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People don't favor gun control because they're eternal optimists about the government's benevolence, that is a ridiculous straw man. Generally people favor gun

by Steko 10y ago

People don't favor gun control because they're eternal optimists about the government's benevolence, that is a ridiculous straw man. Generally people favor gun control because -- to use the same language -- they are not eternal optimists about the benevolence of their fellow citizens who sometimes murder large groups of innocents.

CamperBob2 10y ago
If they bothered to crack a history book, of course, they'd come to understand that on a long-enough timeline, they're most likely to be shot by their own government, military, or police forces. But of course, That Can't Happen Here, because We're Special. (How many times have you heard that schtick lately?) After that, the person most likely to shoot you is a fellow criminal that you're either associated with or competing with, such as a rival gang member. Then comes suicide and firearm-related accidents. Everything else is just so much statistical noise. Meanwhile, the American left's inexplicable insistence on gun control as a key platform element continues to cost them elections they otherwise could have won handily.
- andrepd 10y ago
  I don't even know where to start. Do you have any sources on your first claim? Or on your other claims? Also, gun control costs elections that would otherwise be won handily? With so much going on on this last election, do you think the barely discussed topic of gun control was the single most important topic to blame for an election that could otherwise have been won, and won handily? Would you have Hillary be against gun control, offering the majority of people that favour it no major candidate reflecting their beliefs?
  - CamperBob2 10y ago
    I don't even know where to start. But you're going to anyway, right? Do you have any sources on your first claim? I'm not your personal reference librarian, but you might start with a few of the more reader-friendly popular accounts and see where your interests take you. Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago is worthwhile; also Milton Mayer's They Thought They Were Free, and perhaps Ma Bo's Blood Red Sunset. The idea behind recommending these particular books is that they helped me move past the special pleading fallacy that is American exceptionalism ("It can't happen here.") Hopefully others can point you toward some similar books on the Armenian, Cambodian, Rwandan, and other 20th century genocides, as I'm not as familiar with them. All told, you'd have to cite about 100,000,000 civilian gun deaths to catch up with the records set by modern governments who weren't as afraid of their citizens as they should have been. It's going to take a lot of Columbines and Sandy Hooks to rack up that kind of score. Would you have Hillary be against gun control, offering the majority of people that favour it no major candidate reflecting their beliefs? Yes. It's not as if removing gun control from the Democratic platform would send those voters into the arms of the Republicans.
    - shadowfiend 10y ago
      > All told, you'd have to cite about 100,000,000 civilian gun deaths to catch up with the records set by modern governments who weren't as afraid of their citizens and subjects as they should have been. Yep, the thing that's going to scare the United States government out of killing its citizens is them armed with arsenals of M-16's against their… F-22s, B-52s, carrier groups, and tanks. My goodness, this is an absolutely absurd argument, made more absurd by the lack of realization of how absurd it is. That it keeps being harped on by gun control opponents does their argument no favors. The government will not be afraid of guns should they come after their citizenry. The police literally have tanks. The only thing guns do is make one less afraid of one's government if one fails to comprehend the absolutely beastly military power that it can bring to bear against one were it to decide to do so. In fact, the only thing protecting one from the government deciding to crush one with a single well-placed smart bomb is… Well, it turns out it's permeating the culture with “It can't happen here”, to the point where the military itself believes that such a thing happening here would be utterly unacceptable. Only when the system itself culturally considers it verboten is there any hope of the immense military might the government possesses not being turned against its citizens. Barring that, the guns will be a fun thing for the military to play with after a sniper takes a rebel's head off. Your assertion (in this particular comment, not the original one) is, gun rights will deter the government from attacking its citizens. To support that, citing books that show the government attacking its citizens is insufficient. Present a book that shows that a government was prevented from attacking its citizens because they were armed. Then perhaps the posited argument can be considered more than a delectable fiction to make one feel in control. (Gun control, by the way, is tangential to the question of how absurd this particular argument is. Maybe it's a good idea, maybe it's a bad idea, but it's certainly not a bad idea because the government is afraid of folks with guns.)
      - CamperBob2 10y ago
        That's one opinion. Asymmetrical warfare amounts to another opinion. The Afghan mujahedeen, the Taliban, Al Qaeda, ISIS, and the Viet Cong can tell you more about that sort of thing. So can various warfighters with more formal credentials, from Sun Tzu Wu to Paul Van Riper. It's hard to fight a guerilla war with tanks, carriers and stealth bombers. Some of those folks will probably outlast the US government at the rate we're going. Present a book that shows that a government was prevented from attacking its citizens because they were armed. This is like claiming that the Y2K bug would have been no big deal if we hadn't spent millions of dollars preventing it from popping up, or that polio would have gone away on its own if Jonas Salk had slacked off. It's a bit of an unfair demand. Well, it turns out it's permeating the culture with “It can't happen here”, to the point where the military itself believes that such a thing happening here would be utterly unacceptable Before digging into Mayer and Solzhenitsyn, try some Zimbardo and Milgram. Their work was flawed but also very revealing. (Spoiler: if someone refuses to commit an atrocity for you, all you have to do is ask the next guy in line.)

