Should the US restrict guns?
Yes
Side Score: 21
|
 |
No
Side Score: 15
|
|
|
|
|
3
points
There is no clear cut solution to firearm violence. Simply abolishing the amendment altogether is not a surefire fix, given there are still horrific instances of criminals in nations with gun prohibition committing acts of mass homicide. Granted, overall instances are lower, but these kinds of occurrences just go to show that it is not a foolproof system. The fact remains the criminals still obtain firearms from many unregulated sources, or turn to other means of killing altogether. The issue not as simple to rectify as the left would have the general populace believe. Side: No
Yes, the US should restrict gun rights by various means. For one, military style weapons are not needed simply to "protect your home and family" and if it is a hobby than a system can be thought out and enacted where one's such guns can be stored and used at specified locations such as a gun range instead of being able to have a person be able to stockpile an arsenal for a "hobby?" at their home. Two, I think it is sensible to need a gun license as analogous to having a driver's license where it is a legal right and a privilege of all citizens after achieving a certain age IF they meet certain basic requirements and become "certified". Also, arguments along the lines that "people need to be able arm themselves with military style weapons/arsenals because the government has these weapons and we need to be able to keep the government in check" to be patently absurd considering that the Government has the entire US Military forces on it's side including tanks, fighter jets, chemical and nuclear weapons, ect. Any argument along this line in favor of not restricting gun rights to any extent is the product of a mind that is egregiously delusional. Side: Yes
I would actually agree with most of this. The notion that military style assault weapons as a hobby should be stored in secure facilities where they can be accessed and used by the owner is one I have had myself and consider to be a viable solution. I would also concur that a license (Obtained through training courses and psychological evaluations) needs to be present in order to obtain a firearm. However, I do think it is a valid argument to say that the second amendment should be retained to counteract any sort of government aggression, pertaining to firearms in general. What liberal America needs to accept is that your fundamental freedoms come at the expense if knowing that they will be abused by some. The choice then becomes the decision between abolishing the freedom altogether, or further refining the system, which I am pleased to see you support the latter. Side: Yes
Athene, I am glad to have your input on this topic and respect the tone of your response considering the last paragraph of my argument in my original post (which I know is exaggerated for emphasis, although I do stand by the concept of it that it is not sensible to think that the populace could take on the government by physical force). Now to expand on my point of where we disagree, although it is not possible to take on the Government as a whole by physical force, I can imagine situations where for instance a Police officer that is a loose canon were in your presence and having a weapon of similar force to such a Government agent could be beneficial and a "fundamental right" insofar as "if the officer is going to have a gun, than I can have a gun to protect myself from their misconduct". I concede a scenario such as that to you 100%. Now, in our current society, one would find themselves in tremendous legal trouble if a citizen "stood up for themselves with their fundamental right to defend themselves and family (by being armed) from a Government agent". I am not sure what your feelings are of a potential scenario like this (but would be interested to know where you stand on it and scenarios potentially similar to this) but if you said in this case, "the citizen is in the right and the law (government position is wrong)", then I would side with you. However, attempting to go from a small scale situation like this where each party has similar level of weapon power to fighting against the Government on large scale in any way that could hold them truly accountable and in check is not realistic through the use of physical force because the weapon power is so obviously slanted in the favor of the Government to a tremendous degree over the citizenry. Therefore, any large scale project of keeping the Government in check is going to have to come from a collective/broad scale consciousness raising/protesting effort by the citizens that reaches such a tipping point that it could not go ignored or unanswered in some form by the Government. I would be interested to hear some of your thoughts if you'd like to reply again. Side: Yes
