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@Theweakeredge
I wasn't trying to be arrogant or anything, I made a joke and I realized people here would take it seriously.
Gotcha. As the resident member who likes to pretend he's funny, I know all about that.
Are you interested in debating anyone?
Not really. Debates and arguments are draining and time consuming for me.
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@Theweakeredge
No comment wars necessary, just explain your position, and I'll explain why it's wrong
I should probably have specified that I'm trying to stay out of forum and comment arguments in general, not just the wars.
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@Juice
There are people who agree with you. In fact, there have been complaints that the politics subforum is dominated by conservatives. ILikePie5, Greyparrot, bmdrocks, Chris, fauxlaw, TheUnderdog are some of the conservatives you'll see. I'm also a conservative who agrees with you that men can't be woman and vice versa, although I'm trying to stay out of comment and forum wars (but I keep getting into them because I'm dumb).
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@fauxlaw
You can now add "Associate Justice of the Supreme Court" to her list of accomplishments.
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@BearMan
Featured in the DART Bard
That's funny.
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@ILikePie5
For example your "always lynch millers" policy,As if it hasn’t worked lol.
It hasn't. Miller claims on DART are town 90+% of the time.
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@Danielle
It actually wasn't daring at all. As a Judas, I would have survived being lynched. I would switch to scum, but town wouldn't know that, so I would have been "confirmed." I actually won by convincing town to test my role in MYLO.
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@Danielle
2) 99.9% of lynchproof claims are real including Luna's,
I once won a game as a Judas using lynchproof as a fake claim. That's probably the exception to the rule, though.
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@3RU7AL
Glad to be of service. It should be pretty easy, since all I'll have to do is add up the points and see who got a higher score.
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@3RU7AL
If you want a judge, I'd be willing to help. I would have no problems voting based on the points you assigned to each other.
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@3RU7AL
If I had the time, I would consider it. I don't normally have the time for debates, though.
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@3RU7AL
I was trying to simplify the framework somewhat, in order to focus on "how could a winner lose the popular vote".
Yes, and you did a good job.
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@Intelligence_06
Actually, Mount Everest isn't tall enough for the earth's curvature to be visible. The pictures from its summit show curvature due to distortion from the camera lens. In order to see the earth's curvature, you have to be at least 35,000 feet above sea level, and even then you need a wide angle of view.
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@3RU7AL
It's a "winner take all" system.
In most states. Maine and Nebraska give 2 electoral votes to the candidate who got the most votes and divide the rest of their votes based on who got the most votes in each district. That's the exception, though.
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@3RU7AL
Self-moderating debates are an interesting idea. In an ideal world, where everyone is willing to honestly consider other people's ideas, it would work well. In the world we're actually in, I see some problems with it. A lot of people here are more interested in debating as a competition (which is fine). The current system lends itself to this, with win records and ratings. Adding self-moderating debates where the goal is to convince and to learn wouldn't jive well with that system. Debaters interested only in winning probably wouldn't assign a fair number of points to their opponents. On the other hand, self-moderating debates might appeal more to people like UpholdingTheFaith, who want a more discussion based format than a formal debate. I'm not sure how the two formats would mix. It could work if self-moderating debates were unrated or in their own rating system, but those solutions seem clunky to me.
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@Greyparrot
Shaking them up how? By launching angry tweets at them? By being an internet troll and triggering them? By being politically incorrect for the sake of being politically incorrect? Look, I think a lot of the "untouchable" PC stuff is silly (I'm assuming that's what you're referring to. Correct me if I'm wrong). The TDS out there is an astounding sight, but I don't see how repeatedly triggering it is remotely productive.
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@RationalMadman
Trump is a racist, narcissistic ***wipe. Everyone can blatantly understand this just by watching his demeanour, how he talks and what he says. The difference between his fans vs haters is not that the fans deny he's all these filthy things but that they embrace it as a lesser evil than something they call the 'evil establishment'.
His fans do deny that he is racist, and deny it rather fervently, although only the most fanatical would say that he isn't narcissistic or deny that he has major character defects.
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@Theweakeredge
First of all, hyperbole,
That's what I get for posting when I'm tired. I start taking things too literally or misunderstanding.
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@Theweakeredge
I have never seen a worse case of a word salad.
I have. I've seen way worse than this. RM has his quirks and blind spots, but he's nowhere near as far out there as some I've seen. Unlike many conspiracy theorists, he seems to have some respect for science in general. A lot of conspiracy theorists make basic errors about 8th grade science or earlier. Many are suspicious of science as a whole. Also, RM understands grammar and writes in intelligible English. That alone puts him ahead of a lot of conspiracy theorists.
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@Our_Boat_is_Right
But you think that warrants the title of best president for blacks since Lincoln?
