“Duplicating laws already on the books as Gavin Newsom and all anti-gun advocates want is, and I quote, ‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.’
“Do you want to reduce shootings? Educate. No young person I have ever known who has been taught proper gun safety and taught the seriousness of handling/owning a firearm has ever committed any criminal shooting.” – Kim Dromlewicz in a letter to the editor to the San Jose Mercury News, Making Guns Taboo Not the Answer
Blasphemy. We cannot expose children to such things. Certainly not if it would cut into their tranny storytime. They have more important things to do in school like learn about the 73 genders. We don’t want our children exposed to violent and racist NRA propaganda. Fear and ignorance. That’s all they need to grow up healthy and obedient.
There. You nailed it!
Ignorance is freedom.
Stupidity is sublime.
“So sayeth the shepherd.”
“So sayeth the flock.”
Now, this is bucking the trend in silly cone valley.
Crazy, evil and wicked can come from anywhere and can seem to come out of nowhere. Training crazy, evil or wicked will not eradicate them. Training the victims of crazy, evil or wicked can eradicate them. And the important thing is that when they are identified they be eliminated as soon as possible, and that usually involves a g un in the hands of a good guy.
Disagree with premise of article.
The gangsters I’ve seen practicing at local ranges already have an intended purpose for their gun, and it ain’t self defense. Last thing I’d want anyone to do is train them so they’d actually be better shots.
As I said above, training the wicked to be proficient in the use of firearms will not make them stop being wicked. However, a father training his son to be proficient in the use of firearms CAN prevent the son from associating with the wrong crowd and becoming wicked.
Or training an unsuspecting looking woman or soft targets to make these punk bitch shooters think about walking up on a school or something if they know everyone including the women are packing
@G
I’ve always wondered: if one city took on the experiment of training and equipping every willing, able and mentally healthy woman, what would happen to the rates of sexual assault and rape within two years? Always wondered that.
@Elaine: I recall reading articles mentioning that there was a surge in rape in Orlando some years ago. The Sheriff offered free classes to women to train them to carry. The articles stated that rape fell in subsequent years.
I wouldn’t attach a lot of significance to this report; but, it’s to your point. Lots of variables to account for.
There is a circularity of causation. Suppose the state of Confusion where there is a lot of violent crime. People will buy guns to protect themselves. In the state of Pacific where there is no crime (nor hunting nor ranges nor a gun culture) people won’t buy crimes. So, when you run a correlation between crime and guns you get a positive correlation. Which is the driver? Is it the criminals and their guns? Or, the law-abiding self defenders and their guns?
I find it annoying when non-gun people complain that there isn’t enough data on points of interest that will not illuminate much. They would like to know precisely which kinds of guns and how many are owned by household so that they can run correlations with the demographics of those households. Great; we won’t let them anywhere near that data. So, forget it.
Now, how about we get data from death certificates of who dies from suicide. How about the number of young children who die by gunshot suicide vs. die by drowning suicide in bathtubs. We don’t have any objections to compiling and publishing this sort of data. If we had it we would know whether to lock-up our guns or replace our bathtubs with showers when we have young children in the house. Without this data we get poster-child pictures of a young child who was killed by a gunshot. We don’t get pictures of a Chicago morgue filled with gang-bangers shot-up by . . . whom? Old fat white guys wearing sheets?
We, in the gun community, have a pretty good raw sense of the data from what is made available by CDC and FBI. Most of the homicide by gun is ethnic-on-ethnic crime.
Yes, guns are a factor. Half of suicides are by gun; half by other means. Half of domestic homicides are by gun; half by other means. What counts for problem definition? Gun suicides; or, all suicides? Gun domestic homicides; or, all domestic homicides.
We PotG are mighty pissed-off that gun-control advocates won’t confront questions such as these. Our challenges go unanswered. Why? Where is the conversation they are crying for? They want no conversation; they want only a diatribe.
Less collateral damage. Gangsters killing more gangsters and fewer bystanders is a win I’d take.
This. The more gangsters train, the less little girls will get shot by accident. More training means higher hit ratios on their usual targets – other gangsters.
Win – win!
elaine. You’re starting to sound more and more like ‘I support 2a, but……..’
Starting??
JWM , funny how I thought the same thing.
@jwm
I actually don’t believe in “for/against” 2A. The 2A is there, it’s part of the foundation of our society, it ain’t going away. Period. As such to me “for/against” 2A is a misnomer, it’s like saying you are for or against the sun or something.
I do have skepticism about whether the original intent of the 2A is as broad as some seem to believe. Given that there was gun control at the time of the 2A and there were all kinds of restrictions. Also that states have been okayed to imposed their own restrictions by SCOTUS.
Personally I believe that agreeing to SOME restrictions might be better long term than taking a hard line stance that is less and less popular with the public and simply doesn’t have the base for popular support given how few people are really interested in the issues or own the types of guns that would be affected by bans.
I certainly understand the “no concessions” stance but I don’t realistically see how that can work given that those of us who are scary gun owners, and I’m one of those mind you, are such a small percentage of even the gun owning population that even if we all agreed on certain things, which we don’t, there just wouldn’t be the leverage.
