Shootings

[Daehawk]

Good to see him speak out. He is really leaning into the GOP like that Blackburn bitch from my state and Cruz from his own TX state.

Freedom to a Republican in office is the ability for anyone to secretly slip money into their pocket.

It gets repetitive, but Popovich's opening statement is right on point.

[Blackhawk]

Before it was mental illness, now it's too expensive.

I wonder what would happen if 10-20% were removed.

Which 10-20%? Gun nuts? They'd be down to 80% of an armory (and if you told them that 20% of their guns are illegal, they'd be more likely to just hide them.) The illicit guns used in street crime? Those aren't going to be turned in.

[GreenGoo]

Before it was mental illness, now it's too expensive.

I wonder what would happen if 10-20% were removed.

Which 10-20%? Gun nuts? They'd be down to 80% of an armory (and if you told them that 20% of their guns are illegal, they'd be more likely to just hide them.) The illicit guns used in street crime? Those aren't going to be turned in.

10-20% across the board. No need to distinguish who the owners are.

[Victoria Raverna]

Or maybe just stop selling new guns?

[Zaxxon]

At the very least, LawBeef persuasively established that we can immediately cease manufacturing all guns, as we have enough to go around for many years to come.

Edit - BAMed...

[Unagi]

Let’s go with baby steps.

Let’s say that after someone shoots up a bank and kills a whole bunch of people , how about they destroy that gun instead of auctioning it off.

Can we even start there?

[disarm]

Let’s go with baby steps.

Let’s say that after someone shoots up a bank and kills a whole bunch of people , how about they destroy that gun instead of auctioning it off.

Can we even start there?

But that would infringe upon the rights of some sicko who likes to collect mementos of mass shootings. It's also a gun that's proven to work...beats buying used without any proof that it's in good working order.

[ImLawBoy]

Let’s go with baby steps.

Let’s say that after someone shoots up a bank and kills a whole bunch of people , how about they destroy that gun instead of auctioning it off.

Can we even start there?

But that would infringe upon the rights of some sicko who likes to collect mementos of mass shootings

/Harlan Crow enters the chat

[Blackhawk]

We're having the exact same conversation now that we were having ten and twenty years ago: How do we stop this from happening again?

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen. It isn't a solution if A) Congress will never pass it, B) the Supreme Court will never let it stand, C) the public most affected by it won't fall into line, D) states that don't already have strong gun laws won't enforce it (and those that do will be county-by-county), and E) it would all but guarantee that the next election would go to the people who are guaranteed to remove it from the books. If a law that, say, prohibits the manufacture of new firearms were suggested and is pretty much guaranteed to be dead in the water, then why spend the huge amount of financial, temporal, and political resources to achieve nothing?

We keep seeing a tragedy and we have the same response: What can we do to prevent that from happening again tomorrow? Real answer: Nothing. Between our broken system and our absurd society, there is no solution that will work tomorrow or next year or five years from now. So instead of our politicians spending massive numbers of resources on idealistic laws they know will never actually hit the street, I really do wish that they'd take a step back, and figure out how to ensure that it is solved 20 or 30* years from now. Yeah, that sucks for us today, but I honestly believe that a long-term strategy is the only one that's going to work. Because, like we were discussing earlier, is that our society isn't going to let it happen. Our only hope of wish list laws is to help society shift to new views, and then follow that with laws.

We can either keep trying to solve it tomorrow for the next 30 years and get nowhere, just like we have for the last 30, or we can let tomorrow go as unachievable and try to solve it in 30 years.

*30 years is just a nice round number, not a researched goal.

[Pyperkub]

Interestingly enough, Heller is one of the 5/4 cases in which Thomas was in the majority...

[Alefroth]

We're having the exact same conversation now that we were having ten and twenty years ago: How do we stop this from happening again?

