Lots of shootings...

[profwoot]

I mean, if the reason red flag laws won't work is the cops are too corrupt, incompetent, and unaccountable to be trusted to enforce them and not shoot the people calling in red flags, that's a pretty strong argment for reducing the number of guns in private AND police hands.

The fact modern policing involves treating basically every police interaction as a SWAT exercise is, I'd argue, one of the biggest problems with American gun culture.

Agreed that it's all part of the same big problem, but drastic police reform would sure make it easier.

 

[Glades]

Anyone else rubbing their nips to the Alex Jones trial? This shit is too funny.

As crazy as AJ is, he was right about a lot of things. But inthe process he’s made a lot of really powerful enemies.
He was talking about Epstein and the island 20 years ago. Uncovering secret societies for the powerful and the military industrial complex. His reporting on Bohemian Grove was groundbreaking.

 

[CanserDYI]

As crazy as AJ is, he was right about a lot of things. But inthe process he’s made a lot of really powerful enemies.
He was talking about Epstein and the island 20 years ago. Uncovering secret societies for the powerful and the military industrial complex. His reporting on Bohemian Grove was groundbreaking.

How the fuck did I know you'd come in with a "I know he's crazy but...."

 

[bostjan]

As crazy as AJ is, he was right about a lot of things. But inthe process he’s made a lot of really powerful enemies.
He was talking about Epstein and the island 20 years ago. Uncovering secret societies for the powerful and the military industrial complex. His reporting on Bohemian Grove was groundbreaking.

Wow, yeah, like how he predicted that we'd all be in FEMA camps by 2011 or how Michelle Obama is transgender, or how Barack Obama has a machine that controls tornados, or how gay people are a conspiracy by the New World Order to decrease the surplus population by making people gay using chemicals?

Right about so many things, it's scary.

 

[Glades]

Wow, yeah, like how he predicted that we'd all be in FEMA camps by 2011 or how Michelle Obama is transgender, or how Barack Obama has a machine that controls tornados, or how gay people are a conspiracy by the New World Order to decrease the surplus population by making people gay using chemicals?

Right about so many things, it's scary.

Mod edit: one more report of this kind of trolling and you're gone.

 

[CanserDYI]

He's trolling us now.

 

[tedtan]

He's trolling us now.

He’s been trolling the whole time.

 

[spudmunkey]

It's rare that I "ignore" someone, because there's usually some amusement to be had, but...yeah, no.

 

[BornToLooze]

Calling the police is generally the best option, but it still doesn’t apply to every situation. For example, I live out in the country, so the police wouldn’t get here in time to prevent anything from happening, they’d only be able to try to sort things out after the fact. If I want to prevent something from happening, its pretty much on me to do so.

Ya, like in the example I posted, cops were called right when shit started to go down, and they were there like maybe 30-45 minutes later.

The average cop is also an ignorant simpleton so I'd think twice about calling a cop to any situation more complicated than "I got robbed" or else you're as likely to be the one getting abused/shot/arrested. Especially if you're black, in which case you already know to basically never call the cops.

It sucks, because "just call the cops" should be the correct answer. That cops are so corrupt, incompetent, and unaccountable does change the calculus.

So much this. I live in a small town, and thanks to a job I used to have I have been friends at one point or another with quite a few of the cops. There were some of them I genuinely liked. Damn good people who really wanted to make a difference and help people, and also fresh out of the academy and not jaded yet. Not even counting the corrupt, incompetent, and unaccountable dirtbag cops...think of how many retail workers loathe the general public. Now imagine with every time you interact with the public, instead of helping them buy the cool dikfer they wanted to buy, it's always something shitty. Some shit like I went through, your stuff got stolen, state sponsored revenue enforcement of laws that don't hurt anybody...

Which is my problem with the whole thing. People. Since it seems prevelent in modern politics, we'll go with the right wing religious extremist ideology. Their god made a dude, then their god made a chick (shit I think I mighta used them pronouns in that), their god told the people he made not to do ONE thing. And what's the first thing they did, ate the damn apple. I get the reasoning behind red flag laws, but the war on drugs and Prohibition proves, all government overstep is going to do is make more outlaws. If you are dead set on murdering someone does it really matter what laws you break in the process?

Anyone else rubbing their nips to the Alex Jones trial? This shit is too funny.

