5 ms·

> now you have a gun it seems safer to turn to violence That's not how it works. I'm guessing you don't own any firearms and haven't had much exposure to them.

by bavell 5y ago

> now you have a gun it seems safer to turn to violence That's not how it works. I'm guessing you don't own any firearms and haven't had much exposure to them. Violence is never safe and the only people "turning to violence" after acquiring one are criminals or those soon to be one.

oneplane 5y ago
Of course that is not how it works, hence the word 'seems'. But that doesn't mean suddenly all gun owners are educated gun owners with realistic expectations, experience and training. It would be interesting if a spike in sales also came with a spike in training, range usage or gun safe sales. > I'm guessing you don't own any firearms and haven't had much exposure to them. You'd be guessing very wrongly.
- albroland 5y ago
  >It would be interesting if a spike in sales also came with a spike in training, range usage or gun safe sales. Anecdotally, I'd say yes. The three ranges in closest proximity to me have hour long waits for lanes on weekends. Everywhere, dealers are consistently sold out of "beginner" type firearms: ruger mark iv's, 10/22s, sr22s, etc. It is a similar story with magazines for these types of firearms, and I doubt demand for these is being driven by existing gun owners (who likely already have them). I also happened to order a new safe recently, and every dealer in my metro area had zero inventory on hand. The best you can get is an order allocation, or buying one of the safes they already have on order with an expected delivery of 1-3mo. Part of this is certainly supply chain disruption, but I heard the same story over and over again that demand was through the roof.
throw0101a 5y ago
> Violence is never safe and the only people "turning to violence" after acquiring one are criminals or those soon to be one. I wouldn't say it was always "turning to violence", but there are a lot of people out there that probably 'should' not have a firearm given things like poor impulse control, lack of knowledge/acknowledgement of dangerous they inherently are, or just carelessness: * https://twitter.com/well_regulated_ https://twitter.com/well_regulated_ Once someone owns a gun, or a household has a gun with-in it, there are all sorts of disasters that can now occur that were not possible without one being present.
- woudsma 5y ago
  > Once someone owns a gun, or a household has a gun with-in it, there are all sorts of disasters that can now occur that were not possible without one being present. Amen. The 'upsides' of owning a gun don't outweigh the horrible potential consequences for myself and others around me. I'm really glad that guns are not as prominent in my country compared to the US.
  - throw0101a 5y ago
    > The 'upsides' of owning a gun don't outweigh the horrible potential consequences for myself and others around me. Of course other people make different value judgements as to the risks. If I was in the US I'd be less concerned about general firearm ownership, and people basically being about to have whatever they want in their own homes, versus all the concealed carry and stand-your-ground laws, both of which impact public safety more. And it seems toward the negative (AFAICT). > I'm really glad that guns are not as prominent in my country compared to the US. As someone in Canada, the day-to-day firearms stuff isn't as prevalent, but we're tied for 7th in per capita ownership: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g... However, from a firearms death rate (homicide+suicide), we're lower than what many people would expect: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-r... With a lower rate that Austria, Switzerland, Finland, and France. IMHO this is because (a) we have mandatory licensing/training, which works as a filter to reduce the cowboy types, (b) relatively lower rates of poverty which helps with reduce crime (most shooting seem to be gang-related), and (c) decent social programs which helps the less fortunate. Many calamities are also probably reduced through safe storage laws. I don't think there's a need to even "ban" firearms or specific firearm types if these are implemented. There's no one silver bullet that will solve gun-related problems, but there are a few policies that have been shown to work fairly well. It's 'just' a matter society choosing to implement them.
    - rich_sasha 5y ago
      I guess additionally “gun ownership” is a crude metric. Is it fair to assume that more firearms in Canada are hunting weapons? These are less suited to violence than hand guns, SMGs etc. UKs gun ownership per capita is something like 30% of US’, but these are predominantly shotguns, and a few single-shot rifles. Legal ownership of pistols of any kind is essentially impossible (yes even sport 0.22 ones).
pjc50 5y ago
This certainly is how it works for the UK knife violence problem; people start carrying knives to defend themselves from other people with knives, but it results in fights escalating. (Note that this is still considerably less lethal than any major US city!)
- adolph 5y ago
  So more knives results in escalation as opposed to one-way knifing or victimization in other ways?
  - makomk 5y ago
    Yes. As I understand it, knives are just inherently unsuitable for use as a defensive weapon - they don't stop someone from stabbing you, they're not even usable as a threat to get the other person to de-escalate because if you're close enough to use it I'm pretty sure the other person can draw and stab you before you have a chance to react. The only use of a knife is to stab the other person first, before they have a chance to, before you know if they even would or if they're even armed, and they're deadly enough that untrained teenagers can easily kill with them without intending to. This only ever results in things escalating for obvious reasons. Note that the UK has police armed with guns, but not police armed with knives.
    - handrous 5y ago
      It's also the case that it's a hell of a lot easier to find something around you that's a better weapon than a knife, than it is with a gun (basically impossible, unless the thing you find is also a gun), which enhances its tendency to be a "first strike, or else don't even show it" weapon, rather than one useful for deterrence without violence. > Note that the UK has police armed with guns, but not police armed with knives. Yup. The set of qualities that make knives desirable weapons for criminals don't make them good weapons generally. The cops have very different restrictions (fewer restrictions, that is) and goals. A truncheon plus some strong mace are probably much, much better for their purposes than a knife would be.
- 5y ago

by bavell 5y ago

oneplane 5y ago

Of course that is not how it works, hence the word 'seems'. But that doesn't mean suddenly all gun owners are educated gun owners with realistic expectations, experience and training. It would be interesting if a spike in sales also came with a spike in training, range usage or gun safe sales. > I'm guessing you don't own any firearms and haven't had much exposure to them. You'd be guessing very wrongly.

