The Gun Control Debate Thread

[tshile]

7 minutes ago, Destino said:

Depends on how limited you're talking.  There's a lot of talk about how quickly skilled shooters can reload, but that assumes these shooters are skilled and that their skills translate well when under extreme stress.  What you do in practice and what you do when people are actively trying to stop you are different things. 

 

During reload people have a window of time to escape or attack the shooter, and people can cover a lot of ground in just a few seconds.  Especially when you're talking about indoor distances.  Most indoor rooms can be sprinted across (or out of) in very little time.  Seconds matter. 

 

Reduce capacity dramatically, down to around six, and mass shooters wouldn't be as effective and would be far more vulnerable. 

 

 

I think you’re drastically overrating the delta in reloading between a skilled person and an unskilled person (assuming the unskilled person at least understands how to reload the weapon)

 

in terms of malfunction I absolutely absolute agree with that youre saying. And maybe that’s the context of it all. 

 

I think youd have a better point if you spoke to the burden of carrying, say, 10x10 round magazines vs 1x100 round. Or even cost. But even those arguments would come across as weak to me in regards to mass shootings. 

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, TheGreatBuzz said:

 

You're wrong.  I don't mean this as a anti-gun control point, just pointing out a fact.  I don't think we have had any mass shooting that created this much carnage.  

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Nice_truck_attack

 

It wasn't a comparable situation.  Like 9/11, that was a long term planned attack by somebody that had support.  That isn't the comparison.

 

(Like 9/11 and planes.  Other people have flown planes into building, but none have killed nearly as many as on 9/11.  The Nice attack is an exception of what can be done with car (in that case a truck) when the person actually plans carefully and has support.  Luckily, we haven't seen an example of that in the US with guns.)

13 minutes ago, purbeast said:

I read wiki earlier on the Sandy Hook shooting, and the kid who did that got the guns from his mother who purchased all of them legally, then killed his mother.

 

My point is, what you are suggesting would have no affect on this scenario.

 

Now had the mother not had these weapons, it would.

 

The enemy of good is perfect.

 

The Sandy Hook case is one of the hardest cases to do something about, but just because we can't solve every shooting doesn't mean we should do nothing.

Edited August 7, 2019 by PeterMP

[purbeast]

2 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

It wasn't a comparable situation.  Like 9/11, that was a long term planned attack by somebody that had support.  That isn't the comparison.

 

(Like 9/11 and planes).

 

The enemy of good is perfect.

 

The Sandy Hook case is one of the hardest cases to do something about, but just because we can't solve every shooting doesn't mean we should do nothing.

I never said we should do nothing.

 

I think we should do more than what you were suggesting.

[PeterMP]

6 minutes ago, purbeast said:

I never said we should do nothing.

 

I think we should do more than what you were suggesting.

 

You aren't going to get more pass or approved by the courts currently.

 

@twa might even be right in that I'm not sure you can get that passed or approved by the courts.

 

But I think there's at least a chance of it.

 

(There are 2 bad things the Democrats could do right now:

 

1.  Not do anything because they can't get anything that is "good enough" done.  Which is what you are suggesting.

 

2.  Do something that won't do any good so in 5 years the GOP can talk about how dumb the Democrats are on gun laws and they pass laws that don't do any good, but restrict the rights of honest and good citizens.

 

The Democrats need to focus and push on a small set of things that will actually do some good and get passed.

 

Focusing on the Sandy Hook case (right now in the present) in either way is a waste.)

Edited August 7, 2019 by PeterMP

[tshile]

@PeterMP

i appreciate the academic rigor you bring to discussions. I really do. 

 

We have an an epidemic of mass murder in this country. I’m reluctant to believe removing guns will resolve it. I’m not saying it won’t go down, but the context of the discussion I was thinking in was:

if a person wants to commit mass murder and is going to, and can’t get a gun, will the weapon he used be more or less effective. 

 

I think it would be both and i dont know what percentage would be less and which more. But thinking of it as an isolated event I absolutely see a path for a person to use a more effective weapon because they couldn’t get a gun. And we have plenty of history that shows it can be done. So you can’t suggest it couldn’t be done. 

 

Likelihood? I don’t know. Maybe they do nothing if they can’t get a gun. I don’t know what the numbers would look like. 

 

If we didnt have the past 20 years of mass shootings I would be less reluctant to accept the argument. It seems reasonable to me to think that if we didn’t have a history of mass shootings we wouldn’t go straight to bombs going off everywhere as a way for the same people to do the same things. 

 

But we do have that history. And others don’t. So I have some reluctance to the idea that removing guns won’t result in people just blowing up buildings just because it’s not happening in other countries were guns aren’t available. 

