was unemployed, as a result I have complete sets of CAD drawings for all of my firearms. The equipment needed to put these drawings to use would cost about $7500 dollars. Metal and other materials would run about $75 to $85 per weapon. Last time I checked, primers and powder were easy to obtain and I have plenty of spent brass. Given the number of small machine shops in my area, I could subcontract most of the difficult parts if necessary.
The only thing preventing someone from setting up shop is that you can still buy a weapon cheaper than what it would cost to have one made. A gun ban would be impractical as it would drive up prices and make producing your own cost effective.
The main problem I see with gun ownership is the lack of specific laws governing what is and isn’t self-defence. The majority of the laws are left for the interpretation of the prosecutor. Anybody who reads this blog knows how that can come out. As a result it is difficult to get good training on how to use a firearm in a self-defence situation. I’ve always leaned towards the “better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6″ point of view. It is my belief that with competant training and clearer laws, the Brady Campaign doesn’t have a leg to stand on.
I noticed that the majority of these “so called studies” are based on stories in the media and statistics. Let’s face it, the media has a proven bias and lacks accuracy, while statistics rely too much on projected numbers.
Hut is hilarious..
So your argument is that unless it’s 100% safe, banning it is acceptable.
I propose we ban water.
Also, a bystander was hit in this specific incident. Does that mean the student in this specific incident was in the wrong?
newerner,
Helmut O’ Hooligan
There are precedents for this sort of thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wichita_Massacre
Ken,
Homicide rate in US = 5.7
Homicide rate UK = 1.4
The guardian article you cite reports 15,000 armed offenses in a year. In the US, there are 15,000 homicides. Seems like the gun laws in the UK are working.
Here’s an article that highlights the fact that in this Georgia town, more guns equals less crime.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n15_v46/ai_15729634/
Pop quiz. If one of the intruders had been an off duty cop who would be being charged with what?
I’d bet life for the guy with a $10m fine for ridding the city of a trained employee, and a two week suspension without pay for the surviving cop for attempting to commit rape and murder.
Dave,
That article is about a town of 11,000. A town called in the article a “bedroom community” with almost no homicides. Not exactly a good test case for gun rights. And there was no effect on crime (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennesaw,_Georgia).
Now if Atlanta did it, then we’d have a test case.
Hut
Homicide rates have always been lower in the UK, even before the total handgun ban.
Violent crime rates, other than homicides, are higher in the UK than the US.
Homicides also went up in the UK after the total ban on handguns, even if the numbers are still far lower than the US.
They always had a lower homicide rate, which went UP a bit after a total ban on handguns, and their overall violent crime rate has surpassed ours in every category except homicide and rape.
So, how does this show that the UK’s gun laws are working? Their levels of crime with handguns go up after passing a total ban and somehow this proves that it was a success?
About 15,000 fewer people dead every year, thats how UK laws are working. And about 70,000 fewer people shot every year. Thats in just one year. Over a decade we’re talking about close to a million people directly affected.
Yes crime rates are high in the UK. This was true before the gun laws you cite and it is true after.
Zargon – I wasn’t advocating banning anything. Please read what I wrote if you want to respond to it, rather than tossing irrelevant snark at me.
My point was simply that, if I were in a crowded place and someone came in and started shooting, I don’t know that I really want someone else to start firing back, especially if I’m in between the two. Jay responded to me on this, and while I don’t doubt he sees well-practiced gun owners who are excellent shots, there’s no way to account for how someone would react in an extremely stressful and adrenaline-inducing situation.
Gun-related deaths in the UK in 2007 – 49
Thats the number in one month in one city in the US.
And gun crime in the UK is not increasing, its decreasing:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/roberies-with-knives-rise-as-gun-crime-falls-1673036.html
I would also add that you will see a rise in “gun-related crime” after a gun law is passed strictly from the people being arrested based on that new law: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/capital-gun-crime-rises-by-50-per-cent-524068.html
I don’t see an increase in people arrested for possession as being contrary to the intended effects.
Re: #9 | Hut | May 6th, 2009 at 10:33 am
The most downmodded post I have ever seen. Congrats on a great troll… or go DIAF.
Next Hut is going to tell us why we need cameras installed, EVERYWHERE.
I’m actually a regular here. Been here for several years now. And while I do support stricter gun laws, I do not support gun bans and I do not support cameras, unless its giving private citizens the right to use cameras in public places.
I think nearly everyone supports some restrictions on the right to bear arms (nuclear weapons being the cliche example). The question is where and how to draw that line.
Matt,
I am not an expert, but it is my understanding is that shooting through even thin barriers wildly alters the trajectory of the bullet, so it would likely make a difference, unless these men are expert marksmen which I highly doubt.