The difference between theory and practice perhaps. I’ve done some legislative work. I’ve worked on trying to get “reciprocity” in a different field and seen how impossible it is. There’s how things “should” be and then there’s how they are.
“I do have skepticism about whether the original intent of the 2A is as broad as some seem to believe. Given that there was gun control at the time of the 2A and there were all kinds of restrictions. Also that states have been okayed to imposed their own restrictions by SCOTUS. ”
What a cornucopia of conflation and ignorance.
1. You do not read original sources, you listen to (read) left-wing, liberal pablum about the founding.
2. You do not know the theory of government that resulted in the Constitution (hint: it wasn’t about a smothering government intruding into every aspect of individual life).
3. You imagine the founding and history of the nation through the lens of liberal, anti-American education.
4. You do not understand the difference between central government and State governance as they existed at the beginning.
5. You believe that the original States permitted the central government to determine the nature of weaponry the States, and “the people” that was to be used to throw-off attempts by the central government to use police/military power to subjugate the States into a vassal kingdom.
Stick to hardware and training, you are incompetent to discuss law, the founding, the Constitution, the Second Amendment.
@Sam
I look forward to your thoroughly-researched, fully-notated articles, with references included, for TTAG.
Not sure which comment your note is related to, however…
You haven’t been around very long. Many of us pepper our comments with direct references. So much research data has been presented on this blog that many aspects are already known to the club. Scratching my head, but I don’t remember any or you “unique viewpoint” having any substantiating references, or hard numbers.
…. I did congratulate Dan for having you show up on this blog. You are a much better punching bag that the one before you. Doesn’t matter that you are a complete fraud, the clicks keep coming, and we all have fun. Good show.
“Personally I believe that agreeing to SOME restrictions might be better long term than taking a hard line stance that is less and less popular with the public and simply doesn’t have the base for popular support given how few people are really interested in the issues or own the types of guns that would be affected by bans.”
Indeed Ms. D. We are faced with the FACT that there are more than 200 million guns (and that’s a conservative estimate) in our country. You would think that some restrictions would and should apply. I’m not saying to deny ownership of firearms to the law-abiding but I really do not think that having a dozen variants of an AR-15 in your home warrants “normal” behavior. I mean we’re not talking Harley’s, or Rolex’s or vintage auto’s. We’re talking about an object which is basically designed to do one thing only and do it well.
I guess I better explain myself before I get engulfed by the flames of 2A madness. I own several handguns and I love going to the range and shooting them. I also practice a lot of defensive shooting because defense was and is the primary reason for me to own a gun in the first place. I do own an old Mauser that I use strictly for hunting. I do not own an AR-15 or a shotgun, or a carbine. I understand that there are folks who “collect” firearms. I get it. What I don’t get is the obsession to own every single type of firearm ever invented just so I can fight off tyranny, which at this point in our country is unlikely. Yes, things can go south quick and the the liberal front can be a cause for concern but the many clashes I’ve witnessed in the Northwest are overblown barroom brawls.
I think we’ve reached a point on both sides of the issue that too much of anything is not good. Too much rhetoric and fake news and too many guns owned by too many people. We need to make some hard choices and we need to make them soon.
Agree. Free exercise of constitutionally protected rights should be predicated on: need; amount already used; adequate justification for more use. Each person should be issued (by government) a basic ration of usage for each constitutionally protected right, with UBC required for petitioning for more usage. Score to be kept by a benign, non-partisan, objective government agency.
For the children.
@Eli2016
Personally, I’d rather we try to regulate the people than the arms, because the people are really the problem here. I know so many gun owners who have ridiculous numbers of guns and they are such incredibly law abiding and good people, so I don’t believe the guns are the problem. It’s the bad owners who are the problem.
However, the “bad owners” are the ones that no one can seem to figure out a plan for. And that small subset of super crappy owners makes it bad for the rest of us. And we have no plan and no good data and no good public policy on what to do here. Most active shooters are not mentally ill, so there goes the “crazies and we can fix this with mental health” argument. They also mostly own their guns legally, so there goes the “if we just get rid of illegal guns that’ll fix it” argument. It’s a conundrum.
“However, the “bad owners” are the ones that no one can seem to figure out a plan for. ”
Wrongo !
The plan is to remove guns from the “good owners”, because it is, like, uuhhmm, you know, really hard to deal with “bad owners”. But at least removing guns from “good owners” would show we care, and stuff.
@Elaine: I agree with you. My sister-in-law collected tiny tea spoons; with little emblems representing various places (states). Did she have too many tea spoons? I have lots of screw drivers, lots of cutlery. Do I have too many sharp objects? There seems to be relatively little correlation (let alone causation) between the numbers of guns someone has and the damage he does with them. Even the Mandalay Bay shooter didn’t use very many of the guns he brought with him.
Can we say that the Army has too many guns? The police have too many guns. A holster gun. A back-up gun. A drop gun to plant on a perpetrator. A long gun in the car. Would BLM be so much happier if cops didn’t have so many guns?
We must call upon those who whine “there are TOO many guns” to explain how they think this operates.
