Why would the average citizen need to own an AR-15?

[Mobdeeper7239]

You'd lose that bet. Statistically, handguns are more likely to be used in a mass shooting than a rifle. Off the top of my head, the Giffords shooting and Charleston Church shooting used handguns. It's not like if you're shot with an AR at close range you're dead, but if you're shot with a .45 at close range you rub some dirt on it and walk it off. If the shooting is taking place at close range, a handgun will kill just as many as a rifle.

Anybody can go Into a church or public place and kill people. Charleston had what 9 people die? That doesn't really make your point.


Vtech was a better example but like I said dude was loose for 3 hours. What do you expect? Him to stop and have a picnic? Authorities failed and he had a ton of time and ammo to use

 

[skins85]

i remember the virginia tech shooting well, had friends at school there. the confusion was nuts and he had killed 2 people hours earlier and the cops had no idea of the suspect at the time. then he locked the classroom door and just fired at innocent people. its a tragedy that does lend to the idea that its the person not the gun but i think the tragedy could have been much worse if he had a semi-automatic weapon. its not worth debating. we need procedures in place for these situations and we need a plan. any plan. just something that works towards a solution. if its a mental health thing then fine, but lets work on something.

 

[Defying]

You'd lose that bet. Statistically, handguns are more likely to be used in a mass shooting than a rifle. Off the top of my head, the Giffords shooting and Charleston Church shooting used handguns. It's not like if you're shot with an AR at close range you're dead, but if you're shot with a .45 at close range you rub some dirt on it and walk it off. If the shooting is taking place at close range, a handgun will kill just as many as a rifle.

I am jumping in without reading all 5 pages... but you seem like youre being logical... I think the question posed on page one is the one I'm not understanding....

Full disclosure, I side with Mob here...shocking I know....

I get your point that handguns would not necessarily decrease the number of mass shootings... but are you also arguing that the number of fatalities wouldn't be different?

I'd argue your first point about handguns not decreasing the number of mass shootings too. I would assume that the power of the AR or other more powerful weapons give confidence to terriorist that the damage they create would is worth the inevitable outcome (death or prison). Without a doubt, these people are going into the event fantasizing about the damage. If forced to use a smaller clip and less shots per minute, don't you think that could sway even a tiny number of these guys?

The point that follows that, whatever you get out of owning an AR, isn't it worth not having if it really did stop this latest attack... even if it was the only one?

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

i remember the virginia tech shooting well, had friends at school there. the confusion was nuts and he had killed 2 people hours earlier and the cops had no idea of the suspect at the time. then he locked the classroom door and just fired at innocent people. its a tragedy that does lend to the idea that its the person not the gun but i think the tragedy could have been much worse if he had a semi-automatic weapon. its not worth debating. we need procedures in place for these situations and we need a plan. any plan. just something that works towards a solution. if its a mental health thing then fine, but lets work on something.

He had two semi automatic weapons. Both handguns.

Exactly. He killed two people earlier. Went off and ran some errands, came back to a location with mad students in it and started scouting to see who had the most students in a class.

By now emails should be out. Doors should be locked down. And police should be arriving on scene.....guess not tho. 10 yrs ago they probably thought it wouldn't happen. Therefore the lack of response.

Which makes that facebook post you shared even more stupid. Dumb lady said this doesn't happen 10-20 years ago. Columbine was when late 90's?

 

[guitarjosh]

Anybody can go Into a church or public place and kill people. Charleston had what 9 people die? That doesn't really make your point.

9 people died, but there were only about 15 total in the church. A few weren't nearby when the shooting started, he let one live, and 2 pretended to be dead, but as far as I know, anyone who was shot was killed.

 

[SheriffJoe]

Why not simply ban crime? Wouldn't that be just as effective as banning guns?

 

[Enfuego]

Youre right but mentally ill people shouldn't be able to buy any guns and that's what happened there. He was a known mentally ill person still buying guns.

Two handguns with nineteen 10-15 round mags.

But that was one of the first times shit ever went down at a school since columbine. And the dude was walking around in the school peaking Into clases who had the most kids so obviously he is going to kill a lot of people when you do that. First time it was at a college I believe and the classes were in the same vicinity. If he had an AR-15 might be 100+ dead.

