19 ms·

Cody Wilson, the man who wants Americans to 3D print their own guns

77 points by kfullert 10y ago

TheLarch 10y ago
With the advancement of technology it's harder and harder to sympathize with the idea that firearms in the US could effectively combat governmental tyranny. Situations such as Ruby Ridge and Waco could be handled by drones now. It's hard to believe that there is a principle at play here deeper than a simple love of guns.
- kiba 10y ago
  Cryptography scared authoritarians and chicken little more than guns.
  - ethbro 10y ago
    Can't tell if you're being ironic or not, but in case you're not: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_...
- jonstokes 10y ago
  Yeah, you're right. See, for instance, the way that the West totally put down the Taliban in Afghanistan and pacified the entire country, which is now peaceful to this day. The Taliban were just a bunch of illiterate goat herders with AKs, so there's no way they could stand up to the America's more technologically advanced army, plus the drones. And then look at Iraq, and Syria, and all of the other insurgencies involving irregular combatants armed with nothing but improvised explosives and small arms, that have now been totally put down by the drones... Except that none of the above is true :p
  - kiba 10y ago
    In case of unbearable government tyranny, the civilians are going to have an insurgency against their own fathers, sons, and brothers?
    - jonstokes 10y ago
      Dunno why you got downvoted, but that's actually a much more legit objection to the "guns are a last defense against tyranny" argument than "ZOMG DRONEZ". My answer is, I have no idea, and I hope I never find out.
    - kauffj 10y ago
      In case of unbearable government tyranny, the soldiers are going to kill insurgents that are their own fathers, sons, and brothers?
      - daxorid 10y ago
        Absolutely. Given the full power of the UCMJ, Oathkeepers are little more than a fun Constitutionalist fantasy.
        knieveltech 10y ago
        Aww. I think you hurt someone's libertarian ideals with that comment.
    - adventured 10y ago
      You mean like the Revolutionary and Civil wars in the US? Yes, that exact thing does sometimes occur. Historically it occurs frequently all around the world. At any given time, there is a civil war going on somewhere in the world that involves just such conflict.
    - maxerickson 10y ago
      It happened in the civil war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_against_brother https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_against_brother And that was with the sides largely being split geographically.
  - anoonmoose 10y ago
    I don't think there's enough evidence to say that we necessarily couldn't crush those insurgencies with drones. As far as I can tell, the US has (reasonably, humanely)[1] pulled its punches considerably over the last fifteen years. [1] to the extent that any war can have these descriptors slapped on them. War is hell, The US has done inhumane stuff, I don't think they did as much as for example I think they did in Vietnam.
    - jonstokes 10y ago
      Then you're left to argue that the US military has pulled its punches on the Taliban, but they're really gonna take the gloves off if they get turned against their fellow citizens. Good luck with that.
      - ethbro 10y ago
        That doesn't seem too unreasonable. The former is a conflict half a world away for (at best) geopolitical goals, the later would be an existential threat.
      - mikeash 10y ago
        The whole scenario is predicated on some horrible tyrant taking control of the US. Why wouldn't the gloves come off in that case?
        pkinsky 10y ago
        Because said tyrant wishes to avoid a coup by the armed forces/defections to the rebels/etc?
  - pjc50 10y ago
    Surely the big lesson from the middle East is that guns can deliver violent chaos or despotic centralism but not peaceful stability?
    - angersock 10y ago
      I'm not sure that there are any good lessons to be learned from that region at this point. It brings to mind the ending of Burn After Reading.
      - ethbro 10y ago
        First and last lesson: never partition countries out of disparate ethnic/religious/sectarian groups who don't have some sort of larger overriding loyalty holding them together. Of course, that boat sailed a while ago.
    - mindcrime 10y ago
      Surely the big lesson from the middle East is that guns can deliver violent chaos or despotic centralism but not peaceful stability? Guns, in and of themselves, don't deliver anything. They're tools, that's it. Whether or not the people of the Middle Eastern countries like Afghanistan find peaceful stability or not depends on a whole laundry list of variables.
  - yongjik 10y ago
    In other words, "American civilians with guns" makes perfect sense if you predict (1) America will become like Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria in the near future, or (2) civilians with guns can somehow stop America from becoming like Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria. Considering that all those armed insurgents in those countries didn't stop governments (domestic or foreign) from killing them, I'm skeptical on (2). Regarding (1), well, if you want to believe that... (shrug)
  - inthewoods 10y ago
    Just my opinion, but they do "well" against Americans (Russian, whoever else is foolish enough to weigh in) because the war is asymmetric. They have no issue killing civilians or causing any collateral damage. The US must instead try and precisely get them and only them - and while drone mistakes happen (and they might or might not be mistakes), the US largely has to operate under a completely different and restricted rules of engagement compared with their enemy. The enemy instead folds into the civilian population, making the war extremely challenging.
  - TheLarch 10y ago
    My belief is that you have apples and oranges. Nomadic goat herders are not reliant on the internet. In the US the starvation clock starts running without it. Guns are more effective in the Middle East, but control of the internet is more effective in the US.
- danharaj 10y ago