It definitely puts Grant up there. LBJ, despite his personal flaws, is also a contender because of the Civil Rights Act. I think his Great Society programs have been a disaster for poor people, which, sadly, includes a lot of blacks. I think the Civil Rights Acts outweighs that rather significantly, though. I would put either of them ahead of Trump. Trump has been pretty decent on the economy which has helped everyone, blacks included. Well, he was pretty decent until covid came along and ruined everything. I think the claims that Trump had the best economy ever are greatly inflated and are mostly attributable to partisanship and Trump sycophancy. As for how good Trump has been for race relations, I think his contributions, whether positive or negative, have been largely overshadowed by the contribution of the monster who kneeled on George Floyd's neck. That being said, I don't think Trump has exactly been a smashing success for race relations. Racist or not, he definitely isn't helping things on that front.
And, quite frankly, I find comparing Trump to Lincoln to be grossly insulting to Lincoln.
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@Our_Boat_is_Right
but bearing down on the KKK seemed more of an anti-violence thing and this is what white people are doing thing
Yes and no. The KKK was preventing blacks from voting through intimidation, not to mention the lynches. While it was anti-violence, it was also very much pro-black and was specifically intended to be pro-black.
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@Our_Boat_is_Right
Ulysses Grant. He did a pretty good job of shutting down the KKK for a while.
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@Intelligence_06
It's a collection of funny scenes of Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang Theory.
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@RationalMadman
I'm not a fan of nihilism either, but Nietzche did have point. Nihilism is the logical result of naturalistic atheism.
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@RationalMadman
Been reading Nietzche?
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@MisterChris
Yep. Hopefully it remains a joke, but a few of those things could happen.
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@TheRealNihilist
Hello as well. My memory is bad so we might've hated each other and we both forgot :)
I don't think we interacted very much. I know I never hated you, and I don't think you hated me either.
I'm a bit blown away by the 50 number, I thought Ragnar took my reporting privileges away before I even reached double digits worth of reporting.Probably was me. Don't know my justification/s but if you want me to talk about a specific reported comment then I would gladly try to defend myself. I'm a bit blown away by the 50 number, I thought Ragnar took my reporting privileges away before I even reached double digits worth of reporting. Maybe I'm wrong and Ragnar did show a lot of restraint when it came to me.
I'm not a mod, so I don't know how many there were or if they were all reported by the same person. I do remember that there were a bunch of random SupaDudz posts in a bunch of different threads that were reported. If your memory is correct and you didn't reach double digits, then there might have been someone else involved. Of course, what do I know?
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@TheRealNihilist
Hello. Long time no see.
Basically if MLK was alive today this site would allow the disrespect of him as well.
It actually would. Public figures aren't protected by the CoC.
He was speaking about me.
Are you sure about that? Whoever it was went around and reported large numbers of random posts (50 at least, probably more) he made, many of which weren't remotely offensive or controversial. I don't know if you did that or not, of course, but I'm not sure why you assume he was talking about you.
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Disclaimer: This is purely for entertainment. It is not intended to parody any specific person, nor is it intended to be an accurate representation of any political movements mentioned in it. I am entirely aware that no one actually thinks like this (I hope, anyway). I wonder whether anyone actually reads these copy-pasted disclaimers. This is completely satirical. None of the below content necessarily reflects my own opinions and beliefs.
Editor's Note: We are just twelve days out from the 2020 presidential election, and debate rages over who will win. By all appearances, we are on our way to a record turnout. If you're looking for clarity in these confusing times, then I have some good news for you: the Bard's experts have gathered together to give informed predictions about the election outcome. Without further ado, we will move on to their predictions.
Trum Porter: After the 2016 election, we all learned how inaccurate the polls are. Throughout the last four years, the media has spewed nonstop hate of the president. People know this, and they aren't going to tell pollsters from the fake news media that they're voting for Trump. The silent majority is out there in every state of the nation. It's going to be a fifty-state sweep for the president. The Republicans will sweep both houses of Congress and ensure that the best president in history will have as many terms as he needs to keep America great! The libs will be so triggered and run to their safe spaces while TRUE PATRIOTS laugh at their tears! MAGA!
Environmental Wacko: The polls were accurate in 2016, and they're accurate now. Trump will lose in a landslide, and all those racist Nazis who voted for him will be put in their place. It'll be so-o-o sweet to watch the conservative snowflakes cry. Hate will never win! Harris 2021! Er, I mean Biden/Harris 2020!
ScumAnonymous: Look, fellers, we all know how this is going to go down. Everyone's gonna be sitting on the edge of their seats on election night, but they ain't gonna get results. They won't get results the next day either. No way, pal. The election officials ain't gonna finish counting those early ballots for weeks. And when they do, a whole lotta swing states are gonna be real close. And then, pal, then the recounts begin. Both sides will accuse the other of cheating, and just before they start shootin', the results are gonna come back, and it'll be 269-269. At that point, it ain't gonna matter who wins. It'll all end in flames. And how do I know? Because 2020, pal, because 2020.