Your assumption is that they would be dangerous, but so are cars, yet we let college kids drive cars. Your fear is unfounded, IMO. And not everyone would carry a firearm.
You have no evidence and there are existing laws that are designed to prevent purchases of firearms which is likely more effective. Campus handgun laws would have zero effect once a mentally disturbed individual obtained the handgun, as bast campus shootings have amply demonstrated.
And it is bullshit. The laws have zero enforcement mechanism save for after the fact. They are toothless laws. It is like passing a law on how much toilet paper one can use every time they go to the bathroom. How are you going to enforce that?
So the fear of a shoot out in a crowded auditorium is really not much of a fear since it is highly unlikely. I love how we panic over low probability events, reduce our freedoms, and then engage in behaviors that are far, far more risky. This view is simply incoherent.
Are you unnerved that there are armed people around you every day? People often carry concealed and even do it illegally, but are otherwise law abiding people.
Matt, if you are this afraid, stay home, pull down the blinds, and pull the covers over your head.
And it isn’t worker safety as the primary reason. Try lawsuits. Yes accidents happen, yes people sometimes do stupid things, but if we are going to run around pissing our pants over extremely rare circumstances then we will have no more freedoms left…not even to piss our pants.
Look at Hut making up data. Problem is Hut, many defensive use of firearms are not reported. The law abiding citizens pulls his gun on a criminal, criminal flees, law abiding citizen holsters gun and goes home. He could report the crime, but if he is carrying illegally, or doesn’t think it would do much good, he might not bother. It is hard to say how effective firearms are at preventing crimes vs. being used in them.
Kind of hard to do that when you are making shit up.
but hut, if you don’t follow the line set out in the second amendment, then there is no line. sentimental morons will keep on taking and taking. I also think that nuclear weapons should not be owned by anyone. If you are really concerned about it, perhaps an amendment is in order?
saying that we have to make up a line about how much of the law of the Constitution we want to obey this year makes having a constitution pointless.
I’m sorry that I couldn’t put that more clearly, I realize the wording is bad, but I hope the point comes across.
“Chance, lover of freedom, has spoken. Glad that’s settled, then.”
Matt, your love of freedom is so much purer than mine, that you have changed my mind. I am ashamed of my authoritarian ways.
Come on. Why is it okay to require a test to operate a car, but not a firearm?
Nuclear weapons are ordnance, not arms. There is a legal difference. The second amendment protects your right to arms which are personal weapons, even military-grade infantry weapons, but not the right to have, say, anti-tank weapons that could blow up a modern main battle tank or shoot down or a jet.
honestly people…first of all, anyone who is saying that to ban guns would be a wise decision, you are morons. it cant happen. second all those anti gun people out there, quit using all this definitive language, “never would have happened.” didn’t your mommy ever tell you; “never say never?” and lastly, if it wasn’t for the right to carry and to protect ourselves, we would be a sad pathetic country, its because of us all you pathetic, scared sheeples can feel somewhat safe in this country. just maybe, one of us will be there to save your ass when you are getting jacked at gunpoint. i doubt it though.
special_k44
If you take the literal meaning of the Second Amendment, those military type weapons ARE the ones we are supposed to have. The original intent of the Second Amendment was to have pool of armed, trained citizens ready to augument the military forces.
Do you know where the tradition of public squares came from and why there is usually a cannon there? That is where the local militias came to train and drill. The cannon was usually bought and maintained by the town and a gun crew was assigned to man it in the event it was needed. The militia’s equipment was the same as the active military forces. If you carry that over to today a case can be made that non-military grade weapons are not protected by the Second Amendment, because they cannot be usefully deployed in defence of the country.
Besides think of how much fun it would be to hunt woodchucks with a 40mm grenade launcher.
This is what happens when you mess with Crackers.
We shoot back.
Attn Chance – re testing before firearm ownership
1. Self defense is a right – driving has been determined to be a privilege. The gov’t cannot license us to defend ourselves.
2. 2nd Amendment is more than a right to hunt – it is the embodiment of self defense – from oppressive gov’t as well as from our fellow citizens.
Special k44
I agree with Jim Collins, but for the sake of argument, do you think mentally ill people should be allowed to own guns? Convicted felons? Convicted sexual predators? Illegal immigrants? Nearly everyone is willing to draw the line somewhere, the question is where.
JCoke
There are limits to constitutional rights. Try yelling fire in a theater sometime and see what happens.
Hut, who defines mentally ill? Who writes the laws that can make us felons? I’m not even going into the sexual predator issue, since pissing in the woods while fishing can put you on the sex offender list. We have laws in place that cover the illegal use of guns, we don’t need any more. If we give the politicians an inch, sooner or later we are all going to be defined as mentally ill, a felon or one of the other criteria that is used. I’m still waiting for the discrimination charges to be pressed against a gun store owner when they ask if someone has been diagnosed as mentally ill. Doesn’t that violate the civil rights of the person trying to buy the gun? I wonder where the ACLU would come down on this one?
