I want to argue with a liberal please!

[GobBluth]

I'm seeking a rational argument to get me through my Friday. I intend to be completely open minded here.

Prerequisites: Don't be a dick and get your feelings hurt if I oppose your views, support your position with facts, I promise to do the same.

Topics (liberal's choice): Guns, Hate Speech/Freedom of Speech, Wage Gap, Women's Rights, ANTIFA, BLM, Socialism, etc.

Lets keep all shots above the belt, touch gloves, and get it on.

Cheers,

GB

 

[sandorski]

Bring it!

 

[feralkid]

People come in here to do that every day.

 

[Muse]

Guns? I'm very anti-guns. Fire away, I'm behind a giant boulder.

 

[GobBluth]

Ok, Guns it is!

Republican here. Gun Supporter, Gun Owner.

So why is the Left (I am going to generalize, so be aware) so adamant that regulations of firearms is the answer to gun violence? Or that less guns to law abiding citizens directly equals less guns for criminals. Owning a gun and open carry has proven to be as good of a deterrent of gun crime as anything else.

 

[IronWing]

Topics (liberal's choice): Guns, Hate Speech/Freedom of Speech, Wage Gap, Women's Rights, ANTIFA, BLM, Socialism, etc.

How about hyper-concentration of wealth as a direct, predictable, and predicted result of conservative policy?

 

[GobBluth]

How about hyper-concentration of wealth as a direct, predictable, and predicted result of conservative policy?

I'm up for that too.

Can't say its direct result of conservative policy. It is the result of democracy. To the rich get richer because of policy, sure, I think it helps them, especially from a tax standpoint, or that it favors the wealthy, but, anyone in the country has the potential, at its base level, to become wealthy and benefits from those same policies.

Am I wrong?

 

[feralkid]

I'm up for that too.

Can't say its direct result of conservative policy. It is the result of democracy. To the rich get richer because of policy, sure, I think it helps them, especially from a tax standpoint, or that it favors the wealthy, but, anyone in the country has the potential, at its base level, to become wealthy and benefits from those same policies.

Am I wrong?

Not if you are a white male.

 

[pauldun170]

Ok, Guns it is!

Republican here. Gun Supporter, Gun Owner.

So why is the Left (I am going to generalize, so be aware) so adamant that regulations of firearms is the answer to gun violence? Or that less guns to law abiding citizens directly equals less guns for criminals. Owning a gun and open carry has proven to be as good of a deterrent of gun crime as anything else.

Define "Left"
I live in a republican area and we are perfectly fine with strict regulations. Between gun control laws and policing, and smart choices around economic development we now live in one of the safest areas of the country. While we do have a population of gun owners, we lack the gun culture found in other parts of the country. I don't need a gun to be safe in my neighborhood. we don't get threats of people "shooting up the school" because without a gun culture fed by loose gun laws, there aren't many guns in circulation and a firearm isn't the first thing on a looney bins shopping list.

I can travel to some of the crappiests areas in my region, the areas folks associate with "thugs" and still not need a gun to be safe.

The issue with "gun country" is that "guns" are so ingrained in the culture, that they are seen as the solution to all problems when at best they are badaids to symptoms.

 

[realibrad]

Ok, Guns it is!

Republican here. Gun Supporter, Gun Owner.

So why is the Left (I am going to generalize, so be aware) so adamant that regulations of firearms is the answer to gun violence? Or that less guns to law abiding citizens directly equals less guns for criminals. Owning a gun and open carry has proven to be as good of a deterrent of gun crime as anything else.

The reason is that less access to guns will reduce gun violence. The less of them around, the less they are likely to be used. What it does not correlate with is a reduction in crime and or murder. It's also true that owning a gun is correlated with a higher chance that you will be harmed by guns. So in terms as a safety device it appears to have the opposite effect. Further, guns make doing mass damage easier. Outside of explosives and bio-weapons, there is not a more effective tool.