And, yes, there is the issue of “crazy” people. I expect the mental health field to at least define the problem here. You folks own the DSM-V; it’s your responsibility to figure out which diagnosis codes are the ones that deserve to be disabling. Is ED disabling? Can we say that a male suffering severely with ED is incompetent (because he is impotent)? Then, what can we say about a female? And, for any diagnosis that you professionals deem disabling, how do you put a caliper on the case to say that this guy’s case is so severe that he is not competent?
I’m not complaining here. I don’t trivialize the difficulty involved. Perhaps it’s impossible to do what I imagine. Perhaps its possible, but beyond our reach today. Nevertheless, if we are going to have a law (Prohibited-Person law) that strips a person of his Constitutional right, then it can’t be based on “spectral evidence”. This isn’t Salem.
We sort of have our handle on criminal disablement. It’s not a good grip, but, at least we have a judge/jury that serves as a trier of fact and comes to a verdict. It’s an adversarial process with procedural rights that protect the defendant. Yet, here, we still fail. In two ways.
First, there are the cases that come to the attention of the criminal justice system but the prosecutor decides to not-charge, down-grade the charges, or flubs the case. Second, we have the cases where society doesn’t notice aberrant behavior; or, doesn’t file a complaint. The perpetrator has a perfectly clean record. Not even a suspension of his library card. And yet, he “snapped”.
I think the error might lie in ourselves; in our search for “the solution” in somehow discovering “those that shouldn’t have them”. I mentioned to you elsewhere that through the 19’th century in England a criminal or lunatic could drop into a gun shop and walk out with his purchase with no impediment whatsoever. And yet, they didn’t have enough of a gun crime problem to bother tabulating. I’m certainly not suggesting that we eagerly take-up this approach today. But, the observation ought to give us pause. We may quest for the Holy Grail; that doesn’t mean that we will ever find it, let alone that it really exists.
I fear you are overlooking the cosmic, natural, universal law of “need”. People only need a little bit of everything. Just like too much booze, too much freedom and liberty makes people do stupid stuff. The founders never considered letting the masses have all the liberty enjoyed by the elites of the day. The natural order of things was that certain people were created to rule, and certain people were created to be ruled. Being ruled meant having superior intellect regulate (as in control) needs of the people.
This is all very simple, isn’t it?
Elaine, if you’re on board with regulating (restricting) owners but not banning guns themselves, what do you think about the new law in Washington state? Is that the kind of gun-owner regulation you can get behind?
@Ing
I haven’t looked at that one yet. I’m going to over the next week. I’ve been looking at the ERPO guidelines for Maryland along with my BF, who is LEO. Each of these sets of laws varies by state, so they have to be taken on a state by state basis.
Thus far, looking at the Maryland law, it’s broad enough to leave me with lots of questions. It mentions reviewing evidence submitted by someone requesting an ERPO, but doesn’t say what that evidence needs to be, or how much of it, or what qualifies as being enough or strong enough for a “go ahead.” It says that a mental health worker can request one, but it’s unclear to me how that interfaces with HIPPA. And so forth. I’ll see if I can take a look at the Washington law sometime in the next week. Sometimes the laws get purposefully written broadly and then “rules” to enforce the law are issued by a state agency. It works that way in TX for some things.
The only “gun control” at the time of the 2A (1791) was that all able bodied men between 18-47 were expected to keep their rifle “well regulated” (in proper working order) and a store of dry powder. Revolvers had been invented well over 100 years earlier, and congress had seen the design of the puckle gun. Lewis and Clark were equipped with an air-rifle repeater, and chain guns were becoming common. Even primitive cartridges existed at the time. Absolutely ALL gun restrictions are unconstitutional.
Unfortunately, while agreeing all gun control is unconstitutional, history does not support the theory entirely.
The national compact of sovereign States (which were former colonies and could be considered individual nations) was a proclamation of what the central, limited, restricted, constrained government was permitted to do (and what it was specifically told it could not do). The States did not give up their Sovereignty to manage internal affairs as they say fit – except in those few areas where the central government was given primary jurisdiction. The result was the States were free to control firearms (and almost everything else) within their borders as they determined was necessary or useful.
Ironically, in an effort to abolish the powers of the individual States, a constitutional amendment was ratified requiring the States (now the inferior party to the constitution) to apply the constitution to every State. If logic is followed (and it clearly is not), the States then were prohibited from infringing in anyway on the right of their citizens to keep and bear arms. Such a condition being inconvenient for the central government, Congress informally agreed that legislation could serve the same purpose as constitutional amendments whenever convenient*. Thus we have both the central and state governments using simple legislation to modify the constitution without availing themselves of the amendment process.
Always keep in mind that the central government will permit states to do as they please, so long as it is convenient for the central government. Thus, if one, or several, states pass laws removing all restrictions on firearms, the central government will enforce national legislation to the contrary. So much for states following the constitution.
*Re state nullification of federal drug laws, and federal immigration laws.
