Constitutional Carry: Good or Bad for Gun Owners in the Long Run

[Broc]

. 1) A live fire training requirement with some reasonable level of qualification scoring (basic beat cop level qual here which is not hard?) for licensure. 2) Universal background checks (with carefully scoped requirements; 'no violent felonies', some 'substance abuse' boundaries for example) for all transfers. 3) A standardized course and assessment for de-esclation skills. 4) Minimum age of 21 for unsupervised carry except for hunting.

On one post you talk about learning from history and how rights are eroded.

On another post you literally ask for rights to be eroded.

I hope you live in MA, because you definitely belong in this State. Please, do everyone a favor and stay in MA. CC America does not need your Fudd bullsh*t.

PS: SIGNES is not my alt account. ... even I can't come up with such stupid stuff. But if it is a troll, you sir are boss level troll.

 

[SIGNES]

@Mesatchornug

I was 'outies' but I got a rational reply. . Thank you. I'm not going to point by point, I'll pluck some highlights because yes, I am making a good faith argument. But before I do, the rebuttal above is rational, argues on the merits and in a tone that's a path, at least theoretically to workable compromise that enshrines our rights. (comments about projection being at the margins of attacking the person not the argument notwithstanding). Also, I have been shooting for >40 years and still have my 'award' patches for NRA marksmanship levels earned at day camp in 'liberal-land'.

I've got about 500 rounds downrange at Moon Island.. it absolutely sucks compared to all of the dozen or so other ranges I've been to [or did many years ago, never had cause to go back could be great now but still hell to get to and that hell can't be allowed to limit access to those wealthy/able bodied enough to drive] and yes, ADA style accommodations would be necessary for any test regime. My "police-easy marksmanship" standards was a backhanded snark about how too low the standards are for police not some absurd suggestion you should have to be able to place in a USPCA match to have an LTC. By having some marksmanship standard, you help ensure gun owners can be said to have met some real world criteria for skills necessary for safe operation. Load, unload, put 10 rounds on paper at 21 feet would be a fine standard.

I shorthanded 'planes' from 'public commercial' in my head and stand by that being a reasonable limit. I think no civilian should carry firearms on a commercial 'tickets sold to the public' plane. Locked in carry on would be something I could see as a means to address concerns about how this constrains mobility. An airliner is 100% 'bad background' and even just hitting the 'backstop' could lead to the death of hundreds. It's an environment any sane person should accept as being "non-permissive".

I'm quite familiar with suppressors and have no "think they're like the movies' delusions. (though subsonic with a single shot/locked breach/subsonic and huge can can be shockingly quiet) and think we should be able to own, transfer. modify them and use them for sport freely. Your point about size and weight is exactly why I saw the "no carry" (installed, aside hunting) limitation would be the kind of concession one could make to enshrine a core freedom.

Re; Common Defense? Yep, I absolutely agree Ukraine is an object lesson. I still think limitations against full auto (or F1-style as I put it, and, as you put it 'fiddle at the margins 'workarounds like Glock Switches) is a reasonable compromise. Define it as "fire only once per pull of the trigger" or any mechanism to alter the behavior of a fire control group to alter that one shot per pull behavior (which is mostly as it is now) and have more equitable limits on who can own the exceptions and where they can be used. Even in MA there are well over 1,000 privately held machine guns under the current legal framework. Where the current framework is most problematic (in my opinion here) are the 'manufactured after' and 'transferability' stuff because they're legal traps and arbitrary (or more arbitrary than necessary to continue the rarity of their use in crime) . There has to be some way to more tightly regulate {limits on carry, storage requirements, liability if stolen, full auto vs semi because there is a real difference in risk. (Whereas there is no difference between the Glocks legally own able but not for sale by dealers in MA for 'consumer protection' reasons and any number of hundreds of other guns.) Specifics would be ironed out with exactly this kind of discussion to limit the proliferation of full auto weapons that could satisfy the irrational fearful and the public good and yet still allow those interested and invested negotiated access they could, admittedly grudgingly, live with. Your point about the history of NFA full auto regs (and 'switchblade' bans as it happens) and crime is exactly a good example of where the debate goes wrong, emotional reactionary laws with a dirtbag bonus effort to regulate behavior with 'sin taxes' that lead to the rich having more rights than the poor. (This is a very interesting clip re: the NFA history specifically about SBRs:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsE0naVApPU
) Emotional reaction made a bad law. My point was that in the 'haggle' we could hope to negotiate re: full auto would not (to me) be a concession that materially impacts gun rights but fighting it with absolutism triggers the opposition counterproductively.

I picked 21 because it's the drinking age and a way to 'smooth the debate' with the regulators with a pretty minor concession (minor as a function of temporarily limiting a freedom). I think we can agree that 10 year olds shouldn't carry to T-Ball so we start from there and sort it out) . That said, the drinking age was 18 when I was and thought then and still think that 21 is dumb. 21 is arbitrary but 'winnable'. I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA. The rules in MA are absurd and written, and spread out in the code, in such byzantine ways they seem like a deliberate effort to make them impossible to follow. (so byzantine as to have whole fora dedicated to the interpretation thereof by people actively interested in compliance). Worse, the current MA regime even seeks to implement new rules without a legislative process to back them up. You are not engaging with an "MA is a model" person.

My comment about long guns and supervision was an attempt to remove any minimum age for participation in the shooting sports but include a responsibility onus on a supervising adult. As to the 'emancipated' 18 year old', fair point. Maybe 'legally emancipated' a good place to haggle in my fantasy of 'reasonable compromise ends this insane and doomed to cycle of loosening and tightening of regs'. I did not intend to say my suggestions were 'the right ones' only that they were a jumping off point for this kind of debate to an acceptable compromise that could be nationally inscribed in metaphorical stone everyone could, grudgingly, agree to that avoids state by state legal traps (N.J. and MA ffs!) and worse yet, municipality by municipality traps.

We're going to differ here but, IMO, open carry as political statement is exactly an example of what, in my thesis, is self destructive to any process that leads to sustainable freedom. It's 'looking for trouble' in my view (plus open carry has intrinsic hazards unless you get into mandating levels of retention and then.. ughh.). Where banning open carry. becomes problematic, again in my opinion, is where to draw the line between 'accidental printing' and some idiot flipping out 'A gun.. I'm skeered!" vs brandishing being an escalation of violence like an idiot. it's difficult but not impossible to define equitably.

I am keenly aware of the 'Rule of Lenity"and it relates to your point about 'laws inventing crimes' and it's that very rule that means you could/should design a mechanism to do background checks without a registry. You'd need to structure the laws on background checks to include scoping that stops it from 'creating bonus crimes' (MA currently has a registry it lies and pretends isn't. The recent 'data dump' issue (I can dig up a link, but I bet you know what I mean) is, in itself, proof registries are bad and they absolutely could get worse, and likely will.) In my 'fantasy agreement', you enshrine limitations on the government (with legal teeth) to explicitly to avoid a registry. For example, an idea: You do the background check without recording what was transferred or even specifically that the check was in support of a firearm purchase. I got background checked up the wazoo when applying for my last job. (no lube either, the bastards ;-) ) and if that mechanism was available to my employer, then the same mechanism (with no indication why the check is being requested) could allow background checks without registry. Proof a check was done couldn't [edit: COULD be managed] be managed with a GUID for the check 'database event' retained by the buyer, or seller to prove they checked before transfer if it came up in the event of a subsequent actual crime could be one way to manage this.

While the entirely reasonable aphorism “My right to swing my arm ends where your nose begins.” has been horribly abused (apparently first by the temperance movement of all places), the principle is sound. Your point "participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant nor the whims of the unimaginative" is one I absolutely agree with. One of the major reasons we're in such a political hellscape right now is that the extreme left and extreme right are both breaching this tenet horrifically. Christofascists (piety needs to be excised from Article 17 btw) for example are absurdly claiming gay marriage is a metaphorical punch in their noses and have no regard for the reality that society benefits from people choosing to legally couple up (or thrupling for all I care) and it's nobody's damned concern whose parts are whose in the socially stabilizing and economically beneficial arrangements that are marriage. Those objecting to same sex marriage are claiming nose injury where none exists and, as is so often the case, the effort to prohibit is self injurious. Leftymoonbats are pushing to encroach on free speech to ease tender sensibilities with no awareness of the inevitable consequences of the kinds of speech constraints they seek on their own civil rights. (I picked offensive terms for both extremes to make a point here BTW, not because I think using them leads to productive discussion if you're on either end of the political spectrum. Hell, one person above thinks we can't regulate guns at all but that it's totally constitutionally legit to undo Roe. V. Wade. The hypocrisy is absurd.)

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

The arc of time leads to more constraints if we can't negotiate. Lost on folks is that if you elect further and further right, you lead to an authoritarian who takes the very guns they got you more rigths for just to win your vote because, the end, they'll want only their military armed so they can stay in power and if you elect further and further left, you end up with anarchic lowest common denominator standards of freedom and economic opportunity.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

 

[Asaltweapon]

@Mesatchornug

I was 'outies' but I got a rational reply. . Thank you. I'm not going to point by point, I'll pluck some highlights because yes, I am making a good faith argument. But before I do, the rebuttal above is rational, argues on the merits and in a tone that's a path, at least theoretically to workable compromise that enshrines our rights. (comments about projection being at the margins of attacking the person not the argument notwithstanding). Also, I have been shooting for >40 years and still have my 'award' patches for NRA marksmanship levels earned at day camp in 'liberal-land'.

