7 ms·

I think I read somewhere recently that the majority of Americans were in favour of stricter gun reforms, yet no real change I laws seem to happen and all the cu

I think I read somewhere recently that the majority of Americans were in favour of stricter gun reforms, yet no real change I laws seem to happen and all the current presidential candidates over in the US seems to not even dare touch the subject. I find it reprehensible and puzzling how they’ve got this weird relationship with guns, but it’s interesting how often people are using a certain interpretation of their constitution as to why they need all those guns, or thinking that it’s the safest option that everyone has guns to protect themselves against the “bad guys” than just making it really difficult for the average citizen to get a firearm.

partitioned 3y ago
It’s because we don’t have a choice. A stacked Supreme Court that says any gun law has to be a gun law that would’ve been cool in 1776 has made any progress impossible without violent revolution
- oaththrowaway 3y ago
  If that were true, the NFA would be repealed (the legal ground for it was pretty shaky originally and somehow it has stood)
  - alistairSH 3y ago
    Laws don’t magically get repealed. Somebody has to challenge it in court and show that it damages them/infringes in their rights. The NFS might fail if challenged (I don’t think it’s been challenged since Bruen), given the Bruen decision. But it’s not in the GOP’s interest to find a challenge, as that would almost certainly definitely turn off swing voters.
  - partitioned 3y ago
    It is true, read the opinion. Clarence Thomas wrote it, which might help it make sense.
netsharc 3y ago
Seems like, just with many issues in the US, it's become another "The other side is against it, so we're for it!" problem... "Our kids are getting shot up in school, but the Democrats want to ban guns, so we're pro guns, there must be other solutions! Maybe Ivermectin also creates bullet-proof kids!". The opposition also becomes saboteurs because any wins they give the ruling party means the ruling party gets to look better, and hell no, we can't have that, we have to destroy them! Funnily enough when lockdowns started, the billions of bailout got bipartisan support. It seems like both sides knew a hungry populace would go for their heads, whatever the label after their name is. EDIT: then again, Dems are a more conscionable bunch (which makes fighting against a win-by-whatever-means-possible bunch hard), they knew people needed the money. The hypocrisy was GOP saying money doesn't grow on trees, until it does...
- CoastalCoder 3y ago
  > Seems like, just with many issues in the US, it's become another "The other side is against it, so we're for it!" problem... I'm confused by your comment. Your main thesis is worded as though it applies to all U.S. political groups, but the rest of your post seems specifically anti-Republican.
  - netsharc 3y ago
    At the moment I can't think of Democrats sabotaging things that would be good for the American public to benefit themselves politically; care to find examples for me? Then we can put the examples of Republicans doing that on one side of the scale, and the examples of Democrats doing that on the other side, and call them equally bad... ;-)
    - CoastalCoder 3y ago
      I could give some examples, but I think this would just devolve into an unproductive partisan fight. (Which would be ironic, but I don't support either party.)
    - humanrebar 3y ago
ct0 3y ago
There are 2 schools of thought on the constitution. Living constitutionalists believe that the constitutional adapts or changes and can be fluid based on "modern" beliefs and the interpretation changes to allow for that. Originalists believe the text is strict and not up for debate and that the contract of the constitution is fixed. Most of what we are seeing is based on these 2 ideas in conflict.
- masfuerte 3y ago
  That whole debate feels like a distraction. If the majority wants gun control don't debate the meaning of the text, amend it.
  - CoastalCoder 3y ago
    The 2nd amendment falls within the Bill of Rights. Maybe the "living document" view is the only obvious play, given past SCOTUS rulings? N.B.: I've never studied law, so I may have no idea what I'm talking about.
    - bentley 3y ago
      The Bill of Rights is just as amendable as the rest of the Constitution. Witness the various efforts to “repeal Citizens United,” which often (always?) require amending the First Amendment.
  - galangalalgol 3y ago
    You need a supermajority to amend it, and even if the 64% number in another post is accurate, you need a supermajority of elected representation, which don't map directly to population. Specifically, states that are less populous have the same number of senators, and typically are against more gun control. Lastly, even if you had a supermajority of representation favoring more gun control, you have to get them to agree on the same type of more gun control, so realistically you won't see an amendment until something well north of 80% favor more gun control.
  - matheusmoreira 3y ago
oaththrowaway 3y ago