 

Im not saying you’re wrong. I just have reservations about the overall confidence and matter-of-factness with which you’ve described it all in the last few posts. 

[purbeast]

2 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

1.  Not do anything because they can't get anything that is "good enough" done.  Which is what you are suggesting.

What?  I did not suggest anything.

[PeterMP]

1 minute ago, purbeast said:

What?  I did not suggest anything.

 

Your post suggest (implies) that you wanted more done then what I said because it wouldn't have prevented Sandy Hook.  But you aren't (likely) to get more done so the end result is nothing.

[Destino]

12 minutes ago, twa said:

Which is why the tactics would change.

 

Plenty of ways to eliminate escape routes

 

If you think you can pass a six limit feel free, I still don't think it will make much difference

These shooters haven't shown themselves to be the most effective planners or creative thinkers (which is good).  While there are ways to take the same basic elements of a shooting and make them far more deadly, as Stephen Paddock did, most of these killers just want to walk into a room and start pulling the trigger. 

 

Nothing short of making guns incredibly hard to acquire will make mass shootings truly difficult to attempt, so the best we can do is reduce how many people they actually manage to kill.  Limiting how many bullets they can easily fire from their favorite firearm without reloading is way, of many, to do this. 

[tshile]

10 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

There are 2 bad things the Democrats could do right now:

 

1.  Not do anything because they can't get anything that is "good enough" done.  Which is what you are suggesting.

 

2.  Do something that won't do any good so in 5 years the GOP can talk about how dumb the Democrats are on gun laws and they pass laws that don't do any good, but restrict the rights of honest and good citizens.

 

The Democrats need to focus and push on a small set of things that will actually do some good and get passed.

 

Focusing on the Sandy Hook case (right now in the present) in either way is a waste.)

 

I agree. All of this needs to be the undertone to the conversations they have about crafting a bill. All of it. Especially #2, but they’re all important. 

 

If if I was in charge of planning public outreach to get support my first focus would be on convincing people that there is no one thing that can be done to fix this, and that we need to start implementing incremental things. 

 

And that it will be an ongoing process where we need to repeal or tweak items, and constantly consider adding new ones. 

I would add that I think the pro control people would be well served to make a part of their stance that they’re determined to remove restrictions that are proven to not work. 

 

That the true goal is a reduction is general gun crime, and mass murders. That if something doesn’t work we’ll get rid of it because we’re not interesting in simply infringing on the 2nd. 

 

I realize plenty of people won’t agree to that, that ultimately they’re for restricting gun ownership as much as they’re allowed to. But I think some would definitely be on board with that idea, and that you could argue it successfully. 

 

You would need to garner good faith from gun community that it’s not just lip service. I don’t know how you do that. Maybe it’s not possible and the entire idea is moot. 

[Berggy9598]

2 hours ago, twa said:

 

What law that you could get passed would prevent Lanza?

 

Studies and Peter say a lot of things, some of them even true.

 

Peter and I agree pretty much on gun control from the discussions I recall.

 

Did his mother need a safe full of weapons in one of the safest towns in the country? My point on Lanza and Hui was I don’t think they would have had the initiative to find an alternative to the killing method they used. Both I believe dealt with episodes of states of psychosis, but it’s been a while since I read up on them so I could be wrong. 

[twa]

9 minutes ago, Destino said:

 most of these killers just want to walk into a room and start pulling the trigger. 

 

 

 

I think that rather oversimplified as far as mass shooters, most plan and select targets.

 

 

[tshile]

12 minutes ago, Destino said:

Nothing short of making guns incredibly hard to acquire will make mass shootings truly difficult to attempt, so the best we can do is reduce how many people they actually manage to kill. 

 

And removing them from society. 

 

The topic often left out of gun control discussions. There’s a lot of guns out there. A lot. New restrictions are needed. But the number of guns already out there is staggering and there needs to be a conversation about that. 

 

And that conversation is and will always be difficult. Buy back program is often suggested. I don’t know how effective that’ll be. 

[twa]

1 minute ago, Berggy9598 said:

Did his mother need a safe full of weapons in one of the safest towns in the country? My point on Lanza and Hui was I don’t think they would have had the initiative to find an alternative to the killing method they used. Both I believe dealt with episodes of states of psychosis, but it’s been a while since I read up on them so I could be wrong. 

 

People don't need a lot of things, convincing them of that is rather difficult though.

 

Convincing the mentally ill not to kill people might be even harder.

[PeterMP]

19 minutes ago, Destino said:

These shooters haven't shown themselves to be the most effective planners or creative thinkers (which is good).  While there are ways to take the same basic elements of a shooting and make them far more deadly, as Stephen Paddock did, most of these killers just want to walk into a room and start pulling the trigger. 

 

Nothing short of making guns incredibly hard to acquire will make mass shootings truly difficult to attempt, so the best we can do is reduce how many people they actually manage to kill.  Limiting how many bullets they can easily fire from their favorite firearm without reloading is way, of many, to do this. 

 

First, I think @twa is right tactics will change.  And while none of these people individually are especially creative or effective planners, you do see different wrinkles in things that affect out comes.  And they do study what other people do and will adopt what seems to have worked well in the past.

 

You see that with the Stoneman Douglas shooting.   You see an adoption of tactics there.  He knows what Lanza did won't be very effective because schools have adapted to what Lanza did so he goes at the end of the school day, and he pulls the fire alarm.

 

Those two things eliminate the lock down drill and other things schools have done to prevent school shooting.  He doesn't have to worry about being buzzed in because the doors are open.  The teachers aren't going to lock kids in classrooms because of the fire alarm.

 

Nobody's trying to replicate Lanza did because most of these people understand that if they do, they aren't going to be effective because society changed.

 

The other thing is I think you can do things to make them harder to attempt (see my post on what to actually do).

Edited August 7, 2019 by PeterMP

[Destino]

17 minutes ago, tshile said:

I think you’re drastically overrating the delta in reloading between a skilled person and an unskilled person (assuming the unskilled person at least understands how to reload the weapon)

I'm not interested in the difference between skilled and unskilled in a quiet room.  I'm talking about doing it under extreme stress.  Lets use an example more people are likely to be familiar with than guns:  Hitting a layup is a lot easier on the practice court than in a game.  Both pros and amateurs can hit layups all day in practice.  A hundred in a row?  No problem.  Put defenders on the court, even if all they accomplish is forcing you to rush the shot, and the success rate plummets.  

 

Even the simplest of actions are less likely to be performed successfully when a person is forced to hurry.  Even more so when they are afraid or have so much adrenaline pumping through them that they hands shake.  I believe that a person trying to reload their weapon while their would-be victims sprint at them with murder in their eyes, is more likely to blow the layup, so to speak.   

 

[PeterMP]

30 minutes ago, tshile said:

@PeterMP

i appreciate the academic rigor you bring to discussions. I really do. 

 

If you had started with that post, I probably wouldn't have even commented.  But you started with just saying more.

 

@twa is right.  Tactics will change, and it is possible eventually some body will come up with a set of tactics that are more lethal.

 

I don't think it will happen right away or commonly, but somebody will.

 

And at that time, we'll have to adjust.

 

(There is a reason why we haven't seen another OK style bombing.  And that's because we changed.  There is much more work being done today to track fertilizes and other things that could be used as explosives then there were.)

Edited August 7, 2019 by PeterMP

[Destino]

7 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

First, I think @twa is right tactics will change.  And while none of these people individually are especially creative or effective planners, you do see different wrinkles in things that affect out comes.  And they do study what other people do and will adopt what seems to have worked well in the past.

I have no doubt tactics will change somewhat, humans are problem solvers, but how effective each individual new wrinkle proves to be remains to be seen.  The same basic elements remain in the vast majority of these shootings.  Man with gun, fires a lot of bullets, in fairly close proximity to victims, and no real plan to escape afterwards.  So long as those remain fairly constant, reducing ammo capacity should make shooters less effective and more vulnerable. 

 

Stephen Paddock stands out as someone that adapted the basic elements of a mass shooting to great effect.  He added distance, gave himself a better shooting angle, and chose a crowd that could not easily escape.  His approach isn't the norm however (thankfully). 

[tshile]

10 minutes ago, Destino said:

I'm not interested in the difference between skilled and unskilled in a quiet room.  I'm talking about doing it under extreme stress.

Out of curiosity is there any prevailing theory on whether someone that’s decided to commit mass murder, and is actively doing it, feels this extreme stress?

 

Any other situation I would agree. I don’t know anything about all that stuff to know if it affects them. 

 

Either way I still think you’re grossly exaggerating the issue of reloading. 

 

Malfunction? Agree completely. Simply reloading? Not so much. 

 

Theres a reason that every firearms trainer harps on the importance of carrying multiple magazines   

 

Its because malfunction is a very real possibility and dealing with it may be very time consuming, and that reloading is a pretty quick and simple solution. They certainly don’t seem to think the action of reloading is all that big of a deal. 

 

I tend to defer to them on the issue. 

Edited August 7, 2019 by tshile

[twa]

Paddock added some other elements (as have a few others recently) which I'm not getting into.

 

We need to get better at identifying and intervening.