I've got about 500 rounds downrange at Moon Island.. it absolutely sucks compared to all of the dozen or so other ranges I've been to [or did many years ago, never had cause to go back could be great now but still hell to get to and that hell can't be allowed to limit access to those wealthy/able bodied enough to drive] and yes, ADA style accommodations would be necessary for any test regime. My "police-easy marksmanship" standards was a backhanded snark about how too low the standards are for police not some absurd suggestion you should have to be able to place in a USPCA match to have an LTC. By having some marksmanship standard, you help ensure gun owners can be said to have met some real world criteria for skills necessary for safe operation. Load, unload, put 10 rounds on paper at 21 feet would be a fine standard.

I shorthanded 'planes' from 'public commercial' in my head and stand by that being a reasonable limit. I think no civilian should carry firearms on a commercial 'tickets sold to the public' plane. Locked in carry on would be something I could see as a means to address concerns about how this constrains mobility. An airliner is 100% 'bad background' and even just hitting the 'backstop' could lead to the death of hundreds. It's an environment any sane person should accept as being "non-permissive".

I'm quite familiar with suppressors and have no "think they're like the movies' delusions. (though subsonic with a single shot/locked breach/subsonic and huge can can be shockingly quiet) and think we should be able to own, transfer. modify them and use them for sport freely. Your point about size and weight is exactly why I saw the "no carry" (installed, aside hunting) limitation would be the kind of concession one could make to enshrine a core freedom.

Re; Common Defense? Yep, I absolutely agree Ukraine is an object lesson. I still think limitations against full auto (or F1-style as I put it, and, as you put it 'fiddle at the margins 'workarounds like Glock Switches) is a reasonable compromise. Define it as "fire only once per pull of the trigger" or any mechanism to alter the behavior of a fire control group to alter that one shot per pull behavior (which is mostly as it is now) and have more equitable limits on who can own the exceptions and where they can be used. Even in MA there are well over 1,000 privately held machine guns under the current legal framework. Where the current framework is most problematic (in my opinion here) are the 'manufactured after' and 'transferability' stuff because they're legal traps and arbitrary (or more arbitrary than necessary to continue the rarity of their use in crime) . There has to be some way to more tightly regulate {limits on carry, storage requirements, liability if stolen, full auto vs semi because there is a real difference in risk. (Whereas there is no difference between the Glocks legally own able but not for sale by dealers in MA for 'consumer protection' reasons and any number of hundreds of other guns.) Specifics would be ironed out with exactly this kind of discussion to limit the proliferation of full auto weapons that could satisfy the irrational fearful and the public good and yet still allow those interested and invested negotiated access they could, admittedly grudgingly, live with. Your point about the history of NFA full auto regs (and 'switchblade' bans as it happens) and crime is exactly a good example of where the debate goes wrong, emotional reactionary laws with a dirtbag bonus effort to regulate behavior with 'sin taxes' that lead to the rich having more rights than the poor. (This is a very interesting clip re: the NFA history specifically about SBRs:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsE0naVApPU
) Emotional reaction made a bad law. My point was that in the 'haggle' we could hope to negotiate re: full auto would not (to me) be a concession that materially impacts gun rights but fighting it with absolutism triggers the opposition counterproductively.

I picked 21 because it's the drinking age and a way to 'smooth the debate' with the regulators with a pretty minor concession (minor as a function of temporarily limiting a freedom). I think we can agree that 10 year olds shouldn't carry to T-Ball so we start from there and sort it out) . That said, the drinking age was 18 when I was and thought then and still think that 21 is dumb. 21 is arbitrary but 'winnable'. I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA. The rules in MA are absurd and written, and spread out in the code, in such byzantine ways they seem like a deliberate effort to make them impossible to follow. (so byzantine as to have whole fora dedicated to the interpretation thereof by people actively interested in compliance). Worse, the current MA regime even seeks to implement new rules without a legislative process to back them up. You are not engaging with an "MA is a model" person.

My comment about long guns and supervision was an attempt to remove any minimum age for participation in the shooting sports but include a responsibility onus on a supervising adult. As to the 'emancipated' 18 year old', fair point. Maybe 'legally emancipated' a good place to haggle in my fantasy of 'reasonable compromise ends this insane and doomed to cycle of loosening and tightening of regs'. I did not intend to say my suggestions were 'the right ones' only that they were a jumping off point for this kind of debate to an acceptable compromise that could be nationally inscribed in metaphorical stone everyone could, grudgingly, agree to that avoids state by state legal traps (N.J. and MA ffs!) and worse yet, municipality by municipality traps.

We're going to differ here but, IMO, open carry as political statement is exactly an example of what, in my thesis, is self destructive to any process that leads to sustainable freedom. It's 'looking for trouble' in my view (plus open carry has intrinsic hazards unless you get into mandating levels of retention and then.. ughh.). Where banning open carry. becomes problematic, again in my opinion, is where to draw the line between 'accidental printing' and some idiot flipping out 'A gun.. I'm skeered!" vs brandishing being an escalation of violence like an idiot. it's difficult but not impossible to define equitably.

I am keenly aware of the 'Rule of Lenity"and it relates to your point about 'laws inventing crimes' and it's that very rule that means you could/should design a mechanism to do background checks without a registry. You'd need to structure the laws on background checks to include scoping that stops it from 'creating bonus crimes' (MA currently has a registry it lies and pretends isn't. The recent 'data dump' issue (I can dig up a link, but I bet you know what I mean) is, in itself, proof registries are bad and they absolutely could get worse, and likely will.) In my 'fantasy agreement', you enshrine limitations on the government (with legal teeth) to explicitly to avoid a registry. For example, an idea: You do the background check without recording what was transferred or even specifically that the check was in support of a firearm purchase. I got background checked up the wazoo when applying for my last job. (no lube either, the bastards ;-) ) and if that mechanism was available to my employer, then the same mechanism (with no indication why the check is being requested) could allow background checks without registry. Proof a check was done couldn't [edit: COULD be managed] be managed with a GUID for the check 'database event' retained by the buyer, or seller to prove they checked before transfer if it came up in the event of a subsequent actual crime could be one way to manage this.

While the entirely reasonable aphorism “My right to swing my arm ends where your nose begins.” has been horribly abused (apparently first by the temperance movement of all places), the principle is sound. Your point "participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant nor the whims of the unimaginative" is one I absolutely agree with. One of the major reasons we're in such a political hellscape right now is that the extreme left and extreme right are both breaching this tenet horrifically. Christofascists (piety needs to be excised from Article 17 btw) for example are absurdly claiming gay marriage is a metaphorical punch in their noses and have no regard for the reality that society benefits from people choosing to legally couple up (or thrupling for all I care) and it's nobody's damned concern whose parts are whose in the socially stabilizing and economically beneficial arrangements that are marriage. Those objecting to same sex marriage are claiming nose injury where none exists and, as is so often the case, the effort to prohibit is self injurious. Leftymoonbats are pushing to encroach on free speech to ease tender sensibilities with no awareness of the inevitable consequences of the kinds of speech constraints they seek on their own civil rights. (I picked offensive terms for both extremes to make a point here BTW, not because I think using them leads to productive discussion if you're on either end of the political spectrum. Hell, one person above thinks we can't regulate guns at all but that it's totally constitutionally legit to undo Roe. V. Wade. The hypocrisy is absurd.)

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

The arc of time leads to more constraints if we can't negotiate. Lost on folks is that if you elect further and further right, you lead to an authoritarian who takes the very guns they got you more rigths for just to win your vote because, the end, they'll want only their military armed so they can stay in power and if you elect further and further left, you end up with anarchic lowest common denominator standards of freedom and economic opportunity.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

I’m not reading all that drivel.
Reader’s Digest version is much appreciated.
Broc is dead on. Please stay in MA. Moon island told me more than enough. 500 rounds sent down range is a very impressive amount of rounds.

 

[Kevin_NH]

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

You make two very wrong assumptions in that summary sentence --

1. The antis are not negotiating in good faith, every concession is taken as a concession, there is never a true compromise.
2. The Fudds said the same about "shall issue" concealed carry back in the 1980s, tell us again how that has rolled back 2A?

Did you mean "unwindable" or "unwinnable"?
Not only is constitutional carry winnable, as of July we'll have crossed past the 50% milestone

 

[Broc]

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

You post way too much to be a troll.
So I am just going with a not very smart FUDD.

Again, please don't ever move to another State, stay in MA and go shoot another 500 rounds at Moon Island.

 

[SIGNES]

"The antis are not negotiating in good faith, every concession is taken as a concession, there is never a true compromise." correct and neither are the 'pros'. Gun owners (hell, gun comfortable) are in the minority by US population 50% is a milestone of geography, not population.

The majority of the population are those who see 'AR' and tremble in terror because they think it's machine gun, who hear 'hollowpoint' and don't realize it's less likely to kill a bystander, who have no idea the difference in capacity between a 1911 and a revolver is effectively nil, who can be convinced Glocks are intrinsically 'more evil' than Sigs.

If we don't find some way to stop coming off like trolling bigots as a group and actually want to both help others build understanding and self police our provocations by correcting our own we're going to lose.

Look at the legislation in Washington and don't assume the courts will save us. Look at the 'enforcement' machinations in MA and the sham listening tour. The attacks on our 2A rights aren't going away and defense against them gets no easier when people shoot cheerleaders on their lawn.

Make it your life's work to befriend and convince three 17 year old girls with pink hair, an AOC fan club membership card and a PETA patch on their backpacks that they should care about your rights by helping them realize they'll want those same rights. When you see somebody green at the range, encourage and praise. The dogpiling I advocated for above was against the worst of our own. Just like we expect our hijab-wearing beloved neighbor down the street to distance themselves from Bin Laden while still respecting their faith, we need to distance ourselves from the dirtbags in our midst because there are plenty of them.

