MaxxBot posted:

What loving message is this supposed to send?

If you want to ban semi-automatic weapons why not just ban them all rather than this idiocy?

I own a semi-automatic rifle that's not on the list despite being functionally identical to some that are on the list, I would think the people who made this bill would consider that a problem but whatever.

JonathonSpectre posted:

I'd rather Obama and the Democrats realize gun-control is a loser of an issue and quit handing the Republicans easy dunks for campaign ads

I'd rather Obama and the Democrats realize abortion is a loser of an issue and quit handing the Republicans easy dunks for campaign ads

I'd rather Obama and the Democrats realize civil rights is a loser of an issue and quit handing the Republicans easy dunks for campaign ads

I'd rather Obama and the Democrats realize gay rights is a loser of an issue and quit handing the Republicans easy dunks for campaign ads

Yadoppsi posted:

evilweasel posted:

MaxxBot posted:

All of those other things involve expanding individual positive rights while gun control involves restricting individual positive rights. Why do you think we've made so much more progress in the areas you listed and not gun control?

LeJackal posted:

Actual solutions that will address the underlying issue and improve everyone's lives? gently caress that, you have petty political tribalism to fund.

evilweasel posted:

abortion rights have been going backwards, not forwards, because of these same group of people, civil rights too

evilweasel posted:

you people are the problem, not part of the solution, so getting to actual solutions first involves getting you out of the way

it is clear that gun nuts are not potential partners in addressing the underlying issues because they think the underlying issue is it is too hard to get a machine gun

Shakenbaker posted:

Got any numbers about how many they are versus, say...hammers, bats, and human hands?

LeJackal posted:

The underlying issues are things like economic disparity, institutionalized racism, school-to-prison pipeline, our for-profit justice system, war on drugs, and a dozen other issues that would address the root cause of criminal violence.

Of course, you don't care about actually helping people - it doesn't matter if someone is murdered or commits suicide, as long as it wasn't done with a gun you're happy as a clam.

MaxxBot posted:

If you look at the polling on abortion nothing has changed in decades, the recent progress of anti-abortion people is clearly related to the fact that the GOP has an unprecendented amount of control in state governments.

The notion that civil rights are going backwards is something I have seen on here before but do you have any empirical data that would support that notion? It seems to be largely based on the fact that the GOP base has been more blatantly racist but they've been more blatantly bigoted in every way and that doesn't mean the entire country is moving in that direction.

NerdyMcNerdNerd posted:

The last time I looked at the statistics, small, cheap, low caliber handguns were by far the worst offenders. it makes sense. You'd want something you could conceal and throw away, something that was easily obtainable. There would probably be a much more meaningful drop in gun violence if you eliminated those guns from circulation and production than you'd ever see from any AWB, especially if they continue to be toothless exercises in rule lawyering.

evilweasel posted:

it has both a specific list of banned guns, and a list of banned functions - a belt and suspenders approach, you ban the category and then to avoid weaseling around it, you ban a list of specific guns as well - the list of specific guns also has a function to make the intent of what is banned clear

yours would be banned based on the functions, and the fact that it was functionally identical to ones on the list would be evidence congress intended to ban it and any ambiguities in the banned functions should be interpreted to cover it

first post quoted only the list and not the rest of the law

MaxxBot posted:

Their banned functions list is all full of holes though, plenty of semi-automatic weapons that would be just as effective in a shooting as the banned guns are not banned. Why not just ban them all and list them all if they want to? Banning a certain proportion of them and leaving others out just reinforces the idea that the law is dumb and ineffectual.

-Troika- posted:

Why don't you explain to us what you think guns becoming more "militarized" means, evilweasel

And also why it's a bad thing.

evilweasel posted:

Again, I think because you've got to start somewhere. The AWB isn't really intended to stop all shootings, it's intended to draw a line at guns becoming even more militarized or to use the gun culture word, "tactical". It's targeting guns that have no reason to exist. There's guns where there's some legitimate reasons for them to exist but there's also good reasons why those aren't good enough can't really be discussed when it's impossible to discuss guns that have no reason to exist in civilian hands at all.