  Well guns don't do anything on their own, people do. Organizations of people overthrow governments. I think access to violence is important for the success of such organizations as the past has shown. I think your examples of the governments sieging individuals who refused to bend to its will just demonstrate what kind of resistance fails to threaten the government. The only way to resist a tyrannical government is to fight for the destruction of the structural institutions that enable tyranny. You can't get a government to back off. A government's purpose is to perpetuate itself and increase the scope of its power. No matter how long you try to hold out against it, it will persistently attempt to subjugate you or lose its patience and destroy you. One thing i haven't heard explained in detail by people who justify the 2nd amendment as a safeguard against tyranny is what conditions they personally think justify armed insurrection against the government. There's a lot of abstract support for it, but how could you support insurrection in the abstract without knowing which concrete circumstances would cause you to take up arms against the government? How many pro-gun rights people are down with leftists who want to dismantle capitalism, for example? What about right-wingers who want to do away with liberal values? I think abstract arguments for gun rights, like abstract arguments for free speech are terribly inadequate compared to concrete values.
  - jonstokes 10y ago
    One of the most interesting things about the gun rights community is how strenuously this exact question of "where do you draw the bright line that, once crossed, you'll rise up?" is avoided. You know how that guy took that video of himself asking anti-abortion protestors, "if abortion is murder, then shouldn't we put women who procure abortions on trial for murder?" and they all just short-circuited, like they'd never even thought of the question before? And how Trump stepped in it when he suggested that women who procure abortions should be punished? The "ok, so exactly when do you plan on using that thing, and with what group (because we all know you're not going to fight tyranny by yourself)?" questions are sort of like that, but for pro-gun people. They either haven't really thought it through that far, or they're not willing to talk about it, or both. FWIW, I think many gun rights people have the same delusion about guns as anti-gun people, and that's this: a gun in the hands of an individual is a thing of immense, Godlike power for mass destruction. The pro-gun people are all <boromir>We can use this power for good</boromir>, and the anti-gun people are all <gandalf>drop that ring!</gandalf>. But where they both go wrong is at the heart of what you've pointed out: guns are an effective political force only when wielded by organized groups towards a specific set of goals. Everyone just having a gun in their closet is about as effective as everyone just going out and voting (without having a party or a plan). You can do that and feel like you've got some power, but you're not actually changing anything or threatening the status quo. It's just a political fantasy that you're buying into.
- madengr 10y ago
  That's why the 2A states "arms" and not "firearms".
  - 0xfeba 10y ago
    Right. If you ignore some 200 years of jurisprudence, you might have a point.
    - EdHominem 10y ago
      Well yeah, if it wasn't constitutional it should be ignored. The courts can't make something constitutional.
      - 0xfeba 10y ago
        > The courts can't make something constitutional. That's literally what they do. They determine if executive or legislative branch actions are constitutional or not.
        EdHominem 10y ago
        No, they can declare that the government shall currently act as if X is constitutional (or not). They interpret the constitution, not write it.
    - deadfece 10y ago
      In the present day, civilians own tanks, cannons, rocket launchers, grenades, machine guns, explosives, etc. This has largely been the case for 200 plus years. If we ignore the some 200 years of jurisprudence supporting that ownership, then what?
      - 0xfeba 10y ago
        Then we can reinterpret it to mean "human arms", as opposed to legs. I mean, the courts have the final say in what the US Constitution says, so just rattling off "the constitution says X!!!" like it means one thing but ignoring the years and years of case law meaning something else (and what's actually enforced) is just being naive.
- 0xfeba 10y ago
  Eh, all of those incidents are examples of dubious "He shot first!" claims on both sides. I don't think drones are going to make the government look any better.
  - hga 10y ago
    Errr, the government in both those cases admits to shooting first, to kill these groups' dogs. At Ruby Ridge, Weaver's son and friend were just behind the dog, at Waco, well, we know one BATF agent climbing a ladder had a negligent discharge and shot a guy underneath him, who did not survive. Contagious fire from the BATF agents after the guy who got shot shouted out is more likely than most other explanations, especially when you note how the government was very certain to destroy everything that might have indicated they shot first and shot the most (the vehicles in the back drop, the front door, the whole complex for that matter). And we know they lied about the denouement, for the Texas Rangers found and inventoried a relatively incendiary "tear gas" round they swore up and down that they never used. And as I might comment elsewhere, drone operators have to sleep sometime, somewhere, and depend on a huge logistics tail; the US has never fought without a pretty secure rear, certainly not after the War of 1812 (threat of invasion from Canada).
- djloche 10y ago
  The existence of an armed, trained civilian population prevents the current government from going completely insane with the vast power they've thus far been allowed to take and selectively abuse. I'd love to see the people take some of the power back without a bloody, internal war.
  - jbmorgado 10y ago
    "The existence of an armed, trained civilian population prevents the current government from going completely insane with the vast power they've thus far been allowed to take and selectively abuse." Yes, that's why basically all Europe lives in a dictatorship now-a-days due to our gun control laws.