Most people that are in favor of stricter gun laws don't understand the current laws that already exist and just hear buzzwords like "gun show loophole"
- maxerickson 3y ago
  Not really fair to throw that out there without articulating what you think it means to understand the current laws.
  - oaththrowaway 3y ago
    If you ask most people if they support "background checks" you're going to find that almost all people support that, things change a bit when you explain the difference between the existing background checks and the proposed "universal background checks". Most people don't understand the difference. And to be quite frank, the organizations running the polls might not understand either, or it's in their best interest to not explain
    - maxerickson 3y ago
      Polled pretty high when asked as "Do you think ___ is a good idea" and ___ was "Background checks for gun purchases at gun shows or other private sales." https://www.npr.org/2019/07/22/743516166/npr-newshour-marist-poll-americans-not-sold-on-trump-or-democrats https://www.npr.org/2019/07/22/743516166/npr-newshour-marist... I thought you were maybe speaking more expansively though. Like what about people that think almost no one should privately own a pistol or whatever.
- defrost 3y ago
  I'm in rural Australia and have several firearms, they're tools for feral animal control, my neighbour shoots ULR targets at 5,000 yards (not a typo), and 12 year olds can join a gun club. (ie. recheck any odd notions you might have about gun bans in Australia) Stricter gun laws, more complicated laws aren't the answer - simple clear uniform gun laws, equally reinforced will do the job. Unfortuneately the very nature of the (un)United States seems predestined to never enact uniform laws wrt firearms let alone maintain an up to date central register of information etc.
brobinson 3y ago
You just need 38 states to agree to amend the Constitution and repeal the 2nd amendment.
- PopAlongKid 3y ago
  The problem is that a state with 1/60th the population of another state still gets the same say in the matter.
  - brobinson 3y ago
    That is by design, though. Just because state A has a big population doesn't mean it gets to strongarm state B.
    - humanrebar 3y ago
      Well, more like states themselves would matter relatively less. Politics would focus on Chicago and Atlanta more, Illinois and Georgia less.
    - PopAlongKid 3y ago
      >That is by design So low population state "strong-arming" the majority is OK? The design is poor, it is Tyranny by the minority.
      - brobinson 3y ago
        Strawman. I never claimed or suggested what are you asserting. The design appears to be working well looking over the 240 years since the US' Constitution was ratified. A broad consensus of the states, _not of the people in the US as a whole_, is required to effect large scale, national changes.
      - chipsa 3y ago
        The intent is to avoid tyranny by the majority. And you don't even need a majority, depending on how things would have been written. If each state gets a vote proportional to it's population, you could have something pass with substantially less than a majority of the national population, just by convincing a majority of the population of the states that becomes a majority to vote a given way (just shy of 25% (50% of state votes controlled by 50% of the votes in the states)). The intent is to make it changeable, but not too changeable. The constitution is the supreme law of the land, and it's not beneficial if it can be changed at a whim.
chrisco255 3y ago
I don't think it's true that a majority of Americans want stricter laws. We generally want more authority to carry without restriction, as seen in the rise of states that allow for concealed carry without a license. The laws are nonsensical, since there's many times more firearms in the country than people. Nevermind that we share a porous border with a country known for powerful drug cartels. At any rate, I'm a 10th generation American, and the sense of responsibility for protecting life and liberty with firearms is deeply embedded in my culture. It's not weird, we're the oldest democracy for a reason, the people are armed and stubborn.
- notacoward 3y ago
  At this point, what state governors and legislatures do has little to do with what the people of that state - let alone of the country generally - want. Let's look at real data. https://news.gallup.com/poll/1645/guns.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1645/guns.aspx 57% think gun laws should be more strict. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/26/politics/cnn-poll-gun-laws/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/26/politics/cnn-poll-gun-laws/in... This time it's 64%. Yes, it is true that Americans want stricter gun laws. Your made-up reasons why Americans oppose gun control are Not Even Wrong when in fact there is no such opposition.
  - oaththrowaway 3y ago
    People typically don't understand the laws as they exist currently
  - chipsa 3y ago
    Majority of the population doesn't understand the gun laws that exist now. Democrat politicians advocate for laws that currently exist.
- PopAlongKid 3y ago
  >I don't think it's true that a majority of Americans want stricter laws. The majority of Americans want fewer mass shootings of random individuals out in public.