by Steko 10y ago

CamperBob2 10y ago

If they bothered to crack a history book, of course, they'd come to understand that on a long-enough timeline, they're most likely to be shot by their own government, military, or police forces. But of course, That Can't Happen Here, because We're Special. (How many times have you heard that schtick lately?) After that, the person most likely to shoot you is a fellow criminal that you're either associated with or competing with, such as a rival gang member. Then comes suicide and firearm-related accidents. Everything else is just so much statistical noise. Meanwhile, the American left's inexplicable insistence on gun control as a key platform element continues to cost them elections they otherwise could have won handily.

andrepd 10y ago
I don't even know where to start. Do you have any sources on your first claim? Or on your other claims? Also, gun control costs elections that would otherwise be won handily? With so much going on on this last election, do you think the barely discussed topic of gun control was the single most important topic to blame for an election that could otherwise have been won, and won handily? Would you have Hillary be against gun control, offering the majority of people that favour it no major candidate reflecting their beliefs?
- CamperBob2 10y ago
  I don't even know where to start. But you're going to anyway, right? Do you have any sources on your first claim? I'm not your personal reference librarian, but you might start with a few of the more reader-friendly popular accounts and see where your interests take you. Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago is worthwhile; also Milton Mayer's They Thought They Were Free, and perhaps Ma Bo's Blood Red Sunset. The idea behind recommending these particular books is that they helped me move past the special pleading fallacy that is American exceptionalism ("It can't happen here.") Hopefully others can point you toward some similar books on the Armenian, Cambodian, Rwandan, and other 20th century genocides, as I'm not as familiar with them. All told, you'd have to cite about 100,000,000 civilian gun deaths to catch up with the records set by modern governments who weren't as afraid of their citizens as they should have been. It's going to take a lot of Columbines and Sandy Hooks to rack up that kind of score. Would you have Hillary be against gun control, offering the majority of people that favour it no major candidate reflecting their beliefs? Yes. It's not as if removing gun control from the Democratic platform would send those voters into the arms of the Republicans.
  - shadowfiend 10y ago
    > All told, you'd have to cite about 100,000,000 civilian gun deaths to catch up with the records set by modern governments who weren't as afraid of their citizens and subjects as they should have been. Yep, the thing that's going to scare the United States government out of killing its citizens is them armed with arsenals of M-16's against their… F-22s, B-52s, carrier groups, and tanks. My goodness, this is an absolutely absurd argument, made more absurd by the lack of realization of how absurd it is. That it keeps being harped on by gun control opponents does their argument no favors. The government will not be afraid of guns should they come after their citizenry. The police literally have tanks. The only thing guns do is make one less afraid of one's government if one fails to comprehend the absolutely beastly military power that it can bring to bear against one were it to decide to do so. In fact, the only thing protecting one from the government deciding to crush one with a single well-placed smart bomb is… Well, it turns out it's permeating the culture with “It can't happen here”, to the point where the military itself believes that such a thing happening here would be utterly unacceptable. Only when the system itself culturally considers it verboten is there any hope of the immense military might the government possesses not being turned against its citizens. Barring that, the guns will be a fun thing for the military to play with after a sniper takes a rebel's head off. Your assertion (in this particular comment, not the original one) is, gun rights will deter the government from attacking its citizens. To support that, citing books that show the government attacking its citizens is insufficient. Present a book that shows that a government was prevented from attacking its citizens because they were armed. Then perhaps the posited argument can be considered more than a delectable fiction to make one feel in control. (Gun control, by the way, is tangential to the question of how absurd this particular argument is. Maybe it's a good idea, maybe it's a bad idea, but it's certainly not a bad idea because the government is afraid of folks with guns.)
    - CamperBob2 10y ago
      That's one opinion. Asymmetrical warfare amounts to another opinion. The Afghan mujahedeen, the Taliban, Al Qaeda, ISIS, and the Viet Cong can tell you more about that sort of thing. So can various warfighters with more formal credentials, from Sun Tzu Wu to Paul Van Riper. It's hard to fight a guerilla war with tanks, carriers and stealth bombers. Some of those folks will probably outlast the US government at the rate we're going. Present a book that shows that a government was prevented from attacking its citizens because they were armed. This is like claiming that the Y2K bug would have been no big deal if we hadn't spent millions of dollars preventing it from popping up, or that polio would have gone away on its own if Jonas Salk had slacked off. It's a bit of an unfair demand. Well, it turns out it's permeating the culture with “It can't happen here”, to the point where the military itself believes that such a thing happening here would be utterly unacceptable Before digging into Mayer and Solzhenitsyn, try some Zimbardo and Milgram. Their work was flawed but also very revealing. (Spoiler: if someone refuses to commit an atrocity for you, all you have to do is ask the next guy in line.)