What is his deal/he even on trial for? I've seen his name popping up, and shit like this comes up on youtube and I'm kinda like that Chris Pratt meme, I don't know what's going on and I'm scared to ask.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

What is his deal/he even on trial for?

He's being sued by the families of Sandy Hook victims who received death threats because he actively pushed the conspiracy theory that the massacre never happened, and that the family of victims were crisis actors.

That's way too short of a summary, if you feel like hating the world more, dive down the rabbit hole of how depraved people can be to people whose children just died violently at school.

 

[odibrom]

He's being sued by the families of Sandy Hook victims who received death threats because he actively pushed the conspiracy theory that the massacre never happened, and that the family of victims were crisis actors.

That's way too short of a summary, if you feel like hating the world more, dive down the rabbit hole of how depraved people can be to people whose children just died violently at school.

Shit people are going to be shit people...

 

[works0fheart]

Sorry in advance for the triple post.

I just read through most of this thread and I'm deciding (against my better judgement) to weigh in on some things.
A bit about me: Born and raised in Florida, but I've lived in a lot of different places (including other countries). My work takes me all over. In 4 and 1/2 years I've moved 7 times. I've been to every continental US state except Texas (Not sure how that coincidence happened).

Living in Japan in 2020 was very eye opening compared to the states because it's generally very peaceful. A very calm place overall where I'm hard pressed to name more than 1 area that I felt unsafe. It wasn't uncommon for parents to let their young children transit unsupervised to subway stations and to school with little worry of anything happening.

While I have my own views on guns (I'm military so I have pretty frequent training on how and when to properly use them) I don't think that this issue is 100% the fault of our gun laws, but they damned well aren't helping. Would I prefer they weren't a thing? Absolutely. I've seen too many people that I've known personally lose their lives to them (Pulse Nightclub).

Here's a few points I really wanted to touch on before anything else though.

Ummm that's not exactly leaving much real estate lo View attachment 110776

Having lived in Miami and Fort Lauderdale both areas are fairly unstable and have been for longer than a lot of other places currently. Miami especially so. I really don't think Florida is much worse off than most other major cities at this point though, which is sad. It's always been bad, just the other places have caught up somehow, which is pretty crazy.

As a Canadian and more specifically an Ontarian, I would rather go to Detroit than Windsor.....

Detroit is probably far and away the worst US city I've ever seen, and this was years ago before being ravaged by Covid and before the rise of mass homeless problems that most cities are having now. I don't wish that place upon anyone. It really does feel like a 3rd world country there.

I don’t know. I have a good friend friend from Colorado and he says Cali transplants ruined the state. According to him, they left California but brought with them the ideologies that destroyed their home state. Now Colorado is blue and headed down the same blue trash chute.

I will agree that California certainly has it's issues to sort out, but I don't think the decline of any of these states lately are due to transplants like you're referring. Here in Washington people like to say that same thing in regards to the homeless population. The same thing in Portland. Unfortunately highly addictive prescription drugs (fentanyl) have really done a number on people across the country and lead to an uptick in addictions to drugs like heroin and meth. I've unfortunately had the displeasure of seeing my friends and love ones go this route and it's very sad.

It's not a matter of "oh, the homeless people migrated here and ruined it" so much as a matter of the FDA operating in a way that's outright malicious to the citizens of this country.

I say this as a liberal living in California. Liberal policies have ruined this state. Not much of an alternative available because conservative policies bankrupt it. There are a lot of people in California who leave for a reason, liberal and conservative and it's not just the high cost of living. Everyone that doesn't have a chauffer is miserable. It's an unhappy place to live. Everywhere else I have been people are generally nicer to each other.
The cost to rent a truck and move out of California is 6x higher than moving in with distance being equal because moving companies know once a rental truck leaves California it's never coming back.

I don't want to defend Glades but I too have talked to at least several people who live in the Denver area who say they hate what has happened to the quality of life in Colorado and are leaving. Does that mean everyone in Colorado hates it in Colorado. Doubt it as my sample size is too small but I also find it odd that when I meet and talk to people from Colorado and I tell them that driving from Denver to Vail is the prettiest stretch of America I've ever seen, they all agree and then say they no longer enjoy living in the state and start listing reasons.

This one really hit me a bit for whatever reason. I honestly think that the whole finger-pointing between the major political parties is one of the most hilarious things ever. Both groups are blatantly corrupt and are actively tearing this country down. Our founding fathers actually feared a political party system arising and having the exact effect we're seeing now, both set on short term gains with no intent to help the working class.

