Gun Control

Politics
385

So like this is one of those, I know both of your (and the rest of people talking strategy in this thread’s) hearts are in the right place but from where I stand this chat is a bit like those people who claim to want a more equitable society and then just discuss reducing the national deficit when talking fiscal policy or people who claim to want an equitable society and then only talk about class (not race or gender or sexuality (class reductionist in a word)).

Disarming the citizens and disarming the police and reducing the military are intrinsically linked and have to be considered together. Talking strategy about only one of those objectives while ignoring the other two makes one the straw-man that person was talking about.

Plus between you me and the kitchen table, disarming the people will be way easier than disarming the cops. I do recommend we start with the hard problem.

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386

It is true that the number of people shot by police in the US is way more than the number of people killed in mass shootings. So from that perspective it makes sense to disarm the greatest threat first.

But from a practical perspective, it makes no sense. Let’s hypothetically say we managed to disarm the cops and the military before disarming civilians in the US. Well, that leaves right wing white supremacist militias as the most well equipped domestic force, and a violent fascist revolution is the likely result. That’s not the good ending.

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387

Well, that’s the reason they cite out loud, anyway.

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388

See I agree with the second part and there but not the part where you call it completely impractical. I agree disarming the police completely first before coming for a single non-police civilian gun (cops are civilians) is not the good ending, and you’ll note it’s not what I was saying we should do. I said:

I think there are some smart folks here, as demonstrated by the effective plans they put forth to disarm non police civilians. Perhaps some of that talent could be put towards coming up with a plan that disarms both while considering both?

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390

They are completely separate problems. They’re both bad, but they’re separate.

There is zero reason for a civilian to own a gun outside of extremely narrow uses like specific forms of hunting and sport. Ban most private gun ownership and you save countless lives.

You also, then and only then, completely undercut the primary stated driver of police fear: the armed population. It paves the way for solving the other problem.

Entirely separate to that, you divest most of the things police are responsible for today from the police into other unarmed agencies and services. Mental health, property damage, traffic, etc… Meanwhile, you restructure the much smaller “forces” necessary for public order into an actual paramilitary oranization subject to extreme scrutiny.

Both tracks are important and activists are pursuing both, and have been for some time.

The most fatal fallacy of American leftists is their intense need to solve every problem to talk about any problem.

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391

They’re not separate problems, a great deal of marginalized folks want to keep their guns because they know police will not protect them, (this is one reason a civilian may want to own a gun, so I guess there’s more than zero reasons) if you want to take away their guns without also disarming the police or doing something with police to alleviate their legitimate fears, you truly are the straw-man in the video above.

Thankfully it seems you have a plan that considers both, even if you consider them “entirely separate”.

If we start to see less armed goons showing up to things and more “unarmed agencies and services”, then and only then is a plan to start to disarm non police civilians not a one dimensional effectively pro gun plan.

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392

When they’re not using them to shoot up schools or pride events, white supremacists are largely using their guns on each other, mostly in domestic disputes. When cops are not using them on the line of duty to murder innocents, they are doing the same.

Incidents like this are all too common:

Marginalized people who have guns are not using them for mass shootings or to murder innocents, but they are also using them for domestic violence. Marginalized people specifically say, and have always tried very hard, to get guns out of their communities.

The TikTok video, and presumably you, are imagining some sort of scenario where a violent fascist force is coming to commit genocide and the community must rally together to defend itself. While I don’t want to say that can’t happen, as it has happened several times throughout history, and we are going in that general direction, it does not appear to be imminent.

Outside of that one specific scenario, the presence of guns in a marginalized community, or any community, serves to bring that community down. Incidents where guns are used legitimately for self defense as so rare as to be effectively non-existent. Meanwhile, incidents like this are all too common.

Imagine if we were to hypothetically, remove all the citizen-owned guns from the Bronx. It would be so tremendously uplifting for the safety of the people living there. Being able to go about their business and have one less thing to worry about. Not having to worry about having their children hit by stray bullets. Not being threatened by a domestic partner (at least not threatened with a gun). The economic boon of not having to worry so much about security, being able to open late without fear, being able to attract more tourists to parts that aren’t Yankee Stadium, the zoo, or the botanical garden. That sounds like a much better idea than arming everyone in the Bronx with assault rifles just in case the fascists come.

While you might want them to have guns, marginalized people do not want them for themselves or for anyone else in their community. They are empirically correct in that getting rid of them will make their community safer and more prosperous. The same would be true for the right wing white people living in the rural areas. They would be much better off if they got rid of all their guns and spent their money on something else instead.

People spend too much time discussing all these specific gun scenarios and technical issues. The reality is that the less guns there are, regardless of what type of gun or who has them, the safer and more prosperous all of us are. Therefore we should do everything we can to get as close as we can to the eventual goal of repealing the second amendment and banning them as completely as possible.

