People with guns protect you. Is that so difficult to admit? I guess one can be proud of this privilege and sleep soundly while others defend you while you sleep, but in any case, call Uber Eats and the police and see who reaches you first.

People with guns protect you. — NOS4A2

SOME people with guns protect me, and part of what they protect me against is other people with guns. It is not guns for all or guns for none.

Collective defense and individual defense are one and the same. What you are speaking of is the monopoly on violence, which is hardly collective or individual. This sort of violence is exclusive to someone like you and me.

The pure anarchism of the world government permits that a nation can defend its own borders, but while the government class gets to claim this right and abuse it to all ends, they refuse to extend that right to their own citizens. Why do the chosen nobility and their armies get to defend their borders but a single man cannot? So much for collective defense. This is the defense of state interest and nothing more.

I agree and would add that it is not just guns but a "gun culture" that promotes the idea that guns are the solution to two major threats, the government and criminals. — Fooloso4

True -- they go hand in hand. We wouldn't have the amount of guns nor the ease of access if it weren't for this gun culture, which has been deliberately manufactured over the years by gun companies -- but even if we had the gun culture with less guns and rational regulation, there would still be less shootings.

Perhaps if guns were banned and a sharp rise in school stabbings was observed, it would get people's heads out of the sand, hm? — Tzeentch

The health of the nation is important, no doubt. The same people who argue for more guns also argue against medicare-for-all and other programs that would help people, so pretending to care about "mental health" is laughable coming from them.

But yes, if we're serious about less violence overall, we should try creating a better society. In the meantime, guns need to be regulated rationally. Give me a nut with a knife over a nut with an AR-15 any day -- just ask the Uvalde cops.

As to owning a gun to defend myself and my family against criminals, it is not as if they are going to wait until I get my gun, load it, and point it at them before they point their loaded gun at me or a family member. Perhaps you sleep cuddling a loaded gun, but I think it far more likely that a gun in the house will do me or my family harm than good. — Fooloso4

As has been shown over and over again. To a paranoid gun manufacturing shill who's convinced himself that the government is nothing but evil, you have to be ready 24/7, carrying around a weapon at all times. Too many wild west movies as a kid (which were part of the gun propaganda, incidentally).

Anyway, yeah it's a ridiculous position. Not only paranoid, but also failing to look at other countries and failing to see that if the government wants to arrest you, they will. Daydreams about insurrections aside. It's just a life based on fear and a pathetic notion of "freedom."

The same people who argue for more guns also argue against medicare-for-all and other programs that would help people, so pretending to care about "mental health" is laughable coming from them. — Mikie

Well, so far you haven't shown a great deal of interest in the iceberg of suffering that underlies these killings either.

Carry on.

All the armaments of the United States armed forces--from ICBMs to pistols–do not contribute to the peaceful relations among our fellow citizens. What maintains peacefulness in society is the collective desire to avoid conflict as one goes about one's life. Internal peacefulness is not maintained by 300,000,000 guns either. — BC

Absolutely, and not only is paranoia used to justify having a gun (you know, to "protect yourself against the government" and "criminals" -- which is absurd enough), but it's also used to justify REGULATING guns. How? Well, any talk of gun control becomes the slippery slope: you want to BAN ALL GUNS and "disarm" your fellow law-abiding citizens!

Actually, there are a number of rational things to do:

* Requiring licensure and training, similar to driving a car (or truck, or motorcycle, or plane, or operating complex/dangerous machinery).

* Universal background checks.

* Wait periods.

* Banning assault weapons (except in rare circumstances)

* Better regulate gun shows and private selling.

* Harsher penalties for non-compliance.

Etc. etc. Plenty of sensible ideas, many of which are used in other countries who, lo and behold, have less gun deaths and whose governments haven't capriciously attacked its citizens.

Well, so far you haven't shown a great deal of interest in the iceberg of suffering that underlies these killings either. — Tzeentch

I have -- in Deaths of Despair and elsewhere. Places where it's appropriate to highlight or emphasize the issue of mental health. Making mental health the focal point in a thread about gun control or when the topic is mass shootings is, as I mentioned, an NRA talking point and diversion tactic.

If fentanyl deaths skyrocketed in country Z, and it turned out country Z was an outlier not in drug use but in the amount of, and ease of access to, fentanyl -- then call me crazy, but my first priority would not be to discuss the prevalence of substance abuse. It would be to restrict the amount of, and ease of access to, fentanyl.

The racist roots of American gun control extends even to today. Like segregated governments and their KKK enforcers, confiscation of weapons is above board, so long as it happens to those whom they deem not virtuous and civilized enough to have them. Meanwhile, they would prefer the right remains in the hands of the elected nobility and their enforces, while the rest of us should twiddle our thumbs when threats appear in our streets and neighborhoods. This kind of furtive boot-licking has somehow gained a moral flavor.

Why do the chosen nobility and their armies get to defend their borders but a single man cannot? — NOS4A2

Why do the rich get to drive cars and a single man cannot?

Oh wait, a single man can -- if he has the means, and goes through the proper training. It's almost as if the claim that a "single man cannot" is paranoid. :chin:

If fentanyl deaths skyrocketed in country Z, and it turned out country Z was an outlier not in drug use but in the amount of, and ease of access to, fentanyl -- then call me crazy, but my first priority would not be to discuss the prevalence of substance abuse. It would be to restrict the amount of, and ease of access to, fentanyl. — Mikie

How has that approach been working out?

