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Welcome, BoN
This is a place for general chit-chat about virtually anything that doesn't fit anywhere else.
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What is going on?

(talk) (talk) (talk) (talk) (hic)

Pointless poll

Do you support the evil Trans Fem Agenda?

Yes

104

Vote

No

24

Vote

No I am a transphobic prick

31

Vote

Support the Trans Masculine Agenda

49

Vote

Support the Trans Goat Agenda

19

Vote

I will take a cheeseburger with large fries and a chocolate shake.

97

Vote

Should we add the "booze" category to the Saloon Bar?

Yeah. Also, can I have another beer?

79

Vote

No. The SB is a temperance bar.

32

Vote

Which weighs more, a kilogram of feathers or a kilogram of lead?

The feathers

19

Vote

The lead

25

Vote

They weigh the same

123

Vote

Has internet access become an essential utility?

Yes

197

Vote

No

16

Vote

Down With This Sort Of Thing

10

Vote

Overall, would NATO be better off without Turkey?

Yes

165

Vote

No

108

Vote

To do list

Proposed Assault Weapons Ban[edit]

So, Biden is making it a priority to permanently ban assault weapons. Of course, do it now rather than during an election year, but honestly, I think there should be something better than simply abridging constitutionally protected rights from everyone.

Let's get to the core of the actual 2nd Amendment; what's it even for? Surely, the section about "militia" means something important about the reasons. What people forget is that the US does, in fact, have a militia. If you are a healthy male citizen (or have declared you intend to become one) between the ages of 17 and 44? You are legally defined as part of the "Unorganized Militia". The whole premise of 2A is NOT that you bring your guns to war with you, but you know how to use them. Sure, anyone can become proficient with a rifle after a few weeks of basic, but to truly become good with one you need to have fired a gun thousands of times. And to do that, you need to have a gun.

That said, not everyone is actually part of the militia, now are they? "Shall not be infringed" does not mean, for example, convicted felons may own guns too, and felons are barred from the military under normal conditions. But who else would be rejected by the military? While we wouldn't draft amputees, we no longer hold the belief that "Fewer Limbs = Fewer Rights".

However, we also issue psychological evaluations during the draft. So basically, I don't see any reason that, e.g., we couldn't require a psych evaluation as part of the gun license, perhaps that test could be done every few years when the license is renewed. I also see no reason why owning a gun means all guns immediately; to get a driver's license, you must first get a learner's permit, and if you want a CDL you need a learner's permit for that too. So we could, for instance, require a gun learner's permit before being allowed to own a gun, and other tests involved. Once you have a gun license, well, then you need a learner's permit for handguns or semi-automatics. Thoughts? Core (yak) 20:11, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

I've found this to be a useful resource. I don't agree with everything the author says in it, but it's a reasonably good starting point. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 20:23, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
That requires signing up an account. No thanks. Core (yak) 20:31, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Speaking as someone who is not part of the USA. Rather that try to figure out what the modern impact of the ancient document is - wouldn't it be better to simply amend the constitution so that it's a better fit for the 21st century?Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:36, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Maybe, but passing a constitutional amendment is super difficult. A proposed amendment needs to be passed by two-thirds of Congress (both houses) and then be ratified by three-quarters of the state legislatures. In other words, it ain't happening. Pizza SLICE.gifChef Moosolini’s Ristorante ItalianoMake a Reservation 20:37, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Considering that the constitution was written in a day when it was considered proper for people to murder each other in public over insults, the founder of the Democratic Party being someone who actually did just that at least fourteen times, and children being taught to use guns since before puberty, if anything I think the founders would be angry at the relative lack of guns in everyone's hands.
Except for Black people owning guns, and women, they probably would not approve of that. Core (yak) 20:52, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Damn, somehow I was able to access the linked article above without an account. Strange. I'll see if I can find a copy that's freely accessible. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 21:19, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
In the meantime, as I search, to sum up one of the main points it makes; the great majority of gun crime is committed with handguns (think the Saturday Night Special types) almost always illicitly obtained, often by straw buyers (in some cases coerced into it, in others quite willingly participating in crime). Furthermore, all kinds of gun crime are much more commonly committed by people who have a criminal history. So banning "assault weapons" (itself a somewhat nebulous definition) isn't nothing, but it's a somewhat more peripheral part of the problem than most people believe. The FBI's own crime statistics basically bear that out. I'd support it, but I tend to agree that being serious about cracking down on straw buyers would have more effect. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 21:31, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
What the hell constitutes a assault weapon to begin with? - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 21:34, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
There's no actual definition, but to the general public it means "Big, Black and Scary". Core (yak) 21:54, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
”Assault weapons” is not exactly as arcane a concept as some might like to pretend. Just because there might be debates about the exact delimitation of the concept when used in gun control debates, it doesn’t mean that it is a hopelessly nebulous and undefinable one.
A tentative definition would be: High capacity, semi automatic weapons, primarily firing assault rifle ammunition (e.g. 5.56 mm NATO), derived from military assault rifles with the arguable archetype being the various AR-15 style rifles. Now, some would include similar weapons derived from sub machine guns, which might muddy the water a bit, but it’s not exactly an inscrutable concept.
The prime, common denominator is that there is very little reason for individuals to possess such weapons for the kind of purposes that might obviously and easily be argued as constituting a public good or at least broadly beneficial. These types of weapons are not either necessary or developed for hunting or similar utilitarian purposes and are way overkill for the kind of “personal defence” that US public discourse value so much.
When contrasted with the risks that the relatively easy access to and general prevalence of such weapons carry to society in general, it is hardly surprising that some see limiting both one, relatively simple way to harm reduction. While it’s not going to eliminate mass shootings, it might at least make the scope (pun not intended) of some of them less dire.
Now, you might go further and limit the access to any, semi automatic rifles (incl. those using full power ammunition, e.g. 7.62 NATO), but I think that goes a bit beyond the current assault weapon discussion, even if it would arguably further boost the harm reduction potential. ScepticWombat (talk) 23:37, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
Incidentally, I'm also in favor of having different firearm regulations in different areas. Manhattan and Essex County VT (anyone who thinks of VT as the most liberal state hasn't been there) are two very different places, and what makes sense in one isn't necessarily a good idea in the other. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 23:43, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
@CorruptUser - "Assault weapon" is not a legal term in most places - it is media/popular shorthand. There are numerous definitions as to what constitutes an "assault weapon" in various countries around the world - eg eg in New Zealand they are termed "Military Style Semi-Automatic" - MSSA. Stating there is no definition of what is an "assault weapon" is a pretty poor argument. Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 00:07, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
EC
@Aloysius, I know, which is why I gave a snarky definition used by the general public.
Let's also not forget that the AR-15's caliber is basically "all". The AR-15 is a frame, not a rifle itself, and is popular in part because it can be modified to basically just about any configuration desired. There are AR's that fire 5.56mm, there are AR's that fire 7.62, some fire 9mm, some 10mm, or even a friggin' .50 caliber, though at that point the AR-15 is short for "ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRR, my shoulder!!!" Core (yak) 00:14, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm personally meh, theoretically, on sweeping "firearms regulations". I reserve all rights to make fun of the silly paranoid mall ninja side of firearms culture, but at the same time the US is a big, wide open country, and I think in certain outdoor areas a gun is quite a useful tool. But certain specific features that are not useful for civilians, but are particularly attractive to mass shootings, should be targeted in regulations IMHO. Although mass shootings are a low-incidence event, they have high visibility and high psychological cost. For instance, high capacity magazine restrictions (say >10 as I've heard bandied around), particularly the *detachable* kind, for instance IMHO should be a no-brainer restriction of some kind. Many states have regulations on magazine sizes for certain hunting already, so it's not without precedent. But even this is a step too far for the ammosexual crowd, and to defend this you'll sure find a whole lot of ideological paranoid nonsense, indicating that there's a good bunch of delusioned gun owners who somehow think that their wimpy semi-auto is going to stop some theoretical government nefariousness from the most advanced military in the world. Hah!
The one thing with the previous "assault weapons" regulation in AmericaWikipedia is that, while the ban didn't do diddly squat for ordinary crime, there is some evidence that the ban actually did have an impact on mass shootings... and there were far less of them in the Clinton era compared to today. So, if Biden's "assault weapons" thingy ends up being similar... meh. Maybe it will actually help the mass shooting issue down, that will help. With the NRA and that side of gun culture acting so childish lately, I'm not really in a mood to defend them if they get taken to timeout. BobJohnson (talk) 01:01, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
EC different regs in different areas? is not the gun crime in chicago commited with guns acquired from the neighbouring states that have virtually no regulations at all?
as for the assault weapons definition nonsense - legislation defines the term but varies from state to state where the is or was such legislation. whether you like the definitions or not, arguments along the lines of 'what even is an assault weapon?' or 'there are no definitions' is just arsewater of the worst kind. working definitions have always been easy to find whenever this gets debated. and every time its debated 'its not even defined'. the us has been having this conversation since forever. no one is confused. AMassiveGay (talk) 00:51, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
I'm sick of this debate myself and I almost rather read again about decapitated elementary school kids with their blood-stained cartoon shirts or their shoes being the only means of identifying them and police shootings (of course those almost always involve an armed assailant, funny that, ain't it). Can't wait to read about the next rave party involving a constitutionally-protected man's toy, maybe the gleeful photographs will come this time. --It's-a me, Lgm sigpic.png LeftyGreenMario!(Mod) 01:53, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────To the extent guns are acquired from states with looser regulations, which is a real problem, it's largely through straw buyers. And most of the guns used in crime are handguns, which aren't covered under any assault weapon bans. I'm not against banning things categorized as assault weapons, though I'd want a clearer definition so it passes Constitutional muster, but as far as I can tell they're not the primary issue; illegally acquired Saturday Night Specials are far more common in day-to-day crime, for reasons that seem fairly obvious when considered for a bit. Seriously, have you ever heard of someone robbing a bodega with an AR-15? (To disclose my own biases, I've shot rifles and shotguns before, and while I did find it a fun experience it's pretty far down on the list of things I'd find a hill to die on) The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 02:01, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Mmmm-hmm. Don't think I'd stop on banning AR-15s. Handgun ownership should also be more restricted. --It's-a me, Lgm sigpic.png LeftyGreenMario!(Mod) 02:20, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
And how do you apply those restrictions to people who are already restricted from owning firearms but have them anyway? Again, it's the straw purchases that you need to target. Core (yak) 14:53, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
Well, if you are Japan, if you have an illegal handgun, you are committing a crime that police can arrest you for. There's a reason the assassin of Shinzo Abe had to improvise a device, firearms laws are *super-strict* there.
I do think that there are "cultural paradigms" that factor into laws like firearms regulations. It's going to take a lot for macho, gun-toting America to take after Japan, which tends to be a more pacifist culture. I do think, however, that the NRA everything-goes paradigm (one that happens to be tied to white male grievance) is at present out of step with future American, both because it's far more everything-goes than many people want, and because it's so tied to the white male grievance bullshit. Such will fade over time. (It's worth noting that there's many minority gun owner groups, of course, so this is probably more an NRA problem than a gun one.)
What I'm having a tough time finding is if there are differences by age that may in the future play a factor. "Assault weapon ban" support is roughly 50/50 for/against in polls (the fors have a slight edge, usually), but it's hard to find polls that break it down on exactly where that 50/50 is coming from. BobJohnson (talk) 15:54, 9 February 2023 (UTC
ban assault weapons. ban all the cool guns. ban all the extras. ban all the cosmetic extras. make all the legal fire arms boring. merely functional. guns should not be fetishised. they should not be accessories. remove all that you can fetishise and all that encourges to accessorise. cigerettes in the uk must be sold in drab standardised packaging with hideous images of rotted teeth and cancerous lungs. you should be presented with images of dead kids with dreadful gunshot wounds every time you enter a gun shop, or head to the range, and pick up your gun, and reload, which ideally will be musket balls in your flintlock. they should have suppressors that dont reduce the sound but converts it to that of a wet fart. or makes it even louder so it is too painful to fire the the thing without ear defenders, which by law will be really uncomfortable, massive and poorly fitting so they keep sliding out of place, and be so fugly they hurt yours eyes to look at them. and maybe chemical castration should be required too AMassiveGay (talk) 17:34, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
While I agree we "shouldn't" encourage the fetishizing of guns, I'm quite sure the Guns'n'Ammo magazines and action movies fall under the 1st Amendment. Painting your rifle is again, probably something to do with the 1st amendment. We already ban silencers and bump-stocks, so we could probably ban other modifications, though we need an actual justification beyond "we want to discourage the use entirely". But if you could invent a suppressor that changes the sound to a wet fart? I'd totally buy that. I'd even become a gun-owner just for the chance to shoot the fart-gun. Core (yak) 03:24, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
Wombat's definition of 'Assault weapons' is mainly correct; that it's a collection of particular attributes, not simply a 'big scary-looking gun'. However, there's a lot of issues with all this which I shall show with one weapon - the SKS carbine.
Survivalists and nutjobs love this weapon. It's obviously a tool to kill people and it does it damn well. However, it is not an 'assault weapon'. Why? Because it does not have a 'detachable magazine' and is not capable of full-automatic fire. Thus, it's legal in every US state. Many 'AR-15 style' weapons use this to skirt the bans, normally by having smaller magazines and being limited to semi-automatic fire. But our carbine got even more legal protection than simple rules-lawyering.
As the SKS production runs were between 1945 and 1970, this means almost all carbine production comes under the 'historical and curio' definition which allows it in as long as it's not been modded. Do you know what else gets in via this grandfathering? Almost all AK-47s, many earlier AK-74s/FN-FALs, some M-16s and so on.
Hell, our SKS isn't even 'black and scary'. Unless it still had it's bayonet on, many would mistake it as 'another hunting rifle' [which could seriously kill you too, btw].
Feel safer now? Think the 'assault weapon ban' as is shall protect you and your kids, hmm? It's a rare day, but I do actually agree with the NRA-style complaints that some things like the bans are more political theatre than anything really useful. So our SKS shooter has to press their finger repeatedly to shoot... how much 'slower' does that make them in a firefight? So they only have a 10-round magazine... how long does it take for someone to reload? How many shootings even involve weapons like this?
I'm not suggesting that an eternal assault weapon ban would be useless, but it in the grand scheme of things won't do much for a myrad of reasons which I won't go into. However, if you wished for a bigger effect, I'd start with concreting in a hard date of 1973 for 'historical weapons' [instead of the floating '50-year' one], seal up the 'gun show loophole' and give the ATF a big wad of cash and tell them to scour the open market and buy up every 'historical and curio' AK etc which it can find so the supply dries up. KarmaPolice (talk) 12:09, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
make all guns flintlocks. problem solved. or just illegal AMassiveGay (talk) 17:27, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
I would just like an accurate list of the people who are armed and with what, so we could track straw sales and weapons used in crimes. It's an insanely low bar, but current registration isn't even digital at the federal level.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 21:00, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't disagree per se. My only concern is that if we were to treat guns like cars, that'd give the government an excuse to levy a gun registration tax every year, and something like a $50/yr tax per gun would be an even bigger burden on those with multiple guns and... hmm... wait a minute... Core (yak) 05:42, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
So having the weaponry to go on a shooting spree shall be restricted to the middle class and above? I'll point out that quite a few of the 'mass shooters' were in fact, either somewhat wealthy or stole the weapons from folks who could afford your tax. Oh, you'll have to increase the numbers of ATF/Secret Service to enforce this too. KarmaPolice (talk) 08:18, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
My "never going to happen" snark stance on firearms is to take the second amendment literally (Ooh! Originalism!!), and modestly propose to limit firearm access outside the military only to those participating in the "well-regulated militia" (eg, per the Militia Act of 1903Wikipedia, the National Guard). And no, your ragtag militia movement / mall ninja style "pretend soldier" doesn't count.
Not my real stance on firearms, of course, but the paranoid pretenders who have made firearms a white identity trope that, American style, is mixed in with hyper-consumerism (buy all the guns for Scary End Times etc!!) do tire me so.BobJohnson (talk) 18:12, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
I've actually mooted similar; that anything larger than a 'self defence' pistol or 'hunting' bolt-action / shotgun should require membership of a bona fide 'regulated militia'. And this 'militia' should be the State Defense Force, which would at least teach responsible weapon ownership and be a backdoor vetting system [because militiapersons would be checked before admitted and would need to keep up to a level of 'good citizenship' to retain membership]. I even wondered whether this 'force' could even be trained to provide some disaster support etc. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:57, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
Ignoring what legally constitutes the militia in question (see the opening post), the Second Amendment refers to "arms", not "firearms". The people who wrote it thought it was appropriate for private citizens to operate warships. Things like grenades and bombs (and swords, crossbows, and armor) were not just legal but unrestricted. During most of this period, politicians (including the sitting President) went around without body guards. And regarding firearms, people could buy machine guns (both things like the Tommy gun and actual machine guns made for extended automatic fire) and anti-tank rifles without government tracking, oversight, or regulation.
"anything larger than a 'self defence' pistol or 'hunting' bolt-action / shotgun" Pistols specifically intended for self-defense may use powerful cartridges like .44 magnum to achieve high stopping power. The 9mm Luger that's standard in the modern military sidearms is less powerful than that. And .30-06 is a common rifle cartridge for hunting (deer, say) that's quite a bit more powerful than the 5.56x45mm NATO cartridge that's used in the assault rifles issued by Western militiaries.
There's a trend in these discussions that restrictions of firearm access are advanced as goals in themselves rather than with reference to some public good. And so we have arguments about whether people have good reasons to own "assault weapons" as if the actual effects of gun ownership or the existence of civil rights are irrelevant to the issue. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 21:57, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
If we're going to go all 'original intent' crap, I say, yes fine. Every citizen can own a Brown Bess musket, cavalry sabres, 3-pound cannon and if so desire, outfit a ship of the line made from the finest oak New England can provide. However, I fucking insist that every single item has to be made only to the materials and production techniques known in 1787. Which amongst other things, nothing which isn't turned out by artisan hands.
I am aware the particular issues American gun control would have [well, some of them at least], with amongst other things the prevalance of big game and dangerous predators in parts - issues which both preclude the banning of both high-power ammunition and chunky calibres [which is why old military rounds like the 30-06 are popular for deer hunting]. In an ideal world, perhaps it could work that such 'heavier' weaponry/ammo would only be availible to folks members of registered hunting clubs, but I accept that's gonna be an impossible political sell.
And as your last point... well, there is a point there. The mainstream Democrats have allowed it to become a wedge issue and some are so obvious in their hatred of firearms that it really puts off what I like to think of the 'Hank Hill' type of voter - ones who I think would respond much more positively to 'rights come with responsibilities' lines regarding responsible firearm ownership and chocking off the supplies of them to the ones who shouldn't have them. My 'defence force' idea is a wondering whether it's something which would get Hank Hill in the tent pissing out rather than outside of it pissing in. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:19, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────"If we're going to go all 'original intent' crap, I say, yes fine." The original intent was that law-abiding citizens should have access to any weapon that a military might use, so that the armed citizenry would outgun any army the government might conceivably raise by such a degree that the government would not be tempted to become tyrannical. Keep in mind that a standing army was forbidden on top of that. But at any rate, I was referring to the actual text of the document (the current law of the land), which specifies "arms" rather than anything specific. Arms were seeing fast development at the time the Second Amentment was written and ratified, and the people who wrote the Second Amendment knew that. Thomas Jefferson sent the Lewis and Clark expedition off with high-capacity semi-automatic rifles for hunting, defense, and to impress the natives they encountered. Revolvers had been in use for some 300 years by that time, and rapid-fire mechanisms were being adapted to a variety of weapon designs and purposes. Machine tools were in development for the specific purpose of making interchangeble parts for firearms (with Jefferson issuing a major supply contract for such). And all of that aside, your quip there does run afoul of current regulations. People nowadays are not permitted to bear such arms as people could and did in 1787.