When somebody asks a dumb question about basic mechanics, HELP them, don't chase the likes with an idiot meme. When you see somebody advocating reactionary violence, correct them as a group. If this culture doesn't change, we're screwed. This is Northeast Shooters and when the Reddit gun fora are more welcoming and productive communities than this, we, in one of the population epicenters of anti add to the polarization, we, those of us who want to keep our guns, are in trouble and it seems we're willfully pretending otherwise for the lulz. The recent reclamations of freedom are an opportunity we need to make an effort by being cvil not to piss away.

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

 

[Blackbeard83]

I'll pretend you're not acting in bad faith. We'll consider your idea line by line.

First, everyone reminds us that we're civilians, not cops. Why should we be held to their standard if the situations we're likely to be in are different? Even with a lower standard, they abuse it.
Example: Boston's Moon Island test. On paper, this is an easy test. I quote it here for reference:

The target is about 11x 17. Basically, as long as all your shots are on paper, you're guaranteed to pass.

Except that 40% of the test is shot one handed, double action only. I hope you don't have arthritis or any other form of hand issue that prevents you from pulling that 12lb trigger.

And that's after you get yourself to the test facility. Because the only way you're allowed to get there is if you drive yourself. Pedestrians, bicycles, cabs and rideshares are prohibited from the bridge. If you are a lifetime urban dweller who never got a driver's license, you're prohibited from getting an LTC...or, you're required to spend piles of money taking driver's education, then the test, then paying for your DL, then renting a car.


The only way to enforce this is with a registry. But we'll skip over that for a second.

MA has UBC: simple possession of a firearm is a felony. Transfers require a background check (that's what MIRCS does when it confirms your LTC is active). Private individuals are only permitted 4 transfers per calendar year without going through an FFL. Those FFLs are prohibited to transfer certain firearms that are 100% legal to possess.

As a result, people pay grey market prices for the most popular handguns in America. We'll disregard the magazine price.


This class doesn't exist. I know because I teach classes in avoidance and de-escalation. The group with which I teach this class provides it to police departments who decide to hire our services. Many departments don't have this kind of training.

So now you're holding private citizens to a higher standard than "highly trained" law enforcement officers.

Moreover, the LTC class already costs $100+ and takes 5+ hours. How many hours of additional training do you require someone to gain access to a protected fundamental right? How much more should they be expected to pay? Who will train the trainers?


VT has allowed 18-year-olds to carry since the founding. We let 16-year-olds navigate our country unsupervised with 3000-lb missiles. We let 18-year-olds decide the future of our nation; some jurisdictions are allowing younger people to take part in local decision-making.

Why 21? Why not 25 - most scientists agree that's about when brain development completes. Or, 30, just because?

What about 18-year-olds who have moved out and found jobs? They're adults, leading adult lives, but can't protect themselves?

What about emancipated minors? They're living as adults, but physically smaller and less developed - they should be left defenseless?

Why should hunting suddenly be restricted to 18+? Even in MA, you can get an FID and hunting license at age 15? Why shouldn't that proud 15-year-old be allowed to sit out for turkey this morning while mom and dad have their coffee?

Why are your "minor concessions" worse than the existing rules in MA?


Why are schools a special case? Why should people who carry all day, every day, suddenly change their behavior when they walk over an imaginary line? Why should people who our government invested untold amounts of money training to be effective with firearms lose their right of self-defense, unless they take some half-rate continuing ed. class, simply because they chose to continue to volunteer, this time as educators?


Clearly, you're not a teacher. I pray you're not a parent. "Dogpiling" people who demonstrate imperfect behavior is a terrible teaching tool.

Offer correction. Do it with the appropriate level of seriousness. If someone else is already providing the correction, let them be. If it happens again, and you're the one who sees it, or the nearest, feel free to reinforce the lesson.

Do not "dogpile" unless you want to chase people away.


No, we shouldn't.

First, open carry is lawful and should be. Sometimes, it's the best of several poor choices. For some people, it's just a preference. For others, it's proved a useful political tool that has successfully improved access to concealed carry.

Carrying on planes isn't even illegal. It's prohibited on commercial flights, except by authorized personnel. Even much of that is relatively new.

Granted, there would be special considerations if someone were to use a firearm on a plane, but most of us will never draw a firearm in anger. If it stay son your hip, why should it matter?

More people than ever carry. More people than ever can afford to fly. The laws are wildly different between jurisdictions.

Let's assume our current regulations are appropriate. Like above, if someone makes a mistake that doesn't hurt them, the answer should be "no harm, no foul." The TSA agent who notices the firearm could pull the offending traveler aside and explain the correct method to check a firearm. An airline that wants to help their customers get where they're going could offer pistol cases for sale or rent, and help them check it in their luggage.

If the person who is carrying the firearm actually means harm, we'll learn real quickly during the sidebar conversation when one of three things happens. 1) He pulls the gun out: we've got a bad guy, security gets to respond appropriately. 2) He walks to the baggage check: we've got a mistaken traveler who gets to do right in the future. 3) He leaves: could be a good guy or a bad guy; we may never know. Still, the "crisis" was averted without public shaming.


Serializing firearms didn't become the law in the US until 1968. Until then, it was just a useful tool that some manufacturers availed themselves of for QC and customer care purposes. You literally cannot take away "the right to make our own guns" without a 100% registry.

You're talking about 19th century technology. It was still a common shop class project to make cannons in the 90s. What they learned in that class was sufficient to make a modern firearm. That genie can't be put back in the bottle.

So far, I've been good, but this meme is accurate and appropriate

I'm going to pause you mid-line.

Who's "we"? You're projecting. Again.

The NFA exists because we demanded more ways to catch bootleggers and mobsters in the 30s. Until 1968, you could have Tommy guns mailed to you by Sears-Roebuck. Until 1986, you could still go to your local Sears and buy one.

That prohibition is directly opposed to the spirit of Article 17 of the MA Constitution, Amendment 2 to the US Constitution, and all the similar contemporary documents. Full auto is what the right is all about, and always has been.


There are two things I really need to make sure you understand. Please forgive me if this is repetition.

1. Laws function based on definitions.
   • People will alwaysfiddle at the edges of definitions.
     • In some cultures, this raises almost to the level of scripture.
   • If it's not within the definition of a crime, it's not a crime
   • If we believe it should be a crime, we must modify the definition.
2. Laws not only don't prevent crimes; they invent them.
   • In the US, we operate under a system of "Negative Rights."
     • This means that your rights are absolute until we create laws to constrain them.
     • That is, before there were laws nothing was illegal.
   • When we create a law, we make something that was previously unwelcome into something that is unlawful.
   • By making laws, we make criminals.

Machine guns have basically never been used for crime, at a level that merits statistical analysis. Tools like the NFA don't prevent people from hurting each other, even with guns.


Why?

Everywhere else in the world, Maxim's invention is expected to be used. We require them on cars literally everywhere. 100 years later, the technology has barely improved because the largest market in the world has artificial hurdles. And for what? Because "poachers will use them" or there'll be silent gunfights at malls?

Poachers don't care about silencers. They go out and shoot things when they want, where they want. Most never get caught. Even without suppression.

And they're not "movie silent." At most, they're "hearing safe." Generally, they're just another layer of hearing protection.

And they're big. You're not about to see a lot of people trying to carry suppressors in an industry that's focused on the smallest, lightest firearms possible.

Now I want to make an AIWB holster for a Maxim 9...just because.


You're projecting.

That's not Liberty. Freedom is messy, and sometimes, scary.

Participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant, nor the whims of the unimaginative.

Core to the idea of preparing for "self defense" is readiness for any number of dangers. Some people use "zombie apocalypses" as a shorthand or a teaching tool: it's easier to introduce that umbrella to children as though it's a game than to tell your 6-year-old about the real horrors that exist in the world. Others really believe that "TEOTWAWKI" is around the corner, but as long as they're not hurting anybody why should we hurt them?

This is before we note that "self defense" is a broad term that includes (and, even in Massachusets, definitionally begins with) local militias of irregulars who will "bear arms for the common defence." Before we say that can't happen in 2023, it's happening in Ukraine right now. Taiwan and most of Africa are the precipice. Hell, China's own people keep making noises like they'll act on it.

Unless we fall back to American Exceptionalism, why should it be impossible here?

I am golf clapping the $hit out of this response. Well said sir!

 

[headednorth]

So you can all go compromise somewhere else, because the track record for compromising is pretty f*cking horrible.

Compromise isn't even the right word. If you think of the second amendment as a cake, we've had huge slices taken away from us. Their idea of compromise is us giving them another slice and in return they give us nothing, or they give us a fraction of a slice that was formally ours. That's not a compromise.

 

[Asaltweapon]

Gun Owners Of America is a no compromise organization.

 

[Junior314]

@Mesatchornug

I was 'outies' but I got a rational reply. . Thank you. I'm not going to point by point, I'll pluck some highlights because yes, I am making a good faith argument. But before I do, the rebuttal above is rational, argues on the merits and in a tone that's a path, at least theoretically to workable compromise that enshrines our rights. (comments about projection being at the margins of attacking the person not the argument notwithstanding). Also, I have been shooting for >40 years and still have my 'award' patches for NRA marksmanship levels earned at day camp in 'liberal-land'.

I've got about 500 rounds downrange at Moon Island.. it absolutely sucks compared to all of the dozen or so other ranges I've been to [or did many years ago, never had cause to go back could be great now but still hell to get to and that hell can't be allowed to limit access to those wealthy/able bodied enough to drive] and yes, ADA style accommodations would be necessary for any test regime. My "police-easy marksmanship" standards was a backhanded snark about how too low the standards are for police not some absurd suggestion you should have to be able to place in a USPCA match to have an LTC. By having some marksmanship standard, you help ensure gun owners can be said to have met some real world criteria for skills necessary for safe operation. Load, unload, put 10 rounds on paper at 21 feet would be a fine standard.