@Sam: You raise an important point on the tension between Federal and State laws regulating guns. Let’s take something not especially contentious; let’s say a law regulating minors bearing arms. Vermont forbids children under 16 from carrying handguns. Sixteen was probably the low-water-mark for militia service in the founding era; so, it’s not especially obvious that Vermont is “infringing” upon “the right of the People”. To carry the argument forward, let’s assume Vermont is Constitutional here.
Now, then, the 14A clearly was expected to apply the 2A to the states. In any case, SCOTUS “incorporated” the 2A on the states in McDonald. So, IF there really IS a “right of the People to keep and bear arms” then that right may neither be infringed by the Federales nor the states. Seemingly, we have a level playing field here on which the Feds and states are equally constrained.
And yet, I wholeheartedly agree with you that the Feds are supposed to regulate interstate matters and the states to regulate “domestic” matters.
Strategically, most of us are wary about the Feds legislating about guns insofar as it concerns activities that are clearly within the boundaries of a single state’s jurisdiction. It may be all very well for the Feds to license inter-state dealings in arms; but keeping and carrying should be a state responsibility. We see this clearly in the debate over “National Reciprocity”.
We are – and I think justifiably so – concerned that whenever Congress legislates gun-control concerning conduct within any state that erodes the tradition of states’ rights to police guns within their own boundaries. The more we invite Congress to grant us relief from states, the more we erode this intra- vs inter-state boundary. We should invite the gun controllers to fight us in every state’s legislature until we hold our last ground in Alaska.
If this strategy is deemed to be persuasive (I invite debate here) then I think we need to adopt a posture of being relatively amenable to more state regulation of arms than we are of federal regulation. E.g., we should graciously admit that Vermont is within its police power – and not in violation of the 2A – in forbidding its children of tender years from bearing handguns unsupervised. Vermont may be content to convincing its infants to bearing long arms unsupervised. After all, the children of some other state – perhaps Rhode Island – might not be so thoroughly trained-to-arms as are Vermont children.
Accepting more state regulation than we think is just and legitimate may be a worthwhile strategic sacrifice to preserve a barrier against national infringement by Congress. Not a pretty nor principled position. Nevertheless, real politik is often not pretty nor principled.
What you propose is a return to first principles. The problem is that the federal government imposed “shall not be infringed” upon the states. If one starts from there, the states cannot regulate/control firearm possession of their citizens (though states clearly do so). The question then becomes how is “citizen” (or “the people”) defined? Who defines it, states or federal government?
What happens if the federal government imposes legislation that no one under the age of 21 may possess firearms without the direct supervision and control of a person 21 or over? This is an analog to UBC. Currently, federal gun control does not prohibit states from creating laws that permit private sales of guns without any background check by a state of federal background check. Introduce national UBC, and all states must conform.
Gun control laws are the nose of the camel, but in a manner most do not expect – suppression of states so as to make them political precincts of an all-powerful national government. The hopscotch nature of differences between the laws of the states, and the federal government is irrational to a national government. The desire is to supplant states, making the entire concept of “state” irrelevant.
He didn’t say train. He said educate. He said safety.
Please re-read….then re-post.
Gun education IS gun training. I don’t see how you’re making a distinction. Gun education is hands-on education about how to handle a gun and hit your target.
I’ve been teaching my son about firearms safety for over 4 years. He is yet to fire a shot from a real firearm and that includes air rifles and rimfires.
I am trying to get safe handling practices instilled to the point they are reflex actions.
Teaching firearm safety may be PART of your training but its not the same as training someone with a firearm. Stop being dishonest again and just walk it back.
Here is your original comment that you keep deflecting…..ooops i mean forgetting.
“Last thing I’d want anyone to do is train them so they’d actually be better shots.”
The article was about gun safety and education. Not training thugs to shoot like you misrepresent.
Elaine D ……If these people were better shots, maybe they would not wound so many innocent bystanders with their spay and pray shootings. Better marksmanship might enable them to eradicate each other faster. Just a thought.
@Ed
yeah. Someone said that on another thread. And if they were only shooting each other….hell, I’d say let’s just get them an island and put them all on it and film it like “Survivor.”
However, these guys are all up in things like human trafficking and other stuff too so the firearms are used in those contexts and also to chase down your small time drug dealer who dumbly gets in too deep and ends up owing money. And to get into gunfights with cops.
“However, these guys are all up in things like human trafficking and other stuff too so the firearms are used in those contexts and also to chase down your small time drug dealer who dumbly gets in too deep and ends up owing money. And to get into gunfights with cops.”
Wonderful reasons to have government confiscate guns from law-abiding citizens. Without guns in the hands of non-criminals, only the really bad guys will have guns, and we know they don’t bother “nice” people in “nice” places.
Actually, you only gave further support to the idea that we should put fences around crime infested neighborhoods, round up all the suspected gang members (asset forfeiture, anyone?) and put them in controlled spaces, and, yes, let them have at it. Glad to see you coming around.
@Sam
As I’m sure you know, it doesn’t work like that.
Most heroin “customers” who have come to me for help are white and upper middle class. From very nice neighborhoods indeed.
You can get heroin for about $10 in any of the swanky high schools here.
Wealthy kids are completely mixed up in this mess.
