Connecticut (et al)

[laklak]

Despite your opinions on this (and the opinions of a few million other gun 'enthusiasts'), the second amendment no longer has a purpose in a modern civilised society. A civilian militia is not required, and that was what that amendment was set up for.

It isn't necessary to vote, there are plenty of functioning societies that don't allow it. People are born, marry, have kids, eat meals, do all sorts of things without the right to vote. Why is free speech necessary? Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean. Why should the police be unable to search your home without a legal warrant? If you have done nothing wrong then you shouldn't object, after all, it's for the Good Of The Many. We all know that there's no possibility of a tyrannical despot taking control of any civilized 21st Century country. That sort of thing only happened in the 20th century, we're all far too advanced and educated for a Hitler or Stalin or Mao to rise to power. We've got laws against that sort of thing, you know.

[Jason]

Off duty cop with CCW stops potential killing spree in its tracks, only local media reports: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_ ... z2GOP72zBX

Wonder why major media doesn't pick up stories like that.....

It's your media. I guess these stories don't sell well to the majority of the public? Maybe the majority of the public doesn't like CCW regardless of these rare occurrences for which you cannot provide statistics. Dunno. But the important point in this instance I bolded, then underlined just one word so even a gun-nutter could see it.

From your perspective, what's the important aspect of that?

Training.

[Blind groper]

Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean.

You mean ask one of the survivors after incompetent government in North Korea starved the rest to death?

Afraid your examples are meaningless, Laklak.

The second amendment is quite different to any other human 'right'. The second amendment is about preserving tools for killing people. Can you not see how this is harmful?

[Seth]

I've posted numerous examples of people who were saved from death or injury by their firearms, but like a petulant child you just ignore any facts that conflict with your mania.

There are examples of people who have been saved from death or injury that didn't have firearms.
You're not really making a valid point.

Of course it's a valid point. The fact that other tactics and tools work in some situations doesn't change the fact that the handgun is the most effective tool for self defense ever invented because it can be used to dispense at least four levels of force; warning (by merely saying you have or displaying the weapon); threat (by drawing and aiming the weapon); non-lethal discharge (warning shot or wounding shot...neither being recommended); and lethal force to stop an imminent deadly attack.

Other weapons can do the same thing, but not from a distance sufficient to keep an attacker out of direct contact.

No other weapon, except another firearm, can do that.

When someone invents such a tool that will allow instant incapacitation of an attacker from distances up to 50 yards or more away that is 100 percent effective in all situations (unlike Tasers) then I'll consider putting my handgun in the safe and carrying that tool.

Until then, I'll carry a pistol.

[Blind groper]

As I have said repeatedly, there is no credible evidence to suggest that a gun for self defense is a positive factor, and there is a lot of evidence to suggest that it is harmful.

60% of all women killed in the home by someone else are killed by husband or male partner - not by some marauding stranger or home invader. And a woman's chances of being murdered increase about 3 fold if a gun is kept in the home compared to no gun.

Even males killed in the home are killed mostly by people they know - so-called friends or acquaintances. For a man to be murdered in the home by a stranger is true in a minority of such murders. A large number of those murders by 'friends' involves that 'friend' using the home owners gun.

And then there is the statistic that 87% of killings in the home are suicide - which becomes more common (from 2 to 10 times more common, depending on secure or insecure storage, according to the New England Journal of Medicine) when a gun is in the home. The suicide might, of course, be the gun owner. But it is also, and tragically, common for it to be another member of the gun owners family.

In short, keeping a gun is lousy for self defense and strongly increases the risk of a member of the family being murdered or committing suicide.

[Seth]

Google Lott. All you will find are criticisms for his report. His paper is not factual, and it's the only one you have, Seth. You lose.

Funny, when I google "John Lott" I see plenty of support and a lot of whining by media personalities who disagree with him, but not a single credible refutation of his work.

But let's look atthis:

Consider the findings from two of the most widely cited studies in the field: McDowall et al. (1998), using the data from 1992 and 1994 waves of the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), found roughly 116,000 defensive gun uses per year, and Kleck and Gertz (1995), using data from the 1993 National Self-Defense Survey (NSDS), found around 2.5 million defensive gun uses each year.

Many other surveys provide information on the prevalence of defensive gun use. Using the original National Crime Survey, McDowall and Wiersema (1994) estimate 64,615 annual incidents from 1987 to 1990. At least 19 other surveys have resulted in estimated numbers of defensive gun uses that are similar (i.e., statistically indistinguishable) to the results founds by Kleck and Gertz. No other surveys have found numbers consistent with the NCVS (other gun use surveys are reviewed in Kleck and Gertz, 1995, and Kleck, 2001a).

So, even if we discard Kleck and Gertz's work (not Lott's) we find that the NCVS, performed by the federal government, says that DGUs occur more than 100,000 times per year. That number, which is almost certainly way low because many DGUs are not reported, comprises about 8 percent of the number of violent crimes which occurred in 2010 according to the FBI UCR:

In 2010, an estimated 1,246,248 violent crimes occurred nationwide, a decrease of 6.0 percent from the 2009 estimate.

If we consider murders only, the DGU uses are six times the number of murders.

An estimated 14,748 persons were murdered nationwide in 2010. This was a 4.2 percent decrease from the 2009 estimate, a 14.8 percent decrease from the 2006 figure, and an 8.0 percent decrease from the 2001 estimate.

Since we cannot tell how many DGUs prevented murders it's impossible to say what the murder rate would have been without DGUs, but we can say that AT LEAST 100,000 people who would have been victims of crime were not victimized because they had a gun.

And I lean more towards Kleck and Gertz's numbers because it's more credible given the fact that there is no requirement to report a DGU that doesn't involve injuring or killing someone. I know for a fact that such non-lethal deterrent DGUs happen because I've done it a couple of times as a licensed civilian. So have several other people I know who also carry.