starttoaster 3y ago
First, apologies for the wall of text. I started off thinking I was just going to write a few sentences and here we are. This topic is a bit more complicated than an outside observer would be able to pick up on without perhaps doing a bit more research. One common misconception people from other countries seem to have is that all the change is being made at the federal level. In fact, quite a lot of legislation is produced from smaller jurisdictions, and gun legislature changes frequently, and becomes more strict over time especially in heavily populated areas like Chicago, Seattle, New York City, their respective counties, etc. Keep in mind, the US is larger geographically than all of Europe, so there's a lot of diversity in issues and ideals across the states. Gun reforms at the federal level are complicated. There is a large portion of the US (at least geographically) that is vehemently against a gun reform, or additional legislature on the subject. And not that this conversation has been about the subject of a nationwide gun ban, but often enough that's where these conversations lead so I'll just take it there -- there's a real concern that a national ban of guns would increase the frequency of gun related violent crimes. Guns are such a large part of the culture here, and so many people have them, and would likely not return them in a ban scenario but rather hide them, that the people committing violent crimes would be more unopposed than ever. We would hope that the people committing such crimes wouldn't suddenly become more ambitious. Couple that concern with the general lack of confidence in our police force. Generally in an active shooter situation, the police are arriving on scene 5+ minutes after casualties have already started piling up. Or in the case of someone threatening your life, the police can't really do anything about it -- often your best bet is just to file a restraining order... which of course doesn't stop a person from assaulting you. A common thread amongst gun advocates seems to also be that restricting the ability for law abiding citizens to acquire guns is not an effective counter to gun related crimes. If there's one thing that the Mexican drug cartel has made clear, it's that if there's a market for the trafficking of illegal objects, they can be smuggled en masse into the country and be sold to people that are clearly willing to break the law. I think this argument holds some merit, and I say "some" because of course there are gun crimes committed with legally acquired guns. My disclaimer of bias is that I am a legal gun owner, but I am for gun control legislation. I am agreeable to things such as required universal background checks on gun purchases. Background checks are already required by the federal government for store gun sales, but background check requirements from private sales (person to person) vary from state to state. I am not against a national gun registry. I am not against the restriction of types of firearms that are used disproportionately to commit violent crimes as long as there is a probation period where the new restrictions are measured for efficacy. What I am personally against is what I see more commonly instituted, which is legislation that is purely reactionary and pushed by people with a lack of knowledge on the subject. I talk to too many people about gun control that are familiar with the terms "bump stocks" and "binary triggers" and wanted them banned, but they couldn't even tell me what these things were when asked. I talk to too many people that think I could just go to a gun store and buy a full auto machine gun, which is also false and would be federally illegal. This is just to say, gun control is a topic of much ignorance (from both sides of the fence.) I think it is equally ignorant to be universally against gun control measures, but unfortunately I think their ignorance is at least somewhat valuable in fighting off the ignorance from the other side. I wish that our elected officials were more likely to talk to experts on a topic before proposing what they might propose, but the unfortunate truth is that they don't, and often need reining in.
icegreentea2 3y ago
Well, it's cause a rounding error of Democrats aren't going to vote for an otherwise ok candidate if they don't support tougher gun control laws, while a non-rounding error of Republicans supports would probably not support a Republican candidate if they did support more gun control. Put another way, I think it's fair to say that the majority of people who care about enacting stricter gun control, also do not put it in say... the top 5 issues, especially at a national level (loosening gun control laws might be otherwise). The converse position is true on the other side. I don't think there are many gun fans who would say... "repeal the NFA" as a top 5 'must have' position. But "national semi-auto ban"... well, that's like a top 5 position right there. Put another way - would you have preferred Obama to enact ACA, or stricter gun control laws?
- oaththrowaway 3y ago
  Trump probably hates guns as much as Bloomberg but lots of republicans still love him

