These kinds of tragedies are routine now. If a classroom of dead kindergarteners failed to move the American body politic, this will barely be a blip on the radar. Unless we'd all like to re-state our gun positions again. Heh.
Ah, you're right. Just saying though, you'd see a hell of a lot less of these if gun's weren't legal, which was my point before Manoka set up the strawman again...
You claimed we wouldn't need force fields of guns didn't exist. - No, I claim there'd be less violence, especially of this kind, if guns were not legal, or at least better regulated.-"What if no guns? I'm just saying, forcefields are not necessary..."- This is a quote from you, a few posts before.
I say force fields would be useful against lots of things, including car accidents; yours is the only strawman, since you assumed I meant stopping gun violence, when I didn't. xP
- Right, but until, y'know, forcefields are a practical possibility, how about we go with my plan? Also, since the topic is, in fact, gun violence, I feel safe in saying it wasn't my strawman, man.-If you're talking about all gun violence being reduced by removing guns, it's pluasible, but that doesn't mitigate a desire or need for force fields to prevent all violence, so it would be a strawman. Not that it really matters, since I didn't take the conversation seriously.
Also making guns illegal doesn't mean they'd be less available. - Yes, it does. -And this is based on?
There's the differentiation between legal and available. - Well sure, but they'd still be harder, and riskier to get hold of.-Criminals already smuggle thousands of guns and millions of pounds of drugs across the border all the time; the major drug cartels originate from outside their country and bring the guns they already have with them to use, and then ditch them by selling them along with the drugs to cover any evidence of their smuggling. At least 100,000 illegal immigrants are smuggled across the border every year, so a trunk full of guns doesn't seem out of place.
For instance, a person could try to ban air or water for instance, and it might not work out too well. - Hey, look, a man made of straw! -No, it's called an example. Allow me to explain; in reference to that, banning something doesn't mean it's use or availability will go down. Prohibition only works on things that aren't available through other means. Thus if we're talking about lowering crime rates for instance when using a particular device or method, availability is not regulated by legistlation as much as it is by the physical ability to acquire said things. Since alchohol for instance can be made from nearly any organic substance, such as potatoes (vodka), barley (beer), wheat (whiskey), even apples (apple cider), and recently grass and corn have been explored for use in cars, prohibition of alchohol wouldn't neccesarily work since all you need is something organic and a distillerly in order to proccess the sugar, meaning pretty much anyone can make it; in fact, it didn't work for this very reason, all it did was create an underground lucrative trade for it that gave the Mafia power. It hasn't worked on things like marijuana, but the number of civilians using atom bombs is non-existant. This is becuase atom bombs are relativley hard to produce and get the materials for. The effectivenss of a ban is not determined by legistlation, but the physical reality of obtaining goods neccesary for producing them. Thus automatically assuming a ban would work is a fallacy since you aren't considering the alternative methods of obtaining firearms or other goods. A ban is only as effective as long as goods are scarce. The number of illegally used rockets to go into space by civilians is zero becuase of this.
But banning atom bombs from civilian usage might be more effective due to their rariry; and again! an outright ban doesn't necessarily mean usage will go down among particular groups. Other counter measures still need to be established. Since it's pretty easy to make guns, with a simple mill and lathe, as it's been done in many wars in many country's, it's not exactly an easy thing to ban. Hmmm, I see what you mean, Americans probably would miss their guns so much they'd have to make them at home... But really, do you know how to make a gun like that? Sure, there might be at least one person in every village in whereveristan that can do that, but how many Americans can do that? - Lots and lots of civilians hand load rounds as is, and make their own magazines and accessories. If guns were completely banned, they'd problably see a moral imperative to produce them. In Vietnam, guns were made using very simple tools; while only simple guns can be made, the best guns, the most favored guns, are favored for their simple designs. The Ak-47, 1911, and other popular firearms are created due to the fact that simplicity helps to produce reliability; heavier parts, brawn over design. An AR-15 has over 70 pars, while an Ak can have just 20 or so. The Ak-47 is not only cheaper and easier to make, but is more powerful, and nearly impossible to jam; you can run over it with cars, burry it in a lakebed for 40 years, and all kinds of things and it will still work fine. The AR-15 will explode in your face if it even has water in it, and it's very mechanism requires high to low heat operation; but, when it overheats, this doesn't work, and it will jam after 90 rounds, every time, due to over heating, if you fire that many rounds in just a few minutes. It has a rate of fire of 900 RPM, so it can happen very quickly. You can literally get the weapon to jam in under 6 seconds. And so, could they make crappy Ak-47's with simple hammer forged barrels that get 3-5 MOA with low grade machinery; yes. Could they simply retool basic steel working tools; yes. In fact, it's believed that this is how the Cartels are being armed, with Chinese, Al Qeada, and Guatamalian sweatshops are creating them, and they have access to signifigantly more sophisticated machinery. Will others be able to arm themselves; the answer is almost invariably yes.
