Running out of reality to blame, they got to make stories.
Man if only it was actually like how cars are regulated.
Required training, tests, insurance needs and has to be safe for others.
And you can’t take an F1 car out anywhere.except a track.
I mean you can but it would need a lot of modifications first.
Not that you can get most of them going on your own anyway
Pfft, what are cops gonna do, pull me over? Im in a freaking F1 car, good luck!
Follow me for more life-hacks.
I can’t follow you, you’re too fast
Or they’ll wait for tires to go off or it to rain if on slicks 😂
There is a saying from the “olden days” that nobody outruns Motorola (the radio company).
Not a vehicle on the planet faster than a radio.
I already got a free tank because of you.
This guy is legit!
If only cars were actually regulated like we pretend they are…
What an interesting concept. Insuring the gun owner could really have merit. Then you’d have a company who would be very heavily invested in the responsibility of the gun owner, as well as needing a record of firearms owned to be insured.
You’d also have pressure on firearms manufacturers and regulatory bodies because the insurance companies covering the owners would do everything in their power to shift blame away from their customers, so as to avoid paying out on the policies. Suddenly you have a lot of money behind preventing accidental discharge, etc
You’d also have a lot of people who simply couldn’t afford to be covered because they are obviously unstable jackasses that have no business owning a fucking sharp pencil, let alone a gun, and an insurance company would be able to spot that in about five seconds.
You’d also increase the cost of responsible ownership considerably, while irresponsible owners would be largely unaffected…
Irresponsible owners would have the highest rates. I think they’d be the most affected.
You mean the idiots who like to cosplay being a soldier in Walmart with their badass Ayyyy-Aruhhh Feeeuuuffteeennnn?
I think he means that criminals are going to not pay anything and that you’re punishing a percentag of the gun owners that are doing it legally.
I mean… yeah, any meaningful regulation isn’t really going to have the greatest effect on those who do their best to skirt it. But as our society is based on financial incentive, it gives those with economic power more reason to invest in proper enforcement.
You won’t have perfect enforcement of anything. But giving up because of the minor inconvenience it might impose on the “good guy with a gun” is counterproductive.
But those criminals would then have an additional, easy to prove charge against them. Directly to jail.
There’s no such thing as criminals and non-criminals. Humans are fragile and their mental state constantly changes. That’s the problem with gun ownership.
Is that how it works with cars? Or do they just drive around without insurance?
That’s how it works with cars. Moving violations increase the cost of insurance. Driving an uninsured vehicle could cost you your license.
Yet it still happens often enough that “uninsured motorist” coverage is not only available, but commonly accepted as essential.
Wanna hear a song? Pay the fuckin’ piper.
The person you’re responding to is right, though: adding insurance costs takes a constitutional right and turns it into a privilege only for those who could afford it. We’ve seen what the insurance industry does with medical insurance, homeowners insurance, and every other type of insurance: they fuck the little guy over every chance they get. So you’re just telling gun owners to throw money at a company that is just going to keep it, rather than tell them to take that money and attend biannual (twice a year) firearm safety training to remain in compliance with their license.
Not a single person in this thread has talked about subsidizing firearms training and making it mandatory, you all just want less guns in the hands of fewer people. So just say that, instead of hiding behind this false-altruist “Well, it’ll only affect the bad eggs,” yep, that’s why good people are never denied medical treatment from their insurance, because it only effects the bad eggs.
Since we’re doing cars here despite that not being close …. -Just like unlicensed drivers, uninsured motorists, unregistered vehicles result in jail time, so would the lack of firearm insurance.
- just like car insurance is enforced at registration, tax, time of purchase, so can firearm insurance
- it even solves unregulated sales: insurance ends when you prove you no longer have it, such as a receipt for selling it or a police report for it being stolen.
If uninsured drivers is such a solved problem, why is it necessary to have “uninsured motorist” coverage? And it may frighten you to know that when I was young and unlicensed, I stole my mom’s car and went on a week long multi state joyride without being caught.
Right, and my life insurance should be able to hold a claim against their insurance, or everything they own. That way my insurance doesn’t go up with their recklessness and my heirs don’t need to deal with the legalities
You’re just creating a tax on the poor for them to practice a constitutional right. Insurance providers 1. Aren’t going to pay out anyway, that’s their whole thing, so much like health insurance, it’s money being thrown away every month, and 2. You’re adding another middleman from an industry most people think is greedy/corrupt AF, and why would that ever be a good thing? Plus, you know damn well once the insurance companies get involved, all of a sudden minority gun ownership numbers are going to drop because, mysteriously, all of their premiums shot up overnight for totally
racist/homophobic/transphobic/misogynisticunknown reasons.I’m all for requiring more training, or licensing, background checks should be required for every gun sale, I’m just saying this to show I fully support gun control measures.
