The NORC survey further showed that citizens support stricter firearm limits. The vast majority (91%) support making it illegal to use guns while under the influence of alcohol. High percentages (85% and 82%) want limits on the sale of high-powered 50-caliber rifles and semiautomatic assault weapons. Similarly high percentages favor criminal background checks for all gun sales and the requirement of a police permit before a gun can be purchased. Interestingly, three-quarters of respondents believed that terrorist attacks have increased the need for stricter gun control. Compared with the sale of illegal drugs, 54% want illegal gun sales to be punished more severely, while 37% want the punishments for illegal gun sales to be as tough as penalties for selling illegal drugs.(Marketresearch.com)
The only ones who want less gun control is the NRA and the gun industry - but they are dominating the issue.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/guns-
Some stats about the industry, most of which is probably familiar if you've seen "Bowling for Columbine". Please don't fwd the attached reports around, but just FYI and for talking points.
I've owned and occasionally enjoyed firearms for about a decade. I don't need it at all, never had to use it for its intended purpose, and it is an expensive hobby. Not sure why I started, maybe like a "manhood" thing or just curiosity. I generally handle it safely, but in the past I have done foolish things where an accident could have happened with people I care about. There were times when my emotional state was not great, and if I had quick access to my firearm, maybe it could have been really bad. It's 99.9% liability, 0.1% asset. This situation makes no sense, so I will look into a gun trade-in program with the police. No point selling the gun and transferring the risk to others. I can't in good conscience criticize the industry and perpetrators of violence when I am like one bad day from becoming a major part of the problem.
There are more gun stores than gas stations, and more guns than people, in America. The industry has yearly sales of about $12B, which puts it about 40th percentile of all US industries (and revenue growth is outpacing GDP). All that is under an "anti-gun, socialist" president. Cars and guns each kill over 10,000 Americans per year, despite "technological improvements" and safety education. In contrast, about 5,000 people died on 9/11 and Katrina combined. But we love our cars and guns, so that's that. Clearly guns are doing their job just fine - why the need to ease rules on expanded magazines, assault rifles, ATF powers, stand-your-ground, etc.?
What does that say about the gun industry that they have to spend so much of their revenue on political lobbying and PR? If you have a good, necessary, and safe product - doesn't it sell itself? Why the need to organize and change the laws to protect your product? Ironic that the most harmful industries seem to have the most lobbyists, political spending, and trade associations (dirty energy, tobacco, guns, gaming, financial svcs., junk food, monopolies, etc.). Uncompetitive and obsolete industries rely on propaganda, cheating, and gov't handouts to survive. At least Solyndra never killed anyone. "War profiteering" is the sickest form of income. They make us fearful about everything, so we buy their weapons to feel better, and god forbid we actually use them on other people (usually not due to self defense).
The pro-gun lobby would argue that they are just protecting their interests and your rights from the onslaught of socialist, un-American gun control. Because a disarmed public is one step away from bondage. We all know that is BS. Yeah, disarmed nations like the UK and Japan and are soooo terrible, and gun-heavy nations like Iraq and Somalia are model states. And if gun control was such a threat, then why is the pro-gun camp outspending them 17:1 in Washington? It's not like the left was "gunning" to outlaw guns since the beginning. The Brady Bill and other regs were written in response to horrific, preventable attacks. So-called gun proponents did nothing in response to tragedies like Columbine. They don't even acknowledge a problem. If you love guns for sport or whatever, and you see that there are lapses where bad people can sully the hobby you love, don't you want to make reforms and protect the sport? Even unresponsive and stubborn Major League Baseball realized that rampant steroid use was tarnishing its rep and hurting the business, so they made changes. It didn't fix the problem 100%, but at least it's improving. The gun lobby is just getting in the way of progress, and some gun fans acknowledge that the NRA is actually bad for the sport.
http://www.republicreport.org/
The NRA argument just doesn't hold water. Basically they proclaim that owning guns is an American right and even a patriotic duty. But average modern American civilian life is less gun-centric than ever before (i.e. as hunting for food and protecting your homestead from Injuns have declined to almost nil, the gun is mostly relegated to the domain of criminal violence). In a recent survey, only 9% reported that they hunted in the last year. So if they want to hunt, fine. Have your registered long guns stored at a secure gov't depot, and you check them out when you want to use them (after passing a sobriety and police check). Of the greatest Americans that we remember in history (Lincoln, Edison, MLK, etc.), did guns play a big role in making them great? Did those people even care about guns? You know which Americans love guns - mass murderers. I know there are plenty of law-abiding, upstanding gun enthusiasts out there, so let me put it this way: gun affinity is necessary but not sufficient to be a mass murderer, and not necessary at all to be a good American.
