What gun control laws would be effective?
By Tom Quiner
“Ban assault rifles.”
This was the solution to gun violence from a well-intentioned Quiner’s Diner reader.
He was reacting to an earlier Quiner’s Diner posting, “Obama’s gun control proposal.”
Here is the exchange:
QUINER’S DINER READER: I just read your blog post about the shooting in California. You miss the bigger issue and I completely disagree with everything you wrote.
QUINER: What kind of gun control laws do you think would be effective?
The question is a serious one, because I’m not clear on how some of the gun control laws being proposed would have made a difference in stopping the 18 mass shootings during the Obama years that killed at least 8 people each.
Some of these laws were already in place in California, and didn’t make a difference.
What kind of laws do you think would make a difference?
Thanks for sharing your views. I appreciate them, and respect them.
QUINER’S DINER READER: Ban assault rifles.
QUINER: An assault rife is a semi-automatic weapon that looks like a machine gun, but isn’t.
Machine guns, or automatic weapons, are already illegal.
“Assault rifles” are very popular, because they are lightweight and accurate, but not particularly powerful. In fact, they’re not very good for deer hunting because they don’t have enough kick to take them down. Some states don’t allow assault rifles for hunting, not because they are too powerful, but because they’re not powerful enough.
They were banned in 1994 for a decade before the ban expired. Evidently, the ban was ineffectual.
The Justice Department said, “Should it be renewed, the ban’s effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement.”
I’m led to believe that a ban on assault rifles would be more symbol than substance.
This is not my biggest issue by a long shot. But I haven’t heard of any concrete proposals that would be legal and really make a difference.
Again, thanks for sharing your views.
You won’t get a sane answer, because those who advocate such bans, have no clue. Chicago, DC, and California, have more gun control laws than a remote control, but look at the gun violence in these respective places. In fact, Paris has one of the most gun restrictions, and guess what took place.
The point I think is that most residents in first world countries are concerned about is the hot headed nutters and the mentally disturbed who are able to walk up the road and buy a weapon and ammunition and then distribute their discontent from the weapon of choice into the neighbours house or the local school. Even children have had access unsecured loaded weapons with terrible consequences and stupid untrained firearm owners are prone to accidental discharges.
Gun control laws have to be implemented over a long period of time with buyback programmes, strict licencing and penalties including many other controls. If this sort of control saves a few lives it has to be worth it in the end, does it not?