Understanding guns in the USA: A fresh look

[clakclak]

I always thought the US Navy (and those that might be shooting at them) might generally be using rather different projectiles than small arms rounds?[...]

Correct me if I am wrong, but according to this article, gangs in Chicago use more and more Ar-15 and Ak-47 style weopens lately. If I am not completely missinformed than those fire rounds you will also find in warzones. Sure they don't have bigger machine guns like 50.cal's or the russian 14.5mm rounds, but the russian 7.62mm round (fired by the AKM) and the NATO 5.56mm rounds (fired by the US M16/M4) are also pretty common in todays warzones.

Pretty sure he's talking about even higher caliber shells than those - like howitzer size. You don't usually have sea battles where sailors are firing at each other with personal armaments, is his point, I think.

Ah ok that makes sense. I came to the conclusion that he meant guns used in non naval battles, because the article he linked to stated that Navy medics are embedded with the US marines during their operations.

A howitzer wound probably is totally different from a gunshot, but to be honest naval battles today (don't happen really) are not done with howitzers but with ship to ship missiles.

[Morkonan]

I watched a video the other week there, it was a mock school shooting with an armed teacher protecting the school kids. So they did the run and the guy turns around to the pro arm the teachers at the end and asked so how do you think he did. The pro armed teacher guy was so proud with the, now that's why we need to arm teachers, the other guy says but he just shot and killed one of the kids. The pro guy goes, it doesn't matter as he would have saved other kids from being shot.

That's the mentality of a pro gun shooter, kids lives only matter so long as it is just the good guys who are shooting and killing them. He honestly could not see anything wrong with a school teacher shooting one of his kids, he did not give a damn about a kid being shot and killed by the teacher. OH and he was the principle of the school where the teacher worked, don't know how the teacher felt about him shooting one of the kids.

And, then you said...

Honestly though why do we care, it's just Americans after all, it's what they want. Just let them shoot and kill each other, so long as they keep it to themselves why should we care, it's not our kids after all. All we have to do is keep our kids safe, that's what really matters.

You don't see the irony, here?

[felter]

I watched a video the other week there, it was a mock school shooting with an armed teacher protecting the school kids. So they did the run and the guy turns around to the pro arm the teachers at the end and asked so how do you think he did. The pro armed teacher guy was so proud with the, now that's why we need to arm teachers, the other guy says but he just shot and killed one of the kids. The pro guy goes, it doesn't matter as he would have saved other kids from being shot.

That's the mentality of a pro gun shooter, kids lives only matter so long as it is just the good guys who are shooting and killing them. He honestly could not see anything wrong with a school teacher shooting one of his kids, he did not give a damn about a kid being shot and killed by the teacher. OH and he was the principle of the school where the teacher worked, don't know how the teacher felt about him shooting one of the kids.

And, then you said...

Honestly though why do we care, it's just Americans after all, it's what they want. Just let them shoot and kill each other, so long as they keep it to themselves why should we care, it's not our kids after all. All we have to do is keep our kids safe, that's what really matters.

You don't see the irony, here?

The first part shows how much Americans actually care about the safety of their kids, while the second part is why should we care if they as shown in the first part don't care and that we shouldn't care. We should just sit back and watch as they self exterminate themselves. Stupidity isn't contagious after all, so it's not like we are going to catch it from them.

[Rednoahl]

I don't live in the USA so I don't think I've a valid opinion to give, and I'm certainly not well informed on the whole gun situation over there. Frankly I don't think it's any of my business; like Spain has bullfighting and that isn't popular with a lot of folk who don't live there and I don't live in Spain either so don't have an opinion to share.

However what does appear to me to be true for rather a lot of nations is that youth doesn't seem to know the difference between fame and infamy and a hell of a lot of the youth want fame at ANY price.

Worse is that young men are being bombarded by media, schools and universities stating they are evil by virtue of their birth - especially white lads. Young men at the peak of their physical strength and at their most fragile mentally are getting told all the time that they are evil. Some of those young men will crack under those circumstances - I can understand because I've been there and nearly did crack.