 

[Stokely]

Sorry, not down with the labels. They are intellectually lazy (both to self-label, and to paint others). I am "liberal" on some issues, others not much. Personally if more people would stop blindly subscribing to a packaged set of beliefs and evaluate each issue on its own merits we'd be better off. Instead political discussion is pretty much the same as listening to two rival sports fanatics yell about how their team is best....

 

[GobBluth]

Not if you are a white male.

Previous POTUS disagrees with this statement

 

[GobBluth]

Define "Left"
I live in a republican area and we are perfectly fine with strict regulations. Between gun control laws and policing, and smart choices around economic development we now live in one of the safest areas of the country. While we do have a population of gun owners, we lack the gun culture found in other parts of the country. I don't need a gun to be safe in my neighborhood. we don't get threats of people "shooting up the school" because without a gun culture fed by loose gun laws, there aren't many guns in circulation and a firearm isn't the first thing on a looney bins shopping list.

I can travel to some of the crappiests areas in my region, the areas folks associate with "thugs" and still not need a gun to be safe.

The issue with "gun country" is that "guns" are so ingrained in the culture, that they are seen as the solution to all problems when at best they are badaids to symptoms.

Thats a pretty solid point of view. So you're saying that the strict regulation in your area has actually provided a safer area. I have to say that's the first time I've ever heard of that being the case. Generally, what we see is that restrictions make it harder to own a gun, but do nothing against getting guns off the street and out of the hands of the people who mean to do us harm.

 

[feralkid]

Previous POTUS disagrees with this statement

Explain that one. Please.

 

[GobBluth]

The reason is that less access to guns will reduce gun violence. The less of them around, the less they are likely to be used. What it does not correlate with is a reduction in crime and or murder. It's also true that owning a gun is correlated with a higher chance that you will be harmed by guns. So in terms as a safety device it appears to have the opposite effect. Further, guns make doing mass damage easier. Outside of explosives and bio-weapons, there is not a more effective tool.

Okay, on the surface that makes sense, but in reality, less access to guns legally has zero impact on access to guns illegally. Black market guns aren't going away and are not going to be influenced by policy or government restriction.

 

[rchunter]

You came to the right place if you want to argue with a liberal.

 

[GobBluth]

Sorry, not down with the labels. They are intellectually lazy (both to self-label, and to paint others). I am "liberal" on some issues, others not much. Personally if more people would stop blindly subscribing to a packaged set of beliefs and evaluate each issue on its own merits we'd be better off. Instead political discussion is pretty much the same as listening to two rival sports fanatics yell about how their team is best....

Okay, labels aside, I want to see someone else's point of view, that's the end of it.

 

[yllus]

The correlation between more guns leading to more gun deaths is very well established. It's a fact-based conclusion.

 

[SMOGZINN]

So why is the Left (I am going to generalize, so be aware) so adamant that regulations of firearms is the answer to gun violence?

Because it worked in every other country that it has been tried in, including Australia that had large gun culture like the United States.

Or that less guns to law abiding citizens directly equals less guns for criminals.

If you make it harder to get guns legally it also becomes harder to get guns illegally. If for no other reason than the prices of black market guns will increase and price them out of a lot of criminals hands.

Owning a gun and open carry has proven to be as good of a deterrent of gun crime as anything else.

I don't think I've ever seen any peer reviewed science that would back that up. In fact the opposite has been recently proven.

Right-to-Carry Laws and Violent Crime: A Comprehensive Assessment Using Panel Data, the LASSO, and a State-Level Synthetic Controls Analysis

Right-to-carry (RTC) laws are associated with higher aggregate violent crime rates, and the size of the deleterious effects that are associated with the passage of RTC laws climbs over time.

Ten years after the adoption of RTC laws, violent crime is estimated to be 13-15% percent higher than it would have been without the RTC law.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Okay, on the surface that makes sense, but in reality, less access to guns legally has zero impact on access to guns illegally. Black market guns aren't going away and are not going to be influenced by policy or government restriction.

Logically, less access to guns means less guns are likely to be used. See the drug black market. More people would likely be using drugs if more were available (note, i'm not taking a stance on that). In addition, the likelihood that someone will commit, and succeed, with a suicide is higher if they have access to a 'guaranteed method' such as a firearm.