But how do you know they’re actual gang bangers?
…Cartel tattoos?
I didn’t know Gangsters practiced…
Did they have their Glocks turned sideways..elevated pointed down?
How do you define gangster?
just askin’
@Manse
Yup. They practice at a few ranges here, and take BJJ classes too apparently.
@Manse
I recently ran into my former Wing Tsun instructor doing RSO work at a range. I was surprised to see him working there because he lives just down the street from one of “those” ranges, and this range is easily 30 minutes away.
So I pulled him aside and asked him why he was doing work there instead of at the range that’s less than a mile from his house. His answer matches what I’ve said here.
I agree. The shooter in the Boarderland incident was a Marine machine-gunner. He had all the proper training. Doubtlessly, plenty of other murderers – mass and single incident killers – were also adequately trained.
I hasten to add that I think that we should train our youth – and any interested adults – in safe gun handling. This is a worth-while endeavor.
Nevertheless, to do so does not address the source of the problems we have with gun violence; nor with suicide. (Probably accidents, but these are not statistically numerous enough to be a concern here.)
To train large numbers of citizens in safe gun-handling could – arguably – be part of the solution. The more citizens we have who are knowledgeable about guns the clearer our public policy will be on the nature of the problems and the solutions. The more armed citizens carrying in public places the better we will limit the damage from violent people who will always be armed.
We need to maintain clarity of thought here. The article’s thesis doesn’t pass muster.
Agreed that you can never go wrong teaching anything correctly about firearms to anyone. Just think it’s got nothing to do with solving the kind of violence that has people upset at this point. Unfortunately.
I dunno about that. The carnage being confined to the gangbangers, with no bystanders getting hit, would be an improvement over the status quo.
Elaine D
Every child deserves an education. What they do with it is out of our control. But we can give them expectations and rules to follow. Most don’t know about their civil rights or the responsibilities that go with them. Teaching “bad” kids about guns and holding them accountable, can lead to building a “good” student.
Liberals want to teach children about sexual issues. But not about their birthright as future gun owners and their responsibilities.
“Firearm Education: Teaching the Second Amendment in Kentucky school system grades K through 12”
http://digitalcommons.murraystate.edu/bis437/149
There is a misunderstood element here that is being widely missed. Proper training can, but won’t necessarily, make you a better and/or safer gun handler. Your peer group wields a heavy influence, especially when you are younger. In social groups like gangs, where conformity to group norms is violently and rigidly enforced, even a well trained person may well adhere to unsafe, foolish, and illegal, gun handling norms in order to avoid censure.
In any case, the simple fact is that NO laws or restrictions can prevent willful misuse of guns by those, trained or not, who have evil intentions.
The element being missed by nearly everyone is an attitude held by America’s founders, encapsulated neatly in a T-shirt I have. It reads: “The 2nd Amendment was never intended to guarantee your safety, it was intended to guarantee your ability to fight back.” Training will definitely enhance that, but the attitude is the most crucial thing.
Elaine,
Its a pure math / logic issue. We have a fixed number of LEO who for simplicity sake we call good armed people. We also have a small percentage of evil people in society who disregard laws and other people, we will always have these people among us.
Gangsters / criminal seldom have the discipline to practice at a legal range or take a gun related class, it is not in their nature to invest in education. Thus the overwhelming majority of the trained people are good guys or gals. The more you train people as a normal part of education, the more power you place in the hands of good people to protect not only themselves, but the rest of society. The gun nuts tend to be right leaning politically for sure, but as a group law abiding.
@Grumpy: You make a good point about empowerment. It’s a great slogan that’s become very popular today. Yet, it’s almost always used in a BS way. There is absolutely no desire to “empower” anyone in most organizations.
In a business enterprise the objective of every manager is to accumulate power to himself. Get his subordinates to do precisely what the boss thinks best. Recall the old saying: “A people hire A people. B people hire C people.” (My personal policy was always to be a B person who tried to hire A people. Lots more leverage in this approach.)
The feminist crowd talks a lot about empowering females. But, what they really strive for is to make females dependent on Uncle Sam. If females take it upon themselves to procreate with males who are much smaller and weaker than they are, we may achieve parity on body strength. Then, women will be able to go mano-a-mano with men in their weight class. But it’s going to take millennia of persistence to achieve this plan. In the mean time, women need some equalizer. Traditionally, it was a stronger father/brother/husband/son. Then, Samuel Colt invented his great equalizer. But the feminists will have none of this. They don’t even want women to carry pepper-spray or stun-guns. Did you see NOW submitting an amicus brief in support of Jamie Caetano in her prayer for relief to SCOTUS?
I am NOT saying that “all” women should carry a gun. NOT at ALL. What I AM saying is that every individual should be reared-up to see that responsibility for one’s safety is primarily on each individual. We get by with a little help from family, friends and society. Yet, we do not go into the lion’s den nonchalantly.
It is an infantile mindset that strives mightily to persuade all members of the community to rely – with near exclusivity – upon the collective for sustenance and safety. It’s understandable that infants, small children and even older children should look to their mothers for safety. But it’s a failure-to-launch that teens do not grow into a sense of individual responsibility.