"ones who I think would respond much more positively to 'rights come with responsibilities' lines regarding responsible firearm ownership" Does the right to vote come with responsibilities? How about the right to trial by jury, or the right to freedom of speech or the press? Should the freedom of the press only apply to media available in 1787, like the printing press, and should voting only be permitted using paper ballots and manual counting? The right to bear arms (in the US) is a right, which means that it is (as written, at least) unrestricted by default, with restrictions being an individual matter resulting from due process like conviction for a crime. It is not a license which is restricted by default and subject to access criteria like passing a test or class. This is in the same part of the Constitution and uses the same language as freedom of speech and other basic rights, so tread carefully here. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 00:29, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Um, what the fuck are you talking about, BoN? The only thing Lewis and Clark expedition carried even close to a semi-automatic rifle was, as far as I can tell, a Girardoni air rifleWikipedia, which is an example of a repeating rifleWikipedia. The Wiki on semi-automatic firearmWikipedia claims invention of the semi-auto to be from 1885. Semi-autos are a form of repeating rifle where the cartridge loading is automatic (but, unlike a fully auto, the shooter manually pulls the trigger). This is not the case for the Girardoni. (The Giradoni also is an air rifle, not a firearm, to be pedantic.)
As far as rights, this is one of those things that prevent discussion: the wrapping of the 2nd Amendment as a Holy Document That Shall Not Be Abridged. But here's the thing: the problem with permissive gun regulations is, frankly, as a general rule, the more permissive the gun regulations, the greater the amount of gun violence. This is what a lot of the gun control movement is about: people tire of gun violence, either the high-profile (mass shootings etc.) kind or just the general high gun violence of this nation compared to every single other developed nation out there. Now, there's plenty of arguments that can be made for those who advocate complete abolition (for a start, the "concerns" of rural areas are going to be quite different than urban ones, and it's no surprise that gun control movements tend to come from the experience of the urban side). But there's also no way these concerns can be reconciled with people whose religion is the 2nd Amendment, where even reasonably sensible regulations are seen as verboten due to the Holy Document, and even in some cases you get the idea that people would have absolutely no issue with everyone having nukes in their backyard. It's just like the ACAB types in another thread: at some point you give up, as nothing can be said any further, and hope people discover their errors on their own. Dogma cannot be reasoned with. BobJohnson (talk) 01:04, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
ACAB is a slogan at the end of the day. Obviously things are complex, but slogans aren't meant to be in-depth political and philosophical discussions. I don't think this analogy is very fair. Hell, if one were uncharitable enough they could call it an example of strawmanning or nutpicking. Vee (talk) 01:13, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
(EC) I've linked to this diff before and I'll probably do this again in the future. As far as the evidence goes, more guns, more crimes. I'd say ban them all, but I have no idea at how we can do this in the American case. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 01:50, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
"a Girardoni air rifle, which is an example of a repeating rifle." Yes, you're correct, I mislabeled it. It still could fire its 20-some round capacity in about 30 seconds.
"The Giradoni also is an air rifle, not a firearm, to be pedantic." I never said it was. The use of air as a propellent doesn't make its .50 calibur balls less deadly than those propelled by black powder from muskets. It was so fearsome as a weapon of war that Napoleon ordered the summary execution of any opponents caught wielding one. Suppose electrically-propelled guns (e.g. railguns) become practical in the future. Their utility as weapons is what matters for the Second Amendment, not the propellent technology used.
"the wrapping of the 2nd Amendment as a Holy Document That Shall Not Be Abridged." This is known as the rule of law. The US Constitution is, legally speaking, the supreme law of the land, and any violations of what is written in it are, strictly speaking, illegal.
"as a general rule, the more permissive the gun regulations, the greater the amount of gun violence." The places in the US with the most restrictive gun regulations have the greatest gun violence. Generally speaking, those parts of the world which prevent the law-abiding public from having effective self-defense weapons are more violent than those that allow it. Why do you suppose Mexico is much more violent than the US despite the much stricter firearm regulations, and Switzerland is less violent than the US despite until recently issuing firearms to its citizens to keep in thir homes?
"or just the general high gun violence of this nation compared to every single other developed nation out there." Most non-suicide gun violence in the US occurs in certain large cities, and is assiated with actual criminal activity like gang violence and drug or other back market commerce. It's not a "general" issue. The gun violence in most areas of the US is comparable to most areas of other developed countries.
"where even reasonably sensible regulations" If these proposed "sensible" regulations are unconstitutional, that's an actual problem.
"As far as the evidence goes, more guns, more crimes." Why? That's not what the referecnes in that diff say. I mean, you saw that the first part reads, "One meta-analysis from 2015 arguedthat "It must be tentatively concluded that higher gun ownership rates do not cause higher crime rates, including homicide rates",", right? It's as if there are factors which actually lead to violent crime, with guns merely being one tool which may be used in violent crime. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 02:30, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
I know, I added the content to the article. The reason I said that is because this meta-analysis is older than the other two and because two is bigger than one. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 02:35, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
"this meta-analysis is older than the other two" What other two? Both cites are to the same article. And guns aren't a new technology. What difference do you expect a few years to make? Especially for meta-analyses of previous studies.
"and because two is bigger than one." Not with meta-analyses it isn't. And at any rate, only the first actually examines the question of whether more guns in the general population result in more crime (it doesn't, it concludes). The second is about regulations targeted at specific individuals and businesses, not overall gun ownership. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 03:06, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
BoN, Pew has a handy infograph of gun death rates per capita. Wiki has a nice article on firearm death rates in the United States by stateWikipedia which helpfully also includes per capita rates for murder (as Pew includes suicides etc.). "The places in the US with the most restrictive gun regulations have the greatest gun violence." -- where are you getting that? It's pretty clear that the worst states tend to be Southern US, like Louisiana and Mississippi. Gun laws are quite permissive in both states. Another study from CNN [1] comes to a similar conclusion. Internationally, the same applies: studies I've looked at like this one also conclude that, in general, stricter firearm resolutions reduce firearm death rates. Also, FYI, last year there was a bit of a rural crime wave. The center-left think tank Third Way reported that "Trump states" have steadily increasing gun murder rates per capita compared to "Biden" states since 2000.
Obviously there is a lot of "fuzziness", and you'll find exceptions. There are also cultures like Switzerland and the Nordic countries which have high gun ownership and low gun violence; this is possible through either strict regulations (say, Norway) or a strong actual militia cultural motif (Switzerland). If America the gun culture was in this direction, I'd be okay with it. But American gun culture is more paranoid, base, and contradictory.
There's a Republican tendency to, on the one hand, wrap themselves in the 2nd Amendment and Defend The Right to Bear Arms to absolute degrees... and on the other hand, highlight every Scary Urban Gun Crime in yer Breitbart type fake news for you know what reasons. Well, you know what? Very strict gun regulations is a solution for this purported urban crime y'all complain about! (Along with the rural crimes and suicides, I might add.) No regulation is perfect, and there certainly are good reasons not to implement a full on gun ban in the US. But gun regulations as a whole do tend to put a damper on gun crime and other deaths to some degree, at least according to the vast majority of studies I've seen. There's a lot one can argue one way or another about this of course, but absolutist posturing that can be easily dis-proven with a Google search is just another reason not to take this side very seriously at all. BobJohnson (talk) 03:41, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
'Originalism' is a theory in that you read the Constitution 'as the writers intended', and thus they would have had visions of Minuteman with muskets to fend off redcoats. No, not even Ben Franklin would have been able to visualise an AK-47 [and even if he could, never mentioned it]. I'm simply taking a stupid theory to a logical conclusion, like insisting fundie literalist Christians should follow all the laws laid down in Leviticus. I don't actually buy into this crap.
And yes, the right to vote does come with responsibilities. To be an aware voter, to be a participant as a citizen in the process so it functions as well as it can. The right to a jury trial comes with the responsibility to serve on one if asked and to do it to the best to your damn ability. The right of free speech comes with the responsibility of handling it in a mature manner when you're offended by other's viewpoints and so on. It's a particulary American thing which seems to see rights as absolute and with no duties actually attached to them. I've heard right-wingers bitch about the 'entitlement culture' and 'irresponsibility' that welfare supposedly breeds, but that charge can be equally levelled as the 'free speech absolutists' and yes, the '2nd Amendment religionists'. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:41, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
"It's pretty clear that the worst states tend to be Southern US, like Louisiana and Mississippi." I said "places", not "states". Chicago usually has more murders per year than Louisiana despite a smaller population. It also has stricter gun laws.
"in general, stricter firearm resolutions reduce firearm death rates." The problem with firearm deaths is that people die, not that they were killed specifically with a firearm. Global data (this is a graph of homicide vs. firearm ownership data from 172 countries) indicates a weak negtive correlation between firearm prevalence and homicide rates. As a weak correlation, it's not strongly predictive, but it is more strongly predictive than the inverse. Do you want to have a conversation about strong correlates to homicide rates?
"for you know what reasons." What demographic group do you suppose is hardest-hit in high-crime areas?
"Very strict gun regulations is a solution for this purported urban crime y'all complain about!" Most such crime is already committed with illegally-obtained guns.
"I'm simply taking a stupid theory to a logical conclusion" No, you're deliberately misinterpreting the intention of the Second Amendment while outright ignoring what it actually says.
"And yes, the right to vote does come with responsibilities." Moral responsibilities, not legal responsibilities. There's no law that says you have to vote, or vote responsibly, and there's no legal punishment for failing to do so. There is no test or class one must pass in order to vote. And jury duty is a legally mandatory duty, doing it well is a moral responsibility, but is likewise not legally required.
"It's a particulary American thing which seems to see rights as absolute" This is because the US Constitution makes extensive mention of negative rights formulated as things which the government is not authorized to interfere with, using plainly-worded outright prohibitions. This results in things like the US not having hate speech laws (a result of following the rule of law specified in the Constitution, not a religion). In contrast, "entitlements" are positive rights which require some party to provide a good or service of some kind. Entitlements may be worthwhile (like the right to trial by jury), but they are inherently expensive things (like the requirment of jury duty and the other work and expenses associated with a jury trial). Negative rights are free at the point of use, or only involve expenses by the person making use of them. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 13:11, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
I don't really buy the argument that the founding fathers wouldn't have been able to comprehend rapid-firing and powerful firearms considering that they were alive during the time of the Girardoni air rifle, Puckle gun and other such weapons. Immature technology? Absolutely, but look what they turned into just decades after the lives of the founders ended. It's also pretty easy to tell that they were, in fact, intending for civilians to have access to weaponry that would be considered dangerous or highly destructive based on the fact that anybody who could afford it could legally have access to not just a cannon but rather a warship covered with cannons and similar weaponry. The argument that the founders couldn't have comprehended it ergo it doesn't apply to modern weapons feels a bit disingenuous when a similar argument made for television, radio broadcast and/or internet censorship pertaining to the first amendment because the founding fathers would have been unable to predict those modes of communication would be absolutely absurd. SwampFox (talk) 18:32, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
If you argue from a strict originalism POV, no that would be correct - TV, internet, radio etc are not covered by the 1st Amendement. But that is never argued because 'originalism' is a pile of shit which is trotted out as/when it handy for the 'rights absolutists' crowd, not a general principle. We call this in RPGs 'rules lawyering' [cherrypicking shit when it suits you], and right-wingers do this in spades. KarmaPolice (talk) 08:08, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
"If you argue from a strict originalism POV, no that would be correct" Another deliberate misinterpretation. The First Amendment specifies freedom of "speech" and "the press", not specific technologies which may be used for those purposes. Because the concern of the First Amendment is with rights, not specific technologies which may be used to enjoy those rights. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 07:49, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Realism[edit]

I'm not sure how realistic proposed weapons bans are considering the sheer number of guns in the US. Vee (talk) 00:33, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

