^^^^that's fucked.
United States & Gun Control discussion.
- Thread starter Diamondback 2/2
- Start date
The problem is the anti-gunners would make the training requirements so onerous that no one could buy (eventually own) a gun.
NICS check is all that's needed, no way to legally determine mental status.
Your asking to make everyone's Mental Health Records (essentially) open source.
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2009
- Messages
- 4,305
I am against a psych test to own a gun.
Yep...they are "way" too subjective.
Besides, I don't need somebody to tell me if I am a "little off" to them. :-"
I don't think it's too much to insure someone is not a psychopath before selling them a gun.
I've also thought for years that every person entering the 9th grade should be given a psychological evaluation before entering HS as a regular student.
You see my problem is nobody address's the issue of mental health from a standpoint of identifying and setting restrictions on those people until they have proven their mental health is up to par. In a country where we have over 300 million people, we need to do something to identify and properly deal with the crazy ones. I can see the concerns of wanting to keep health records safe and out of the public. Hell everyone has a moment or two where they deal with some form of mental health issues. But when you have people who are straight up nuts walking around unknown to the public, that's a problem.
Our mass killings on the other hand were ticking along at about 1 a year, with no real decline in sight. There has only been 2 fire arms related mass killings since 1996 and one was a murder suicide on a remote property with one mentally impaired parent and one severely depressed parent, so not your typical spree killing.
@digrar
Sure.
I've always said that confiscating guns would move the needle- especially when it came to suicide.
But I've also believed that violent crime would climb as people went from being basically able to defend themselves to victims.
And that is certainly the case now in Australia where GUN RELATED DEATHS are virtually nonexistent, but violent crime, sex assault, and other types of crime have skyrocketed.
AUSTRALIA: MORE VIOLENT CRIME DESPITE GUN BAN
Sure.
I've always said that confiscating guns would move the needle- especially when it came to suicide.
But I've also believed that violent crime would climb as people went from being basically able to defend themselves to victims.
And that is certainly the case now in Australia where GUN RELATED DEATHS are virtually nonexistent, but violent crime, sex assault, and other types of crime have skyrocketed.
AUSTRALIA: MORE VIOLENT CRIME DESPITE GUN BAN
Brill
SOF Support
Shhhhh!!! Not so loudly!!! There's nothing to keep the Dims from requiring a psych test to buy/possess ammo!
I agree something needs to be done about mental illness, but only if there is a way back from the abyss.
Anti-gunners will get you on a Psych list (see VA Scandals) and you are screwed for life.
Someone self admits because they are depressed, and now they are screwed for life; others see that and refuse to seek treatment resulting in a bigger mess.
Look at the no-fly list.
They won't tell you why you are on it, and do everything to make sure you stay on it, even if it is a mistake on their part.
Brill
SOF Support
I'm confident that if POTUS go the EO route, the order would be overturned in SCOTUS as a violation of 5th Amendment rights since the watch list is subjected to due process.
Harvard legal scholar indeed.
IIRC the courts just slapped the government down for not providing any way (minus an expensive lawyer) off the list.
They came up with a way to get off, it's just going to cost a lot of change.
So gun control doesn't work in the land of backwards flushes?
It doesn't stop illegal weapons. Same as in your neck of the woods. We're essentially fucking around law abiding people, to stop people who aren't in the legal weapon system at all.
I think I read that the original Australian gun buy back only removed about 20 or maybe 30% of the guns in Oz at the time.
It's by no means the end of crime as we know it, but it makes some people feel better. The one area it always has a huge effect is in suicide. Gun free nations have a lower suicide rate where guns were used as the weapon. It has little to no effect on stopping crime and statistics indicate in many cases, crime (particularly violent crime) becomes worse.
The answer to crime is just more complex and honing in on guns as the problem will not solve it.
It's by no means the end of crime as we know it, but it makes some people feel better. The one area it always has a huge effect is in suicide. Gun free nations have a lower suicide rate where guns were used as the weapon. It has little to no effect on stopping crime and statistics indicate in many cases, crime (particularly violent crime) becomes worse.
The answer to crime is just more complex and honing in on guns as the problem will not solve it.
Honest question: But do suicides as a whole go down or just those using guns?
It seems to me to be a given that they would have a lower firearm suicide rate. The question is whether the lack of guns actually affects the overall suicide rate or if the people who would have committed suicide with a firearm just find another means, invalidating the statistic as meaningful.
I get what you're saying, and I used to see the issue the same way that you do, but research is starting to show that firearm suicides are not only the most common form of suicide, but states with lower gun ownership rates also have lower suicide rates. The reasoning there is that most suicides are impulsive acts, and guns are much more lethal than other suicide methods.