The U S and it's continuing love affair with the gun is baffling to me anyway ; one of the main excuses they have for guns is this irrational fear of the need to protect themselves from a hostile government , for a nation that's people seem very patriotic it always amazed me they view future governments as being possibly hostile and use this absurd reasoning for the need to retain arms . What chance would an untrained unorganised population have against the highly trained armed to the teeth professional powerhouse that's the American military ? Guns deaths in America from the 60's are truly staggering and top figures for Americans killed on battlefields of all the wars in American history ; but of course it's not a problem it's just nasty foreigners telling us what to do . Normally when someone likes me makes an argument against I'm hit with totally conflicting stats and ridiculous arguments as in the dreadful " Guns don't kill people , people kill people " etc , etc . Do Americans never ask why does their society need guns ? Is American society much more violent than others and if so why ? Should guns be legally available in all societies and if not why not ? In a column published shortly after the on-air slayings of two TV journalists in southwestern Virginia, the New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof offered some "data points" about the pervasiveness of gun violence in the United States. One of them was: "More Americans have died from guns in the United States since 1968 than on battlefields of all the wars in American history." That sounded familiar. Really familiar. As it turns out, the web version of Kristof’s column sourced a PolitiFact article from Jan. 18, 2013, that fact-checked commentator Mark Shields’ claim that since 1968, "more Americans have died from gunfire than died in … all the wars of this country's history." (Shields used the year 1968 because it was the year presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated by gunman Sirhan Sirhan.) We rated the claim True. Two and a half years later, we wondered whether the statistic still held up, so we took a new look at the data. Deaths from warfare We found a comprehensive study of war-related deaths published by the Congressional Research Service on Feb. 26, 2010, and we supplemented that with data for up-to-date deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan using the website icasualties.org. Where possible, we’ve used the broadest definition of "death" — that is, all war-related deaths, not just those that occurred in combat. The one change we’ve made since our initial fact-check is to revise upward the number of Civil War deaths. As several readers pointed out after we published our earlier fact-check, the CRS report cited 525,000 Union and Confederate dead, but a subsequent study revised that estimate upward to 750,000. The study’s author acknowledged a great deal of uncertainty about the proper figure, and some experts later questioned whether it’s wise to include so many deaths from disease — perhaps two-thirds of the 750,000 figure — since disease in an era of relatively primitive medicine was so widespread that it’s unclear what share of fatal disease during that period was really a result of the war. Still, we’ll err on the side of the higher estimate and use the 750,000 figure this time. Here’s a summary of deaths by major conflict: War Deaths Revolutionary War 4,435 War of 1812 2,260 Mexican War 13,283 Civil War (Union and Confederate, estimate) 750,000 Spanish-American War 2,446 World War I 116,516 World War II 405,399 Korean War 36,574 Vietnam War 58,220 Persian Gulf War 383 Afghanistan War 2,363 Iraq War 4,492 Other wars (includes Lebanon, Grenada, Panama, Somalia and Haiti) 362 TOTAL 1,396,733
Gunfire deaths As we did in our previous fact-check, we used a conservative estimate of data from a 1994 paper published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to count gun-related deaths from 1968 to 1980. For 1981 through 2013, we used annual data sets from CDC. Finally, for 2014 and the first eight months of 2015, we estimated that the number of gun-related deaths were equal to the rate during the previous three full years for which we have data — 2011 to 2013. Here is a summary. The figures below refer to total deaths caused by firearms:
Years Firearm-related deaths 1968 to 1980 377,000 1981 to 1998 620,525 1999 to 2013 464,033 2014 (estimated based on rate from 2011-2013) 33,183 2015 (estimated based on rate from 2011-2013) 22,122 TOTAL, 1968-2015 1,516,863 So the statistic still holds up: There have been 1,516,863 gun-related deaths since 1968, compared to 1,396,733 cumulative war deaths since the American Revolution. That’s 120,130 more gun deaths than war deaths -- about 9 percent more, or nearly four typical years worth of gun deaths. And that’s using the most generous scholarly estimate of Civil War deaths, the biggest component of American war deaths. We’ll offer some added thoughts for context. These figures refer to all gunfire-related deaths, not just homicides. In fact, homicides represent a minority of gun deaths, with suicides comprising the biggest share. In 2013, according to CDC data, 63 percent of gun-related deaths were from suicides, 33 percent were from homicides, and roughly 1 percent each were from accidents, legal interventions and undetermined causes. There’s a risk in using a statistic like this to decry mass homicides carried out with guns. Using total firearm-related deaths makes the case against guns more dramatic than just using homicides alone. However, in our view, Kristof framed this comparison with care. He mentioned suicides not once but three times