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For a time I was paid by the US gov't to use the AR-15 for its original purpose. I was well trained and used it very effectively. Later I was trained to smith i
by ryanmarsh 10y ago
For a time I was paid by the US gov't to use the AR-15 for its original purpose. I was well trained and used it very effectively. Later I was trained to smith it as well.
It fucking terrifies me that so many of you people have one.
It's a tough position for me to be in. I support the 2nd amendment but I don't think you folks should have access to this sort of weapon of war.
There are plenty of options that provide the utility of home defense, plinking, target practice, and hunting without having a 30 ROUND FUCKING MAG.
In a military context we wouldn't call the AR-15 a "mass casualty producing weapon" because there are relatively higher caliber, faster cycling, higher capacity, man portable weapons. However in the civilian context the AR-15 is most definitely a "mass casualty producing weapon" and should not be easily obtained.
- paloaltokid 10y agoIf you're willing and it's not too personal, would you share more about your experiences using the AR-15? My father was in the military and I only ever saw his service weapon once. If it was present in our home growing up, I never knew. I mention this because I find that getting the perspective of people who have actually had to employ weapons for their original purpose adds a lot of richness to these discussions. Thanks in advance for sharing.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- diek 10y agoJust out of curiosity, where would you draw the line? Mini-14? Shotgun? SKS? Is it a capacity issue? caliber? detachable magazine? or a combination?
- ryanmarsh 10y agoMass casualty producing weapons.
- diek 10y agoThe problem with this argument is that in the timeframe the Orlando shooter was given (3 hours), a shotgun could have easily been a mass casualty producing weapon.
- ryanmarsh 10y agoLOL at carrying around a few hundred 12 GA shells and stopping to reload in a room full of people that could over power you.
- diek 10y agoYou don't have to stop to reload at empty, you can just keep feeding the magazine after every shot or two. 50 (2 3/4) shells isn't an unrealistic loadout.
- willhamina 10y agoA foolish remark. The shooter spent his time in different rooms, each full of people, many of whom could have overpowered him. At many times he was within arms' length of people. There are no reports whatsoever of anyone trying to "over power"[sic] him. They were likely frozen by fear, alcohol, drugs and wounds. I'm not blaming them, simply noting that they were unable to react. He had free reign. Under such circumstances a serious shooter with a 12 gauge would generate far _more_ casualties. LOL all you want, the 12 gauge is way more destructive than an AR, especially at the short ranges involved.
- Aloha 10y agoI'm perfectly OK with a 10 round magazine limit, I have trouble justifying more, even in a militia situation, no one has made a convincing argument that a greater magazine size would save lives - it just means that you'd be carrying less weight. I am opposed to banning 'assault rifles' because an assault rift is a category with a list of things - I can make something just as deadly (and practical) without that list of things. Because of that, banning a gun with specific features (most of which are not known to enhance rate of fire or deadliness of aim) amounts to bad law.
- creeble 10y ago>30 ROUND FUCKING MAG. I think that this is actually the most significant difference between guns. To rationalize having such a large magazine, you must believe either that A) you are going to be attacked by a large group of armed people, or B) are going to attack a large group of people. It's the same rationale for not allowing fully-automatic weapons to be owned by ordinary citizens, and it's a good starting place for new legislation (and hopefully not the only legislation).
- jonstokes 10y agoThis mag limit obsession /fascinates/ me. Here is why. The people who push this are generally people who also believe that what we really need in the gun debate is hard data. Like, actual data from studies and such. There are no studies indicating that mag limit would save lives in a mass shooting situation. None. I understand that the mag capacity/body count link seems intuitively to be true, but I've read a number of accounts from actual weapon experts (I think the last time I saw this was on Sofrep.com, from some former SF guys) that indicate that this is not actually the case. And ultimately, wouldn't it be best to base a mag capacity ban on, y'know, actual hard data, and not what we sort of think is probably true? I read someone who did the math (i.e. 2 seconds per mag change, rate of fire, mag capacity... I don't recall the details and Google isn't cooperating at the moment) and he determined that mag capacity has pretty much no effect on the amount of fire you can lay down in 5-minute engagement, which is about how long these shootings last. The one thing you can say about mag changes is that they introduce an opportunity for operator error (dropped mag etc.). So over the course of some number of mass shootings, if you know the odds of operator error during a mag change and the impact of that error on the rate of fire, you could probably calculate some number of rounds saved. Anyway, for reference, here is some random Meal Team Six commando on YouTube that I found demonstrating a mag change: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkLCc7H-oSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkLCc7H-oSI That guy took two seconds to change mags, and doesn't even look like he knows what he's doing. You can find plenty of sub-second mag changes on YouTube from random airsoft guys. I'm pretty confident that the mag capacity/body count link would not hold up to even cursory scientific scrutiny.
- ryanmarsh 10y ago
- mimo777 10y ago.
- woodman 10y agoWhen I was in Fallujah we let each household keep one AK (which was almost always full-auto). Why did we do this? Because it is immoral to strip an individual of all means for self defense, especially when we knew that we couldn't protect everybody. So while the US is not a war zone, when does such a moral principle kick in? I don't trust everybody with a rifle, hell - I especially don't trust you given your expressed view, but I accept the fact that the police can't protect everybody - and it is immoral to insist that they depend on protection that isn't there.
- ryanmarsh 10y agoBrother you know why they were allowed an AK. I did the same cordon and searches too. They faced a different threat model.
- woodman 10y agoAgain: "So while the US is not a war zone, when does such a moral principle kick in?" Concerns over moral principles might be totally irrelevant to you though, if you are a utilitarian/end-justifies-the-means sort of guy.
- ryanmarsh 10y agoSelf defense doesn't require a 30 round mag.
- arca_vorago 10y agoBullshit it doesn't. Ever get in a firefight with a bolt-action and win? Didn't fucking think so. Fuck, a 15 minute firefight could have me expend 240+ rounds easy! (especially if our 249's were down or for suppressive reasons, but still)
- ryanmarsh 10y agoDo you still suffer from PTSD or something? We're back home. You aren't going to find yourself in an L shaped ambush in the shopping mall.
- tracker1 10y agoBut would a glock 10 with a 15 round magazine in the Orlando context really have resulted in that much of a difference? You can always swap out magazines as one empties, and he could have just carried twice as many in with him. He also, if I understand correctly (there's a lot of bs posts flying around) that he had passed gov't background checks that would have allowed him firearm access even if most of the population was banned from owning.