This article from Pew is a little old, but it gives some good information about firearm suicides Suicides account for most gun deaths
Now I know everyone is going to jump my shit for this, but the Brady Campaign (booooo hiss!!) put out a pretty good report on the link between gun ownership and suicide rates earlier this year http://www.bradycampaign.org/sites/default/files/Truth-About-Suicide-Guns.pdf
I hate the fact that we have to resort to a partisan group for research on the issue, but that brings me to another point: The Dickey Amendment
Currently, the CDC is banned from collecting data about gun deaths because of concerns over partisan manipulation on behalf of the government. Unfortunately this has had the resultant effect of forcing the public to rely on even more partisan sources (Brady et. al) for data and analysis on the issue. I can understand (and sympathize with) conservative fears over this issue, but I really think its high time that we put that aside for a minute and take a dispassionate look at the issue. I see that many posters here are accusing the various sides of appealing to emotion and rhetoric, which is a fair accusation, but ultimately it stems from not having an authoritative source to tell us "Here is the data. Draw your own conclusions". Instead, we have lobbying groups massaging what data is available for their own ends, and honestly that's kind of shitty.
I think a good concession from those on the right would be to say "Hey, we get that there is a problem, but instead of flying off of the handle and proposing more gun control, how about we remove the Dickey amendment and take an impartial look at the problem?"
I think the CDC should be able to study firearms related crime, but we shouldn't rely on a "one and done" strategy in a single presidential term. That's my big fear: a small sample or a handful of studies making the case one way or another.
At any rate, the CDC recently released a study looking at Wilmington, DE's firearm violence:
http://dhss.delaware.gov/dhss/dms/files/cdcgunviolencereport10315.pdf
A somewhat biased review here:
The CDC Just Released a 'Gun Violence' Study
The shocking conclusion: young men with a history of violence eventually escalate to using firearms. Again, this is a small sample which illustrates my fear(s).
One really interesting tidbit is found on page 2. It compares homicide rates per 100,000 people. 27* of 50 states saw a decrease, 11* saw a decline, and the remainder had such a slight change I didn't include them, hence the asterisks. I think that's significant because it comes after the expiration of the AWB and during a time which saw firearms purchases increase.
More studies need to be done and considering the Constitutional implications I don't think studies like the above are enough and they need to occur over time. We shouldn't hang our hat on a handful of limited focus groups.
Ultimately, the only reason the anti-2A crowd has any traction is because of a handful of mass shootings. Yeah, I'm cynical, but once this hit white, suburban, latte-sipping America it became a "problem." One of the greatest rock bands of all time, Rush, did a good job with the mentality:
Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone
Like I posted earlier, either they don't know, don't show, or don't care about what's going on in the hood.
At any rate, the CDC recently released a study looking at Wilmington, DE's firearm violence:
http://dhss.delaware.gov/dhss/dms/files/cdcgunviolencereport10315.pdf
A somewhat biased review here:
The CDC Just Released a 'Gun Violence' Study
The shocking conclusion: young men with a history of violence eventually escalate to using firearms. Again, this is a small sample which illustrates my fear(s).
One really interesting tidbit is found on page 2. It compares homicide rates per 100,000 people. 27* of 50 states saw a decrease, 11* saw a decline, and the remainder had such a slight change I didn't include them, hence the asterisks. I think that's significant because it comes after the expiration of the AWB and during a time which saw firearms purchases increase.
More studies need to be done and considering the Constitutional implications I don't think studies like the above are enough and they need to occur over time. We shouldn't hang our hat on a handful of limited focus groups.
Ultimately, the only reason the anti-2A crowd has any traction is because of a handful of mass shootings. Yeah, I'm cynical, but once this hit white, suburban, latte-sipping America it became a "problem." One of the greatest rock bands of all time, Rush, did a good job with the mentality:
Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone
Like I posted earlier, either they don't know, don't show, or don't care about what's going on in the hood.
Blizzard
Member
- Joined
- Dec 10, 2012
- Messages
- 3,807
The issue is of course politicized but there are still some reasonably objective sources for information available, including the CDC and FBI. IMO, no one should ever rely on one source for data. Rather, a more comprehensive and objective approach is to utilize several sources to validate against each other. As an example, if you're interested, a while back, I made a post with some links to sources that contain fairly objective and quantitative data, including suicide stats:
United States & Gun Control - Post #459
Note: CDC does collect data on firearm related deaths and some of there numbers are included in the link above. I'm not sure it's in the scope of the CDC to be any more involved than that.
Last edited:
