Potentially useful regulatory distinctions

Some useful distinctions, I think:

* Regulating using a gun
* Regulating carrying a gun
* Regulating owning a gun
* Regulating parts of guns
* Regulating tools that can be used to make guns
* Regulating the information necessary to make guns
* Regulating the information necessary to make tools that can be used to make guns

Bonus distinction:

* Substantial noninfringing use
* Substantial non-horrific use

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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http://twitter.com/AwesomeRobot AwesomeRobot

Regulating ammunition!
- corydodt
  
  The Chris Rock solution.
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuX-nFmL0II
- http://daruiburns.tumblr.com/ Dlo Burns
  
  Yeah I came here to say it’s the bullets that’s the problem.
  - GlyphGryph
    
    But do we regulate using, owning, buying, making, the tools to make, or the information to make bullets? That’s the question!
    - http://daruiburns.tumblr.com/ Dlo Burns
      
      it’d be fairly useless, those genies are out of the bottle.
http://twitter.com/jeffreymcmanus Jeffrey McManus

Regulating ammunition
Regulating the price of guns, gun parts, and ammunition
rattypilgrim

Fining people whose guns get stolen (because they didn’t keep them in a locked place and also out of the reach of children).
- kringlebertfistyebuns
  
  Most safes are pretty easy for a bad guy to compromise. Good luck with that.
  - nickiter
    
    How so?
    - kringlebertfistyebuns
      
      A couple guys with pry bars can make pretty quick work of most safe. A demo on a large safe:
      
      http://youtu.be/nBhOjWHbD6M?t=2m17s
      
      Most gun safes sold aren’t even that good.
      
      And smaller safes are terrible. To wit:http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcwebertobias/2012/07/27/unsafe-gun-safes-can-be-opened-by-a-three-year-old/
      - http://daruiburns.tumblr.com/ Dlo Burns
        
        That’s still a ton of work. They’d have to be isolated, so no typical suburban smash-n-grab (unless they stole the entire safe), and you’d have to have a couple guys unwilling to rat on each other (although gangs would be ideal for that kind of thing).
      - kringlebertfistyebuns
        
        I don’t disagree. My points, however, were:
        
        1) That safes and locks are often unreliable;
        
        2) As such, penalizing gun owners who have their guns stolen (provided they actually have it locked up) and used in a crime is ridiculous.
    - kringlebertfistyebuns
      
      Oh, and trigger locks? They can be defeated by a screwdriver:
      
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P397UsoyNBc
      
      I have personally done this one when a trigger lock was stuck on one of my rifles.
      
      I’m not saying that people shouldn’t do everything they reasonably can to secure their firearms.
      
      I AM saying that uniformly penalizing people if their guns get stolen is stupid.
      - rattypilgrim
        
        Making an EFFORT to keep guns out of the wrong hands is not stupid.
        Banks, cars, your home can be broken into but that doesn’t stop people from locking them.
      - kringlebertfistyebuns
        
        How fortunate, then, that I didn’t argue that making the effort is stupid.
        
        This discussion would be a lot more intelligent if you would answer the propositions put forth, not something I didn’t write.
      - rattypilgrim
        
        I stand corrected . You did say people should do everything they can….
        That said, if evidence points to guns being stolen because they weren’t secured, then I stand by my comment those people should be fined, if not cited, for negligence on their part.
        
        This discussion would be a lot more civil if you would consider my basic premise. Whether you agree or disagree you don’t have to get so defensive.
  - wysinwyg
    
    Please. Other things being equal, a safe and gunlocks obviously make it less likely for someone to steal the guns. Yes, you can get around them; as rattypilgrim points out, it’s possible to get around a lot of things. Possible and probable are not the same thing.
    
    Face it, there’s a much lower probability of a gun getting stolen if it’s properly locked up. It requires at the very least knowledge that you can get around the locks, knowledge of how to do that, and at least a little bit of equipment that not everyone is going to carry around with them.
    
    If you don’t want to lock your guns up come up with a good excuse like “locking up the guns prevents me from using them for self-defense”. No one considers locks useless just because every lock that’s ever been devised can be broken somehow.
    - kringlebertfistyebuns
      
      I belabor my point, because you evidently missed it. I’m not arguing per se that locks and safes aren’t worthwhile, because they do indeed deter theft and use by the only casually-motivated.
      
      I am arguing against the original notion that gun owners should necessarily and uniformly be punished if their guns are stolen and used in the commission of a crime. Does that make sense?
      - rattypilgrim
        
        If a simple handgun (whatever that is) is stolen, or a run of the mill hunting rifle, then depending on if it was under lock and key or sitting on the coffee table with minors in the house there is room for discussion.
        
        But if the gun(s) are automatic multi round weapons of mass destruction the owner should face some penalty. Owners of Pit Bulls and other dogs who have gotten loose and injured or killed people are held responsible.
        
