Costs and Benefits of Guns

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Do_Good_Then_Go said:
I don’t know anyone who has a gun either and I’ve never even SEEN one in my actual daily life let alone held one or fired one or seen anyone else hold or fire one. I agree, the difference in culture and what is considered normal, acceptable, or at least not unusual is astonishing.

For anyone reading the thread who has a gun, would you be happy to leave it at home when travelling to a different country or would you feel a bit uneasy without it? Would you feel that you perhaps needed it more in a place where you were a ‘stranger’ or would you feel that it wasn’t needed if no-one else was likely to have one? Serious question, really want to know 🙂
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I do not currently own a gun. But there was a situation in which I’d have liked to have one close by…While in another country, a resident of an apartment building we were staying in went berserk, yelling, throwing things, truly unstable. We had no weapon. Thankfully, neither did he. But it was a very insecure feeling, especially since the police didn’t come for a very long time.
 
Also, someone pointed out that all but one of the multiple shootings since the 1950’s have occurred in GUN FREE ZONES. Hmmmm… I wonder why???
 
triumphguy said:
OK simple question, and a serious one:

We don’t live in India or the Middle East. We live in the developed west.

Why such a difference between Canada and the US?

We have the same rate of gun ownership. Probably fewer handguns, but probably more hunting rifles per capita.

Because this question is not just about guns is it? It’s also about culture.
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America is the most multicultural country in the world. The problem is, these cultures that come here no longer embrace the American way of life like they used to. My grandparents came here from Italy in the '20s and embraced the American way of life immediately. They assimilated into society, did whatever they could to learn English and embraced the American trinity - Liberty, In God We Trust and E Pluribus Unum. This is no longer the case.

Nowadays, liberals encourage each culture to hold on to their cultures with dear life. We are no longer E Pluribus Unum, or Out of Many, One. We are now Out of One, Many. We no longer have liberty in virtually any aspect of our lives. And the biggest of all, we no longer live under the most important of them all - In God We Trust. It is now In Government We Trust.
 
Bradski said:
Surely nobody could argue against severe restictions on assault weapons? Who needs to protect themselves with a semi-automatic rifle, for heaven’s sake.

And I’ve even seen comments today that it might be a good idea to restict gun access to mentally ill people. Say what? Mentally ill people have access to firearms? Tell me it ain’t so…
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How do you deal with multiple intruders?
 
smndtupidisaftr said:
How do you deal with multiple intruders?
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Not only that, but one of the main reasons of the 2nd Amendment was to ensure that the government never got too strong and had a way to overthrow them, if necessary.

I, then, hear people say that this is fear mongering and that this would never happen. But it has happened, and in this century! I can guarantee that the millions and millions of murdered Jews in Poland and Germany under Hitler, the Russians under Stalin and the Chinese under Mao would have done anything to be able to rise up against their dictators.
 
Back in college we had an apartment off campus, one day while I was at class the 300lb child sex offender (he buggered some boys under the age of 12) across the hall tried crashing through our door to do God knows what to my gf, she pointed our rifle at him and off he went, meek as a lamb. He was arrested and evicted since he couldnt post bail or his rent and we moved when I finished classes shortly after.

The gun was unloaded too. I am thankful to this day even a psycho will back down when presented with steel.

GUNS SAVE LIVES!
 
Statistics in Public Health has shown that guns ownership is more likely to result in the death of family members than it is to protect one from an intruder threatening one’s life.
 
Robert_Sock said:
Statistics in Public Health has shown that guns ownership is more likely to result in the death of family members than it is to protect one from an intruder threatening one’s life.
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Statistics also show that you’re more likely to die in a car accident than flying. We should probably ban cars and fly everywhere.

If you don’t like guns, don’t buy one. I sincerely hope that the situation never presents itself where you wish you had one.
 
dandingo said:
Statistics also show that you’re more likely to die in a car accident than flying. We should probably ban cars and fly everywhere.

If you don’t like guns, don’t buy one. I sincerely hope that the situation never presents itself where you wish you had one.
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I try to be prepared for death at any time. If somebody wants to murder me, so be it. But I’m not going to own a weapon. Guns are ridiculous.
 
Robert_Sock said:
I try to be prepared for death at any time. If somebody wants to murder me, so be it. But I’m not going to own a weapon. Guns are ridiculous.
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And what if someone tries to murder your loved ones? You may be OK with dying, but many people have reponsibilities to protect others.