This is basically the crux of the issue. There’s a reason banning alcohol and pot made things worse, so I can hardly imagine banning guns would go any better. Pizza SLICE.gifChef Moosolini’s Ristorante ItalianoMake a Reservation 01:48, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, I can see people resisting and forming militias to protect an abstract concept of freedom. A more gradual approch would probably work better. Something like, you can keep your guns, but you can't buy new guns. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 01:53, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
I also don’t see that working. Saying people can’t buy new guns is a simple one-step process to create a massive black market of untraceable and unregulated guns. Pizza SLICE.gifChef Moosolini’s Ristorante ItalianoMake a Reservation 02:08, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, the black market is always a problem too, especially since it already exists with the current legislation. The fact that America has a huge border with Mexico also doesn't help. And no, I'm not supporting a wall or anything like this, I'm almost on the open borders side of the debate, just saying that it's a practical problem since Mexico has a huge problem with arms trafficking. Still, I think that slowly banning guns is the least bad option. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 02:15, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
To be fair to Mexico, current arms trafficking mostly brings guns from our side to theirs. But it very well could work the other way should certain misguided policies create demand. Pizza SLICE.gifChef Moosolini’s Ristorante ItalianoMake a Reservation 03:26, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Making firearms is not a particularly difficult process, considering that Pashto tribesmen with crude hand tools were able to make effective and working firearms. Cartels in Mexico would absolutely branch out into a business that literally requires a CNC machine and is ridiculously profitable. While the flow of firearms into Mexico may stop temporarily, that just means that the cartels making billions of dollars a year have to find new toys. How about some AKMs and M16A4s rather than semi-automatic rifles? SwampFox (talk) 05:07, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
To all of you, I retort; 'it's not a perfect solution, therefore there is no point doing it.'
Which is patently a load of bollocks. I've pointed this out before; that 'new ideas' are forced to have a level of projected success which is never demanded of the status quo. You know what? This is the usual tactic of the gun extremists. Bog you down in welter of detail, cite a few edge cases / exceptions, insist you fix every fucking single one before changing a thing and let you all talk yourselves into a coma for there is no bleeding single perfect solution out there [and they fucking know it!].
SwampFox is providing a excellent example. Just because it's within the ken of human beings to produce their own firearms if they have the sufficient skills, equipment, time and motivation... oooh, we can't do nothing about any guns! You know if we had the same mentality towards food safety America would have constant waves of deaths by salmonellosis and botulism, right? Or what about fire codes? Or the production of drugs? Or child porn? I bet you'll scream blue murder if we took the same 'it's terrible but we can't eliminate it in one swoop so shall do nothing' mentality!
Regulations are there to reduce the risk. 'Elimination' of say, fire risk is impossible; all we can do is work on the reductions which we can. Yes, there's a lot of 'assault weapons' in civilian hands already and a new/continued ban on fresh sales wouldn't effect them - so do what I suggested above, to give the ATF a ton of cash and orders to buy up at gun shows / sites every 'vintage' AK they can get their hands on. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:10, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
@SwampFox IIRC the gun used to assassinate Abe was homemade. Vee (talk) 16:33, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
How about instead banning guns from people, we ban some people from guns? EDIT: Forgot to sign.ASerb (talk) 17:00, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
"that 'new ideas' are forced to have a level of projected success which is never demanded of the status quo." That's because the status quo is the status quo. A change from the status quo may be worse than the status quo and involves the costs associated with the change, so it must at the very least be enough better than the status quo to justify the change, taking into account the risk that things may work out differently than expected.
"Or the production of drugs?" Prohibition of alcohol was tried in the US. Not only didn't it work, it resulted in increased alcohol abuse and greatly expanded criminal activity as a result of the massive black markets that formed. Alcohol is easy to make, you see. Prisoners make it in prison. So if there's a demand, people are able to supply it without the government being able to prevent it. Guns are currently made from scrap metal in jungles with hand tools to supply black markets. Actual to-spec reproductions of common guns. Do you want to ban files and hacksaws?
"Regulations are there to reduce the risk." But wishing that a regulation would be effective at its nominal purpose does not make it so. And even if it did, not all things that can be done for the sake of reducing risk should be done.
"ban some people from guns?" This is already the case in the US. Felons (among some others) typically can't have guns. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 19:44, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Making guns at home gets easier and cheaper every day. I'm not exactly seeing how it would be possible to prevent people from churning out firearms with a 3d printer and some tools or a basic machining setup either. Buybacks would barely make a dent in the half a billion guns circulating in the US, plus the people who would actually comply aren't exactly the ones you have to worry about having guns in the first place. The current situation needs to be navigated carefully and mass bans would often be useless if not more destructive than the status quo. SwampFox (talk) 20:19, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Guns are an ancient technology. What was cutting-edge in the 8th century is no longer so. This shouldn't be an argument against regulation (after all the Court recognized that the Second Amendment is not an unrestricted right, there are responsibilities that come along with gun ownership), but we should keep in mind these details when discussing regulating firearms. Vee (talk) 20:22, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
Not to mention, since it's not actually illegal to make a gun in your garage, you can make a decent amount of money from making gun parts specifically to sell them as part of a gun buy-back Core (yak) 20:24, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
"that 'new ideas' are forced to have a level of projected success which is never demanded of the status quo." That's because the status quo is the status quo. A change from the status quo may be worse than the status quo and involves the costs associated with the change, so it must at the very least be enough better than the status quo to justify the change, taking into account the risk that things may work out differently than expected.
Not the point I was making. The point was that 'perfect is the enemy of good' and bad-faith actors shall use this by demanding the change be to perfection, not simply 'better'. As this is impossible, all changes are put on hold, forever. It's an excellent tactic, and vital to whack it when it is pulled out.
"Or the production of drugs?" Prohibition of alcohol was tried in the US. Not only didn't it work, it resulted in increased alcohol abuse and greatly expanded criminal activity as a result of the massive black markets that formed.
I was simply commenting on the right's usual boogyman, drugs. That despite the fact the drug prohibition is very flawed, that doesn't stop them from chopping/changing to try to improve the results and would scream blue murder if lawmakers simply gave up because said laws weren't perfect straight off. Contrast with the comment above.
"Regulations are there to reduce the risk." But wishing that a regulation would be effective at its nominal purpose does not make it so.
I'm impressed you already know 100% that any of the risk-reductions I've ever suggested [and possibly others] won't work. And without explaining why they won't.
Making guns at home gets easier and cheaper every day. I'm not exactly seeing how it would be possible to prevent people from churning out firearms with a 3d printer and some tools or a basic machining setup either. Buybacks would barely make a dent in the half a billion guns circulating in the US, plus the people who would actually comply aren't exactly the ones you have to worry about having guns in the first place. The current situation needs to be navigated carefully and mass bans would often be useless if not more destructive than the status quo.
It's Fox's broken record time! But not only is there a gamut of technical issues/complications which you keep on ignoring [and I shall not repeat here] but I've got a simple clincher now; bring it on. I don't believe that America shall be filled with people printing off AKs for $10 and a half-hour and near zero skill due to many technical reasons and the fact most folks won't want to either.
And if it does... well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Because oddly enough, it shall be a problem whether or not assault weaponry was more restricted in the land. Lastly, lawmakers never say [for example] 'oh no, we cannot introduce this anti-piracy law becase one day every citizen may have the theoretical abilty to produce illegal media discs for use!' KarmaPolice (talk) 08:08, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
None of you pro-gun chucklefucks have apparently used a 3D printer, they are neat in a way, but the items they produce are really too brittle. Would I trust this sort of material for something that goes "bang"? Nope. Yes, better additive manufacturing tools do exist, but are usually too expensive / out of reach for the general home crowd.
Now, I don't doubt, of course, that those with good engineering tinkering skills can perhaps cobble up an improvised gun type device. But I'm sensing a wee bit of "armchair engineering" here. I doubt anything created in a home environment would be as slick as a modern manufactured device, where fancy machines can achieve some incredibly tight tolerances (and you need this in order to prevent the huge amount of issues that can happen with something going bang projecting a pellet of metal in a particular direction). I think there is an underestimation of the time needed to assemble something semi-competent (home 3D printing is not really plug and play, and I really do think you'd really need some metallurgy skills to "do it right" old school style, and/or maybe some CAD type skills to do anything semi-modern). Finally, frankly, the biggest "item of concern" among many in the gun-regulation crowd is mass shootings. I seriously suspect that the type of typical "mass shooter" profile is very different compared to the typical "I know what ShapewaysWikipedia is" profile. I mean, how many people make their own furniture these days, despite the fact that CNC routers (a somewhat comparable device to a 3D printer in that it allows some automated-by-program manufacturing) exist?
Most of you recent "mah rights!" folks are exactly what turns me off about the "mah freedoms!" crowd, a whole lot of pedantry, [citation needed], and questionable armchair analysis. Keep telling people that active shooter drills in elementary school are definitely necessary because you read about a 3D printer once and because of this you absolutely know that it can print guns. That's a great sell. BobJohnson (talk) 15:36, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
For a quick reply that repeats things said in a previous discussion here on the topic, fully-functional guns can be made quietly in an apartment by people with no prior gun or related manufacturing experience for about the cost (including all tools, supplies, and machinery) of a Glock 19. To reiterate, that's a fully-functional gun.
"Most of you recent "mah rights!" folks are exactly what turns me off about the "mah freedoms!" crow" Yeah, who needs those things, really? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 19:20, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
The FGC-9 is a "tinker"/"hacker" type project IMHO. An emphasis on 3D printing, sure... but you also need certain other skills (welding, soldering, etc.) as written, along with certain components from either an AR-15 platform or an Airsoft. The well-designed build manual is, nonetheless, 110 pages. It's probably a "garage" build (welding in an apartment, eek!) unless you can get around certain aspects. So, great for the Makerspace tech libertarians who like to make something blow shit up, I suppose. If you got build skills, it's probably the couple weeks they claim, but if you are like "what's a dremel?" it will take quite a bit longer. I don't see evidence it has a lot of traction outside of certain spaces, at any rate. Now, I also think that a fully functional gun can be made by any tinkerer sufficiently experienced in old-school metalsmith concepts all the way up to the new CNC router stuff etc (and maybe even a little Macgyvering along the way), without the need of such toys as a 3D printer that produce elements that are probably less durable "in the field". Guns aren't exactly new tech. So, whoop-de-shit. Let me know when a mass shooter type stops writing their idiotic manifestos long enough to actually learn enough useful life skills to accomplish any of these things.
(No need to go any further as you are clearly arguing from ideology and this ride will go on and on forever; freedom and rights are important, but so is safety. Just a warning that I do see a few signs that the youngsters generations are much more wary about current NRA culture, so IMHO y'all need better arguments than you are giving. That is all for now.) BobJohnson (talk) 20:34, 14 February 2023 (UTC)
KarmaPolice is correct, criticizing proposed policy because it isn't perfect is fallacious. The harder it is to obtain a gun, the fewer guns there will be. Maybe they'll make their own, and maybe it will blow up in their face. That is not the issue. As you put up hurdles to obtain guns the gun crime stats will go down. If you grandfather in current guns but prevent any new ones from being bought the existing ones will command a much higher price, and they will eventually wear out. FairDinkum (talk) 09:44, 15 February 2023 (UTC)
zip guns have been a thing since forever. in some regions production of 'homemade' guns by criminal gangs is a cottage industry and does not need to be especially sophisticated to be effective. CAD available to a hobbyist is plenty sophisticated enough to produce a sten gun, a submachine gun developed for the british military in ww2 to be simple and easy to produce with very little. 3d printing does not shift dynamics of gun control debates in any significant way and does not make regulations any more redundant or unenforceable than owning a lathe does already. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:44, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
Very correct. The best example of the 'backyard gunsmiths' being the 'Khyber Pass Copies' and 3D-printing merely changes the medium [somewhat], not the principles. And we can safely assume the power of money shall combat printed guns; that just like DMCA attacked people getting around anti-piracy measures [like DRMs] the gun-makers shall do all they can to make sure you continue paying $500+ for a new pistol rather than 'printing' one for say, $100. In fact, 3D printing threatens to change the whole 'spare parts' market; if you don't think the myriad of companies which make a living producing/retailing such things won't do their best to put in enough hurdles to preserve their business viability [having seen how the music/magazine industry was decimated by the SuperWeb and still hasn't recovered] somehow you're a total bellend. Combine this with the moral panic we'll see regarding the tech the moment a printed weapon is used in an assasination/school attack means the hurdles to this production method shall remain considerably higher than believed. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:55, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
"bad-faith actors shall use this by demanding the change be to perfection, not simply 'better'." Can you provide a quote to this effect which is relevant to the discussion here?
"I was simply commenting on the right's usual boogyman, drugs." Alcohol, nicotine, and pharmaceuticals are also drugs. Are you pointing to the current US policies regarding such things as meth and fentanyl as something to emulate in firearm regulation?
"I'm impressed you already know 100% that any of the risk-reductions I've ever suggested [and possibly others] won't work. And without explaining why they won't." That's because I was explaining why changes to the status quo are held to different standards than the status quo, not the merits of any particular changes. It's a callback to the previous sections, with prohibition serving as an example of a counterproductive regulation. As one class of possible changes to the status quo, proposed regulations can produce results worse than the status quo even if they're well-intentioned. Which is why proposed changes should be evaluated carefully and weighed for costs and benefits before implementation.
"but I've got a simple clincher now; bring it on." This isn't generally a very good basis for policy decisions.
" despite the fact that CNC routers (a somewhat comparable device to a 3D printer in that it allows some automated-by-program manufacturing) exist?" CNC routers are not more complex than FDM printers, but they're bigger and heavier, which results in them costing much more. They also produce a lot of noise and dust, and generally live in a workshop rather than a closet or on a countertop. But yes, consumer CNC routers capable of milling aluminum do exist at relatively modest prices, and are another indication that many proposed gun control laws are aimed at disarming law-abiding citizens rather than criminals.
"No need to go any further as you are clearly arguing from ideology" So, in response to a quick post that makes your silly and wrong statements look clearly silly and wrong, you declare rhetorical victory and that the conversation is over. Very impressive.
"freedom and rights are important, but so is safety." There's a rather famous quote about that, but I'll leave that to you. Looking at history, how did you conclude that safety is best achieved by giving an unaccountable government and criminals a duopoly on weapons?
"3d printing does not shift dynamics of gun control debates in any significant way and does not make regulations any more redundant or unenforceable than owning a lathe does already." Not in principle, but it does make them look silly. That's important in politics.
"And we can safely assume the power of money shall combat printed guns; that just like DMCA attacked people getting around anti-piracy measures" A big difference is that guns are physical items that need to be built on a per-unit basis. Digitized media can be produced once and endlessly copied for negligible cost. This makes media markets dominated by small groups of large corporations distributing media through central systems. Gun manufacturers produce ready-made physical products, which 3D printing and other homemade gun techniques don't compete with directly. They're also doing just fine due to high demand associated with various recent societal upheavals. How do you propose that gun manufacturers would even attempt to restrict something like the guy making an FGC-9 in his apartment? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 07:57, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
3d printed guns or even just homemade guns are a significant priblem anywhere else in the world. why do you think it would be any different in the us? the problem there is the thoudands on thousands of fire arms already in circulation, and gun companies adding yet more and more to those many thousands. AMassiveGay (talk) 11:54, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
I agree with BobJ, 192 is arguing from ideology alone and is using debating techniques to 'win' [and thus can be ignored]. However, they show a critical issue; that they may in fact be leading to the ending of their beloved 'fweedoms' [the entitled, irresponsible kind] because they end up infurating me, and I think I'm perhaps the most 'pro gun' person in the Bar.
That when folks like me [the ones who accept gun ownership but want to see it become responsible ownership and much less fetishised] try to have a discussion over this, all we get is cranky, blinkered screaming from the dogmatic 'maximalists' who won't budge a single iota on any point, even as small as requiring owners to keep their weapons secure from being stolen. Any idea shall be driven into the ground, on the semi-secret principle of 'any change is BAD!'
Faced with such a bone-headed and obstinate opponent, but accepting the needs to actually do something fucking productive to try stem the orgy of violence in the land, the pragmatist normally comes to the conclusion that the maximalist is perhaps not just 'part of the problem' but may in fact be the critical element. Thus, the 'war on guns'. But the maximalist is [again] too fucking stupid to realise that they have mainly made their own enemies on this topic. KarmaPolice (talk) 12:20, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────universal background checks and creating a firearm registry are good starters for overhauling our pathetic gun laws. without these, pretty much any other gun law will be unenforceable. i'd also argue for mandatory training and/or military service before buying a gun, but i digress.

a lot of guns flowing to latin america are made in the usa. this is only one example of how the united states is a major player in the global arms trade. background checks and a firearm registry will at least bring scrutiny to the american firearms industry and their lobbyists. i mean, if they have nothing to hide, they shouldn't be afraid of monitoring their own supply chains. it makes you wonder why the gun lobby is so adamantly opposed to even the most basic regulations like these. The G (talk) 01:58, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

How does this address the fears of minority communities that the police can't be trusted to protect them? (For instance, nearly half of all murder cases go cold in the US, and the case is far more likely to be a cold one if the victim is a minority.) The police often act more like street gangs than "protectors of the peace." Minority communities arm themselves because no one else can be trusted to protect them. The state certainly won't do it, especially when the state is actively harmful to the minority groups in question. Not all gun owners are cishet white males. There's also the the issue of the state literally dumping guns on the street. VeeMeow? 18:52, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
all i'm saying is that maybe we can take things in the right direction if we at least make it more difficult to buy guns than donate blood (if you're gay). police brutality is a topic for another discussion, though i wouldn't doubt that us gun culture is one reason american cops are so trigger happy. as for the arms trafficking and political corruption, that isn't something a little cracking down cannot fix. (i mean, if even brazil can do it, why can't we?) we have the resources to rein in our erratic gun culture; our elected representatives are just too greedy and lazy to put them into practice, so they keep making excuses. The G (talk) 21:15, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
"3d printed guns or even just homemade guns are a significant priblem anywhere else in the world." Guns themselves aren't a problem per se. "Problems" don't even exist without reference to some goal structure. What goal are you invoking here?
"the problem there is the thoudands on thousands of fire arms already in circulation, and gun companies adding yet more" There are about 400 million civilian-owned guns in the US, with about 20 million new sold per year recently.
"192 is arguing from ideology alone" Is this a new meme? You seem to regard that accusation as a "get out of social disapproval for forfeiting the argument you joined" card. If you disagree, how about you provide a quote in which I "argued from ideology alone" and explain what's wrong with it?
"and is using debating techniques to 'win' [and thus can be ignored]." Winning an argument is really not complicated. You just become familiar with a topic before joining an argument about it. Did you think this was the first time I've had this conversation? And are you seriously making the point that you know you're wrong and can't argue it, so you should ignore the statements explaining how you're wrong?
"but want to see it become responsible ownership" Meaning what, SPECIFICALLY as policies?
"even as small as requiring owners to keep their weapons secure from being stolen." There is no such state of affairs. What do you actually mean here?
"Any idea shall be driven into the ground, on the semi-secret principle of 'any change is BAD!'" A lot of proposed changes are obviously unconstitutional, which is a rather different criticism. Do you have any relevant quotes you'd like to share of what you're referring to?
"but accepting the needs to actually do something fucking productive to try stem the orgy of violence in the land" This is a really bad methodology for deciding public policy.
"universal background checks" Gun sales from licensed dealers are already subject to background checks. Do you mean to say that private gun owners should be prohibited from selling their guns to other individuals?
"and creating a firearm registry" For what purpose?
"without these, pretty much any other gun law will be unenforceable" How would those things prevent criminals from committing crimes with guns? It's obvious how they could be used for disarming the law-abiding public, but that's not usually the stated goal of these things.
"it makes you wonder why the gun lobby is so adamantly opposed to even the most basic regulations like these." They are illegal and don't address actual problems. Federal law prohibits the creation of a registry, and federal regulation of gun sales is mostly done under the auspices of its authority to regulate interstate commerce. The Commerce Clause is even more abused than the Second Amendment, but one person selling a homemade gun to a neighbor is so obviously not that that we haven't reached that point yet.
"at least make it more difficult to buy guns than donate blood (if you're gay)" Keeping and bearing arms is a right which the US government is Constitutionally prohibited from infringing. Donating blood is not, and heuristics aimed at ensuring uninfected blood are a high priority in the process. Homosexual men do in fact have higher rates of bloodborne infections than the general population. I don't know if you've ever donated blood, but there is a rather long list of qualifying questions that people besides homosexual men may be disqualified for.
"why can't we?" Be careful of using "we" like this. Presumably you're not proposing that you should personally be involved in police oversight, so you shouldn't imply that you would be. But at any rate, stuff like that does happen in the US. As for "cracking down" more generally, an issue there is that people in the US have rather more robust rights than Brazilians, and proposals for doing away with that are not usually very popular. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 09:52, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
i neglected an important 'not' in my statement about about 3d printed and homemade guns. i should learn to proof read. the goal though is prohibition of many firearms, the aforementioned assault weapons for one, and stricter regulation of remaining legal firearms. you know, what we've all been discussing. pay attention AMassiveGay (talk) 10:25, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
@192... it seems that you misunderstood my point. i happen to know how difficult it is to donate blood as i donate plasma every so often. however, i lack evidence to definitively claim that it is more difficult to do so than to own a gun in the united states. on the other hand, the article i posted (which you apparently did not open) specifically mentioned gay men. and just because owning a gun is a constitutional right doesn't mean that right is limitless, in the same way that the first amendment doesn't grant a right to defraud, defame, or even threaten people. lastly, i understand that you disagree with my assessment on oversight of authority figures (not necessarily limited to police), but i stand by what i said earlier. we may be a nation of rights, but we are also a nation of laws, and no one – not even those in the government – is above the law. The G (talk) 05:37, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
"the article i posted (which you apparently did not open) specifically mentioned gay men." And it incorrectly said that "gay and bisexual men are the only group stigmatized as potentially having “bad blood.”" Considering your own stated experience, you should have known that that point is incorrect. Supposedly only 37% of the US population is eligible to donate blood, compared to about 75% which is eligible to own firearms (with most of those not eligible being minors). In contrast to the article's statemet, that does make sense, for the reasons previously stated.
"in the same way that the first amendment doesn't grant a right to defraud, defame, or even threaten people" Exactly so. Like with freedom of speech, people can use speech to commit crimes, for which they face punishment. Speech is not preemptively stifled in the general population because someone might potentially use speech in a crime. Similarly, law-abiding citizens in the US have the right to keep and bear arms, but not to use them to, say, rob a bank.
"i understand that you disagree with my assessment on oversight of authority figures" You seemed to be under the impression that anti-corruption arrests and such don't take place in the US, which is incorrect. It's far from perfect, but unconstitutional authoritarian power grabs are not what I would propose as a fix for current problems. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 11:41, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
i don't know where you got the idea that i support unconstitutional power grabs from. sounds like you're putting words in my mouth. and it doesn't seem like you understood the point of the blood argument at all. everything you said about it being complicated to donate blood for the safety of society at large only proves my point: we should regulate guns in a likewise manner. there's no reason we should make it easy for just anyone to buy weapons. The G (talk) 19:58, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
"i don't know where you got the idea that i support unconstitutional power grabs from." You said above: "as for the arms trafficking and political corruption, that isn't something a little cracking down cannot fix. (i mean, if even brazil can do it, why can't we?) we have the resources to rein in our erratic gun culture" "Trafficking" usually refers to trade involving illegal items, but with guns being legal to make, sell, and buy in the US, most arms trafficking in the US is legal. And you gave Brazil as an example to follow, with many of its policies being unconstitutional in the US. And so, on their face, your statements appear to call for the US government to significantly expand its control over the economy and restrict people's rights, both in unconstitutional ways. If that's not what you meant, what did you actually mean?
"it doesn't seem like you understood the point of the blood argument at all." You initially brought it up as a reference for what you proposed as a suitable "difficulty" for getting guns should be, with a linked article claiming that gay/bisexual men are the only group "stigmatized as potentally having "bad blood"" and that guns being easier to acquire than it is for that group to donate blood "doesn't make any sense". Which is incorrect on both counts. And so I explained that. To which you repeated the original point. To which I explained in greater detail. So yes, it is "easier" (in the sense that more people are eligible - guns are generally not free while blood donation is) to buy a gun in the US than it is to donate blood, and it is entirely appropriate that this is the case. Do you have an actual argument for a different position? Because presently, it's an unsupported assertion rather than an argument.
"we should regulate guns in a likewise manner." Blood donation is restricted for people of demographic groups believed to be at higher risk of bloodborne infections. An analogous gun rights policy would be to prohibit members of demographic groups with higher violent crime rates from having guns. How do you think that would go?
"there's no reason we should make it easy for just anyone to buy weapons." Why? Do you have an actual articulable reason? Keep in mind that weapons are easy to make. Prisoners make them in prison. Are you proposing a police state more overbearing than an actual locked-up-in-a-cage-with-guards prison? And who's "we"? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 23:37, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
all that was in response to someone else's post. i never once supported a police state. there you go again with your strawman. now, you can either read the whole thread in context or your can keep arguing over nothing and making patently false assumptions about me. your choice. The G (talk) 00:37, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
"all that was in response to someone else's post." You still said it. In a group discussion anyone can reply to.
"i never once supported a police state." Do you want me to repeat the quotes? If what you said isn't what you meant, what did you actually mean?
"there you go again with your strawman. now, you can either read the whole thread in context or your can keep arguing over nothing and making patently false assumptions about me." Can you provide a single quote in which I strawmanned you or made a false assumption, and explain how it constitutes a strawman or false assumption? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 02:10, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
just re-read the thread yourself. all of your claims that i support a police state are 100% baseless. all i said was that we should at least track firearms sales by creating a registry and a system of background checks. i included the "blood donations" argument as an analogy in response to objections to my basic proposal. i still hold that obtaining a firearm should be more difficult than donating blood – minus the discrimination part, of course. (and yes, i know that some gun laws are historically discriminatory. and you know what? they are ineffective, too. i never said all gun laws don't work. in fact, i only suggested two gun laws that might work. but i digress.)
yes, i still stand by what i said on cracking down on corruption. no, that doesn't mean i support a police state. it means i support enforcing existing laws on everyone, regardless of social status. if we already do that, good; let's keep doing that. no further comment on the matter is necessary.
if you disagree with my overall premise, that's fine. that's why we have discussions. it's part and parcel of living in a healthy democratic society. however, don't make groundless and dishonest claims about me that you yourself don't even believe to be true. i swear, this is why we can't have nice things. The G (talk) 04:58, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
"all i said was that we should at least track firearms sales by creating a registry" Which is illegal. Hence, your proposal constitutes an expansion of government power in violation of current law. And what is this registry to be used for? Would police be tasked with that job?
"and a system of background checks." Which already exists. What difference from the status quo do you propose?
"i still hold that obtaining a firearm should be more difficult than donating blood" But why? Do you have an actual reason?
"minus the discrimination part, of course." Either everyone can have guns, no one can, or there is a discriminatory policy by which some people can and some people cannot. That's what "discrimination" means. It's a recognition of some difference which may be used as the basis of differential treatment or consideration. Differentiation, discernment, and judgement are close synonyms. So what are you actually proposing? It's not at all clear from your statements.
"i only suggested two gun laws that might work" But you didn't answer questions about them, which leaves what you mean by "working" rather unclear.
"no further comment on the matter is necessary." Except that you said above, "there's no reason we should make it easy for just anyone to buy weapons." "Weapons" includes things like knives, baseball bats, and sharpened sticks. These are not only ubiquitous but also easy to produce if all in existence suddenly vanished for some reason. So if you want the government (your use of "we" doesn't indicate who you think should do this, but it's the government, right?) to make "weapons" not easy to buy, there has to be a massive intrusive police apparatus to actually enforce that. If that's not what you meant by saying that, what did you mean?
"don't make groundless and dishonest claims about me" I quoted your words, parsed them, and evaluated implications. That's the opposite of a groundless or dishonest statement. To rephrase an earlier question which you did not answer: Can you provide a single quote in which I made a groundless or dishonest claim about you and explain what's wrong with it? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 08:26, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
We had a firearms registry in Canada it was a political ploy and a huge waste of money. As far as I know it never helped solve any crimes. If you want to curtail firearms use, implement huge penalties for using them anywhere but a firing range, and huge penalties for any transport (the ranges can supply the guns for use there). Eliminate all carry permissions. You could also make ammo and bullet-presses a hell of a lot harder to get, just like they have with pill-presses. FairDinkum (talk) 11:43, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── I doubt that gun culture motivates police gangs in Los Angeles. Hell, it's more dangerous to be a delivery driver, garbage collector, and groundskeeper than it is to be a police officer in the United States. US cops have definitely drunk their own Kool-Aid a little too much. VeeMeow? 14:35, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