You may dispute the numbers all you like, but it's irrelevant anyway because if ONE SINGLE DGU prevents ONE PERSON from being victimized by a criminal then the right to keep and bear arms for lawful self defense is entirely vindicated. You cannot ethically or morally say that that one person, or however many more might have used a firearm defensively, are or were not entitled to possess the firearm because, statistically, their victimization was minor or paltry compared to the incidences of criminals using firearms to commit crimes. Such arguments are completely immoral and unethical because they reduce the absolute and unquestionable right of the individual to effective self defense against criminal victimization to an immoral and evil collective calculus of the worth of one innocent man's life against the vacuous fears of the collective that some armed law-abiding citizen might go suddenly and spontaneously berserk and therefore all of society must be disarmed against that eventuality.

No person's right to life may be taken away from him based on a statistical estimate of potential harm to others if he chooses to defend his life.

[Woodbutcher]

I accept the 1/20th that this shows. If one defensive gun use saves a life and you use this to justify gun ownership, wouldn't one aggressive criminal or neglicent non-criminal gun death justify a total ban?

[Blind groper]

Since we cannot tell how many DGUs prevented murders it's impossible to say what the murder rate would have been without DGUs, but we can say that AT LEAST 100,000 people who would have been victims of crime were not victimized because they had a gun.

But other countries with no right to bear arms, and where very, very few people carry a gun, the violent crime rate is similar to the USA and the murder rate is a quarter or less. Or look at the 200 million Americans who do not own a gun. There is no evidence whatever that they are victimised or murdered more often than the 100 million Americans who do own a gun.

Sorry, Seth. Your conclusions are garbage.

[orpheus]

I've posted numerous examples of people who were saved from death or injury by their firearms, but like a petulant child you just ignore any facts that conflict with your mania.

There are examples of people who have been saved from death or injury that didn't have firearms.
You're not really making a valid point.

Of course it's a valid point. The fact that other tactics and tools work in some situations doesn't change the fact that the handgun is the most effective tool for self defense ever invented because it can be used to dispense at least four levels of force; warning (by merely saying you have or displaying the weapon); threat (by drawing and aiming the weapon); non-lethal discharge (warning shot or wounding shot...neither being recommended); and lethal force to stop an imminent deadly attack.

Other weapons can do the same thing, but not from a distance sufficient to keep an attacker out of direct contact.

No other weapon, except another firearm, can do that.

When someone invents such a tool that will allow instant incapacitation of an attacker from distances up to 50 yards or more away that is 100 percent effective in all situations (unlike Tasers) then I'll consider putting my handgun in the safe and carrying that tool.

Until then, I'll carry a pistol.

Excellent case you've made for why guns truly are substantially different from other weapons. Most gun nuts insist that there's no difference: gun, knife, car, rock - they're all the same. I'm glad you admit that guns are particularly bad.

[Warren Dew]

Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean.

You mean ask one of the survivors after incompetent government in North Korea starved the rest to death?

Afraid your examples are meaningless, Laklak.

The second amendment is quite different to any other human 'right'. The second amendment is about preserving tools for killing people. Can you not see how this is harmful?

The second amendment is about preserving the ability to overthrow tyrants or prevent them from coming to power.

[Tero]

I thought it was about militias. The British could attack out in the territories. Areas with no forts. Other than that, the states needed militias when the feds were of no help.

[JimC]

Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean.

You mean ask one of the survivors after incompetent government in North Korea starved the rest to death?

Afraid your examples are meaningless, Laklak.

The second amendment is quite different to any other human 'right'. The second amendment is about preserving tools for killing people. Can you not see how this is harmful?

The second amendment is about preserving the ability to overthrow tyrants or prevent them from coming to power.

Funnily enough, most other modern democracies manage to muddle along quite nicely, letting the normal political and legal processes do the job without relying on crazed individual gunmen to protect them from tyrants...

[Svartalf]

Many of them are in sore need of a good revolution to improve people's lots... Remember, the Bastille was taken for its light artillery and powder stores.

[Warren Dew]

Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean.

You mean ask one of the survivors after incompetent government in North Korea starved the rest to death?

Afraid your examples are meaningless, Laklak.

The second amendment is quite different to any other human 'right'. The second amendment is about preserving tools for killing people. Can you not see how this is harmful?

The second amendment is about preserving the ability to overthrow tyrants or prevent them from coming to power.

Funnily enough, most other modern democracies manage to muddle along quite nicely, letting the normal political and legal processes do the job without relying on crazed individual gunmen to protect them from tyrants...

To the contrary: most of Europe was under the control of a tyrant only a few decades ago - and not for the first time since our second amendment was written.

[JimC]

Living in a society that will jail or kill you for criticizing the government should be no big deal, because there really is no necessity to criticize your government as long as you are kept safe and supplied with enough food to survive. Ask any North Korean.

You mean ask one of the survivors after incompetent government in North Korea starved the rest to death?

Afraid your examples are meaningless, Laklak.

The second amendment is quite different to any other human 'right'. The second amendment is about preserving tools for killing people. Can you not see how this is harmful?

The second amendment is about preserving the ability to overthrow tyrants or prevent them from coming to power.

Funnily enough, most other modern democracies manage to muddle along quite nicely, letting the normal political and legal processes do the job without relying on crazed individual gunmen to protect them from tyrants...

To the contrary: most of Europe was under the control of a tyrant only a few decades ago - and not for the first time since our second amendment was written.

But in the end, all those tyrants were sorted out, not by armed civilians, but by mass political and military action.

Your 2nd amendment was perhaps relevant to the original struggle for independence. After that, an absurd anachronism, used by selfish individuals as window dressing for their personal gun obsessions.