To get anywhere on the difficult problems you have to break the political power of the crazies, and to do that you have to show they oppose any regulation no matter how sane. That's why things like universal background checks - where there's no legitimate reason to oppose it whatsoever - are useful to push, because it makes it clear that the opposition is not rational and is not offering good-faith arguments. They're just being loonies, and the discussion about the more complex stuff can't include them.

evilweasel posted:

i agree, but its far, far more difficult to regulate those guns, and given the politics of the past two decades you have to start with regulations that don't do as much good, but can get done. like, background checks: it's important to work on the stuff that there's just no good reason to oppose to make it clear to people that the opposition is not "reasonable" and that there isn't any compromising with these people

it's not like if you go to the nra and say "ok, how about we just ban handguns instead of assault rifles" they'll go ok, they'll go even more ballistic, and if you went to any group advocating commonsense regulation of guns and said hey, we can get one of these, which do you want, they'd go with the handguns as well

-Troika- posted:

Why don't you explain to us what you think guns becoming more "militarized" means, evilweasel

And also why it's a bad thing.

MaxxBot posted:

The "tactical" guns or not one single iota less or more dangerous than the non-tactical ones though, which is why the AWB is considered dumb and ineffectual. A blanket ban on all semi-autos would be just as difficult to pass but would actually appear logical from the standpoint of gun control proponents, banning "tactical" cosmetic/ergonomic features on the other hand doesn't make any sense.

NerdyMcNerdNerd posted:

I'm not disagreeing with that. I'm just saying that fruitless things like AWBs and similar laws accomplish nothing but adding more fuel to the fire, and alienating people that are in the middle. There are a non-zero amount of people that would support new gun legislation but want nothing to do with AWBs and other such nonsense.

evilweasel posted:

When it comes to the politics of the issue, I don't think we agree on the audience that can be moved. I think that to the extent that "reasonable" gun owners exist, they may oppose a blanket semi-auto ban because maybe they have a semi-auto, but anyone who has an assault weapon just isn't reachable.

evilweasel posted:

i don't need to

sane people understand it instinctively, and making it clear gun nuts don't get it is part and parcel of making it clear to people who don't pay close attention that gun nuts are crazy people who shouldn't be listened to as opposed to reasonable people with a legitimate point of view

i get nothing out of telling you why it's a bad thing, what i want is you taking about how it's crazy to think it's a bad thing as much as possible because people read that and put you in the same category as the hobo ranting about judgment day

Yadoppsi posted:

NathanScottPhillips posted:

Some would say that model is better and we should try to turn our heading back towards that style of national security instead of the leviathan we currently use that has run awry in all sorts of ways.

The Aurora Movie Theater shooter used a 100rd AR-15 magazine. It jammed 7 rounds in because high-capacity magazines are not reliable. Now Colorado has a 15-round maximum capacity law, thereby making sure the future would-be, depressed, mentally unstable, trenchcoat wearing, scheming in his apartment, but little-actual-gun-experience-or-knowledge-shooter's AR-15 will not jam.

MaxxBot posted:

Personally as a gun owner I'd be all on board with licensing and registration and generally treating guns like cars. Sure many gun owners are ardently opposed to that stuff but gun owners are by no means some sort of NRA hivemind. If gun control proponents pushed for that stuff you'd have at least some gun owners and gun rights proponents on your side, as opposed to things like the AWB where no gun owner would have a reason to agree. Those things also have the upside of actually being productive measures that would do something to reduce shootings, unlike the AWB.

LeJackal posted:

Actual solutions that will address the underlying issue and improve everyone's lives? gently caress that, you have petty political tribalism to fund.

evilweasel posted:

The issue is that I just don't see any evidence there's a lot of people like you - there are a lot of people who have guns and say they'd support common sense regulations, but somehow most of them never show up when they're actually proposed. That's basically what was tried after Sandy Hook, and you saw where that went. That was the effort to work with the reasonable gun owners, and that failed miserably because it's the crazies who have control. In essence, I don't see any way to get to even these sort of regulations without significantly breaking the power of the crazies, and so any political action needs to be focused there. If there was a way forward working with the gun owners who aren't crazy, it would have been the bill after Sandy Hook. But that failed, miserably, and the crazies once again dominated the conversation on the part of gun owners. What's going to change that besides the sort of focus on stuff that you just can't justify opposition to, even if it doesn't go far enough? The stuff that does go far enough can't be done without breaking the NRA's power on the issue, so you have to do the stuff that can be done in the face of the NRA or that weakens the NRA.

evilweasel posted:

If there was a way forward working with the gun owners who aren't crazy, it would have been the bill after Sandy Hook. But that failed, miserably, and the crazies once again dominated the conversation on the part of gun owners. What's going to change that besides the sort of focus on stuff that you just can't justify opposition to, even if it doesn't go far enough? The stuff that does go far enough can't be done without breaking the NRA's power on the issue, so you have to do the stuff that can be done in the face of the NRA or that weakens the NRA.