understandable. i think gun culture paranoia is one possible cause of "trigger happiness" in policing, but that's far from the only problem. also, i appreciate the feedback on the registry. maybe there are some better ideas out there.
i appreciate those of you who can disagree with me without "parsing my words" and making incorrect and dishonest claims about me and/or my arguments. The G (talk) 02:25, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
So you can't produce an actual quote of me doing any of that. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 12:34, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
i already have. multiple times. not liking my examples and their respective refutations isn't a valid rebuttal, nor is it my problem. The G (talk) 17:31, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
i have no reason to believe you are just asking questions in good faith. i've made my claims, and all you've done is make strawman arguments just because you don't agree with me. "evaluate implications" is at best just a euphemism for senseless fearmongering (and at worst, concern trolling) considering other developed countries that have implemented gun control laws and are less tolerant of corruption also rank higher in personal freedoms.
now, if you don't have anything else to contribute other than jaqing off and/or making false claims that i support a police state, i'll save us both some time and end the conversation right here (i.e., i'll ignore you just like everyone else on this thread has). The G (talk) 17:58, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────as a side note, i've noticed that a lot of people use abe's assassination as "proof" that gun laws don't work. in fact, gun laws don't stop all gun violence (in the same way that our criminal code doesn't stop all murders, thefts, or drug trafficking) but they definitely reduce gun violence over time. that doesn't mean that high-profile murders won't happen. improbable things happen, and his killing says more about japan's security (or lack thereof) for politicians than anything else. japan still has a much lower rate of gun violence (and yes, the article mentions abe) than the us, and it's not even close. The G (talk) 18:19, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

"If you want to curtail firearms use" A more appropriate goal for societal wellbeing with respect to gun policy is the reduction of crime, specifically violent crime, especially homicides and aggravated assault. Targeting firearms themselves is more typically the goal of governments interested in doing things which an armed public may want to shoot them for.
"Eliminate all carry permissions." Including police, military, and security? So that only criminals would have them, knowing that they would face no armed opposition as they go about committing crimes? What is this supposed to achieve with respect to public wellbeing?
"You could also make ammo and bullet-presses a hell of a lot harder to get, just like they have with pill-presses." Let's consider pill presses. Apart from specialized mass production presses, they're just regular presses of the kind used ubiquitously in industry (and not uncommonly in home workshops), and are neither illegal nor hard to get. What's illegal is counterfeit pill-forming dies that can be used to produce pills that masquerade as brand-name medications. These are specialized bits of equipment with no other uses, and which require some moderate technical resources to produce (e.g. a decent CNC mill or metal-capable 3D printer, plus CAD files). They're still so massively made and distributed via black markets, and so rarely found and prosecuted, that the law might as well not exist as far as the supply of counterfeit pills is concerned. Regarding bullet presses, those are likewise just regular presses with specialized dies. These dies are much simpler than those used for pill production, and can be made on such tools as a manual lathe (which are both legal and easy to acquire). Do you have any reason to suppose that such restrictions would work for their stated purpose?
"i think gun culture paranoia is one possible cause of "trigger happiness" in policing" What paranoia are you referring to, and why would that matter more than, say, qulified immunity and police organizations largely being responsible for their own oversight?
"i already have. multiple times." A quote is the verbatim repetition of a phrase, passage, or some such spoken or written statment, typically demarcated as with quotation marks when written. That bit at the start of this paragraph is a quote, and it's there to identify the context that the rest of the paragraph is a reply to. You have not provided a single quote (from anyone) in this discussion. You have made several accusations against me regarding things that I have supposedly done in this discussion, yet you have refused to provide a quote in which I have actually done what you accuse. If I had, that would be a trivial task, yet you have not. So kindly put up or shut up on these accusations and address what I've actually said.
"i have no reason to believe you are just asking questions in good faith." "Jus asking questions", the bit of RationalWiki jargon you linked, refers to something else. To quote: "Just asking questions (also known as JAQing off) is a way of attempting to make wild accusations acceptable (and hopefully not legally actionable) by framing them as questions rather than statements." For an example from the previous discussion, let's consider the "police state" issue. You may not have explicitly said "I want a police state rawr," but proposing things tantamount to a police state or things with a police state as a prerequisite do constitute advocating for a police state. And so I quoted what you said, explained how that constitutes advocacy for a police state, and asked if that was really what you meant. To which you have neither contested my analysis nor clarified what you meant. For contrast, have a look at the exchange between AMassiveGay and myself on February 26th above. He said something, I asked for clarification, he clarified, and that was that. Do you understand what I am asking of you here?
"and are less tolerant of corruption" The Corruption Perceptions Index is, as the name implies, a tabulation of results from opinion surveys regarding how people perceive corruption, not an empirical measure of actual corrupt practices.
"also rank higher in personal freedoms" The Human Freedom Index is a publication of the Cato Institute (a libertarian think tank), and their (not published in detail) methodology in producing that index is tailored to conflating "freedom" with libertarian ideals. It's not a meaningless index, but it says very little about comparisons of what is usually considered "freedom". For example, Ireland is ranked higher than the US in freedom, when people in Ireland are forbidden from having weapons of any kind for self defense (including pepper spray), publications which are "offensive", "blasphemous", or "unacceptable" (as judged by some government agencies) are banned, and people who utter "hate speech" may be fined or imprisoned. Further, a current bill proposes extending such penalties to things like Holocaust denial. It's important to keep in mind that "freedom" is a collection of particulars, not some vague gestalt.
"they definitely reduce gun violence over time." How did you reach this conclusion? Why do you suppose Mexico has higher gun crime rates than the US despite its much stricter regulations? 192․168․1․42 (talk) 14:20, 12 March 2023 (UTC)
mexico has a higher rate of gun violence because of all the guns that flow in from the united states. [2] if there were a way to, say, scrutinize what happens to guns after they were sold, maybe a lot of that violence would be prevent. but there's no money to be made in that, so...
as for "put up or shut up", you know how to write whole paragraphs, yet you seem to struggle to read someone else's more concise texts. that's not my fault, nor is it my problem. you can help yourself. i'm not gonna waste my time to enable someone else's laziness. The G (talk) 15:55, 12 March 2023 (UTC)
"mexico has a higher rate of gun violence because of all the guns that flow in from the united states." You know what place has more US guns than Mexico? The United States. So why does Mexico have higher rates of gun crime?
"if there were a way to, say, scrutinize what happens to guns after they were sold" So, a massive state surveillance program which tracks where people go and what they have in their possession, at all times? What specifically are you proposing?
"that's not my fault, nor is it my problem." Making false accusations that everyone can see are false is indeed your fault. You don't have to care about how it makes you look, but it does tend to lead to social conflict. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 21:54, 12 March 2023 (UTC)
false accusations? ha! you make funny jokes.
anyway, just because mexico has fewer guns and higher crime doesn't mean more guns means less crime. there are other factors at play (poverty, inequality, the controversial war on drugs, etc.). none of this is relevant to what i said, since it doesn't change the fact that as much as 90 percent of mexico's guns are trafficked from the united states.
and no, i will not believe "more guns means less crime" until our crime rates are as low as those of either japan or singapore even with our 400 million guns floating around. The G (talk) 23:44, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
Japan's murder rate is low in part because the police mark difficult-to-solve cases as "Suicide" to make themselves look more competent than they are, on top of them having a much easier time controlling the drug trade. Core (yak) 19:32, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
"false accusations? ha! you make funny jokes." You have accused me of strawmanning you, of making false assumptions and dishonest claims about you and/or your arguments, of just asking questions, and fearmongering / concern trolling. I can simply refer to the text above, which everyone here can see, and reply that no, I did not do those things. All you have to do to prove otherwise is to give a quote in which I did what you accuse me of. Which you have failed to do despite the trivial ease of such a task if your accusations were true. Hypothetically speaking, would you concede the point if I went line by line through everything I've said here and added, "No strawmanning, false assumptions, dishonest claims, JAQing, fearmongering, or concern trolling in this sentence." to each?
"anyway, just because mexico has fewer guns and higher crime doesn't mean more guns means less crime." It's an example where a place with stricter gun laws and fewer guns has more gun crime. You said above that "[gun laws] definitely reduce gun violence over time." Well, no they don't, and that example shows that they don't. It only takes a single counterexample to disprove a universal claim.
"none of this is relevant to what i said, since it doesn't change the fact that as much as 90 percent of mexico's guns are trafficked from the united states." Where the guns came from is entirely unrelated to the questions of whether restrictions on guns reduce crime or whether more guns in a population result in more crime, which were the actual points you were making. Do you need me to repeat what you actually said? And where do you think the guns in the United States come from? What point are you trying to make here anyway? If the gun-ness of the guns imported from the United States isn't what's important for gun crime in Mexico, what do you think is?
"and no, i will not believe "more guns means less crime"" This isn't about beliefs, it's about facts. Empirical data. This isn't some dogmatic mystery or secret. And what I actually said is "Global data (this is a graph of homicide vs. firearm ownership data from 172 countries) indicates a weak negtive correlation between firearm prevalence and homicide rates. As a weak correlation, it's not strongly predictive, but it is more strongly predictive than the inverse." So then, do you want to have a conversation about strong correlates to homicide rates? It would mean talking about things other than guns.
"Japan's murder rate is low in part because" While these things matter, there are indeed places with very different actual crime rates, and there are actual reasons for that. 192․168․1․42 (talk) 02:41, 19 March 2023 (UTC)
using mexico to disprove that gun control works is just plain ludicrous. that's like saying that environmental regulations don't work (when in fact, they do) because china (or some other country) is polluting our air, anyway.
certainly, mexico benefits from gun control in some form or another. how do i know? well, for starters, even though gun violence is high, most of it is attributed to organized crime. "lone wolf" shootings are extremely rare – so rare, they dub them "gringo-style" shooting incidents. if you want to argue that gun control has failed and that the alternative would be to weaken gun laws to reduce crime, well the burden of proof is on you.
also, anyone can draw a graph and not properly label the axes. i'm gonna need a better source for that graph. however, even if it does demonstrate an inverse correlation between firearm ownership and homicide rates, it oversimplifies the issue of gun violence. i've already conceded that crime has a multitude of causes. let's look at a country that has high rates of crime and strict gun laws: brazil. yes, if only i had a dollar for every time someone used brazil as "proof" that gun control doesn't work. well, brazil is like mexico in the sense that most of its violence is tied to organized crime. school shootings are rare, but they have gradually increased in frequency in recent years since the previous presidential administration started relaxing gun laws. maybe that's just a coincidence. (and yes, crime has been trending downward in recent years – no thanks to weakened gun laws.) The G (talk) 00:55, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
"that's like saying that environmental regulations don't work because china"
Except that...
1) Excluding China from environmental controls means the dirty jobs DO go there
2) China's lax policies means the jobs that go there are even DIRTIER
3) Having to ship the goods from China means you have to transport the goods 6000 miles; gone are the days of those ships using wind power
Ideally, we as a society would move away from our throw-away culture, but to do that, we'd have to get the celebrity-class on board with re-using old clothing. Other than the Macklemore "Thrift Shop" song, can you name one hit song about how awesome it is to either Reduce or Reuse? No, because celebrities are paid far, far too much money in promoting useless garbage, with music videos collecting more from product placement than from whatever pittance youtube pays them. Core (yak) 18:54, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
yeah, but that goes beyond the authority of our own environmental regulations. to be fair, i think supply chains in general need better oversight. the problem with our gun culture is that it is irresponsible and relies on the "not my problem" mindset – that is, everyone is a teenager who want all the freedoms and zero responsibilities. we could try to model our gun laws to be like those of switzerland, which also has a high rate of firearm ownership. "they're a small country" is not an acceptable excuse because nothing is stopping states from doing so themselves. the problem is that there's no money to be made from having a responsible gun culture. besides, responsibility takes too much effort (and who has the time for that?). jokes aside, i'm pretty sure some people would argue that swiss gun laws are unconstitutional, so we're basically stuck waiting for crime rates to drop even as we sell weapons with little to no regulatory oversight. The G (talk) 19:24, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
The big change that I want from gun laws is that it should be a misdemeanor to carry a gun while wearing a face-obscuring mask. Basically, giving the police carte blanche to harass anyone who has a gun and is masked. So sick of people showing up to protests with guns while wearing masks; disasters waiting to happen. Core (yak) 19:23, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Just change your bloody constitution[edit]

Just change it. Easier said than done. But people are even too afraid to talk about amendments. This is deranged. US gun mentality is deranged. Change your constitution and change your deranged gun-mentality. Even the most deranged social phenomena is not insurmountable. ShabiDOO

2A continues to be a fucking disgrace. Turns out an American with a uterus is more free to shoot up schools and dismember six people than get a safe abortion. News organization, please show us the mutilated corpses, it's better than this fucking debate again. --It's-a me, Lgm sigpic.png LeftyGreenMario!(Mod) 19:21, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
This is the one time I would support basically a totalitarian strategy. High powered guns should be reserved to government agencies, military branches and national guard reserves. Private security seeking to carry firearms should be subject to a battery of mental examinations, be limited to what they can carry and be subject to random inspections by the FBI. Individuals should have requirements to carrying a side arm, basically making it prohibitive. I've been saying this for awhile, but the Gun Lobby is only concerned with selling more guns. The US has more guns than people, their rhetoric is just about getting more guns in circulation.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 23:30, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Yes, weapons of war should be banned, firearm should require mandatory background check and safety training, license to register a gun, and a federal buyback. But nothing will be done as long as Republicans remain in office and sleep soundly over gun lobby dollars soaked by the bodies of shooting victims. --It's-a me, Lgm sigpic.png LeftyGreenMario!(Mod) 02:19, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

