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Vegas Mandalay Bay mass shooting / Gun Control 2017 Thread

Yeah I wanna apologize for saying gun owners want to kill. I was going through some crappy symptoms following kicking dope and just angry. Still pretty anti-gun but this was just stupid of me.

As a former gun owner I wanna say I appreciate the apology.

I never owned a gun cause I wanted to hurt anyone, I owned one cause I'd been hurt.

Plus, people seldom recognize and apologize for previous mistakes, most people just try and justify and cover it up. So when someone does apologize and recognize a previous mistake, I think it shows character and deserves to be recognized.
 
You don't think about killing while buying the gun, or you're probably dead or in prison.

But the gun nut press talks up home invasion robberies. The Preppers stockpile guns waiting for the apocalypse, cause they think city folk will storm the place and they'll have to defend it. The folks who drove cross country to the bundy ranch so they could point guns at law enforcement.

And all the action movies out there.

Some people who buy guns really want to use them. To kill people.

people seldom recognize and apologize for previous mistakes, most people just try and justify and cover it up. So when someone does apologize and recognize a previous mistake, I think it shows character and deserves to be recognized.

Well said, Jess. We could all use more character.
 
Hey, I agree with what you'd written. We need responsible gun owners to get on the irresponsible ones, cause they won't listen to us.
 
Maybe the left can start an alternative for responsible owners...like a liberal nra.

It's already been tried. As I've said before on bluelight I grew up around hardcore right wing gun nuts and endured an enormous amount of their ranting on all things right wing.

Anyhow, within the world of serious 2nd amendment acivists there have been lots of views on that front.

If you ask me, the NRA already is the moderate organization of the gun rights crowd. There are other more extreme organizations. And other far less extreme organizations, generally they are the ones who confined themselves to what they call "hunters rights".

With the NRA in the middle. I know to the left the NRA is seen as this extreme right wing boogie man but they're not. There is a lot of pressure from within that would like the NRA to take a much more aggressive and right aligned stance on various issues.

And another side that wants them to take a much more liberal stance, more aligned to the interests of hunters and farmers.

So you have the hunters and farmers on one side, the crazy doomsday preppers and anti government crazies on the other side.

And those of us a bit more like me in the middle, which is where the NRA falls.

But for the most part all of the factions do a much better job compromising with each other than pro and anti gun sides do with each other. They know they can't compromise or they all lose. So they call compromise knowing the NRA isn't perfect and doesn't perfectly represent everyone. Because they know there is strength in numbers.

And sadly, in a democracy such thinking is correct. There is power in numbers so everyone on every internal side of the progun side have to put up an uncompromising united front. Cause the anti gun side will take whatever they can get and pounce on any weakness. And because of that the progun side can't compromise. And the status quo remains.

The antigun side have their own factional differences of course but on the whole they're more united.

If only both the major sides could compromise with each other as well as they do within their side. But that's the way with denocracies. You keep merging your similar views together until you have two extremely large homogenous extreme sides within which there are diverse differences of opinion, but from the outside appear to represent a united front.

As I recall one such splinter group is gun owners of America, as I recall they represent a more extreme ideology pandering to the people who feel the NRA is too soft and compromising.

There's another problem too, as I recall, keeping in mind I left this world long ago. There is a strong distrust of gun owners rights groups that are any more left leaning than the NRA. As I recall many years back someone caught a left leaning "hunters rights" group as having financial ties to the anti gun Brady campaign. It was widely believed that the Brady campaign had intentionally helped form a "more sensible, left leaning" group that represented gun owners, with the secret goal being to spread division and splinter the support for the NRA among people who believe in gun righs.

Basically the one of the most aggressive Antigua campaigns, the Brady campaign, seemed to have had a hand in starting what claimed to be a group representing sensible gun owners like farmers and such. And thus keep them away from supporting the NRA. I don't know how true that is, but here is definitely some truth to it and it's true the more radical elements of the Antigun side in the Brady campaign have engaged in some truly underhanded tactics over the years.

