Originally posted by tum
the united states has the highest rate of homicide of any of the 36 most developed economies in the world. we beat israel hands down. and we're neck-and-neck with northern ireland. of every 6 homicides in the us, 4 of them are due to firearms.
Comparisons to other countries are unfair and pointless. The US is by its very nature more violent than other countries for a number of reasons not having to do with guns. We're one of very few developed nations that recently grew to power in a "frontier" mentality, which generally involves killing what you eat, and killing those who would try to steal what you eat. More importantly, we have by far the most diverse population, ethnically, culturally, and economically, of any of the developed nations. Diversity means differences, differences means conflict, and conflict means violence. That's just the way this country is, and coming from a non-dominant ethnic group I can say that sometimes it sucks. But that's the way it is, and you can't blame that part on guns.
beyond this, it would be impractical to limit the access of 'obvious' criminals to guns to do this when firearms are generally legal and background checks can be deceiving.
It is not impractical. It
is imperfect, but I think it's going too far to imply that such measures are useless.
so we need to be more aggressive. guns are a luxury, and this is simple utilitarianism: the luxuries of the few must give way to the necessities of the many.
So you are proposing banning guns altogether. That's quite utilitarian (if it is practicable in this country). However, we do not live in a strictly utilitarian country. We have values that supercede simple utilitarianism.
while i understand people must have some vices, this one may be too costly to keep around.
admittedly, sometimes when dealing with patients i want to ban alcohol and cigarettes and fatty foods. i know these aren't reasonable ideas, as these vices are even more entrenched than guns are in our society, and sometimes i enjoy them in moderation. it's alright to have an occasional crappy meal or a drink with your friends, it might even be a good idea.
More people die from the consequences of smoking, poor diet, and lack of exercise than from gun ownership by a long shot. Why is banning guns acceptable but banning fatty foods, cigarette smoking, and being lazy fatass unacceptable. Given your utilitarian bent, I'd think cigarettes would be the first thing to go on your list. After that, you should ban sitting around on the couch doing nothing. Then ban fast cars and limit all cars to <=30 mph, ban motorcycles and bicycles (those are dangerous too), definitely ban dangerous sports such as skydiving, downhill skiing, and motocross.
so psychologically, what's going on here? why do we like guns?
I don't think it's any one thing for all people. As a country we like guns for lots of different reasons. For some people it's just fun. Things that make loud noises and blow up other things are just cool, as our preference for action movies clearly demonstrates. Some like the security aspect. Others like the sporting aspect, and not necessarily hunting other living creatures. What difference does it make?
former gov bush proved that when relaxing restrictions on the death penalty actually increased the frequency of crimes punishable by death in texas.
I am no fan of either Bush, but that statement is unfair. You're drawing a cause and effect when none is proven. All you have is a temporal association, but so many other factors change over time that you can't state "A caused B". The most consistent predictor of violent crime in this country is the overall health of the economy and the unemployment rate. The utilitarian thing to do would be to have the government employ all the people that can't or won't find jobs. All studies about changing gun laws (either more or less lenient) are similarly flawed. To draw conclusions from them is shaky business.
in a recent newsweek article, they talked about how some communities have passed laws prohibiting minors from carrying guns WITHOUT PARENTAL PERMISSION.
Uhh, why is that nuts?
this creates an environment where the dialogue stops and progress becomes stagnant.
Yeah, because we all know that the NRA is the only unreasoning, extremist viewpoint being expressed on this topic.
and that brings us to where we are now: the NRA is lobbying ungodly sums of money onto congress, and EDs around the country are being bombarded with stupid gang members and too curious children and innocent bystanders and psychopathic criminals--all with holes in places they shouldn't be and pieces rearranged where god never meant them to be, and we get more business and yay, we can all pretend we're Noah Wyle.
Umm, yeah. None of us likes the gun traumas. The trauma surgeons especially hate them. They don't pay. I wouldn't mind being in Noah Wyle's shoes though. He's dated some amazing beautiful women.
I don't think the changes you are suggesting (an outright ban on firearms) are consistent with the values of our country. There are countries that hold those values, but they don't have the Stars and the Stripes flying above them.
Disclaimer: I am not, nor have I ever been, a member of the NRA. I have never owned a gun (not even a BB gun), and I've fired a gun only once when target shooting with friends. I am not a rabid pro-gun advocate, but I think people who want guns banned outright want to live in a different country than the one we share now.