My newest creation[edit]

https://youtu.be/Sh31RE6b9-4

A purpose of my channel is providing a voice for transgender EAS fans. If I can help people like me even in a small way, it is worth it. --Trans Fem Agenda 14:19, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Pretty cool. Is it horror? If so I’ll give it a watchJakester499 (talk) (contributions) 20:09, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Just subbed. Hope you scare the beejeezus out of me!Jakester499 (talk) (contributions) 20:22, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for the sub! Here is the Reanimation EAS philosophy: King of the Hill gets interrupted by the Emergency Alert System. --Trans Fem Agenda 00:16, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

When terrorists are so desperate for members that they advertise on pornographic websites[edit]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailydot.com/debug/russia-wagner-group-pornhub-advertisements/%3famp

Wagner Group must be that desperate to get members. Sex sells people! Even if you want to recruit members for terrorist groups. --Trans Fem Agenda 00:40, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

You learn something new every day. In my case, is that I thought the folks at PornHub were 'better than this'. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:53, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
The website that steals content from sex workers and allowed users to post their own videos of rape and CHILD PRON until they were threatened with being excised from the 'net has such a low moral compass that they are willing to let Putin advertise with them? I'm shocked, shocked I say. Core (yak) 15:04, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, Pornhub / Mindgeek are pretty shady, not surprising at all. They built their empire on piracy and "looking the other way" at questionable content. My understanding is most of those that actually work in the porn industry have much hate for this company.
(This, of course, is not too much different than the YouTube story.) BobJohnson (talk) 15:25, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
I must admit that I thought the story was fake. But multiple news-sites are covering it - some with images to the twitter post.
I guess they know their audience - though I wonder what the average life expectance of a Wagner Group recruit is.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 16:00, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
PH/MG was so terrible that OnlyFans was created specifically for the stars to eek out a living. But, being PH, most of the OF content makes its way to PH anyway.
The very fact that they have a "celebrity" category with leaked sex tapes proves that either 1) PH is still stealing content and committing what is effectively committing some sort of "invasion of privacy" crime, or 2) those sex tapes were never "leaked" but intentionally put out by the celebrities. Or possibly a mixture of both. Core (yak) 16:14, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

At least Stephen Colbert will have additional material to mock Russia with. --Trans Fem Agenda 18:08, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Regarding life expectancy for new Wagner recruits: 4 hours on the front line, according to a US Marine.[3] Bongolian (talk) 07:32, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
They can probably afford to promise fantastic retirement benefits in their porn-hub advertisements in that case.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 07:43, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
God damn. In WH40K, life of the average Imperial Guardsman is 15 hours. Core (yak) 19:17, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
The odd thing about this is that their most recent recruitment targets, prisoners, wouldn't have access to the internet let alone Pornhub. It would seem to imply that the prisoner-to-frontline pipeline is close to tapped out and now they're going after subintelligent masturbaters. Bongolian (talk) 04:24, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
I think it's more in a vague hope that some PornHub watchers are also evil violent fuckwits who frankly would love the idea of going off and spending a few months committing mass rapes, murders and looting in a locale with no legal 'comeback'. It was part of the 'appeal' of serving in holes like Angola in the 70s/80s. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:31, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
@BongolianThey can't recruit from prisons anymore, they're trying to recruit outside of the military blogger space as well. I bet this type of advertisement is target at PH users in economically depressed regions of the Russian Federation.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 19:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)
'Economically depressed regions' of other states too; I've heard reports that they've been trying to recruit in not just Central Asia, but also Serbia, Moldova etc. If the Ukranian high command informs us by this winter that they've started recovering North Korean bodies from known Wagner-fodder locations I'd not be surprised one bit. KarmaPolice (talk) 02:00, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Should Hamas, Taliban and ISIS start using PornHub for advertising? Why not? Wagner Group is on the same level as them. --Trans Fem Agenda 00:18, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

What the f*ck are they even doing there? I thought anti-porn was their thing.ASerb (talk) 17:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
They're not. Those three are idologically-based outfits, and religiously conservative at that [of differing levels]. Wager is just a bargain-basement outfit who are basically a semi-militarised gang who simply wants bodies for Putin's meat-grinder. KarmaPolice (talk) 10:54, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
The major social media platforms are so porous and haphazard in their content monitoring, from what I can tell, these orgs simply use them, there's no need for Pornhub. Particularly Twitter since the Elon Musk takeover is attractive to them,[4][5] since to Musk, banning journalists, left-wing activists, and people being mean to him are far more important.BobJohnson (talk) 16:49, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

How difficult would it be to revive Latin as a spoken language?[edit]

Contemporary Latin already exists and there are Latin language courses. The big hurdle, from my understanding, is that there are no communities that speak Contemporary Latin. --Trans Fem Agenda 19:34, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

I think it's the official language of the Vatican City. So if you are thinking of becoming Pope one day it could be a useful skill.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:21, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
Or a cardinal, or a Catholic bishop... less a requirement, but highly useful in that area. Or perhaps as a professional sedevacantist. Latin's pretty much a go-to there, or at least it should be. Or... um... is there a career for people who name new critters and plants when they do get found, taxonomically? Anyhow, there's a few jobs it applies to, still, a little bit? Kencolt (talk) 23:05, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
A somewhat related journal article by Benjamin Harshav: The Miracle of the Revival of Hebrew. Bernstein (talk) 07:41, 19 March 2023 (UTC)
I read somewhere a while back - there was an Anglican vicars versus Roman Catholic priests (possibly a Vatican team) cricket match and they amused themselves by translating all the cricket terms into Latin (silly mid off, leg gully etc). This is a good definition of Englishness (even if one does not understand cricket.) Anna Livia (talk) 18:01, 22 March 2023 (UTC)
It wouldn't be hard if there was the will. Hebrew was revived from a liturgical and/or barely spoken language to a thriving one. You should note there have been many radical changes to it since it's revival (and even a high level of change to a living literary language), so Latin would very rapidly appear quite different from works from centuries ago (both literary and colloquial). I cannot see there being any will to revive it. In a sense, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Sicilian, Catalan etc are "Latin". What lived on of Classical Latin, was a sort of academic, liturgical, intellectual means of communication (and a prestige lingua franca) for quite some time. To give you an idea of how odd it would be to revive Latin, it would be like reviving Old-English somewhere, say on the Isle of Wight, while English was still being spoken in its various forms around the world (not that Old English continued in any meaningful form). Not only does it barely resemble English as we know it now, it would change very quickly and almost certainly be heavily influenced by modern English (as would a Latin revival be heavily influenced by Italian/French/Spanish). While it is hard to imagine why we would try to revive Latin into a living colloquial/standard/mother language, and the oddities that would come along with it, it would not be that hard if there was a desire to. Hebrew is a far more challenging language to learn and Master and is now the functioning language of a nation. ShabiDOO 01:38, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
I think Shabi nailed it; what you need is 'will', and that is normally done by having a purpose. Unless there was a definitive benefit for using Latin, attempts at 'revival' shall be half-hearted at best. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:04, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Happy birthday![edit]

One of the greatest disgraces of our age turned 20 today!-Flandres (talk) 14:37, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

Newsflash; Blair still says it was the right thing, it worked and I'm not sorry. Not really, but I'm sure he'd say that. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:55, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
Probably an unpopular opinion, but for all the Iraq War was a disaster I can't imagine the would would've been a better place if Saddam Hussein was still around. They didn't call him the Butcher of Baghdad for nothing. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 02:24, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
No ISIS. A lower-tempo 'War on Terror' [including no 7/7 in London]. No sectarian gore-fests in Iraq. A somewhat more boxed-in Iran which would be somewhat less scared of 'regime change' [stimulating them to get Da Bomb]. Perhaps a less spooked Israel, due to previous [which might have retarded the growth of the hard-right there]. An America which hadn't squandered her 'moral capital' gained from 9/11 and may have had the strength to actually really sort out Afghanistan and perhaps even 'do more' in regards to Syria [in fact, Syria may have not happened at all]. In the UK, it may have stopped Labour losing the 2010 UK GE and thus dodging the strands of the evils of Austerity and then Brexit. It may have even allowed America to avoid the Orange One in '16. Lastly, it may have made Putin a bit more hesitant in his own wars, as the main plank of the charge of 'western hypocrisy' would be missing and the feelings of 'American isolationism' wouldn't be so strong due to lethargy. Yes, it's quite possible that if Abrams hadn't rolled towards Baghdad in '03, T-80s wouldn't have gone towards Kyiv in '22.
Can we say our alt-2023 would look better without the Iraq War? Of course we can't. Can we say it could have been better? That's the thing with alt-history; as Camus noted, 'stupidity has a knack of getting it's way' and it's quite likely other stupid decisions would have been made and we went off along another timeline [which may ultimately be as crap as ours, simply a 'different crap'].
And lastly, on a purely subjective level, was the 'blood and treasure' the Alliance spilt on this worth the result we got? KarmaPolice (talk) 03:02, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
I don't think I'm necessarily the best judge of it, but then I also (unlike many who speak to the war) don't presume to talk for the people who actually had to live there. This is something I always find interesting about the Vietnam War, people talk about it as if it's a history of some assholes in Washington and some hippies in a mud pit in upstate New York; just as I've taken time to read about what the people living in Vietnam actually thought, I'm interested in what Iraqi people today think of their lives now. As best I can tell, most of them seem to think it's a dramatic improvement over what was happening before. The path to get there was ridiculously error-ridden and led to who-knows-how-many unnecessary deaths, that's not in tension with the proposition that overthrowing Saddam was A Good Thing. (And I was 12 when the war started, it's not like I had any say in it either way) The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 03:44, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
Then we seem to be consulting very, very different people. The Iraqi reports I've seen put their experiences 'post Saddam' as generally 'neutral' or 'negative' in general tenor - usual minuses mentioned are 'rollback of womens/LGBT rights', 'collapse in government services', 'widening inequalities', 'enfeeblement of central government', 'chronic political infighting due to sectarianism', 'twenty years of constant foreign meddling', 'serious attacks on minorities' and lastly, 'chronic and deepening brain-drain'. The only groups who seem to have overwhelmingly 'won' on this are the Kurds, the upper echelons of the 'Shia block' which is aligned with Iran and naturally, those who did well off the Occupation.
Which leads back to the question; was the amount of blood and treasure worth the result we ultimately got? Could it have been better, for example to have simply installed some Iraqi general in the big chair on arrival in Baghdad, told him not to be outrightly evil and then left them to it? KarmaPolice (talk) 03:57, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
from 'the conversation' AMassiveGay (talk) 10:16, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
By all measures, Iraqis on average have longer life expectancy and significantly more money; here is where it lays out the numbers. Freedom of speech is nowhere near all the way there, but at least it's more than what used to be. There's far too much corruption there, but the last few years have sure been an improvement over Nouri al-Maliki. And even if, arguendo, the Kurds were the "only" ones who won, I'd say stopping ethnic cleansing counts for something; I don't know if it was "worth it", but it wasn't the total loss that people now seem to like to claim. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 14:42, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
The main issue here is 'apples and pears'; we cannot compare 2003 to 2023 Iraq on the simple fact it makes the assumption that under a 'continuing Saddam' hypothetical there would be zero developments anywhere in-state in twenty years. What's more, it makes the assumption that Saddam would still be ruling in 2023; in this scenario he'd now be 86 - quite possible he would have been 'retired' [in one way or another] and in our alternative world the post-Saddam ruler was now trying to trying to find a 'pathway back to the normal world' in a similar manner [for example] the 'post-Fidel' Cuba has been attempting.
And I'll see your Kurds for my dead Yazidis, Christians and Shia who perished from ISIS [oh, and all those dead Kurds from fighting them]. For while many things are hypothetical regarding a 'continuing Saddam', we can be pretty clear that he would have crushed any proto-ISIS brutally [if needed] and they only arose in the first place from the post-occupation power vacuum. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:19, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
It doesn't seem like there was any "good" way to resolve it. US intervention was well-intentioned but went horribly wrong, I would absolutely agree; that stands whether or not Iraq is better for it. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 23:08, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
This is true; Syria being an excellent example of relative non-intervention. Though I honestly don't really think for many of the neocons who backed the invasion had much in the manner of 'good intentions'. Anyhows, I think one of the most important elements of this is to look at the various issues and try to work out which ones were visible at the time. Regardless of whether you thought it was a good idea or not at the time, I think all can agree that a) the disbandment of the Iraqi Army/Police/Government was a mistake, b) going in without any real idea of the post-Saddam political setup was stupid and c) that the Alliance got very poor 'value for money' in regards of the some ~$75billion they spent rebuilding the country. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:28, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
The Onion has a good take on it 149.19.40.216 (talk) 16:20, 24 March 2023 (UTC)Bumpf

Ukraine: DU rounds threat?[edit]

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-blasts-uk-move-send-ammo-with-depleted-uranium-ukraine-2023-03-21/

Propaganda or genuine threat? I'm a bit freaked out by this... 2A02:A459:4859:1:F57B:4C4D:702C:F1DA (talk) 17:22, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

I'd say; a threat, but mainly a case of radiophobia, being pushed by Putin apologetics. Here's WebMD on the topic. If I recall right, there is a risk of DU poisoning for civilians [abandoned/lost munitions etc] but to be honest, a) conventional lost munitions are a risk period [people are still being killed/maimed by old munitions from the two world wars] and b) it's only related to the Challenger tanks being sent - which only the UK and Jordon have. Which are 14 in mumber.
The fact Russia has been using white phosphorus now/then since the invasion is more a long-term threat to all than some old DU tank shells. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:17, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
I was more referring to if this might be used as a pretext to escalate. 2A02:A459:4859:1:6CCA:E998:8382:2DB7 (talk) 18:22, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
No. Or more correctly, if that bastard was going to use something on Ukraine, he would find some reason to do so. What's more, it's 90% certain Pooh-Bear told him to not do that, or China shall pull the plug. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:34, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
So, as ISW has put it, another "tired, low-credibility nuclear threat"? 2A02:A459:4859:1:6CCA:E998:8382:2DB7 (talk) 18:46, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Pretty much. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:54, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
So what? The US used DUWikipedia in the Gulf War, Bosnia, Serbia, Iraq, and against ISIS in Syria. It's nasty and morally reprehensible but not unprecedented. —cosmikdebris talk stalk 18:55, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Still, it's notable that Shoigu mentions it in one breath with a (arguably hyperbolic) nuclear threat. 2A02:A459:4859:1:6CCA:E998:8382:2DB7 (talk) 19:06, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Update: British government (which considered sending the DUs together with the Challenger tanks) claims it's a targeted disinformation campaign. 2A02:A459:4859:1:6CCA:E998:8382:2DB7 (talk) 19:33, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
Depleted Uranium sounds scary but it's actually not. There isn't a concern for radiation poisoning, the shells are just denser, so impact will be deeper.RipCityLiberal (talk) 20:00, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

As has ben noted there is no "nuclear" threat from DU - however it is still a "heavy metal" so ingestion of it causes "heavy metal poisoning", particularly affecting kidneys when in high doses and generalized illness at lower ones. The action of penetrating armour causes it to disintegrate resulting in lots of what is essentially dust in the environment - the "long rod" abrades at the penetrating tip as is pushes through armour. Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 20:31, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Not saying that isn't worrying, but I think in the grand scheme of things a bit of heavy metal poisoning is the least of the Ukranians worries right now. And I suspect Ukranians care more about the average Russian than their own leaders do [ie more than 'none']. KarmaPolice (talk) 01:54, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
Yes, I would imagine that actually being hit by one of these things would be a more immediate worry.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 09:14, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
We also need to remember that the ammo in question is exactly the kind gear the Ukranians want right now - stuff which can stand 'toe to toe' with the T80/90s which make up the bulk of Russia's 'advanced' tank forces [of which it appears to lack the capability to replace in numbers]. And that reports are suggesting that Russia is fast running out of T72s [themselves 'obsolete' when compared to Challengers/Leopards/Abrams] and having to resort to the 1950s vintage T54/5s to arm troops [which is frankly 'WW1 butcher commander' level of competence even before the Western tanks show up]. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:31, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
Coming back to the "escalation risk"... apparently the idea of escalation over DUs got a talking head laughed out of the room on Russian state TV - which is notoriously hawkish to begin with. Also the Kremlin has pretty much shut up about DUs period after the US and UK pushed back earlier in the week.
I think we'll be just fine. 84.80.188.65 (talk) 21:11, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
Welp. Apparently the bastard's planning to host nukes in Belarus now, while claiming it's a decision pulled forward in reaction to Britain sending DUs. What a fucking ghoul. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/what-did-putin-say-tactical-nuclear-weapons-belarus-2023-03-25/ 2A02:A459:4859:1:25CC:C600:EFD5:D381 (talk) 19:29, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Good to hear. Every time he does this, I smile because it means he has nothing else he can really 'do' than bluster and rattle the nuclear sabre. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:06, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
As much as I know bluster is a huge part of his strategy, I still get riled up a bit every time he does this. As in: "what if?". I absolutely hate that feeling any time it comes up. Still doesn't lessen that point though. And regarding the DUs themselves, he responded by saying he'll deploy DU tank ammo in kind, which tbf sounds pretty weak since those apparently already have been used by the Russians in Ukraine for some time. 2A02:A459:4859:1:25CC:C600:EFD5:D381 (talk) 21:47, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Snark fail[edit]

I don't think I'm good at writing snark into the articles I edit here, though I'd say I do alright here and there. It's probably influenced by a long stretch of editing for Wikipedia with dedication to NPOV; I'd actually say I'm far better with humor outside of wiki editing.