No certifiable crazy person has ever obtained a gun and committed mass murder. It's illegal for a certifiable crazy individual to purchase a gun. Know your facts.

 

[Defying]

it's always the person's fault, not the inanimate object, that's common sense

PS: there are many people killed intentionally with vehicles, I'm sure you've heard about them too

this is the worst argument to make to your opposition.

The difference between a car and a gun is vast.

Life without cars would be a major inconvenience and detrimental to the economy. Cars are worth the risk. But with that said, we're continually getting better. The same is NOT happening with guns.

1. The technology of safety in cars. Cars are engineered to withstand accidents, to save lives. 2. We're trending to a driverless society which in theory should drastically reduce the accidents. 3. laws continually adapt to the automobile.. raised speed limits, lowered speed limits, engineering of roads, understanding of traffic patterns, use of data analytics for such things...

Cars are not intended to be weapons. Guns are.

4. Guns can't be concealed. You see a car coming in most cases, cant bring a car inside a school.... 5. Hitting mass amount of people with a car vs a gun, a gun will do far more damage (see charlottesville. A car rammed through a crowd, one died vs if he was carrying, who knows how many would have died.)

I could continue. But if you want to really talk about guns, I think you only hurt your argument with analogies that don't really apply.

 

[Defying]

No certifiable crazy person has ever obtained a gun and committed mass murder. It's illegal for a certifiable crazy individual to purchase a gun. Know your facts.

whoa...

umm... you get you're saying that every mass murder in history that legally obtained a fun is not certifiably crazy, right?

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

You can't use a handgun in a las vegas hotel window and do real damage I can tell you that.

Of course if you go anywhere up close to someone you can kill them. Don't even need a gun to do that. You don't need an AR-15 to go to a church to kill 9 people. Ar -15s is militant shit. No regular citizen needs one for their safety. That's why they advertise them for sporting purposes. Because nobody needs one, so they use that marketing strategy.

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

No certifiable crazy person has ever obtained a gun and committed mass murder. It's illegal for a certifiable crazy individual to purchase a gun. Know your facts.

Know my facts lmao. Do you know how easy it has been for decades to purchase a gun? So you think everybody runs background checks at gun shows? Hmmm know my facts he says

 

[guitarjosh]

I am jumping in without reading all 5 pages... but you seem like youre being logical... I think the question posed on page one is the one I'm not understanding....

Full disclosure, I side with Mob here...shocking I know....

I get your point that handguns would not necessarily decrease the number of mass shootings... but are you also arguing that the number of fatalities wouldn't be different?

I'd argue your first point about handguns not decreasing the number of mass shootings too. I would assume that the power of the AR or other more powerful weapons give confidence to terriorist that the damage they create would is worth the inevitable outcome (death or prison). Without a doubt, these people are going into the event fantasizing about the damage. If forced to use a smaller clip and less shots per minute, don't you think that could sway even a tiny number of these guys?

The point that follows that, whatever you get out of owning an AR, isn't it worth not having if it really did stop this latest attack... even if it was the only one?

Yes, I'm arguing that the amount of shootings really wouldn't decrease, and that handguns are designed to inflict maximum damage at close range. Rifles have more of an advantage at a distance, but either way, up close, you're dead. One advantage you have with a handgun is the element of surprise. The Charleston Church shooter sat in church for about an hour with a .45 handgun concealed in his fanny pack.

 

[guitarjosh]

You can't use a handgun in a las vegas hotel window and do real damage I can tell you that.

Of course if you go anywhere up close to someone you can kill them. Don't even need a gun to do that. You don't need an AR-15 to go to a church to kill 9 people. Ar -15s is militant shit. No regular citizen needs one for their safety. That's why they advertise them for sporting purposes. Because nobody needs one, so they use that marketing strategy.

You're right about the Vegas shooting, that's the one shooting I can think of that would have been changed if no ARs were used, but no military uses AR-15s. They aren't powerful enough, although if you want to kill people up close, a gun will do the job better than a baseball bat.