NerdyMcNerdNerd posted:

Sorry, I should have clarified that I meant among people that own guns. My bad.

Assault weapons themselves aren't particularly uncommon, depending on what your definition of what they are. If we're talking military pattern rifles like AR or AK variants, they're very popular for a number of reasons. They're in media a lot, so people that just want a cool gun will typically buy something like that. People that are into recreational shooting, hunting or collecting firearms typically have one in their collection for any number of reasons.

If you expand the definition to include semi-automatic weapons with 10 rounds or more in the magazine, those are extremely common. And they're cheap. For around 200 bucks you can get a .22 rifle just about anywhere in the country. For not much more, you can get bigger calibers. I don't even mean at pawn shops or Walmart or whatever, I could go to a flea market or pick up a newspaper and have one within the hour.

They're pretty piss poor weapons if you're planning a murder. They're long, often bulky, not particularly easy to conceal. AKs and AR/M-16 variants are also expensive enough that they're a poor choice if you're planning on getting rid of the evidence. Shotguns are used much more frequently than assault rifles because they're cheap, easily cut down, and common.

The last time I looked at the statistics, small, cheap, low caliber handguns were by far the worst offenders. it makes sense. You'd want something you could conceal and throw away, something that was easily obtainable. There would probably be a much more meaningful drop in gun violence if you eliminated those guns from circulation and production than you'd ever see from any AWB, especially if they continue to be toothless exercises in rule lawyering.

Pauline Kael posted:

"Assault rifles" rank below baseball bats, hammers, and fists, in cause of deaths. I look forward to Barack Obama tearfully decrying death by hammers on his next infomercial on cnn.

Shakenbaker posted:

First off, I am not completely ignorant about guns, and I have some familiarity with them. I used one to shoot at jars of tannerite with my brothers on Christmas day, even But I don't think of them as special or necessary, either. They are just things; things that don't matter a whole hell of a lot outside of the fact that some people get so fetishistic about them.

Secondly, my specific gripe was that this:


Is a bad argument because no poo poo they do. I mean for god's sake most people are with two fists so of course they see a lot of use.

I completely understand that pistols and shotguns are more useful for your common ~nefarious doings~ but that isn't a great argument in favor of assault weapons being super easy to get in my eyes.

Pauline Kael posted:

I mean I just got a new set of wusthof kitchen knives that cost a lot less than the last rifle I bought and I didn't even have to go through a background check.

NerdyMcNerdNerd posted:

They proposed an AWB and background checks. The background checks on their own would have had much more support.

A new AWB is dead in the water just about anywhere. The single-issue voters get riled up about them and vote in droves. The people in the middle that don't really like either party may vote the other way or just stay home when forced to choose between two uninspired candidates that differ in one way they somewhat care about.

It's really easy to say AWBs are stupid and unnecessary by using the statistics. It's harder to stand against things like universal background checks, cheap handguns that are of such poor quality that they fall apart after a few rounds, etc.

If we're using voter turnout as evidence that reasonable gun owners don't exist, then what does that say about the masses of people that supposedly want AWBs and such, but fail to show up and vote about it?

Pauline Kael posted:

Awbs are popular in the same places and with the same people that are fond of telling us what correct acceptable thought is, and basically nowhere else. Fortunately their reign of micro aggressive terror is about done.

Literally The Worst posted:

who had three pages in the "how long will it take to point out you can kill people with knives" pool

evilweasel posted:

what is this illegal thought you have

let me guess you're also really angry about people telling you you can't say racist poo poo

gee, who would have guessed

SedanChair posted:

Man I could write a bill that is more comprehensive and more likely to pass.

But I won't because I serve evil

Pauline Kael posted:

While evil weasel and his various supplicants mew endlessly about how deadly semi automatic rifles with evil black plastic on them are, I pointed out that very few people die every year from assault rifles compared with pretty much every other cause of death. There are tens of millions of evil black rifles in the us, how can such a menace be used in so few deaths?

Edit: sorry responded twice