Require more training, but it needs to be made affordable. Every gun control bill is just banning firearm models, or limiting magazine capacities, or whatever. None of them every talk about subsidizing firearms training for those who need or want it. Even my blue state only requires one 8-hour class and one live-fire test to get your conceal carry permit, and the instructors even talked about how people ask about taking further training, but when they hear the cost and time (almost all the classes require taking time off work, which some can’t do) involved, they just say they can’t afford it and they’ll just watch YouTube or whatever.
Edit: Not sure how “creating an unnecessary monetary barrier turns a constitutional right into a constitutional privilege for the rich, all while enrichening a corrupt industry that will absolutely fuck this up” is such a controversial take, especially when I’ve added that training courses should be mandatory and subsidized so that finances aren’t a barrier…
Just like the constitutional right to free speech, you’re not free of the consequences of your speech. Be a responsible owner and your. Insurance rates stay low but when you’re not, you’re the one paying for your mistakes
Ok… I didn’t say you were free from consequences, I said by adding insurance to the equation, you’re putting an unnecessary financial burden on the poor amd minorities to practice a constitutional right, all while creating an opportunity for some middleman to get obscenely rich off something that won’t change gun violence at all. By adding mandatory insurance, and letting insurance companies handle all of it, you’re taking rights out of the hands of minorities and the poor alike. And there are already consequences for improper gun ownership: they’re called prison sentences, so maybe focus more on your elected officials who aren’t prosecuting irresponsible gun owners instead of adding insurance premiums and costs to an equation that doesn’t need them.
If there is an unreasonable monetary barrier for an individual to practice a constitutional right, it’s no longer a right, it’s a privilege. So congratulations, you’ve taken away the rights of minorities/poor folks, and allowed those who already have the means to face no consequences continue to face no consequences. Just like the firearm’s stamps: the prices are high enough to keep those weapons out of the hands of the poor, but not out of the hands of the wealthy, so only the wealthy have the privilege to own more dangerous weapons.
And once again, all you are interested in, clearly, is just taking firearms from people. You proposed an idea (firearm owners insurance), I pointed out why that may be a bad idea, and you immediately doubled down on it while making a comparison to another constitutional right that doesn’t have any financial barriers like you describe.
Plenty of people have been hurt and/or killed by the speeches/words of others, yet not once have you said there should be speech insurance, so your premiums can go up the more inflammatory your speech is, that would be fair, right?
You also completely dismissed everything I had to say about subsidizing firearms training for those who want/need it. So let’s not try and educate our populace, no no, we’ll just create another privilege for the wealthy and the poors can just deal with it. 🙄
If you’re not agreeing to any regulation or safety standards, then insurance is a non-government way of minimizing the burden on responsible owners while ensuring the irresponsible ones have consequences for their recklessness, and ensuring at least some recompense/justice for their victims
Got it, so gun ownership is for the wealthy and privileged only, according to you, got it. Insurance will not solve this problem, full stop. Auto insurance doesn’t stop people from driving illegally or without licenses, and driving is a privilege, so let’s apply the same logic and standard to a constitutional right.
It’d be a lot faster if you just said, “I don’t think anyone should own guns,” instead of parroting this fake altruism that insurance will make people face consequences. There are already laws in place to issue consequences to those who are reckless, and I would say that should constitute recompense and justice for their victims. So instead of introducing some useless middleman that, again, will only impact the poor and minorities, go after your state AG’s for not prosecuting gun crime.
Or, as I’ve said repeatedly, subsidize firearm training and make it required twice per year to maintain your licensure. That’s on top of the required class to get your conceal carry license, and everything else associated with it. Insurance providers will only make those requirements and monetary hurdles worse, so again, you’re making a constitutional right a privilege for only those with money.
Make our current medical insurance providers (y’know , the ones who don’t provide the services you pay for when you need them for arbitrary reasons) actually pay for mental health care so maybe people can have healthy ways to deal with any issues they have instead of shooting up a school/mall/whatever. Get rid of the social stigma around mental health in general, and require background checks before every gun sale.
There’s literally a myriad of other directions we could and should take gun control, but introducing and requiring insurance for something that is a right makes it a privilege for those with money. This reeks of the same justifications people used to pass the first big wave of gun control laws when the Black Panthers started showing up to rallies with firearms. It even reminds me of the voter ID laws being pushed, since the only people burdened by them are those who can’t afford to get an ID, y’know, the majority of whom are minorities.