393

New video covering how Australia responded to a spate of mass-shootings in the 80’s-90’s by clamping down on gun purchases and getting them out of people’s hands. Also, is the significant reduction in mass shootings as a result of the gun control laws or merely correlated with the legislation?

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Arming people to “protect” themselves doesn’t work. Owning even one gun increases your chance of death by gun. Full stop. They aren’t useful tools of self-defense, and there is ample evidence of this.

But more to the point, what exactly are you trying to accomplish in this thread? You seem adversarial for no real reason, and I don’t think you’re acting in good faith here. This argument is pretty weaksauce and you’re coming across as pro-gun in a big way. More specifically, you’re echoing the talking points that I mostly only see in accelerationist circles.

Like, what the fuck are you arguing? That a non-white civilian could defend themselves against the police in any way with a gun? Use a gun in any sort of self defense? We know that’s ridiculous.

395

To repeat myself, I’m asking for, and I even stated I was given, a solution to gun control that considers both police and non police gun ownership. If being adversarial is asking for something, getting what I ask for, critiquing the answer but ultimately backing down is adversarial then yes.

I’m arguing against living in a country where nobody but the police have guns. And the reason I’m arguing against that is because I see that as being exactly the same as the scenario Scott provided above where only the police are disarmed and nothing else changes.

I also see plans that don’t consider both together as leading to that outcome.

I’ll write up a longer answer to Scott later

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396

Why?

Nobody is arguing for that here.

You also ignored the more salient point. What do you possibly think a non-white person is going to do with a gun to “defend” themselves? Against police or anyone else?

397

I’m not a gun owner, I’m not speaking for myself here but I’ll let the pink pistols speak for themselves:

"Armed queers don’t get bashed. We change the public perception of the sexual minorities, such that those who have in the past perceived them as safe targets for violence and hateful acts — beatings, assaults, rapes, murders — will realize that that now, a segment of the sexual minority population is now armed and effective with those arms. Those arms are also concealed, so they do not know which ones are safe to attack, and which are not…which they can harm as they have in the past, and which may draw a weapon and fight back.

The Pink Pistols are the ones who have decided to no longer be safe targets. They have teeth. They will use them."

Honestly Rym, I’m not sure why we’re still talking. You seem amenable to the one point I’m trying to make, which is when you make gun control plans, include plans for police in them lest your plan lead to the thing that “Nobody is arguing for that here.”

As to Scott

No group is a monolith. Were they such, groups like Black Armed Resistance, Armed Equality, The Pink Pistols, Huey P. Newton Gun Club, The National African American Gun Association (I could be here all day but for brevity’s sake I’ll stop) wouldn’t exist.

By and large these groups aren’t specifically saying they intend to gather up their forces and lead an armed resistance against the united states government, nor are they saying that they are looking forward to the day someone tries something with them so they can defend themselves with a gun. As has been pointed out, that scenario is not a common one.

So why do these groups exist? Why do the not-a-monolith minorities want to arm themselves and train and such? Well we can ask them, look at the pink pistols, they’re a decent representative here.

It’s a bit nuanced but basically it’s harder to bully armed groups of people than it is unarmed groups. The credible and implicit threat of violence changes the behavior of the aggressors. I’ve seen this myself protesting in Jersey. When among the protestors there are visibly armed people, the cops hit people less, escalate less and generally are more peaceful.

I don’t like this twisted state of affairs, I’d prefer it if neither side had guns. Hence my repeated pleas that you consider both in any call to action you may do re:gun control.

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398

"Armed queers don’t get bashed. We change the public perception of the sexual minorities, such that those who have in the past perceived them as safe targets for violence and hateful acts — beatings, assaults, rapes, murders — will realize that that now, a segment of the sexual minority population is now armed and effective with those arms. Those arms are also concealed, so they do not know which ones are safe to attack, and which are not…which they can harm as they have in the past, and which may draw a weapon and fight back.

It is true that this group may believe this. It is true that this is an easy thing for people to believe. It is an idea that is ingrained not just in our minds but in our DNA. You can see so many animals on this Earth that have the same idea. Whether it’s frogs with bright colors, peacocks with big feathers, or various large animals being loud and intimidating, there is an idea that appearing and/or actually being dangerous brings safety.

But when it comes to humans and guns this instinct is in direct opposition to empirical fact. All data shows that the presence of firearms present a great danger to those who have them as well as those who are near those who have them regardless of other factors. While groups like the pink pistols might believe that having guns will protect them, their belief is strongly contradicted by the evidence. Statistically speaking the guns possessed by the pink pistols are vastly more likely to be used in domestic disputes within their community than they are to protect the community via any intimidation factor. They would greatly benefit themselves by disposing of them.

