Andris Birkmanis: Re swimming pools: "In 2004, there were 3,308 unintentional drownings in the United States, an average of nine people per day. 19% of drowning deaths involving children occur in public pools with certified lifeguards present." Crap, somebody has to do something about it! Ban public pools NOW!
Re swimming pools:
"In 2004, there were 3,308 unintentional drownings in the United States, an average of nine people per day. 19% of drowning deaths involving children occur in public pools with certified lifeguards present."
Crap, somebody has to do something about it! Ban public pools NOW!
I'm glad someone caught my comment. lol.
To paraphrase Marc Faber: We're all doomed, but that doesn't mean that we can't make money in the process. Rabbi Lapin: "Let's make bricks!" Stephan Kinsella: "Say you and I both want to make a German chocolate cake."
And while the US reacts en masse to this school shooting, no one gives much of a shit, much less considers the effect of the US policy of mass killing of people, including children, abroad.
@fountainhead: what's the source on that claim about gun violence in the uk?
Somehow I have a feeling it isn't so clear cut as both partisans would have you believe. Stat cookery and all that.
EDIT: Consumariat seems to have addressed this pretty well.
@Willy Truth:
Regarding the Onion piece,
I love how liberals advocate so many things in terms of positive rights but are unaware of the irony of attacking their own logic when it pertains to 'the right' to own a gun.
Beating up a strawman they embrace in the same breath for other things.
FWIW, they will argue no one should be able to own a gun if you point out this guy got it from his mother. I think the swimming pool comment pretty much eviscerates their proposed rationale, however, unless they plan on being stubbornly illogical. In which case they only make themselves look stupid.
Freedom of markets is positively correlated with the degree of evolution in any society...
@Cortes
The increase in UK gun violence after their firearm ban is an argument I've heard from various places in debating the gun control issue. Here are a couple of examples:
Gun politics in the United Kingdom - Near complete ban of privately-owned firearms goes into effect in 1997
Culture of violence: Gun crime goes up by 89% in a decade - From 1998/1999 to 2009
I agree that stats can be easily manipulated but I think the UK presents at least a good counter-example to show that a ban on private ownership of firearms doesn't necessarily decrease gun violence. Switzerland too, on the opposite end.
I guess my main feeling is that it's a complex issue and I'm tired of everyone claiming they have the perfect solution after every shooting that occurs.
xahrx
Those are from the entire campaign
Amusingly, they will claim the UK has no record of school gun shootings. There's a lot of control freaks out there, sadly.
Welp, another massacre. This one, as you all know, is of a particularly heinous nature because the children are involved. Horrible, horrible stuff.
Just like in the Waco massacre, there were children involved, too. Was the AFT disarmed for that?
Morgan Freeman, for a Hollywood type, seemed quite sensible on the matter.
No way, you must have confused him with Thomas Sowell.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17922-carrying-a-gun-increases-risk-of-getting-shot-and-killed.html?full=true&print=true
CARRYING A GUN CAN & WILL KILL YOU
Which weapon are we banning again?
Is there a hidden cause, that of the people who carry guns being in greater danger and therefore choosing to carry a gun? Or some other hidden cause for a person wanting to carry a gun and that person getting shot at more than other people.
Prime, don't tempt them. They may just call for banning all of them. :P
Hell, last time I checked, in my city I'm not even allowed to carry PEPPER SPRAY to defend myself.
I've gotten into a few 'debates' regarding gun ownership lately. Seems to be the left argument boils down to less guns equals less gun related murders. Not only is this demonstrably false(at least in the unilateral sense) but it misses the point, that being that we do not simply want less gun-related homocides, but less violent crimes in general. Point to the Soviet Union as an example; strict gun control compared to the US, far higher murder rate. Or point to the fact that in the middle ages, before guns were invented, the murder rate was astronomically higher. Not only were there less people, but less efficient ways to kill them -- and they still were butchering one another.
Vanitas Nomen:I've gotten into a few 'debates' regarding gun ownership lately. Seems to be the left argument boils down to less guns equals less gun related murders. Not only is this demonstrably false(at least in the unilateral sense) but it misses the point, that being that we do not simply want less gun-related homocides, but less violent crimes in general. Point to the Soviet Union as an example; strict gun control compared to the US, far higher murder rate. Or point to the fact that in the middle ages, before guns were invented, the murder rate was astronomically higher. Not only were there less people, but less efficient ways to kill them -- and they still were butchering one another.
I've been down the same road as you it seems. I used Brasil as an example as to how you can have very strict gun laws and it doesn't stop wack jobs from getting them. One of the responses I received was something along the lines of how they have a different culture and that they are poor, so it isn't fair to compare the USA to Brasil and that it makes more sense to compare the USA to Canada. I had to push my brain back through my ears after I read that one.
That seems to be the following on the agenda, after guns are banned. Commonly this is used to chase away muggers and would be rapists.
You should ask them how culture or poverty makes brazilians more violent. Seriously, how does celebrating carnival, wearing bikinis and going to the beach make people more violent and how does being poor make one turn to a life of crime? Clearly, until they can explain the exact connection between crime and these other things, their responses are much like the "brawndo" scene from Idiocracy.
This article claims that a few background checks in CO actually prevented violent felons from getting guns. http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1c7qwj/background_checks_in_colorado_stop_38_from_buying/
Assuming that this is actually true, what are some good arguments against background checks?