“A frenzy of attempts at preventive policy making follows each high-profile incident but actually creates the conditions for future failure . . .
“Gun prohibition produces the same problems as drug or alcohol prohibition; attempts to restrict harmless sale and possession in order to catch a minority of misusers yield all kinds of unintended consequences.
“Black markets make the purchase of prohibited items riskier and more expensive, and make the transactions untraceable.
“Bans are likely to be disproportionately enforced among black and Muslim gun owners, increasing racial disparities.
“Narrowly tailored restrictions will push product development teams at big firearms manufacturers and garage tinkerers alike to find workarounds that circumvent the letter of the law.
“And any mass confiscation of illegal weapons or accessories will lead to more violence, as die-hard gun rights believers inevitably fight back against law enforcement.” – Katherine Mangu-Ward in How to Talk to Your Kids About Guns [via reason.com]
Huh… Seems she gets it.
Nothing of substance will come of this latest frenzy of bloody shirt waving.
I correct myself. What will happen is more folk that don’t own a gun yet will buy one so that they can have a chance to protect themselves and their loved ones from the leftist loonies out there.
We rapidly approach the time when every home in America will have a gun.
We rapidly approach the time when MOST every home in America will have a gun.
There, fixed that for you. While we will never have firearms in every home, we are gaining momentum and seeing a resurgence in firearm ownership.
(I predict about 33% of the population will never keep a firearm in their home.)
Which is why we should introduce a Swiss style militia and require yearly training with weapons to be kept in the home from age 18 to age 45 with the weapon being retained afterwards at the discretion of the individual militiaman. Quite frankly, every high school should have a summer boot camp requirement to graduate. If nothing else, it will help melt the lard off of the disgusting fatbodies that make up a good chunk of the present generation.
First we need to stop the lefty indoctrination in schools, or we’re going to be handing future terrorists machineguns.
I think the drill instructors are more than capable of beating the commie out of them.
Agree 100%. The idea of the militia being comprised of the body of the people should start in school. However I think the polishing of the turd that is the american public school system is just a pipe dream.
Agree. Also, there are a lot of things that need to be completely revamped in the school system.
When I was in high school around the turn of the millennium, we were required to take a “health class” which was basically nothing more than a semester of sex ed with some adverts for sunscreen thrown in. “Wrap it up Johnny” for an entire semester. Ugh. [Full disclosure while I got an A in the class I didn’t pay much attention.]
That class could be much more useful. CPR and AED certs could be rolled into it as well as an advanced First Aid class with skills like TQ and nasopharyngeal airway application. Sure, those skills atrophy over time and people need to recert occasionally to learn the newest and bestest practices but it would be a hell of a lot more useful to the students, to society and be a better use of taxpayer funds than having some jerkwad teacher blather on about rubbers and sunscreen for an entire damn semester.
If you’re gonna have the class anyway then you might as well teach the kids being forced to take it something useful and do so in a hands on way that really gets them engaged. Hell, they might just save some lives at a car accident scene with the skills they learn in such a class.
Add in a DI beating the skinny jeans off the students and you might just turn out some useful individuals… and really, the DI doesn’t need to beat anyone. Do enough squats and skinny jeans just aren’t an option.
Completely agree. I’ve thought about this type of policy before & how much better this country would be with requirements such as this.
Ms. Mangu-Ward’s article is refreshing in it’s simple yet complete explanation of the deaths related to firearms and the “we must do something” hysteria.
Reason has produced some great content on gun rights in recent years. My fav:
“And any mass confiscation of illegal weapons or accessories will lead to more violence, as die-hard gun rights believers inevitably fight back against law enforcement.”
I’d say any attempt to confiscate legal firearms from law abiding citizens will lead to a civil war that sees the near and necessary complete liquidation of anti American Liberal Terrorists™ who pose an existential threat to our Constitutional Republic. Our “fight” isn’t with the “government”, it’s with our domestic ENEMIES that vote for filthy, subhuman Democrats.
You nailed it, once again!
Someone who sorta’ “gets it”…except for the black/Muslim drivel. Don’t be a criminal/and/or a terrorist. FIFU.
Repressive measures are always disproportionally applied to dispised minorities. “All gun control is ALWAYS racist.”
Reason is solid on the 2A.
That’s where Reason magazine usually goes off the rails and why a few years ago I let my 15 years or so of subscriptions lapse. I just got tired of the all-rights/no-responsibilities school of thought.
Open the borders for everyone! Drugs for everyone! Never mind tolerate, if you don’t embrace, celebrate, jump up on the float and lead the parade, then you’re a [insert relevant -phobe slur here]!
It’s that counterweight of responsibilities that keeps freedom-loving libertarians from slouching toward statism. Absent that, they transform into liberals, or at least liberal-light, and I lose interest.
“all-rights/no-responsibilities ”
You should put a TM tag after that one! I, for one, have already saved it to macro and will be using it regularly. Rights ALWAYS come with responsibilities. One has not only the right, but the DUTY to shout “FIRE” in a crowded theater, If the theater is actually on fire. If not, then that one is responsible(there’s that word again…) for the carnage which might follow…
The “Can’t Yell fire in a crowded theater” quote is one of the most ironic supreme court quotes that people use today. Do you know the case it was used in was a case where the supreme court ruled that the first Amendment did not protect speech or press criticizing thee draft; atrocious case law that remained for nearly 50 years unit 1969 when it was fully understood to be a gross violation of the First amendment and reversed by SCOTUS.