Carl Engels: An old, rich, corrupt, bourgeoisie member of the elite will win. He will trod all over the proletariat as they suffer. Which one? It doesn't matter. The bourgeoisie will laugh either way, safe in their positions of power. When the great revolution begins, they will know the feeling of a boot stamping on a human face, forever.
Conspi Theo: Does it really matter which lizard person wins? They're both part of "them". They're out to get you. I just saw a YouTube video that exposed their Satanic plot. Whichever one wins will shapeshift into the antichrist! We will see the establishment of the New World Order, Babylon the Great! The guy in the video also discovered why the Illuminati launched the plandemic. They needed to keep us all inside so we wouldn't see them send rockets to the moon to plant evidence that they really landed on the moon. Someone was about to figure it out, so they had to maintain the hoax! "They" are lying to you!
Editor's Note: If any of these predictions are wrong, the guy who made the YouTube video reserves the right to retain full prophetic credibility for any future predictions.
Grandpa Curmudgeon: Back in my day, America was already great. Didn't have none of these cheesy slogans. No sir, we had distinguished, sophisticated platforms like "I like Ike." Politicians didn't say the dumbest things you ever heard every time they opened their mouths. Leastways, if they did, we didn't have no internet media telling us about it. Well, that's why Trump should win, cause he wants to make us great agin. But that's also why he ain't gonna win, cuz all you young rips don't know what greatness looked like. Look, boy, you wouldn't know greatness if it hit you like a brick. You spend your days with your eyes glued to yer phones. If you'd look up for two seconds and read a book, you'd know that socialism ain't never gonna work. But no, you all gonna vote for Sleepy Joe. Well, when I was yer age...
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@Barney
You just made it to the #2 debater position. Congratulations!
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@Intelligence_06
That is a terrible prompt. It made for a good forum post, though.
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@Greyparrot
@ILikePie5
Oh, sure! Tempt me! Now I need a tank and a Mig to put beside my sword and shield. Knights in tanks, yeeessss.
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@HistoryBuff
it has no negative impact on a law abiding citizen. but if a criminal cannot get access to high capacity mags, it has a significant positive impact.
Only if you assume that high-capacity mags aren't useful for self-defense in certain situations. More on that later.
since america has never made any serious attempts to limit mag sizes (all attempts that I am aware of have had serious limitations based on which guns they are applied to or which states they apply to. this massively hinders their effectiveness) which means there is no apples to apples comparison. So you are asking for definitive proof that cannot, by definition, exist. Comparing the US situation to countries that have enforced such restrictions is the closest comparison that it available.
State to state comparisons would be closer, since they have more in common with each other than different countries. Strictly speaking, though, definitive proof on most political positions is nonexistent. That doesn't mean there isn't evidence. However, country comparisons are very poor evidence. Part of the scientific method is controlling for variables that you aren't studying. Thus, comparisons that involve fewer variables are better, and comparisons that involve more variables are worse. Different countries have lots of variables involved. States share more culture and have the same background of federal laws, so they are closer, though still not ideal.
How many scenarios actually occur where a victim shoots all of their multiple assailants? I'm guessing very few.
Why is it necessary for them to shoot all of their assailants for a high-capacity mag to be useful? They only need to fire more than five shots for it to be useful.
Either they get scared off by the gun, or the victim gets gunned down by being outnumbered and outgunned.
False dichotomy. The number of ways such a confrontation can play out are nearly infinite. You're arbitrarily limiting the number of possibilities.
What kind of scenario would possibly require a person to have that much firepower
Well, they could panic and miss their first few shots, they could be facing multiple assailants who don't give up at the sight of the gun, their opponents might require multiple shots to take down, they might be a bad shot, etc., etc.
and they are actually likely to survive it?
Some people would survive those situations, others wouldn't. Having a gun with enough ammo would increase the number of people who would survive.
And how rare are those types of scenarios?...your argument has little to no evidence that it is true.
According to the FBI, a murder occurs every 30.5 minutes. Violent crimes occur every 24.6 seconds.
So the answer to how rare these scenarios are is how often murders are carried out by two or more criminals added to how often attempted murders are done by multiple assailants. I haven't found any statistics on how frequently violent crimes or murders are carried out by multiple assailants. Even if only 5% of violent crimes are committed by multiple assailants, then that's ~2.4 murders every day that could be stopped by a gun with a high-capacity magazine and ~175.6 violent crimes (counting murders) every day that could be stopped by a gun with a high-capacity mag. Now, I don't know what the actual percentage is. The FBI keeps statistics on how often crimes occur, but they don't seem to keep statistics on how frequently they're committed by more than one person. Even so, it would be silly to deny that dealing with multiple assailants never happens.
