Seems pretty clear to me, want to place limits on it, get support for a new amendment.

@freemo right on. And before someone posts the "well regulated militia" argument, the militia at that time was the able-bodied male population. The 2a is definitely about the general public being armed and trained to repel either invasion or tyranny.

If the Federal government wanted to take the 2a seriously, they should be expanding the Civilian Marksmanship Program and offering free rifle lessons in high school.

@mike805 @freemo even if that were the case (it's isn't), you still have them "well-regulated" bit. Also, if the first part is to be taken for sacred, by your interpretation then only white men should have the right to bear arms?

The reification of an old document is a choice. One that is killing our children. Guns are the number one cause of death for children in America! Our life expectancy is way lower than all other advanced countries. Choosing this mortality for an interpretation of an old text is the definition of a death cult. One that is imposed on a majority of Americans who do not want it.

@lmrocha @mike805 @freemo guns literally do nothing without a person. Blaming inanimate objects for the actions of people is low effort

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @freemo @lmrocha

Bingo! You've got it!

Nobody wants to ban guns and nobody is coming for your guns. We just want to be sure that they don't end up as easily in the hands of a person that may start shooting indiscriminately in a school or other public place.

Even the founding fathers had some "well-regulated" criteria for who can and who cannot have a gun (white men with wigs yes, founding mothers and people with slightly dark complexion no).

The criteria arguably changed from then but the principle stands.

@pj

People have literally banned entire classes of guns such as handguns and imaginary "assault rifles".. not only arr thry coming for our guns, they are explicit about it...

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@pj @thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

Also no, there was never a well regulated criteria. That was an exemplarly clause as is explicitly stated, not a qulifying clause. Thry have been quotes countless time saying as much.

@freemo

Yes, they don't explicitly state in the constitution who is and who isn't allowed to have guns, but I think it is pretty clear what would have happened if one of their slaves went for a gun.

You can't run a society without qualifying clauses.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@pj @thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

Surr thry do, thry explicitly state the right shall not be infringed. Pretty clear that means all people.

Follow

@freemo

I believe the definition of "people" at that time, as @lmrocha pointed out, might have been very narrow.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805

@pj @freemo @lmrocha @mike805 the point I'm making is that the definition of a person is not part of the 2nd Amendment. It's not part of the debate in gun control unless you are claiming that people you think are more likely to become violent are somehow not people. Then we need to figure out how we define that and maybe you have a case. Where we stand today all people are people, and natural rights apply to all people.

@thatguyoverthere

We dont need a definition for people, we all know what a person is and the founding fathers made it very clear they intended that word to include all people.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo @mike805 @lmrocha @pj I agree. I am just trying to separate the arguments because it seems like there is an attempt to conflate the idea that "slaves weren't considered people" with "all people shouldn't get guns". To me the validity of the first argument has no bearing on the validity of the second.

@thatguyoverthere

Yea its an invalid argument in so many ways.. for one its just not relevant, and for another the founding fathers were rather explicit the constitution intended "we the people" to mean everyone.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo

Again. It is not about how you define "people". It is about having on who can and who cannot have a gun, drive a car or buy cigarettes or alcohol ...

The founding fathers had such criteria, as ***everyone could not bear a gun***, and we should also have them.

That's all I have to say.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@pj

If you want criteria on who can or cant own a gun get support for a new amendment. At the moment it clearly states "shall lot be infringed".

It has been shown in no uncertain terms that the 2A intended to include all people. You want to change it thats fine go through the propernlegal channels.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@thatguyoverthere

You've said it is not the gun that is a problem, it is the person, and I agreed with that.

I just don't agree that we all should have to protect ourselves (supposedly with more guns) from bad persons with guns, instead of, as a civilized society, minimizing the chances these people can do harm.

@mike805 @freemo @lmrocha

@pj

guns arent to protect yourself from a bad person with guns... not sure why you keep repeating something that everyone has told you isnt the case or what is being argued...

We have access to guns to protect you from bad people with knives, or fists, or a penis and muscles they intend to use to force you into submission and rape you... Guns are the great equalizer and to use them against other guns is not remotely the point, yet somehow anti-gun people keep repeating the same nonsense like a broken record to disagree with an argument no one ever said.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@freemo @pj @mike805 @lmrocha yeah the point of bad people having guns regardless of the law isn't to say that you having a gun is specifically to fend of gun wielding raiders. It is the equalization of force that it provides.

@thatguyoverthere

Yup in fact criminals already have big barriers (and i think its ok to make access to criminal records easier).