    - blakes 10y ago
      Hey, you never know. Also, I'll bet the American government is a lot more afraid of the people than most European governments are of their people. I suppose that could be argued either way to be a good or a bad thing.
      - pnut 10y ago
        I disagree. I bet the French government is more afraid of their people than the American government is. The French people shut down their economy and raise holy hell when the government starts acting contrary to their interests. The Americans mumble some crap about 2nd Amendment rights online, and then fire up steam or crack a beer.
      - Daishiman 10y ago
        I don't see people going on general strike, boycotting entire state agencies or even going out to protest massively
  - return0 10y ago
    That american idea can only hold ground in the US, a country that has not experienced an external threat or revolution since its inception. The world's revolutions started from relatively unarmed people. Once the flame is ignited, and the socioeconomic conditions fan the flame, there is little chance a government can stop it.
- mindcrime 10y ago
  it's harder and harder to sympathize with the idea that firearms in the US could effectively combat governmental tyranny. People keep trotting out this argument, and it remains just as wrong. "Regular" firearms by themselves probably aren't enough to resist the US government, but that isn't the point. Firearms are just one tool out of many that would be in play if an actual armed revolution broke out. And what people gloss over are factors like: 1. Military units that defect to the "rebellion". Now the rebellion has tanks, airplanes, drones, etc. 2. IEDs and other improvised munitions which are capable of doing more damage that just, say, an AK-47. 3. The idea that "quantity is its own quality". Enough people, armed with AR-15's or AK-47's can constitute a formidable force just through sheer numbers. Anyway, nobody is out there pretending that they are going to overthrow a hypothetical "tyrannical US government" using nothing but light weapons. But that doesn't mean that those light weapons aren't still important.
  - sievebrain 10y ago
    The only thing that really matters is (1) and if your revolution requires military defections to succeed then you didn't need amateur firearms to begin with. Unless you believe a bunch of randoms with rifles are a match for a professionally trained army equipped with the latest tech. In which case I think Iraq may wish to disagree with you.
    - bllguo 10y ago
      A revolution would not involve conventional warfare (invasion of Iraq) but asymmetric, guerilla warfare (Vietnam, occupation of Iraq)...
  - TheLarch 10y ago
    "Firearms are just one tool out of many that would be in play if an actual armed revolution broke out." I reject your premise. How will militias assemble before these conflicts can take place? Facebook? I'm not being facetious. A ruthless government could, in a state of emergency, cut off the internet in a locality, or lean of Facebook to turn over names, or etc. The internet IS the battleground. Physical control of land with guns is a small, receding target. Guns aren't protecting us from the government, the EFF is.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- naveen99 10y ago
  by the US, I guess you mean the federal government. Remember people are actually at various smaller levels. Any sort of rebellion would require organization atleast at the city level. Cities have police forces, some of which have access to firearms, and maybe even a few non-active duty or defecting soldiers. After the federal government puts down uprisings at a few cities, they might get whole states defecting, if those city dwellers had powerful friends. This is not even considering possible rebellions at outfits like corporations, which are little countries in themselves, which internal economies, surveillance of their employees etc... But realistically i can't even imagine USA going to war with any major trading partner, much less their own population. More likely is some corrupt local city government gets ousted by organized people defecting to neighboring towns... again neighboring towns have police / weapons. But you can also just sue cities in state / federal court probably, as they don't have sovereignty. Not to mention elections. So again, i don't really see cities doing anything too stupid to a majority of their own population... i think the need for weapons will continue to decrease as time goes on and the world economy consolidates more and more... weapons are mostly for sport, just like boxing or mma. Its more of a staged drama...
- EdHominem 10y ago
  It's a straw-man to nitpick only the worst-case scenario - a full-on civil war against a nuke-wielding government. Syria is an on-going example of people involved in limited engagements with a somewhat modern government, defending themselves with small arms. They don't need to be ideal to be better than nothing. Even in Syria, a large part of the armed forces refused to fight their own people. I imagine in America it would be a greater percentage, and you'd only be facing limited local insurrectionists. And it'd be enough to hold out for help, rather than battle them to a stand-still ala Rambo.
bifrost 10y ago
IMHO this whole movement is out there to point out how ridiculous some legislation is. Pretty much anyone with a brain can make a deadly weapon with time and materials. They even make guns in prisons, so of course someone could 3d print the serialized parts of a gun. In certain types of guns those 3d printed parts are only minorly structual so they don't receive that much force, you could even conceivably hand carve one out of plastic. In addition, you could mill your own parts pretty easily, those plans have been available for decades as well.
- Aelinsaar 10y ago
  You can make a knife from a sharpened spoon, but you can do a lot more damage, more reliably, to more people, with a real sword. For now (although not forever) you're not going to 3D print an AR-15 Lower.
  - djloche 10y ago
    It is easier and more economical to mill with a cnc. It is probably far cheaper even to just walk to the gun store and buy a rifle than it is to 3D print something similar.
    - celticninja 10y ago
      Not everywhere has gun stores.
    - Aelinsaar 10y ago
      A CNC is something that is pitifully easy for a regulatory agency to track, as far as large numbers of purchases go. See: that fellow who was milling AR-15 lowers and just got busted. We're talking about the difference between machining metal, and downloading and printing a schematic. I hope that you do see the difference.
      - 0xffff2 10y ago
        Easier than 3D printers? how so?
01Michael10 10y ago
I am all for people being independent and creating their own DIY project but wish Mr. Wilson used his energy towards something more productive. Personality wise, he comes across as your typical gun nut with small balls to me. Maybe it's just guns don't interest me at all... Guns for all intents and purposes already grow on trees here in the US. What's the point of a DIY gun?
millzlane 10y ago
Everyone has a natural right to self defense. But by what means? We understand the laws of sciences like physics and thermodynamics, but we still can't agree on how humans should live. Why is that?
ajmarsh 10y ago
...or you could just go to the hardware store and make a better one. http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Zip-Gun http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Zip-Gun
scrollaway 10y ago
I heard about this before on a documentary that was recommended on HN, so I'll pass the recommendation on: Print the Legend, from 2014, on the story of 3d printing. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3557464/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3557464/
whatgoodisaroad 10y ago
I'm going to pedantically nitpick the title, but surely "3D" should apply to "print" rather than "guns". Printing 2d guns isn't a big deal.
- mbil 10y ago
  Imagine a paper cut at 370 m/s
  - DigitalJack 10y ago
    That is the stuff of nightmares.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
  At the right angle the problem completely disappears.
- dang 10y ago
  As far as pedantic nitpicks go, that's actually pretty good. We changed the title.
folksonomy 10y ago
I've been watching this story for the longest time. Great to see it on HN so people can discuss it a bit more. Don't shoot the messenger (No pun intended!). Cody is only a small part of the story, and the wider implications of 3D printing is the democratization of so called 'physibles' into every household. I think makerspace needs a story like this to catapult 3D printing into mainstream, just like Silk Road kick-started the Darknet market phenomenon. It's not as if criminals haven't thought of importing guns in parts rather then the fully assembled piece anyways, so the outrage is uncalled for. I imagine the parts of real guns are made with equipment very similar to the equipment mentioned in the article anyway?
Mizza 10y ago
To be honest, though Cody Wilson was responsible for the initial organization of the movement, he is largely irrelevant now, and the DIY gun community has pretty much disavowed him and moved over to FOSSCAD.org // https://twitter.com/fosscad https://twitter.com/fosscad and IRC. To show the difference in the developments, compare the single-shot Liberator featured in this article to the revolving Washbear designs by FOSSCAD: https://imgur.com/a/M1A0P/layout/horizontal#0 https://imgur.com/a/M1A0P/layout/horizontal#0 or the semi-auto Shuty MP-1v4 https://twitter.com/fosscad/status/718190339090059265 https://twitter.com/fosscad/status/718190339090059265 Cody is more of a political agitator and propagandist, whereas the FOSSCAD community are typically much more gun-enthusiast/engineer-y - although they share similar political opinions, their motivations seem to be much technical/recreational rather than political.
- tantalor 10y ago
  Thanks, this kind of perspective is useful for outsiders. Quick comment: isn't "Free Open Source Software & Computer Aided Design" a pretty misleading name for a group that is apparently only interested in 3d printing firearms?
  - Mizza 10y ago
    Agreed, but it came out of evolution - Cody's organization used to be called "DEFCAD" (Defense CAD), but it operated more as a company than as an open source initiative, so the community forked to "FOSSCAD" to indicate that's how they would be operating. Maybe FOSSDEF would have made more sense but it's kind of too late now.
- Canada 10y ago
  Thanks for those links. Fantastic!
fudged71 10y ago
It's really interesting when I tell people that I'm in the 3D printing industry and their first reaction is to tell me someone 3D printed a gun. So many people know about it now, and I don't think it's a bad thing either. It gets people thinking about what complex things can be created with this technology. I believe the story has been an overall positive educational tool for the industry and the mainstream's understanding.
- Taniwha 10y ago
  I run a small Makerspace, I see a teenage boy come in the door every month or so, eye the printers, and ask if they can print a gun .... that gives me a good chance to explain that making your own hand gun is illegal and that using a printer doesn't change that.
  - erichocean 10y ago
    > making your own hand gun is illegal If true, that's extremely surprising to me as a US citizen.
    - Taniwha 10y ago
      Please don't make the assumption that many seem to do that US law or the US constitution applies everywhere on the planet
  - donw 10y ago
    You can manufacture firearms for personal use across the US -- even in California -- provided those arms otherwise comply with the law[1]. https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/does-individual-need-license-make-firearm-personal-use https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/does-individual-need-license...
    - Taniwha 10y ago
      again you assume that California laws, or even US laws apply everywhere on the planet, they don't - the 2nd amendment is historical curiosity everywhere else
serge2k 10y ago
> The theory is that for the first time ever, publication to the internet, apart from generating data, amounts to an export of technical data related to defense services.” wasn't this the case with crypto 2 decades ago? > “No,” says Wilson. “It does not register on my meter. Whatsoever.” Seems like this could be phrased better at least.