On a more practical level, they say guns are necessary to protect yourself, your wealth, and your loved ones from "bad people" - specifically bad people who are armed. So we need to buy guns as protection against gun-toting enemies? At any moment you need to be ready to grab your gun and neutralize a threat (maybe even keep in on your person or in your purse). But NRA-endorsed safe gun ownership requires that you store your gun unloaded with the safety on, and preferably in a gun safe or with a gun lock (more things to buy on top of the ammo, cleaning kit, etc. - a lot of ancillary costs like a car). After the 1-2 minutes to unlock and load it, your child could be kidnapped already. OTOH, if you have your loaded gun ready for action by your bedside, what is to prevent Junior from finding it and bringing it to school (it has happened)?
So guns are both the salvation and the threat, the problem and the solution. It makes no sense. Premeditated rampages aside, most gun owners would admit that people can snap at any moment, and if they are armed it could get ugly (the football player Belcher example recently). But it's never them, it's always other people. Well if everyone thinks like that and shootings still occur, then obviously introspective opinions on gun safety are not entirely accurate. I am sure Belcher never thought of himself as a potential murderer before the day he became one. And he must not have been that bad of a guy when the whole stadium had a tearful moment of silence for him and his victim. I am not proud to say this, but I believe that it could have been me. Amazingly and fortunately, gun murders are relatively rare considering the obscene number of circulating guns and opportunities for random conflict in US society. Maybe that is a testament to our better angels. But it is poor public policy to rely on better angels. Most narcotics and explosives are illegal. In some places gambling and even abortions are basically illegal. We don't have and shouldn't have absolute freedom; there is legal precedent for restrictions to reduce the chance of us harming ourselves and each other when the risk-benefit make sense. Yet guns are available to purchase in virtually every city, in some cases without even a background check or waiting period. I guess we have to chalk that up to the 2nd Amendment, and more recently the NRA.
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Obviously this particular mass shooting is of interest to me
because of the Oregon ties, and I have to admit that last place I'd ever
expect a shooting like this to happen is in a suburban Portland mall.
I remember the year before I went to college up there they had a school
shooting in Springfield, OR, but that area is more rural and redneck-y
(stereotypes are fun). Obviously the similarities are an (apparently)
disturbed individual with access to weapons.
The
only thing I can really comment on was the TV coverage of this
incident. I flipped to CNN, expecting wall-to-wall coverage of the
event and was a tad disappointed with the sense that these types of
incidents are becoming blase to reporters. Fox News didn't cover the
event AT ALL, they had Bill O'Reilly on yelling at some people. I guess
that's not surprising. Is the new normal that these disturbing
shootings are just going to happen every 3 months, and unless more than
10 people die there's scant amount of coverage? Even right now on CNN.com,
the front headline is "GLOBE GOES GAGA FOR 12/12/12" while the Oregon
shooting is crammed off to the side of the page. Who the F cares about
12/12/12.
T, I appreciate your point that
NRA people say guns are necessary to protect themselves and their wealth
from bad people. But it's funny... the real bad people we should all
be worried about are bankers and financial institution pulling strings
behind the scenes that affect the livelihood and health of our economy.
No gun could stop them.
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Well a gun could stop them, but who wants to get lethal injection for knocking off Blankfein (who will just be replaced by a nastier guy)? :) Dang I am on the watch list for sure now. But it sends the wrong message that powerful bad people can only be defeated by violence. Maybe that was true during the European revolutions, but it is inspiring that blacks, Mexicans, women, and gays in America won more rights without having to kill any of their oppressors (though plenty of them were killed). It can happen on rare occasions at least, and is a testament to the good parts of our political system.
Yeah I hope Daily Show at least shames the MSM for their lack of coverage on this. My theory is that since it happened a a suburban mall in a city known for nice people during Xmastime, it would scare away a lot of holiday shoppers nationwide (or maybe inspire copycats). And the corporate-media complex definitely doesn't want that. But aren't people killed like every year due to Xmas shopping stampedes, fights over parking spots, etc.? That is an issue for another day.