I was in grade school in the late 60’s and early 70’s. Our grade school had a shooting range in the basement. Parents could sign up their children for firearm safety and marksmanship classes. We use single shot Anschutz rifles. Not once was there ever an “accident” or any safety issue. In high school we had a special locker that students could secure their rifles or shotguns in and retrieve them for hunting on the walk home. Now to be fair, this was in Alaska, but it was a public school and not once was there any type of “Gun Violence” incident.
It’s not the guns, It’s the culture. I blame parents, many are simply ignorant or plain stupid, refusing to spend time and educate their children on firearms.
I grew up on Long Island in the early 60s. We also had a place for our single shot 22s. To hunt with on our walk home. The Principals office. No one ever got hurt. Or actually shot anything else but dirt. Not even a squirrel. Our intended target. We were taught never to fire up into the trees.
Are you sure they are gangsters? Are you assuming based on their appearance? I know some drillers and miners who wear pants down to their knees, have about a million piercings and are tattooed up the whazoo, I see em at the range, but have also seen them volunteering at soup kitchens and at their children’s well visits.
children’s well visits=$vaccination time$
@liljoe
I can safely say that in my 50 years of living in Texas and 15 of working in mental health, I have yet to meet a law abiding citizen who is sportin’ Sinaloa, Mexican Mafia, Latin Kings, MS13, etc. tattoos on their neck, forearms, knuckles and hands.
I suppose it is possible, I can say I have not seen it yet. I am heavily tattooed myself so i pay attention to such things and am familiar with the difference between work done by artists and gang symbols.
Elaine, I have a reasonable degree of confidence in your powers of perception. Nevertheless, we really all ought to strive to maintain an open mind.
I recall one fellow student in my NRA shotgun instructor class. Guy was young and all “tatted-up”. If I saw him on an airplane with a gun I’d probably be inclined to shout “Let’s roll” on him.
Bad move, should that have happened. He was an Air Marshal. Instructor. Can’t always tell your thugs by their tatts.
I’m with Elaine on this, gang tats are pretty distinctive. People don’t get one on accident.
@Mark
Keep in mind I’m tatted myself. But I’ve never seen anyone with the ink I’m describing that WASN’T in a gang. Not yet. The cartels do that on purpose so that the people who work for them can’t go work for a rival or work for the good guys. I guess it’s possible, just never seen it.
@rosignol
I just don’t know any reputable tattoo artist who would put one of those on someone. Not for any reason. Wouldn’t matter how bad the client wanted it, they just would not do that. Same reason they won’t put swastikas on people. I guess there are unscrupulous ones who would, but that’s just not the norm for professionals…
So, teach your children well? I guess that Crosby, Stills & Nash were right after all.
Somehow I don’t get the feeling that firearms proficiency was what C,S&N had in mind.
“C,S&N”
C,S,N&Y
Nobody cares about Neil anymore. Especially after he blamed Trump for his house burning down.
Nobody cares about Neil anymore. Especially after he blamed Trump for his house burning down.
And Crosby, Stills and Nash are enthusiastic Trump supporters?
Well by comparison. Trump hasn’t burned their houses down yet.
“Well by comparison. Trump hasn’t burned their houses down yet.”
There’s still time.
The underbrush is drying as we type.
…and the climate’s still changing…
“…and the climate’s still changing…”
Causing all the wildfires (but apparently only in the western US).
I’d seriously like to know that these hippies think happened to that underbrush a thousand years ago.
“I’d seriously like to know that these hippies think happened to that underbrush a thousand years ago.”
The eco-nazis are the same people who believe we should leave “nature” pristine and untouched, while simultaneously trying to interfere with “nature” allowing certain species of lifeforms to become extinct. Liberalism is a mental disorder; untreatable.
“Somehow I don’t get the feeling that firearms proficiency was what C,S&N had in mind.”
Graham Nash wrote the song after he saw a Diane Arbus photo of a child playing with a toy grenade in Central Park. Nash didn’t think that kids should be taught about war. Personally, I think the kid looked a lot scarier than the grenade.
https://news.artnet.com/market/diane-arbus-birthday-890000
Of course if we just don’t let our kids play with toy weapons there won’t be war anymore! This is the downside of LSD.
She almost gets the root problem of these shootings, but it has nothing to do with firearm safety. It’s parents taking the responsibility of raising their children. That’s why this crap didn’t happen 30 or 40 years ago, even when you could order a gun from a magazine and have it delivered right to your doorstep, with no background checks. Oh, and what else did we have back then? Two-parent households. People stayed together for their kids, even if they couldn’t stand one another, because once you have a child with someone, it isn’t about you anymore. It was about what was best for your children.
I agree with you completely in regard to 2 parent households. Kids learn important lessons from BOTH parents. And stability in the home added a lot to stability in society.
Your timeline is a little off, though. It has been 50 years since a firearm could be delivered to your door. The Gun Control Act of 1968 began the requirement of shipping to an FFL only.
Thanks for the correction!