That's the logic anyhow. I'm personally a major proponent of personal rights, so you'll usually see me carrying the flag of pro-gun.

 

[Muse]

Republican here. Gun Supporter, Gun Owner.
So why is the Left (I am going to generalize, so be aware) so adamant that regulations of firearms is the answer to gun violence? Or that less guns to law abiding citizens directly equals less guns for criminals. Owning a gun and open carry has proven to be as good of a deterrent of gun crime as anything else.

Nonsense. Problem is you gun nuts can't see beyond the narrow confines of your status quo vision.

It's not about the laws, it's about the guns. If you have guns everywhere, people are going to use them, well, some of them. Sure, with 200 million guns out there they aren't all going to be used to do heinous acts. It's the heinous usage that's the problem and the only way you are going to eliminate that (it's a huge problem and something needs to be done) is to take the guns away... from everyone, everyone but those trained, vetted. And they should only be able to get their hands on a gun when they need it! Yes, I want to take your guns away!!! Now, back behind my boulder...

 

[Moonbeam]

I want to argue that liberals are right to want to ban gweboses. When the constitution was written the annoying properties of gweboses were largely unknown but since that time the gwebos population, thanks to the fact that gweboses have become emblematic of a proud conservative dinner table, have multiplied into the million threatening to drive the American picitivi population to extinction. We need a constitional amendment to ban private ownership of gweboses since the value to children’s nutrition of the picitivi is immense, and this regardless of the psychosis gwebos withdrawal causes to conservative brain defects.

 

[Muse]

Okay, on the surface that makes sense, but in reality, less access to guns legally has zero impact on access to guns illegally. Black market guns aren't going away and are not going to be influenced by policy or government restriction.

It will take time, you need to be patient for the black market to fade, but if it's illegal to possess (much less use) a gun, less and less people will want to possess them over time and there will be less and less gun proliferation. It won't happen overnight but it will happen. However, if you continue to allow all manner of people to own guns (and yes, as we all know now, anyone who's informed and honest) people can get guns who aren't legally entitled to own/possess them, due to loopholes like gun shows and private sales. And currently, as we just saw Feb. 14, people who have no business possessing ultra-killing weapons can get them legally. What's more, the government totally sucks at doing anything to prevent heinous crimes using such weapons (hello, FBI!). Is that what you endorse?

The NRA's response is that taking away your guns eliminates your ability ("right") to defend yourself. That's the world you want? You don't give a shit what happens beyond your right to threaten to shoot (or actually shoot) a threat? Sick sick sick.

 

[Bird222]

Nonsense. Problem is you gun nuts can't see beyond the narrow confines of your status quo vision.

It's not about the laws, it's about the guns. If you have guns everywhere, people are going to use them, well, some of them. Sure, with 200 million guns out there they aren't all going to be used to do heinous acts. It's the heinous usage that's the problem and the only way you are going to eliminate that (it's a huge problem and something needs to be done) is to take the guns away... from everyone, everyone but those trained, vetted. And they should only be able to get their hands on a gun when they need it! Yes, I want to take your guns away!!! Now, back behind my boulder...

So are you going to go house to house taking guns without any guns yourself?

 

[GobBluth]

Explain that one. Please.

The correlation between more guns leading to more gun deaths is very well established. It's a fact-based conclusion.

No argument here that more guns = more gun violence. The argument is that less guns do NOT equal less gun violence. Criminals don't abide by the law

Because it worked in every other country that it has been tried in, including Australia that had large gun culture like the United States.



If you make it harder to get guns legally it also becomes harder to get guns illegally. If for no other reason than the prices of black market guns will increase and price them out of a lot of criminals hands.



I don't think I've ever seen any peer reviewed science that would back that up. In fact the opposite has been recently proven.

Right-to-Carry Laws and Violent Crime: A Comprehensive Assessment Using Panel Data, the LASSO, and a State-Level Synthetic Controls Analysis

Nice, supported by fact, or documentation at least.