As you said, these occasional shootings are the "price" that the gun lobby and Washington have decided that the public should pay for our "freedom to bear arms" (and their freedom to make $$$ off us). I don't think the CEO of Smith & Wesson and some redneck senator from GA should be allowed to make that call for everyone though. It will only change when someone of import or their loved ones are randomly killed by a deranged shooter who should not have been able to own a gun. But even Giffords didn't move the needle. After Columbine, public support for more gun control hit an all-time high, but the NRA weathered the storm and the public eventually forgot (as we always do). Now in the post-9/11 & great recession eras, there is no hope.
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Do you all feel that more coverage is the right answer? I feel at this point it is local news and a blurb on the national level. What benefit can there be with nonstop coverage?
Secondly, is access to guns really necessary for large scale killing? Aren't these mass shootings generally organized and planned? Guns may be easier to get but the barrier to entry for a home cooked pipe bomb isn't terribly high. Napalm, poison gas, all relatively simple to make from household products and Google. What about a knife and some pepper spray with a gas mask? I have a hard time believing these things would stop happening with more gun laws. that was stuff I came up with in 30 seconds. Imagine months of thought.
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I thought the coverage over the CO shooting was fairly substantial. Maybe because it occurred near Littleton, and the shooter was such an "interesting" character. It was also noteworthy that he was so heavily armed, much more than past shooters. More news coverage is not the "fix" to this problem, but more awareness and outrage is better than ignoring it.
I agree with M's comments that now we are desensitized to these kind of shootings and they aren't even shocking anymore (to some). I don't want the US to be like Baghdad or Juarez where the people are used to beheadded bodies showing up in a ditch every week. And more guns is not the answer to fix that. I think the scary part is that these shootings are "random-premeditated" and lack the traditional crime-of-passion profile. What I mean is that the shooter carefully planned to lash out at society over some grievance, but attacked random innocents rather than people who directly hurt him. How can you stop someone like that? I guess you can look for mental "warning signs" (there was much discussion of this after VA Tech and the cinema shooter), or you can do the easier and more effective thing - curtail access to guns. Every society has violent sociopaths and otherwise good people who get angry and do something they regret in the heat of the moment. You can't stop that from happening, but at least reduce the chance that those people can do major harm to others.
To address M2's comments: yes there is plenty of knowledge on the internet on how to harm others - either bombs or kung fu or whatever. But those take some effort to master and execute. Guns are the easy solution for mass violence. Based on US history, guns are a prerequisite for mass killings. There are notable exceptions like OK City and 9/11, but those were perpetrated by "professional" terrorists. With a $300 gun bought at Big 5, any Joe who poses no threat to anyone can instantly become Rambo. That is the problem. I guarantee that if guns were outlawed tomorrow, violent crime would plummet. In general, violent crime stats have been going down in the US since the 1990's, but the % of those crimes involving a gun has not declined and may even have risen. I think there are fewer gun murders per year combined in GER, FRA, and UK than Oakland. What's the difference? There are far fewer guns and no NRA/2nd Amendment in Europe.
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What is worse?
(a) A sick, pathetic man who fantasizes about harming innocents
(b) A sane, rational, powerful man who enables said sick man to actually carry out his fantasies, due to his own negligence, obsolete ideology, and/or the profit motive
Men in category (b) often lay 100% of the blame for tragedies on men of category (a) without ever considering their own involvement. I guess this issue relates to the free speech vs. Muslim violence topic we discussed before. How do you divide up blame between those who exercise their "freedoms" by provoking/enabling others to commit violence, and the actual physical perpetrators of the violence (who probably wouldn't have harmed anyone if those freedoms were exercised and regulated more responsibly)?
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Someone on Twitter said they need to rephrase "gun control" to "massacre prevention."
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Very good comment. Let's stop the NRA from framing this really simple issue only on their fallacious terms.
I
would encourage everyone to write their elected officials and protest.
Let them fear us more than the gun lobby. Of course I doubt anything
much will change, because if our leaders were the type to care more
about public good than political survival, then we wouldn't even need to
have this discussion.
But here is my attempt:
Dear X,
Stop
being a coward and start showing leadership. 10,000 Americans
die each year from gunfire, and there has been one major shooting
tragedy after another on the news. I am fed up. We are not
talking about an absolute ban here (though it seems to work fine in many
other nations), but there should be more scrutiny as to who can own
guns, and how they should be legally used and monitored. It shouldn't be
easier than getting a driver's license or a bank loan.