On the second part of this though, Colorado was indeed one of my favorite states as well. So was Virginia, so was Oregon, and so was Washington. The issues that are now rampant in these places are unfortunately issues that we're facing everywhere across the states to varying degrees. Washington DC, our nations capitol is one of the biggest shitholes I've ever seen, as was Philadelphia. I enjoyed myself in both places when visiting and I at least recognize these issues they're having as the same issues I've seen in many states at this point.

Yeah also the irrational amount of fear over being the victim of a violent crime at random is mind boggling.

While I get the point you're trying to make, violent crime in the US is a very real thing now. I mean, this thread was made because there are school shootings regularly now, as well as at supermarkets and parades. At this point I wouldn't call it irrational to fear those things when they regularly occur. I would call it irrational though to think that more people with guns would fix the issue.

Well, Antifa riots in Seattle, the ever increasing opioid crisis and homeless situations, it’s very real in the Seattle area. True, that the world is broken and these circumstances are not ideal, but because they are not, you have to be prepared to respond appropriately to protect your family, all the while being cautious not to cross over into becoming the aggressor.

I'm not trying to give you a hard time, but this is just plain false (the antifa bit). The last semblance of anything like this happening in Seattle was in the summer of 2020 and it being by "antifa" is conjecture at best. I live 20 minutes away from Seattle, and while I wouldn't call it a safe place, it's not as bad as it was 2 years ago. I do agree though, I obviously would like to be able to protect my family but there's not a clear answer on how that should be done in this day and age. Deadly weapons in the hands of regular citizens isn't a great idea. Our "trained" police officers can barely use them properly so I definitely don't trust Harry the right-wing YouTube watcher to do the job either.

Ironically enough, when I was in Portland last year people tried claiming that the violence going on there at the time was antifa as well, but low and behold when the people were taken into custody they ended up being in the proud boys or your typical RWNJ (as Max refers to them).

 

[works0fheart]

I've lived in Seattle most of my life. I'm much more afraid of getting shot by some angry white guy from Auburn ready to lose it over some perceived injustice than I am from some made-up antifa boogeyman.

This isn't inaccurate, but I've definitely had people approach me in Seattle and the surrounding area with questionable intentions but I've never had, or seen a situation escalate. Hell, earlier this week a homeless man tried opening my car door while it was moving. In the last couple months I've had to call the police because of people shooting up on the stairs leading up to my apartment that I have to pay way too much money for. That being said, I do feel safer here than I do in a lot of places. The police presence here is at least noticeable enough to deter people I think. I do wish something could be done to help these people around here who are suffering from very bad addictions problems and I don't think "guess I'll just wait on them to fuck up and then I'll shoot them" is the answer.

I grew up in South America and have been robbed at gunpoint many times, including one time when 4 guys broke into our house at gunpoint. There is nothing you can do down there. You cant protect your family. Your family’s life is at the mercy of the criminals. If your shoot a criminal in your house you go to jail.
I am so glad to live in America now, in a state with sound castle laws. Where if you break into my house and put me and my family in danger, I have a right to defend myself and my family.

As a married man myself I can sympathize with you here. My wife and my dogs are my world. However, South America is unfortunately known for having a lot more problems than just criminal violence. Some countries there have 1st world economies with 3rd world infrastructure and it's because of corrupt political parties running these places and money isn't allocated properly so systems aren't put in place to protect their people. A road that the US is steadily going down now. While you may think that owning a firearm will help to keep you safe (and it may to some degree) a large group of regular people with deadly weapons and living in fear will just lead to more turmoil.

Dude emigrates from South America and becomes a Trumpublican.

As someone who works with a pretty diverse group of people I find this often the case pretty frequently, oddly enough.

I mean, the fact that America also has strong rule of law might also have just a wee little bit to do with it, instead of a wildly corrupt police force on the payroll of the drug trade, as is the case with most crime-ridden parts of South America, no?

We do have these things though. In most major police forces throughout the country it's pretty much gone from the point of "suspected" to "continuously proven" that the police are wildly corrupt or involved in the drug trade in some manner. I can't speak for places like Los Angeles where I've heard about this pretty commonly but I can tell you that Miami and Orlando very much fit that criteria.

We may have it better than some other countries in regards to this, but make no mistake, our justice system is very blatantly corrupt.

