Can you read this email and be unmoved?

It is heart-breaking.

I don’t think there is anyway around the fact that we have been insanely “liberal” in our gun policies, protecting the virtually unlimited purchase and usage of deadly pieces of metal. No other product gets this kind of pass on public safety concerns, and no other product kills or maims more often.

It’s absolutely insane. And so much of it is based upon a recent, irrational, illogical, rabidly emotional misreading and reinterpretation of the 2nd amendment. Nothing in that amendment ever gave anyone the right to unlimited consumer choice of weaponry, and if we actually do take it as intended, it was meant solely for white males in state government militias — which no longer exist.

Time to return to sanity. IMO, we need to get rid of conceal carry, nationally, impose a ban on all weapons with removable, detachable ammo containers, limit legal guns to those with internal chambers only, six bullets max, and these must be hand-loaded. No capacity for any kind of auto-loading.

License and registration for all guns and gun owners. Like our cars.

Smart tech ASAP on all guns.

Change the way we do our ratings on media. The depiction of deadly violence should get restricted ratings. We should flip the emphasis from sex and sexuality to violence. Without censorship, we should mount public safety campaigns that push for a mass reduction in any kind of glorification of guns, gun violence or violence, period.

We have had amazing success reducing smoking levels. They’re now under 20%. We should do the same with guns and all things regarding guns.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 3 months ago by Billy_T.

bnw wrote:

Billy_T wrote:

I don’t think there is anyway around the fact that we have been insanely “liberal” in our gun policies, protecting the virtually unlimited purchase and usage of deadly pieces of metal. No other product gets this kind of pass on public safety concerns, and no other product kills or maims more often.

Use of tobacco and alcohol both kill and maim far more than private ownership of firearms.

We have strong regulations when it comes to tobacco and alcohol. Our gun regulations, OTOH, are extremely lax.

And, yes, tobacco is worse. Tobacco kills roughly 400,000 smokers a year, and more than 40,000 non-smokers, through secondhand smoke.

Alcohol is the fourth leading, preventable cause of death, at roughly 88,000 a year. Still trying to track down info on accidents.

Gun deaths and accidents combined number over 100,000 per year. Gun fatalities — accidents, homicides, suicides — come to roughly 33,000 a year.

bnw wrote:

Billy_T wrote:

bnw wrote:

Billy_T wrote:

I don’t think there is anyway around the fact that we have been insanely “liberal” in our gun policies, protecting the virtually unlimited purchase and usage of deadly pieces of metal. No other product gets this kind of pass on public safety concerns, and no other product kills or maims more often.

Use of tobacco and alcohol both kill and maim far more than private ownership of firearms.

We have strong regulations when it comes to tobacco and alcohol. Our gun regulations, OTOH, are extremely lax.

And, yes, tobacco is worse. Tobacco kills roughly 400,000 smokers a year, and more than 40,000 non-smokers, through secondhand smoke.

Alcohol is the fourth leading, preventable cause of death, at roughly 88,000 a year. Still trying to track down info on accidents.

Gun deaths and accidents combined number over 100,000 per year. Gun fatalities — accidents, homicides, suicides — come to roughly 33,000 a year.

Gun regulations are already far more stringent than those for either alcohol or tobacco.

We disagree about that. I think we’re about as far apart on this issue and can be. I see our gun laws as insanely lax and dangerously permissive. You see them as far too strict. There’s a Grand Canyon between us on this topic.

bnw wrote:

Billy_T wrote:

I don’t think there is anyway around the fact that we have been insanely “liberal” in our gun policies, protecting the virtually unlimited purchase and usage of deadly pieces of metal. No other product gets this kind of pass on public safety concerns, and no other product kills or maims more often.

Use of tobacco and alcohol both kill and maim far more than private ownership of firearms.

I wonder, do you have a tendency to change the subject much?

When a critical statement is made about something you like, do you feel like saying, “Hey! Over here! Look here instead!”

bnw wrote:

I challenged the veracity of his statement. He conceded the point. However your post is directed solely about me which is against the rules here.

It was directed at your rhetorical strategy (of throwing out red herrings) which is fair game.

And you didn’t succeed in challenging the veracity of anything Billy said. All you succeeded in doing was getting Billy to admit that alcohol and tobacco kill more people than guns. Which is completely irrelevant, however correct it may be, and however much anyone agrees with you that the numbers are correct. That doesn’t mean in any way that guns are not a problem, or that you succeeded in winning the argument that guns are over-regulated. Nobody conceded that.

You want to know some other things that kill fewer people than tobacco and alcohol?

Muslims.

Illegal Immigrants.

But, hey, you wouldn’t mind seeing a little more government action there, would you, bnw?

400,000 tobacco deaths a year.

In 2015, 19 people killed by terrorists in the US. But let’s support a candidate for president who wants to respond to Muslims with a policy equivalent to banning the manufacture of firearms altogether. Who wants to respond to illegal immigrants with a policy equivalent to rounding up all firearms and destroying them.

Oh…………..suddenly tobacco and alcohol numbers are completely irrelevant, huh? Because “that’s different.”

Yeah. That’s different.

Tobacco and alcohol are irrelevant to the gun conversation.

Zooey wrote:

bnw wrote:

I challenged the veracity of his statement. He conceded the point. However your post is directed solely about me which is against the rules here.

It was directed at your rhetorical strategy (of throwing out red herrings) which is fair game.

And you didn’t succeed in challenging the veracity of anything Billy said. All you succeeded in doing was getting Billy to admit that alcohol and tobacco kill more people than guns. Which is completely irrelevant, however correct it may be, and however much anyone agrees with you that the numbers are correct. That doesn’t mean in any way that guns are not a problem, or that you succeeded in winning the argument that guns are over-regulated. Nobody conceded that.

You want to know some other things that kill fewer people than tobacco and alcohol?

Muslims.

Illegal Immigrants.

But, hey, you wouldn’t mind seeing a little more government action there, would you, bnw?

400,000 tobacco deaths a year.

In 2015, 19 people killed by terrorists in the US. But let’s support a candidate for president who wants to respond to Muslims with a policy equivalent to banning the manufacture of firearms altogether. Who wants to respond to illegal immigrants with a policy equivalent to rounding up all firearms and destroying them.

Oh…………..suddenly tobacco and alcohol numbers are completely irrelevant, huh? Because “that’s different.”

Yeah. That’s different.

Tobacco and alcohol are irrelevant to the gun conversation.

Excellent analogies, Zooey.

As you know, pretty much anytime gun violence is mentioned, gun, uh, hem, “advocates” will respond with deflection and redirection. They’ll mention car deaths or something else. They just don’t want to deal with the fact that gun proliferation in America is out of control, that it creates death and destruction where it wouldn’t exist if not for those guns.

To me, this nation should think about it as a public health and safety hazard issue. The right has managed to twist it beyond recognition into a crusade for “freedom.” Guns have absolutely nothing to do with “freedom,” just death and destruction. Unless one wants to talk about making murderers, rapists, kidnappers, etc. etc. etc. “free” to do as they please.

It’s time to rethink guns in America and consider them what they really are: Death machines, in direct opposition to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.