While I believe it is quite obvious that being limited to low capacity mags would hinder someone's ability to shoot a large number of people.
The fact that it's only obvious to you and other people who share many of your ideological biases should tell you that it isn't actually obvious. That being said, I don't deny that it could prevent a few deaths. The question is how many. Let's examine that.
Mass shooters often carry multiple weapons, so they can start the mass shooting with 5, 10, or 15 bullets. There are also mass shootings involving more than one shooter, which can double the initial amount of bullets. The overwhelming majority of mass shootings are 10 or fewer people. A majority were 5 or fewer. In maybe half or a third of them, no one died. Now, it is absolutely true that killers won't always hit. However, a lot of mass shooters target relatively crowded areas, making it more likely that they will hit. Magazine restrictions would have a very limited impact on these shootings. They will have the most effect on the deadliest shootings, which are fairly rare. Now, they will probably save a few lives in those cases. The question is how many? Limiting magazine sizes will slow shooters down a bit, but not a whole lot. You can see my earlier estimate that they might get as many as 24 shots off for every 30 shots they would get off without the ban. That will save a few lives in the larger mass shootings, but it won't be a huge number.
Magazine restrictions would also motivate killers to use weapons other than guns. While guns are deadly, so are vehicles driven into crowds, pressure cookers, and stabbing sprees. Guns are more convenient that those, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're more deadly. They have a lot of gun control in England, but found that they were having knife crimes instead. They got so bad that they now have knife control in London. Gun control didn't solve their problems.
So would it save more lives than it would end? Even attempting to answer that question would require more detailed statistics than are available. We can argue about whether high-capacity magazines are more commonly used to kill or to save, but it would be fairly pointless, since the quantitative data to answer that question doesn't seem to exist.
There is no evidence that I am aware of that an AR is ever more effective at personal defense than a handgun or a shotgun. So banning an AR would have no impact on this at all.
Sure there is. Handguns, of course, are the best if you're on the street because you can actually conceal-carry them. For home defense, though, ARs definitely have advantages. They're more accurate than handguns (this is a general advantage that long guns have over handguns). They're shorter than shotguns, which makes them easier to get around corners in a house. They are also lighter than shotguns, which makes them easier to handle. If you want a more detailed breakdown of shotgun vs handgun vs AR15 for home defense, here's a gun instructor talking about that very topic.
Of course, no gun is objectively the best for self-defense. It's very situational. As I mentioned, handguns are the best if you aren't at home, whereas AR-15s and shotguns are better if you are at home. For stopping mass shooters, if you have a choice, the AR-15 is better for the very same reasons it is dangerous in a mass shooting. Stephen Willeford proved this at the Sutherland Springs shooting.
Saying that AR-15s aren't useful for self-defense is simply incorrect. The very same qualities that make it dangerous in a mass shooting also make it an excellent self-defense tool.
I would argue ARs meet the same definition. They are far more powerful than any legitimate civilian purpose warrants.
Absolutely ridiculous. It's easy to fire an AR-15 and not hurt anyone. Try setting off a nuke without hurting anyone. They aren't remotely comparable.
A letter of marque puts you in direct service to the government. You are licensed to arm your vessel and attack enemy vessels. At that point you aren't really a civilian any more. So the comparison seems a bit moot.
Historically inaccurate. They were authorized by the government, but were not in service to it. They frequently owned the cannons before the war. Privateers were commanded by themselves. They got the reward for the ships they captured. They were very much civilians. Armed, privately owned merchantmen (which is what privateers often were) were very common.
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@HistoryBuff
your stats don't say that either. Attempting the crime, is a crime. So by the time the gun was used, there was already a crime. So no, it does not reduce crime.
That's a valid point. It would reduce the number of successfully carried out crimes, though, which is still a good thing.
ok. but that means that restrictions on mag sizes would have no negative effect, but still have a positive effect. that's a win-win.
No. In that scenario mag size restrictions have neither a positive nor a negative impact because the gun is never used.
ok. but no one is talking about banning all guns.
Not here, but there are people who take that position.
again, most countries don't track the number of shots a victim took to defend themselves. But canada has strict rules about magazine size and both their general death by guns per 100,000 and homicide by guns per 100,000 are considerably lower than the US. If mag size limits had a significant negative effect on people defending themselves, this shouldn't be true.
You're confusing correlation and causation. There are large number of differences between countries. They have large numbers of societal and policy differences other than just magazine sizes. Comparing the two and saying, "It's due to this policy right here" is frankly silly. Unless you have strong evidence that it is, in fact, due to that policy rather than other factors, this is a complete non-argument.
you misread. I said "mass shooting" not "mass killing". if 4 or more people are shot, that is a mass shooting.