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen. It isn't a solution if A) Congress will never pass it, B) the Supreme Court will never let it stand, C) the public most affected by it won't fall into line, D) states that don't already have strong gun laws won't enforce it (and those that do will be county-by-county), and E) it would all but guarantee that the next election would go to the people who are guaranteed to remove it from the books. If a law that, say, prohibits the manufacture of new firearms were suggested and is pretty much guaranteed to be dead in the water, then why spend the huge amount of financial, temporal, and political resources to achieve nothing?

We keep seeing a tragedy and we have the same response: What can we do to prevent that from happening again tomorrow? Real answer: Nothing. Between our broken system and our absurd society, there is no solution that will work tomorrow or next year or five years from now. So instead of our politicians spending massive numbers of resources on idealistic laws they know will never actually hit the street, I really do wish that they'd take a step back, and figure out how to ensure that it is solved 20 or 30* years from now. Yeah, that sucks for us today, but I honestly believe that a long-term strategy is the only one that's going to work. Because, like we were discussing earlier, is that our society isn't going to let it happen. Our only hope of wish list laws is to help society shift to new views, and then follow that with laws.

We can either keep trying to solve it tomorrow for the next 30 years and get nowhere, just like we have for the last 30, or we can let tomorrow go as unachievable and try to solve it in 30 years.

*30 years is just a nice round number, not a researched goal.

You keep putting all your money on a long-term solution, but you never explain what that would be. Changing society's attitude isn't any more realistic than removing all guns.

[GreenGoo]

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen.

Are you serious? Destroying 10% of the guns currently in the United States is an impossible task? Where's that American exceptionalism that I've been heard about for decades?

You guys landed on the moon for god's sake. Surely you can destroy some guns. Hell, the mint destroys bills all the time, and that is *literally* money. What's so hard about guns?

[Pyperkub]

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen.

Are you serious? Destroying 10% of the guns currently in the United States is an impossible task? Where's that American exceptionalism that I've been heard about for decades?

You guys landed on the moon for god's sake. Surely you can destroy some guns. Hell, the mint destroys bills all the time, and that is *literally* money. What's so hard about guns?

American exceptionalism has been suborned by the exceptionally stupid Americans?

[Zaxxon]

You keep putting all your money on a long-term solution, but you never explain what that would be. Changing society's attitude isn't any more realistic than removing all guns.

He's right, though. It ain't happening without a change in society's attitude. And that's going to take a very long time (if kids dying in schools was going to do it quickly, Sandy Hook would have been a major catalyst. It was not). I don't know what the answer is.

Are you serious? Destroying 10% of the guns currently in the United States is an impossible task? Where's that American exceptionalism that I've been heard about for decades?

You guys landed on the moon for god's sake. Surely you can destroy some guns. Hell, the mint destroys bills all the time, and that is *literally* money. What's so hard about guns?

Welcome to the 21st century, GG. I would recommend you read up on what's happened in America thus far since the turn of the millennium. It might disabuse you of some of your ridiculous thoughts on America's present ability to do things for the collective good.

[Blackhawk]

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen.

Are you serious? Destroying 10% of the guns currently in the United States is an impossible task? Where's that American exceptionalism that I've been heard about for decades?

You guys landed on the moon for god's sake. Surely you can destroy some guns. Hell, the mint destroys bills all the time, and that is *literally* money. What's so hard about guns?

American exceptionalism? I haven't believed in that since grade school. The best shot would be destroying all of the guns used in crimes rather than auctioning them, but now we're destroying, what, 120,000 guns per year while we manufacture 15,000,000? Destroy 10%? They'll be replaced in three years unless we stop their manufacture, and that's not going to happen. People want guns, and people are willing to get rich selling them guns and spend part of those riches to make sure that they can keep selling them guns.

You keep putting all your money on a long-term solution, but you never explain what that would be. Changing society's attitude isn't any more realistic than removing all guns.

You realize how complex of a question that is, right? Actually coming up with what it would entail would likely be something discussed with a team of psychiatrists, criminal justice experts, lawyers, and advertising agencies.

I can brainstorm, if that helps.