Do something about it, or we'll replace you with someone who will. Only Mayor Bloomberg had the guts to speak out against guns. Will you join him, along with millions of victims' loved ones and concerned Americans? Because if you don't, then the blood of more innocent children (outrageously sacrificed on the altar of corporate greed and petty politics) will be on your hands.
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I thought this was interesting, although I can't verify if it's all totally legit or not.
One thing I would like to point about the gun control
issue is that most crimes are committed with illegally obtained guns, as
the above link mentions. From the Freakonomics book, they did some
research and found that gun control in general, gun buybacks, stricter
laws, etc.don't have much of an effect on gun ownership because illegal
guns are obtained so easily anyway, at least here in America. In other
words, gun control has little to no effect on obtaining illegal guns, at
least according to Freakonomics.
To be clear, I'm not expressing any sort of stance on gun
control laws other than to say gun control's lack of effect on reducing
gun ownership. Much like the drug war and prohibition when a LOT of
people want something, they can find a way to get it one way or another.
If you're looking to seriously reduce gun ownership I think one would
should look at anti-tobacco campaigns. It's an useful comparison, as
less people smoke than ever and yet, a whole lot of people still smoke.
We're at a point in our culture that gun ownership is ingrained and it
would take several generations of increasingly stronger social taboos
(much like smoking) to even make a dent in the percentage. It makes me
wonder if it would be more effective to try to prevent people from
shooting up public places to begin with, whatever those reasons may be.
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Agreed. The pro-war people got so upset when all those white crosses were put up by Lafayette BART to remind us of the war dead. Why get mad at the protesters - they didn't send our troops overseas to die? We care more about unborn fetuses in this country than victims of violence.
Gun control DOES work, and there are literally dozens of examples in the world. America's patchwork, corrupt, and stupid gun control system is terrible, so we can't use that track record to totally dismiss the relationship between gun control and gun violence. Remember the GOP strategy: they want less gov't, so they have incentive to make gov't appear as corrupt and ineffective as possible, so voters will side with their views. Pro-gun forces want gun control to look as wrong, stupid, and counter-productive as possible, so that it may encourage people to oppose gun control. That is probably why the right has made so much out of "Fast and Furious" when it is really not a big deal (definitely not as bad as Iran Contra). Pro-gun politicians have handcuffed the ATF and made the laws so ridiculous that gun control is almost guaranteed to fail. But that doesn't mean it has to.
The article is right that the NRA has blocked the ATF and other law enf. from better tracking guns and sellers. Why? What do honest sellers have to fear? That isn't stopping our right to form regulated militias. It has nothing to do with gun rights, but it would impact gun sales. That is another problem for them. The gun industry doesn't really care who buys its products (African warlords, Mexican cartels, unstable people, etc.). So they are actually fighting law enf. and making our society (and the world) less safe because they want to sell to bad customers as well as lawful ones. I know there is the argument that "If people really want to get something, they'll find a way to get it." But criminals in Western Europe definitely want guns, and most still can't get them. And guns are not like drugs and booze. Prohibition was stupid (one of many reasons) because it erroneously assumed booze was the primary driver of social decay and undesirable behaviors. So they thought the cost-benefit of outlawing booze would be worth it. But with guns, they ARE the primary driver of gun violence, obviously. So in that case, prohibition or more regulation should produce better results. Some may argue that criminality, anger, and other human social forces are the main causes of violence, not guns themselves. Maybe so, but as we already discussed, humans are always going to be angry and violent at times. We probably can't 100% exorcise that from any society. But when we get crazy and mad and violent, at least we shouldn't have access to WMDs. Knifings and hit-and-runs may spike without guns, but fewer people would die. It's really not that complicated.
I agree with you that better socialization and education will help de-emphasize the gun in American culture. But already we see a difference. As that market research pdf I sent out showed, if you live in higher income, urban, educated areas, you are less likely to own a gun. It's just not a part of your lifestyle, so you probably are less opposed to gun control. But then again, the majority of mass shooters in the US have been somewhat educated, suburban, non-poor people. We tax what we want to discourage, right? Maybe it shouldn't be so cheap to buy body armor and assault rifles. I mean, those are expensive already, but quite affordable for the middle class. Tax guns, ammo, etc. 100% and I'm pretty sure violence would decrease. Use that money to fund education, counseling, and violence prevention programs. As you said, follow the smoking example.