And you don’t think requiring licensure won’t be abused to disenfranchise minorities and the lower class? There is a reason poll taxes and anything beyond simple registration was ruled unconstitutional for voting, and even simple registration gets badly abused. Any enumerated right cannot have hoops to jump through to actually be rights instead of privileges.
Training is great, and should be part of our compulsory education starting from elementary school due to the fact that there are more guns than people in this country. Free training should also be offered for adults to be able to regularly (annually or more often) attend, and needs to be available so people who cannot take time off work can attend. I think this might be something that the Guard and Reserves might be tapped for, subsidized training.
Keep up and beef up the universal background checks, and they need to be made free and fast so private sales can also use them.
Mental healthcare needs a huge bump, and honestly we need a universal healthcare system because of the disaster our insurance industry has become. Healthcare at this point should basically be a right, and a universal system is the way to go at this point. Trust busting and anti-competition laws need to be enforced to fix the monopoly and oligarchy situations we have causing mass wealth inequality and killing free market capitalism. With better economic conditions and mental healthcare, that will do the most to improve violence.
Look, like a lot of things - this works great on paper.
However, reality is a whole different beast.
This doesn’t “minimize” the burden of responsible owners.
A responsible owner wouldn’t ‘need’ insurance in the 1st place, so any premium they pay would be a burden.
Plus - just look at insurance rates.
I guarantee you that little old black lady who has never been in a car accident is still paying more than the little old white lady who lives next door and also has been in an accident.
Nevermind that rich folk technically don’t even need to pay for insurance because there are multiple loopholes those with money can access.
Its the same ole shit - nickle and dime the less fortunate while bending over backwards to let the rich get richer.
I agree. Gun insurance is the future. You want to have your guns? Fine. Underwrite the risk.
No thank you. Guns ownership is a protected right under the constitution and can not be controlled to the degree that car ownership can.
Yes but… A lot of shooters would not seek that insurance. Steal guns, ghost guns, or simply not give a fuck about the law since they’re going to break it anyways.
In my opinion, the root issue is a moral/mental one. Do the shooters believe they are killing? Are they “saving”? Are they not real people? Etc. If you don’t believe people are real, you’re not really hurting anyone.
A lot of shooters would not seek that insurance
Just like a lot of people who accrue lots of driving violations don’t bother insuring their own cars.
And yet, a lack of insurance is easily the difference between a ticket and ending up in jail with a massive fine, even more points on your license, and your car impounded for $200/day. So pretty much everyone short of those who have their licences revoked, or those who cannot even be insured anymore, will still try to get insurance any way they can.
It’s no different.
The required training for a driver’s license is a bit of a joke.
I’d rather a joke with a little training and safety classes to lower your liability insurance than the current solution of ignoring the problem
It is more than is needed for gun ownership. The arsenal I inherited required nothing. The one I have purchased required a 48 hour wait I think it was. In none of the cases did I have to prove I knew how to handle a firearm.
Do you really think requiring more training before getting a driver’s license wouldn’t be used to disenfranchise minorities?
Not necessarily no.
I would. They’d disenfranchise them in a heartbeat.
You can say that about every law.
Doesn’t mean we should just stop improving the system.
It absolutely would but only by conservatives.
Sadly depends on the state. Would also love if we did more like other countries for driving instruction. Although would need more public transport before that would possible
You don’t need any of that if you don’t go on public roads. Many a farm truck has been driven by kids.
And no one cares about what you do with your guns if you’re out in the boonies where you can’t hurt anyone else.
Oh I promise you that there are plenty of people who do.
There are 300 million people in America. I’m sure you can find dozens who care.
You say that, but your support of gun control says otherwise.
Apparently you’ve read everything I’ve ever posted, so why don’t you pull out the exact quote where I demand that ALL guns be confiscated? I seem to have forgotten that one.
Ah, didn’t realize you weren’t the other guy.
But gun control isn’t just “all guns should be confiscated”, there’s a hell of lot of stuff before you hit there, and it’s all aimed at controlling guns.
God I wish we could apply that to every right, y’know? Like, wouldn’t it be great if we could test people before they could vote, so that we knew that they understood the functions of the different branches of gov’t, the limitations, the history of legislation, the origins of common law and where our style of government comes from… It would be so wonderful if rights weren’t really rights at all, but were privileges only given to the most well educated and intelligent people.
Maybe even some literacy tests.
Oh, or if you needed a license and credentials in order to speak in public! That would be awesome! Or if you needed to be an attorney to assert your right to remain silent!