@Bryan
We also lived in smaller communities. Small communities tend to self-police so to speak. Everyone knows everyone, so anything a person does has a direct impact on the entire community. This tends to create a sense of greater responsibility. That just doesn’t happen as more of the world’s population lives in cities and next to strangers you don’t know. That sense of interpersonal connection and therefore responsibility decreases.
The responsibility doesn’t decrease in urban settings, people become more dependent on the state in urban settings, by design. There is an international push to herd populations back into urban settings where they are both easier to keep under surveillance and to control.
@Mark
Great post, and things I think about a lot too, especially since all the mental health fallout of the ways in which our society doesn’t work well ends up “in my lane.”
I truly think that as a society we’ve given up on trying to fix larger problems and instead are just looking for an easy solution. Regulating guns seems like an easy solution to a lot of people, and it’s not really hard to see why, especially when you look at other countries that have done so and see the reduction in their gun violence rates.
I’d also say “everyone have a gun” is another easy-sounding solution that doesn’t work either. Working in the middle is what’s hard. A lot of people seem to believe that if we could clone Madison and talk to him, he’d be totally A-OK with everyone having an AR. Well, I have a couple, and I am fond of them, and I am a squeaky clean law abiding licensed etc. gun owner, and even so I am not as of yet convinced that he would say, “Yeah, that’s totally what we were going for here.” I am just not convinced of that at this point. And if by some miracle we could do that, and he said, “Actually, that’s not what we intended,” I bet a lot of gun owners would proceed to tell him to fuck right off and we don’t care what you have to say.
Ya know?
Yea, the world is becoming more urbanized. I saw a projection the other day that 75% of the world’s population will live in cities 20 years from now. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that you see the biggest push for restrictive gun policy coming from urbanized centers. One violent person with a gun can do a hell of a lot of damage even in a rural environment given the right setting (church, school). Multiply violent person times amount X for a city population and you have multiple violent X folks who can do that much more damage in a target rich environment.
I also think that we don’t know how to talk about evil in our society, what it is, what we do about it, so we just avoid the whole discussion. And if like me you say, “Well, fund the gun violence research we need so we can know more,” that turns into “You’re trying to mine data for gun control you Socialist secret agent.”
(Which I’ve also never understood, mainly because I have a lot of family who are Socialists, and they’re doing fine, and very pleasant and upstanding people, so have never been sure why that’s such an insult around here, but, tangent.)
@Elaine:
“. . . we’ve given up on trying to fix larger problems and instead are just looking for an easy solution.” Yes, and you join with us in recognizing that there is no quick fix with guns (or any other difficult problems.)
“. . . look at other countries that have done so and see the reduction in their gun violence rates.” I’m not convinced by the data from other countries. I’ve worked in several other countries, among them Japan, Singapore, England, Mexico. I’ve notice great culture differences. Great differences in the foundations of government and the relationship between government/people. Excepting for Mexico, I don’t care how they handle either their guns or their culture.
Japan and Singapore have cultures such that if they had as many guns as we have nothing would change. Switzerland has gun possession comparable to ours; notice anything?
Mexico has a culture such that if there were no guns nothing would change. Mexico’s government works really hard at enforcing its gun-control. Look how that’s worked out for them. Criminals carry guns; cartel members with impunity. Citizens are armed in their homes; hardly any hot home invasions. Citizens are dis-armed on the streets and there is lots of street crime.
“I’d also say “everyone have a gun” is another easy-sounding solution that doesn’t work either.” The “everyone have a gun” is a straw-man that we PotG aren’t “shooting-down”. In my wildest wet-dream not “everyone” would have a gun. My mother and grandmothers wouldn’t have guns. Not that they thought twice about guns in the home; they wouldn’t have – didn’t. Somewhere between 40% – 60% of people carrying guns and maintaining them for home defense America will reach a saturation point. The rest of the population won’t bother. They will have other interests and will “free ride” on the fact that criminals will be aware of the risk that they MIGHT be armed.
“I am just not convinced of that at this point.” I stipulate to your right to imagine whatever you like about what the founding fathers might say if we could interview them. But, the interpretive method of “original meaning” does not involve reading the minds of the founding fathers nor of the first Congress or any other Congress. It doesn’t matter. Instead, what matters is what the words in the Constitution or Amendments meant to the voters when they were ratified by the state legislatures (or conventions in the case of the original body). We have to strive to get into these peoples’ heads. It’s still difficult to do. Nevertheless, we have a large body of newspapers, letters, diaries, historical context from these times and it’s really feasible to work all this stuff out with a high degree of confidence.
One guy who is particularly adept at this is Clayton E. Cramer. Look up his blog, web page with an syllabus of his professional and popular articles and books. (When you are a computer programmer with footnotes in both Heller and McDonald you have a legitimate claim to be taken seriously.)
“. . . biggest push for restrictive gun policy coming from urbanized centers. One violent person with a gun can do a hell of a lot of damage even in a rural environment given the right setting (church, school). Multiply violent person times amount X for a city population and you have multiple violent X folks who can do that much more damage in a target rich environment.” Yes, that’s true.
And, it’s also true that one good guy with a gun in an urban venue has a sporting chance of stopping the bad guy with a gun. Even in an urban area, when seconds count the police are just minutes away.
