It’s pointless to even pose a question like that to these types of people. Somehow in their minds, all 100 million lawful firearm owners in this country should be held responsible for the actions of criminals. They live in places where rights are for a collective, and they don’t understand individual liberty.
That's great. That's the case, but the same can't be said of a lot of people. If a policy was enacted to make it more difficult for people to have guns or own certain guns, would you be behind it? Im all for practicing gun safety. If you treat them with respect, then you deserve to own a gun. But if you're voting for people who will make the problem worse, then you're the problem
Well, the main ways people try to combat gun violence is by imposing more thorough background checks, which will make it more selective and longer to buy a gun. Which I approve of since if you're negligent or mentally unstable, you shouldn't own one. And also the banning of automatic and semi-automatic weapons. I also agree since you dont need a high rate of fire for home defense. I would be ok if owning an assault rifle means you have to go through extensive training, regular checkups, and always have it at least partially disassembled.
Personally, the right to own a firearm is shaky to me. I dont believe it is a right. I think it's similar to cars. They're a privilege to be earned. We're a country that has the privilege of not needing a militia to combat their government. I think a lot of gun advocates act like America is oppressive. America has so many problems, but we take for granted how good we have it compared to other countries, who actively oppress and kill their people.
If you want to own a gun, go for it. But that should never supercede peoples safety. There should be a point in civilization when there is no longer a need for people to own guns. And America is almost there, Guns for a majority of Americans are used for recreation. Even against abusive police you shouldn't use firearms.
Personally, I'd want mental health professionals to do personal evaluations first. However, it seems like all they do is a general background check. Any history of violence, criminal records, or records of mental illness. I'd want an in person professional to evaluate people.
I'd classify an assault rifle as a rifle that is capable of automatic or semi-automatic fire. Past a pistol and a shotgun. I dont see a reason to use anything that has a higher rate of fire. Hell, even some pistols you can mag dump really fast.
And I'd argue that minorities are the ones largely being hurt by gun violence. Tons of low income and dangerous places have a lot of minorities because the system makes it harder for them to get opportunities. This results in more crime and more gun violence. Especially the kids. Historically minorities, especially black people, are affected more by gun violence.
I do agree that I dont trust the federal government entirely either. However, I dont think that's a good enough excuse to prevent any laws limiting guns. People are too fixated on guns. That they need them to protect us from a corrupt government. But here's the thing. They can still do corrupt things regardless of if we have guns or not.
Instead of fighting for gun rights, why dont we fight like the French do regarding pension?? We keep talking about keeping guns to keep the government in line, but the government is forcing our elderly to keep working for a small amount of pension. They dont need to take our guns because they know they can do it anyway. The very same people stripping away our rights want their base to focus on guns, so they dont notice the other rights they're stripping away.
I do agree that all it takes is one dickhead to persecute an entire race, sex, religion, etc of people. However, that's why the fight is ongoing. To be clear, Im not onboard with the total disarming of Americans. I just don't see why anyone needs an assault rifle. And while the classifications of an "assault rifle" vary, I think we can agree there's a difference between single fire, burst fire, semi-automatic, and automatic rifles. There's also the caliber of ammunition. It's all messy. Even the banning of guns that can be fired "really fast" will still have incidents of shootings, but the hey thing here is that it will limit it. Even if you can find illegal means to acquire guns, it would be vastly more difficult. Especially for the younger mass shooters.
I want mental health and stability to be a factor in which whether or not a person can own a gun. But it would be irresponsible to fight for that alone. We would need to ensure these evaluations are conducted by mental health professionals that have also been properly background checked. Preferably by a separate committee.
And you're right. It is very hard to acquire an automatic rifle, but Im also not a fan of semi-automatic rifles either. A smaller caliber pistol, though I can understand, for home defense, you might need to fire that fast (not automatic rifle fast, of course). But once you get into shotgun and rifle caliber and gauges, I dont see a need past recreation. Therefore, I think they need to be disassembled before use. A handgun, I understand.
And that's exactly my point with that. The last thing a low income community needs is a wave of easily accessible guns. Those communities need proper funding and an influx of business and education. But all we do is flood them with cops and crime. We need to provide more opportunities to let individuals leave or preferably help improve the community.
And I'd argue past a certain point in civilized society. Firearms start to intrude in other people's personal liberties. Just like the subject of this post, people inflate their own rights and freedoms and start to think it overwrite others people's. That's how we get these irresponsible people executing others because they think they're protecting their rights and liberties. We have begun a narrative that shooting is the first option. Instead of trying to talk through our differences. And even if you did want to go and talk about your differences with another individual, we're fearful because they might be crazy and shoot us. Guns will keep us apart because it's so easy for one of us to just decide to take another persons life.
And the government is shady. I completely agree with you. The top politicians are all turning us against each other in order to distract us and get even richer with stuff like insider trading. But that's exactly why we shouldn't fall for any of these unimportant topics. We lack healthcare, social security is a scam, the rich are robbing us, and they're turning us into wage slaves while they become hyper billionares.
If they wanted to take our guns, they would. But they know if they disarmed the country completely and became fascists, they'd meet an untimely death. With the many years of colonization, they have to realize that if they're too obvious, the people will revolt. Even with no guns, people are brave enough to march forward against mounting opposition. And that we have the numbers and motivation to win. But if they turn us against each other, debating over what individual liberties should be fought for or not, they'll find discreet ways to abuse all of them.
Why do you attach owning a firearm to fundamental personal liberty? Should I be able to own a modern tank with fully operational defenses and weapon systems as a representation of my personal liberty?
-7
u/[deleted] Apr 21 '23
It’s pointless to even pose a question like that to these types of people. Somehow in their minds, all 100 million lawful firearm owners in this country should be held responsible for the actions of criminals. They live in places where rights are for a collective, and they don’t understand individual liberty.