KLAMarine said:
So you can punish behavior that is undesirable. Murder is undesirable hence we have laws against it. |
I think it is a little more complicated than that. Laws serve both a proactive and a reactive function. They exist both to punish people and to prevent additional crimes from occurring.
Proactive function is one of the important and overlooked aspects of gun control legislation in my opinion. It essentially allows creates a situation where the police are able to intervene before an incident occurs. For example, if an individual is stockpiling illegal weapons to use in a shooting, the fact that these weapons are illegal allow the police to step in and arrest this individual. If these weapons were made legal, the police would be unable to act without further information. This is also one of the goals of "red flag" laws.