Anyone else? I believe I can improve on this front. But for now, I perceive my strengths are elsewhere. One of the draws this wiki had for me originally is that it made even just attempts at humor, instead of staying totally dry. So I'd clearly like to write in a way that retains that character. Chillpilled (talk) 23:42, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Not everyone finds the same things funny. My observation has been that as articles evolve over the years, especially towards silver and gold ratings, they tend to get less snarky. Snark, if it's good, is more likely to be preserved within photo captions. Bongolian (talk) 17:45, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
You're not alone in this regard. "Snarky POV" strikes me as the inevitable product of mid-2000s online skeptic culture. Back then a lot of the movement's energy was focused on mocking the absurd claims of creationists like Ray Comfort. Thunderf00t had a forty-part video series called "Why Do People Laugh at Creationists?" Some of that humour hasn't aged well in my judgment. It feels rather dated, and sometimes cheap. You can usually tell an article hasn't been touched in a decade if there's multiple strikeout jokes in the lede. I love a well-placed bit of snark but RW's satire game hasn't kept pace with changing times as well as The Onion. Nope Rocket (talk) 12:02, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

TERFS in the UK, why?[edit]

I've always wondered why the UK specifically has so many TERFs. I don't mean transphobes broadly, specifically optically liberal "feminist" women and men who attack transgender people from a "feminist" perspective. It's always confused me, because transphobia here in the US is just open bigotry veiled under a disguise of "protecting children", while in the UK it's open bigotry veiled under a disguise of "protecting women" from a "feminist" viewpoint. Any explanation for this? --Ozzyboo (talk) 17:02, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

My guess it partly has to do with a certain fantasy book author. 84.80.188.65 (talk) 17:20, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
JKR is a symptom, not the cause. --Ozzyboo (talk) 17:23, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
She is in fact a perfect example, of the strength of the 'radical feminists' from c1975 onwards which has seeped generally within UK general 'women's culture', like the musings of say, Germaine Greer et al. Problem was, so many of their cut-price derivitives focused on the 'oppression/abuse of women' to the point it became [sometimes very thinly-covered] misandry in general. For if you have an ideology that states 'all men are rapists' and 'being a woman is so terrible' then you pose the situation regarding transwomen Occam's Razor leads you to the conclusion that if it's not simply a ploy to 'get into women's spaces' to abuse women it's the result of an 'extreme end of sexualisation of women' as in they get off on the idea of 'being women'. I mean, one of them literally defined womanhood as 'the life of oppression she has faced since birth', which in fact presents the fucked-up conclusion that if we ever had a true gender-blind land, no women would exist.
I also suspect some of the now elderly heads of the RadFems are loving this. Going after transwomen and revelling in the pushback/'cancellations'/etc they recieve [sometimes unjustly, other times justly] is almost like old times... and means they do not need to actually answer the defects in their own ideology or the failures in their policies. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:36, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
I'll admit, I have a guilty pleasure seeing these misandrist type, "#YesAllMen", feminists finally facing the fire for their all men are evil axiom of beliefs since I remember if I tried to argue with their logic, I was "siding with the rapists and alt-right". Now that they have to contend with the existence of trans people, people can finally see the logical conclusion of such uncompromising beliefs. It shows how bigotry can present itself with a "progressive" aesthetic just by utilizing progressive buzzwords.Ryan1257 (talk) 18:59, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
This New York Times article seems to identify a few factors:
A) While in the United States the trans has been almost exclusively a boogeyman of the right, some of the origin of the transphobic paradigm actually dates to the days of second-wave radical feminism (this source, Left Voice, a "Trotskyist news network" associated with La Izquierda DiarioWikipedia for what it is worth, dates some of the rhetoric to Janice Raymond's 1979 book The Transsexual Empire.) While this radical strain of feminism has largely died out in the United States (where it began), it "crossed the pond" and still lived on in Britain, apparently.
B) The New York Times article also implies that the "skepticism" movement, which was very strong in Britain in the late 1990s/early 2000s, influenced the TERF movement by providing a framework to push back against what they perceived as "junk science". (Personal commentary, though, the "issue" here is that the TERFs haven't really skimmed actual research papers on transgenders, so it's a bit of a facade if such is the case.)
C) The New York Times article also implies that due to a relative dearth of social movements, there has been no push-back from other feminists outside feminism of the white, well-to-do variety, as has happened in the United States.
D) Not in the Times article, but in the Left Voice one: British tabloid culture is IMHO even worse than American tabloid culture (not by much though), and in particular is susceptible to multiple moral panic outbreaks. The Left Voice identifies these tabloids as an amplifier for the movement. In addition, Mumsnet is cited as another factor in the transphobia popularity. This seems to be confirmed by this Vice article which also notes that some reasonably respected British publications like The Guardian have crafted articles seen as transphobic. (I'll personally add that Economist and even the BBC have taken transphobic stances, too.)
Essentially, in Britain, transsexual rights seem to be under attack by "both sides" (the far right of course, but also the ultrafeminist left with more support from "mainstream media" as well), in a strange application of the horseshoe theory. In America, the dialog between "womyn" type feminists and organizations that are all encompassing have already, by and large, played out, with transgender (mostly, I think) being accepted among American LGBTQ+ activists. This hasn't quite happened in Britain yet. BobJohnson (talk) 17:40, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
I actually think a major issue in the UK is a generational one. In that it's basically the folks born before say, 1970 who are the TERFs and well, they're the ones who are overwhelmingly dominating our academic halls and journalistic offices. Part of their bitching about 'being cancelled' [which is in fact pretty fucking rare] simply reeks of old people bitching about the fact their 'privilege' of not being contradicted or questioned is being eroded by the masses and in a manner [ie social media] they don't really get/like. Coupled with the fact that the British mediascape/academia is relatively small and concentrated on London, you can find a relatively few [older, white, straight, bourgeois and educated women] absolutely dominating the 'official narratives' on feminism and trans issues - even when younger, less visible/connected '3rd/4th gen' feminists are doing some very interesting work on the topic. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:10, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
On the whole, London is more socially conservative than the rest of Britain and it has some substantial and intense areas of traditionalism. Bernstein (talk) 19:14, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
the take home from that article is the religious nature of the socially conservative. its interesting that article doesnt discuss ethnicity because ethnic communities in london are largely where the religious reside. i didnt think people still went to church before i moved to london. my commute on the bus to kch passed a dozen little fire and brimstone style churchs down walworth road, offering conversion therapy and handing out leaflets offering faith healing exorcism. and thats after getting on the bus at elephant and castle opposite the tabernacle. it should be noted these areas are, more often than not, safe labour seats.
as for terfs, i said it before - they are not seeing trans people as the enemy, they are seeing men as the enemy. until we adequately address that issue with them, we are on a hiding to nothing with them. the met police arent exactly helping with that one AMassiveGay (talk) 20:48, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
i also would like to point out if you are lgbt, london is the place to be in the uk - for community, for safety, to live and to be free AMassiveGay (talk) 20:54, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
used to pass the former labour party hq on my commute down walworth road too, incidentally AMassiveGay (talk) 20:59, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
addding on to karma police's point, terfs arnt radical in the uk. they are the establishment. AMassiveGay (talk) 21:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, as soon as we see this as a 'male issue' rather than a 'trans issue', then we can start combating it. Dealing with this would also help turn down the incel shite a little bit; because when you've got elderly TERFs screeching via every medium they can muster about how crap men are all the time and they learn that 'this is feminism', well I can understand why they may come to the conclusion that 'feminism' is in fact a poisonous ideology [something which I suspect tallies with that recent social survey report that showed a strong minority of Millennials/Zers believed society was 'going too far' in regards to feminism.] KarmaPolice (talk) 09:01, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
I can't say this is an authoritative list but these are some of the main theories I've encountered or formed through following in the rising tide of transphobia:
1. Feminism in the UK doesn't seem to have progressed beyond the second wave at an institutional level. A popular explanation is that the UK hasn't reckoned with other forms of systemic injustice to the same extent as Australia, Canada, NZ, and the US. Maybe that has something to do with those countries' status as former colonies. As they've tried to navigate their way out of that history, they've been forced to confront issues of race, gender, class, disability, etc. more directly. White second-wave feminists in those countries got pushback from indigenous feminists, Muslim feminists, trans feminists, etc. That made those national feminist movements more diverse and focused on a broader range of issues. Whereas Britain's feminist thought-leaders remain overwhelmingly white, educated, upper-middle-class cis women of a certain age. Their concept of feminism hasn't changed much since the 1980s and they're only getting more and more out-of-touch as time passes. Even relatively uncontroversial feminist issues like period povertyWikipedia seem to be met with scorn by British feminists.
2. Class still seems to be baked into the fabric of British society in a way that it isn't in other English-speaking democracies. Power structures in the UK seem to tilt more toward a privileged ruling class than anything resembling American-style meritocracy. A talented or at least determined enough American/Canuck/Aussie can often elbow their way into politics, journalism, or academia. It seems a lot harder to break into those spaces in the UK if you don't come from the right family, go to the right school, and make the right friends. Consequently, the British media often seems like a cliquish circlejerk. It enables a relatively small circle of people to wield outsize influence over what gets reported and what doesn't.
3. For all the flaws of the current American media landscape, there's nothing quite so vicious, partisan, and small-minded as the British tabloid press. Even formerly well-regarded papers like The Guardian have spent the last five years in a race to the bottom. Jesse Singal (RW really needs an article on him) was able to launder transphobia into American newspapers in that same timeframe but his career is pretty much over now that his journalistic integrity has seriously been called into question. That kind of accountability isn't really possible in a British media ecosystem that breathlessly and uncritically publishes whatever ridiculous nonsense TERFs dreamed up that morning as front-page news.
4. In contrast to other Western democracies, where conservatives have been the primary force driving the anti-trans backlash, many of the UK's most prominent transphobes are ostensibly left-leaning. The left- and centre-left vote is split at least three ways in the UK. Major political parties and leaders in the UK don't want to stand in support of trans rights when it means getting branded a "destroyer of women's rights" despite their actual record on that front. This has limited the UK trans-rights movement's ability to effectively organise in resistance. It's also made the movement seem a more lot scary and radical to onlookers.
5. The UK had a more robust skeptic movement than the US and seems to be more comfortable with secularism. In general, that's a positive thing. However, the last decade has seen several New Atheist figures begin peddling the same reactionary/anti-progressive nonsense as the Christian right. It's easy for rationalists to discount preachers pointing to the Bible to justify gender essentialism. It's harder to discount famed biologist Richard Dawkins using science to justify gender essentialism.
6. English defamation lawWikipedia is bonkers. It places the burden of proof on the defendant rather than the plaintiff. The defendant must prove they didn't libel the plaintiff, rather than the plaintiff being required to prove they were libelled, as in the American system. As a consequence it's easy for well-connected and moneyed Brits to SLAPP their critics into silence. This is how J. K. Rowling has repeatedly sued people for calling her transphobic. This has had a chilling effect on a UK media already hostile to covering trans issues. Nope Rocket (talk) 11:04, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
My counterpoints...
1 - The 'second wave feminists' [mainly of the bourgeois radical stripe] have become 'the institutions' in the UK. In short, their general tenor have become part of 'official progressivism', which explains why they're strong in what Americans would call the 'bastions of the liberal elite'. Truth is, while racial and sexual minority injustices are accepted, most of the above second-wavers generally think those are very secondary when compared to the 'female issue' [and in more general, different campaigners seem to operate in isolation]. What's more, said second-wavers generally speaking do not accept/address class at all - this is partly because 'Marxist sociology' was the previous 'dominant thought' in this field [and in their defence, the post-War Marxists who they kicked against did ignore women and their issues, often quite completely]. This is why their bitchiness is almost personal; for the Marxist fems and later generations are quoting some of the very people who the second-gens 'cancelled' back in the 70s/80s.
Naturally, this makes said second-gens a form of 'useful idiot' for the capitalist elite; for their creed does not threaten the fundimental structure of the capitalist state. This naturally means it's gonna get a much better hearing in the media etc than anything which is genuinely 'Marxist' in scope. This aspect cannot be forgotten.
2 - Yes, the USA does have a bit wider ability for an outsider to 'crash the elite' because said elite is larger and wider in 'origin'. And basically, you're repeating what already said on that. What's more, social mobility has been declining since the 1980s as Conservative cuts have basically involved taking those 'ladders up', turning them into logs and using them to keep the rich warm and simply 'surviving' as a newbie media/journalism/academia bod is almost impossible for anyone not already relatively wealthy [esp in London and the SE, which almost everything happens at] which limits the pool even more.
3 - The centralised nature of the British mediascape (see above) means it's easier for a small clique to capture the 'mainstream opinion' on anything and then set the narrative - for as Gramsci pointed out in his 'Hegemony Theory', once a clique has achieved this it can then warp the discussion along axies that it decides, in terms it defines and with them controlling the 'rules of battle'. And I contend that as Gay pointed out earlier, the second-gen radfems have achieved this and are going to fight their removal tooth-and-nail.
4/5 - This is mainly an issue with the electoral system. FPTP seriously enourages wide-tent parties, being 'pro-trans' does not promise to gain many votes but could cost quite a few in the fabled 'Red Wall' [basically, our Rustbelt] which the Conservatives shall amplify to create the culture war shite [as they have nothing else left]. Generally speaking, I quietly, cautiously hope that the LDs/Greens/Plaid shall help nudge a Labour Govt into some advancement on trans issues 'on the quiet' in a similar manner Blair did with LGB rights in the 1990s [credit where it's due].
The Scottish issue is somewhat different, as they are a land which has PR, and the SNP did it partly at the behest of the Greens [who are truly 'pro trans' in this respect]. But their actions were frankly a bit kack-handed; in that they simply lumped en bloc all complaints about the policy as 'transphobia' when some of them were somewhat legitimate, or at very least came from an 'innocent' origin.
6 - Hell yeah. As Marx would say, it's all about power, baby and the second-gens are the ones with it and by fucking jove, they'll keep it by means fair or foul. They are not just the ones threatening libels to gag, but they're also the academic seniors, on editorial boards, chairing interview panels and chatting with fellow 'important personages' over coffee, wine and nibbles etc.
KarmaPolice (talk) 12:15, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Why are the global warming denialists so inconsistent?[edit]

First they say that climate change is not real then say that it is caused by the sun, then say that it is caused by water vapour then They scrap all that and say that it was made up by neo-Marxists to control us . They just keep being so inconsistent ←§ Edward the eight (talk) 21:32, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

they do not need to be consistent. they cannot afford to be consistent. if they had a single consistent and organised rationale you can focus all opposition into showing its all bullshit. what is needed is dozens of different arguments to say climate change aint a thing, or no big deal. you need an alternative everytime the current one is shown be false. you dont need to convince anyone, you just need to keep enough doubt in the general population, that any anxiety about climate change is overridden by presenting the cost and self sacrifice and personal effort is a crutch to grasp to justify not doing anything for something they dont personally feel they are not directly experiencing and if they do admit to themselves it is a thing, its hyped up, tomorrows problem, primarily for those on foreign shores. climate change is real but it isnt real enough for too many people. AMassiveGay (talk) 22:34, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
in australia and california, where the world is literally on fire, its not real to people. it wont be real for many if the whole world was a blaze or underwater. consistency is not needed. its the doubt that is needed. a consistent argument for climate change needing to be defended from all directions is the harder sell. dozens of counter narratives all needing constant debunking? it sows that doubt. AMassiveGay (talk) 22:43, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
Much of the root cause is what should be called Upton SinclairWikipedia's "salary law". ("It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.") Climate change denial, from what I can tell, seems most fervent in places where extraction industries (in particular oil) would be affected by corrective policy and also dominate certain parts of the economy. So, to give some examples, it runs more rampant in places like the United States, Brazil, and Australia in comparison to, say, much of Europe.
In the United States, the "obfuscating" is largely driven top-down by politically active extractive industries (with, in my opinion, no long-term vision) in a manner similar to other dying corporations of the past did (eg tobacco). Koch is the most famous of this lot. Part of what you are seeing is a couple of different approaches. One of them is to appeal to more (semi) educated types with bullshit studies passed on through thinktanks and uppity political mags, or even have stoic "talking heads" babbling some smart sounding but empty crap. You saw a lot of this back in the good old days of the 1980s and 1990s; most reasonably smart people have figured out that the Heritage Foundation type bullshit on climate change is bullshit, so you're seeing less of this now, I think. The other angle was to spread the message through "populists" who are primarily Culture Warriors first. This is the Tucker Carlson or Rush Limbaugh type model, where one sets up gut-appeal boogeymen (eg scary Blacks); this allows one to sweep in other boogeymen the audience may not quite understand, but will accept if the argument is forceful or deepity sounding. The politically informed aren't fooled, but there's many who are politically naive. BobJohnson (talk) 00:03, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
The question is mentioned here. The staircase.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 06:17, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, it's a combination of a 'fighting retreat' and simply 'throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks'. The latter is more serious, as it's the hirelings and hacks who are tailoring their message to the planned demographic and it's not an overtly planned 'message' from above [at least I don't think it is]. For example, one catering to Boomers often works the 'appeal to selfishness/greed' side - they don't deny the ecological destruction, but carp on about 'by 2050' and similar, the unspoken message being 'you'll be dead by then, so why worry about it? Turn the heating up and plan your holiday flights!'
It doesn't help that the 'opposite side' is sometimes a bunch of liars or at very least, confused and unwilling to admit holes in their plans/policies. For example, here in the UK the Greens are hard-on for the 'zero growth' thing - I argue this is a terrible mantra because it suggests to poor people that their SoL shall never be allowed to increase 'for the planet'. KarmaPolice (talk) 08:27, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
noticed the same thing with anti-vaxxers they keep changing the Covid vaccine death toll ←§ Edward the eight (talk) 22:27, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

NATO bombing and anti-Westernism again[edit]

Yesterday marks the anniversary of illegal NATO bombing of Yugoslavia which killed thousands of civilians and damaged buildings, which ended a huge political clusterfuck in the 90s. But it also caused anti-Western sentiment and contrarianism among Serbs to grow even more. Conspiracy theories about the effects DU causing cancer also emerged.

Idk how many Serbs today would rather be contrarian and think opposite of whatever the West says, even when it has weight, just to spite West. One of main TV channels occasionally hosts conspirational cranks, yet also broadcasts a reality TV show. It also has a show where some "analysts" spew the same far-right shit RT says, but with nationalist slant. And popular "independent" political shows on YouTube are also right wing.