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It would probably be about getting the message out and maintaining discussions about the real impact of firearms in a careful, incremental way that doesn't cause the pro-gun crowd to instantly tune them out. As it is, practically all anti-gun ads I've ever seen take the 'shock' approach that pro-gun people instantly block out. It would likely involve convincing the under-40 population, with a carefully designed message that will affect everyone, but is more targeted at those who have grown up with guns.

It would involve peripheral laws that make guns every so slightly less convenient to buy, advertise, sell, own, and use - not "this is the solution" laws, just minor tweaks that add up over time. The sort of thing that helped with tobacco, as an example - make it less convenient and you make it less appealing. Make it less appealing and you make it less popular. Make it less popular and you make it easier to make more effective laws.

It would involve a campaign to put pressure on Hollywood that makes guns less popular in film and on TV Think about the impact that Me Too seems to have had on the portrayal of women in film, and BLM on diversity. Think about how films and TV from even 25 years ago is often seen as disturbing now. Now apply that to guns so that guns-are-great films start receiving actual backlash.

And, like I said, all of this would be incremental, frog-in-hot-water levels of incremental. At first it would be extremely subtle, but would pick up steam over the years.

It would be (and this would be the tricky part), backing off of some of the super-controversial, hard-hitting measures that keep the pro-gun crowd paranoid and watchful.

A real team of actual experts could come far better ideas and plan than that.

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People want the Democrats to take a cue from the Republicans in order to right the ship. This would be one of those cues - if you can't get what you want now, use this time to lay the groundwork and chip away at it until the time is right to start taking decisive action.

[LawBeefaroni]

Or maybe just stop selling new guns?

Definitely low hanging fruit. At the height of the "Trump Slump", the period after Obama era panic buying, gun sales were "down" to 1M/month sold in the US. By 2020 it was back to 2M. I wouldn't be surprised if we're right around that level now.

New gun sales are the most regulated and tracked, which would make restricting new sales fairly easy, administratively speaking. Used sales would be far more difficult to track and regulate and you'd probably see an increase in used sales as used prices went up.

But yeah, limiting or stopping new gun sales would absolutely cut down on the number of guns in the US.

[Isgrimnur]

Pew, 2017

One key and defining characteristic of gun owners is the extent to which they associate the right to own guns with their own personal sense of freedom – 74% of gun owners say this right is essential, compared with only 35% of non-gun owners who say the same.
...
Many Americans (44%) say they personally know someone who has been shot, either accidentally or intentionally.
...
Overall, 19% of all U.S. gun owners say they belong to the NRA.

[Smoove_B]

I maintain that the only thing Americans worship more than guns is money. There's a magic buyback number that will result in 90% of the guns being turned in and melted into slag. That doesn't address anything other than existing supply, but it's a start.

[LawBeefaroni]

Are we discussing solutions here, or wish lists? Because, honestly - most of the stuff being suggested here would be awesome, but none of it will ever happen.

Are you serious? Destroying 10% of the guns currently in the United States is an impossible task? Where's that American exceptionalism that I've been heard about for decades?

You guys landed on the moon for god's sake. Surely you can destroy some guns.

Destroying guns is easy. Getting ahold of them is the problem.

Hell, the mint destroys bills all the time, and that is *literally* money. What's so hard about guns?

Guns would be easy if there were a gun bank that people deposited their guns into and the gun mint made new guns to replace whatever they destroyed so you could withdraw whatever you put in. But just like currency, that wouldn't cut down on number in circulation. In fact, if it was anything like the cash, the gun mint would make more than they destroyed.

(Source: FRBSF)

[Blackhawk]

Silly rabbit, America is the gun mint.

[GreenGoo]

Destroying guns is easy.

Excellent.

Getting ahold of them is the problem.

For a year, as a pilot project, everything that gets confiscated gets destroyed.

Let me know how we do.

P.S. I like that you spent time refuting my "destroying actual money" comparison. Time well spent on fixing the gun problem.

[LawBeefaroni]

Destroying guns is easy.

Excellent.

Getting ahold of them is the problem.

For a year, as a pilot project, everything that gets confiscated gets destroyed.

Let me know how we do.