“providing evidence that you won’t be a danger before being allowed to have a weapon? HOW DARE YOU!”
…That’s a logical impossibility though. You can’t prove a negative.
And now we’re right back to laws that prevented non-white people from owning firearms.
Don’t argue semantics.
You can provide evidence that you are capable of safely using and storing your weapon.
Require weapons training, licensing and certification, require passing a background check, require renewal of said certification & license (ideally with refresher tests required. I’d like to see the same for drivers licenses too), revoke licenses when certain law enforcement actions happen (again, just like a drivers license), and most importantly actually remove the property when there is nobody licensed to have it (this needs to happen with cars too!) easy peasy
You can’t prove
Where did I say prove?
Oh, gee, sorry, I assumed you were speaking in good faith.
“Provide evidence that you won’t be […]”
You can’t provide negative evidence.
You can’t provide negative evidence.
Yes, you can. I can provide evidence that my walls aren’t painted black by uploading a picture of them.
I can provide evidence that Leprechauns don’t exist by showing the science that you can’t just scale down a human body to that degree and have the organs function.And I can provide evidence that you aren’t speaking in good faith because I said “Provide evidence for” and you responded with “You can’t prove”.
Evidence is not proof. Every single criminal trial the defendant provides evidence that they did not commit a crime.
This is… Not how evidence works. I know that you think it is, but you’re simply not correct.
Evidence provides a positive proof, not a negative. If a coroner says that a murder occurred at 5pm on Saturday, and I have tickets, video evidence, and eyewitness accounts showing that I was across the country at 5pm on Saturday, that does not prove that I didn’t commit the murder. It proves–probably–that I was across the country at 5pm on Saturday. Perhaps, for instance, the coroner was incorrect about the time the murder occurred.
But, even if we accept your premise, you run headlong into two issues: first, you’re saying that civil rights aren’t rights at all, and secondly, who defines “risk”? I can tell you for certain that there are a whoooooooooole lot of people on the right that don’t think that anyone that is trans- or gay should be allowed to own any firearms, because they’re all ‘mentally ill’. What about political ideology? Should that be a valid reason to deny rights too? If you won’t pledge allegiance to the American flag, should you lose your right to speech, religion, and so one? (That, at least, was clearly decided in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 1943.)
As an aside, the number of people that claim to be liberal gun owners, yet still advocate for revocation of their own rights is… Sadly, not very surprising.
The 2nd amendment doesn’t give the right to all Americans to have guns, it simply provisions a well regulated militia. Right now we don’t have sufficient regulation to keep gun violence at a reasonable rate, so we clearly don’t have a well regulated militia as detailed in the constitution
Categorically false. When you look at the circumstances surrounding the drafting of 2A, it’s clear what the framers intended. (EVERY able-bodied, white, adult male was a member of the militia. They were obligated to provide their own militarily-suitable arms, and were likewise obligated to train themselves in their use. Moreover, the existence of the right was a holdover from English common law, which recognized the right of people to be armed. Oh, and the first battle of the American Revolution? It was because the British were trying to seize arms, including a cannon, that the people had been using to protect themselves from First Nations peoples.) When you look at the debate that surrounded the National Firearms Act of 1934, it’s clear that they knew a ban wouldn’t pass court review; hence the reason that the opted for a tax. (And, BTW, they originally intended to include pistols; that fact that ‘short barrel rifles’ are part of the NFA today is because they were sloppy in making the edits prior to passage.) When you look at nearly 250 years of precedent, it’s clear that it’s an individual right. And when you look at SCOTUS rulings–Heller v. D.C., McDonald v. Chicago, Bruen v. NYSPRA–it’s definite.
BTW, “well regulated” at the time was understood to mean trained, specifically people that knew how to use the arms they had the right to possess.
Gun ownership is a right protected under the 2nd amendment. If cars had been around during the revolutionary war then perhaps there would have been an amendment as well. But as it is cars can be regulated to a larger degree as they are not a protected right under our constitution.
Constitution doesn’t say anything about banning regulations on guns.
Almost calls for it by saying we need to make sure they’re well maintained
If it is not stated in the constitution then the right falls to the states. Fortunately gun rights are guaranteed for both state militias and citizens under 2A in the constitution.
2nd Amendment: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
They also wanted the document to continuously be updated.
Turns out shit changes between flintlock guns to what we have now
They did indeed leave a mechanism to update the constitution. You are free to propose an amendment and if the majority of the country agrees, it can supersede an existing amendment.
The only thing that has changed are unconstitutional laws infringing upon our rights.