I shorthanded 'planes' from 'public commercial' in my head and stand by that being a reasonable limit. I think no civilian should carry firearms on a commercial 'tickets sold to the public' plane. Locked in carry on would be something I could see as a means to address concerns about how this constrains mobility. An airliner is 100% 'bad background' and even just hitting the 'backstop' could lead to the death of hundreds. It's an environment any sane person should accept as being "non-permissive".

I'm quite familiar with suppressors and have no "think they're like the movies' delusions. (though subsonic with a single shot/locked breach/subsonic and huge can can be shockingly quiet) and think we should be able to own, transfer. modify them and use them for sport freely. Your point about size and weight is exactly why I saw the "no carry" (installed, aside hunting) limitation would be the kind of concession one could make to enshrine a core freedom.

Re; Common Defense? Yep, I absolutely agree Ukraine is an object lesson. I still think limitations against full auto (or F1-style as I put it, and, as you put it 'fiddle at the margins 'workarounds like Glock Switches) is a reasonable compromise. Define it as "fire only once per pull of the trigger" or any mechanism to alter the behavior of a fire control group to alter that one shot per pull behavior (which is mostly as it is now) and have more equitable limits on who can own the exceptions and where they can be used. Even in MA there are well over 1,000 privately held machine guns under the current legal framework. Where the current framework is most problematic (in my opinion here) are the 'manufactured after' and 'transferability' stuff because they're legal traps and arbitrary (or more arbitrary than necessary to continue the rarity of their use in crime) . There has to be some way to more tightly regulate {limits on carry, storage requirements, liability if stolen, full auto vs semi because there is a real difference in risk. (Whereas there is no difference between the Glocks legally own able but not for sale by dealers in MA for 'consumer protection' reasons and any number of hundreds of other guns.) Specifics would be ironed out with exactly this kind of discussion to limit the proliferation of full auto weapons that could satisfy the irrational fearful and the public good and yet still allow those interested and invested negotiated access they could, admittedly grudgingly, live with. Your point about the history of NFA full auto regs (and 'switchblade' bans as it happens) and crime is exactly a good example of where the debate goes wrong, emotional reactionary laws with a dirtbag bonus effort to regulate behavior with 'sin taxes' that lead to the rich having more rights than the poor. (This is a very interesting clip re: the NFA history specifically about SBRs:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsE0naVApPU
) Emotional reaction made a bad law. My point was that in the 'haggle' we could hope to negotiate re: full auto would not (to me) be a concession that materially impacts gun rights but fighting it with absolutism triggers the opposition counterproductively.

I picked 21 because it's the drinking age and a way to 'smooth the debate' with the regulators with a pretty minor concession (minor as a function of temporarily limiting a freedom). I think we can agree that 10 year olds shouldn't carry to T-Ball so we start from there and sort it out) . That said, the drinking age was 18 when I was and thought then and still think that 21 is dumb. 21 is arbitrary but 'winnable'. I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA. The rules in MA are absurd and written, and spread out in the code, in such byzantine ways they seem like a deliberate effort to make them impossible to follow. (so byzantine as to have whole fora dedicated to the interpretation thereof by people actively interested in compliance). Worse, the current MA regime even seeks to implement new rules without a legislative process to back them up. You are not engaging with an "MA is a model" person.

My comment about long guns and supervision was an attempt to remove any minimum age for participation in the shooting sports but include a responsibility onus on a supervising adult. As to the 'emancipated' 18 year old', fair point. Maybe 'legally emancipated' a good place to haggle in my fantasy of 'reasonable compromise ends this insane and doomed to cycle of loosening and tightening of regs'. I did not intend to say my suggestions were 'the right ones' only that they were a jumping off point for this kind of debate to an acceptable compromise that could be nationally inscribed in metaphorical stone everyone could, grudgingly, agree to that avoids state by state legal traps (N.J. and MA ffs!) and worse yet, municipality by municipality traps.

We're going to differ here but, IMO, open carry as political statement is exactly an example of what, in my thesis, is self destructive to any process that leads to sustainable freedom. It's 'looking for trouble' in my view (plus open carry has intrinsic hazards unless you get into mandating levels of retention and then.. ughh.). Where banning open carry. becomes problematic, again in my opinion, is where to draw the line between 'accidental printing' and some idiot flipping out 'A gun.. I'm skeered!" vs brandishing being an escalation of violence like an idiot. it's difficult but not impossible to define equitably.

I am keenly aware of the 'Rule of Lenity"and it relates to your point about 'laws inventing crimes' and it's that very rule that means you could/should design a mechanism to do background checks without a registry. You'd need to structure the laws on background checks to include scoping that stops it from 'creating bonus crimes' (MA currently has a registry it lies and pretends isn't. The recent 'data dump' issue (I can dig up a link, but I bet you know what I mean) is, in itself, proof registries are bad and they absolutely could get worse, and likely will.) In my 'fantasy agreement', you enshrine limitations on the government (with legal teeth) to explicitly to avoid a registry. For example, an idea: You do the background check without recording what was transferred or even specifically that the check was in support of a firearm purchase. I got background checked up the wazoo when applying for my last job. (no lube either, the bastards ;-) ) and if that mechanism was available to my employer, then the same mechanism (with no indication why the check is being requested) could allow background checks without registry. Proof a check was done couldn't [edit: COULD be managed] be managed with a GUID for the check 'database event' retained by the buyer, or seller to prove they checked before transfer if it came up in the event of a subsequent actual crime could be one way to manage this.

While the entirely reasonable aphorism “My right to swing my arm ends where your nose begins.” has been horribly abused (apparently first by the temperance movement of all places), the principle is sound. Your point "participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant nor the whims of the unimaginative" is one I absolutely agree with. One of the major reasons we're in such a political hellscape right now is that the extreme left and extreme right are both breaching this tenet horrifically. Christofascists (piety needs to be excised from Article 17 btw) for example are absurdly claiming gay marriage is a metaphorical punch in their noses and have no regard for the reality that society benefits from people choosing to legally couple up (or thrupling for all I care) and it's nobody's damned concern whose parts are whose in the socially stabilizing and economically beneficial arrangements that are marriage. Those objecting to same sex marriage are claiming nose injury where none exists and, as is so often the case, the effort to prohibit is self injurious. Leftymoonbats are pushing to encroach on free speech to ease tender sensibilities with no awareness of the inevitable consequences of the kinds of speech constraints they seek on their own civil rights. (I picked offensive terms for both extremes to make a point here BTW, not because I think using them leads to productive discussion if you're on either end of the political spectrum. Hell, one person above thinks we can't regulate guns at all but that it's totally constitutionally legit to undo Roe. V. Wade. The hypocrisy is absurd.)

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

The arc of time leads to more constraints if we can't negotiate. Lost on folks is that if you elect further and further right, you lead to an authoritarian who takes the very guns they got you more rigths for just to win your vote because, the end, they'll want only their military armed so they can stay in power and if you elect further and further left, you end up with anarchic lowest common denominator standards of freedom and economic opportunity.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

"The antis are not negotiating in good faith, every concession is taken as a concession, there is never a true compromise." correct and neither are the 'pros'. Gun owners (hell, gun comfortable) are in the minority by US population 50% is a milestone of geography, not population.

The majority of the population are those who see 'AR' and tremble in terror because they think it's machine gun, who hear 'hollowpoint' and don't realize it's less likely to kill a bystander, who have no idea the difference in capacity between a 1911 and a revolver is effectively nil, who can be convinced Glocks are intrinsically 'more evil' than Sigs.

If we don't find some way to stop coming off like trolling bigots as a group and actually want to both help others build understanding and self police our provocations by correcting our own we're going to lose.

Look at the legislation in Washington and don't assume the courts will save us. Look at the 'enforcement' machinations in MA and the sham listening tour. The attacks on our 2A rights aren't going away and defense against them gets no easier when people shoot cheerleaders on their lawn.

Make it your life's work to befriend and convince three 17 year old girls with pink hair, an AOC fan club membership card and a PETA patch on their backpacks that they should care about your rights by helping them realize they'll want those same rights. When you see somebody green at the range, encourage and praise. The dogpiling I advocated for above was against the worst of our own. Just like we expect our hijab-wearing beloved neighbor down the street to distance themselves from Bin Laden while still respecting their faith, we need to distance ourselves from the dirtbags in our midst because there are plenty of them.

When somebody asks a dumb question about basic mechanics, HELP them, don't chase the likes with an idiot meme. When you see somebody advocating reactionary violence, correct them as a group. If this culture doesn't change, we're screwed. This is Northeast Shooters and when the Reddit gun fora are more welcoming and productive communities than this, we, in one of the population epicenters of anti add to the polarization, we, those of us who want to keep our guns, are in trouble and it seems we're willfully pretending otherwise for the lulz. The recent reclamations of freedom are an opportunity we need to make an effort by being cvil not to piss away.

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

That’s a whole lot of words to confirm your a FUDD.

 

[Broc]

Compromise isn't even the right word. If you think of the second amendment as a cake, we've had huge slices taken away from us. Their idea of compromise is us giving them another slice and in return they give us nothing, or they give us a fraction of a slice that was formally ours. That's not a compromise.

Try explaining that to @SIGNES ... but he is too stupid to get it. Good luck.

 

[Broc]

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

Dude, STFU.

 

[drgrant]

"The antis are not negotiating in good faith, every concession is taken as a concession, there is never a true compromise." correct and neither are the 'pros'. Gun owners (hell, gun comfortable) are in the minority by US population 50% is a milestone of geography, not population.

The majority of the population are those who see 'AR' and tremble in terror because they think it's machine gun, who hear 'hollowpoint' and don't realize it's less likely to kill a bystander, who have no idea the difference in capacity between a 1911 and a revolver is effectively nil, who can be convinced Glocks are intrinsically 'more evil' than Sigs.