And the law on yelling fire in a crowded theater is ridiculous analogy in second amendment cases. We dont gag everyone who might, or take away freedom to yell, we say if you do so, with intent, and someone is harmed, we sacniton YOU and only you. It is a post-harm sanction, not a premetion, after proven harm occurred, and only leveled on that person who committed the harm. It is not analogous to owning a gun, or carrying a gun, but analogous to your liability if you shoot and hurt someone, a body of law called “assault” or “homicide” law. gun control is preemption and not analogous at all.
preemption would be: No one can go in a theater at all since someone else “shouted fire” in one at another place and other time
Every time the gun grabbers talk about bill of rights having “limits”, they use examples that are not at all analogous to what they want with gun control, which is preemption of all citizens from exercising a right, or as DC did with carry (and why they would have lost profoundly in the courts) “ration” a right which has already been held to be unconstitutional.
Libertarians are liars. Or you can use the word disingenuous to describe them. When they support a victim’s right to shoot a drug dealer who threatens a property owner or a neighborhood resident because it don’t like drug dealing and the social problems it brings to their neighborhood, I will then consider what they say.
120 years ago you could use any drug that you wanted there was no law against it, this is what the Libertarians have always wanted. But what they will not tell you is that you could shoot a drug dealer or a drug user who threatened you or your property no questions asked. These were the days of the Wild West that many people say they want to go back to. Because of all the “freedom” that existed back then. That didn’t apply to black citizens and the Jim Crow laws of the time however.
Libertarians and others are upset at the Philippine president for ordering the killings of drug users or drug dealers who do not turn themselves into the authorities. It seems Libertarians are just like the Republicans and the Democrats. They want full force their values onto other societies. Jews and others were very happy to kill American citizens, without a trial, who were a threat during world war two. There are many things they don’t put in high school history books. The American governments extrajudicial killings during World War II are one of them.
https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/meyer-lansky-the-american-mobster-who-fought-the-nazis.html
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-devil-himself-explores-mobs-fight-against-nazis-during-wwii
http://www.cosanostranews.com/2011/02/gangsters-are-decorated-war-vets-too.html
When I see libertarians like Gary Johnson and William Weld or anyone else make a public case for private ownership of rocket launchers, something they did support at one time, I will consider what they say on their favorite subject, marijuana intoxication and other goals. Where is the libertarian press asking elected libertarian leaders about these issues??????
http://reason.com/archives/2007/08/16/the-right-to-own-a-bazooka#slide1
The second amendment has never been about guns. It’s about ARMS.
GEEZ! A “Quote of the Day” that doesn’t get my blood boiling first thing in the morning…NICE! very nice. I agree with “fww” Ms. Mangu-Ward’s inclusion of the “black and Muslim gun owner” remark is a little off-putting for the reasons “fww” stated, but otherwise she’s right. Black and Muslim gun owning American citizens have the same fundamental right to keep and bear Arms as every other American citizen AND the same responsibility/obligation to conduct themselves peaceably and responsibly as the vast majority of every other American citizen gun owners do.
The Left, by and large will never understand that the Genie is out of the bottle and there is no way to force him back in. From those who truly take “from my cold dead hands” to heart and will fight to retain their firearms, to the criminals that haven’t obeyed the laws and won’t start now, to the P. A. Lutys of the world building guns in their workshops.
Or the shear cost of implementing a nation wide gun confiscation in both treasure and blood.
My motto “it is no longer enough to be willing to fight and die to preserve our rights, one must be willing to kill for them, too”, stands. We are a VERY different country than we were since the 94 AWB or the confiscation during Katrina. There are 10’s of millions of gun owners who will NEVER allow those things to happen again. Dare I say, there are only a handful of issue that could plunge our country into a Civil War again. The Second Amendment is at the top of that list. Except this time, it will make what happened in the 1860’s look like a playground scuffle.
Historically, it only takes about 3%.
I would point out that “workarounds” don’t circumvent the letter of the law, they COMPLY with the letter of the law. Spirit of the law may be another thing, but I don’t believe in spirits.
The gun-control movement’s “commonsense reforms” are nothing more than virtue signalling—symbolic gestures that reflect the contempt that America’s anti-gun culture has for the rest of us. In social-movement theory these efforts are called “coercive reforms” which usually appear after the movement has failed to convince its target population to accept its values. Fueled by a sense of moral indignation, gun-controllers want to punish gun-owners by confiscating guns. It’s kinda hard to talk about “commonsense” when everybody knows the score.
Every now and then I stumble upon an angel on earth. One who sees and articulates an issue, no matter what issue, with transcending clarity. Such is her statement above!
Should (God forbid) there be a general confiscation of privately owned firearms, I don’t believe many will fight back. Aside from recreation, the purpose for which most people own guns is self defense. Disarmed, there is a risk that you will be killed by a criminal. Getting into a gunfight with the cops guarantees it.
What worries me more about gun confiscation is that it would embolden criminals. They wouldn’t disarm and would no longer fear effective defense by victims. I wonder how much of the opposition to private ownership of firearms is rooted in the weapons themselves and how much is opposition to the very idea of fighting back and, necessarily, doing injury to the assailant.
You’d be wrong. There’s be 10’s of thousands willing to immediately mobilize on specific, regional locations to prevent confiscations. After the Bundy Ranch- Connecticut passed their new forced registration scheme, with the threat of confiscation for those that refused (btw, 90% of the rifle owners did not and have not complied). If you were aware of what’s was going on, it’s this very threat of this mobilization that was made apparent to the Governor, forced him to back off of his hyper aggressive posture. Now he’s stuck with a law that the citizens won’t obey and that they are afraid to enforce other than on an incidental, case by case basis. Give it a google. We are a very different country today than we were when the AWB passed or the confiscations during Katrina. There’s not much that would spark a full civil war, but the Second Amendment is at the top of that list. “It is no longer enough to be willing to fight and die to preserve our rights, one must be willing to kill for them, too”. Remember, it would only require 3% of gun owners.
She left out the part where we line members of congress up in front of the Capitol and shoot them.