So by its very nature one would expect good guys with guns to far outweight bad guys with guns from the start. Which implies most of the protection from guns is going to be against unarmed people.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo @mike805 @lmrocha @pj I would say though that I believe that most non-violent (and even some violent) criminals likely deserve to regain their rights after they have served their sentence. I might exclude sex offenders from that because I think the chance of re-offending is too high, but if someone served out the full sentence for their crimes I feel like they should be fully restored afterwards. Not doing so might even push people toward more criminal activity. If the only job you can get is gonna be bullshit pay because of your past you might just lean into it.

@thatguyoverthere

Id say even extremely violent people should have a path to get their rights back, the key shoukd be recovery and eventually entering society again... that said they may have to jump through a lot of hoops to get there since thry woukd have to show quite clearly they have been reabilitated.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@pj @mike805 @freemo @lmrocha

> I just don't agree we should all have to protect ourselves

I mean you don't have to protect yourself, but we do hold some level of responsibility (not all) for what happens to us. Back to the car analogy for a moment, you put on your seat belt right? If you live in an area where you actually feel your life is in danger you should take steps to minimize that danger. What steps you choose are entirely up to you. We have police who will put in some effort (using firearms) to execute the laws which can sometimes be enough to protect people or make people feel safe. You also have the right to own a firearm and become proficient with it so that if you should need to use it (god forbid) you can adequately protect yourself. You can also always look for an area where you don't feel like you are under constant threat. I live in a state with constitutional carry. I never feel like I am in any serious risk when I leave my home. Sometimes I carry. Sometimes I don't.

If we have laws about murder, assault, theft, rape, etc already, I don't see why we need to nitpick about how the person commits the crime.

@thatguyoverthere
You had to "drag me back in"😀

In my opinion if you have to use guns to solve anything (even in case of the police) it means we as a society suck.

@freemo's argument that women use guns to protect themselves from bad penises is also dubious. I think taking a self-defense training or even a bear spray would be much more effective.

@mike805 @lmrocha

@pj

> In my opinion if you have to use guns to solve anything (even in case of the police) it means we as a society suck.

Then every society on earth sucks, and I wont disagree with that... Until you eliminate rape and violent acts from even being attempted then you will never be able to rely on cops. Cops will always be some distance away and it will always require you to have access to a phone and early enough warning make the phone call.

Usually if someone is being raped or held at knife point or assaulted in the overwhelming majority of cases there was never a chance to even reach out to the police in the first place.

So yes I am happy to eliminate guns, if the criteria for it is you must first eliminate all violent crimes so you can ensure we dont need those guns in the first place.

When a guy is twice your size physical defense training is perhaps going to help the womans odds slightly but she will still be at a huge disadvantage, afterall men and women can both get that same training so its not a equalizing force.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha

@freemo @pj @mike805 @lmrocha when I attended the course recommended for concealed carry (not required - constitutional carry) they pointed out in very clear terms the job of the police is not primarily to defend you. It is to execute the law which generally means arresting people suspected of a crime. That means the crime already happened by the time the cops show up.

@thatguyoverthere And SCOTUS recently confirmed this, regarding the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas shooting: "An official has a duty to protect individuals from harm by third parties only when the individuals are in the official’s custody."

media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinio

@LouisIngenthron > in the officials custody

This is a special carve out specifically in the case of an official being given domain over your safety. This is not how it works "in the streets"
@LouisIngenthron so it's kind of irrelevant to daily life. Unless you would prefer to be "in the custody" of someone else for your whole life.

@thatguyoverthere You've still missed the point. I was agreeing with what you said, not arguing against it.

@freemo @pj @thatguyoverthere @lmrocha in that case, Japan sucks less than most. The police there go most years without firing a shot. They are trained to use their batons with modified sword-fighting techniques to disarm a knife attacker.

However... in the absence of guns, the Yakuza was able to run extortion and protection rackets with basic strong-arm thugs, and force small businesses to pay them a substantial percentage. That's the downside of being gun-free. Organized muscle dominates.

@mike805

Japan has a much healthier social environment built on respect, and much much better access to mental health than americans... So Japan is just as well explained by the two criteria I already gave earlier than by access to guns.

@pj @thatguyoverthere @lmrocha

@pj @freemo @mike805 @lmrocha > we suck as a society

yep. Humans are terrible with a few exceptions. We are actually like a lot of other animals except we reflect on our terrible behavior and from what I can tell others don't.

a 110 lbs woman with a can of mace somewhere in her purse that she's never used may or may not be able to fight of a 230lb monster in the middle of the night.