partitioned 3y ago

It’s because we don’t have a choice. A stacked Supreme Court that says any gun law has to be a gun law that would’ve been cool in 1776 has made any progress impossible without violent revolution

oaththrowaway 3y ago
If that were true, the NFA would be repealed (the legal ground for it was pretty shaky originally and somehow it has stood)
- alistairSH 3y ago
  Laws don’t magically get repealed. Somebody has to challenge it in court and show that it damages them/infringes in their rights. The NFS might fail if challenged (I don’t think it’s been challenged since Bruen), given the Bruen decision. But it’s not in the GOP’s interest to find a challenge, as that would almost certainly definitely turn off swing voters.
- partitioned 3y ago
  It is true, read the opinion. Clarence Thomas wrote it, which might help it make sense.

netsharc 3y ago

Seems like, just with many issues in the US, it's become another "The other side is against it, so we're for it!" problem... "Our kids are getting shot up in school, but the Democrats want to ban guns, so we're pro guns, there must be other solutions! Maybe Ivermectin also creates bullet-proof kids!". The opposition also becomes saboteurs because any wins they give the ruling party means the ruling party gets to look better, and hell no, we can't have that, we have to destroy them! Funnily enough when lockdowns started, the billions of bailout got bipartisan support. It seems like both sides knew a hungry populace would go for their heads, whatever the label after their name is. EDIT: then again, Dems are a more conscionable bunch (which makes fighting against a win-by-whatever-means-possible bunch hard), they knew people needed the money. The hypocrisy was GOP saying money doesn't grow on trees, until it does...

CoastalCoder 3y ago
> Seems like, just with many issues in the US, it's become another "The other side is against it, so we're for it!" problem... I'm confused by your comment. Your main thesis is worded as though it applies to all U.S. political groups, but the rest of your post seems specifically anti-Republican.
- netsharc 3y ago
  At the moment I can't think of Democrats sabotaging things that would be good for the American public to benefit themselves politically; care to find examples for me? Then we can put the examples of Republicans doing that on one side of the scale, and the examples of Democrats doing that on the other side, and call them equally bad... ;-)
  - CoastalCoder 3y ago
    I could give some examples, but I think this would just devolve into an unproductive partisan fight. (Which would be ironic, but I don't support either party.)
  - humanrebar 3y ago

ct0 3y ago

There are 2 schools of thought on the constitution. Living constitutionalists believe that the constitutional adapts or changes and can be fluid based on "modern" beliefs and the interpretation changes to allow for that. Originalists believe the text is strict and not up for debate and that the contract of the constitution is fixed. Most of what we are seeing is based on these 2 ideas in conflict.

masfuerte 3y ago
That whole debate feels like a distraction. If the majority wants gun control don't debate the meaning of the text, amend it.
- CoastalCoder 3y ago
  The 2nd amendment falls within the Bill of Rights. Maybe the "living document" view is the only obvious play, given past SCOTUS rulings? N.B.: I've never studied law, so I may have no idea what I'm talking about.
  - bentley 3y ago
    The Bill of Rights is just as amendable as the rest of the Constitution. Witness the various efforts to “repeal Citizens United,” which often (always?) require amending the First Amendment.
- galangalalgol 3y ago
  You need a supermajority to amend it, and even if the 64% number in another post is accurate, you need a supermajority of elected representation, which don't map directly to population. Specifically, states that are less populous have the same number of senators, and typically are against more gun control. Lastly, even if you had a supermajority of representation favoring more gun control, you have to get them to agree on the same type of more gun control, so realistically you won't see an amendment until something well north of 80% favor more gun control.
- matheusmoreira 3y ago