Ultimately how true it is isn't too important. Because of it there are a lot of gun rights supporters who now hold any organization that claims to be like the NRA but for sensible, more moderate gun owners as an Antigun front trying to splinter the pro gun side.
 
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Fair enough. I just thought it was an interesting insight. I don't think most people think much about or realize how complex and human gun rights fanatics are. I mean obviously all seemingly extremist groups of humans are like that. But people have a habit of simplifying groups of people as all good or all bad without seeing the complexity and humanity.

I bet if you could be a fly on the wall with a group of Isis supporters we'd be amazed how normal they are sometimes. I don't actually know that and I'm certainly not condoning any of it, it's just interesting. And you gotta know your enemy right?
 
I really don't know. Islam impresses me in that the koran got dna and the solar system. Beyond that, its all just an outgrowth of Judaism to me.
 
Also...you are a good writer. I make no comments on your pov...if only because I get names mixed up....but you always make articulate points...and I recognize the time you take to post jess.
 
In regards to the purchase of guns the worst is knowing that when society start to talk about bans or restrictions- the sales increase overwhelmingly according to an article I read earlier this year.

This is very sad because people buy more as they fear it won’t be as easy in the future. Even if it’s not entirely true I believe that’s how this maket works.

It is true and it's actually worse. I held back on posting these because I thought they were too depressing after the Las Vegas shooting.

Before we can talk about gun control because it's disrespectfully politicizing a tragedy, before people run out and buy more guns, gun stock prices rise as traders buy in anticipation of a run on sales.

And apparently the stock market traders correctly anticipated that everyone wants the same accessory used by a mass murderer.

Bump Stock Prices Soar in Online Gun Marketplaces

Why Do Gun Sales In the US Spike After Mass Shootings?

Firearm and Defense Technology Stocks Spike in Aftermath of Las Vegas Shooting
 
I'm still wondering how the guy supposedly got all of those weapons and ammunition into his room without being noticed. That and still no footage or pictures of anyone getting shot afaik. Not to be grim but with 59 dead you would think there would be something.
 
And I honestly dont give a s#÷t anymore about America and gun control.

There's been so many mass shootings done by mentally disturbed people for one reason or another.


America doesnt seem to get it that the only people who are being affected by their extraordinary need to not admit to having a gun problem is themselves and pride comes before the fall.

So if you dont want to take stock and reassess the need for attachments that make guns into machine guns then you must really need them. So make sure everybody has their own.
 
I would probably support a ban on bump stocks honestly as I believe the NRA does. I don't think civilians should be able to essentially fire a semi-automatic like a fully automatic. With that said tho, people are still going to convert semis into autos illegally if they want to.
 
A month after Las Vegas shooting, there's still no bump stock regulation

By Daniella Diaz, CNN

Updated 6:11 AM ET, Thu November 2, 2017

Washington (CNN)Many lawmakers, both Democratic and Republican, agreed one response to the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history should be to ban the sale of bump stocks -- but a month later, they are still legal and neither Congress nor the agency in charge of controlling such devices appear to be taking steps to outlaw them.

A bump fire stock, also known as a bump stock, is a device that enables semi-automatic rifles to fire more rapidly, similar to automatic weapons. Twelve of them were found on firearms recovered from the gunman's Las Vegas hotel room.

Gun control legislation has failed to make any progress in Congress after each mass shooting, and the Las Vegas massacre appears to be no different.

After the massacre, lawmakers first responded by saying they, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, didn't even know what a bump stock was.

Ryan then called for a regulatory fix for bump fire stocks earlier, rather than passing legislation that was proposed in the House and Senate.
"We think the regulatory fix is the smartest, quickest fix," he said when asked about how to address the devices.

Also in response at the time, nine Republican senators sent a letter to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives asking the agency to review its policy on bump fire stock.

"We recognize that it is impossible to prevent tragedy and acts of 'pure evil,' in the words of our President," the senators wrote. "We believe, however, the tragic events in Las Vegas brought to light an issue from this past administration that we respectfully request that your Bureau swiftly review,"

After the shooting, the National Rifle Association pointed to the ATF to regulate the device.
"The ATF should review bump-fire stocks to ensure they comply with federal law," Jennifer Baker, spokeswoman for the Institute for Legislative Action at the NRA, told CNN, calling bills to ban them "intentionally overreaching."