Here's an easy one:

Any gun used in a crime (with a conviction) is destroyed cannot be auctioned/sold by the municipality.

[GreenGoo]

Here's an easy one:

Any gun used in a crime (with a conviction) is destroyed cannot be auctioned/sold by the municipality.

[Blackhawk]

I maintain that the only thing Americans worship more than guns is money. There's a magic buyback number that will result in 90% of the guns being turned in and melted into slag. That doesn't address anything other than existing supply, but it's a start.

The carrot is always a good approach. Americans are selfish and greedy. Of course, you'd likely see a lot of people turning in grandpa's double barrel, then using the money on a shiny new AR. And then there is the problem that the manufacturing (and my numbers may have been off - I was going with older data that said 15,000,000 per year, but if we're selling close to two million per month, that could be much, much higher. I mean, if we have to buy/destroy 25,000,000 guns per year just to get the totals going down, we're not going to get far.

[Isgrimnur]

State by state

A 2013 North Carolina law prohibits law enforcement agencies from destroying firearms taken from criminals or recovered at crime scenes.

[Blackhawk]

Here's an easy one:

Any gun used in a crime (with a conviction) is destroyed cannot be auctioned/sold by the municipality.

I absolutely agree with this one, and it might even have a chance to get passed (in fact, the Lousiville gun being sold could be exactly what's needed to get the public behind such an action.) Of course, the law might have to be written such that it requires the federal government to pay the states to do so to avoid the "states' rights!" outcry. It's a great chip - but it's nothing more than just that - a tiny little chip.

[GreenGoo]

Get back to me after a year's worth of data is collected. We can look to improve things at that point.

[LawBeefaroni]

It would have to get kept according to whatever standard other post-conviction evidence is, but as soon as it's no longer required to be held as evidence, it's destroyed.

[Blackhawk]

Get back to me after a year's worth of data is collected. We can look to improve things at that point.

That would make for a slow, slow conversation.

Here's some data in the meantime, estimating data in a way that works against my point:

Guns that this would cause to be destroyed annually in the US*: 1 million
Guns manufactured annually for circulation in the US**: 14 million
Guns owned in 2022***: 433.9 million

Guns owned at start of 'destroy all confiscated': 433.9 million
Guns owned after one year of 'destroy all confiscated': 446.9 million

Feel free to take a few off for wear-and-tear - some guns just wear out and are tossed/destroyed.

It's a step, but it is nothing more than a tiny, tiny chip.


*It's surprisingly difficult to find the total number of crimes involving guns (not just shootings) or total confiscated guns in the US. We know that ~120,000 people are shot per year. I know that California and Illinois take ~3,000 guns yearly from people not allowed to have them. If we spread that out to all 50 states (which is pads the number significantly), that's 150,000 more. That alone is 270,000 guns. Let's triple that to include anything I wasn't able to take into account (810,000 guns), and then round it up to the nearest million just to be even safe. Being incredibly generous, that's saying 1 million guns would be destroyed annually.

**Using the old, lower data. This is likely much higher. The actual number manufactured is ~15 million, but I'm going to drop it to 14 million to account for exports (in 2021 is actually 458,000.)

***Estimated based on manufactured minus exported minus attrition in order to take into account unregistered weapons.

[Kurth]

State by state

A 2013 North Carolina law prohibits law enforcement agencies from destroying firearms taken from criminals or recovered at crime scenes.

Obviously. Because guns are sacred in the United States. My Constitution told me so.

[malchior]

Guns have rights too!

[Alefroth]

He's right, though. It ain't happening without a change in society's attitude. And that's going to take a very long time (if kids dying in schools was going to do it quickly, Sandy Hook would have been a major catalyst. It was not). I don't know what the answer is.

I don't either, and it's really damned depressing. Getting guns out of the American psyche is just as likely as taking climate change seriously.

