I think any argument around guns that focuses on ideological thought experiments like self defense from a "violent government" is not worth exploring. Because then you're talking about how to organize an armed insurrection, not how to reduce mass shootings and domestic partner violence.
> Its also convenient for you to decide that others don't "need" to protect themselves from situations that they've deemed necessary.
And it's convenient for the craziest people in our society to have easy access to weapons and ammunition because of widespread paranoia about defending yourself from those people. Seems like the easy solution is to make access to weapons harder!
For me this smacks of California style government i.e. "we've made gas and energy so expensive that people use less energy, and environmentally that's -a good thing-" or "we've made permit regulations so bad nobody is able to build anything anymore and environmentally that's -a good thing-"
The crux of these things is that if you presume that these are basic rights: not having property confiscating, building a house without too much red tape, free market energy economy - then we have arrived at -a good thing- via -an unethical thing- and thus it's a good outcome through an unethical means, or "fruit from the poison tree" as ethics states.
From a legal perspective, these are trying to avoid a completely hypothetical scenario of Peter's hypothetical gun hypothetically shooting Paul, or Peter's hypothetical +20% pollution hurting the life of Paul, and George got jammed up by the law and hates it, but the lawmaker who is worried solely about Paul is quite pleased with himself about having saved Paul from the hypothetical which may or may not have actually happened.
I did not make that point, but I also don't understand yours.
That's the problem though, isn't it? Less guns should exist in public, and the 'right' the US has shouldn't have been extended as far as it has, so it needs to be choked and leashed.
Same with utilities...they might be a right, but the specific means of generation isn't necessarily a right, and maybe it shouldn't be.
Guns are used to kill something. In hunting they are used to kill animals, and otherwise they are used to kill other people, or yourself in the case of suicide. You don't do anything with a gun except kill or attempt to kill something.
But yes, in general killing or potential killing is the purpose. But this reasoning implies that killing is bad even when there are legitimate circumstances.
Also, I never once implied that killing is bad. For example, killing animals for food is not bad. Also, killing someone who is trying to kill you is not bad.
Websters even considers books as tools as they relate to scholars. By the definition, they are tools. In the context of hunting (and policing, and self defense), they absolutely offer utility.
I don't know what you meant to imply or not. But colloquially, when those statements are made they usually imply a negative view of it. I would bet that more than a few readers would have read it with that in mind. What is evident based on your prior comment and this one is that you do not consider utility to include killing.
I'd like to emphasize the "potential" here even more - one of the greatest uses of guns is as as a deterrent, and this is worth differentiating from actually killing.
People who claim that the only use for a gun is to kill are factually wrong, and you can point this out.
What non killing-or-practicing-killing use do handguns have? Zero.
Surely there must be better ways of “ensuring equity” than threat of death.
Also, if you think a handgun is going to protect you “from a … violent government” you should see what happens (or really, doesn’t happen) when a handgun round hits modern tank plate.
This argument implies that killing is never justified. Society in general seems to disagree with that. Killing as a last resort to protect yourself is considered reasonable.
Also, there are remote areas where it would be much more likely for the killing to take place against animals than humans. These sorts of scenarios seem to be overlooked quite frequently in these arguments.
In your remote area hypothetical, a rifle would be the appropriate tool. I was very specifically talking about handguns, which are most frequently used to kill the person holding it[0][1], and it’s getting worse[2], hence the Red Flag laws that started this entire thread. And that’s the reason there’s a significant difference between a pile of cash and the equivalent value handgun should absolutely not be treated equally.
0: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2013/05/24/suicides-...
1: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/26/what-the-...
2: https://www.cdc.gov/firearm-violence/php/data-trends/firearm...
The courts find justifiable homicides often. Statute, code, and case law even define specific instances when it is justified. That's not one person, but many creating those. The only person who can make a decision in the moment is the person who is there. They have to live with that decision, but nobody else can make it for them.
"In your remote area hypothetical, a rifle would be the appropriate tool."
Not really. Handguns are the prevailing tool of choice due to the ease of carrying them while performing other tasks. Sure, rifles and shotguns are better choices for hunting, but get burdensome if fishing, foraging, working, etc.
"I was very specifically talking about handguns, which are most frequently used to kill the person holding it[0][1], and it’s getting worse[2], hence the Red Flag laws that started this entire thread."
They might be the tool of choice for suicides, and that suicides are more common than homicides. However, that has nothing to do with their "most frequent use". There are plenty of uses that don't result in death. If you only focus on the negatives, then your perspective will be skewed and you can come to a valid value proposition. The numbers have been trending down and have only ticked up slightly. Your argument also assumes that suicide is always wrong. Most of the people I know who committed suicide did so because they had terminal dementias. Perhaps it's not as big of a problem as the gross numbers suggest if we dive into it deeper. There are also stats out there that show defensive gun use us more common that firearm injuries.
Finally, red flag laws are not primarily about preventing suicide. Existing laws about involuntary commitment better handle it because they offer actual help whereas red flag laws take away only one of many methods of suicide and don't offer any real help. They were primarily created to prevent mass shootings by creating a a version of existing protection from abuse orders that didn't require domestic or family relations.
The logical conclusion from this is that if someone is going to kill you, and you have the option to stop them via possible-fatal means, you have to let them kill you. I don't think most people agree with this ideology, or that it's compatible with...any of the common systems of morality.
> It should never, ever be up to one person to decide if someone else should live or die.
This is inconsistent with reality. Criminals don't adhere to this belief, and so it doesn't work for anyone who might be attacked by a criminal, either.
This is factually wrong. Guns are extremely useful as deterrents, even when never fired.
> Also, if you think a handgun is going to protect you “from a … violent government” you should see what happens (or really, doesn’t happen) when a handgun round hits modern tank plate.
This has been debunked a long time ago, in Afghanistan, and in most other authoritarian regimes - governments need a disarmed populace in order to stay in power. You cannot have tanks driving around on the streets, policing opposition - actual humans have to do the policing.
https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/779/561/67c...
I'd lean towards saying that there are many times more misuses of a gun than "a good guy with a gun". Wonder if there are stats on lawful shootings vs unlawful.