If we don't find some way to stop coming off like trolling bigots as a group and actually want to both help others build understanding and self police our provocations by correcting our own we're going to lose.

Look at the legislation in Washington and don't assume the courts will save us. Look at the 'enforcement' machinations in MA and the sham listening tour. The attacks on our 2A rights aren't going away and defense against them gets no easier when people shoot cheerleaders on their lawn.

Make it your life's work to befriend and convince three 17 year old girls with pink hair, an AOC fan club membership card and a PETA patch on their backpacks that they should care about your rights by helping them realize they'll want those same rights. When you see somebody green at the range, encourage and praise. The dogpiling I advocated for above was against the worst of our own. Just like we expect our hijab-wearing beloved neighbor down the street to distance themselves from Bin Laden while still respecting their faith, we need to distance ourselves from the dirtbags in our midst because there are plenty of them.

When somebody asks a dumb question about basic mechanics, HELP them, don't chase the likes with an idiot meme. When you see somebody advocating reactionary violence, correct them as a group. If this culture doesn't change, we're screwed. This is Northeast Shooters and when the Reddit gun fora are more welcoming and productive communities than this, we, in one of the population epicenters of anti add to the polarization, we, those of us who want to keep our guns, are in trouble and it seems we're willfully pretending otherwise for the lulz. The recent reclamations of freedom are an opportunity we need to make an effort by being cvil not to piss away.

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

You need to stop watching television. It's abundantly clear that you're basically swallowing their astroturf like a broad on pornhub....


View: https://youtube.com/shorts/LbU0ZgcuEjc



Also you really are completely clueless about gun politics. Antis are not a great target market, the 90% of the public (especially outside of this region) that doesn't care is much better.... why expend resources on people who are clearly in the wrong (and would love to kill you, and steal all your shit, by the way) when the wobblies, the people who decide things, are out there.....

 

[Blackbeard83]

"The antis are not negotiating in good faith, every concession is taken as a concession, there is never a true compromise." correct and neither are the 'pros'. Gun owners (hell, gun comfortable) are in the minority by US population 50% is a milestone of geography, not population.

The majority of the population are those who see 'AR' and tremble in terror because they think it's machine gun, who hear 'hollowpoint' and don't realize it's less likely to kill a bystander, who have no idea the difference in capacity between a 1911 and a revolver is effectively nil, who can be convinced Glocks are intrinsically 'more evil' than Sigs.

If we don't find some way to stop coming off like trolling bigots as a group and actually want to both help others build understanding and self police our provocations by correcting our own we're going to lose.

Look at the legislation in Washington and don't assume the courts will save us. Look at the 'enforcement' machinations in MA and the sham listening tour. The attacks on our 2A rights aren't going away and defense against them gets no easier when people shoot cheerleaders on their lawn.

Make it your life's work to befriend and convince three 17 year old girls with pink hair, an AOC fan club membership card and a PETA patch on their backpacks that they should care about your rights by helping them realize they'll want those same rights. When you see somebody green at the range, encourage and praise. The dogpiling I advocated for above was against the worst of our own. Just like we expect our hijab-wearing beloved neighbor down the street to distance themselves from Bin Laden while still respecting their faith, we need to distance ourselves from the dirtbags in our midst because there are plenty of them.

When somebody asks a dumb question about basic mechanics, HELP them, don't chase the likes with an idiot meme. When you see somebody advocating reactionary violence, correct them as a group. If this culture doesn't change, we're screwed. This is Northeast Shooters and when the Reddit gun fora are more welcoming and productive communities than this, we, in one of the population epicenters of anti add to the polarization, we, those of us who want to keep our guns, are in trouble and it seems we're willfully pretending otherwise for the lulz. The recent reclamations of freedom are an opportunity we need to make an effort by being cvil not to piss away.

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

I understand what you a preaching and want to do. Unfortunately the anti-gun crowd is pushing so hard to ban ALL guns it's not even funny. Their compromise might end up being lever action and double barreled shotguns at best. So we have to be firm that the 2nd amendment is not to F'd with. You give the gun grabbers an inch and they will take it a mile because the next school shooting they will keep saying we NEED more gun control! It will never end. I try to educate my liberal friends, who are willing to listen, about the difference between the current background checks and universal. All them that I have talked to didn't realize that when ever you buy a gun from a FFL that a background check needs to made in all 50 states. They are severely uninformed about the current gun laws at local and federal levels.

 

[ChevyGuy91]

This thread sucks, I'm out.

 

[eboos]

I'll pretend you're not acting in bad faith. We'll consider your idea line by line.

First, everyone reminds us that we're civilians, not cops. Why should we be held to their standard if the situations we're likely to be in are different? Even with a lower standard, they abuse it.
Example: Boston's Moon Island test. On paper, this is an easy test. I quote it here for reference:

The target is about 11x 17. Basically, as long as all your shots are on paper, you're guaranteed to pass.

Except that 40% of the test is shot one handed, double action only. I hope you don't have arthritis or any other form of hand issue that prevents you from pulling that 12lb trigger.

And that's after you get yourself to the test facility. Because the only way you're allowed to get there is if you drive yourself. Pedestrians, bicycles, cabs and rideshares are prohibited from the bridge. If you are a lifetime urban dweller who never got a driver's license, you're prohibited from getting an LTC...or, you're required to spend piles of money taking driver's education, then the test, then paying for your DL, then renting a car.


The only way to enforce this is with a registry. But we'll skip over that for a second.

MA has UBC: simple possession of a firearm is a felony. Transfers require a background check (that's what MIRCS does when it confirms your LTC is active). Private individuals are only permitted 4 transfers per calendar year without going through an FFL. Those FFLs are prohibited to transfer certain firearms that are 100% legal to possess.

As a result, people pay grey market prices for the most popular handguns in America. We'll disregard the magazine price.


This class doesn't exist. I know because I teach classes in avoidance and de-escalation. The group with which I teach this class provides it to police departments who decide to hire our services. Many departments don't have this kind of training.

So now you're holding private citizens to a higher standard than "highly trained" law enforcement officers.

Moreover, the LTC class already costs $100+ and takes 5+ hours. How many hours of additional training do you require someone to gain access to a protected fundamental right? How much more should they be expected to pay? Who will train the trainers?


VT has allowed 18-year-olds to carry since the founding. We let 16-year-olds navigate our country unsupervised with 3000-lb missiles. We let 18-year-olds decide the future of our nation; some jurisdictions are allowing younger people to take part in local decision-making.

Why 21? Why not 25 - most scientists agree that's about when brain development completes. Or, 30, just because?

What about 18-year-olds who have moved out and found jobs? They're adults, leading adult lives, but can't protect themselves?

What about emancipated minors? They're living as adults, but physically smaller and less developed - they should be left defenseless?

Why should hunting suddenly be restricted to 18+? Even in MA, you can get an FID and hunting license at age 15? Why shouldn't that proud 15-year-old be allowed to sit out for turkey this morning while mom and dad have their coffee?

Why are your "minor concessions" worse than the existing rules in MA?


Why are schools a special case? Why should people who carry all day, every day, suddenly change their behavior when they walk over an imaginary line? Why should people who our government invested untold amounts of money training to be effective with firearms lose their right of self-defense, unless they take some half-rate continuing ed. class, simply because they chose to continue to volunteer, this time as educators?


Clearly, you're not a teacher. I pray you're not a parent. "Dogpiling" people who demonstrate imperfect behavior is a terrible teaching tool.

Offer correction. Do it with the appropriate level of seriousness. If someone else is already providing the correction, let them be. If it happens again, and you're the one who sees it, or the nearest, feel free to reinforce the lesson.

Do not "dogpile" unless you want to chase people away.


No, we shouldn't.

First, open carry is lawful and should be. Sometimes, it's the best of several poor choices. For some people, it's just a preference. For others, it's proved a useful political tool that has successfully improved access to concealed carry.

Carrying on planes isn't even illegal. It's prohibited on commercial flights, except by authorized personnel. Even much of that is relatively new.

Granted, there would be special considerations if someone were to use a firearm on a plane, but most of us will never draw a firearm in anger. If it stay son your hip, why should it matter?

More people than ever carry. More people than ever can afford to fly. The laws are wildly different between jurisdictions.

Let's assume our current regulations are appropriate. Like above, if someone makes a mistake that doesn't hurt them, the answer should be "no harm, no foul." The TSA agent who notices the firearm could pull the offending traveler aside and explain the correct method to check a firearm. An airline that wants to help their customers get where they're going could offer pistol cases for sale or rent, and help them check it in their luggage.

If the person who is carrying the firearm actually means harm, we'll learn real quickly during the sidebar conversation when one of three things happens. 1) He pulls the gun out: we've got a bad guy, security gets to respond appropriately. 2) He walks to the baggage check: we've got a mistaken traveler who gets to do right in the future. 3) He leaves: could be a good guy or a bad guy; we may never know. Still, the "crisis" was averted without public shaming.


Serializing firearms didn't become the law in the US until 1968. Until then, it was just a useful tool that some manufacturers availed themselves of for QC and customer care purposes. You literally cannot take away "the right to make our own guns" without a 100% registry.

You're talking about 19th century technology. It was still a common shop class project to make cannons in the 90s. What they learned in that class was sufficient to make a modern firearm. That genie can't be put back in the bottle.

So far, I've been good, but this meme is accurate and appropriate

I'm going to pause you mid-line.

Who's "we"? You're projecting. Again.

The NFA exists because we demanded more ways to catch bootleggers and mobsters in the 30s. Until 1968, you could have Tommy guns mailed to you by Sears-Roebuck. Until 1986, you could still go to your local Sears and buy one.

That prohibition is directly opposed to the spirit of Article 17 of the MA Constitution, Amendment 2 to the US Constitution, and all the similar contemporary documents. Full auto is what the right is all about, and always has been.