Ok, but how is a high-capacity magazine ban going to stop someone from shooting 4 people? That doesn't require a high-capacity magazine. A lot of those mass shootings wouldn't be impacted by a high-capacity magazine ban.
no it doesn't. You are simply using the wrong term in an attempt to lower the number of incidents that would qualify. If 4 people are being shot, that is obviously a very serious incident even if most of them end up surviving.
Yes, but you haven't done anything to demonstrate that a high-capacity magazine ban would actually stop that from happening. Maybe a few less people would get shot, but that also goes the other way. A few more people attacked by multiple assailants would be overcome.
ok. well we would all still be much better off if the gang and the victim didn't have high capacity mags. There would be alot less death.
How do you know? You've continually asserted that a high-capacity magazine ban would save lives, but assertion is all you've provided. If the victim had a high-capacity mag, he would be better able to fend off the gang. That could save his life. You're ignoring that.
i reject the premise that you would need a high capacity mag to defend yourself in these scenarios.
You reject it, but you have no reason to reject it. As you point out yourself, people miss. If someone is under attack by multiple assailants, they're probably going to need more than 5 shots.
that seems to be a significant assumption. you say 15 people get shot, so it must only be 15 shots. There is no reason to think that is true. in the real world, most people do not have perfect accuracy and/or would fire more than 1 shot per person they are shooting at. in a real world scenario, a shooter is likely to need multiple 5 round mags in order to shoot 15 people slowing him down and reducing his effectiveness.
This is a double-edged sword. The more shots that are needed for mass killers to kill people, the more shots people fending off multiple assailants need to defend themselves. Mass shooters aren't always accurate. Neither are people being attacked by multiple assailants. This argument completely undermines your rejection of the fact that people under attack by multiple assailants need more than 5 shots. No matter how hard you try, you can't escape the fact that gun control makes it harder for people to protect themselves.
you haven't established high capacity mags ever save anyone.
Your rejection of my argument has no basis in fact.
It is well established that high capacity mags are used to kill alot of people though.
Asserting that over and over again does not qualify as establishing it.
again, you are assuming that forcing them to change weapons has no effect on how many people die.
And you are assuming that it does. And again, you're ignoring that people can save their lives with those weapons.
If they have a grenade launcher they will kill alot more people than with an assault rifle. If they have knife they will kill alot less people than with an AR. You will never be able to stop crazy or violent people entirely, but by limiting the availability of deadly weapons you can reduce the level of violence they are able to carry out.
Well, one guy can kill 84 people with a semi. A group of guys with knives can kill 33 people and injure 130.
I already know you don't want to ban semis or knives. What evidence do you have that banning ARs actually decreases the number of people killed in mass killings? And even if they do, your work isn't done. Banning ARs also means that people can't protect themselves with them, so you would also have to demonstrate that the number of people saved by an AR ban was greater than the number of people who couldn't protect themselves because of the ban. It's not enough to say, "this thing is deadly, so we should ban it." You also need to demonstrate that fewer people die in its absence, which requires analyzing how many people use it to protect themselves.
If we were to take your argument to it's concussion, then we should legalize all automatic weapons, belt fed weapons, flame throwers, etc.
Those are legal, although they are heavily restricted. Except for flame throwers. Those aren't heavily restricted.
However, they're also not used in crime, which should tell you something. Well, unless you count that idiot who used a flamethrower to kill a spider in his house and ended up burning his house down as a criminal.
I mean if limiting the weapons isn't helpful, then everyone should just be armed to the teeth right?
And how do you know they shouldn't be? If you were a criminal, would you try to kill someone who was armed to the teeth, or would you look for an easier target? Deadlier weapons do pose a greater threat if used for evil, but they also provide a strong deterrence to said evil. You have to take both of those things into account before deciding whether such weapons save lives, kill them, or are neutral. So far, you've only been considering one of those two factors, which skews your analysis.
AR 15's were designed as an infantry weapon. They also clearly had the civilian market in mind as well, but that doesn't change the fact that the design was a pitch for military use.
Yes and no. The first gun that had the AR-15 name was designed for the military and was adopted as the M16. However, the AR-15 as we know it today is a different gun designed specifically for civilians. The major difference between the two is that the AR-15 that became the M16 is capable of automatic fire, whereas today's AR-15s are not.
this argument doesn't seem to have much merit. Essentially your argument is we should do nothing to attempt to prevent people from getting deadly weapons because they will just get them anyway. So the extension of that argument is that we should legalize all weapons. Grenade launchers and tactical nuclear weapons for all I guess.
Straw man. My argument is that banning weapons is only useful if it actually reduces the murder rate. If criminals just use other weapons and the same number of people are killed, then banning the weapon didn't save any lives. That's the argument I'm making. Also, grenade launchers are already legal. As for nukes, there is a fundamental difference between nukes and almost every other weapon. They are simply so powerful that there is no legitimate civilian purpose for them. Any civilian use of a nuke would result in massive collateral damage. Even if you have something as powerful as a bunker buster, you could at least find a place to set it off where no one would get hurt.