So long as he abides by the rules you’ve set out for him. That you get to set the rules and I don’t only fuels the paranoia, because someone will take the same power, using the same mechanisms, and take them away almost entirely, like a vast majority of the nations in the world. The idea that this will never happen is far more ridiculous than believing it will.

Apart from being a very odd argument, this exemplifies the genetic fallacy. It wouldn't even matter if the KKK invented gun control, it's either a good idea on its own merits or it isn't. And examining whether or not it will save lives seems a reasonable way to approach the debate. Fallacy-ridden rhetoric randomly strewn with emotive language less so.

How has that approach been working out? — Tzeentch

Quite well, in terms of guns.

As the U.S. gun control debate intensifies, some Americans are looking overseas for ideas on how to prevent mass shootings. Japan has one of the lowest rates of gun violence in the world. There were more than four firearm homicides in the U.S. per 100,000 people during 2019, compared to almost zero in Japan.

As CBS News senior foreign correspondent Elizabeth Palmer reports, Japan's strict laws on private gun ownership have surprising origins in the United States. She met Raphael, a well-known Japanese YouTuber who decided to take skeet shooting lessons. Despite being ex-military, he had to jump through all the same hoops that any Japanese civilian must clear to get a gun license.

There's mandatory training. You have to pass a written exam, plus a physical and mental health evaluation. Even then, the police will go and ask your family and friends whether you have any violent tendencies.

All said and done, Raphael told CBS News it took him a year to get his license, during which time the police even interviewed his wife.

Japanese police do carry handguns, but they're the only ones who can have them, and they're rarely drawn.

I wouldn't argue for even something as strict as this, but it goes to show...

(If you meant literally fentanyl, which was only an example, it's still being smuggled in illegally to the US from China through Mexico, so the amount is still quite abundant in the US.)

The same motives with the categories broadened. A compliant populace and safety from the unvirtuous inheres in both, I’m afraid.

You've just aptly described the justice system. Should we stop punishing criminals then?

A justice system requires that we punish the guilty and protect the innocent. But you would see them restrict my rights when I have done nothing to deserve it.

That's how changes in law work. Because they are made to benefit society as a whole not you personally.

take them away almost entirely, like a vast majority of the nations in the world. — NOS4A2

Indeed paranoia -- at least to those like you who view this as some kind of nightmare scenario. In my view, way too HOPEFUL. It won't happen.

But if it did, can you imagine? We'd be more like that hell hole Japan -- practically no mass shootings or gun violence. What a dystopia. But wait -- even Japan doesn't fully ban guns. Ah well.

I guess requiring a driver's license was also government overreach, on their way to banning cars for its citizens. What came of that? Guess it may happen eventually, and isn't paranoid at all to think it will...

Look at it this way, NOS: You may feel you and other gun owners don't deserve to have your guns taken away. Others may feel that future victims of mass shootings don't deserve to die. If there's an incompatibility there, the law needs to prioritize. The sensible priority seems to be the preservation of life.

Last I checked I’m a part of society. Restricting my rights does not benefit me. It benefits you personally.

Because they are there to benefit society as a whole not you personally. — Baden

And this really summarizes the heart of the matter, the taproot belief from which these absurd analyses emerge: a weird kind "individualism" a la Ayn Rand and company.

I guess the same people aren't in favor of stricter voting ID laws, or even registration. Why should I be inconvenienced when I've never committed voter fraud, and don't intend to?

Why should I have to sit in line for a driver's license, when I've never been in an accident and don't intend to?

I don't recall anyone asking ME if this was OK.

See the above post. I personally benefit only in that I am disturbed by children and other victims of gun violence being needlessly murdered and I won't be if they're not. But the argument is based on society's responsibility to prioritize needs, desires, and rights among its citizens.

I believe both, that no one’s rights should be restricted and that innocent people do not deserve to die. So any attempt to ameliorate the situation should be fit for both. You believe only one. So any restriction of the former is justified so long as it serves the latter.

Maybe you can, but I cannot abide by controlling people’s lives and letting them control ours. The ease with which you advocate for it only hardens the heart and closes the mind on the matter.

Your rights are socially instituted and involve not only you but those who you may endanger in their exercise. You have no natural right to run around with any kind of weapon you choose. Let's get that straight first.

no one’s rights should be restricted — NOS4A2

My rights are restricted every time I drive a car. My freedom, my liberty, is restricted. If I want to go through a red light or drive on the left hand side of the road, I could be punished for it. Those are the rules, the laws. People create laws. People in government, voted in by and supposedly representing its citizens. That's how societies work -- at least republican style democracies.

By all means voice your opinion for why we shouldn't have any rules whatsoever. You'll be laughed out of town, and deservedly so.

I believe rights are naturally founded, derived from human nature, and not the edicts of those in power. I believe I and others have the right to defend our lives from those in power and those who would otherwise threaten it. Guns in particular are a great equalizer in this regard.

Maybe you can, but I cannot abide by controlling people’s lives and letting them control ours. — NOS4A2

I'm not controlling anything. People can do anything they want. You can go shoot up a school, obviously. Is that your idea of true "freedom"? Is creating laws that discourage or punish those acts "controlling"?

What a strange view of the world.

And if all those restrictions disappeared tomorrow would you start driving through red lights and murdering your fellows?

No they're not but put it another way, if you were designing an ideal society, would you really make it such that people could privately own any weapon they could afford? You realize what would happen would be an arms race among the rich and unscrupulous that would lead to them controlling society's resources and enslaving those they could outgun. Feudalism, basically.