God Bless
 
Robert_Sock said:
Statistics in Public Health has shown that guns ownership is more likely to result in the death of family members than it is to protect one from an intruder threatening one’s life.
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That is a completely false statement.

Kleck and Gertz (1994) reported 1.5 million defensive uses of firearms per year in the United States, with 1 out of every 6 of those being a situation where a life was likely saved as a result. The US Department of Justice did follow-up study where they cited Kleck and Gertz, and did their own sampling (Cook and Ludwig, 1997). The US DOJ report actually showed a much higher number 3.1 million, or approximately 1% of the US population every year used a gun for defensive purposes.

The same DOJ report cited approx. 1300 accidental deaths from firearms per year. This is a ratio of 1 accidental death per every 1153 times a gun is used for self defensive purposes based on the low number from Kleck and Gertz (1994) and 1 accidental death per every 2300 times a gun is used for defensive purposes (Cook and Ludwig, 1997).

Even if we take a major critic of the Kleck and Gertz (1994) study at their word and assume a 40% error and instead go with 1 out of every 10 times a gun was used defensively being a life or death situation, we still see a ratio of 110 lives saved through defensive use of a gun for every 1 accidental gun death (Hemmingway, 1996). In addition, if we base our numbers off the Depart of Justice study, we see a ratio of 300 lives saved through defensive use of a gun for every 1 accidental gun death (Cook and Ludwig, 1997; Hemmingway, 1996).
 
The best defense against a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.
 
Bradski said:
With some of the attitudes posted here in regard to guns, I don’t know if that’s a serious suggestion or not. Which is a sad reflection on how the discussion is going.
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If your kid was in the class, wouldn’t you have liked to have the teacher of that class armed so he could have prevented many deaths, likely even your son’s? I know I sure as heck would!
 
TheRealJuliane said:
But it was a very insecure feeling, especially since the police didn’t come for a very long time.
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I know that handguns make tens of thousands of woman feel secure as they won’t be an easy victim of rape while carrying a gun. I don’t want to take that feeling of security away from any reasonable non felon.
 
Bradski said:
Surely nobody could argue against severe restictions on assault weapons? Who needs to protect themselves with a semi-automatic rifle, for heaven’s sake.

And I’ve even seen comments today that it might be a good idea to restict gun access to mentally ill people. Say what? Mentally ill people have access to firearms? Tell me it ain’t so…
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Brad,

The issue should not be about ‘assault rifles’ which is a meaningless term for a semi-automatic rifle. If anything it should be about the number of bullets held in a clip. 30 round clips used to be banned I believe with the brady bill, that expired. But having a 10 round clip is simply convenient at the gun range. And handguns have something like that in their clips anyway, they are ‘assault pistols’? lol
 
Robert_Sock said:
I try to be prepared for death at any time. If somebody wants to murder me, so be it. But I’m not going to own a weapon. Guns are ridiculous.
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So don’t own one, but leave the others who want to own them alone u fashist lol
 
smndtupidisaftr said:
How do you deal with multiple intruders?
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With an assault rifle? What the…? Please don’t tell me you keep a loaded assault rifle in your house. Please don’t tell me that any guns you have aren’t under lock and key.
Bill_7154 said:
If your kid was in the class, wouldn’t you have liked to have the teacher of that class armed so he could have prevented many deaths, likely even your son’s? I know I sure as heck would!
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I guess you’re right. We should arm all teachers. And bus drivers. And hospital staff. And postmen. And priests. And librarians. And little league coaches. And the girl who does face painting at the mall. And the people at the old people’s home.

Hey, why don’t we make it compulsory that everyone has to carry a gun at all times. Think how much safer the world would be.
 
Bradski said:
With an assault rifle? What the…? Please don’t tell me you keep a loaded assault rifle in your house. Please don’t tell me that any guns you have aren’t under lock and key.

I guess you’re right. We should arm all teachers. And bus drivers. And hospital staff. And postmen. And priests. And librarians. And little league coaches. And the girl who does face painting at the mall. And the people at the old people’s home.

Hey, why don’t we make it compulsory that everyone has to carry a gun at all times. Think how much safer the world would be.
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How about we let adults be adults and choose for themselves? Naw, you need to poke at them and tell them what to do, don’t you???
 
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