Dump the gun laws and come down hard on the people who use guns in the comission of a crime. When was the last time you heard of a criminal saying “I couldn’t rob the bank, because I couldn’t violate the gun laws.”?
Jim Collins
Wow, that is a really extreme view. We deprive felons the right to vote in many places. You would allow anyone to buy a gun, regardless of age, mental capacity, criminal records, etc.? Really? You don’t think that would lead to any problems? You think people would be safer? Really?
And in terms of coming down hard on criminal who use guns – who writes those laws? How can you rely on government to prosecute these gun crimes? Isn’t that giving an inch as well?
““Apparently, his intent was to rape and murder us all,” said student Charles Bailey.”
yeah, I’m sure he had his eyes on you, Charlie.
“Badass” college student? Really? Having a gun makes you a ‘badass’?
special_k44
No, it is more probable that you will be there to shoot someone or jack them at gunpoint. It is far, FAR, more likely than any individual gun will be used in a crime rather than directly defending against a crime.
There is obviously the fact that gun ownership does prevent crimes because potential criminals might be concerned that potential victims might be unarmed, but that is beside the point.
You are not ‘tough’ because you own a gun. By owning a gun, you prove that you are the one who is pathetic and scared. Get over yourself
““Badass” college student? Really? Having a gun makes you a ‘badass’?”
wallster, are you really that fucking stupid?
What would of happened had gun control been in place is the victim would not of been able to protect himself and his friends and the perpetrators would of killed them ALL with their guns. Bad people don’t care about good laws, bad laws, gun control laws, or any law. Like that matters because they don’t even comprehend the concept of Rights, Property, Privelege, and Responsibility. They do care about who or who may not be carrying a gun; obviously because they ran away and died. LOL! And some of you want to make their proffesion care free. I don’t think so and you would not either once you had the pleasure of being the victim.
“One time a person uses a gun to save people. Great. Now how many times have guns been used to murder, assault, rob, and terrorize people. Well, in this one instance we have 2 guns used to terrorize, 1 gun used to save. In all instances I’m sure the ratio would be much more worse.
Firearms are used for self-defense much more than committed crimes. You only never see a national story painting firearms in a positive light. The statistic of such is incredibly difficult to keep. Brandishing is enough to stop most criminals. In thirteen surveys and studies over the years, and the figure swings about 800,000 to 2.5M defensive gun uses annually by law abiding citizens.
In fact, my friend scared off a burglar trying to pry open his front door at 1:30AM last Friday by racking the slide on a pump-action shotgun. He made a police report afterward but it’s unlikely this event will be kept recorded into some database since a firearm wasn’t actually discharged.
There have been armed students or staff at schools that HAVE stopped massacres in the United States. When these stories air, its “a student stopped so-and-so” and left at that. They conveniently leave out the part where they retrieved a gun from their persons or automobile and held the crimminal(s) at bay before police arrive.
Just last year, there was a student in Israel that actually killed an active shooter at his school but it never made national US news circuits.
So in restricting firearms…lets see the folks you judge as unworthy by your personal metric:
Felons…so people who cheat on their taxes are just as dangerous with a gun as a rapist or murderer that got out of prison?
Sexual predators, like the 18 year old that had consensual sex with a 17 year old?
Mentally ill, so folks who are obsessive compulsive, bulimic, have phobias, personality disorders (ie narcissism), or anxiety are just as dangerous with a firearm as people with schizophrenia who think aliens are after them?
Illegal immigrants…so anyone willing to work in the US and doesn’t want to pay thousands of dollars and wait months through the “proper obfuscated channels” is in the same category as a felon or sexual predator?
It’s pretty easy to use blanket statements.
Screaming “FIRE” in a movie theater is the same as my screaming “FIRE” if I was standing in your lawn. Private property isn’t the government. The Constitution limits government power (…theoretically anyhow) and not individuals. If doing so results in damages, then the property owner can go after you for such damages. If screaming “FIRE” in a movie theater is somehow beneficial, the owner can tell everyone to scream “FIRE” if the owner wanted.
Playing the “nuclear weapon” card is juvenile and illogical. I can play the same card. “We shouldn’t let gays get married, because they’ll be marrying animals and our children next”. You should familiarize yourself with the 1934 National Firearms Act and the 1968 Gun Control Act and the supporting documentation surrounding the Second Amendment before making false statements.
What Eric said works for me. Nicely put.
By owning a car, does that prove you are weak and slow? Do you carry everything you need on foot, to make sure no one thinks any less of you?