Those young men who don't crack I expect to eventually become a tribe of sorts - a violent one at that. The seeds are already there with the alt-right and antifa. Why do I think this? Because that was the 1970's I grew up in, and history has a bad habit of repeating itself.

[clakclak]

[...]

Worse is that young men are being bombarded by media, schools and universities stating they are evil by virtue of their birth - especially white lads. Young men at the peak of their physical strength and at their most fragile mentally are getting told all the time that they are evil.[...]

As a young white man currently in University I have no clue what you are talking about. Could you elaborate?

[...]I don't live in the USA so I don't think I've a valid opinion to give[...]

And I don't life in North Korea, yet I still think that my criticism of the regime is valid, the same way some of the criticism about Germany (my country) coming from the outside is very valid.

[Antilogic]

Data

https://gfycat.com/PartialThunderousHerculesbeetle

[Morkonan]

The first part shows how much Americans actually care about the safety of their kids, while the second part is why should we care if they as shown in the first part don't care and that we shouldn't care. We should just sit back and watch as they self exterminate themselves. Stupidity isn't contagious after all, so it's not like we are going to catch it from them.

I don't have to add anything at all. Your commentary cuts its own legs off, all by itself. It's a truly remarkable work of literary and moral engineering.

[JSDD]

Whenever there's a problem to solve, step 1 is always trying to understand the other. This case is no different.

To people outside the USA, it all seems simple - too many guns = too many shootings. And we are baffled as to why the Americans permit this - it seems like it should be a no-brainer.

i'm outside of usa, and i think its another way of thinking ...

in the us, not all people live in big cities, with several top-equipped police stations nearby (maybe with a swat team etc). burglaries for example are a HUGE problem in germany and its growing like a tumor. in the us (e.g. texas) you must be suicidal to dare breaking into another house ... or prepared to commit murder.

i think its a good thing that people there have the right to own guns, even sub-machine guns. what is f*cked up are the regulations ... even a child can own a AK47 in texas. "gun-show loop hole" is another no-brainer for most of us (except altright terrorists) ... reasonable restrictions / regulations is the key, but with that "show" thats running in the capital NOTHING will be done. the "freak show" in congress hasnt started with trump, it has started earlier when the "tea party" terrorists got into congress ... trump is just the tip of te iceberg. reasonable republicans (they actually do exist!) cant open their mouth without being publicly "excommunicated" by the "populist hardliners" ...

[clakclak]

[...]burglaries for example are a HUGE problem in germany and its growing like a tumor. [...]

There were 10% less buglaries 2016 than in 2015. (151.000 burglaries in total) As of this moment I was not able to find numbers for 2017, but according to an article from December 2017, it is expected that there were less burglaries in 2017 than in 2016, so the number sunk again.

So how are burglaries spreading like a tumor? Don't get me wrong, there are still to many but in 2016 and 2017 it seems like the situation improved quite a bit.

[...]in the us (e.g. texas) you must be suicidal to dare breaking into another house ... or prepared to commit murder.[...]

Than explain to me why there are a lot more burglaries in Texas than in Germany. Taking the number from the Spiegel article above there are 188 burlaries per 100.000 people in Germany. And the number for Texas is 548. According to this site there were 148.000 burlaries in Texas in 2016. The total number is almost the same, but Texas has a lot smaller population than Germany.


Edit: Lot of edits, sorry for that.

[Morkonan]

...Than explain to me why there are a lot more burglaries in Texas than in Germany. ...

There's nothing worth stealing in Germany?

;P

Sorry, I couldn't help myself! Yes, Germany is a great country, plenty of stuff there worth stealing!

In all honesty, there's a pretty bad drug problem going on in the US. These are really "nasty" drugs, like "crystal meth", several different types of opiates, and then weird crap that drives people nuts. There's also, still, things like heroin, crack, and the usual round of suspects. This isn't all that's responsible, IMO, but it may be an aggravating factor that Germany doesn't have as serious a problem with as some regions in the US.