Each generation is as independent as the one preceding, as that was of all which had gone before. It has then, like them, a right to choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its own happiness; consequently, to accommodate to the circumstances in which it finds itself, that received from its predecessors; and it is for the peace and good of mankind, that a solemn opportunity of doing this every nineteen or twenty years, should be provided by the constitution; so that it may be handed on, with periodical repairs, from generation to generation, to the end of time, if anything human can so long endure.
https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/jefferson-memorial-education-each-new-generation.htm
Nice quote, I’m glad you agree with me that change is good and that there is a mechanism to change the constitution. It is of course called an amendment.
👍
They also attempted to draft a version of the Second Amendment that contained the rights you think it contains, and it was unanimously a rejected at the constitutional convention in Philadelphia. Perhaps you could look to the constitutions of the original colonies to see if any of them thought that an individual right to bear arms was so essential, but you will find that not a single one of them had an individual right.
You will not also not find a single original work in the English language in which the phrase bear arms is used in any context outside of a military one, until dumbasses started perverting that phrase fifty odd years after the Constitution was written.
SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED
Define arms and militia
Arms: weapons
Militia: in a different clause. If you paid attention in 1st grade English, you’d know better
Figured insults wouldn’t happen until later.
Funny how it changed to be anyone instead of militia, in the beginning of your shall not be infringed, once we also started to stop caring about strength of the nation in favor of individuals all out for themselves.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/second_amendment
Cause anyone with a brain could tell our founders meant a force to protect from threats not anyone can have a nuke
“To protect the security of the state…”
Washington State just legislated a legal requirement that all gun purchases must include proof of a completed gun safety course. Unfortunately in typical government fashion, they did it in the stupidest way possible. It’s an online class that can be finished in 5 minutes, you have to bring printed proof of it every time instead of storing the status somewhere, and there’s no exemption for law enforcement, military, or scouts. It would be great if it was an actual gun safety course and they exempted people with a proven history of gun safety training.
You may think you want guns regulated like cars, probably because you heard it somewhere and thought, “yeah, that seems reasonable”.
But if you stop and think about how cars are actually regulated vs how guns are actually regulated, I think you’ll maybe see that it’s perhaps not so reasonable an idea after all.
First and foremost, guns are already regulated in significant ways that cars are not. For example, requiring background checks, prohibiting purchasing/owning by particular groups of people (e.g., felons, drug addicts, domestic abusers), and numerous places where you’re not allowed to take them.
None of those restrictions apply to cars (though maybe they should), so “regulating guns like cars” implies rolling back those restrictions on guns. (Otherwise it wouldn’t actually be “like cars”, would it?)
Second, a lot of restrictions on cars are for common use, and the minute you fall outside of that, many of those regulations don’t apply.
For example, in many (maybe the majority of? Not sure) states, the whole license/registration/insurance requirement only applies to vehicles that are operated on public roads (of course, your bank will require insurance if you finance, regardless).
So a farmer could buy a brand new pickup for cash, sign an affidavit saying it won’t be operated on public roads, have it delivered by flatbed truck to his farm, then his 14 year old kid could drive it around all day with no license, registration, or insurance, and everything is (potentially, depending on the state) completely within the law as long as it stays on the farm.
There are parallels that can be drawn with gun purchases for use on private property, but hopefully you get my point by now.
So for sure, if you want more/better gun regulations, then by all means, advocate for that. But please don’t suggest that we regulate guns like we do cars because that’s a terrible idea.
When people say “regulate guns like cars” all they mean is to add the requirements of a licence, tracking ownership and sale, and proof of training.
It’s a short hand, meant to be snappy, like all political phrases (BLM?). So next time you see the phrase be sure to respond to that argument because that’s all anyone is really talking about when they use that phrase.
Tracking ownership?! Have you thought this through?!
I’m an outspoken liberal gun owner. I sure as hell don’t want on a Trump list of bad guys.
Then use your car to drive over them.
I want a background check similar to the one done for security clearance. Just go ask their friends and family if they are the kid who was voted “most likely to be a school shooter”. Maybe that guy is the one we shouldn’t hand a gun to.
I want insurance, like with a car, to ensure at least some restitution for their mistakes, so irresponsible gun owners find it more expensive to encourage better practices, and easy to prove jail time for no insurance
No one really cares about tracking weapons, except it’s the only way to find irresponsible owners. An insurance mandate might be a better way
So, yes. I’m well aware of that. But thank you (and I mean that sincerely!) for pointing that out. I’ll explain…
But first, as an aside, I’ll say I’m not a fan of snappy when it’s also grossly imprecise (or worse, dishonest). There’s too much dishonesty and “spin” in politics as it is, and we could do with less. But I digress…
Anyway, while you’re correct about it being shorthand, I submit that there are people that don’t follow gun-related politics, but have heard “regulate guns like the cars” and take it to mean exactly that because they’re unaware that it has a deeper meaning.
