Umpqua Shooting

One of the other problems with weapons of incapacitation, is that they only work at most against a target 20 meters away, and even with the best of weapons it has taken multiple shots to take down a normal sized person with both tazers and beanbag rounds. Some people are trained to shrug them off even without losing control of their weapon.

Blackflag: Said armed individual is incapacitated though. You can't fire a gun while you're being electrocuted.

Shortbows aren't powerful enough. Doing that is illegal in New Zealand. As is the use of poison etc.

admin: The hope is that the person is incapacitated. There are people trained to shrug off electric shocks from tazers.

The real problem with tazers is the fact that they work on someone only a meter away and are one shot. Even with the charged bullet ones they are still one shot and only go a couple meters.

You are better off using a knife than a tazer. Your best choice would be a firearm though. Incapacitation weapons are questionably effective on one person, so if you are defending yourself against multiple people you are as good as screwed.

admin: Admin, is there ever premise you say that I ever agree to?

You say the United States has a culture of fear. I reject that premise entirely. That is empty rhetoric that has no basis in reality. Gun control is strongly advocated when a mass shooting happens. It is obvious to most Americans who is spinning up the hysteria every time a shooting happens.

True Capitalist Acolyte: You reject it, and here we have Stag in this very same thread lecturing me on how we in New Zealand don't know what it's like to have so many neighbourhoods you can be easily killed in around the place. Can you see why, to an outsider, America at least appears to have a culture of fear, even when there isn't a mass shooting?

nzlockie: Again you are wrong. Ok in nearly half of these instances the shooter takes their own lives before the police arrive.

Guns for defense is paranoia? Clearly, you and admin have never have had your lives in danger and don't know what real crime looks like except from a distance. I will not put my girlfriend or mother in harms way because someone thinks people should be incapable of defending themselves against predators.

admin: Again, as I said before to nzlockie, a society with no history of crime would not understand. The need for firearms for self-defense simply can't be replicated. It is a matter of logic in many places in the United States to keep a firearm for protection. You may obey the law and keep to yourself but many people will not.

True Capitalist Acolyte: So then there IS a culture of fear. You're afraid somebody will hurt you.

NZ may have only had one mass shooting (the Aramoana Massacre), but this doesn't mean we don't have unsafe neighbourhoods. We do. The difference is in this culture of fear. You can't put it all down to mass shootings.

Instead, I see it played out in ordinary attacks. Drive-by shootings and the like are basically unheard of in New Zealand. And those kinds of attacks have a far greater impact on normalization.

admin: Again, I reject your premise. What you keep claiming as a fear is merely a normality. It is logical to prepare for self defense in the United States. Fear derives from the mass shootings. Mass shootings are abnormalities and it is irrational to associate them with being normalities.

True Capitalist Acolyte: So in your view, you cannot be afraid of something once that thing is normalized?

Do you think people in the middle east are like "nah, we're not afraid of bombings, they happen all the time"

admin: Irrelevant, the primary basis of self defense is based on the high crime realities in the United States. It is logical to prepare oneself for this reality. Fear itself is not the primary incentive for gun rights in the United States where people are killed often. Fear is the primary incentive for gun control. That is a fact.

True Capitalist Acolyte: ... be it based on a fact or not, it is still a culture of fear.

admin: And by the way, the term "culture of fear" does not imply that this culture is IRRATIONAL or that there's nothing to be afraid of. It simply means that generally, a population is predisposed towards being afraid of something.

admin: I don't think that is absurd. Good parents have a responsibility to teach their children self defense skills at as young an age as possible. This is hunting USA; it is initiation for manhood to go out into the wilderness and hunt a deer down with your father as young as seven.

this doesn't mean we don't have unsafe neighbourhoods. We do
lol

Admin, the mean streets of wellington do not compare. It is a whole different ballpark with a whole different set of rules.

Simpy said, NZlockie and admin have no personal credibility on the topic, and have failed to provide educated opinions from people who live in crime ridden areas first hand, or supplemented their arguments with any actual statistical backing.

Usually I excuse this if there is a strong logical argument, but there isn't. Totally ignoring the fact that I know for a fact that people who possess firearms are less likely to be victimized.

Sick of this world being ran by fragile wussies who shroud themselves behind ideological concepts bigger than they are. Reason why the world is F'd up to begin with.

nzlockie: It really doesn't.

Americans aren't driven by fear, and it's not harmful to "throw guns into it." The basic premise is that, if the likelihood of a potential victim is armed, a criminal will be *less* inclined to carry out an act of violence. It's the same with other things. If someone plans on stealing something, and they recognize the possibility of security cameras, they are *less* inclined to steal something. The same holds true with guns.

On another note, even tightening gun laws wouldn't help. Adding more laws doesn't prove deficiency. For example, in the Columbine shooting, nearly 20 gun laws were violated in obtaining the guns used in that particular shooting. Moreover, gun laws can easily be sidestepped, regardless of how strict. In the same example, two shotguns and a rifle which the two shooters at Columbine were purchased by a girlfriend who could have easily passed a background check with flying colors. Adding more laws makes absolutely ZERO sense.

admin: Read my response to nzlockie, it might help.

Regardless, I know for a fact you have enough intelligence to realize that having a gun is self defense. If not a tool to deflect a bullet, it can be used in an aggressive defense as well. Guns don't *have* to kill people. Incapacitating them is often the course of action people take in the first place. Besides, having a gun, as you mentioned, makes people feel more safe. It's unfair to say that in other countries, it makes people uneasy. Of what relevance is that? Uneasy or not, they are objectively more safe. Criminals will execute criminal activity regardless of any laws placed upon them.

As I demonstrated with the Columbine shooting, gun laws are easy to bypass, and there's no way to create more that would solve for that. A simpler solution would be to arm more people. This would effectively dissuade criminal activity for the fear of being injured/killed themselves. Also, this does not necessitate a "culture of fear." It's a culture of accepting reality for what it is, and recognizing that it's not objectively solved by less guns, but more.

admin: This is inherently false. If America was a "culture of fear," then why do liberals and left-wing advocates think that less guns is the problem. Disarming the common folk would regurgitate a culture of fear, not the status quo. Your argument here is fundamentally flawed, as you advocate for something that would fulfill your negative claim.

admin: This is definitely not what Stag was advocating. The right to bear arms also factors in competence, which is why there are *some* gun laws. The abolition of guns would also be ineffective. What stops the government from exerting more power than is necessary? We've already seen instances where the police have acted questionably. Without any risk of a counterattack, what would stop police from doing more than they should? There's so many flaws to a pro gun control stance that it's not even funny.

Besides... this thread has gotten seriously distracted. Thanks, though, for at least discussion.