in his column, and he referred broadly to the "unrelenting toll of gun violence," not specifically to the toll of gun homicides. Indeed, at one point, Kristof specifically referenced the impact that stricter gun laws can have on gun suicides, writing that in 1996, after a mass shooting in Australia, lawmakers tightened gun laws. "The firearm suicide rate dropped by half in Australia over the next seven years, and the firearm homicide rate was almost halved," according to data published in the Journal of Public Health Policy, Kristof wrote. Finally, we’ll note that Kristof’s wording differed ever so slightly from the claim by Shields that we checked previously. While Shields said that "more Americans have died from gunfire," Kristof wrote that "more Americans have died from guns." Some may argue that guns don’t kill people, people do. However, that’s a philosophical judgment and beyond our ability to fact-check. Here, we’ll stick to the numbers, and we find they’re on Kristof’s side. Our ruling Kristof wrote, "More Americans have died from guns in the United States since 1968 than on battlefields of all the wars in American history." Even using a significantly higher estimate for Civil War deaths than we did the last time we fact-checked this claim, the comparison still holds up. The number of gun deaths since 1968 — including, as Kristof was careful to note, both homicides and suicides — was higher than war fatalities by roughly 120,000 deaths, or almost four years’ worth of gun deaths in the United States. We rate the claim True. Side: Yes
Incorrect , a certain type of American might indeed celebrate that way not the ones I know though . Ya'll ..... oh Christ please don't tell me you're a red neck 🙀 Your use of the word " aesthetic " is somewhat typical of your continuing misuse of the English language aesthetic iːsˈθɛtɪk,ɛsˈθɛtɪk/Submit adjective 1. concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty. "the pictures give great aesthetic pleasure" noun 1. a set of principles underlying the work of a particular artist or artistic movement. "the Cubist aesthetic" Side: Yes
Only the "guns of war" that are intended ONLY for killing as many people as possible in the shortest time. Actual sporting guns should not be touched ... however, there should be regulations (that Republican swear word), on the mental health, criminal record and, of course, terrorist affiliations of the people allowed to own them. Even Reagan was in favor of reasonable regulation! Side: Yes
True story. This was a debate topic in academic debate over two decades ago. The context for the affirmative was taking guns away but because of how it was worded you could also run a case on affirmative arguing everybody should have a gun and/or everybody should have marksmanship training. It really threw negative teams for a loop. So hey, I can vote on this side of this very vague debate topic and say it's for one of those reasons. Be more precise next time. Side: Yes
A most misunderstood change made to the U.S. Constitution is the 2nd Amendment. Unfortunately, after the politicians politicized the Supreme Court, it was interpreted very broadly and thereby incorrectly. The damage is done and, due to vested interests, unlikely to be fixed for some time to come, if ever. Side: Yes
|
1
point
1
point
Why do people keep incessantly pushing this gun control topic into my field of vision? No one is less mentally fit to use deadly weapons than the governments which reside over the nations of earth. The government has nuclear weapons and drones and chemical weapons and biological weapons and secret projects that the public doesn't even know about and all you libtards want is to let the government run wild while you try to limit what citizens have like the authoritarian waste machines that you are. Side: No
I think guns are already restricted enough as they are. For example, anything faster than a semi automatic gun is already banned from civilian use. We can't even use attachments that make a gun fully automatic. I see what you're getting at though with the gun restrictions though. However, once we start restricting things, it will be a slippery slope on what gets restricted and people will still be able to get things illegally Side: No
The 2nd amendment isn't a "law" that "allows" people to bear arms. Those are called privileges. The 2nd amendment acknowledges what everyone innately possesses, a right. At the same time though, the reason for an armed populace is for the very purpose of regulating the militia. A well regulated militia is one that is kept in check by an armed population. The right of the people to bear arms is supposed to be left alone because it is necessary for a free state that the armed forces can't just march in and declare that they are the new government. Yet in most of the United States you are not allowed to walk around with a sharpened sword. Did the writers have swords in mind when they wrote the second amendment? The certainly did. There are those who do not respect the second amendment, and these people are either intentionally or inadvertently aiding the would be conquerors of this nation. They are helping the enemy. Americans would be better off to stick with the bill of rights, regardless of their politics. Side: No
|