There's also the "definition" problem. Does the article/study correctly categorize these crimes so that they are equitably defined? "Theft" definitions could differ between the US and Germany. That sort of thing has been responsible for a great many errors in comparisons between the criminal reporting in different countries.

PS: For US information, I would be extremely suspicious of any "study" that did not directly refer to the FBI criminal statistics. That's the clearing-house for information of that sort. "Some" state agencies may have reliable numbers, but I'd still prefer the ones they felt were safe to report to the FBI. Because of the controversy surrounding such subjects, I'm suspicious of any reports that don't directly correlate with FBI data.

[Observe]

Trying to figure out a single cause for gun violence, is like trying to find a single reason for people becoming alcoholics. It's not that simple.

Regardless of which country has the most crime, all nations need to take steps on many fronts to reduce crime in general. Drug abuse, mental health, economic security, healthcare, education and yes, gun control are all factors that need to be addressed.

Reasonable people of all political persuasions should be able to find common-sense grounds for limiting firearms to those who are likely to be responsible with them.

Age is certainly an element to consider. I would be for limiting gun purchases to those over 25 - when the brain is fully developed and good judgement has reached some maturity.

[clakclak]

[...]

PS: For US information, I would be extremely suspicious of any "study" that did not directly refer to the FBI criminal statistics. That's the clearing-house for information of that sort. "Some" state agencies may have reliable numbers, but I'd still prefer the ones they felt were safe to report to the FBI. Because of the controversy surrounding such subjects, I'm suspicious of any reports that don't directly correlate with FBI data.

Just in case that was still adressed at me, the website I linked for the US numbers refers directly to the FBI report as it's source, whereas the German one refers to the BKA.

[BugMeister]

Trying to figure out a single cause for gun violence, is like trying to find a single reason for people becoming alcoholics. It's not that simple.

- take an extreme situation as an example:
- imagine a room full of mentally ill people
- flood the room with guns and watch what happens..
- are the people in the room safer without the guns?

- weapons are dangerous..
- that's why they are called weapons..
- guns are weapons..




PS - if we're talking barbies, I'm tempted to vote sausages on this one..

[Masterbagger]

I suspect most people agitating for gun control don't want to understand guns in America and completely ignore anything that isn't pushing a narrative that guns are bad. I think that is why we've gotten to where we are now with gangs running amok in our cities. Gun control laws are implemented poorly. The people actually doing the harm with guns have already gotten around the laws and won't be stopped by new ones. I really think gun control isn't designed to stop crime.

The past few years have seen more States pass laws removing restrictions on public carry of a firearm for self defense. A few have even gone to Constitutional carry and deregulated it entirely. The blood on the streets and the wild west shootouts never appeared in any of those states. The addition of more lawful guns circulating in public didn't produce more violence. The situation isn't as simple as less guns less crime.

[clakclak]

[...]
The past few years have seen more States pass laws removing restrictions on public carry of a firearm for self defense. A few have even gone to Constitutional carry and deregulated it entirely. The blood on the streets and the wild west shootouts never appeared in any of those states. The addition of more lawful guns circulating in public didn't produce more violence. The situation isn't as simple as less guns less crime.

What states are you talking about specifically?

[Morkonan]

...Just in case that was still adressed at me, the website I linked for the US numbers refers directly to the FBI report as it's source, whereas the German one refers to the BKA.

It was just a general comment regarding "statistical" posts. It's easy to get lost in the sea of reports, some of which are inaccurate.

Do both the German and American reports define "Burglary" in exactly the same way?

Not that this is certain, but say that the FBI defines "Burglary" and also counts "Automobile Burglaries" as a general "Burglary" where, perhaps, the German authorities have a completely separate definition for that crime. When comparing the two sets of numbers, one would not be comparing equivalent measurements.