In fact, there are 2 (unrelated) people in my friend group that believed this, until I told them basically what I wrote above. I didn’t do it as some sort of gotcha - they’re my friends - I want them to be able to make informed decisions based on facts. And they’re not dumb people - they were just ignorant of the issue and parroting said snappy phrase without understanding it was shorthand for something different. Now they have a better understanding of the topic, and a better understanding of what kind of regulations they do and don’t support. I don’t agree with their positions 100%, but that’s fine. My goal was to educate and get them thinking about it, not convert.
So, with respect, I intend to ignore your suggestion about how to respond to this phrase in the future, for as long as it keeps being used in the same way without any additional explanation. Not because I’m trying to be an agitator (I’m not), but because I think this discourse is helpful for bystanders that aren’t steeped in this stuff, so that they don’t misunderstand.
After all, if there were 2 people in my little friend group that didn’t understand the phrase as shorthand, there are probably plenty more out there.
And to that end, thanks again for helping by posting the missing “additional explanation”.
Required training, tests, insurance needs and has to be safe for others.
Fuck the NRA.
You didn’t make a point. You talked about some unrelated things with operating vehicles on private roads, which is nonsense, because plenty of laws still apply to the manufacture and sale of the vehicle initially, and also all laws of civil liability still apply to it.
Funny comparing guns to cars. I need a drivers license to operate a car, something I will be tested for and have to renew regularly. A car has a registration number that is registered to me and a license plate with the state that gets renewed regularly. Also insurance is required, the cost of which goes up if I’m irresponsible.
Owning and driving a car is not a Constitutionally protected right.
Yah and the right to bear arms is not absolute. You can’t and shouldn’t be able to own just a bunch of rocket launchers. Just like with the first amendment, you still can’t threaten people. You can have sensible laws around rights.
Also, running the country off ideas people had hundreds of years ago is so backwards.
…killed 10 people on the interstate.
Regardless of the rest, this is like saying that guns would be confiscated because someone shot 10 people at a shooting range.
If it were a regular occurrence that people were driving cars through classrooms, like it is with shooting into them, then the conversation around regulating cars would look a lot more similar to the one about guns.
The biggest difference is you need to have a license for a car and it needs to be registered, and in most places you have to have insurance to cover any damage you may cause. None of this is true for gun ownership, despite a car being nearly required for life in the US and a gun being a toy for most people, or at best a tool that is used for one particular job.
The biggest difference is you need to have a license for a car
I agree and made a similar comment on this post but you can buy a car without a license in every US state. It’s the driving part that requires a license. It’s a nitpick but still applies given the conversation around gun control is focused mostly on the purchase side of things.
About 45,000 people are killed in motor vehicle crashes each year, and that’s nearly double the number of homicide–which includes negligent homicides–committed with firearms.
How many hours of car driving are there before a death?
How many of those deaths from cars are intentional?
What would happen to the economy if we remove cars Vs guns? (Public mass transit would hopefully get better)
What would happen to the economy if we remove cars Vs guns?
If you did it all at once? The economy would crash, and we’d have a depression that would make The Great Depression look like the Dow having a minor downtick. Too much of the US population lives too far from where they work to get to work without a car, and building the infrastructure so that even suburban areas could get to jobs would be difficult.
On the other hand, personal cars–and commercial vehicles–are a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions, both from burning fossil fuels, and from the production of the vehicle itself. Even switching to all electric vehicles will not make them emission-free over their lifetime (although it will certainly help), nor would going to solely mass-transit. Looking at projections for climate change, and taking into account the direct emissions alone from motor vehicles, the number of deaths indirectly caused by them is going to be sharply increasing. So, IMO, banning all personal internal combustion engine vehicles would make a lot of sense, even if it would crash the economy for a decade or three, because that would significantly help with climate change.
Ok. I guess I was really trying to address your point of 45k car deaths being double the number of gun murders.
Saying let’s ban guns because they kill people, and then saying let’s also ban cars because they kill twice as many people is, I feel, a flawed argument.
Most countries in the world get by with no civilian (or very few) guns. Bar a few small islands, there are no countries that get by without cars.
Most countries in the world get by with no civilian (or very few) guns.