There are two things I really need to make sure you understand. Please forgive me if this is repetition.

1. Laws function based on definitions.
   • People will alwaysfiddle at the edges of definitions.
     • In some cultures, this raises almost to the level of scripture.
   • If it's not within the definition of a crime, it's not a crime
   • If we believe it should be a crime, we must modify the definition.
2. Laws not only don't prevent crimes; they invent them.
   • In the US, we operate under a system of "Negative Rights."
     • This means that your rights are absolute until we create laws to constrain them.
     • That is, before there were laws nothing was illegal.
   • When we create a law, we make something that was previously unwelcome into something that is unlawful.
   • By making laws, we make criminals.

Machine guns have basically never been used for crime, at a level that merits statistical analysis. Tools like the NFA don't prevent people from hurting each other, even with guns.


Why?

Everywhere else in the world, Maxim's invention is expected to be used. We require them on cars literally everywhere. 100 years later, the technology has barely improved because the largest market in the world has artificial hurdles. And for what? Because "poachers will use them" or there'll be silent gunfights at malls?

Poachers don't care about silencers. They go out and shoot things when they want, where they want. Most never get caught. Even without suppression.

And they're not "movie silent." At most, they're "hearing safe." Generally, they're just another layer of hearing protection.

And they're big. You're not about to see a lot of people trying to carry suppressors in an industry that's focused on the smallest, lightest firearms possible.

Now I want to make an AIWB holster for a Maxim 9...just because.


You're projecting.

That's not Liberty. Freedom is messy, and sometimes, scary.

Participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant, nor the whims of the unimaginative.

Core to the idea of preparing for "self defense" is readiness for any number of dangers. Some people use "zombie apocalypses" as a shorthand or a teaching tool: it's easier to introduce that umbrella to children as though it's a game than to tell your 6-year-old about the real horrors that exist in the world. Others really believe that "TEOTWAWKI" is around the corner, but as long as they're not hurting anybody why should we hurt them?

This is before we note that "self defense" is a broad term that includes (and, even in Massachusets, definitionally begins with) local militias of irregulars who will "bear arms for the common defence." Before we say that can't happen in 2023, it's happening in Ukraine right now. Taiwan and most of Africa are the precipice. Hell, China's own people keep making noises like they'll act on it.

Unless we fall back to American Exceptionalism, why should it be impossible here?

Holy mothereffing marathon post! I am sure there is great content here but I need my glasses before I even attempt to read this.

Edit: lol, the reply was just as long.

 

[G4Y4HK]

The second amendment doesn't really exist in this country until any Tyrone from Alabama can visit NYC and open carry a suppressed fully automatic Glock 18 with extended mags thru Times Square.

 

[whatluck]

@Mesatchornug

I was 'outies' but I got a rational reply. . Thank you. I'm not going to point by point, I'll pluck some highlights because yes, I am making a good faith argument. But before I do, the rebuttal above is rational, argues on the merits and in a tone that's a path, at least theoretically to workable compromise that enshrines our rights. (comments about projection being at the margins of attacking the person not the argument notwithstanding). Also, I have been shooting for >40 years and still have my 'award' patches for NRA marksmanship levels earned at day camp in 'liberal-land'.

I've got about 500 rounds downrange at Moon Island.. it absolutely sucks compared to all of the dozen or so other ranges I've been to [or did many years ago, never had cause to go back could be great now but still hell to get to and that hell can't be allowed to limit access to those wealthy/able bodied enough to drive] and yes, ADA style accommodations would be necessary for any test regime. My "police-easy marksmanship" standards was a backhanded snark about how too low the standards are for police not some absurd suggestion you should have to be able to place in a USPCA match to have an LTC. By having some marksmanship standard, you help ensure gun owners can be said to have met some real world criteria for skills necessary for safe operation. Load, unload, put 10 rounds on paper at 21 feet would be a fine standard.

I shorthanded 'planes' from 'public commercial' in my head and stand by that being a reasonable limit. I think no civilian should carry firearms on a commercial 'tickets sold to the public' plane. Locked in carry on would be something I could see as a means to address concerns about how this constrains mobility. An airliner is 100% 'bad background' and even just hitting the 'backstop' could lead to the death of hundreds. It's an environment any sane person should accept as being "non-permissive".

I'm quite familiar with suppressors and have no "think they're like the movies' delusions. (though subsonic with a single shot/locked breach/subsonic and huge can can be shockingly quiet) and think we should be able to own, transfer. modify them and use them for sport freely. Your point about size and weight is exactly why I saw the "no carry" (installed, aside hunting) limitation would be the kind of concession one could make to enshrine a core freedom.

Re; Common Defense? Yep, I absolutely agree Ukraine is an object lesson. I still think limitations against full auto (or F1-style as I put it, and, as you put it 'fiddle at the margins 'workarounds like Glock Switches) is a reasonable compromise. Define it as "fire only once per pull of the trigger" or any mechanism to alter the behavior of a fire control group to alter that one shot per pull behavior (which is mostly as it is now) and have more equitable limits on who can own the exceptions and where they can be used. Even in MA there are well over 1,000 privately held machine guns under the current legal framework. Where the current framework is most problematic (in my opinion here) are the 'manufactured after' and 'transferability' stuff because they're legal traps and arbitrary (or more arbitrary than necessary to continue the rarity of their use in crime) . There has to be some way to more tightly regulate {limits on carry, storage requirements, liability if stolen, full auto vs semi because there is a real difference in risk. (Whereas there is no difference between the Glocks legally own able but not for sale by dealers in MA for 'consumer protection' reasons and any number of hundreds of other guns.) Specifics would be ironed out with exactly this kind of discussion to limit the proliferation of full auto weapons that could satisfy the irrational fearful and the public good and yet still allow those interested and invested negotiated access they could, admittedly grudgingly, live with. Your point about the history of NFA full auto regs (and 'switchblade' bans as it happens) and crime is exactly a good example of where the debate goes wrong, emotional reactionary laws with a dirtbag bonus effort to regulate behavior with 'sin taxes' that lead to the rich having more rights than the poor. (This is a very interesting clip re: the NFA history specifically about SBRs:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsE0naVApPU
) Emotional reaction made a bad law. My point was that in the 'haggle' we could hope to negotiate re: full auto would not (to me) be a concession that materially impacts gun rights but fighting it with absolutism triggers the opposition counterproductively.

I picked 21 because it's the drinking age and a way to 'smooth the debate' with the regulators with a pretty minor concession (minor as a function of temporarily limiting a freedom). I think we can agree that 10 year olds shouldn't carry to T-Ball so we start from there and sort it out) . That said, the drinking age was 18 when I was and thought then and still think that 21 is dumb. 21 is arbitrary but 'winnable'. I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA. The rules in MA are absurd and written, and spread out in the code, in such byzantine ways they seem like a deliberate effort to make them impossible to follow. (so byzantine as to have whole fora dedicated to the interpretation thereof by people actively interested in compliance). Worse, the current MA regime even seeks to implement new rules without a legislative process to back them up. You are not engaging with an "MA is a model" person.

My comment about long guns and supervision was an attempt to remove any minimum age for participation in the shooting sports but include a responsibility onus on a supervising adult. As to the 'emancipated' 18 year old', fair point. Maybe 'legally emancipated' a good place to haggle in my fantasy of 'reasonable compromise ends this insane and doomed to cycle of loosening and tightening of regs'. I did not intend to say my suggestions were 'the right ones' only that they were a jumping off point for this kind of debate to an acceptable compromise that could be nationally inscribed in metaphorical stone everyone could, grudgingly, agree to that avoids state by state legal traps (N.J. and MA ffs!) and worse yet, municipality by municipality traps.

We're going to differ here but, IMO, open carry as political statement is exactly an example of what, in my thesis, is self destructive to any process that leads to sustainable freedom. It's 'looking for trouble' in my view (plus open carry has intrinsic hazards unless you get into mandating levels of retention and then.. ughh.). Where banning open carry. becomes problematic, again in my opinion, is where to draw the line between 'accidental printing' and some idiot flipping out 'A gun.. I'm skeered!" vs brandishing being an escalation of violence like an idiot. it's difficult but not impossible to define equitably.

I am keenly aware of the 'Rule of Lenity"and it relates to your point about 'laws inventing crimes' and it's that very rule that means you could/should design a mechanism to do background checks without a registry. You'd need to structure the laws on background checks to include scoping that stops it from 'creating bonus crimes' (MA currently has a registry it lies and pretends isn't. The recent 'data dump' issue (I can dig up a link, but I bet you know what I mean) is, in itself, proof registries are bad and they absolutely could get worse, and likely will.) In my 'fantasy agreement', you enshrine limitations on the government (with legal teeth) to explicitly to avoid a registry. For example, an idea: You do the background check without recording what was transferred or even specifically that the check was in support of a firearm purchase. I got background checked up the wazoo when applying for my last job. (no lube either, the bastards ;-) ) and if that mechanism was available to my employer, then the same mechanism (with no indication why the check is being requested) could allow background checks without registry. Proof a check was done couldn't [edit: COULD be managed] be managed with a GUID for the check 'database event' retained by the buyer, or seller to prove they checked before transfer if it came up in the event of a subsequent actual crime could be one way to manage this.

