Hacker News Reader

Comment by doodlebugging | Hacker News Reader

Since we already have the 2nd Amendment then it should be obvious to you that you are mistaken.

With that in mind, what are your more reasoned thoughts about how to solve the problems in San Francisco? Deep thinking is encouraged here as I don't live there, have never been there, probably will never visit, but still would like to understand cause, effect, and solutions for things that people who live there see as problems. I too would see many of these things as problems if they were occurring in my neighborhood.

View on HN

The 2nd Amendment was in practice not honored in California until June 2022 when the Supreme Court ruled in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. SF still didn't issue its first concealed carry permit until January 2023.

I didn't know this about concealed carry. Thanks for that.

Concealed carry or open carry is not the answer though. It clearly doesn't work as a deterrent in places where it is available as crimes still occur in broad daylight against victims who one could assume have a high probability of being armed. In fact, it is more common now that one would be shot in a road rage incident by some coward with a gun than it has been in the past.[0]

[0]https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/12/us/road-rage-shootings-gu...

I don't think 2A is the answer here, but I just wanted to point out: "having" something in the Constitution doesn't mean anything when local politicians, courts, and police restrict it.

Kinda reminds you of how the other amendments are treated doesn't it? Seems to depend a lot on what's socially okay in your region whether it is speech, privacy, religion, etc.

2A is Federal Law, so local government can't restrict it. If you think local government has been violating it for years, then it doesn't mean what you think it means, according to the current very-right-wing Supreme Court, which has recently struck down unconstitutional gun laws.

The Supreme Court doesn't just go through the books of places and strike-through laws they don't agree with. The law has to be used against someone and it has to be appealed through multiple levels and then the Supreme Court has to be petitioned to review it. It takes a lot of money and time, and many people are just going to settle in the lower courts.

Places have had unconstitutional laws on the books for a long time before someone had a case that made it to the Supreme Court. For every case that you do hear about, there are cases that don't make it for whatever reason and you don't hear about.

I am definitely not a legal scholar, so if any facts in my comment are wrong please let me know.

I believe you are correct and you have identified part of what is broken or frequently abused in our political system. Unfortunately there are only two parties and they seem to focus on all the things that piss off the other guys so much that they are each more than willing to advocate for and attempt to pass new laws that clearly are unconstitutional knowing that if they can maintain control of enough of the process that those laws can be in force for a long time and may bolster their position over that term.

Citizens need to be more informed about the whole legislative process, their rights and their responsibilities etc. Voting should be mandatory and more than two parties should be in the process. Somehow we have to make this work or we are all pawns.

> local government can't restrict it

Local government isn't supposed to be able to restrict it. But in practice, it often takes a really long time before unconstitutional laws get declared as such by a court.

Here's an idea: what if SF's DA applied the same prosecutorial discretion to anything that looks remotely like self-defense for 30 days. Simply as an experiment to see if there would be a precipitous decrease in crime.

A drop in crime, after ignoring all the shooting murders?

A classic purge scenario. Crime might indeed be lower after.

> Since we already have the 2nd Amendment then it should be obvious to you that you are mistaken.

The 2A is still being infringed across California. SF continues to not grant conceal carry licenses and open carry is illegal.

I see no reason why concealed carry should be legal anyway. Open carry should be the norm if you are going to allow individuals to bear arms anytime, anywhere as some 2A supporters argue.

Of course I am against open carry too since we already pay for city, state, and federal law enforcement operations that should allow all of us to go about our business without fear of being robbed, assaulted, or murdered.

Law enforcement though has been militarized and has become a tool of fascists after a couple of generations of careful fear-mongering designed to turn us against each other and thus build a case, first in one area and then expanding nationwide, for everyone to go around armed all the time increasing the likelihood of unstable personalities using their firearms in crimes of passion that otherwise would not have occurred.

Open carry and concealed carry create the environment for an increase in firearm crimes while at the same time failing to serve as a deterrent in the hands of untrained citizens.

in theory i also agree except the law enforcement that we pay for does almost nothing for us to go about our business without fear of being robbed, assaulted, or murdered. a prominent tech executive was just stabbed to death in SF, you cannot park anywhere in the bay area without clearing your entire car of belongings, elderly people are being mugged and robbed in their neighborhoods, asians continue to be attacked in broad daylight, home break ins are frequent, and the police are nowhere to be found and they do not even seem to attempt to find or book the perpetrators

i dont think that firearms is necessarily the right answer but i can understand why people may feel the need to take their protection into their own hands when our law enforcement agencies are like this

Have there been lawsuits challenging those laws?

There are several active lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of many of California's current gun laws. With the recent Supreme Court ruling, they are making excellent progress forward, but are still often stuck in a process hell driven by the politics of the 9th Circuit Court.

Details on the most recent ruling of Boland vs Bonta from a couple weeks ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/CAguns/comments/11wrknm/preliminary...

You may also see a rather lengthy detail of the state of firearms carry in CA: https://www.reddit.com/r/CAguns/comments/vlnrrw/the_rcaguns_...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com