77 points by kfullert 10y ago

With the advancement of technology it's harder and harder to sympathize with the idea that firearms in the US could effectively combat governmental tyranny. Situations such as Ruby Ridge and Waco could be handled by drones now. It's hard to believe that there is a principle at play here deeper than a simple love of guns.

kiba 10y ago
Cryptography scared authoritarians and chicken little more than guns.
- ethbro 10y ago
  Can't tell if you're being ironic or not, but in case you're not: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_...
jonstokes 10y ago
Yeah, you're right. See, for instance, the way that the West totally put down the Taliban in Afghanistan and pacified the entire country, which is now peaceful to this day. The Taliban were just a bunch of illiterate goat herders with AKs, so there's no way they could stand up to the America's more technologically advanced army, plus the drones. And then look at Iraq, and Syria, and all of the other insurgencies involving irregular combatants armed with nothing but improvised explosives and small arms, that have now been totally put down by the drones... Except that none of the above is true :p
- kiba 10y ago
  In case of unbearable government tyranny, the civilians are going to have an insurgency against their own fathers, sons, and brothers?
  - jonstokes 10y ago
    Dunno why you got downvoted, but that's actually a much more legit objection to the "guns are a last defense against tyranny" argument than "ZOMG DRONEZ". My answer is, I have no idea, and I hope I never find out.
  - kauffj 10y ago
    In case of unbearable government tyranny, the soldiers are going to kill insurgents that are their own fathers, sons, and brothers?
    - daxorid 10y ago
      Absolutely. Given the full power of the UCMJ, Oathkeepers are little more than a fun Constitutionalist fantasy.
      - knieveltech 10y ago
        Aww. I think you hurt someone's libertarian ideals with that comment.
  - adventured 10y ago
    You mean like the Revolutionary and Civil wars in the US? Yes, that exact thing does sometimes occur. Historically it occurs frequently all around the world. At any given time, there is a civil war going on somewhere in the world that involves just such conflict.
  - maxerickson 10y ago
    It happened in the civil war: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_against_brother https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brother_against_brother And that was with the sides largely being split geographically.
- anoonmoose 10y ago
  I don't think there's enough evidence to say that we necessarily couldn't crush those insurgencies with drones. As far as I can tell, the US has (reasonably, humanely)[1] pulled its punches considerably over the last fifteen years. [1] to the extent that any war can have these descriptors slapped on them. War is hell, The US has done inhumane stuff, I don't think they did as much as for example I think they did in Vietnam.
  - jonstokes 10y ago
    Then you're left to argue that the US military has pulled its punches on the Taliban, but they're really gonna take the gloves off if they get turned against their fellow citizens. Good luck with that.
    - ethbro 10y ago
      That doesn't seem too unreasonable. The former is a conflict half a world away for (at best) geopolitical goals, the later would be an existential threat.
    - mikeash 10y ago
      The whole scenario is predicated on some horrible tyrant taking control of the US. Why wouldn't the gloves come off in that case?
      - pkinsky 10y ago
        Because said tyrant wishes to avoid a coup by the armed forces/defections to the rebels/etc?
- pjc50 10y ago
  Surely the big lesson from the middle East is that guns can deliver violent chaos or despotic centralism but not peaceful stability?
  - angersock 10y ago
    I'm not sure that there are any good lessons to be learned from that region at this point. It brings to mind the ending of Burn After Reading.
    - ethbro 10y ago
      First and last lesson: never partition countries out of disparate ethnic/religious/sectarian groups who don't have some sort of larger overriding loyalty holding them together. Of course, that boat sailed a while ago.
  - mindcrime 10y ago
    Surely the big lesson from the middle East is that guns can deliver violent chaos or despotic centralism but not peaceful stability? Guns, in and of themselves, don't deliver anything. They're tools, that's it. Whether or not the people of the Middle Eastern countries like Afghanistan find peaceful stability or not depends on a whole laundry list of variables.
- yongjik 10y ago
  In other words, "American civilians with guns" makes perfect sense if you predict (1) America will become like Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria in the near future, or (2) civilians with guns can somehow stop America from becoming like Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria. Considering that all those armed insurgents in those countries didn't stop governments (domestic or foreign) from killing them, I'm skeptical on (2). Regarding (1), well, if you want to believe that... (shrug)
- inthewoods 10y ago
  Just my opinion, but they do "well" against Americans (Russian, whoever else is foolish enough to weigh in) because the war is asymmetric. They have no issue killing civilians or causing any collateral damage. The US must instead try and precisely get them and only them - and while drone mistakes happen (and they might or might not be mistakes), the US largely has to operate under a completely different and restricted rules of engagement compared with their enemy. The enemy instead folds into the civilian population, making the war extremely challenging.
- TheLarch 10y ago