@thatguyoverthere @freemo @lmrocha @pj only a minority of humans seem capable of rationally overriding their emotions. We have rational thought but the ape mind controls all the rewards and punishments. The rational mind just exists to figure out how to satisfy the ape desires.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @freemo @pj that is not the point I made. I was pointing to the capriciousness that gun profiteering apologists use when interpretating the 2A. All concepts that it trades in have changed dramatically, but the apologists treat the inconvenient bits as, well 'it's not like that now”, and the bits they care about as immutable, reified text that only other amendments can adapt.

As I said, all this is legal interpretation that depends only on a few lackeys the profiteering oligarchy pays up to sit on the supreme court---in another profound constitutional blunder. It is very hard to fight oligarchy, but the youth whose lives it values less than profit may yet have the power to change things.

@lmrocha @mike805 @freemo @pj what inconvenient bits? Shall not be infringed seems pretty straight forward. If you are referring to the militia portion we're back in a loop.

Where I think we may differ is that I see these rights as natural god given rights of man. Government doesn't give us our rights, and allowing them to take your rights away and calling any rights preservation oligarchy hurts my brain. If every supreme court justice tomorrow said oh we've change how we interpret the 2a that changes nothing as far as "rights" go. 2A is protection against infringement (weak as it may be) not granting you the right to bear arms.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @freemo @pj God is besides the point here. The constitution is to establish a secular society for believers and unbelievers. Besides, I take take issue with equating guns at least with Christianity. The gospels are very clear about Jesus' thoughts on self -defense. You need to be diabolical (in the original sense of the word) to make a connection between "turn the other cheek” and the 2A. I think his surrender to crucifixion is quite clear on that note.

@lmrocha @mike805 @freemo @pj natural and god given are synonyms take it as you will I'm not asking you to accept God, bit good luck declawing me and anyone else who sees having claws and the capabilities that affords to be part of nature. I will always have the right to defend myself regardless of what the legal status of firearms is. No person or group of people can take that away. Best you can hope for is tyranny

@lmrocha @thatguyoverthere @freemo @pj God is never beside the point. A person's position on that question reliably predicts most of his other views. There is a "root" or top level in everyone's mind, and what resides there decides everything else.

Jesus was advising a small group of traveling evangelists, for whom getting into a violent confrontation could not possibly help them in their mission. Thus "shake off the dust of that place." He was not referring to all people for all time.

@mike805 @thatguyoverthere @freemo @pj wow, so we do have the Gun-Jesus figure after all. Who needs the cross when you have the guns....

@lmrocha @mike805 @freemo @pj I guess that's a jab. No one is saying you should be able to use guns to convert people to Christianity, but to pick and choose the things he said (out of context) to support an argument he never made is not going to work. He did want the disciples to be peaceful and slow to anger. He also recognized the dangers of the world and told them to be prepared. These ideas can coexist, and in fact we have quotes from Jesus in the Bible that suggest they do.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @freemo @pj "be prepared" is not the same as "be armed". I was raised Catholic, and the idea of using a Christian conception of God to defend gun-based self-defense is, frankly, diabolical---especially when we know it leads to incident children being killed over and over again.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @freemo @pj there is much context, and prophecy parallelism, in that passage to make that such a simple case. The sermon on the mount is much more relevant to understand Jesus' moral teachings, than confusing/ambiguous (”two swords are enough”) prophetic statements just prior to arrest.

Personally, and this is just me, I read that passage as an indication of the futility of the few arms his disciples could buy from selling their clothes, in the presence of the might of the Roman army. Certainly two swords weird have both been enough... So, I interpret this as as call to focus on what matters about his message, which is the opposite of swords.

@lmrocha @mike805 @freemo @pj

> and he was counted among the lawless

I'm pretty sure this says he (and his disciples by proxy) will be considered outlaws. It seems to me that before this they were considered to be safe from imprisonment, but that he was warning them times are changing and soon they will be wanted criminals.

The larger point is that cherry picking turn the other cheek as the only time Jesus spoke on arms or self defense doesn't convince me that arms are against his will. Honestly Leo Tolstoy makes some compelling arguments, but I think at the end of the day that even if a person decides to turn the cheek or allow an intruder to take their stuff or hurt them because of the way they interpret those passages that's separate from forcing people to depend on the government for protection. Especially since we live in a nation with separation of church and state. I may not choose to defend myself, but I still have the right to do so.

@lmrocha

Except we dont know that, all the data suggests the opposite, banning guns means people die en massem, including kids... But since you have no peer-reviewed data to show that (and neither do I) thats another matter.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @pj

@freemo @thatguyoverthere @mike805 @pj that is just patently false. All data points to the opposite. No evidence whatsoever (from all other similar countries) that regulating the use of guns leads to people dying en masse. That's just silly and totally false.