But for your information, the most powerful weapons in the days of the Founding Fathers, warships, actually were legal (and probably still are, not that anyone other than governments are interested in building aircraft carriers). In fact, privately owned warships are mentioned in the Constitution when it gives Congress the authority to grant letters of marque, which are authorizations for private citizens to use their own cannon-laden ships to capture enemy ships. But to be realistic, any criminal that actually has the funds to buy a warship or a nuke isn't going to have any troubles getting illegal weapons.
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@n8nrgmi
does anyone dispute that trump says things that are racist?
I don't. The man is the real-life incarnation of an internet troll. He seems to think that anyone who disagrees with him is deserving of any insult he can come up with. Publish a negative story? You're the enemy of the people! Undergo horrible torture after being captured while serving your country, but you don't support Trump? He prefers soldiers who don't get captured. You're a Jew, but you don't support Trump? You're a traitor to Israel. Trump is a Trumpist. If you don't agree with him or support him, you're inferior.
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@Vader
Cruz actually has a Canadian citizenship.
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@HistoryBuff
your stats don't say that though. They say they are used by victims as often as they are used by criminals. but that crime could be trespassing, or vandalism, or a bar fight.
No, those stats don't say that. What they do say is that guns are used to prevent crimes more than they are used to commit crimes. In other words, they reduce crime.
Additionally, those stats don't say how often the gun was even fired in self defense. The presence of a gun might be enough to deter the crime.
Which makes it even better, since no one gets hurt if the criminal just decides not to mess with that person.
At which point a limit on the magazine size wouldn't negatively impact survival of victims very much at all.
True, but I was trying to make a point about guns in general with that stat, not make a point specifically about magazines. Sorry if I confused you there.
well, Canada has strict controls on this and there doesn't seem to be any issue with people defending themselves.
You just defended your sweeping assertions with yet another sweeping assertion. What data to you have to back up your claims?
What defines uncommon? There is more than 1 mass shooting per day in america. Here is an article about it. There were 90 mass shootings in June alone. If something happens every day, it isn't uncommon.
Highly misleading. Here is the data that article uses.
Notice something about these incidents: the vast majority of them have fewer than three deaths. In other words, they don't meet the federal standard for a mass killing, which is three or more deaths. The article you linked gets away with this by using a sleight of hand. They use the term mass shooting, which has no standard definition (the definition the source used is four or more people, not including the shooter, being shot). However, a lot of people, including myself, use mass shooting and mass killing as synonyms, even though they aren't. Thus, the article gives the impression that there are mass killings every day, even though that isn't the case. Also, look at this quote from the source's methodology page. "GVA does not parse the definition [of mass shooting] to remove any subcategory of shooting. To that end we don’t exclude, set apart, caveat, or differentiate victims based upon the circumstances in which they were shot." This allows them to include gang violence in their archive as well. That source is pulling out all the stops to inflate the numbers.
in a mass shooting scenario, having people returning fire with automatic weapons seems like it is much more likely to cause problems than to resolve the issue.
Firstly, what automatic weapons? AR-15s and civilian AK-47s aren't automatic. Secondly, this is yet another sweeping assertion made without supporting data.
I don't believe this kind of research is done. The government needs to fund extensive research into this topic to better answer these questions.
Yes, they should. However, that also means that you don't actually know how big of a problem crossfire would be.
I wasn't aware the US had ever had a ban on high capacity magazines. could you provide more information on what ban you are referring to?
"For example, in the United States, the now-expired Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 included limits regarding magazines that could hold more than ten rounds."
what? why? who is having large scale shootouts with gangs?
Firstly, I never said anything about large-scale shoot-outs. One person vs. a gang doesn't imply a large-scale shoot-out. Secondly, "these estimates suggest that gang-related homicides typically accounted for around 13 percent of all homicides annually."
There are about 15,000 homicides a year, so gangs account for about 1950 homicides a year. I doubt the whole gang was present for all of those, so the number of times those victims would need high-capacity magazines would go down. On the other hand, those numbers don't include the number of times people were attacked by gangs but survived, so the numbers would go up again. Also, those numbers don't include violent crimes committed by multiple assailants who weren't part of a gang, which would also make the numbers go up. So yes, there are times when a high-capacity magazine is needed for self-defense.
ok, so lets time this out. he fires 5 shots in about a second. then takes 3 seconds to reload. fires another 5 rounds in a second. reloads in 3 seconds. fires another 5 rounds in a second.he fires 15 rounds in about 9 seconds.