  My belief is that you have apples and oranges. Nomadic goat herders are not reliant on the internet. In the US the starvation clock starts running without it. Guns are more effective in the Middle East, but control of the internet is more effective in the US.
danharaj 10y ago
Well guns don't do anything on their own, people do. Organizations of people overthrow governments. I think access to violence is important for the success of such organizations as the past has shown. I think your examples of the governments sieging individuals who refused to bend to its will just demonstrate what kind of resistance fails to threaten the government. The only way to resist a tyrannical government is to fight for the destruction of the structural institutions that enable tyranny. You can't get a government to back off. A government's purpose is to perpetuate itself and increase the scope of its power. No matter how long you try to hold out against it, it will persistently attempt to subjugate you or lose its patience and destroy you. One thing i haven't heard explained in detail by people who justify the 2nd amendment as a safeguard against tyranny is what conditions they personally think justify armed insurrection against the government. There's a lot of abstract support for it, but how could you support insurrection in the abstract without knowing which concrete circumstances would cause you to take up arms against the government? How many pro-gun rights people are down with leftists who want to dismantle capitalism, for example? What about right-wingers who want to do away with liberal values? I think abstract arguments for gun rights, like abstract arguments for free speech are terribly inadequate compared to concrete values.
- jonstokes 10y ago
  One of the most interesting things about the gun rights community is how strenuously this exact question of "where do you draw the bright line that, once crossed, you'll rise up?" is avoided. You know how that guy took that video of himself asking anti-abortion protestors, "if abortion is murder, then shouldn't we put women who procure abortions on trial for murder?" and they all just short-circuited, like they'd never even thought of the question before? And how Trump stepped in it when he suggested that women who procure abortions should be punished? The "ok, so exactly when do you plan on using that thing, and with what group (because we all know you're not going to fight tyranny by yourself)?" questions are sort of like that, but for pro-gun people. They either haven't really thought it through that far, or they're not willing to talk about it, or both. FWIW, I think many gun rights people have the same delusion about guns as anti-gun people, and that's this: a gun in the hands of an individual is a thing of immense, Godlike power for mass destruction. The pro-gun people are all <boromir>We can use this power for good</boromir>, and the anti-gun people are all <gandalf>drop that ring!</gandalf>. But where they both go wrong is at the heart of what you've pointed out: guns are an effective political force only when wielded by organized groups towards a specific set of goals. Everyone just having a gun in their closet is about as effective as everyone just going out and voting (without having a party or a plan). You can do that and feel like you've got some power, but you're not actually changing anything or threatening the status quo. It's just a political fantasy that you're buying into.
madengr 10y ago
That's why the 2A states "arms" and not "firearms".
- 0xfeba 10y ago
  Right. If you ignore some 200 years of jurisprudence, you might have a point.
  - EdHominem 10y ago
    Well yeah, if it wasn't constitutional it should be ignored. The courts can't make something constitutional.
    - 0xfeba 10y ago
      > The courts can't make something constitutional. That's literally what they do. They determine if executive or legislative branch actions are constitutional or not.
      - EdHominem 10y ago
        No, they can declare that the government shall currently act as if X is constitutional (or not). They interpret the constitution, not write it.
  - deadfece 10y ago
    In the present day, civilians own tanks, cannons, rocket launchers, grenades, machine guns, explosives, etc. This has largely been the case for 200 plus years. If we ignore the some 200 years of jurisprudence supporting that ownership, then what?
    - 0xfeba 10y ago
      Then we can reinterpret it to mean "human arms", as opposed to legs. I mean, the courts have the final say in what the US Constitution says, so just rattling off "the constitution says X!!!" like it means one thing but ignoring the years and years of case law meaning something else (and what's actually enforced) is just being naive.
0xfeba 10y ago
Eh, all of those incidents are examples of dubious "He shot first!" claims on both sides. I don't think drones are going to make the government look any better.
- hga 10y ago
  Errr, the government in both those cases admits to shooting first, to kill these groups' dogs. At Ruby Ridge, Weaver's son and friend were just behind the dog, at Waco, well, we know one BATF agent climbing a ladder had a negligent discharge and shot a guy underneath him, who did not survive. Contagious fire from the BATF agents after the guy who got shot shouted out is more likely than most other explanations, especially when you note how the government was very certain to destroy everything that might have indicated they shot first and shot the most (the vehicles in the back drop, the front door, the whole complex for that matter). And we know they lied about the denouement, for the Texas Rangers found and inventoried a relatively incendiary "tear gas" round they swore up and down that they never used. And as I might comment elsewhere, drone operators have to sleep sometime, somewhere, and depend on a huge logistics tail; the US has never fought without a pretty secure rear, certainly not after the War of 1812 (threat of invasion from Canada).