        People should be prepared for the ramifications of owning military type weapons and the consequences should they get into the wrong hands.
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Eatme-Completely/100003303282508 Eatme Completely
  
  Wonderful. Punish the victim of a crime for the crime of being a victim. Congratulations, you have discovered a whole new level of doublethink.
  - jackbird
    
    When you file a theft claim on your car or homeowners’ insurance, what happens to your rates?
  - rattypilgrim
    
    It’s called “responsibility” a word the right wing likes to throw around a lot. People whose houses are arsenals should have to account for their weapons and do their damnedest to make sure kids, thieves, or drunk spouses or partners have a very difficult time accessing them.
DoubleTee

Also:
Regulating buying a gun
Regulating defining the definition of a gun

Bonus:
Transporting (temporalily) a gun from Canada into the USA
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Dave-Nullstein/100003753218370 Dave Nullstein
  
  I say we define ”arms” as single shot muskets and be done with it.
  - http://www.facebook.com/TylerSeanWaugh Tyler Sean Waugh
    
    That wouldn’t even come close to surviving 5 minutes in a court.
http://twitter.com/GregortheMendel Gregor Mendel

Ammunition types and magazines.
http://whimsicalacious.tumblr.com/ Patrick McGorrill

I want to learn how to use a gun to make another gun.
- http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
  
  AutoGunton Theory
- nickiter
  
  Fill the lower reciever with molding material and use the result as a pattern to hammer metal over. That’s how some Afghan gunsmiths make black market AKs.
http://twitter.com/AwesomeRobot AwesomeRobot

http://i.imgur.com/Hi8Gd.gif
- noah django
  
  ＼（★´−｀）人（´▽｀★）／
  fuckin saved. probably the hardest I ever laughed at that show.
  
  oh, and uh… guns ‘r’ bad, m’kay?
- ldobe
  
  Also from the Simpsons:
  
  Lisa disguised as Jeff Boyman: “Whatcha drawing there?”
  Nelson Muntz: “Robot with guns for arms shooting a plane made out of guns that fires guns”
thaum

Regulating thinking about guns.
bo1n6bo1n6

Don’t forget to regulate Warren G.
http://openid.aliz.es/Depression Depression

In Canada use and storage and ownership were separate.
anansi133

Regulating the use of the people’s bandwidth: It belongs to us, if you’re using it in a manner that is harmful, then your usage is subject to renegotiation. I’m thinking of the Charlie Brooker video here.
- noah django
  
  link pls?
  edit: wait, was that link always there? I’m not thinking clearly, this cold I’ve got is brutal
Jaan

When lathes are outlawed only outlaws will have lathes.
- http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
  
  Every ammunition casing an industrial work of art.
  Every primer a chemist’s masterpiece.
- http://www.nathanhornby.com/ Nathan Hornby
  
  But at least they’ll be harder to come by.
David John

Require all guns to be bright pink and to emit a noise like a kazoo when fired.
- http://www.nathanhornby.com/ Nathan Hornby
  
  Now this is an idea.
Eark_the_Bunny

Sane gun laws will be very helpful but they are not the only thing needed. Guns don’t kill people, crazy people with guns kill people. You can pass all the gun laws you like but it will not prevent some crazy person like that deranged fellow in China who stabbed a bunch of children. Prevention though the proper treatment of those with mental problems is going to be essential too. We need more Doctors and fewer guns.
- Adela Doiron
  
  Stupid people, incompetent people and evil people kill with guns as well and you can’t cure that with more doctors.
  - Ipo
    
    Unless the doctors use guns.
  - https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
    
    In most (though probably not all) cases, “evil” is just shorthand for “I don’t understand what he’s upset about”
    
    People don’t get infected with evil, they become like that because that is the way their live goes for some horrible horrible reason. This is not cured with medicine.
    
    But giving people a regular option to have someone listen to their problems is a way to change it. So is valuing people more, even if we don’t understand what they’re upset about.
    - 10xor01
      
      Agreed. Evil != mentally ill. And in most of these cases, mental illness of some sort is the underlying problem.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_6LOJDBXCDHL5MVQQRLOCCJ35AY alexb
  
  Oh, so we’re proposing locking up innocent people here rather than treating obsessive gun ownership as a mental health issue itself eh? Or can one inform the other?
- AllyPally
  
  Crazy people without guns kill fewer people. My son’s school was invaded by a nutter with a hammer. One teacher got seriously hurt. My son saw the whole thing. If the loony had been carrying a gun, my son would be dead.
- jsd
  
  Stabbed and injured. Disgusting, but every one of those parents have their children.
  
  There’s 20 parents in Newtown, CT that don’t and never will because a seriously disturbed person had access to an arsenal all his own.
  - Jerril
    
    Exactly the point of gun control, right here, in this point. You can still hurt and kill people with other weapons, and it’s not even hard to improvise something. Greatest danger in the home etc etc.
    
    But it takes so much more work to kill people with other weapons that people on a rampage can be stopped before major damage is done, because victims can improvise defensive weapons that are just nearly as good as the attackers and level out the imbalance of force. Or failing that, have two or three people tackle them – charge 30 feet down an open hallway at someone with a gun aimed and a commitment to killing, that’s not going to end well for anyone without a miracle. Charge 30 feet down an open hallway at someone with a knife and a commitment to killing, that’s a different thing altogether, and odds are good that it ends with your two or three heroes being interviewed on TV from hospital or from home, not their widows.
    
