Let's pool our knowledge: D&D helps D&D Debate and Discuss

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Let's pool our knowledge: D&D helps D&D Debate and Discuss

Interlude: Jan 24, 2001; Guns are basically hand fedoras.

Hieronymous Alloy posted:

Not to bog this thread down in issue debates, but are people still talking about gun control? I thought the general consensus on this forum was that gun control was a red-herring issue that simply wasn't worth talking about, given the political cost & the fact that it's like the only civil rights issue the Republicans can still legitimately claim to be on the constitutional side of.

Apparently some are still fighting that losing battle. See above, with someone linking Kellerman 2: Suicide Harder.

# ¿ Oct 19, 2011 16:26

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# ¿ Apr 23, 2024 23:05

Interlude: Jan 24, 2001; Guns are basically hand fedoras.

internaut posted:

It might surprise you to learn not everyone is American and we tend to have different beliefs on gun control. If you have studies that show the huge gun homicide rate in the US compared to other countries is a "red herring issue" then post them. I'm not interested in getting into a debate in this thread but I would like to collect more studies and data to have a better informed opinion.

Well are we trying to limit this thread to topics on which the majority of D&D agrees or not? Anyone can just post a bunch of links about a particular topic and let the reader decide but that doesn't seem to be the point of this.

# ¿ Oct 19, 2011 19:58

Interlude: Jan 24, 2001; Guns are basically hand fedoras.

Helsing posted:

Many of us are not American and do not consider gun ownership a "civil right".

Whether or not you consider gun ownership a "civil right" by the standards of your home country's law, it is here in America and thus your standard of judgment is inapplicable.

# ¿ Oct 22, 2011 14:50

Interlude: Jan 24, 2001; Guns are basically hand fedoras.

Bruce Leroy posted:

Except the point is that there are functioning, stable, democratic nations that don't have gun ownership as civil rights, which is an obvious refutation of the gun rights advocacy tropes that the 2nd Amendment is necessary to preserve order, keep crime low, and prevent government tyranny.

That's nice that you think that, but it still can't be used to hand-wave away the 2nd Amendment. I mean I suppose you can just pretend it doesn't exist and debate the issues, but it's kind of the elephant in the room.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2011 03:34

Interlude: Jan 24, 2001; Guns are basically hand fedoras.

Bruce Leroy posted:

Nice job quoting me out of context.

The second part of my comment was that I'm still in favor of gun rights, so I was clearly not "hand-waving away the 2nd Amendment." My point was that those specific issues used by some groups to promote gun rights and reduce regulation (e.g. reducing crime, preventing government tyranny,etc.) are fallacious and just obscure more important arguments about civil liberties and real sociological issues, which I contend support the 2nd Amendment.

You're over-analyzing this. I was simply saying that if we're discuss guns in America, its useless to bring up the fact that gun ownership is not a civil right in other countries.

quote:

It only hurts supporters of the 2nd Amendment to argue demonstrably false tropes that guns are necessary to solve certain problems, especially when other nations have shown that this is not the case. It's more productive to talk about things like (1) fearmongering from those in favor of very strict gun control, (2) false choice fallacies from idiots who frame the debate as either being against the 2nd Amendment entirely or in favor of completely unrestricted and unregulated weapon ownership, (3) that there are other, more important contributors to crime like poverty, so we should deal with those instead, (4) how other nations like Canada, Switzerland, and Finland have personal gun ownership, but do not have anything close to the crime and recidivism rates of the USA so it's not gun ownership in and of itself that causes crime and other problems.

In case you haven't noticed, things are pretty bad in the US. We have awful socioeconomic mobility, a harmful war on drugs, vast swaths of people with little to no access to anything that will lift them out of a subsistence existence. That things are so much better in other first world countries has little to do with access to guns and more to do with the fact that are better places to live if you're poor, ergo less crime.

# ¿ Oct 25, 2011 01:46

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