All legal immigrants I have ever met are staunchly opposed to illegal immigration, and we all believe in stricter border control. It is fundamental that we protect our country from human, drug and sex trafficking.

Trafficking of people and drugs aren't unheard of here either. I wouldn't go as far as to say they're rampant, but it's very much a thing. Controlling our borders is a whole other can of worms, because I do think it's important to some degree, but I don't think that putting people in internment camps and chemically castrating them the way we have been is the way forward either.

Eh, I'm sure that footage is out there somewhere!

Soldiers I feel like are more likely not to go nuts and totally over-react by pulling out the guns and starting to hyperventilate in every situation, unlike cops. I also give cops less of an excuse since they're supposed to be helping their fellow citizens instead of sometimes being put in situations where they're told to go fight an enemy force. But yeah, definitely neither exactly gives me the warm fuzzies.

While we certainly have our crazies in the military, we're held to a much higher standard when it comes to being issued a weapon for our position. Are there people in the military who are unfit to carry a weapon? You bet your ass there are. A lot of them. But, we are constantly trained on how, when, if, and why we use them. If I shoot someone I'm under extreme scrutiny as to why I did it, even if I'm in the right and I followed every instruction permitting me to do so. This isn't like the type of situation where a police department investigates themselves and deem themselves in the right. The military has no problem whatsoever with absolute ruining me if I so much as slipped up in any regard to even drawing a firearm. We're also taught that it should be the absolute last line of defense after exhausting all other options. Just this alone has made me realize that if it's this much trouble for me, that it should be moreso for police, and significantly more for a regular person to obtain them.

- Guns haven't been about protecting the people from gov't for a long itme now, imo. The U.S. military could win against it's own people, assuming it could keep itself together internally in such a time. I imagine it would look like a never ending drawn out war like Afghanistan. I hope this time never comes because the military will turn on it's own citizens if forced to, imo.

This is the funny thing that gun nuts don't realize, and a few of you have made this point already. If the government really wanted to go to war with civilians it wouldn't even be a close fight. They don't even need to do that though because the political party owned media companies are doing a fine job of pitting the working class against each other while those same parties systematically rob us. The irony would be hysterical if it weren't so real that it's numbing. Remember when people were brainstorming about microchips being in the vaccines so the government could spy on them? Meanwhile most people over the age of 15 have a smart phone. The government has very easy systems in place to "defeat" the American people without ever needing to fire a shot.

It sucks really. Thankfully I live in MA with fairly stringent gun laws and we haven't had a mass shooting in something like 22 years. It'll happen though, I'm sure of it.

I'm not trying to be some good guy with a gun, but if I find myself in a situation where someone points a gun at me I at least want a fighting chance.

You guys did unfortunately have the Boston marathon bombing a few years ago. A gun wouldn't have helped that situation, but I can't fault anyone that feels they need to at least own one to defend themselves. I can see why you would feel that way. I don't think it will really help most of the time, but I do at least sympathize.

 

[works0fheart]

Really the logical next step is to preemptively shoot anyone that might commit a mass shooting.

Police here are already one step ahead on this one, unfortunately.

I once asked an AI to solve the problem of mass shootings and it suggested that if humanity was made to go extinct, there would be no more mass shootings. Technically correct, but somehow not helpful.

Solves the climate, pandemic and inequality too.

It's sad and pessimistic that these are the truth.

Weird how you just dropped the subject of Trump's war on legal immigration, once we pointed out he actually HAD been cracking down on legal immigration.

This usually ends up being the tactic for most Trump supporters. They'll argue with you vehemently on something until you prove them wrong, and then they'll change the subject, lose that argument and then come first circle back to the original subject again, get proven wrong again, etc. That's if they don't stop the conversation or, even better, their signature move: childish name calling with the word libtard sprinkled in somewhere, topped off by the fact that they can't comprehend that just because you aren't a supporter of one party doesn't by-default make you a supporter of the other.

The US doesnt need the military to turn on its populace because the police already did.

Bingo.

Btw, something missing in this statistical debate is that we keep arguing over volume of events and so far looks like we're ignoring volume of victims per event.

Also true. I saw it pretty recently and linked it to my friends, but apparently there have been around 4,300 children killed by gun violence since 2020 alone. All other gun violence statistics aside, that's absolutely sickening. If people really believe there isn't an issue at hand then they're just wrong. As I said above though, I don't think guns are the only thing causing this. They most certainly aren't helping, but this country has had deepening mental health issues for years now. As a people we've become calloused and unsympathetic for people we don't directly see. The vaccine thing showed this, and so has the issues in Ukraine where I've heard people say we shouldn't be helping them because of money that could be used to help our own people (spoiler, that won't happen).