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In general I think we could do with more and better gun control, and obviously these mass killings are tragic. But I worry about my own ability to be objective given that I'm not really a member of the culture around guns. That is, guns and gun ownership are a stereotypical red-state activity, and San Francisco is about as opposite-end from that as can be.
So let me play devil's advocate with this problem I've been thinking about: Why should alcohol be legal in the US?
Firearm homicides totaled 11,493 in 2009 (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/
Both firearms and alcohol
have recreational uses. Firearm recreation tends to be red-state only,
while alcohol recreation cuts across cultural lines, but they both have
that component.
Firearms have uses as tools,
for protection (from wild animals, criminals, tyrannical governments,
etc). Alcohol's use as a tool … social lubricant?
So
why should firearms be illegal, but alcohol should not? My immediate,
emotional reaction is "well guns are bad, and I like alcohol, so …
obviously." That's the difficulty being objective about firearms vs
alcohol.
I think the proper reason has to do
with preserving the state's monopoly on violence. That is, guns
undermine the rule of law by enabling a coercive strategy outside the
law. If criminals have guns, they can be more effective at enforcing and
sustaining their criminal culture outside of the rule of law. On the
public safety side (deaths vs legitimate uses), I think we should draw
the line in favor of more liberty, such that we'd allow both guns and
alcohol (ignoring the rule-of-law effects of guns).
Thanks, J. You are right, guns kill about 10K Americans per year. I said 50K in my OP, but that was over 2006-2010. Apologies.
For alcohol, of course there are more ways to die from it than car accidents, but I get your point. Culture aside and just thinking about policy here, I would say this:
From a personal freedoms and American values standpoint, I think we should allow some guns and booze in society. But not all forms and under all circumstances, obviously. Alcohol is not freely available. You have to be a certain age, the alcohol has to be inspected by gov. agencies, the seller has to have a license, and in some states you can't buy on Sunday or if the alc% is too high. All that makes some sense (to some people) and doesn't really preclude most consumers from using alcohol for its intended purposes and deriving some happiness from it. Not all users approve of all the current laws, but you can't please everyone. The goal is to maximize social utility without harming minorities too much, and accommodating some minorities if it doesn't cost overall society too much.
For guns, even the NRA would probably agree that private citizens should not be allowed to own and use depleted uranium rounds and anti-aircraft cannons. So some "reasonable" limitations on personal firearms makes sense, especially in the interests of public safety. You can't practice medicine without a license, you can't even be a sleazy realtor without passing some exam. So why in many red states can you buy and use a gun just by signing on a dotted line (even signing a false name)? You just need to pay some fee to get a "hunting license" - you don't even need to demonstrate basic knowledge and skills. It is reasonable to enforce background checks, cooling-off periods, mandatory regular training and certification, magazine size limits, concealment regs, etc. Many gun users will still be able to use guns for their intended purposes, and derive some pleasure from it. Some will be disappointed, but their sacrifice is probably worth more people being alive and un-maimed.
These regs may help reduce gun accidents, but I am not sure how to really stop murders. Maybe if we change the framing of the gun in society. Now it seen as a sign of being badass, how to settle scores, power, revenge, to get noticed, take what you want, etc. That is really bad. As you said, we can't condone violence as a means of resolving disputes (but as Michael Moore's film suggested - what message are we sending when our gov't uses violence to get what it wants overseas?). Of course guns are also seen as protection, deterrent, sporting equipment, etc. Maybe if people perceive them more from a risk and caution angle (what could happen if misused), we wouldn't be so cavalier about them (same with cars and booze). Some think of alcohol for the taste, for social lubrication, etc. Others think of it as a means to get crazy and date-rape women. Most products can be used for good and bad, and we can't really control how they are used once they leave the store. So all we have are social norms and expectations of behavior. Also, people think of sports cars differently than minivans. People think of assault rifles and hi-cap magazines in only a few ways, and they're generally detrimental to society. So outlaw or heavily restrict them. People think about .22 rifles and .38 revolvers much differently. Any of those weapons can bag a deer or stop a home intruder. But some are much more likely to be used in a school mass shooting.
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