    Amok, berserk, “shooting-spree”, this sort of mass-killing suicide isn’t new; what’s new is that the murderers are more successful with guns because guns are more dangerous than knifes, swords, maces, axes, picks, the grand panapoly of pole-arms, and so forth.
http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist

Add to the list:
Regulating areas where a firearm is legally permitted.
- erikistired
  
  they already do that?
  - Thorzdad
    
    Sort of. Though, the trend in the US is to allow firearms almost anywhere, and to carry them concealed.
    - nickiter
      
      Most of the mass shootings of recent years have occurred in places where guns are totally banned.
      - Jerril
        
        Is that because guns are banned? Or is that coincidental (ie we ban guns around our most valuable/vulnerable citizens?)
        
        Regardless, I wouldn’t want teachers carrying guns at school because inevitably either some dumb kid is going to steal one to show off, or we’ll have one of those “idiot saftey demo” moments, and having either in a room of 20-30 kids and surrounded by many more rooms with same is a very high density population for being hit by an accidental discharge.
        
        There’s far more teachers in school every day over the nation than spree killers. The statistical probability of bad results from armed staff make my head ache.
  - http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
    
    They do. I merely stated it to “Add to the list”.
    Without active checks like security guards and metal detectors it’s not an effective regulation but it is one and thus can be placed on the list of regulation types.
Gerald Mander

“It’s not the bullet that kills you, it’s the hole.” –Laurie Anderson
- http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=6206630 Rick Ertel
  
  Regulating holes.
  - http://twitter.com/amanicdroid Dr. Chronobiologist
    
    There’s a regulation most Republicans can support if it includes a trans-vagine scanner.
http://twitter.com/Bobdobbs7 Bob dobbs

Connecticut has some of the strictest gun laws in the nation.

In Mexico guns are pretty much outlawed, and has much more gun violence.
Do you really think more gun regulation will help?
One of the things that most school shooter have in common is that they are on prescription psychoactive drugs.
If you want to regulate something regulate homes with guns that have people on these medications. It’s not the guns fault that mentally unstable people have access to them.
- exile
  
  So not Marilyn Manson then? Not death metal? This year’s scape-goat is the mentally ill? Or is it prescription medications?
  The only thing ALL school (mall/cinema/etc.) shooters have in common is… um, shooting. Hmm, if only there was some way to limit their ability to do that.
  - erikistired
    
    well, they also have being batshit crazy in common. unless you’re suggesting it’s normal to go on a shooting spree.
    - http://twitter.com/chriscoreline chris coreline
      
      true, however its double difficult to go on a shooting spree without a gun.
- toyg
  
  Most countries regulating gun-ownership do, in fact, require extensive background checks on the individual and his/her immediate family. Divorced parents of young males with developmental problems would be refused a permit in many cases. Of course this requires health authorities to know about such individuals, something that’s easier to have with a national health service that actually cares about such things.
  
  Gun ownership is actually allowed in Europe, you know?
- foobar
  
  Wait, have I been misunderstanding the American obsession with “gun rights” all along? You lot don’t really give guns themselves rights, do you?
  - http://www.littlecirclesvt.com MikeB
    
    well, if a group of guns got together and incorporated, then… perhaps, yes.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  One of the things that most school shooter have in common is that they are on prescription psychoactive drugs.
  
  About a quarter of the population is on prescription psychoactive drugs, maybe more.
  - erikistired
    
    having been on anti-depression medication before, i can attest that they can in some cases worsen the condition. and they can make you feel really screwed up. and had i not come forward and told my doctor so, i would still be on them.
    - Jerril
      
      ”That’s nice”.
      
      I’m sorry to hear that you’ve had trouble with medication, and I’m glad to hear you have good lines of communication with your doctor, but I kind of feel like this is a “what does this have to do with the price of tea in china?” moment.
      
      Depression is not spree killing.
- http://twitter.com/Sn1ds Stiv
  
  Won’t somebody please think of the poor guns?!
  Just think about those poor little guns being melted down makes me sad :(
  
  Mexico is in the currently in the middle of the bloodiest war on earth. So there’s that too.
- David Pawlyk
  
  In Mexico, the law is pretty-much outlawed.
- https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
  
  You should really read Maggie’s Post about this:
  http://boingboing.net/2012/12/14/what-science-says-about-gun-co.html
  
  Laws usually reflect the culture or opinions of voters (at least to some extent). In order to change how (and how often) they are used, you need to change how they are perceived, which will then change everything else mostly by itself.
  And then there’s the media side, the social side, the educational side, the cultural side of this thing … an airplane does crash because a single component failed, and humans do not become like this because a single thing went wrong.
  
  Especially with Christmas coming up, I’d say that we should maybe try and be nice to each other for a change. That includes cutting down on our use of stereotypes. That’s not easy, but let’s try.
  
  Regulating using stereotypes and/or easy answers
- http://twitter.com/z0phi3l Anibal Perez
  
  No one wants to deal with that side of the issue, it’s easier to blame guns than the medications too many people take usually for BS reasons, and not being properly treated, and no throwing pills at the person is not treatment it’s an expensive bandaid
- Gerald Mander
  
  I’d be willing to bet that it’s nowhere near as difficult to get a gun in Connecticut as it is to get a driver’s license.
- Luther Blissett
  
  Need. DISLIKE. Button.
  Your sincerely comparing a country like Mexico to the US? Have you EVER been out of town, or are you just out of your mind?
Mitchell Glaser

There should be a psychological survey that qualifies you to own a gun. The first question should be: do you want to own a gun? Answering yes to this question should be the first mark against you.
- erikistired
  
  keep setting back the possibility of any type of regulation with ridiculous positions. thanks.
  - Mitchell Glaser
    
    Absurdity can be thought provoking. Arthur C. Clarke wrote a book where in the future computers were used to choose the ideal president. The first rule the computer applied is that the candidate should never have expressed any desire for the job.
    