While the entirely reasonable aphorism “My right to swing my arm ends where your nose begins.” has been horribly abused (apparently first by the temperance movement of all places), the principle is sound. Your point "participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant nor the whims of the unimaginative" is one I absolutely agree with. One of the major reasons we're in such a political hellscape right now is that the extreme left and extreme right are both breaching this tenet horrifically. Christofascists (piety needs to be excised from Article 17 btw) for example are absurdly claiming gay marriage is a metaphorical punch in their noses and have no regard for the reality that society benefits from people choosing to legally couple up (or thrupling for all I care) and it's nobody's damned concern whose parts are whose in the socially stabilizing and economically beneficial arrangements that are marriage. Those objecting to same sex marriage are claiming nose injury where none exists and, as is so often the case, the effort to prohibit is self injurious. Leftymoonbats are pushing to encroach on free speech to ease tender sensibilities with no awareness of the inevitable consequences of the kinds of speech constraints they seek on their own civil rights. (I picked offensive terms for both extremes to make a point here BTW, not because I think using them leads to productive discussion if you're on either end of the political spectrum. Hell, one person above thinks we can't regulate guns at all but that it's totally constitutionally legit to undo Roe. V. Wade. The hypocrisy is absurd.)

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

The arc of time leads to more constraints if we can't negotiate. Lost on folks is that if you elect further and further right, you lead to an authoritarian who takes the very guns they got you more rigths for just to win your vote because, the end, they'll want only their military armed so they can stay in power and if you elect further and further left, you end up with anarchic lowest common denominator standards of freedom and economic opportunity.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

Wow bro that was a lot of words.

All infringements are tyranny. I hope you're just a troll because otherwise you're a bootlicking tyrant.

 

[whatluck]

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

eat a bag of dicks you gun hating anti.

 

[Mesatchornug]

The second amendment doesn't really exist in this country until any Tyrone from Alabama can visit NYC and open carry a suppressed fully automatic Glock 18 with extended mags thru Times Square.

Can I have a beer with Tyrone while we do it?

 

[whatluck]

Can I have a beer with Tyrone while we do it?

He's probably a better advocate for constitutional rights than the limpwrist who posted above.

 

[whatluck]

We should have reasonable 1A restrictions and take this retard's right to post on the internet away until he submits to a background check and takes a class, all of which is going to cost hundreds.

Also I don't like him so he shouldn't have any 4A or 8A rights. Let's make him stand in front of a judge for sentencing but not give him a trial. Then we should beat him with sticks daily and leave him in gen pop all injured so he can't fight off the chicken hawks. Unless he paid a license fee and has free speech insurance. We can't let just anyone enjoy their rights without government approval, people are too stupid to enjoy that amount of freedom and I am the arbiter of right and wrong so you have to do what I say.

These things are totally reasonable, and what I say is both compelling and intelligent because I'm using bold words.

 

[whatluck]

Those who can't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. GenZ overwhelmingly do not like guns or gun people and they are going to be the majority of voters soon enough. Learning to win them over by not acting like jerks or seeming to endorse those who do is the only long term hope.

This is called concensus cracking.

'hello there fellow gun owners'

'if you're mean to your enemy they win'

'just give up your guns anon why are you so mean uWu?'

I don't care to win over people who don't believe in individual rights because those people like yourself do not deserve any quarter at all.

 

[Mesatchornug]

I've been AFK. I don't want confusion to be the result of swypos.

The presented views are not only in conflict with our Constitutional guarantees, they are incompatible with themselves.
exempli gratia:

I still think limitations against full auto [...] is a reasonable compromise.

I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA.

The proposed restrictions (née compromises) are all fundamentally repugnant.

Even if we could imagine a licensing test that would make most of NES happy, we are not the problem as we're not the ones who implement law. To quote Caetano, that responsibility falls on "state authorities who may be more concerned about disarming the people than about keeping them safe." As such, there is no reasonable way to institute a licensing test that can be trusted to not be abused. Even your example is a barrier so low as to be no barrier, so why bother?

There are ~2000 MG LTCs in MA right now. In most of America, such licensing is not needed. Implementing limitations again makes it either worse than MA or is simply another way to disenfranchise the poor.

I've taken everyone else's point about my verbosity - the rest of the novella has been trimmed.

Before any virtue signaling returns, let's be clear - I lead a firearms advocacy group for members of sexual minority communities, and volunteer significant time to one of the most full auto-friendly clubs in MA. My vision of liberty includes mixed race, same sex couples who protect their column stills and pot grows with unregistered M4s they purchased with crypto. I also agree with the Notorious RBG, who told us for decades that Roe was a poorly decided case, serving only to protect doctors' privacy not patients' rights; any such right could/should be integrated by those legislatures that truly intend to protect it. Inserting such hot-button tangents are disrespectful to the discussion of possible benefits to licensing schemes and its participants.

 

[pastera]

Learning from history means learning how your rights will, over time, erode unless you ensure they're locked in by more than court decisiosn. Half the American population is now $%^&*ed because of the courts erosion of Roe V. Wade. Why? Because we never managed to get those rights enshrined in law and, almost more important, acculturated as a (near) universal norm.

"But the Constitution" ... Yeah, the court read the Constitution one way (correctly) in 1973, now they read it wrong and women (and men, but most men don't get that) are #$%^&ed. This devolution in a seemingly unrelated domain of personal freedom should be a hint when it comes to the rights we on this board care about more personally but it's not a hint enough are taking.

Y'all can continue being absolutists and, in many ways worse, childishly belligerent (seriously, some of these memes... not just crass but so retro and played out) about it but it's not a winning strategy in the long term.

What Heller and Bruen giveth, legislation, media spin and an evolving court can take away. The trends in this country do not, in the long term, favor the ideologies dog-whistled all over these boards and if we can't find a way to ague for our rights effectively without allowing those rights to be entangled with extremism, the extremists that oppose those rights will win.

I'm glad I'm old, (No Depends, yet anyway) because the politically suicidal extremism on every side of everything is not something I'd want to watch keep getting worse for another half century. I am, as the kids probably stopped saying 10 years ago, "outies" on this debate. I'll drown my sorrows for the future of humanity in a purchase of a new toy at my LGS this weekend.

Do you prefer idiot or moron?
Roe literally had no basis in the constitution and that's why St. RBG herself stated it was bad caselaw needing to be revisited. Both sides did nothing because it wasn't about a woman's control over her body, it was all about political control of the population.

The 2nd is enshrined in the Bill of Rights with the last four (3 major, one per curiam) opinions strengthening the right.
Most here are 2nd Amendment absolutists and know that compromise with anti-freedom absolutists only results in loss of freedom.

Or we can be like your ilk and give in hoping they will take our little niche last.

 

[pastera]

@Mesatchornug

I was 'outies' but I got a rational reply. . Thank you. I'm not going to point by point, I'll pluck some highlights because yes, I am making a good faith argument. But before I do, the rebuttal above is rational, argues on the merits and in a tone that's a path, at least theoretically to workable compromise that enshrines our rights. (comments about projection being at the margins of attacking the person not the argument notwithstanding). Also, I have been shooting for >40 years and still have my 'award' patches for NRA marksmanship levels earned at day camp in 'liberal-land'.

I've got about 500 rounds downrange at Moon Island.. it absolutely sucks compared to all of the dozen or so other ranges I've been to [or did many years ago, never had cause to go back could be great now but still hell to get to and that hell can't be allowed to limit access to those wealthy/able bodied enough to drive] and yes, ADA style accommodations would be necessary for any test regime. My "police-easy marksmanship" standards was a backhanded snark about how too low the standards are for police not some absurd suggestion you should have to be able to place in a USPCA match to have an LTC. By having some marksmanship standard, you help ensure gun owners can be said to have met some real world criteria for skills necessary for safe operation. Load, unload, put 10 rounds on paper at 21 feet would be a fine standard.

I shorthanded 'planes' from 'public commercial' in my head and stand by that being a reasonable limit. I think no civilian should carry firearms on a commercial 'tickets sold to the public' plane. Locked in carry on would be something I could see as a means to address concerns about how this constrains mobility. An airliner is 100% 'bad background' and even just hitting the 'backstop' could lead to the death of hundreds. It's an environment any sane person should accept as being "non-permissive".

I'm quite familiar with suppressors and have no "think they're like the movies' delusions. (though subsonic with a single shot/locked breach/subsonic and huge can can be shockingly quiet) and think we should be able to own, transfer. modify them and use them for sport freely. Your point about size and weight is exactly why I saw the "no carry" (installed, aside hunting) limitation would be the kind of concession one could make to enshrine a core freedom.

Re; Common Defense? Yep, I absolutely agree Ukraine is an object lesson. I still think limitations against full auto (or F1-style as I put it, and, as you put it 'fiddle at the margins 'workarounds like Glock Switches) is a reasonable compromise. Define it as "fire only once per pull of the trigger" or any mechanism to alter the behavior of a fire control group to alter that one shot per pull behavior (which is mostly as it is now) and have more equitable limits on who can own the exceptions and where they can be used. Even in MA there are well over 1,000 privately held machine guns under the current legal framework. Where the current framework is most problematic (in my opinion here) are the 'manufactured after' and 'transferability' stuff because they're legal traps and arbitrary (or more arbitrary than necessary to continue the rarity of their use in crime) . There has to be some way to more tightly regulate {limits on carry, storage requirements, liability if stolen, full auto vs semi because there is a real difference in risk. (Whereas there is no difference between the Glocks legally own able but not for sale by dealers in MA for 'consumer protection' reasons and any number of hundreds of other guns.) Specifics would be ironed out with exactly this kind of discussion to limit the proliferation of full auto weapons that could satisfy the irrational fearful and the public good and yet still allow those interested and invested negotiated access they could, admittedly grudgingly, live with. Your point about the history of NFA full auto regs (and 'switchblade' bans as it happens) and crime is exactly a good example of where the debate goes wrong, emotional reactionary laws with a dirtbag bonus effort to regulate behavior with 'sin taxes' that lead to the rich having more rights than the poor. (This is a very interesting clip re: the NFA history specifically about SBRs:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsE0naVApPU
) Emotional reaction made a bad law. My point was that in the 'haggle' we could hope to negotiate re: full auto would not (to me) be a concession that materially impacts gun rights but fighting it with absolutism triggers the opposition counterproductively.