I don’t think that’s relevant, because we, in the US, have 250 years of recognizing that it is an individual right to be keep and bear arm; other countries don’t even recognize an individual right to self defense, and I would hope that we would agree that’s morally repugnant. Relatively speaking, very few countries have real, robust protections for free speech and political discourse, and I would hope that we would agree that protections for speech–even speech that is revolting to all sense of morality–need to be protected in order for democracy–such as it is–to remain even remotely functional.
If we’re looking at overall harms, banning IC engines entirely would do far more to address global mortality rates than ending civilian ownership.
If we want to reduce the harms of guns, specifically, then rather than eliminating a civil right, why not address the conditions that cause people to engage in violence? If you remove the tool, rather than correcting the underlying cause, then you simply shift the means of violence rather than reducing or eliminating it. Even countries with fairly high individual firearm ownership–Switzerland, Finland–have very low rates of violence, because they simply don’t have the same underlying problems that we seem to celebrate in the US.
That’s where I get so hung up; you wouldn’t treat pneumonia with cough syrup, you’d treat it with antibiotics. Treat the disease, and the symptoms go away on their own. And the great part is, if you treat the disease, the all of America is a nicer place.
The UK most definitely recognises a right to self defense.
The law on self-defence allows a person to use reasonable force to defend themselves or another, to protect property, to prevent crime or to apprehend a criminal offender. https://www.stuartmillersolicitors.co.uk/self-defence-laws-guide/
It also has laws covering free speech, and the limitations, such as offensive or hateful language - https://care.org.uk/cause/freedom-of-speech/free-speech-law
section 4 of the Public Order Act 1986 makes it an offence for a person to use “threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviours that causes, or is likely to cause, another person harassment, alarm or distress”. This law also includes language that is deemed to incite “racial and religious hatred” as well as “hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation” and language that “encourages terrorism”.
I’m sure you’d agree in a civilised society there’s no need to go around threatening people, or being abusive towards people based on their race, religion, or sexual orientation. After all the US’ very foundation was to escape religious persecution!
As for the prevalence of violence in the US vs Switzerland, yeah fair enough. If you can change the underlying culture, good on you! However, a gun will kill a lot of people a lot faster than a car or knife!
Take the average person who will cause a fatal car crash next year, and ask them what they use their car for every day.
Now take the average person who will shoot someone to death next year and ask them what they use their gun for every day.
I enjoy and own guns. Ive used them for hunting, I’ve used one in self defense (no shots fired). Sensible laws regarding guns are just fine by me.
Yep, I own 4 pistols and 1 revolver, and I still think we need a lot more gun control.
When you say “sensible laws”, you’re saying that anyone who disagrees is not sensible. It’s shorthand for, “Agree with me or you’re a fool.”
Think on that argument, think on those words.
Truly, you have the dumbest take.
Amazing how many of those types of takes anytime gun control is brought up.
Not everyone who disagrees is a fool, but you certainly are.
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Not trying to compare these two things, but as a German it always stroke me as odd that many Americans will go to any lengths in order to defend their right to bear arms, but they all totally accept the fact that there’s not a single highway in the US without a speed limit.
In Germany, it seems to be the other way round. Noone really cares that guns are strictly regulated but most people will fiercely oppose the introduction of speed limits with the same level of fanaticism of American gun nuts.
Tbf, the limit on how many bullets you can legally fire (outside of defense of life or great bodily injury) in public is “0” so technically there is a limit on that too.
Yeah I’ve always kinda questioned why we have speed limits on highways because not only is the entire point of a highway is to go as fast as possible but there’s also very rare actual enforcement with the few speed checks being the cause of accidents thanks to people braking to 50mph when they were going 80mph also we have laws dictating that if everyone is doing a faster speed then the limit you can get pulled over for doing the limit
Yeah I’ve always kinda questioned why we have speed limits on highways
So the police have somewhere to find extra funding.
A speed limit encourages everyone to go a similar speed and sets the tone to a safeish speed. How fast most traffic goes on a highway does vary wildly by region, but at least from what I’ve seen regionally, its largely informed by the construction of the highway and the speed limit. Lower limit means lower overall speed while a higher limit leads to a higher overall speed
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As an American who has lived in Germany, I’ve found the lack of speed limits to be more of a fantasy.
Sure, there are stretches of the autobahn where there is no speed limit - but they are comparatively short. The constant construction destroys any ability to make true use of the autobahn. Similarly, the public tends to drive at 110-120kph - despite the lack of speed limit. Overall, a disappointing experience.
To compare, the highways in the US may have speed limits of 65mph, but the traffic moves at 75-80mph in the slow lane (NJ, NY).