There is nothing pathetic about being afraid of people who are willing to break into your home, rape, and murder you. A person who takes charge of her security by owning the most efficient means of protection is not pathetic or cowardly, but rationally intent on keeping her life (not allowing herself to be murdered), liberty (not allowing herself to be raped or prevented from coming and going as she sees fit), and property (not allowing thieves to take her things). The same for a man.
Expecting a 911 call to protect you isn’t brave. Considering the number of examples of victims whose call to 911 didn’t save them, why would you try to shame people into being that stupid?
No one has any obligation to give up anything which is theirs to murderers, rapists, and thieves. Furthermore, one is not obligated to rely on one’s body, foregoing the use of efficient tools (guns, door locks, guard dogs) because some simpleton might consider that “pathetic” or cowardly.
Thank god we live in a democracy:
“In general, do you feel the laws covering the sale of handguns should be made more strict, less strict, or kept as they are now?”
More Strict 60%
Less Strict 7%
Kept as They Are 32%
Unsure 1%
Would you be thankful for democracy in the US if you were a black person in Alabama in 1820 or 1920? What about if you were a Jew in Germany in 1934?
I don’t care if 99% of people want more strict laws, every human being has an inalienable right to peacefully acquire the means to defend himself or herself. There is no reason why someone who doesn’t fill out a form gives up that right.
If only you could take the place of the woman who was unable to legally purchase a handgun which could have saved her from an attack.
Eric -
I do not want people who have been convicted of aggravated battery with a firearm to have the right to legally purchase firearms. I do not want people who have been found by a medical professional to be psychotic to be able to legally purchase a firearm. I do not want a child to be able to purchase a firearm without their parent. I do not want someone convicted of molesting children to be able to legally buy a firearm. I think these are pretty basic common sense limitations. Your extreme points about people with phobias and anxiety is not at all what I’m talking about and its not what the law is.
Elliot-
You see civil rights being equivalent to gun rights? I don’t see how they are comparable. Enslaving people based on race is equivalent to making people get background checks before buying a gun? The holocaust is equivalent to a felon being denied the right to bear arms? That’s ridiculous. I can’t believe I’m even responding to it.
And your final point about the woman – if you are so concerned about the safety of women, why don’t you explain why homicides rates in European countries with stricter laws are so much lower?
As was said in Heller’s dissenting opinion – “that the Second Amendment protects an individual right does not tell us anything about the scope of that right”
The main problem with your arguement Hut, is that laws only stop the people that you don’t have to worry about in the first place. The people who you want to stop, don’t pay attention to the laws we have, what makes you think that they are going to pay attention to any new ones.
The Supreme Court has ruled that the Police are under no obligation to protect an individual (Gonzales vs Castle Rock), so forget dialing 911. The only person you have to protect you is YOU.
I’ve heard a theory as to why violent crime has risen over the years. Up until the mid 70′s the US had a military draft. This ment that the majority of men in this country knew how to use a gun. At the same time most households had at least one gun. This made life kind of dangerous for the criminals. Now the majority of people in our military have no weapons training and we have declared large areas to be “gun free” zones. This puts the odds in favor of the criminal. Add a justice system where in many cases the rights of the criminal take precedence over the rights of the victim and you get what we have now.
As far as the UK is concerned, I think I read a story a few months ago about a man being made to remove barbed wire from around his garden plot because someone stealing from his garden may hurt themselves on it.
Man, I can’t wait to move to Vermont where there are practically NO gun laws, and practically NO gun violence. Hell, last time I was there in 2007 the big news that week was a stabbing in St. Albans where the victim was talking about it on the evening news the same day.
Hut (#104): “You see civil rights being equivalent to gun rights?”
You see some rights as less equal than others, and thus dispensable.
To you, black people should be free, but unarmed. It’s all about being afraid of a BMWG, right? (Sorry, I was channeling the evil spirit of Janeane Garofalo there!)
All kidding aside, if it’s a right, it’s a right. Statistics be damned, there is no reason you should be able to stop someone from getting a gun for self defense. Ever.
[...] to say someone with a gun
[...] to say someone with a gun
[...] to say someone with a gun
[...] to say someone with a gun
If the government takes away your right to defend yourself, they have essentially removed the last vestiges of sovereignty over your own body. That’s the point of demarcation that differentiates “the people” from a mere cash crop.
It doesn’t matter if the UK has a lower homicide rate. We’re not in a competition with the UK to see which country can repress its citizens more.
The idea that all it takes to justify a law is to point to a statistical benefit, then we might as well abandon the Constitution and institute rule by committee.
Ah, the tyranny of the majority….
Would someone please explain what posts like #109, #110, #111 are? Thanks.