That reminds me of an incident some years ago. A guy was driving with his family down a highway in NYC. Encountered a road-rage incident with a gang of motorcyclists. They managed to cut him off and started attacking him in his car. Wife phoned 9-1-1. No response – not in NYC. In any case, two undercover NYC police were in the motorcycle gang. One participated in the violence; the other did nothing.
“Well, fund the gun violence research we need so we can know more,” that turns into “You’re trying to mine data for gun control you Socialist secret agent.”
I agree that we need more research; and I’m on-board with government funding. Yes, the researchers will try to “mine the data” for gun control. Many of them really are socialist secret agents; most don’t do anything to disguise their political biases. Yet, facts are stubborn things. When they publish the facts we can read and analyze them just as they may manipulate them to their own purposes. In the end, the Second Amendment will still be there and will still keep some policy options off-the-table. Yet, other policy options – be they public policies or private decisions – will be better informed.
“. . . so have never been sure why that’s such an insult around here, but, tangent.)” Well, you see, we PotG are students of history. We see what RJ Rummel saw when he did his research. Despite our mainly Judeo-Christian origins, we don’t tend to have much forgiveness for the non-repentant. We just aren’t interested in making America Venezuela again.
I for one don’t really care whether you might be a socialist gun-controlling statist troll. I’m perfectly content to deal with your insights and arguments at face value. I don’t see much point in calling out someone else’s political proclivities. We’re here to talk about guns, gun-rights and gun-control.
“We also lived in smaller communities. Small communities tend to self-police so to speak. Everyone knows everyone, so anything a person does has a direct impact on the entire community.”
It would be interesting to see your population research of 40-50 years ago for: Boston, NYC, Newark, Detroit, Baltimore, LA, Miami. Smaller communities? Self-policed? Heck, show us population figures for 50-60 years ago.
Murderer at Thousand Oaks didn’t get adequate gun safety training in the USMC?
He wasn’t a child soldier. so no, he did not receive adequate training as a kid.
I think the premise is good, but I would suggest an addendum: combine firearm education with moral education. Teach people the sanctity and value of human life, while also teaching them how and why the firearm is the best mesns to protect human life.
My kids’ school (public school in the county) teaches some moral standards as a part if the curriculum; things like treating people with respect, personal and social responsibility and so forth (from a fairly ‘politically neutral’ point as far as I can tell, none of the ‘there are 47 different genders ‘ or other such far left bullcrap). Though I sincerely applaud them for the effort, the real moral education for my kids is at home. We emphasize TIMELESS moral standards, not the ‘flavor of the day type.
Unfortunately, many kids don’t get this because they only have one parent who works constantly to make ends meet, they have parents who wouldn’t know moral standards if they were smacked in the face with them or they live with people, who couldn’t be called ‘parents’ by any stretch, who actively live highly IMMORAL lives.
The problem with relying on schools to teach morality is, who’s standards are they going to use. The left will swear up and down their evolving moral standards are the only ‘good’ ones as they take into account the present climate and societal changes, anything else is just outdated, obsolete, oppressive 1950’s thinking.
Now, teaching gun safety in school I’d be 100% behind. Though I don’t believe for a milisecond it would reduce mass killings, or any other type, it’s still HIGHLY valuable information that I FIRMLY believe kids need.
Good to see you again, Chip.
Thanks, Sam. Likewise. I try to contribute something of value when I can. Just haven’t had a lot of free time for months.
Well, come and stay more often.
Um Parkland anyone?
About 30 years ago I became concerned with the morals of the country so I proposed, in writing, an idea for a way for teachers to teach morals. The lessons could be worked into their normal classwork. I was absolutely roasted by the school administration; “We will not teach religion in school!”. I was not suggesting religion and it was not couched in any religious terms, but the problem was they took the idea of morals to be religious based. That may in fact be true. Most of the major world religions, with the exception of Islam, have somewhat similar moral guidelines that most here would recognize.
Today’s youth are not being taught traditional morals and don’t go to church where they would hear them.
The left has successfully subverted the public school system from bottom to top and are working on subverting “christian” churches with liberal preachers. How else can you explain all the “gay” priests and preachers in what previously were very conservative, orthodox, churches.
Please, this is statistical malpractice of the worst sort. No young person you know who was educated in responsible firearms use has committed a criminal shooting? Have you personally known any that were not so educated who have? I personally don’t know anybody, educated or not, youth or otherwise, who’s committed a criminal shooting. That’s simply a function of the circles I move in, rather than the salutary effect of firearms education.
Gun ownership being integral to America…gun safety classes should be mandatory from grade school through college…
Teach proper handling and safety…have doctors come in…gunshot victims…military…a wide variety of gun-related individuals.
Show films and photos of gunshot victims…bring in survivors of gunshots.
Teach kids that with great rights come great responsibilities…and that there is no reset button or extra life icon.
I frequently sought such support when I was a student. To be honest, finding reliable experts is challenging. Without support, I couldn’t compose an personal statement writer . I am convinced that such a team of experts would be able to help me.
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