 

 

[PeterMP]

5 minutes ago, Destino said:

I have no doubt tactics will change somewhat, humans are problem solvers, but how effective each individual new wrinkle proves to be remains to be seen.  The same basic elements remain in the vast majority of these shootings.  Man with gun, fires a lot of bullets, in fairly close proximity to victims, and no real plan to escape afterwards.  So long as those remain fairly constant, reducing ammo capacity should make shooters less effective and more vulnerable. 

 

Okay, but that's because society hasn't adapted to that general model.

 

An the adaption to taking away guns that fire lots of bullets is pretty simple as bringing more pre-loaded guns.

[Destino]

Just now, PeterMP said:

 

Okay, but that's because society hasn't adapted to that general model.

 

An the adaption to taking away guns that fire lots of bullets is pretty simple as bringing more pre-loaded guns.

I agree that this would be a likely change in tactics, but using 5 different guns to fire 30 bullets would make things more difficult.  Certainly more difficult than firing 30 bullets out of their favorite rifle without ever having to reload.   

[Dont Taze Me Bro]

1 hour ago, twa said:

 

I'm fine with limiting magazines and have said so, I don't think it will have much impact and others are opposed to it though.

 

 

I'm fine with it too.  The only impact it would have on me personally would be having to pre-load and bring a bunch of 10 round clips to the range instead of being able to bring less higher capacity magazines.  And if I'm going to shot my .45, zero impact since the clip for mine is only 10 rounds anyhow.  

 

And yes, we have had that argument on here before about how reducing clips to 10 rounds or less most likely wouldn't impact the end result in a mass shooting as the sicko performing the act was going to bring say three 30 round clips would just bring nine 10 round clips.  Sure, there is the possibility that the few seconds it takes to reload and for them to start shooting again could be enough time where multiple lives are saved.  And I'm all for supporting the reduction of magazine capacity if it will save even one life.

 

 

 

 

[twa]

2 minutes ago, Dont Taze Me Bro said:

 

I'm fine with it too. 

 

 

 

 

 

Would you be fine with six?....just curious where peoples limits are .

 

And the problem of supply already in place as well as the ease of acquiring more if you are willing to ignore the laws.

 

Would a plug/blank be allowed like on shotguns , which is easily bypassed.

 

[Dont Taze Me Bro]

1 hour ago, tshile said:

 

Realistically, unless I'm missing an argument from someone that actually knows what they're talking about, we're talking about reload failure and whether that itself stops the shooting spree or whether it allows police (or anyone, really) to stop the person before they can continue shooting.

 

Reload failure is a real thing. Especially for people who use cheap weaponry and ammo, which the AR-15 community is super guilty of; I would guess more than any other, but if you lump all handguns into a  'handgun community' that might not be true... The sub 1500$ AR's (which it seems most people have, particularly the 600-800 range) are mostly garbage. (Not counting people who build their own, you can use quality parts for much cheaper.) 

 

Has it been released how/why the one guy over the weekend was caught? My gut was reload failure/jamming allowed the police to take him into custody and he couldn't do anything to make them shoot him.

 

In the interest of "doing things that may help a little" it's not a terrible idea. It's certainly not a real good idea on it's own, in my opinion. 

 

But I also don't have a need nor care to have 30+ round magazines, so it's easy for me to support something like it. It just doesn't affect me.

 

Not necessarily true, depending on the manufacturer and how well kept the gun is.   I have a Smith & Wesson that is .22LR and have gone through plenty of clips at the range with it never jamming up at all (in one session), not even once.  It's happened maybe 3 times on that one before and I think all of them were in the same session, probably due to me buying cheaper ammo that time. 

 

It's never happened on my 5.56 nato one, but I haven't shot that one nearly as much because the .22LR is cheaper to shoot.  The range we go to, the guys that work there always rave about getting the best ammo, so I do.  

 

 

[Dont Taze Me Bro]

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

Easiest thing to do would make it illegal to buy a gun under the age of 25, go after people and stores involved in illegal purchases, and require people to get a license approved by local law enforcement.

 

That makes much more sense than going after magazine size or assault weapons.  The Va Tech shooter only used a couple of hand guns.

 

Would gun deaths and mass shooting go to 0?  No, but we'd see an effect.

 

I posted this a while back, that they should raise the age to purchase all firearms to at least 23 yo, 25 works.  Along with all firearms (not just handguns) requiring a purchase permit. 

 

I figure that if one goes to college right after high school (around age 17-18) that after 5 years, they are most likely graduated, reducing the chance of a mass shooting on a college campus by a student.  Not to mention, it allows more time for someone (family, friends, teachers, law enforcement, etc.) to see warning signs develop in those that are mentally troubled, etc. and get an actual chance to prevent them from snapping and shooting up schools, malls, etc.