@lmrocha

You have not provided a single study that addresses whatI am arguing.. you can scream about "all data" all you want, but as long as you keep posting completely irrelevant studies that are not addressing what I asserted then you dont have a leg to stand on.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @pj

@freemo @thatguyoverthere @mike805 @pj I don't have to provide data for what *you* are arguing. That's your job. Go ahead and publish it. I gave you published evidence in strong support of my claim: more guns --> increased mortality. If you have evidence against the current scientific evidence, which can sustain peer-review, by all means publish it. Restating your beliefs without proof (beyond your own mind) is not enough and it is dishonest to claim your belief invalidates current peer-reviewed and replicated studies without demonstration.

@lmrocha @freemo @mike805 @pj what percentage of gun suicides would decide life is worth living if they didn't have a gun?
@lmrocha @freemo @mike805 @pj I would expect this paper to have some way to extrapolate that if they choose to lump in suicide?

@lmrocha

> I don't have to provide data for what *you* are arguing. That's your job.

No you dont. My stance is that there is no good peer reviewed data that addresses my assertation either way. I am willing to provide non-peer reviewed data I did myself which is perfectly reasonable when there is an absence of peer reviewed data to address a question, though it is fair to take it as preliminary until better studies are availible.

Now if **you** are arguing that there is peer-reviewed data and it proves my relatively weaker evidence wrong, then that is on **you** to provide, which you have not done.

> I gave you published evidence in strong support of my claim: more guns --> increased mortality.

You keep saying that, saying it doesnt make it true. No you havent, you have not linked to even a **single** peer reviewed study that addresses what I asserted. You posted soem random studies that address other issues that are different from what I asserted, and playing some rediulous game of "I have more links than you"/

As I said if you want to play that game I dont mind posting non-sense peer reviewed articles that dont argue my case but vaguely sound like they do... but I wont stoop to your level, I'd rather keep my integrity as a scientist.

> If you have evidence against the current scientific evidence, which can sustain peer-review, by all means publish it.

there is no current scientific evidence... and you have yet to link to a single paper that addresses the assertion I made, again repeating soemthing that has already been clearly shot down, without actually making a valid argument, wont get you anywhere

> Restating your beliefs without proof (beyond your own mind) is not enough and it is dishonest to claim your belief invalidates current peer-reviewed and replicated studies without demonstration.

Thats not what I said, are you even listening? There is no "current peer-review" for me to invalidate, you have yet to post even a single link to that effect.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @pj

@lmrocha @freemo @mike805 @pj A study on gun violence __should__ make sure to separate suicide from homicide. Lumping gun suicides in with gun violence instead of with suicides is stacking the deck in your favor.

@thatguyoverthere @mike805 @lmrocha @pj

Stacking the deck in Luis's favor, especially given the cherry-picked and irrelevant nature of all the studies, is clearly Luis's intent here.

@lmrocha @freemo @mike805 @pj This actually highlights one of the problems with making decisions based on statistics. It's very easy to select data that fits a preformed bias. Some issues are too important to rely on statistics to make decisions on.

@thatguyoverthere

I disagree, the statistics are correct and valuable... the issue isnt the statistics, the issues is that they are being either intentionally abused by cherry picking and not analyzing the data in a way even the most beginer of data scientists would agree is proper.

Dont blame the data for some person trying to manipulate it, especially when its trivial to point out that manipulation and shoot it down, as I have done.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo @mike805 @lmrocha @pj well that's where I would say the "data" is correct and valid, but the "statistics" are selected from that data to achieve a desired outcome (cherry picked).

@thatguyoverthere

The data is correct, the statistics are correct... the interpretation of the statistics is wildly invalid most of the time.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo @mike805 @lmrocha @pj I don't mean to say the statistics are invalid, just that they have bias injected which makes them less useful (at least for this discussion). All statistics do. We bias our selection of data, both intentionally and unintentionally.

@thatguyoverthere

That can sometimes be an issue, but no I dont find that is generally the issue here, and peer-review will often catch that... the statistics are fine, and they arent usually biased (sometimes)... its purely an issue with "Here is Statistic X which claims Y"... X is correct, the statement it claims Y is not.

@mike805 @lmrocha @pj

@freemo @mike805 @lmrocha @pj I guess this is why "appeal to authority" is considered a logical fallacy. If you appeal to an authority, but you don't actually understand if the argument applies or can't actually articulate the argument yourself it isn't really helping your case and just gets in the way of the discussion.
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