oaththrowaway 3y ago

Most people that are in favor of stricter gun laws don't understand the current laws that already exist and just hear buzzwords like "gun show loophole"

maxerickson 3y ago
Not really fair to throw that out there without articulating what you think it means to understand the current laws.
- oaththrowaway 3y ago
  If you ask most people if they support "background checks" you're going to find that almost all people support that, things change a bit when you explain the difference between the existing background checks and the proposed "universal background checks". Most people don't understand the difference. And to be quite frank, the organizations running the polls might not understand either, or it's in their best interest to not explain
  - maxerickson 3y ago
    Polled pretty high when asked as "Do you think ___ is a good idea" and ___ was "Background checks for gun purchases at gun shows or other private sales." https://www.npr.org/2019/07/22/743516166/npr-newshour-marist-poll-americans-not-sold-on-trump-or-democrats https://www.npr.org/2019/07/22/743516166/npr-newshour-marist... I thought you were maybe speaking more expansively though. Like what about people that think almost no one should privately own a pistol or whatever.
defrost 3y ago
I'm in rural Australia and have several firearms, they're tools for feral animal control, my neighbour shoots ULR targets at 5,000 yards (not a typo), and 12 year olds can join a gun club. (ie. recheck any odd notions you might have about gun bans in Australia) Stricter gun laws, more complicated laws aren't the answer - simple clear uniform gun laws, equally reinforced will do the job. Unfortuneately the very nature of the (un)United States seems predestined to never enact uniform laws wrt firearms let alone maintain an up to date central register of information etc.

brobinson 3y ago

You just need 38 states to agree to amend the Constitution and repeal the 2nd amendment.

PopAlongKid 3y ago
The problem is that a state with 1/60th the population of another state still gets the same say in the matter.
- brobinson 3y ago
  That is by design, though. Just because state A has a big population doesn't mean it gets to strongarm state B.
  - humanrebar 3y ago
    Well, more like states themselves would matter relatively less. Politics would focus on Chicago and Atlanta more, Illinois and Georgia less.
  - PopAlongKid 3y ago
    >That is by design So low population state "strong-arming" the majority is OK? The design is poor, it is Tyranny by the minority.
    - brobinson 3y ago
      Strawman. I never claimed or suggested what are you asserting. The design appears to be working well looking over the 240 years since the US' Constitution was ratified. A broad consensus of the states, _not of the people in the US as a whole_, is required to effect large scale, national changes.
    - chipsa 3y ago
      The intent is to avoid tyranny by the majority. And you don't even need a majority, depending on how things would have been written. If each state gets a vote proportional to it's population, you could have something pass with substantially less than a majority of the national population, just by convincing a majority of the population of the states that becomes a majority to vote a given way (just shy of 25% (50% of state votes controlled by 50% of the votes in the states)). The intent is to make it changeable, but not too changeable. The constitution is the supreme law of the land, and it's not beneficial if it can be changed at a whim.

chrisco255 3y ago

I don't think it's true that a majority of Americans want stricter laws. We generally want more authority to carry without restriction, as seen in the rise of states that allow for concealed carry without a license. The laws are nonsensical, since there's many times more firearms in the country than people. Nevermind that we share a porous border with a country known for powerful drug cartels. At any rate, I'm a 10th generation American, and the sense of responsibility for protecting life and liberty with firearms is deeply embedded in my culture. It's not weird, we're the oldest democracy for a reason, the people are armed and stubborn.

notacoward 3y ago
At this point, what state governors and legislatures do has little to do with what the people of that state - let alone of the country generally - want. Let's look at real data. https://news.gallup.com/poll/1645/guns.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/1645/guns.aspx 57% think gun laws should be more strict. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/26/politics/cnn-poll-gun-laws/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/26/politics/cnn-poll-gun-laws/in... This time it's 64%. Yes, it is true that Americans want stricter gun laws. Your made-up reasons why Americans oppose gun control are Not Even Wrong when in fact there is no such opposition.
- oaththrowaway 3y ago
  People typically don't understand the laws as they exist currently
- chipsa 3y ago
  Majority of the population doesn't understand the gun laws that exist now. Democrat politicians advocate for laws that currently exist.
PopAlongKid 3y ago
>I don't think it's true that a majority of Americans want stricter laws. The majority of Americans want fewer mass shootings of random individuals out in public.