    I feel the same way about gun ownership. I don’t trust anybody who wants one to be calm enough to own one.
  - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=220000259 Hans Landon-Lane
    
    the idea of a psychological survey is not in itself absurd – in fact, it’s required in Japan. http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/07/a-land-without-guns-how-japan-has-virtually-eliminated-shooting-deaths/260189/
Stuart Carter

In y the UK guns are pretty much outlawed and we have VERY low rates of fun crime, and we kinda like it that way, too.
- Ipo
  
  ”Fun crime” normally does not involve guns.
- David John
  
  Glum crimes only please, we’re British!
- https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
  
  I love that regular policemen are not carrying guns in the UK. Which all the more makes me abhor those types with automatic weapons _in hand_ running about train and tube stations. Please make them go away, they scare me!
David John

Remember how, after nearly 3000 people died on 9/11, the US government passed the patriot act, went to war with two countries, invented the TSA, the DHS, killer robots, and eroded civil liberties?

Would be great if they could get even halfway as excited over the homegrown terrorism killing four times as many people every year.
- John Napsterista
  
  Yes. Let’s react to senseless, horrible tragedy with more security theater, flushing away more of our civil rights and unleashing our collective rage on people who had absolutely nothing to with the tragedy in the first place.
  - David John
    
    That’s not really what I’m suggesting, but now that I think about it: a killer drone in every school would probably be more readily approved by Congress than any gun control measure.
    - GyroMagician
      
      If the drone is programmed to kill anyone carrying a gun, maybe we’re getting towards a solution?
      
      ‘Oh, it was a toy gun? The drone can’t tell the difference. Sorry’. On second thoughts, let’s just get rid of the guns.
      - https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
        
        Surely, the response to potential violence must always be actual violence, as hard as possible — proven recipe.
  - http://twitter.com/Sn1ds Stiv
    
    Every day I curse my government for taking away my civil liberties!
    
    Without feeling that comforting bulge under my jacket I feel like I could be snuffed out at any time, like a candle in a stiff breeze.
    
    Damn you, interfering UK government!
  - http://tryingsense.blogspot.com/ R_Young
    
    *Definition of Civil rights may vary depending on your location, and may or may not include the right to own or carry tools invented for efficiently penetrating flesh, bone and brains using chemically propelled metal pellets.
  - Luther Blissett
    
    Like the list Cory proposed: totally collective rage. Nothing to do with killing people: access to guns.
    
    Right.
- http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1706514600 Valerie Metzger
  
  We got so excited we killed over a million more, and set on our way to “feel safe” by decimating our civil rights.
  
  No, it would not be great for america to get that excited again. There is no boogeyman left alive in this situation.
uuuggghhhbb

Federal/State/pedantic
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000604446906 Neil Mcintyre

Nobody talks about why these young men do this. Clearly, it’s a complex issue, but there are some the things I would love to see debated beyond the obvious hot button issue of Gun control

The first is this glorification of homicide in American Drama. How many cop shows do you need where the plot revolves around a murderer, who is in turn predictably legally murdered by our heroes. Culturally, Americans seem to have embraced the use of lethal force as the ultimate way to solve problems.

The second thing I don’t see discussed is the divisiveness of Social and Political discussion. When Media and Politicians ratchet up the fear for political advantage, or an edge in the debate, it is clear that a percentage of the population buys the message, subconsciously at least. When Politicians ‘raise the stakes’ again and again, some people just think the sky must be about to fall, and that kind of thinking can rationalize anything. A little more nuanced, rational discussion on things would help as well as a willingness to say ‘Well it’s not how I want it to be, but it is how the majority want it’.

So if you want regulation, lets start with regulating the number of a) gun deaths b) Use of Guns to threaten death or bodily harm on prime time TV, and move homicide to become an NC-17 classification in Movies and games.
- David John
  
  Are you suggesting regulations targeting fictional violence over regulations targeting actual violence? Because that’s the sort of scapegoat thinking that enables the problem.
  - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1425234843 Stefán Sigurjónsson
    
    I guess it is more about making violence have more weight in the movie and entertainment classifications, rather than skin. So 12 year olds could rather see a boob than an AK-47 on TV. Currently it is the other way around.
- wysinwyg
  
  Nobody talks about why these young men do this.
  
  You sure about that? I seem to remember for a few weeks after the CO shooting everyone was talking about “why do these young men do this?” And something similar seems to be going on right now.
  - http://twitter.com/z0phi3l Anibal Perez
    
    But as usual everyone ignored the real issues and went looking for the easiest scapegoat, the guns. The issue is that instead of treating mental health issues we drug them up with psychoactive drugs and then act like we don’t know the real reason they went off the deep end, and guns and access to them aren’t the issue, the drugs and lack of real treatment is the problem, and even with Obamacare we don’t deal with it properly
    - Jerril
      
      No, no, they went for the easiest scapegoat, Marylin Manson and Rammstein. That was in the first 24-48 hours. I think then they may have blamed the ability to wear long coats for a bit.
      