To drive that car, she had to take a class, get experience under an instructor/valid driver, take a paper test, take a practical test.
This is not the gotcha you think it is. As a gun owner, I’m for responsible gun control, and this meme is anti-gc.
also there are different licenses for different classes of vehicles.
And driving licenses are far too easy to get as well.
Just because jt was easy for you doesn’t mean it was easy for everybody else.
It shouldn’t! Operating two ton vehicles at hundreds of kilometres per hour should not be for everyone!
There is a reason why traffic is a top killer.
This argument is bad and you should feel bad
Funny, the only politician I’ve ever heard actually talk about taking away/seizing guns was Donald Trump
They must all really hate him for that, right?
Donnie banned the bump stocks!!!
But for real though, maybe we do also get rid of cars? Why not build more public transit and less drunk driving accidents? The only especially bad part of this is the police.
How does one drunk driver even kill 10 people before dying themselves?
Drive into a basketball court
Or a bus. Or sets off a big chain reaction crash
Funny enough most drunk drivers survive. Ragdolling instead of tensing up. The macabre of life.
Plowing into a crowd. I’m sure it’s happened.
On the interstate that seems less likely.
Less likely maybe but not unreasonable. I remember a time when protestors were blocking off interstates and iirc some did get hit.
Actually pretty easy; a car swerving around and being a danger can often pass others by because those others took evasive maneuvers to avoid them…which caused them to crash into yet more vehicles.
I’m up for banning all cars slowly.
Luckily there is not a word in the constitution about em!
Right? Good policy means you look at issues and try to fix them systemically.
I don’t think cars should be removed at gunpoint, but if we could have a more robust and clean public health transportation system which would naturally phase out cars, I’m for it. Give us fucking decent high-speed rail.
And for the guns, at minimum give people health care including mental healthcare
make up stories
It’s an analogy, that’s how they work.
And it’s not a really flawed one. But the big difference is that Cars are tools, they have legitimate and important usecases outside killing people and they are much harder to kill people with since it’s relatively easy to flee from a car, they tend to get stuck in tight spaces
Which imo makes cars okay to own.
But yes, cars are also super dangerous, look at the Christmas-market attacks over here in Europe. And nobody wants to ban cars.
The fuck are you talking about? So many people want to ban cars. Myself included.
Well, in some niche cases (rural living and wild animals) I can be convinced they can be a tool. But generally that ‘tool’ is just violence.
2A ppl want to have violence as an option, which rapidly turns problematic.
Letting the government have a monopoly on violence can indeed be problematic. I would be more amenable to the 2A arguments if they weren’t such arrogant fucks about it.
I like the implication that guns are equal to cars in terms of necessity. Some people can’t leave their homes without driving, and some people (cowards) can’t leave their suburban house without their emotional support weapon.
I see this sentiment parroted in every post about guns, and I get it: Some people have never been in a situation that required one, and they don’t understand why people would need one.
What I don’t get is what it’s contributing to the conversation.
The problem is for every responsible gun owner there are dozens of irresponsible ones who are a danger to themselves and others.
Look at all the damn cases of kids killing themselves playing with guns left out by their owners.
Anyone who argues against the idea of gun control shows a distinct lack of empathy at best and is one of the those irresponsible and dangerous users at worst.
Who’s arguing against the idea of gun control in this thread? Again, parroting.
The meme is literally arguing against the idea of gun control.
Nobody is taking your guns away, if the requirements for owning and using a firearm became the equivalent of the requirements for owning and operating a motor vehicle that would be a massive improvement.The meme at the top is arguing that.
I’ll certainly buy that there are some people and situations where a weapon is a necessary tool, And some people who can use them responsibly. however the problem is the majority of careless or frightened weapons holders who are a deadly threat to everyone around them. Most talk about guns rights doesn’t account for that and completely ignores the rights of the potential victims to not be killed
As long as you’re treating gun control as all or nothing, I’ll have to side with all the victims rather than the few responsible gun holders. Meet us someplace in between to try to reduce the harm caused by your tool and protect all the innocent victims
Some people have never been in a situation that required one, and they don’t understand why people would need one.
Realistically such situations come about because of easy access to guns. Make it more work to buy and keep a firearm, use red flag laws to prevent those who cannot safely own and maintain a firearm from having them, provide easy gun buyback & disposal, and eventually the gun population will dwindle and fewer people will have actual needs for guns. Overtime with such programs firearm ownership should eventually find itself at a reasonable level where only responsible gun owners have them
I agree that cars are over-dispensed.
This is some peak dumb shit.