This happened, somewhat, in a recently widely circulated report comparing violent crime between the US and UK. The violent crime rate in the UK was much higher than in the US, somewhat absurdly so. But, the two countries define "Violent Crime" differently and in the UK it included some offenses that the US had separate criminal charges for.

[clakclak]

[...]
Do both the German and American reports define "Burglary" in exactly the same way? [...]

Yes pretty mutch. Both countries also separate between burlagry/Einbruch and trespassing/Hausfriedensbruch.

The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program defines burglary as the unlawful entry of a structure to commit a felony or theft. To classify an offense as a burglary, the use of force to gain entry need not have occurred. The UCR Program has three subclassifications for burglary: forcible entry, unlawful entry where no force is used, and attempted forcible entry. The UCR definition of “structure” includes apartment, barn,
house trailer or houseboat when used as a permanent dwelling, office, railroad car (but not automobile), stable, and vessel (i.e., ship).

Unter dem Begriff „Einbruch“ ist das unerlaubte Eindringen in einen abgegrenzten Bereich zu verstehen, bei dem ein Hindernis oder eine Absicherung überwunden wird. Ein klassisches Beispiel ist hierbei der Einbruch in eine Wohnung oder in die Geschäftsräume einer anderen Person in dem Vorhaben, eine fremde Sache zu entwenden.

[Rough Translation: Einbruch=unauthorized entry into a zoned area (for example a house or company premises). Example given: Breaking into the flat or premise of someone else with the intend to steal.]

[The Q]

Central Michigan shooting: University says 2 dead, suspect at large


I think the main problem in the USA these days is that gun related violence is just too common and has lost a lot of it's shocking value. While these incidents are still tragedies, especially for the people involved of course, there are so many other tragedies so commonly displayed and broadcasted in the news today that people have lost any relation whatsoever. People haven't had time to mourn the dead of one incident, when the next incident happens already. As such I would say that people simply do not care enough for any real change to happen. The status quo is more important than the lifes of other people.
It's a bit like with texting and driving: Everyone knows it's dangerous, there are numerous studies and a lot of evidence that using your phone in the car will have a negative impact on your driving skills, it is super easy to get you a hands-free headset for your phone and car (which is still not ideal). Yet there are still a huge number of accidents caused by distracted driving. The reason: People don't care and consider their own “informational needs“ to be more important than the lifes of others, and ironically of themselves.

[Observe]

I suspect most people agitating for gun control don't want to understand guns in America and completely ignore anything that isn't pushing a narrative that guns are bad. I think that is why we've gotten to where we are now with gangs running amok in our cities. Gun control laws are implemented poorly. The people actually doing the harm with guns have already gotten around the laws and won't be stopped by new ones. I really think gun control isn't designed to stop crime.

Gun-related crimes or criminals having guns is not the major problem. We focus too much on that. I don't have the statistics on-hand and I can't be bothered looking them up again. Most gun deaths are from suicide and domestic violence. Accidental deaths also number over 100 thousand each year.

Again, I don't know the stats, but I'm guessing most gun deaths are caused by those under 25 years of age. Raise the gun purchase age to 25 and we will significantly lowered the number of gun deaths. If you are over 25, it can be presumed that you have at least half a brain. Under that age - not so much.

[Usenko]

The blood on the streets and the wild west shootouts never appeared in any of those states. The addition of more lawful guns circulating in public didn't produce more violence. The situation isn't as simple as less guns less crime.

Interesting statement - I think it demonstrates that you are acclimatised to a higher level of violence than most of us. To people outside the USA, "Blood on the streets" is almost exactly what we're seeing.

Not trying to be cruel or anything, just to point out that at least part of the issue is American perceptions. If you're accustomed to a society in which gun violence is a rare thing (pretty much any discharge of a weapon in city areas of Sydney gets reported on the news), hearing of regular shootings of 3 or more people seems very much the kind of violence that one would describe in (albeit emotive) terms such as "blood on the streets".