Now being a crank is apparently being a good Serb. While a hopefully normal Serb thinks that war in Ukraine is bad and Russia is the aggressor, a True Serb thinks that Russia defends itself and the world from imperialist West. And being anti-LGBT, anti-vax, anti-globalist is apparently pro-Serbian too.ASerb (talk) 10:47, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Human Rights Watch says civilian deaths were between 488-527 - where do you get "thousands" from?Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 10:55, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Serbian Wikipedia, although it was sourced from RTS and Politika. It also had the numbers from HRW too.ASerb (talk) 11:01, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Also being peddled by Chinese sources. The ICTY on the other hand, states they believe the true number is ~500 dead and ~6,000 injured. Couple with the ~1,200 service personel killed [current NATO calculation], counting later 'died of wounds' and a bit of 'margin of error', then yes, perhaps we can technically get to 'thousands', if only just. KarmaPolice (talk) 11:10, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
Anyway, I have to wonder how much of this is just old fashioned 'Serbian exceptionalism'. Why does so much of the last century's history seem to focus around either expressions of this poisonous ideology or the reactions to it by other powers? KarmaPolice (talk) 11:12, 25 March 2023 (UTC)
And what of the genocides? Oh who am I kidding, the response from the likes of you would either approve of it or deny it with the usual excuses. NATO didn't make Serbia pro-Russian and far-right, it was already like that.Ryan1257 (talk) 01:07, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
As someone who was friends with Bosnian refugees, fuck you.
With a cactus.
Using lemon juice for lube.Core (yak) 01:40, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

What's up with this wiki's article on electroconvulsive therapy?[edit]

A couple months ago, someone strongly opposed to ECT edited part but not all of the page, which was previously fairly sympathetic to modern forms of the treatment. Now the page is an incoherent mix of pro- and anti-ECT rhetoric. What should we do about this? I personally don't know what side the article should take, but it shouldn't try to take both. — Unsigned, by: 2601:249:9302:9b50:18fe:e009:a1de:d634 / talk

This is largely a single editor article, with little overall movement since then.
That being said, there are a few contributions from a BoN, who as I recall from this conversation, are probably from a banned user who is largely anti-psychiatry. While a few of the edits look OK, the bulk of the edits are similar POV or unsourced bunk found in the same user's attempted edits on the antidepressant article; this probably should be removed. BobJohnson (talk) 00:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Hello, new member.[edit]

Hello, I'm a lurker who's made a few minor edits in the past who recently deiced to make an account. I figure I should give a semi formal introduction. I'm Valeria22, or Valeria for short. I've been aware of RW for at least a year and decided to finally make an account to write about articles regarding technology and privacy. Something I tend to do on new communities, and I figure some might be interested here, is disclose one of the skeletons in my closet. I'm an Ex-Kiwi Farms user. I regret spending time there and actions I did on there, but it did give me insight as to how it works internally and I made a post about my experiences on it back when I was using Dreamwidth. San some typos in it I believe someone might make use of it here for the Kiwi Farms article. I'm also an active IRC user on Libera.chat , if anyone else here uses IRC... Valeria22 (talk) 03:33, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

i don't browse kiwifarms cuz the site stresses me out every time. but i recall being told that being 'noticed' on kiwifarms usually starts off as a disgruntled nasty ex-community member who wants to get revenge for being "wronged" so often it's not the same shitty strangers saying shitty things. to what extent is that true? --It's-a me, Lgm sigpic.png LeftyGreenMario!(Mod)
That's interesting that you claim to regret posting on Kiwi Farms when your self-description (User:Valeria22) here (non-binary, furry, Asperger's) indicates that you could have been a potential target over there. There have been Kiwi Farms users in the past who have been targeted by Kiwi Farms. What was your attraction to that site? Bongolian (talk) 06:47, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
For User:LeftyGreenMario's question: I would say a significant amount of posts are made by disgruntled ex-community members, but how many I can't say for certain due to how seriously hiding ones identity (both IRL and elsewhere online) is taken on Kiwi Farms. My personal guess would be at least 1/3 of posts, and up to 2/3 of posts about an individual or group are done for the purpose of revenge.
For User:Bongolian's question: I explained my attraction to the site in my post on Dreamwidth, but to summarize: I joined Kiwi Farms because at the time several family members of mine were following Alt-Right influencers and I choose to lash out against them through Kiwi farms instead of something more productive after seeing a thread on an Alt-Right influencer on the site. Looking back it was clear what I did was out of impulse for a desire for petty vengeance, and I’m not sure if I can ever fully make amends for the actions I did on it. This wasn't a question (I think?), but I do wish to explain it. I never said I was autistic, non-binary, and a furry on Kiwi Farms for different reasons. I've only recently been identifying as non-binary earlier this month, I've been considering myself a furry since late 2022, and I was smart enough to know saying I'm autistic on Kiwi Farms wasn't a good idea. Valeria22 (talk) 07:43, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanation. Bongolian (talk) 18:18, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

"Parental Rights"[edit]

"Parental Rights" is good euphemism for transphobia, homophobia, restricting free expression, free speech and support of theocracy.

Much like the euphemism "Special Military Operation" instead of "Hostile invasion". --Trans Fem Agenda 00:08, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Just because they have ulterior motives doesn't mean they don't have a point. The LGBT community needs to stop defending the "all ages" drag shows, regardless of how frequent or rare they are. The LGBT community has spent decades trying to prove that they aren't just a bunch of perverts that hide under rocks to snatch your kids, but then you end up with creeps doing pretty much just that... Core (yak) 01:43, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Someone is going to have to explain how a man merely wearing a dress is now rated R entertainment (and if it is, I can produce a long list of light comedy that suddenly will become "adults only"). Generally speaking, I understand that the "drag queen story hours" are G rated in content. So really, the biggest problem here therefore is the "homosexual" part (eg the event promotes diversity), and that some people think that the concept of men wearing dresses to tell inclusive stories is "weird". Guess what, I think shit like speaking in tongues is fucking weird too, but we have some parents who are perfectly fine with taking their kids to Pentecostal services with that claptrap. If "parental rights" extend to simply banning shit because they don't like it, fine, I modestly propose that if you get to legislate away the drag queen story hour weirdness, I get to legislate away the Pentecostal weirdness. Hell, most things are not liked by someone, but if "parental rights" were really that open (and not just a thinly veiled vehicle for homophobia, transphobia, and racism, reminiscent of "state's rights") I betcha everything and anything will be banned in no time. BobJohnson (talk) 02:34, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
As best I can tell, drag seems to want to have it both ways. All the way back in 2004, as a teen I went to Provincetown (my family was primarily there to see the dunes) and saw the dissonance even then; the dueling messages from the people out on the streets in their costumes came off as, "We're really That Transgressive And Super Edgy, so here's our show where you can bring your family along!" For obvious reasons it just doesn't work that way, think about what happened to leather and studs; Rob Halford so thoroughly popularized the look that it hasn't been the exclusive domain of the the gay community for decades. Same thing happened with Twisted Sister, they were That Transgressive enough that Dee Snider got hauled before Congress and then 17 years later campaigned for a Republican governor. At least in those two cases Halford and Snider stopped pretending they were still on the cutting edge of being EdgyTM and leaned into it. To take it out of gender, it's the equivalent of sticking a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac, then getting grievously offended when someone either points out the dissonance or chooses not to engage with you because it's not something everyone is all that interested in. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 02:58, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
You aren't wrong that drag shows are associated with bawdy adult humor, and trying to G-rate such throws up a bit of cognitive dissonance. There's a difference though between questions like "er, why the drag, really, is this really helping?" and "LET'S THROW UP THE BANHAMMER", and when the side doing the later is also simultaneously trying to whitewash educational material of any notion that America could *gasp* be racist, and is throwing a moral panic on anything transsexual etc., you suspect that the motivation to be a wee bit beyond questions like the above.
Most of the arguments you hear in fact are more of the "think of the children!" variety. Now, I haven't personally heard of any massive child abuse scandals with drag queens. I have heard massive child abuse scandals with the Catholics and the Southern Baptists. So, continuing my "modest proposal", we should THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!! and ban all religion. Or, in the spirit of Ron DeSantis administrivia attacks, take away their tax exemption. (Given how Republican propaganda pulpits some churches are becoming, it makes perfect sense to me!)
Euphemism for brainwashing kids with whatever the parents' think the kids should be thinking - eg religion is the classic - for 90% of religious peopled the "right" and "only true" religion is whatever you were raised in. But it has always been like that and it is pretty difficult to see any sort of way society will change to be otherwise. Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 02:07, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Remember in Mrs Doubtfire, there was this hilarious scene where Robin Williams was twerking in Mara Wilson's face while she put dollar bills in his thong? Me neither.
There's a HUGE gulf between "we are just another type of normal, trying to live our lives in peace" and "we are going to sexualize your kids". Core (yak) 03:24, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Interesting, I don't seem to remember that scene either. And while this has nothing to do with the legality of it, how does it in any way enhance the experience of kids to hear a story from a man... in a dress? Even if it's not overtly sexualized, as the Provincetown "edgy family friendly" shows clearly were, something can be both harmless to and add no value whatsoever to the task at hand. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 04:06, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
In theory, Drag Queen Story Hour (DQSH) is much like having LeVar Burton in Reading Rainbow; by having a member of a minority group interact with kids, you raise a generation that is not afraid when they meet another member of the minority group. In practice? I don't know how many people volunteered with DQSH so I can't make any conclusions, but I know that at least two were convicted sex offenders.Core (yak) 04:26, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
My rule of thumb is this; if a person uses the line 'parental rights' it normally means I'm dealing with a person who views their kids as a form of property. I shall not convict on this line alone, but it sure as hell be fairly alert for corroborating evidence. Why? Because my experience has taught me that this POV is an orange flag for abusive/neglectful parenting. Now, onto the tangent.
I am no way an expert on this, but it would appear that the moral panic regarding let's call it 'cross dressing' [as I desire to make the discussion wider] is almost uniquely American [at least in the Anglosphere]. Here in the UK, we have the tradition of 'Music Hall' which started in the early 19th and often featured Drag King/Queen acts [yes, for ladies did this too]. They were often regarded as somewhat 'racy', but by modern standards they weren't 'sexy'; the Queens charms were much more the 'dirty smirks and double entendres' sort - something we still have as an echo in the 'pantomime dame' character at Christmas. The Moral Guardians hated music-hall with a passion, but it wasn't directed against the Queens/Kings in particular. The American variant seems to be simply obssesed about 'people wearing "wrong" clothes' to a much greater extent; for example the bitching about the Python 'Pepperpot' characters in the 70s or the fact that some locales had gendered public dress codes [something which I believe was never on the books in the UK].
The other aspect of this is the renowned American prudishness, which is perhaps the most severe in the 'Western World' - to the Helen Lovejoys and Ned Flanders' of the country, their demands of female 'modesty' is often so high the admission that you have knees or breasts puts you in the same category as a pole-dancer. I mean, go and Google some of the Story Hour persons in question - often, they' object to the attire regardless of who was wearing it [normal people, on the other hand normally would see it as 'acceptable']. The last bit of this is the simple fact that Helen and Ned simply cannot see any 'reason' for drag which was not sexual in intent. This view is reinforced by the fact the only association they can think of is the tradition of 'carnival' in Rio etc, of which they shall generally view as something approaching what Sodom was like [though I am not sure what is Sodom; either LA or Vegas, I assume]. KarmaPolice (talk) 10:05, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Anytime I hear people use the term Parental Rights, it is from homophobic and transphobic jerks, anti-vaxxers and Christian fundies. --Trans Fem Agenda 18:14, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

you've never heard of (shit)fathers for justice then AMassiveGay (talk) 19:13, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Is that part of the Manosphere, where dads complain the courts are biased towards the mom or that child support payments are too onerous? Core (yak) 19:18, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
It's kinda 'proven' of being biased against fathers, at least traditionally. And sometimes. I suspect this was partly a 'feature, not bug' of family court, because it might have made the assumption a) father would always be able to 'outgun' mother with lawyers [as he would be the wealthier] and b) mothers made the better parent. From what I've seen of life so far, it can be said that normally if fathers play silly buggers over maintenece, mothers shall play similar with contact. And when it comes down to it, courts are much quicker to knife you about not paying dosh than not allowing the spawn to see their other creator. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:41, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
It's perhaps pointing out that "someone in drag" is several centuries old, not a new invention - the Pythons did it half a dozen of times in their acts. The term literally comes from Shakespearean theater - women weren't allowed to perform in stuffy British theaters (because quite literally sexism; they were seen as inferior to the men and therefore only men were allowed to perform), so the men would have to be put in big flowy dresses that dragged across the floor to hide their more manly features. It's believed that in Romeo & Juliet, the first performer of Juliet was a man as a result. The sexual association some people have is really just the association that comes from the sudden popularity of VaudevilleWikipedia in the 1920s, easily accessible comedy that in part featured jokes about men dressing as women and as a result had slightly sexually charged comedy (because the second lowest form of wit is a sex joke, only surpassed by a poop joke) whilst also having people in drag. This is the entire appeal of drag and drag shows in a nutshell; it's a modern day vaudeville act. The association with trans people is there like... well, any form of "people being able to dress as something they not usually are" is, but I would point out that unlike what conservatives would have you believe, being trans is not a requirement for drag. There was a rather popular television show here a few years back that largely featured straight guys (stuffy TV presenters mostly, a few bi dudes and I think one gay guy?) in drag and a jury who would have to guess who the presenter was. That's... really all it is. The outrage is rather blatantly charged about hating trans people but that's only so obvious because the people passing the bills are constantly screeching about them. If it was actually about drag queens or drag shows, we'd have actual arguments about that, but instead it's constantly screaming about how trans people want to rape kids or whatever. -- Techpriest (talk) 20:02, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
theatres at the time of shakespeare were hardly 'stuffy' AMassiveGay (talk) 20:10, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Frankly anything British automatically is stuffy to me as a non-anglophone European :p. -- Techpriest (talk) 20:12, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Now that's a bit unfair; we've been telling each other dirty jokes and stories since forever. Hell, even the Canterbury Tales had them. And I don't hail from a land which gets all offended when pictures of get shown to students. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:22, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Hah. Point taken. The uptightness of United States parents and the outsized influence they like to muscle around on school boards is disconcerting. -- Techpriest (talk) 20:51, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
For some context, the David statue uproar was triggered from three parents; all were attending a "charter school" which (hilariously, given what happened) was supposedly specializing in "classical education". Things makes more sense when you realize these "classical education" schools are often really thinly veiled fundie schools in disguise, designed so that parents can escape the "horrors" of having their children subjected to a broad-based public education in favor of a supposed "Judeo-Christian" one, but without being so obviously religious that they'd get their tax dollars yanked. That Tallahassee school is part of a network of charter schools designed by the conservative Christian Hillsdale CollegeWikipedia.BobJohnson (talk) 21:32, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Charter schools, what a joke; I too can outperform public schools by expelling any child that doesn't perform the way I want.
Sorry, I just hate that we are once again returning to the 2-tier system of education for the haves and have-nots. Core (yak) 04:48, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
No, the USA has a three-tier, possibly four or even five. And contains sub-tiers too. From what I can tell, Charter Schools almost overwhelmingly cater to lower/mid middle class types who feel they are [in short] 'too good' to be in the state run system but lack the fiscal firepower to genuinely go private. However, most of said parents are 'uninformed shoppers' and like any such shopper, can very easily be taken in by advertising, peer pressure, woo-peddling and similar. And as they don't have to literally pay for it the level of actual 'research done' shall often be rather shoddy as they don't have so much 'skin in the game'. And as charter schools are rackets, much work shall go into pandering to the customers' own desires over the needs of the customer's spawn.
This is relatively normal for business. You have the informed choosers who take quality but have to [and do] pay for it, the ignorant choosers who usually get crap on the cheap and then the beggars can't be choosers who either go without or get the mandated minimum doled out on the plate.
And on the 'British stuffiness'... even now, we are more 'reserved' - it's a particular class thing, but I'd hazard even working-class English are moreso than say, their American counterparts. Personally, it's partly because we have stronger divisions between private and public 'personas'. Like with say, Russians and Swedes, the outsider need to work on cracking through the public mask before you hear our dirty jokes and personal feelings. KarmaPolice (talk) 07:59, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
In my hometown, we had several religious academies and public schools. The public and religious schools were actually equivalent, and the public schools did have honors/AP and remedial courses so there were 3 tiers but all within the same school. So I don't know if that actually counts as different tiers, the way you would have literally separate schools for Black and White students a la Jim Crow.
As for British Stuffiness, I once saw this one British play where in the opening act, the men make fun of each others' dick sizes, raping/murdering virgins, and pooping on heads. The play was "Romeo and Juliet". Core (yak) 19:28, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Everything is woke[edit]

They keep saying that everything is woke even vaccines and caring about the environment. At first it was just people like sargon of akkad saying that black people, women, LGBT are woke it was bad that now every movie, TV show, Comic is woke. I bet in 5 years that conservatives will call even goats woke. They can't even define the word since it is as consistent as global warming denialists' claims, speaking of global warming denialists the conservatives are calling environmentalism woke now. Thanks to the Covid pandemic they are calling vaccines woke, so not believing that Bill gates injects 5g microchips is woke now. ←§ Edward the eight (talk) 22:25, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

