Killing Spree in AL

[Mise]

mrstickball said:
Mise, I think you forget that the idea of an armed society would stem from the idea that the responsible would own guns, and not the irresponsible, nor those that didn't want to carry. You can argue increased domestic violence, and mental health, but if you only allowed smart, intelligent, responsible citizens to carry guns, you would skirt the problems you brought up.

That's another problem: There is no system that ensures only "good guys/gals" can have guns, or that the "good people" won't eventually turn into "bad people". There's no guarantee that someone who can ie. pass a marksmanship, gun maintenance and psychological exam on the day he gets his license isn't just putting up a facade, doesn't have latent/invisible mental issues, won't encounter a mind-crushing event later in his life etc. Constant surveillance would be a massive resource drain and a legal shitstorm, and wouldn't really solve these issues either. Plus, when the majority owns firearms, it also lowers the threshold of using those firearms, hence the criminal/domestic issues.

If you want to ban dangerous things, then I think that, if we start with guns, we should not finish until the world has banned fatty foods, driving, smoking, hard drugs, and drinking. It's only rational that if you ban guns due to crime and health, that you not finish until the items that cause even higher numbers of deaths are removed, too.

So you can't help one without helping everything else, cause it wouldn't be fair otherwise? That's just silly.

Besides, I wasn't advocating a total ban on guns. If anything, gun ownership outside the military and police should be restricted to hobbyists: If you belong to a local marksmanship society for six months, for instance, and pass all the necessary tests, you would be granted a license to purchase a limited number of registered firearms - and the license would have to be renewed every 1-2 years or so. Bullet control wouldn't hurt, either.