      But when things settled down the consensus is very much that one boy was a sociopathic monster and the other was a vulnerable depressive who was bullied and manipulated into going Thelma and Louise with him.
grimc

Potentially useful statistics

• 20% of US gun owners own 65% of the guns
• The US is 5% of the world population, owns 50% of guns worldwide
- benher
  
  Regulation of statistics. ;)
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Eatme-Completely/100003303282508 Eatme Completely
  
  And your point is?
  - http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1425234843 Stefán Sigurjónsson
    
    He is presenting statistics. Statistics on their own don’t have points or opinions. You have to do that bit. So, either you think “America is the freeest country on earth, fuck yeah!” or “That is a lot of guns” or “I wonder why that is”, etc.
Paul Boudreaux

* Regulating the tools that are capable of carrying the information necessary to make tools that can be used to make guns.
* Regulating societal groups thought most likely to break one of the aforementioned items.* Regulating the thought patterns necessary to create or discover one of the aforementioned items.
uuuggghhhbb

*Regulate tools that can make tools that make guns
*Regulate information that can make tools that make tools that make guns
*Regulate tools
*Regulate information.
camnotthebutler

Good evidence all over the place that limiting powerful guns reduces massacres and murders. It won’t stop them, it will dramatically limit them. QED
- kringlebertfistyebuns
  
  Meh…there are countries that have high rates of gun ownership but have far less violent crime, and countries that have far lower gun ownership rates but have higher gun homicide rates.
  
  http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/interactive/2012/jul/22/gun-ownership-homicides-map
  - wysinwyg
    
    You seem a lot more excited about criticizing solutions than finding them.
    - kringlebertfistyebuns
      
      It’s difficult to take any proposed “solutions” seriously when the people proposing them don’t appear to have a grasp of the facts.
- nickiter
  
  Massacres, yes, murders, no. There is no strong correlation between gun bans and murder rates; access to guns is a less strong driver of violent crime than other factors like poverty and enforcement. In order to lower the murder rate, help for the desperate goes much further than gun laws (as evidenced by the low murder rates in countries with successful social welfare programs.)
  - wysinwyg
    
    I’d probably settle for fewer massacres.
geessebeschleier

In our tiny country (the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg), owning guns is completely legal, we even have a “European” version of our permit allowing us to “travel” to other countries with a max of 12 firearms (when i say travel , I mean to a hunt or a shooting range/competition)
Concealed carry is allowed in very rare cases for civilians
Having a few contacts in the right places , I can say we have around +-90 k registered firearms with civilians for a population of +-500 k.
Add another +- 15 k for unregistered/illegally owned ones.(probably more)
All that to say that we are quite well armed around here and i never saw anyone blowing a fuse and massacre innocent people.
One reason maybe being that anyone having registered weapons and being reported for excessive drinking, domestic violence, treatment linked to depression etc…, will be stripped from his guns and permits.
Anyone behaving like an ass on the range will be reported similarly.
Problem is , what about the black market stash he hid in his barn/garage and no one knows about.
Germany has a very strict system (and an evaluation) and still we have seen a number of shootings happening there.
What I see from here, all the way in the Shire , is that something is rotten in the U.S. of A.
Some say it’s because weapons are so easy to get to, I’m not so sure about that. I strongly believe it is ultimately about a society, it’s members and how they are (not) being taken care of .
- http://tryingsense.blogspot.com/ R_Young
  
  “I strongly believe it is ultimately about a society, it’s members and how they are (not) being taken care of .”
  
  I think that in the end, this is probably the right answer. This, and how many semi-automatic casualness weapons those people who are not being taken care of have access to.
- Luther Blissett
  
  My dear Lëtzebuerger, the number of kills by gunfire in Germany is directly related to gun access. Every single death is a direct outcome of broken regulations or illegal possession. And while there are approximately 70 million people in Germany, the death toll by gunfire is low compared to the US. As in Lëtzebuerg.
http://imcravingpresidency.tumblr.com/ SedanChair

So, we’re what, going to round up people’s guns? You’re gonna show up at gun owners’ houses and ask for their guns?

The point is to have fewer shootings, right?
- peregrinus
  
  Buyback like Australia:
  
  The gun buy-back scheme started on 1 October 1996 and concluded on 30 September 1997.[23] The buyback purchased and destroyed more than 631,000 firearms
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia
- millie fink
  
  $1000 per gun buyback, limited to certain kinds of guns.
  
  Nice economic stimulus too.
  - http://imcravingpresidency.tumblr.com/ SedanChair
    
    Number of guns in America: 270-310 million
    - millie fink
      
      Size of the last stimulus, iirc: 700 billion
      
      Percentage of guns likely to be turned in: 10? 20?
sectio

The Supreme Court will rule that concealed firearms be allowed in all spaces, public and private.
All patriotic Americans will carry firearms most of their lifes, to guard against tyranny.

Law enforcement will carry military weaponry, wear full body armour and travel in IFV:s and armored helicopters at all times to protect society from the armed crazies.