[LawBeefaroni]

There's also
TSA (6-10K a year)
Border Patrol (10K/year)
The various state DNRs (they're usually auctioned off, no idea how many but probably another 10K at least)
ATF (who knows?)
NICS Check Siezures
(10K)


Point is, it's not just guns used in shootings. It's guns recovered in arrests for other crimes (drugs, burglary, poaching, DUI, etc), guns confiscated in federal/state prohibited places, prhobited persons in possession, and more. No idea what the number is but seems like a fairly achievable start.

[Alefroth]

It would probably be about getting the message out and maintaining discussions about the real impact of firearms in a careful, incremental way that doesn't cause the pro-gun crowd to instantly tune them out. As it is, practically all anti-gun ads I've ever seen take the 'shock' approach that pro-gun people instantly block out. It would likely involve convincing the under-40 population, with a carefully designed message that will affect everyone, but is more targeted at those who have grown up with guns.

It would involve peripheral laws that make guns every so slightly less convenient to buy, advertise, sell, own, and use - not "this is the solution" laws, just minor tweaks that add up over time. The sort of thing that helped with tobacco, as an example - make it less convenient and you make it less appealing. Make it less appealing and you make it less popular. Make it less popular and you make it easier to make more effective laws.

It would involve a campaign to put pressure on Hollywood that makes guns less popular in film and on TV Think about the impact that Me Too seems to have had on the portrayal of women in film, and BLM on diversity. Think about how films and TV from even 25 years ago is often seen as disturbing now. Now apply that to guns so that guns-are-great films start receiving actual backlash.

I really hope that's how it goes, but it seems like as many of the young generation are inducted into the gun culture as there are those that say enough is enough.

Along with Hollywood, the games industry would have to stop romanticizing guns as well.

Whatever happens, I'm sure it won't be while I'm alive.

[YellowKing]

Personally I'd be OK with just reinstating the assault rifle ban. Let's start *somewhere*. If we can't get the ban passed, let's strengthen existing background checks/laws. Let's just do ONE thing that may save the life of a little kid. Instead of standing around doing jack shit and waiting for the next mass shooting. It's beyond frustrating.

[LawBeefaroni]

State by state

A 2013 North Carolina law prohibits law enforcement agencies from destroying firearms taken from criminals or recovered at crime scenes.

Obviously. Because guns are sacred in the United States. My Constitution told me so.

In Chicago they take about 12K guns off the street annually. They then have to test them all (ballistics, serial number recovery, etc) to check if they were used in other crimes and they recover more guns than they have time to test. That creates a massive backlog of guns in storage. No idea if that's the issue in NC and elsewhere.

[Isgrimnur]

State by state

A 2013 North Carolina law prohibits law enforcement agencies from destroying firearms taken from criminals or recovered at crime scenes.

Obviously. Because guns are sacred in the United States. My Constitution told me so.

In Chicago they take about 12K guns off the street annually. They then have to test them all (ballistics, serial number recovery, etc) to check if they were used in other crimes and they recover more guns than they have time to test. That creates a massive backlog of guns in storage. No idea if that's the issue in NC and elsewhere.

And the state’s largest municipal law enforcement agencies are running out of storage for guns they don’t want to sell.

[GreenGoo]

That would make for a slow, slow conversation.

Take a step, re-evaluate. Take another step.

We can both agree that there will never be a single solution that solves all possible problems.

So I'm not interested in your estimates. Do it. Take a step.

[Blackhawk]

That would make for a slow, slow conversation.

Take a step, re-evaluate. Take another step.

We can both agree that there will never be a single solution that solves all possible problems.

So I'm not interested in your estimates. Do it. Take a step.

I would adjust that to, "Evaluate. Take a step, re-evaluate. Take another step."

If you scroll back up, I actually agree with you. It's a good step to take, and I think we should.

I just see it as a tiny, tiny step that is unlikely to have any real impact.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't take it.

[GreenGoo]

I'm just sick of all the reasons nothing can be done or if it's done, it won't matter.

And while I haven't mentioned it recently, I've certainly agreed in the past that a cultural shift is required for long ranging results.

Listen, half your country want to vote a proven con-man back into office. For some reason. At that point, all bets are off on anything. Reap what you sow.