I picked 21 because it's the drinking age and a way to 'smooth the debate' with the regulators with a pretty minor concession (minor as a function of temporarily limiting a freedom). I think we can agree that 10 year olds shouldn't carry to T-Ball so we start from there and sort it out) . That said, the drinking age was 18 when I was and thought then and still think that 21 is dumb. 21 is arbitrary but 'winnable'. I absolutely didn't intend to suggest any rule that's worse than it is in MA. The rules in MA are absurd and written, and spread out in the code, in such byzantine ways they seem like a deliberate effort to make them impossible to follow. (so byzantine as to have whole fora dedicated to the interpretation thereof by people actively interested in compliance). Worse, the current MA regime even seeks to implement new rules without a legislative process to back them up. You are not engaging with an "MA is a model" person.

My comment about long guns and supervision was an attempt to remove any minimum age for participation in the shooting sports but include a responsibility onus on a supervising adult. As to the 'emancipated' 18 year old', fair point. Maybe 'legally emancipated' a good place to haggle in my fantasy of 'reasonable compromise ends this insane and doomed to cycle of loosening and tightening of regs'. I did not intend to say my suggestions were 'the right ones' only that they were a jumping off point for this kind of debate to an acceptable compromise that could be nationally inscribed in metaphorical stone everyone could, grudgingly, agree to that avoids state by state legal traps (N.J. and MA ffs!) and worse yet, municipality by municipality traps.

We're going to differ here but, IMO, open carry as political statement is exactly an example of what, in my thesis, is self destructive to any process that leads to sustainable freedom. It's 'looking for trouble' in my view (plus open carry has intrinsic hazards unless you get into mandating levels of retention and then.. ughh.). Where banning open carry. becomes problematic, again in my opinion, is where to draw the line between 'accidental printing' and some idiot flipping out 'A gun.. I'm skeered!" vs brandishing being an escalation of violence like an idiot. it's difficult but not impossible to define equitably.

I am keenly aware of the 'Rule of Lenity"and it relates to your point about 'laws inventing crimes' and it's that very rule that means you could/should design a mechanism to do background checks without a registry. You'd need to structure the laws on background checks to include scoping that stops it from 'creating bonus crimes' (MA currently has a registry it lies and pretends isn't. The recent 'data dump' issue (I can dig up a link, but I bet you know what I mean) is, in itself, proof registries are bad and they absolutely could get worse, and likely will.) In my 'fantasy agreement', you enshrine limitations on the government (with legal teeth) to explicitly to avoid a registry. For example, an idea: You do the background check without recording what was transferred or even specifically that the check was in support of a firearm purchase. I got background checked up the wazoo when applying for my last job. (no lube either, the bastards ;-) ) and if that mechanism was available to my employer, then the same mechanism (with no indication why the check is being requested) could allow background checks without registry. Proof a check was done couldn't [edit: COULD be managed] be managed with a GUID for the check 'database event' retained by the buyer, or seller to prove they checked before transfer if it came up in the event of a subsequent actual crime could be one way to manage this.

While the entirely reasonable aphorism “My right to swing my arm ends where your nose begins.” has been horribly abused (apparently first by the temperance movement of all places), the principle is sound. Your point "participation in society must never be constrained to the fears of the least tolerant nor the whims of the unimaginative" is one I absolutely agree with. One of the major reasons we're in such a political hellscape right now is that the extreme left and extreme right are both breaching this tenet horrifically. Christofascists (piety needs to be excised from Article 17 btw) for example are absurdly claiming gay marriage is a metaphorical punch in their noses and have no regard for the reality that society benefits from people choosing to legally couple up (or thrupling for all I care) and it's nobody's damned concern whose parts are whose in the socially stabilizing and economically beneficial arrangements that are marriage. Those objecting to same sex marriage are claiming nose injury where none exists and, as is so often the case, the effort to prohibit is self injurious. Leftymoonbats are pushing to encroach on free speech to ease tender sensibilities with no awareness of the inevitable consequences of the kinds of speech constraints they seek on their own civil rights. (I picked offensive terms for both extremes to make a point here BTW, not because I think using them leads to productive discussion if you're on either end of the political spectrum. Hell, one person above thinks we can't regulate guns at all but that it's totally constitutionally legit to undo Roe. V. Wade. The hypocrisy is absurd.)

The bottom line in my initial post is: "We need to find a a way to convene and reasonably regulate firearms to some 'tolerable but nobody loves it' place between "Everyone gets a nuke!" and "It's black and looks like an Assault Rifle Sixteen and I'm gonna pee myself if I even think you're allowed to own that" if we're going to get to a national standard that ensures full reciprocity. Constitutional carry is unwindable.

The arc of time leads to more constraints if we can't negotiate. Lost on folks is that if you elect further and further right, you lead to an authoritarian who takes the very guns they got you more rigths for just to win your vote because, the end, they'll want only their military armed so they can stay in power and if you elect further and further left, you end up with anarchic lowest common denominator standards of freedom and economic opportunity.

Enshrine basic rights by having rational discussions (like this) and making constrained laws to maximally preserve both individual rights and societal function.

Let's make it easy
The second covers "any thing that a man wears for his defense, or takes into his hands, or uses in wrath to cast at or strike another"
That pretty much covers everything you state should be banned or regulate in order to balance the right with the perception of safety. However SCOTUS emphatically states the 2nd " is the very product of interest balancing by the people " and is "surely elevates above all other interests the right of law abiding, responsible citizens to use arms"


If you are too dangerous to K&B then you are too dangerous to be in public.
Otherwise you should have available the entire spectrum of items that constitute bearable arms.

 

[Whutmeworry]

If you are too dangerous to K&B then you are too dangerous to be in public.
Otherwise you should have available the entire spectrum of items that constitute bearable arms.

This!!

This must be hammered on continuously. It's NEVER about the inanimate tools! It's about removing from free society (or at least requiring custodianship of) those who cannot be trusted to be free, responsible sovereign citizens, regardless of whether this is due to their tendency towards criminal, or severely mentally-ill behavior.

 

[LTCRN]

I understand what you a preaching and want to do. Unfortunately the anti-gun crowd is pushing so hard to ban ALL guns it's not even funny. Their compromise might end up being lever action and double barreled shotguns at best. So we have to be firm that the 2nd amendment is not to F'd with. You give the gun grabbers an inch and they will take it a mile because the next school shooting they will keep saying we NEED more gun control! It will never end. I try to educate my liberal friends, who are willing to listen, about the difference between the current background checks and universal. All them that I have talked to didn't realize that when ever you buy a gun from a FFL that a background check needs to made in all 50 states. They are severely uninformed about the current gun laws at local and federal levels.

Liberal friends, almost all the Northeast, and California politicians fit your statement! But they all know because they are smarter than us and they have "common sense" that we supposedly don't!

 

[Dench]

When somebody asks a dumb question about basic mechanics, HELP them, don't chase the likes with an idiot meme. When you see somebody advocating reactionary violence, correct them as a group. If this culture doesn't change, we're screwed. This is Northeast Shooters and when the Reddit gun fora are more welcoming and productive communities than this, we, in one of the population epicenters of anti add to the polarization, we, those of us who want to keep our guns, are in trouble and it seems we're willfully pretending otherwise for the lulz. The recent reclamations of freedom are an opportunity we need to make an effort by being cvil not to piss away.

We need to focus on being $%^&*ing NICE FFS.

If you think you're getting a bad treatment here and now consider yourself lucky that you werent here 10 years ago when people really got beat on. Considering how unpopular your opinions are on this forum the reaction to your posts is pretty tame.

One thing we hate on NES is mandatory common sense think. We don't like it. It's a trap. As it turns out, there is no "middle road" or "consensus" to the problem. One side wants guns under the 2A and the other side wants guns gone. Sure, there is some overlap in the middle where you seem to fall but that's not what NES is about. We are 2A absolutionists and we really don't care much for anything else.

NES isnt reddit. Which is a good thing. NES has had a LOT of problems with post COVID-19 accounts who seem to have a lot of weird things in common. Are we sick of that here? I know I am.

As for being nice to each other the only times I've been treated poorly irl at ranges was by FUDDS.

edit:english is hard

 

[drgrant]

The reason there is no middle ground is because, quite frankly, if you look at gun politics and gun control objectively, there really isn't any. There is a very well defined line in the
sand. It is something along the lines of "Is the shit that is pouring out of my mouth or pen likely to be considered or perceived as an infringement of rights?" If the answer is "yes" or "maybe" then it's probably anti-gun garbage.

Its kind of an issue on the cusp of someone telling you "they can be a little bit pregnant" it doesn't work like that. The lines in the sand are pretty sharp and
well defined and theres not a lot of nuance there. It is exceedingly difficult to have a gun law that is simultaneously not rights infringing, or for that matter, doesn't violate some other
important civil right.

There are already a bunch of laws that cover the middle ground wrt gun control (I'm not going to elaborate, but as an example in most places a toddler cant legally possess a handgun without at least parental consent). Those basic laws will never be challenged because most people don't consider them infringing, and in all honesty, a lot of them really aren't even
"gun laws" in the strictest sense anyways.

Most of the time when people start braying about "reasonable restrictions" In reality, there actually is no such thing. To put it in another sense, "reasonable restrictions" at this point is like a diddler trying to tell us they're not a diddler because they merely only leer and grope the children and sniff their hair but don't have sex with them. Nobody is buying into that kind of shitlogic. "reasonable restrictions" are just 110% anti gun turds covered in a thin layer of frosting, and when you peel any of them apart, the real 110% anti-gun motives behind them are laid bare for everyone to see, further, its pretty obvious that whenever any of that stuff is implemented, the "thing" they were supposedly whining about, AKA, "gun violence" is rarely effected by the restriction but the net damage to 2a is easy to see and very easy to measure.