The wage gap is growing larger and larger, health care is a joke, inflation is a joke, our political leaders are a joke, our humans rights are being abolished, and all the while the people who run this country who are growing more and more wealthy would have you believe that all of these things are the fault of your neighbor, in the same situation as you.

 

[c7spheres]

This is the funny thing that gun nuts don't realize, and a few of you have made this point already. If the government really wanted to go to war with civilians it wouldn't even be a close fight. They don't even need to do that though because the political party owned media companies are doing a fine job of pitting the working class against each other while those same parties systematically rob us. The irony would be hysterical if it weren't so real that it's numbing. Remember when people were brainstorming about microchips being in the vaccines so the government could spy on them? Meanwhile most people over the age of 15 have a smart phone. The government has very easy systems in place to "defeat" the American people without ever needing to fire a shot.

I think the more important reason to have a gun is to protect oneself from your 'good neighbors' that will break into your house and take whatever they want when food and water and other supplys start getting low and looting begins. I should buy a gun but I figure if I just blast my amp when they come inside they'll leave because of the terrible noise, lol. jk. I think most people will behave but in the case of gov't taking control they got contol of everything (food, water, electric, supply lines, roads in and out of town, communcations etc) they could literally flick a few swtiches and shut everyone down and the only way to get food or water would be to comply. Scary stuff. I really hope it never gets to this point but unfortunately I think in that type situation we'd see a lot of citizens killing eachother to get what they want and others killing them so they can't. After the fall it'd look a lot like little communities of people trying to re-establish normalcy with a lot of Jabba the Hutt and Mad Max type characters floating around waring and trading and stealing supplys etc. City's would look like the Megadeth Dystopia album cover or something. Maybe I should get at least a bb gun. They'll be plenty of pigeons to eat still and bb's are low cost ammo, plus you could shoot peoples eyes's out. I also want a laser so I can burn little holes in people. People can't shoot you easy if you burn out their eyes. jk. Trying to keep it light.

 

[Adieu]

Which of those are untrue?

Fine, we'll give you one:

Michelle Obama is a bigger man than you'll ever be.

 

[StevenC]

I think the more important reason to have a gun is to protect oneself from your 'good neighbors' that will break into your house and take whatever they want when food and water and other supplys start getting low and looting begins. I should buy a gun but I figure if I just blast my amp when they come inside they'll leave because of the terrible noise, lol. jk. I think most people will behave but in the case of gov't taking control they got contol of everything (food, water, electric, supply lines, roads in and out of town, communcations etc) they could literally flick a few swtiches and shut everyone down and the only way to get food or water would be to comply. Scary stuff. I really hope it never gets to this point but unfortunately I think in that type situation we'd see a lot of citizens killing eachother to get what they want and others killing them so they can't. After the fall it'd look a lot like little communities of people trying to re-establish normalcy with a lot of Jabba the Hutt and Mad Max type characters floating around waring and trading and stealing supplys etc. City's would look like the Megadeth Dystopia album cover or something. Maybe I should get at least a bb gun. They'll be plenty of pigeons to eat still and bb's are low cost ammo, plus you could shoot peoples eyes's out. I also want a laser so I can burn little holes in people. People can't shoot you easy if you burn out their eyes. jk. Trying to keep it light.

So guns for when the apocalypse happens? Shouldn't the goal of humanity be to prevent apocalypse?

 

[narad]

So guns for when the apocalypse happens? Shouldn't the goal of humanity be to prevent apocalypse?

People watching "The Road" and thinking, oh, I want to be prepared in case that happens! I want to make sure I live as long as possible in that world!

 

[works0fheart]

So guns for when the apocalypse happens? Shouldn't the goal of humanity be to prevent apocalypse?

People watching "The Road" and thinking, oh, I want to be prepared in case that happens! I want to make sure I live as long as possible in that world!

Come on guys, this is obviously what 2A is meant for. /s

 

[odibrom]

So guns for when the apocalypse happens? Shouldn't the goal of humanity be to prevent apocalypse?

... unless everyone turns "whole food vegan" in this very instant, I very much doubt it's possible to prevent anything, only delay it...