To protect the children, black pods with CCTV systems and robot-controlled machine guns will be mounted around and inside all public buildings.
These will be supplemented with cruising helicopter drones and high-altitude dirigibles.

The algorithms controlling the robot weapons will be classified and shielded from the public for reasons of national security.
They will make sure not to interfere when law-abiding Americans stand their ground against unarmed threats, while instantly taking out bad people making sudden and suspicious movements.
The industry building these advanced and trusted systems will become rich, amass huge influence, and will thus be given immunity from wrongful-death claims.

The American people will finally be secure from all threats to their safety and freedom alike.
- acidrain69
  
  And to think, the only thing preventing it is patriotic americans like yourself with high capacity clips and assault rifles.
  
  Thank you for your service
  /s
- http://twitter.com/chriscoreline chris coreline
  
  ’All patriotic Americans will carry firearms most of their lifes, to guard against tyranny.’
  
  *streightface*
arikol

As has been pointed out, there are also guns in Europe, yet there are fewer shootings. There are multiple reasons for that, some are socioeconomic in nature.

However, there are some seemingly very obvious reasons for our high gun ownership and low gun crime.
1: Mostly hunting weapons (semi-automatic, spary-fire weapons, and hand guns are not common, and quite hard to get)
2: There are some background checks
3: To get a gun license you have to pass a course about guns and gun safety4: Rules about the STORAGE of guns. This last one is a biggie, as it reduces both accidental shootings (shooting your child because you though he was a burglar) and means that the kitchen drawers aren’t filled with an Uzi and ammo for Psycho Jr. to take as he exits the building.Those are the ones I see as being practical. Guns need not be outlawed, just add the requirements of a course, safe storage, and don’t sell so many non-hunting guns (make it just a bit harder to get new ones). The ones that already own these guns will hang on to theirs, and it will be a little harder to get new ones.
- geessebeschleier
  
  are you in the UK ? sounds like it
  Hunting weapons are a minority here (in Lux) , there is no legal difference between a semi auto rifle and a hunting rifle and/or a hand gun, any gun is a firearm.
  Full auto’s can be purchased but not used (yes i know …) we have a carry permit (not concealed carry) and a detention permit , the detention one is basically for collection firearms and knives (yes knife carry is prohibited here too, talking about combat/hunting knives and swords)
  Background checks are minimal , basically show a crime free record .
  One difference though, you will be called in for a short interview at the local police station and they are supposed to check your storage (which never happens)
  I know for a fact that .223 semi autos are not being sold freely in France anymore, or rather that they are now in a category that makes it almost impossible for a civilian to purchase (last death cases i remember of in France were due to .22 LR , which are still freely available)
- http://twitter.com/wingland Will England
  
  Unfortunately, all of that was already in place in CT. Training, locks, permits, regulation and ban of assault-looking weapons -
  Permit to purchase handgunFBI and State background check
  Training course
  Fingerprints
  and a high licence fee14 day waiting period to purchase handgunPermit required to transport handgun, even to the rangeGuns must be stored unloaded in a locked container All transfers, even private party sales, are subject to having a permit and are registered and tracked through a state databaseAll ‘assault weapons’ are registered since 1993.Cosmetic features and some functional features are banned (bayonet, pistol grip, etc) since 1993.Allowed police seizure of weapons with sworn warrant of ‘danger to others’.
Nick Kukich

Enact an outright ban on all guns tomorrow. Fat lot of good it will do to address the many millions of privately owned guns already out there. Even if you forcibly confiscated all of the registered firearms, there’d still be enough in circulation that they’d be cheap and available.

It’s a bit late to put the toothpaste back in the tube.

Besides, as awful as these instances of gun violence are, cheeseburgers and mongo-sized pepsis kill FAR more people. And, overall, school violence is actually very low. These are statistical corner cases.

It seems to me that it would make much more sense to implement better methods to identify and treat mentally-ill kids and improve schools in general – smaller classes, better compensated teachers, better in-school counseling, etc.

Or, we could do what we’re about to do: make a bunch of noise over it, waste a bunch of money and effort on legislation that will either fail or get gutted by the time it’s implemented and find ourselves in the exact place we started.
- erikistired
  
  Only crazy people think an outright ban would ever happen. Stricter laws regarding purchase would be a better start. It wouldn’t have helped in this case though, as all of the weapons were (allegedly) purchased by a capable adult, who was then killed using the weapons by her mentally unstable son.
- https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
  
  Whatever you can do, it cannot solve the problem within a fortnight.
  And I think everyone who thinks about this a little longer wil agree that no single measure can help here. It’s all a complicated mess, and you don’t just switch it off with a law.
  If there _is_ a change in weapon-related laws, it will have to be accomanied by a lot of other legislative, executive and other changes that need to happen, and it must happen over a period of time.
  
