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Armed individuals, enabled by the Second Amendment, is largely the reason mass shootings are not a daily occurrence. There's no mutual exclusivity between priva

by oil25 7y ago

Armed individuals, enabled by the Second Amendment, is largely the reason mass shootings are not a daily occurrence. There's no mutual exclusivity between privacy and a natural right to defend oneself.

dragonwriter 7y ago
> Armed individuals, enabled by the Second Amendment, is largely the reason mass shootings are not a daily occurrence. No, it's not. Evidence: the parts of the world with no parallel to the Second Amendment, where mass shootings are far rarer than in the US; in the US, they are nearly a daily occurrence, depending on the precise threshold you set. The safety, such as it was, provided by the Second Amendment was the disincentive the availability of a militia drawn from the armed populace placed on the reliance on large professional armed police and military forces, which reliance was the threat it was designed as a bulwark against. This completely fell apart a little bit into the 20th Century.
- oil25 7y ago
  Certainly countries with lower populations and fewer guns experience less shootings, but USA is not such a country and guns are ubiquitous, which is also precisely what guarantees law-abiding citizens the means to thwart assaults and attacks on them. Conservative estimates of defense gun uses are on the order of hundreds of thousands per year, while unlawful homicides in the mere thousands, and most of these are gang-related. That's solid evidence the Second Amendment is working as intended - to guarantee the natural right to self-preservation for each individual. It has nothing to do with any organized militia now.
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    > Certainly countries with [...] fewer guns experience less shootings Yes, which is the opposite of your claim that an armed population prevents mass shootings. An armed population enables mass shootings, which is why, in total, per capita, and heck, probably even per gun, the US has the most mass shootings outside of actual organized armed conflicts anywhere in the world.
    - oil25 7y ago
      "No guns = no shootings" is an idealized logical conclusion, not a pragmatic consideration for how an existing super-empowering technology can be used by individuals to decentralize and evenly distribute political power, which firearm rights fundamentally are. We are safer and more reliable when the State does not have a monopoly on force.
      - dragonwriter 7y ago
        > "No guns = no shootings" is an idealized logical conclusion, not a pragmatic consideration Perhaps, but “better control of guns = less shootings” I'd an emninently well-demonstrated pragmatic consideration. > an existing super-empowering technology can be used by individuals to decentralize and evenly distribute political power The US has very nearly the least evenly distribution of political power as well as the easiest access to firearms in the developed West, so whatever the US actually has, ideological fantasies aside, isn't a pragmatic solution to that question, either. > We are safer and more reliable when the State does not have a monopoly on force. The State is by definition whatever entity or combination thereof possesses a monopoly on the legitimate use of force.

by oil25 7y ago

dragonwriter 7y ago

> Armed individuals, enabled by the Second Amendment, is largely the reason mass shootings are not a daily occurrence. No, it's not. Evidence: the parts of the world with no parallel to the Second Amendment, where mass shootings are far rarer than in the US; in the US, they are nearly a daily occurrence, depending on the precise threshold you set. The safety, such as it was, provided by the Second Amendment was the disincentive the availability of a militia drawn from the armed populace placed on the reliance on large professional armed police and military forces, which reliance was the threat it was designed as a bulwark against. This completely fell apart a little bit into the 20th Century.

oil25 7y ago
Certainly countries with lower populations and fewer guns experience less shootings, but USA is not such a country and guns are ubiquitous, which is also precisely what guarantees law-abiding citizens the means to thwart assaults and attacks on them. Conservative estimates of defense gun uses are on the order of hundreds of thousands per year, while unlawful homicides in the mere thousands, and most of these are gang-related. That's solid evidence the Second Amendment is working as intended - to guarantee the natural right to self-preservation for each individual. It has nothing to do with any organized militia now.
- dragonwriter 7y ago
  > Certainly countries with [...] fewer guns experience less shootings Yes, which is the opposite of your claim that an armed population prevents mass shootings. An armed population enables mass shootings, which is why, in total, per capita, and heck, probably even per gun, the US has the most mass shootings outside of actual organized armed conflicts anywhere in the world.
  - oil25 7y ago
    "No guns = no shootings" is an idealized logical conclusion, not a pragmatic consideration for how an existing super-empowering technology can be used by individuals to decentralize and evenly distribute political power, which firearm rights fundamentally are. We are safer and more reliable when the State does not have a monopoly on force.
    - dragonwriter 7y ago
      > "No guns = no shootings" is an idealized logical conclusion, not a pragmatic consideration Perhaps, but “better control of guns = less shootings” I'd an emninently well-demonstrated pragmatic consideration. > an existing super-empowering technology can be used by individuals to decentralize and evenly distribute political power The US has very nearly the least evenly distribution of political power as well as the easiest access to firearms in the developed West, so whatever the US actually has, ideological fantasies aside, isn't a pragmatic solution to that question, either. > We are safer and more reliable when the State does not have a monopoly on force. The State is by definition whatever entity or combination thereof possesses a monopoly on the legitimate use of force.