With how much 'woke' is being said by the Alt-Right for... Well, anything they dislike I'm starting to think it's their bootleg version of Prop 65Wikipedia. Though dispute its overuse, at least Prop 65 has a real meaning and purpose behind it. Valeria22 (talk) 23:24, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
At least here in CT, the Latino population has had about enough of "Latinx" bullshit. Latino Democrats here are leading the charge to recognize how ridiculous it is, and this in about the most liberal state you could think of. When I see Frontline documentaries with some black "community organizer" (whatever the hell that means) from Wisconsin trotting that word out, I can't help but cringe at such an obvious and unnecessary self-inflicted wound. It's that sort of hill way too many liberal types are willing to die on, and I've sure never seen any of them helping out at the food pantry or sorting through the donation bins. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 00:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Yep, 'woke' is basically 'I don't like this'. And yeah, crap like names and similar are so important compared to people's actual lives. I shall only genuinely entertain neo-pronouns for trans folks once shit like conversion therapy, teen/young adult issues and the class-based problems are sorted out. KarmaPolice (talk) 08:06, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
The far right cannot define woke but use it as an insult. --Trans Fem Agenda 11:03, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
According to merriam-webster (Yes, I know they are not far-right) woke is defined as "“aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice)” That's a bad thing then?Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 13:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
If that was actually how people used it all the time, I'd be fine with that. But it's not, and I don't think anyone seriously disputes it. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 13:26, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Actually I think that "the right" would broadly accept that definition. Except they genuinely believe that being concerned about social issues is a bad thing.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 13:36, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
That certainly hasn't been my immediate experience. My current state representative is a Republican; I don't agree with him on a lot, but on social issues he's done a tremendous amount to get more funding for organizations serving disabled people and food distribution. Certainly did better than our previous Democratic governor on that issue, who is himself dyslexic and relied on services for the blind to get by in law school; he did a lot I like, but basically gave the finger to those very same places and slashed their funding (our current governor has been much better on this). It doesn't neatly fit into boxes. And since I live relatively close to Yale and sometimes go to the art shows up that way, people there most certainly do not use "woke" to just mean "supporting social justice awareness"; it's a very specific vision of social justice, I've seen "White silence is violence" buttons being hawked by the same people who then make it a point to "center [insert your abbreviation of choice] voices"; I mean, I can either talk or be quiet, but I can't do both. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 15:12, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
As used by the reactionaries (eg Fox News, Ron DeSantis) the term has gone well beyond mere social justice though. For instance, if one attempts to address climate change issues, this crowd will now whip out the "woke" label regardless of merit. Thus a Ron DeSantis will whip out the term for the major passive Wall Street investment firm BlackRockWikipedia simply because they have some token marketing attempting to attract the "ESG investing" crowd. "Woke Blackrock" is honestly a hilarious concept to me, it's like taking the latest stereotype fad targeting "those darn liberals!" and pointing it at the exact same type of "stuffy suits" the right would worship in the Ronald Reagan days.BobJohnson (talk) 15:52, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Yeah, there I would agree. DeSantis is about as bad as it gets with that sort of nonsense. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 16:25, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Woke means nothing and everything at the same time. Woke has no meaning. You could put a gun to a Republican's head and they could not give you a coherent definition even after a million years. Woke is a vibes based term. It is literally "everything we do not like." Black people in movies? Woke. Tampons? Woke. Gay people kissing? Woke. Children having independence from their parents? Woke. Non-religious education? Woke. All of these things are "woke" despite having no connection to each other at all. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:52, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
You could make the same argument about "porn" and "art", since there's no coherent definition of either. But I'm quite sure that currently, "woke" means "constantly pushing 'social justice' issues where it doesn't make sense". Adding a Black character alone is not "woke". Adding a Black character where it makes no sense, is "woke". E.g., let's say you make a historical drama about Christopher Columbus and include a Black sailor. Some might whine that it's "woke"... except that there really was at least one Black sailor in Columbus's crew. So including said sailor would actually be undoing Whitewashing and thus arguably "based". Now, if the Black sailor is given excessive focus or heroic actions with no basis in history, you are back to being "woke". Core (yak) 19:47, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
The word is used a lot, with different meanings. Some use it genuinely for social justice, some use it to mock social justice, some use it to promote wacky ideas.ASerb (talk) 20:15, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Woke has a meaning; being alert to racial prejudice and discrimination. It has been twisted by conservatives to apply to basically anything they don't like. It didn't help that white people started using it judiciously, especially after the George Floyd lynching, but it isn't a way to explain away a bank failure, nor is it some all encompassing menace that is a threat to Americans way of life. I guess except for those that refuse to acknowledge that Black Americans face no prejudice and discrimination.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 23:44, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
For Conservatives, the word "woke" is useful because it lacks a single meaning: As long as it's a snarl word it can be used to attack anything and anyone and can't be defended against. — Chbarts (talk) 05:11, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Another school shooting[edit]

Recently there was another school shooting in the United States, and now news outlets are immediately saying the shooter was transgender, what a load of bull! Conservapedia is gonna milk this one — Unsigned, by: 110.151.89.228 / talk / contribs

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cosmikdebris talk stalk 23:51, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
Link or it didn't happen - what media is saying he shooter was trans? Got a link? All I see currently is she was a former student. Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 23:52, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
The shooter was a biologically female trans-identified man. No words on motive yet. Pizza SLICE.gifChef Moosolini’s Ristorante ItalianoMake a Reservation 00:09, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Another source here. Just hope this manifesto never gets out, no need to inspire anyone. If the police reports are true (yes, I know better than to assume), I'm glad they won the shootout and ended it there. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 00:12, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
It's also very preliminary information (first the shooter was a teenager, than a "28 year old female", etc.) Transgender individuals have been involved in mass shootings in the past,Wikipedia so it's possible (as any other motive is). But given the trans hate in this country, there have also been some nasty rumor mill shit with this topic (notably for Uvalde.Wikipedia) So I feel like one needs to be a wee bit cautious here.
At any rate, we're already starting to see the "guns for me, not for thee" hypocrisy pop up among the reactionary conservative crowd.[6] It'd be actually quite revealing if Conservapedia and others rant about THE TRANS; not that it wasn't obvious before, but such reveals what feelings are *really* behind the supposed "libertarian 2A / MY GUN RIGHTS!" mask. BobJohnson (talk) 00:23, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
The Tennessean, a local paper affiliated to the USA Today's network (Gannett), reports specifically as a trans man, as DuceMoosolini mentioned. Based on what I've seen, I believe this report to be accurate. It's contradicted by many other reports, especially but not exclusively in right wing media (NY Post, Daily Mail, Fox News but also another NBC report, Metro Weekly, and some others) that claim the suspect was a trans woman. From my view this seems to be a misinterpretation that probably originates from the cop who made the announcement misgendering the suspect. The Advocate also says that these reports seem mistaken. Snopes reposted a statement given to the Daily Beast by a family friend of the shooter that Hale had: "recently announced she was transgender, identifying as he/him." One police spokesperson said the suspect was assigned female at birth, according to NPR. Also went by Aiden, though this was already known to anyone who saw the LinkedIn account before it was deleted.
Regarding a motive, the fact that a manifesto was allegedly written is notable. I originally thought it may have been because the school was transphobic but: 1. this is an elementary school so that would've been a long-held grudge (suspect was 28) 2. apparently other locations were potential targets 3. the denomination of the school is Presbyterian which is very pro-LGBT according to HRC. Chillpilled (talk) 04:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Does anyone have any actual stats on Trans/NB criminal rates, and how it compares to the general population? Core (yak) 04:28, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
I'm aware of only two other cases where a trans man was in a mass shooting, which would be Aberdeen and the other shooting linked above by BobJohnson (which had a second shooter who wasn't trans). For nonbinary people, I'm only aware of the Colorado Springs nightclub shooter, whose identity I suspect (for more than a few reasons)Wikipedia was taken on as a harebrained scheme to get out of hate crime charges. For trans women, I know of zero mass shooters. Even if that'd be an anomaly, it'll eventually emerge, I'm sure. Shootings are very frequent now, and when something unique about one happens we get more attention on it like this, so three trans men as mass shooters feels like a lot, but relatively it isn't. Chillpilled (talk) 04:47, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
In fairness, women in general are much less likely to commit mass shootings. If transwomen have "woman-brain", one would expect they'd behave more like women than men when it comes to mass murder.
In terms of how to identify mass shooters beforehand, one of the warning signs of mass murder seems to be suicide-ideation, so perhaps ironically, the solution may be better suicide-prevention measures. Core (yak) 05:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Oh this is some pretty unimpressive “discourse”. Some of y’all can’t really resist, huh? - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 04:45, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for improving it. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 05:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Usually trans men are cast as helpless victims in the trans culture war narrative. So I'm a little bemused at the trumpeting of this point going on, though willing to provide the facts of it... yet some of the things I see being said on Twitter about it, would be unthinkable if pushed to their logical conclusions (e.g. "ban testosterone for mentally unwell people"; it has not been confirmed he was even using testosterone btw). Chillpilled (talk) 05:35, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

On the other point the OP was making, who cares what take Conservapedia has on this incident? After all it's not like that site has any relevance whatsoever these days, except perhaps in the mind of Andy S. Kencolt (talk) 05:38, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

View from Blighty - that bloated Tory hack Ferrari is reporting it as 'a female transgender'. This being close enough to give the impression to the vast majority of listeners that the shooter was a transwoman. KarmaPolice (talk) 08:12, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Conservapedia is irrelevant, but the 2A phenomenon is not.
Again: if it isn't obvious, much of the fetish (and I speak of the fetish, not the Ordinary Joe gun owners) is largely a "culture war conservative" white male identity / grievance phenomenon, as gun manufacturers and rights organizations have successfully transformed a tool that you can use for hunting or self defense into A Political Statement (a phenom that has probably served gun manufacturers well). Sure, many of the major gun organizations will talk about the Evils of Government and Freedom and 2nd Amendment and all of that. But there's a noticeable, much-commented-on cool-off whenever the rights of minorities carrying guns is mentioned. In fact, since it's Culture War, the 2A fetish seems to be quite linked with websites that over-promote the black brute narrative (excessive coverage of black crime etc.). There's also a narrative floating around the 2A fetish sphere that only conservatives own guns for some reason (how they correlate this with their Scary Black stereotype, they never say, and the 2A forum talk on liberal gun organizations like Redneck RevoltWikipedia is, shall we say, rather enlightening.)
So basically, the reactions from that side of the Internet, as well as prominent single brain cells aligned with that side like Marjorie Taylor Greene, are predictable towards a mass shooting caused by a Hated Identity (even if it's preliminary information, what's stopped Internet, or Greene before?). Middle East Islam was a "trigger" in the past, for instance. Likewise, if the shooter ends up being a "culture war conservative" type, the reactions also will be predictable (eg denialism etc.). One can certainly also comment on the predictable reactions from the "other side" of the silly culture war binary, of course. The "fun" ones are identities that mess with the silly culture war narrative (eg the Boston Marathon bomber was a white male... and Islam!).
But this is a reason why any sort of gun control measures aren't going to happen anytime soon, IMHO; the fetish that speak loudest against gun control measures of *any* sort is tied to identity and a deep rooted issue that has dogged this nation since the founding days. It's more than just an amendment. BobJohnson (talk) 13:46, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
And what fraction of the mass shooters come from the Ammosexual families?
Let's be fair; the largest source of gun fetishization is not from the NRA, but from Hollywood itself. How awesome was that hallway scene in The Matrix? Many of our movies are little more than glorified commercials for Beretta. Core (yak) 14:11, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Not really, in terms of how it applies to laws and culture. The Matrix borrowed heavily from 1990s Hong Kong cinema, including the shoot-em-up flicks of John WooWikipedia. Hong Kong gun laws are pretty strict (even before the China takeover). Mass shootings in Hong Kong are very rare (I actually couldn't find an example Googling). A Better Tomorrow, The Killer, and Hard Boiled didn't change this.
Many mass shootings have no ideology. But extremism linked shootings of the last few years in the US have heavily been oriented towards white supremacy and related, or Venn diagram cousins like the incel movement. Since the NRA ammosexuals and white supremacy go hand and hand, I'm going to speculate the answer is "actually, a fair bit of em" of these high profile type mass shootings incidents, if you want to be honest. (Obviously, if one talks more of gun violence in general, the demographic answer is more "everyone". Well, actually, mostly men, but that's another story). BobJohnson (talk) 14:51, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
NBC reports that the shooter was ostensibly a trans man. A former school headmaster is quoted as remembering them as "...just one of our young ladies."Ariel31459 (talk) 15:42, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Wow, this is some high level discourse isn't it? "What if the shooter is... trans?". I think I can speak on the consequences of this a bit, not to do idpol but I am trans. I do expect conservatives to parrot this as a reason to ban trans people specifically from owning guns. This is a bad thing. If nothing else, the 2A exists for self defense. Depriving an actively persecuted minority group of their ability to defend themselves with guns will get people in that minority group killed. This shooting is an anomaly. The vast majority of all mass shootings are committed by cisgender white men with no history of mental illness. We obviously do not raise the question of banning men specifically from owning guns, because that's insane. Even if I was to raise that as a possibility I doubt any of you would even engage with it is because it is so obviously crazy. Conservatives will try to disarm trans people using this as an excuse. Don't take the bait, don't buy into the narrative. --Ozzyboo (talk) 15:43, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Ah, the "cis white men" claim. White men are actually slightly underrepresented, the most disproportionate demographics are black and Asian men. See here and here. And if any conservatives try to use that as an excuse to ban transgender people from having guns (and unfortunately I can see someone at least trying), I would agree that's completely ludicrous. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 15:50, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Oh, I don't expect right-wingers want to keep guns away from anyone. That's not what they do.Ariel31459 (talk) 15:54, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Almost exactly 2 years ago, a white man shot up a grocery store, and Twitter (and even here) were parroting that it was yet another white guy committing a mass shooting. Then they revealed that his name was Arabic, and suddenly the entire news story just disappeared. When the Colorado Springs shooting happened, Twitter was full of people blaming Matt Walsh et al for the shooting, and then the shooter was revealed to be NB. What happens and what you see are not always one and the same.
In terms of WHO commits the shootings, the biggest red flag for a mass shooter, albeit TOO big to be useful, is suicidal tendencies; these aren't mass murders, but mass murder-suicides. Heck, armed guards actually INCREASE the odds of a mass shooting, because for the shooter, the guard is a feature not a bug. Suicide prevention likely does more to stop mass shootings than anything else. The problem with pushing for this is that it's not too far a leap to say that anyone from a population that has high suicide rates should be barred from owning guns, i.e., Incels, Trans, etc. Core (yak) 16:23, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
No, the biggest flag is not suicidal tendencies. Most mass shooters have no record of mental illness. Additionally, the "shooter being NB" was a LIE, literally Google it. The fact that you bought it uncritically speaks to how little you care about this issue, like all conservatives do. Also, no, that is a far leap. Do we ban black people from owning guns because of their disproportionately higher suicide rate? Obviously not, that's insane. Additionally, trans people do not commit anywhere near the level of gun violence as larger population groups. This logic is completely inept. "Suicide rates mean more mass shootings, so we should ban groups with higher suicide rates from owning guns," is genuinely one of the stupidest takes I've heard on this wiki so far. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:46, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Since when do Black people have higher suicide rates? And if suicidal tendencies not the biggest red flag, there exists a bigger red flag. Please, what is this bigger red flag. Core (yak) 17:27, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
I wasn't advocating for banning trans people from owning guns, only that there's an argument that could be made. However, given that having a gun in the home MASSIVELY increases the risk of both suicides and suicide attempts, and that 1 in 5 Trans kids already attempt suicide at least once, if the Republicans really did want to reduce the number of people attending Pride rallies they'd be trying to ensure that every home has a gun. Wait a minute... Core (yak) 17:48, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Rebecca Watson did a whole video about how the biggest predictor for mass violence is a past history of misogynistic violence, as most mass shooters have a history of domestic violence or non-domestic assaults against women. Suicidality has not been established as a predictor for future violence — guns or otherwise. I really dislike this rhetoric of “propose hypothesis X without any empirical evidence and just assume X is true until someone provides evidence for an alternative hypothesis”. It’s pseudo-scientific thinking paired with an appeal to ignorance fallacy. That is not what scientific-skepticism is. You don’t accept an empirical hypothesis until external evidence has been provided, and all alternative explanations have been ruled out. Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 18:04, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Suicide prevention, mass shootings. From 538. Core (yak) 18:41, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
According to CBS, 72% of mass shooters were suicidal before or during the event. Apparently, 54% of mass shooters have a history of domestic violence. Core (yak) 18:49, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
There are studies that claim suicidality is a strong indicator for potential mass violence. Also, see NIJ report. Domestic violence can be strongly linked to mass shooting events where one of the victims had been a dating partner of the perpetrator.[7]Ariel31459 (talk) 18:54, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
Would it have killed you Cory to have cited the sources before hand? Also I wonder to what degree that “during the event” impacts those numbers. I would have only included prior-to-event suicidality if I was investigating it as a predictive factor. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 20:20, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
>"Oh, I don't expect right-wingers want to keep guns away from anyone. That's not what they do."
Well some seem on board with limiting access for "mentally ill people" by now. I've always suspected that line was ripe for abuse; in practice it can be used to strip rights from people with minor anxiety disorders or whatever else more often than anyone actually dangerous. And in this case, we see them anticipating it can be abused against transgender people. The ability to strip rights from neurodivergent people has been abused against autistic people frequently. And at the end of the day that means less people seeking help if they know that they'll be put under more legal scrutiny for it. Chillpilled (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
I mean if I am not mistaken the political right and even the NRA was pretty on board to restricting the black panther’s access to guns. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 04:52, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
Let's face it - conservatives harp on about everything LGBTQI+ because they get a boner/wet-on just thinking about them - but hety have to APPEAR all angry and repressive to hide it because everything sexual is evil if pleasurable. Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 20:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
I feel that narratives like that only serve to give cishets an out so as to relinquish themselves any responsibility for systematic oppression and bigotry against queerness. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 20:26, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
@Chill
That it's ripe for abuse, or that the ulterior motive actually is said abuse, does not mean the actual issue is invalid. I fully support "red flag" laws and taking guns away from anyone that's suicidal or otherwise violent, the obvious problem I brought up is someone could start using LGBT as a proxy for suicidal alone.
@Only
This is a light-talk page, not the articles themselves; citation isn't needed for every claim, though obviously you are allowed to ask for citations when someone makes a claim you have reason to be suspicious of. Don't continue to try to blame me if you don't like the taste of foot. Core (yak) 21:15, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
How this person chooses to identify or projects to society isn't the factor here. The only factor is easy access to guns. It took the shooter 14 minutes to kill 6 people, it could only accomplish that with a gun. Everything else is window dressing. Across the world, the number of gun deaths is directly correlated with the number of guns, period.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 23:49, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Could revenge against a bigoted system be a motive? Sure. Is that the underlying issue? No. Easy access to guns is the biggest issue as is lack of school security. It is bad when school security becomes necessary. --Trans Fem Agenda 00:40, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Security seems to increase the chance of mass shootings, not reduce them. As mentioned earlier, they are a feature not a bug for shooters. As for ease of access to guns, I suggested a month ago that maybe there should be waiting times of sorts for the gun licenses, and different licenses for bigger guns compounding the waiting times. Eg, learners permit for rifle (with a sponsor!), then after year of responsible use you get the license itself. Then another year before you get a handgun or assault rifle license. So, like 3 years between applying for first gun license and actually being able to get an AR15. It wont stop the people who already have an assault rifle license or w/e, but I dont think mass shooters plan events out 3 years in advance and if they do, that's 3 years to change their minds. Instead, they might just try mass shootings with bolt action rifles, which are admittedly good at taking out people 1x1 but not larger crowds... CorSock (talk) 01:00, 29 March 2023 (UTC)