The number of people who can actually fire 5 shots in one second can probably be counted on only one or two hands, since the world record is something like 6 or 7 shots a second (for semi-autos. Automatics aren't used in mass shootings). Also, you're forgetting the time it takes to aim those shots. If we assume one second to aim, then he fires 5 shots in 5 seconds and takes 3 seconds to reload, so that's 5 shots every 8 seconds. Over 30 seconds, this killer has fired 19 shots. However, this ignores the fact that many mass killers use multiple guns, so they could functionally have 10 or more shots before having to reload. Accounting for that, the killer gets off about 24 shots in 30 seconds. A killer without the ban can fire 30 shots in 30 seconds. If we look at the data of mass killings committed with guns compiled here (https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data/), the majority of these are 15 or fewer people getting shot and about half are 10 or fewer, counting the injured. Depending on how good a shot the killer is, he'll only have to reload once or twice, if at all. Thus, this ban isn't going to save huge numbers of people. You might reach a few dozen. That doesn't compare well to the number of times a high-capacity magazine could potentially save people. Of course, it's impossible to truly know how many people were killed because of high-capacity magazines or how many people they saved, since that would require knowing what would happen in alternate realities where the killer didn't have one or the victim did have one. Still, there doesn't seem to be a strong justification for banning them.
this is a super weak argument.
No, it isn't. If banning various types of guns only results in the same number of people dying from other weapons, zero lives have been saved. You've just changed how those people were killed, which is an exercise in futility.
But that is not an argument for allowing people to stockpile killing machines designed to gun down lots of people very quickly
That's not what AR-15s were designed for, but that's a minor point. In reality, dangerous weapons are only an issue if fewer people die in the absence of those weapons. However, if people just get killed by maniacs driving through crowds instead, then banning those dangerous weapons hasn't saved anyone, and you've taken away people's rights for nothing. The question is not whether guns kill people. The question is whether fewer people would die in the absence of guns. If the answer is no, then banning guns or various types or features of guns won't save anyone.
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@HistoryBuff
because the tool itself is dangerous. The tool itself is costing people their lives. Having a gunman able to fire off 30 rounds in a matter of seconds gets people killed.
Yes, guns are definitely dangerous. Yes, in the wrong hands, they can be used to commit horrible acts of murder. However, guns can also be used to save lives. According to the CDC, guns are used defensively 500,000 to 3,000,000 times a year. To quote the study, "Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million (Kleck, 2001a), in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008 (BJS, 2010)."
While lives weren't saved in all of those cases, since most violent crimes are things like rape and burglary rather than murder, the data suggests that using guns for self-defense does decrease a person's chance of being injured or killed. To quote from the study I linked, "Studies that directly assessed the effect of actual defensive uses of guns (i.e., incidents in which a gun was “used” by the crime victim in the sense of attacking or threatening an offender) have found consistently lower injury rates among gun-using crime victims compared with victims who used other self-protective strategies (Kleck, 1988; Kleck and DeLone, 1993; Southwick, 2000; Tark and Kleck, 2004)." My point is that you're only telling one side of the story. Yes, guns kill, but they can also save. The question is whether they kill more people or whether they save more people. Given that, according to the study, guns are used more frequently to stop criminals than to commit crime, it seems reasonable to believe that they save more than they kill.
Most people don't, or shouldn't need that many rounds for self defense.
Based on what? It's easy to make sweeping assertions, but what are those assertions based on? Secondly, even if most people don't need that many rounds, that implies that some people still do. Even though that might be relatively uncommon, mass shootings are also relatively uncommon. Again, before you can just say, "High-capacity mags kill, so let's ban them," you first have to find out whether they kill more people or save more people, or are neutral. However, you're only considering when they kill but are ignoring when they save.
If you are firing 30 rounds at someone in "self defense" then there is probably a pretty good chance of other people getting caught in the crossfire anyway.
Yes, crossfire is definitely an issue. Again, you're ignoring the other issues. If someone shoots a mass shooter, he might hit a few people by accident; how many people could the mass shooter have killed if he wasn't stopped? And again, what's the data on this issue? How common are deaths or injuries due to crossfire?
how many scenarios actually come up where someone needs to be able to fire a dozen rounds at someone to protect themselves? Probably not very many.
How many scenarios come up where having a "high-capacity" magazine ban would have saved lives? Also not very many. Mass shootings are relatively rare events. Furthermore, how many lives would actually be saved in an individual mass shooting by a "high-capacity" magazine ban? Remember, the Columbine massacre happened when there was such a ban. How many lives did that ban save then?
Basically, you are saying someone in the rare circumstance where they needed a large mag for self defense should die so that dozens of potential victims in mass shootings can live. The answer is yes.
Firstly, how do you know that a ban on high-capacity magazines would save dozens of lives? From 1982 to 2019, 941 people were killed in mass shootings.