djloche 10y ago
The existence of an armed, trained civilian population prevents the current government from going completely insane with the vast power they've thus far been allowed to take and selectively abuse. I'd love to see the people take some of the power back without a bloody, internal war.
- jbmorgado 10y ago
  "The existence of an armed, trained civilian population prevents the current government from going completely insane with the vast power they've thus far been allowed to take and selectively abuse." Yes, that's why basically all Europe lives in a dictatorship now-a-days due to our gun control laws.
  - blakes 10y ago
    Hey, you never know. Also, I'll bet the American government is a lot more afraid of the people than most European governments are of their people. I suppose that could be argued either way to be a good or a bad thing.
    - pnut 10y ago
      I disagree. I bet the French government is more afraid of their people than the American government is. The French people shut down their economy and raise holy hell when the government starts acting contrary to their interests. The Americans mumble some crap about 2nd Amendment rights online, and then fire up steam or crack a beer.
    - Daishiman 10y ago
      I don't see people going on general strike, boycotting entire state agencies or even going out to protest massively
- return0 10y ago
  That american idea can only hold ground in the US, a country that has not experienced an external threat or revolution since its inception. The world's revolutions started from relatively unarmed people. Once the flame is ignited, and the socioeconomic conditions fan the flame, there is little chance a government can stop it.
mindcrime 10y ago
it's harder and harder to sympathize with the idea that firearms in the US could effectively combat governmental tyranny. People keep trotting out this argument, and it remains just as wrong. "Regular" firearms by themselves probably aren't enough to resist the US government, but that isn't the point. Firearms are just one tool out of many that would be in play if an actual armed revolution broke out. And what people gloss over are factors like: 1. Military units that defect to the "rebellion". Now the rebellion has tanks, airplanes, drones, etc. 2. IEDs and other improvised munitions which are capable of doing more damage that just, say, an AK-47. 3. The idea that "quantity is its own quality". Enough people, armed with AR-15's or AK-47's can constitute a formidable force just through sheer numbers. Anyway, nobody is out there pretending that they are going to overthrow a hypothetical "tyrannical US government" using nothing but light weapons. But that doesn't mean that those light weapons aren't still important.
- sievebrain 10y ago
  The only thing that really matters is (1) and if your revolution requires military defections to succeed then you didn't need amateur firearms to begin with. Unless you believe a bunch of randoms with rifles are a match for a professionally trained army equipped with the latest tech. In which case I think Iraq may wish to disagree with you.
  - bllguo 10y ago
    A revolution would not involve conventional warfare (invasion of Iraq) but asymmetric, guerilla warfare (Vietnam, occupation of Iraq)...
- TheLarch 10y ago
  "Firearms are just one tool out of many that would be in play if an actual armed revolution broke out." I reject your premise. How will militias assemble before these conflicts can take place? Facebook? I'm not being facetious. A ruthless government could, in a state of emergency, cut off the internet in a locality, or lean of Facebook to turn over names, or etc. The internet IS the battleground. Physical control of land with guns is a small, receding target. Guns aren't protecting us from the government, the EFF is.
deleted 10y ago
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naveen99 10y ago
by the US, I guess you mean the federal government. Remember people are actually at various smaller levels. Any sort of rebellion would require organization atleast at the city level. Cities have police forces, some of which have access to firearms, and maybe even a few non-active duty or defecting soldiers. After the federal government puts down uprisings at a few cities, they might get whole states defecting, if those city dwellers had powerful friends. This is not even considering possible rebellions at outfits like corporations, which are little countries in themselves, which internal economies, surveillance of their employees etc... But realistically i can't even imagine USA going to war with any major trading partner, much less their own population. More likely is some corrupt local city government gets ousted by organized people defecting to neighboring towns... again neighboring towns have police / weapons. But you can also just sue cities in state / federal court probably, as they don't have sovereignty. Not to mention elections. So again, i don't really see cities doing anything too stupid to a majority of their own population... i think the need for weapons will continue to decrease as time goes on and the world economy consolidates more and more... weapons are mostly for sport, just like boxing or mma. Its more of a staged drama...
EdHominem 10y ago
It's a straw-man to nitpick only the worst-case scenario - a full-on civil war against a nuke-wielding government. Syria is an on-going example of people involved in limited engagements with a somewhat modern government, defending themselves with small arms. They don't need to be ideal to be better than nothing. Even in Syria, a large part of the armed forces refused to fight their own people. I imagine in America it would be a greater percentage, and you'd only be facing limited local insurrectionists. And it'd be enough to hold out for help, rather than battle them to a stand-still ala Rambo.