  Arguing against any simple solution like this is effectively arguing a strawman. Outlawing guns would not have changed this persons actions significantly in the short term, neither would outlawing games, music or movies, forced religious “education”, punishing every mildly suspicious behaviour, ignoring every mildly suspicious behaviour, medicating or otherwise treating every mildly suspicious behaviour.
- millie fink
  
  @google-8951a767487a18dda9c79c84ce2196b3:disqus
  
  $1000 per gun buyback, limited to certain kinds of guns. Nice economic stimulus too.
- wysinwyg
  
  Does it ever seem to anyone else that people making this argument are actually bragging about the fact that, although gun control might be a good way to keep innocent people from dying, it’s too late and you can’t take my fucking guns away?
peregrinus

Ah – if the gun ‘lobby’ had its way, we’d regulate regulating. Then regulate that. Reggerlaters, mount up!
peregrinus

Regulate Walmart! http://www.walmart.com/ip/Bushmaster-M4A3-.223-REM-16-Patrol-Carbine/19235996
peregrinus

Regulation is full of pitfalls (but must be tightened). Just stop doing business with any company, store, financial advisor – anyone – who has anything to do with the supply of deadly weapons. Money talks.

Oh, and I’m with Morgan Freeman. Regulate the disclosure of information about suspects, victims, locations, methods in these incidents.
- Nick Kukich
  
  I agree that you should vote with your wallet. Sadly, I don’t think it will do anything to curb gun violence. Besides, what constitutes a deadly weapon? Even if you restrict it to guns. Does that include hunting rifles and shotguns?
  
  As for regulating disclosure of information regarding suspects in these cases, that’s effectively censorship of the press. While one would hope that they’d have the tact to avoid dwelling on these individuals, telling them what they can and can’t report is, arguably, a very bad idea.
  - peregrinus
    
    Yeah, I know. Free speech is critical. But I totally buy into the “they got fame I’ll get fame” school.
    
    Maybe there’s a simpler solution. Invest massively in laser weapons. Surely they wouldn’t be defined as “firearms” under the 2nd Amendment! Or regulate the sale of gun lubricant – let ‘em all rust away over the next 50 years.
    - Atomic Cow
      
      Unfortunately ordinary motor oil makes an excellent weapon lube.
    - http://twitter.com/dargaud Guillaume Dargaud
      
      ”Or regulate the sale of gun lubricant – let ‘em all rust away over the next 50 years.”
      You’ll end up with a lot of guns smelling of MacDonald old grease !
  - https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken
    
    In Germany at least, the names of suspects or victims are not given by the police, and News usually don’t report them even if they have them. Especially for suspects who turn out not guilty, but also for victims and their families this is very good. Under the influence of other countries’ reporting habits, this is eroding, and this year there was a witch hunt for a guy who later turned out completely innocent, but now everyone knew his name. Lots of people and at least one newspaper had a lot of apologizing to do afterwards. I think personal data of people involved in crimes (or accidents for that matter) does not belong in the public, and it does not add substance to the story, it just sells it better.
  - Aneurin Price
    
    > that’s effectively censorship of the press
    
    In all honestly, that sounds like a fucking great idea with no drawbacks.
    
    I think the idea that the press should have free reign to do whatever the hell they want to has been tried extensively and been shown conclusively to be disastrously harmful to basically everyone, and I would fully support the censorship or even outright ban of profit-making news media, the vile shitbags.
peregrinus

Regulate the ‘militia’ that the 2nd Amendment mentions (not in passing).

‘A well regulated militia being necessary…’ (fuck the comma in the other version, it’s an 18th century grammatical thing)

Switzerland has a militia: ’Switzerland does not have a standing army, instead opting for a peoples’ militia for its national defence. The vast majority of men between the ages of 20 and 30 are conscripted into the militia and undergo military training, including weapons training. The personal weapons of the militia are kept at home as part of the military obligations; Switzerland thus has one of the highest militia gun ownership rates in the world’

See that bit about ‘vast majority of men’? Big numbers.

Compare and contrast gun homicide rates USA vs Switzerland: USA 2.98 gun homicides per 100,000 population in 2009; Switzerland … 0.72.

Make of that what you will.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Second_Amendment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Switzerland
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-states
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/switzerland
- Dave Lloyd
  
  Was the whole point of a regulated milita to be an alternative to a standing army which various of the founding fathers feared would be used by the govt to oppress its citzenry (having plenty of evidence from the British Army)?
  
  Maybe the US should choose between a standing army and the 2nd amendment.
  - peregrinus
    
    I didn’t quite follow that, but “regulated” made sense to me, especially in the context of my comment.
    The US govt has plenty of armed forces within its borders that could be used for oppression if they chose. DEA, FBI, Police, Army Reserves, so on. The process of voting people into power carries the inherent responsibility of a little “know your customer” with it – so that you don’t vote in a crazed tyrant.
    
    Why can’t the US regulate its militia well, like Switzerland does?
    
    I can’t quite get a fix on where you’re coming from or what you’re saying. Apologies.
    - Dave Lloyd
      
      Sorry that was less coherent than it could have been. Both Jefferson and Madison wrote heavily against having a standing army, preferring militias to defend the state. My understanding of the history behind the 2nd Amendment is that is was supposed to be instead of having a permanent standing army.
      
      So, perhaps the US should disband its standing army and replace it with regulated militias instead – just as Switzerland.
      But you don’t want both!
Yacko

Make any violation of noise laws punishable by death.
tomassino

good luck with your gun problem America, you really need it
jsd

I have to imagine that there is substantial overlap between the group that wants no gun regulations and the group that thinks decent health care, mental health care, school funding, and well paid teachers are pinko commie conspiracies to destroy America.