With some practice, it only takes a few seconds to switch out a magazine. A high-capacity magazine ban would only slightly slow down mass killers. Sure, a few lives might be saved. But again, what's the flip side of the coin? How many lives would be saved by having a magazine with more than five rounds? Gang violence is common in America. Facing multiple criminal assailants is nothing new. Having a magazine large enough to deal with those threats would save lives. You're simply asserting that such magazines kill more than they save based on absolutely nothing.
the gunman had to stop and reload after a few shots.
Do you know how long that actually takes? Here's some guy reloading his AR-15. Switching out the magazine took 2-3 seconds, and there are only 4-5 seconds between his last shot on the first mag and his first shot on the second mag.
That would only be a minor inconvenience to a mass shooter. Furthermore, as you try to make it harder for mass murderers to use guns, they will start using other methods. How many were killed at the Boston Marathon from pressure cooker bombs, of all things? And for criminals too dumb to build one of those, they could just follow the example of some lunatic in France who killed 84 people by simply driving a large truck into a crowd.
It doesn't take guns to kill large numbers of people. Evil people find a way to commit evil crimes.
In summary, there are several major problems with your ideas.
1. You're ignoring the lives that can be saved by guns and/or magazines with more than 5 bullets. In order to properly evaluate whether banning AR-15s and high-capacity mags will actually save lives, you need to compare the lives lost as a result of those things to the lives saved. Instead, you're focusing only on the lives lost.
2. You're making sweeping generalizations without evidence. How do you know how many bullets people might need to defend themselves? How do you know that lives would actually be saved by high-capacity magazine bans? You're simply asserting that your ideas would save lives in the absence of actual data.
3. You're ignoring the fact that guns aren't the only way to commit mass murder. They happen to be the most convenient in America, but they aren't the only option for criminals. If some random dude with a semi can kill 84 people in one go, which is more than the average number of people killed annually in mass shootings in America, then I don't think going after guns is actually going to solve the problem.
4. You're ignoring the fact that mass shootings, while tragic, are relatively rare. Even if situations where assault weapons and high-capacity magazines can save lives are rare, so are the situations where they end lives.
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@Castin
As I thought. You do have a soul.
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@Castin
Life as a cancelled liberal is easy. All you have to do is go on Dave Rubin's show, or Steven Crowder's. Then you start a YouTube channel where you post videos complaining about cancel culture, and conservatives will flock to you and tell you how much more tolerant they are than liberals. You get to complain about how persecuted you are and make money doing it. It's a great gig.
Or, you could not, because you don't want to sell your soul to the open sewer that is YouTube politics.
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@Castin
I think liberals often shoot ourselves in the foot with our purity tests and woke-offs and the hyper-PC standards we try to hold our candidates to.
Did you just criticize political correctness? Cancelled.
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@HistoryBuff
let me phrase it this way. if someone threw a brick of cocaine at someone to defend themselves, should they get a pass for possession of a brick of cocaine just because they used it to defend themselves?. It is highly illegal to own cocaine. There is absolutely nothing wrong with defending yourself. But that illegal item didn't pop into existence at that moment. You had been breaking the law long before you needed to defend yourself.
Yeah, I get that part. I don't question that that would be how such a law would work. What I'm trying to figure out is the logic behind such a law. In this theoretical world, various guns and features thereof are banned to protect people. But if some criminal is going after me, I don't see how my life is being protected if the tool that could save my life is illegal. Maybe I don't need more than 5 bullets for hunting, but that's not life or death. If I need 6 bullets for self-defense, then I guess I die in the name of saving lives?
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@HistoryBuff
If you use a gun in self defense, then the police are going to come. And if you used an illegal weapon part, you would get arrested (in this hypothetical scenario where these mags are illegal).
I really don't know what to say to that. If someone uses a gun to save their life, and that gun has a magazine that holds more rounds than the arbitrary number you decided was "high-capacity", they get arrested? Wow. I just don't know what to say.
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@HistoryBuff
I would advocate for all automatic weapons to be banned.
They aren't technically illegal, but they're already heavily restricted. You have to get a license to buy one. Furthermore, they're extremely expensive, largely due to the fact that it's illegal to buy an automatic weapon that wasn't already in the civilian market since 1980-something. Actual automatic weapons haven't been used in mass shootings in at least the last three decades, if I recall correctly.
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@RationalMadman
I think the reason people complain about it is simply that they would prefer to choose the greater of two goods. Having a choice between one incoherent, creepy, deceitful old man and another incoherent, creepy, deceitful old man (you can argue about which is worse) or voting for a 3rd party or write-in who will never win isn't going to fill people with excitement. That being said, I agree with you that people should go out and vote, even if they don't vote for either of the major party candidates. Although tempting, throwing up your hands and refusing to vote will solve exactly nothing.
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@oromagi
Once my mind got over the shock of that icy blast from the past, I rather enjoyed that. Far better than today's pop music. In fact, I almost feel dirty even comparing the two.
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