Gunchat MKII*

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captainblastum: Dec 1, 2004

Rent-A-Cop posted:

3D printing is a red herring. Building a rudimentary firearm has been trivially easy for 100 years. It isn't a huge problem.

3D printing and readily available CNC machines in the home are a big, big difference from a black iron pipe zip gun. Personally - I don't think that printed or homemade guns are going to be the choice for criminals for a long time, due to how easy it is to get a regular ol' gun, but as 3D printers are improved and refined it will at some point be possible to plug a thing in and have it pop out most or all of a gun (probably any gun ever made). We should be ready for that.

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captainblastum: Dec 1, 2004

suck my woke dick posted:

otoh policy should follow statistics more than public outrage

ban handguns stop worrying about tacticlol rifle attachments so much

The damaging effects of mass shootings extend beyond just the physical victims, and beyond even the people with direct relationships to them. Whether or not restrictions on types of guns or characteristics of guns is a necessary part of stopping them I don't know, but 25 people killed all at once is a different kind of crime than 25 people killed in 25 different incidents, and it's not reasonable to just compare bodycounts.

# ¿ Sep 24, 2019 14:20

captainblastum: Dec 1, 2004

Squalid posted:

if you look at my post history itt you can see I'm basically just saying that over and over but "mass shootings aren't statistically significant" doesn't mean that, it doesn't mean anything. I'm not sure the guy who posted it even knows what a statistic is.

do you think the effects of dispersed violence don't extend past the physical victims? Not going to check it right now but I recall hearing kids from communities effected by endemic violence frequently suffer symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder. Mass shootings and individual shoots are ultimately different manifestations of the same problem.

To answer this specific question: "do you think the effects of dispersed violence don't extend past the physical victims?" - No, I think that the effects of dispersed violence do extend past the physical victims. I disagree with the notion that "[m]rear end shootings and individual shoots are ultimately different manifestations of the same problem" unless you abstract the root "problem" away to a point that it's nearly meaningless. There are certainly important similarities and connections (for example, the fact that a gun was used), but we shouldn't be trying to find a single solution to both problems, nor should we decide that one shouldn't be addressed based on an over simplified comparison (the number of people shot). If we can do something to reduce the frequency or deadliness of mass shootings, we should do it, even if it doesn't address other types of gun violence. We should also try to do something about the other kinds of violence at the same time.

# ¿ Sep 24, 2019 20:03

captainblastum: Dec 1, 2004

Squalid posted:

The fundamental problem is violence. The reason any shooting is bad, mass or otherwise, is because it is a homicide and assault. It doesn't take much abstraction to realize suicide is a related form of violence, even if it is directed at the self.

As connected phenomena, a policy that ameliorates one kind of violence can also reduce other kinds, especially if it is well designed. For example the article I posted earlier about red flag laws goes into the psychological relationship between suicide and mass shootings, and finds that policies designed to remove guns from the hands of people at risk of mass shootings also reduce suicides.

This should be kept in mind when designing policies, since a good policy should be able to reduce mass shooting deaths and other kinds of violent death at the same time. Since our goal is reducing violent death, the best policies are those which reduce it the most.

A policy that reduces gun prevalence is likely to save the most lives through reducing suicide, but it could plausibly also reduce mass shooting and other kinds of homicide deaths as well. So such policies are worth championing above something with lower potential impact and high costs like mandating greater security at schools or public functions.

I don't disagree with you on a general level - we should be absolutely be trying to address the root causes of violence, but if you're arguing that we should only address the root causes and not also try to reduce the effects of or damage caused by particular forms of violence, I can't agree with that.

Which is not me saying that we should do anything at all, just that we should do things that are effective, even if they don't help in every case.

# ¿ Sep 25, 2019 14:05

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