starttoaster 3y ago

First, apologies for the wall of text. I started off thinking I was just going to write a few sentences and here we are. This topic is a bit more complicated than an outside observer would be able to pick up on without perhaps doing a bit more research. One common misconception people from other countries seem to have is that all the change is being made at the federal level. In fact, quite a lot of legislation is produced from smaller jurisdictions, and gun legislature changes frequently, and becomes more strict over time especially in heavily populated areas like Chicago, Seattle, New York City, their respective counties, etc. Keep in mind, the US is larger geographically than all of Europe, so there's a lot of diversity in issues and ideals across the states. Gun reforms at the federal level are complicated. There is a large portion of the US (at least geographically) that is vehemently against a gun reform, or additional legislature on the subject. And not that this conversation has been about the subject of a nationwide gun ban, but often enough that's where these conversations lead so I'll just take it there -- there's a real concern that a national ban of guns would increase the frequency of gun related violent crimes. Guns are such a large part of the culture here, and so many people have them, and would likely not return them in a ban scenario but rather hide them, that the people committing violent crimes would be more unopposed than ever. We would hope that the people committing such crimes wouldn't suddenly become more ambitious. Couple that concern with the general lack of confidence in our police force. Generally in an active shooter situation, the police are arriving on scene 5+ minutes after casualties have already started piling up. Or in the case of someone threatening your life, the police can't really do anything about it -- often your best bet is just to file a restraining order... which of course doesn't stop a person from assaulting you. A common thread amongst gun advocates seems to also be that restricting the ability for law abiding citizens to acquire guns is not an effective counter to gun related crimes. If there's one thing that the Mexican drug cartel has made clear, it's that if there's a market for the trafficking of illegal objects, they can be smuggled en masse into the country and be sold to people that are clearly willing to break the law. I think this argument holds some merit, and I say "some" because of course there are gun crimes committed with legally acquired guns. My disclaimer of bias is that I am a legal gun owner, but I am for gun control legislation. I am agreeable to things such as required universal background checks on gun purchases. Background checks are already required by the federal government for store gun sales, but background check requirements from private sales (person to person) vary from state to state. I am not against a national gun registry. I am not against the restriction of types of firearms that are used disproportionately to commit violent crimes as long as there is a probation period where the new restrictions are measured for efficacy. What I am personally against is what I see more commonly instituted, which is legislation that is purely reactionary and pushed by people with a lack of knowledge on the subject. I talk to too many people about gun control that are familiar with the terms "bump stocks" and "binary triggers" and wanted them banned, but they couldn't even tell me what these things were when asked. I talk to too many people that think I could just go to a gun store and buy a full auto machine gun, which is also false and would be federally illegal. This is just to say, gun control is a topic of much ignorance (from both sides of the fence.) I think it is equally ignorant to be universally against gun control measures, but unfortunately I think their ignorance is at least somewhat valuable in fighting off the ignorance from the other side. I wish that our elected officials were more likely to talk to experts on a topic before proposing what they might propose, but the unfortunate truth is that they don't, and often need reining in.

icegreentea2 3y ago

Well, it's cause a rounding error of Democrats aren't going to vote for an otherwise ok candidate if they don't support tougher gun control laws, while a non-rounding error of Republicans supports would probably not support a Republican candidate if they did support more gun control. Put another way, I think it's fair to say that the majority of people who care about enacting stricter gun control, also do not put it in say... the top 5 issues, especially at a national level (loosening gun control laws might be otherwise). The converse position is true on the other side. I don't think there are many gun fans who would say... "repeal the NFA" as a top 5 'must have' position. But "national semi-auto ban"... well, that's like a top 5 position right there. Put another way - would you have preferred Obama to enact ACA, or stricter gun control laws?

oaththrowaway 3y ago
Trump probably hates guns as much as Bloomberg but lots of republicans still love him