bifrost 10y ago

IMHO this whole movement is out there to point out how ridiculous some legislation is. Pretty much anyone with a brain can make a deadly weapon with time and materials. They even make guns in prisons, so of course someone could 3d print the serialized parts of a gun. In certain types of guns those 3d printed parts are only minorly structual so they don't receive that much force, you could even conceivably hand carve one out of plastic. In addition, you could mill your own parts pretty easily, those plans have been available for decades as well.

Aelinsaar 10y ago
You can make a knife from a sharpened spoon, but you can do a lot more damage, more reliably, to more people, with a real sword. For now (although not forever) you're not going to 3D print an AR-15 Lower.
- djloche 10y ago
  It is easier and more economical to mill with a cnc. It is probably far cheaper even to just walk to the gun store and buy a rifle than it is to 3D print something similar.
  - celticninja 10y ago
    Not everywhere has gun stores.
  - Aelinsaar 10y ago
    A CNC is something that is pitifully easy for a regulatory agency to track, as far as large numbers of purchases go. See: that fellow who was milling AR-15 lowers and just got busted. We're talking about the difference between machining metal, and downloading and printing a schematic. I hope that you do see the difference.
    - 0xffff2 10y ago
      Easier than 3D printers? how so?

01Michael10 10y ago

I am all for people being independent and creating their own DIY project but wish Mr. Wilson used his energy towards something more productive. Personality wise, he comes across as your typical gun nut with small balls to me. Maybe it's just guns don't interest me at all... Guns for all intents and purposes already grow on trees here in the US. What's the point of a DIY gun?

millzlane 10y ago

Everyone has a natural right to self defense. But by what means? We understand the laws of sciences like physics and thermodynamics, but we still can't agree on how humans should live. Why is that?

ajmarsh 10y ago

...or you could just go to the hardware store and make a better one. http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Zip-Gun http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Zip-Gun

scrollaway 10y ago

I heard about this before on a documentary that was recommended on HN, so I'll pass the recommendation on: Print the Legend, from 2014, on the story of 3d printing. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3557464/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3557464/

whatgoodisaroad 10y ago

I'm going to pedantically nitpick the title, but surely "3D" should apply to "print" rather than "guns". Printing 2d guns isn't a big deal.

mbil 10y ago
Imagine a paper cut at 370 m/s
- DigitalJack 10y ago
  That is the stuff of nightmares.
0xdeadbeefbabe 10y ago
At the right angle the problem completely disappears.
dang 10y ago
As far as pedantic nitpicks go, that's actually pretty good. We changed the title.

folksonomy 10y ago

I've been watching this story for the longest time. Great to see it on HN so people can discuss it a bit more. Don't shoot the messenger (No pun intended!). Cody is only a small part of the story, and the wider implications of 3D printing is the democratization of so called 'physibles' into every household. I think makerspace needs a story like this to catapult 3D printing into mainstream, just like Silk Road kick-started the Darknet market phenomenon. It's not as if criminals haven't thought of importing guns in parts rather then the fully assembled piece anyways, so the outrage is uncalled for. I imagine the parts of real guns are made with equipment very similar to the equipment mentioned in the article anyway?

Mizza 10y ago

To be honest, though Cody Wilson was responsible for the initial organization of the movement, he is largely irrelevant now, and the DIY gun community has pretty much disavowed him and moved over to FOSSCAD.org // https://twitter.com/fosscad https://twitter.com/fosscad and IRC. To show the difference in the developments, compare the single-shot Liberator featured in this article to the revolving Washbear designs by FOSSCAD: https://imgur.com/a/M1A0P/layout/horizontal#0 https://imgur.com/a/M1A0P/layout/horizontal#0 or the semi-auto Shuty MP-1v4 https://twitter.com/fosscad/status/718190339090059265 https://twitter.com/fosscad/status/718190339090059265 Cody is more of a political agitator and propagandist, whereas the FOSSCAD community are typically much more gun-enthusiast/engineer-y - although they share similar political opinions, their motivations seem to be much technical/recreational rather than political.

tantalor 10y ago
Thanks, this kind of perspective is useful for outsiders. Quick comment: isn't "Free Open Source Software & Computer Aided Design" a pretty misleading name for a group that is apparently only interested in 3d printing firearms?
- Mizza 10y ago
  Agreed, but it came out of evolution - Cody's organization used to be called "DEFCAD" (Defense CAD), but it operated more as a company than as an open source initiative, so the community forked to "FOSSCAD" to indicate that's how they would be operating. Maybe FOSSDEF would have made more sense but it's kind of too late now.
Canada 10y ago
Thanks for those links. Fantastic!

fudged71 10y ago

It's really interesting when I tell people that I'm in the 3D printing industry and their first reaction is to tell me someone 3D printed a gun. So many people know about it now, and I don't think it's a bad thing either. It gets people thinking about what complex things can be created with this technology. I believe the story has been an overall positive educational tool for the industry and the mainstream's understanding.

Taniwha 10y ago
I run a small Makerspace, I see a teenage boy come in the door every month or so, eye the printers, and ask if they can print a gun .... that gives me a good chance to explain that making your own hand gun is illegal and that using a printer doesn't change that.
- erichocean 10y ago
  > making your own hand gun is illegal If true, that's extremely surprising to me as a US citizen.
  - Taniwha 10y ago
    Please don't make the assumption that many seem to do that US law or the US constitution applies everywhere on the planet
- donw 10y ago
  You can manufacture firearms for personal use across the US -- even in California -- provided those arms otherwise comply with the law[1]. https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/does-individual-need-license-make-firearm-personal-use https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/does-individual-need-license...
  - Taniwha 10y ago
    again you assume that California laws, or even US laws apply everywhere on the planet, they don't - the 2nd amendment is historical curiosity everywhere else

serge2k 10y ago

> The theory is that for the first time ever, publication to the internet, apart from generating data, amounts to an export of technical data related to defense services.” wasn't this the case with crypto 2 decades ago? > “No,” says Wilson. “It does not register on my meter. Whatsoever.” Seems like this could be phrased better at least.