 

[skins85]

Yes, I'm arguing that the amount of shootings really wouldn't decrease, and that handguns are designed to inflict maximum damage at close range. Rifles have more of an advantage at a distance, but either way, up close, you're dead. One advantage you have with a handgun is the element of surprise. The Charleston Church shooter sat in church for about an hour with a .45 handgun concealed in his fanny pack.

the number of shootings wouldnt go down maybe but the number of fatalities at these shootings likely would. you said it yourself that you prefer the AR-15 for home protection and mentioned how quickly you can reload and whatnot. thats the same reason someone would choose that weapon specifically for a mass shooting

 

[Defying]

You're right about the Vegas shooting, that's the one shooting I can think of that would have been changed if no ARs were used, but no military uses AR-15s. They aren't powerful enough, although if you want to kill people up close, a gun will do the job better than a baseball bat.

Given that, would you give up your ability to own an AR to keep that massacre from happening? If no, Why not?

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

Yes, I'm arguing that the amount of shootings really wouldn't decrease, and that handguns are designed to inflict maximum damage at close range. Rifles have more of an advantage at a distance, but either way, up close, you're dead. One advantage you have with a handgun is the element of surprise. The Charleston Church shooter sat in church for about an hour with a .45 handgun concealed in his fanny pack.

Element of surprise is when you are living life and some psycho starts shooting. Doesn't matter how small the gun is if someone can sit up in a hotel room at a distance and rain down fire at a crowd of people with an AR-15 "sporting rifle".

That is still the element of surprise.


Nobody is ready for any of these things. That's why when people say....oh if he just had a gun he would have stopped this.

The colorado shootings had people with guns in the movie theatre. Even if you think to fire back and not take complete cover.....which most are thinking "run" or take cover....but if they did fire back they are still outmatched by the AR-15

 

[nuckers]

Pointing to Chicago reveals the futility of gun laws. There already is a national policy that you can't take a firearm from 1 jurisdiction into another in which that firearm is illegal. It is a national policy and Chicago reveals how it fails.

Bringing up Australia is just comical. Australia is an island with a mostly homogenous population that is a fraction of that of the United States. The UK is the same and after they banned guns they, like Australia, saw a spike in rapes, burglaries and assaults. In fact, you're more likely to be a victim of a violent crime in the UK than you are in the United States.

Pointing to Chicago reveals the futility of implementing stricter gun zones in an overall lax gun policy country and that is all it points to. As I said, it has to be national commitment or no commitment, half ass approaches don't work.

If you're going to wait for a perfect comparison country to concede that America needs to act on it's problems it's doomed. There is no exact comparison, their gun culture is worse, their population is higher, they have a higher degree of ethnic diversity, pick your excuse not to follow the path of other successful countries... but be it the UK, Australia, Japan, Canada, the nordic countries (which almost all have high gun ownership rates) etc you find that they do regulate and that regulation has kept homicide numbers down. The facts don't lie regulation does lead to less gun deaths. Look there is no good crime, rape assault are awful but you recover from those, you're not dead. Last I checked the stats on rape were worse in the us than any of the other developed nations outside South Africa, if you can call that developed. Many countries have gun policy in place that allows for ownership with responsibility that is all most are advocating for, instead of the free for all that exists today.

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

whoa...

umm... you get you're saying that every mass murder in history that legally obtained a fun is not certifiably crazy, right?

I think Enfuego does everything he can to make up something in his head that I am wrong. Pretty funny. I try to be nice to the guy, ask him how his knee is doing....get nothing

 

[Mobdeeper7239]

You're right about the Vegas shooting, that's the one shooting I can think of that would have been changed if no ARs were used, but no military uses AR-15s. They aren't powerful enough, although if you want to kill people up close, a gun will do the job better than a baseball bat.

Nah I'm good. Appreciate the advice but don't think I'll be killing anybody any time soon. Military don't use it because they know the public has access probably. Need to go even stronger to subdue them

 

[Enfuego]

whoa...

umm... you get you're saying that every mass murder in history that legally obtained a fun is not certifiably crazy, right?

I'm saying it's already against the law for a certifiable crazy person to purchase a firearm and no certifiable crazy individual has ever committed mass murder in our nation's history.