albroland 5y ago
>It would be interesting if a spike in sales also came with a spike in training, range usage or gun safe sales. Anecdotally, I'd say yes. The three ranges in closest proximity to me have hour long waits for lanes on weekends. Everywhere, dealers are consistently sold out of "beginner" type firearms: ruger mark iv's, 10/22s, sr22s, etc. It is a similar story with magazines for these types of firearms, and I doubt demand for these is being driven by existing gun owners (who likely already have them). I also happened to order a new safe recently, and every dealer in my metro area had zero inventory on hand. The best you can get is an order allocation, or buying one of the safes they already have on order with an expected delivery of 1-3mo. Part of this is certainly supply chain disruption, but I heard the same story over and over again that demand was through the roof.

throw0101a 5y ago

> Violence is never safe and the only people "turning to violence" after acquiring one are criminals or those soon to be one. I wouldn't say it was always "turning to violence", but there are a lot of people out there that probably 'should' not have a firearm given things like poor impulse control, lack of knowledge/acknowledgement of dangerous they inherently are, or just carelessness: * https://twitter.com/well_regulated_ https://twitter.com/well_regulated_ Once someone owns a gun, or a household has a gun with-in it, there are all sorts of disasters that can now occur that were not possible without one being present.

woudsma 5y ago
> Once someone owns a gun, or a household has a gun with-in it, there are all sorts of disasters that can now occur that were not possible without one being present. Amen. The 'upsides' of owning a gun don't outweigh the horrible potential consequences for myself and others around me. I'm really glad that guns are not as prominent in my country compared to the US.
- throw0101a 5y ago
  > The 'upsides' of owning a gun don't outweigh the horrible potential consequences for myself and others around me. Of course other people make different value judgements as to the risks. If I was in the US I'd be less concerned about general firearm ownership, and people basically being about to have whatever they want in their own homes, versus all the concealed carry and stand-your-ground laws, both of which impact public safety more. And it seems toward the negative (AFAICT). > I'm really glad that guns are not as prominent in my country compared to the US. As someone in Canada, the day-to-day firearms stuff isn't as prevalent, but we're tied for 7th in per capita ownership: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g... However, from a firearms death rate (homicide+suicide), we're lower than what many people would expect: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-r... With a lower rate that Austria, Switzerland, Finland, and France. IMHO this is because (a) we have mandatory licensing/training, which works as a filter to reduce the cowboy types, (b) relatively lower rates of poverty which helps with reduce crime (most shooting seem to be gang-related), and (c) decent social programs which helps the less fortunate. Many calamities are also probably reduced through safe storage laws. I don't think there's a need to even "ban" firearms or specific firearm types if these are implemented. There's no one silver bullet that will solve gun-related problems, but there are a few policies that have been shown to work fairly well. It's 'just' a matter society choosing to implement them.
  - rich_sasha 5y ago
    I guess additionally “gun ownership” is a crude metric. Is it fair to assume that more firearms in Canada are hunting weapons? These are less suited to violence than hand guns, SMGs etc. UKs gun ownership per capita is something like 30% of US’, but these are predominantly shotguns, and a few single-shot rifles. Legal ownership of pistols of any kind is essentially impossible (yes even sport 0.22 ones).

pjc50 5y ago

This certainly is how it works for the UK knife violence problem; people start carrying knives to defend themselves from other people with knives, but it results in fights escalating. (Note that this is still considerably less lethal than any major US city!)

adolph 5y ago
So more knives results in escalation as opposed to one-way knifing or victimization in other ways?
- makomk 5y ago
  Yes. As I understand it, knives are just inherently unsuitable for use as a defensive weapon - they don't stop someone from stabbing you, they're not even usable as a threat to get the other person to de-escalate because if you're close enough to use it I'm pretty sure the other person can draw and stab you before you have a chance to react. The only use of a knife is to stab the other person first, before they have a chance to, before you know if they even would or if they're even armed, and they're deadly enough that untrained teenagers can easily kill with them without intending to. This only ever results in things escalating for obvious reasons. Note that the UK has police armed with guns, but not police armed with knives.
  - handrous 5y ago
    It's also the case that it's a hell of a lot easier to find something around you that's a better weapon than a knife, than it is with a gun (basically impossible, unless the thing you find is also a gun), which enhances its tendency to be a "first strike, or else don't even show it" weapon, rather than one useful for deterrence without violence. > Note that the UK has police armed with guns, but not police armed with knives. Yup. The set of qualities that make knives desirable weapons for criminals don't make them good weapons generally. The cops have very different restrictions (fewer restrictions, that is) and goals. A truncheon plus some strong mace are probably much, much better for their purposes than a knife would be.
5y ago