Of course no group is a monolith. There are enough people on earth that you can find someone believing any combination of things. The existence of humans believing a thing is not evidence that the thing is correct. You can find plenty of right wing people who want to ban guns and cars, just as much as you can find left wing people with pickup trucks and full arsenals. There just aren’t many such people.

The point is to concentrate on facts and facts alone. Guns create danger for everyone, regardless of who has them. The end goal is, of course, to get rid of them entirely. But any amount of reduction in possession of firearms, even if we disarm the populace prior to disarming the police and military, is beneficial and uplifting to all of society. Therefore any change which brings us closer to that ideal, however small and imperfect, is still positive, and I fully support it.

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399

I suppose this is a first principal disagreement we have. No amount of arguing will change minds. You believe this and I don’t.

I see disarming the populace prior to disarming the police as:

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400

Show evidence then. Major scientific studies back my stance. What backs yours other than anecdotes and conjecture about hypothetical scenarios?

If we disarm all the cops and leave guns only in the hands of right wing domestic terrorists, then I agree with you. It will be a bad time. That’s what I was saying in the quote. As much as I hate cops, and as many of them are white supremacists, I don’t see that scenario happening if we disarm everyone but the cops.

There is a huge material difference between police with guns and patriot front with guns. There is a significant difference between FBI agents with guns and domestic terrorists with guns. There is a difference between capitol police with guns and Jan 6 traitors with guns.

I’m not concerned with hypothetical, but with current reality. Guns are an extreme danger to all of us. We know for a fact that if we reduce how many guns are out there, regardless of who has them, many lives that would have been ended early will not be. Our society as a whole will be safer and more prosperous. This is true even if the government are the only ones with guns, as is the case in many countries around the world.

If we were to target our policies towards a hypothetical future scenario we would serve only to cause greater harm. Such policies would likely act as self-fulfilling prophecies. We must target our policies to take action on real threats that exist today and that we have proven solutions for. We should push those policies as hard as we can. Even if the end result is ultimately inadequate, it’s still vastly preferable to doing nothing or regressing.

When your biggest concern seem to be hypothetical doomsday scenarios, it becomes difficult to take you seriously.

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401

If you don’t understand why you are harming your own points, I don’t know what to say. You are ignoring the clear and direct evidence that what you are saying isn’t true and doesn’t work.

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So I must confess I’m not completely sure what you’re asking for here. If you want studies showing that guns save lives or that there’s not enough evidence to whether they save more lives than they take, they’re not hard to come by. This is one of the most researched subject in America with powerful interests trying to influence policy. Here’s a few to show that:

https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6853&context=jclc

The reason I’m confused here is because contradicting your data isn’t something I’m interested in. I basically agree with your data. I’m fully aware that the mere presence of guns is a dangerous thing regardless of context. I recognize that all the training in the world can only ever be mitigation.

My issue isn’t with your data, it’s with the conclusions you draw from it. Major scientific studies say guns are dangerous regardless of context so you say, “we should fully ban guns and it doesn’t matter how”.

If I may be hyperbolic, I view this as similar to major scientific studies saying the sun is responsible for climate change so you say “we should fully block out the sun and it doesn’t matter how”

If you’re asking for data showing that allowing only the cops to have guns while the rest of the civilian population remains unarmed is a bad thing, worse than the current state of affairs. I’m not sure what data I could possibly offer to show you that. I’ll try my best in the next paragraph but in the interest of being fair, could you give me data showing the opposite? Substantiate with data that disarming the cops but not everyone else would be bad.

I could hand over wikipedia’s list of military dictatorships or police states. I could point to the history of labor relations in the united states. I could even point out this recent survey of experiences of violence and gun homicide in California, which was unexpected to have something so recent from the United States. I can even find the UN agreeing with me that you have to reduce the civilian and state stockpiles at the same time (Point 1 of their 4 point plan)

What I can’t do is give you data showing that disarming American non police civilians and changing nothing else would be bad. There’s not a data set that can show that. It’s a judgement based on history, not data. When it comes to how countries act in nutty circumstances there’s just not enough data to say anything conclusively.

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403

Totally regardless of where civilian gun laws stand, I don’t see an even remotely plausible scenario in which the US federal govt, police, etc will do any standing down on their gun issuance and deployment within the next, I dunno, half-century. Even if in the next 10 years civilian gun ownership is more-or-less banned they have another 20 years of cleanup to deal with, and then another 30 years of slowly diminishing returns on firearms issuance and training so that most officers loose that ability. It seems other places have been able to pull it off quickly, but as a country/culture we’ve had a lot longer time at this with modern arms than almost anyone else in the world, so it’s hard to say what worked in those places could happen within a similar timespan here. I wouldn’t say it’s impossible but it’s a big project.

That’s assuming over the next 50 years or so things more-or-less ride the line of the current paradigm. I’m imagining within the next 20 we see a major upset that sort-of resets the whole debate, and it could go any number of ways.

404

Good discussion on gun control.