It’s really odd seeing people here advocate for better mental health services in place of gun regulations. If the insane opposition to the pathetic health care law already put into place is indicative of the wider population, the same group that vocally opposes gun regulation is the same group opposing decent health care. According to them, either route is a non-starter.
- acidrain69
  
  We call them republicans.
- am.w
  
  It’s just “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” 2.0. If gun violence can be blamed on an already stigmatized minority, we don’t have to confront the idea that their toys are a big problem.
rwsll

Prosecute pill pushers like bartenders who “overserve”.
- millie fink
  
  pill pushers have too many high-paid lawyers and lobbyists.
class_enemy

Regulating media hysteria.

Why just go after one constitutional amendment??
peregrinus

Create a daisy-chain of civil responsibility all along the ‘value’ chain of weapons manufacture and distribution.

i.e. Bushmaster and the ammo suppliers would now be supporting and compensating the families and community of Newton.

Unworkable? Isn’t the USA the country of “just make it work”?
rdbms

smash the looms

return to an agrarian culture
Tetsubo Kanamono

In reference to the original list:

None of the above.
http://twitter.com/pickledbeatnik pickledbeatnik

Didn’t BoingBoing do an article a while back about a 3d printed gun that was fully functional? Oh wait, they did.

http://boingboing.net/2012/12/04/3d-printed-gun-fires-6-shots.html
- millie fink
  
  Is it a semiautomatic?
  
  Will it work in an automatic or semiauto way with lengthy ammo clips?
  
  If no, then those two sensible bans would still help.
mikedt

Short of going door to door and taking all guns away from everybody I don’t know how you can prevent the mass murders that seem to be a part of the American psyche. It might be the violence in movies that we like so much or it might be the 24 hour news cycle that creates a mythology around the mass murderer that makes this more and more common.

I know the NRA would suggest we just arm everyone – emergency shotguns in every classroom. Mass murders would probably go down since somebody will take out the perp before he gets to far. But on the other hand simple everyday arguments would probably turn into gunfights.
crimpers

Regulating the maximum angle of the slippery slope argument used to derail any potential progress.
signsofrain

Change the media conversation surrounding mass killings. Report what happened, then stop reporting it until substantial new information is available. The talking heads and pundits should do no more than sympathize and let viewers know how to help the victims through donations or other means. No politics. Stop talking about “preventing tragedies like these” that’s fucking bullshit, no legal policy is going to stop a determined crazy person from doing a crazy thing. In matters of public policy, focus on destigmatizing and treating mental illness. Yes, weapons are a problem but they’re not THE problem.
millie fink

Melt the guns.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBGc5h1yWHQ

1982! These arguments sure are nothing new. Why have we made so little progress?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Eatme-Completely/100003303282508 Eatme Completely

Forget the idea of regulating the use of tools or information. You can use the same tools to make brooms and furniture. There’s no intrinsic difference between gun-making tools and furniture-making tools; a drill press is a drill press no matter what’s under the work head. There are shops in Afghanistan that make AK 74s using nothing but hammers and hand saws and rattail files.

And there’s no way to regulate “information needed to make guns” or “information needed to make tools to make guns.” There’s no way to delineate a difference between that information and any other kind. Information on how to use a drill press is the same in all cases. There’s no way to say that talking about using a drill press is legal if you want to make furniture but it’s illegal if you want to make an M1911 slide.

All the other types of regulations you mentioned – there are already tens of thousands of laws on the books that cover just exacty those subjects.
- Luther Blissett
  
  While your are right about information, this one is a nutter:
  
  There are shops in Afghanistan that make AK 74s using nothing but hammers and hand saws and rattail files.
  
  Right, and the ammunition is made by grinding charcoal and some minerals?
http://twitter.com/jhritz jhritz

I suggest adding a tax on gunpowder. Smokeless gun powder is very difficult to manufacture and gets around background checks, gun buybacks and other methods for reducing gun violence that just scratch the surface. Raising the price of bullets sounds good, but its relatively easy to manufacture bullets in the black market.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/enact-immediate-federal-excise-tax-smokeless-gun-powder-200/BvLkM83t?utm_source=wh.gov&utm_medium=shorturl&utm_campaign=shorturl
- Daemonworks
  
  You say this as though it’s hard to make gunpowder.
ikegently

What if we just did everything possible to reduce the number of guns. Every single thing. Let’s make it illegal to buy and sell all assault weapons. All semi automatic weapons. All handguns. Let’s have buy back programs so people turn in the guns they already have.

Would every violent death be done away with? No. Would more people get shot and killed because we have fewer guns? Also no. Would people who enjoy hunting and target shooting be inconvenienced? I don’t fucking care.
artbyjcm

Regulating stuff that came make guns? Say goodbye to 3D printers then.
DewiMorgan

I’m not sure that talking about guns makes sense until another question is answered.

In the UK, there are much higher population density and alcohol issues than the US. The most common murder method is stabbing.

You would expect, then, that with the presence of a better weapon, namely guns, and with less of a binge-drinking culture, and lower population density, that stabbings would be less frequent, per capita, in the US.

But it’s not. Fatal stabbings are more common in the US per capita. Shootings with non-handguns are about the same level as stabbings, and shootings with handguns four times higher than those.

So what is it that makes Americans want to kill each other so much more often than other cultures?