US Supreme Court limits ban on gun ownership by marijuana users | Hacker News Reader

US Supreme Court limits ban on gun ownership by marijuana users

reuters.com

42 pointshelterskelter19 comments

Apropos of not much, but life experience tells me that people who consume alcohol are far more concerning gun owners than those that smoke weed.

US drug policy is more "which population demographic uses it?" based than anything else.

Hence why this is now changing. Every demographic smokes weed now. It is no longer a good proxy to hamstring blacks, browns, and leftists.

If you said people who carry firearms when drunk, I might be inclined to agree.

But if you mean more generally people who drink, vs. people who smoke weed, I would expect to find the type of people who use illegal drugs (even weed) would be far more concerning on average.

I’ve never seen someone stoned outta their mind get into a fight with strangers, friends, or beat their spouse. I have seen drunk people do that though. I’ve been attacked by drunks myself. I’ve never been attacked by someone who is high as fuck. And I spent years smoking, and hanging out with a huge amount of folks who smoked weed.

The connotation that because marijuana is an “illegal drug” in some places means those people are more inclined to violence is borderline absurd. Violence is more likely to happen to producers, and sellers, because they have no access to the police. Producers and sellers are also categorically different than someone buying it to consume it.

Can someone who consumes weed be violent? Sure, but I would highly suspect it’s correlation and not causation.

mild devil's advocate, but i have heard that spice, a synthetic cannaboid, can cause violent psychosis.

however as it's a synthetic drug i don't think it's in the same category as quote unquote "regular" cannabis

It’s not at all. They’re wildly different substances. All the synthetic approximations of weed or imitations are categorically different substances. Comparing weed to “spice” is like comparing alcohol to Rohypnol. They’re materially different compounds and effects are dramatically different even if there’s a marginal similarity.

And FWIW- I used to know body builders who would take Rohypnol in extremely small doses because it’d make them feel drunk without the calories.

Which, tangentially, is insane considering how fucked up I was from (what I assume was) Rohypnol— as it was the most insanely drunk I’ve ever felt after consuming a single beer. I wasn’t the intended target, but all things considered I’m glad I was the one who had to tank it because the alternative would’ve been awful (one of the ladies in my group who got the beers).

I really doubt the nonviolent, victimless crime of smoking weed correlates much with violence.

Drugs that are a strong indictor of underlying psychological issues like Heroin, maybe. But for weed that's just far fetched, especially compared to alcohol.

If you are pro gun, gun rights should be universal. Anyone should be able to buy a gun, because otherwise, "the big bad government" can take away your gun rights by labeling you as belonging to the group that is forbidden to buy guns.

If you are scared of getting shot by people that you think shouldn't own guns, then it means you haven't trained enough with your own gun.

(I personally don't believe this, but its a fun way to troll pro gun people)

Who are you even trolling with this? Thats the pretty much verbatim belief of most the 2A community I've interacted with.

I know for a fact in Virginia you were explicitly told when getting your medical cannabis certificate from a doctor that you would then be ineligible for a concealed carry license.

Unbelievable that a right like firearm ownership was ever gated like this.

It isn't that unbelievable. This came in direct response to the Black Panthers armed protest in Sacramento in 1967. The law came in 1968. You have to remember that power then, and still now in a lot of ways, was racist.

Ah, the 1960s.

This predates DC v Heller.

The 4473 still hasn't changed, so it still appears to be a felony to buy a gun from an FFL if you use recreational marijuana, since it would require lying on the form to get it approved.

The Supreme Court doesn’t have the power or the need to rewrite the form. Either the Executive rewrites the form to comply with this ruling, Congress passes a law ordering the Executive to rewrite the form, or someone answers the form truthfully, gets denied, and then sues the ATF. Depending on how the case is filed and relevant case law, the court can order the ATF to issue a permit to the plaintiff, or order the ATF to stop denying permits to anyone who is in a similar situation to the plaintiff. (The recent rulings about nationwide injunctions are directly relevant to this discussion.)

- are you an unlawful user of or addicted to, [list,x]

so user of [x] disqualifies, or seemingly addiction to [x] no usage required will also disqualify

if federally you are a lawful medical recipient, you could qualify, it might be grey, as the combination of firearm and medical marijuana might become illegal use even with a prescription.

not legal advice but the ATF appears to already be considering medical marijuana lawful use after the rescheduling, and even filed a rule change to exempt it from that question. The comments period recently closed, I think the form will probably change in less than a year. But there's no expectation yet it will be changed to include recreational marijuana.

I suspect dcrazy is right, someone will have to sue and wait god knows how long for it to wind through the courts, before it will change for recreational.

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