But so far, there's been no change in the regulation of the device.

A spokeswoman for the ATF told CNN on Tuesday that Senate judiciary committee staffers were briefed by the ATF regarding bump stock related matters, but had nothing further to add.

When asked about the status of bump stock regulation on Tuesday, GOP Sen. John Thune's office referred to the letter, which he was part of sending -- but there appeared to be no new developments.

Stalled legislation

In the House, Republican Rep. Carlos Curbelo and Democratic Rep. Seth Moulton, introduced legislation to ban the sale of bump stocks, but there's been no action since.

And in the Senate, Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein introduced a bill that would ban the sale, transfer, importation, manufacture or possession of bump stocks, as well as trigger cranks and other accessories that accelerate a semi-automatic rifle's rate of fire.

GOP Sen. Ron Johnson was outspoken after the shooting about his support for banning bump stocks following the shooting. Asked for comment about the lack of action, his office only referred back to a statement he gave Politico for story published on October 4.

"Automatic weapons are illegal," he said at the time. "If that (bump stocks) facilitates that, to me it would be subject to the same ban. If that (bill banning bump stocks) actually gets on the Senate floor, I'd vote for it."

On Tuesday, Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut who has been engaged in the gun debate on Capitol Hill for years, told CNN that he's heard nothing on whether ATF is seriously looking at changing regulations surrounding bump stocks.

"I don't think the ATF is going to move unless the White House tells them to move and my impression is that they have been given no direction from the White House," Murphy said.
"It is unclear what the ATF can do," Murphy added.

GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham also told CNN he hadn't heard anything about where ATF is in reviewing bump stocks.

"I think once they make a decision then it would be our job to evaluate if it makes sense or not," Graham said.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut, told CNN that he thinks that the idea of a regulatory change is not enough, adding also he has not heard anything from the ATF on what they are doing now.

"We need legislation because the alternative is 'regulation,' which means two or three years of waiting for a rule that the NRA itself probably will challenge and tie it up for years more," he told CNN. "So I think the proposal for a rule or regulation is a deceptive dodge, purposefully suggested by the NRA as a way to avoid any real prohibition."

GOP Sen. John Barrasso told CNN that he hasn't heard what the ATF is doing about bump stocks now.

"I'm expecting to hear from them. I don't know that they're timeline is going to be, but It was something most of us hadn't heard of beforehand and then we found out how it came to be, we found out it was the ATF and we expect them to deal with it and let us know," Barrasso said.

Separately from the previous legislation, a bipartisan group of four House members, two from each major party, unveiled legislation Tuesday to regulate but not ban the sale of bump stocks. The "Closing the Bump Stock Loophole" act would require that those in "possession of or purchasing bump stock devices ... (undergo) a rigorous background check, fingerprinting and (pay) a $200 registration fee," according to a summary of the bill posted on the website of Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick.

CORRECTION: This story has been updated to correct Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick's party affiliation. He is a Republican.

CNN's Lauren Fox and Deirdre Walsh contributed to this report.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/01/politics/bump-stock-gun-debate-congress/index.html
 
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The alternative to gun control (which is really unlikely anyway) is for America to just accept that theres a huge price for insisting on these weapons being allowed around and just accept that theres going to be on going shootings at random.

It sucks but so does the denial that there is an obvious gun control problem .

Seems every time this happens and the rest of the world (well us aussies and poms) point this out the Americans cling tighter to guns.

So really youve made the choice many times to keep guns as is despite these events

*shrug*
 
I think I've said it before but even if firearms were outright banned which would pretty much be impossible, there's still so many guns already out there that it wouldn't even matter. It would just help the black market and criminals would still get them. Imo the answer is having more accountability for things like background and mental health checks. I think those are the best ways to stop these shootings, but people need to be proactive in enforcing these things.
 
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