RE: Hardware Upgrades: AR-15

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RE: Hardware Upgrades: AR-15

ds-tech in #guns • last year

I don't know where you live, but the fact that it's not easy to own a rifle seems insane to me. Every person should be able to defend themselves from assailants.

Where I live guns are quite common. Thousands of shootings happen every year, and the majority of those shooting occur with handguns. Handguns are the most heavily regulated gun in the USA. You have to have a permit to own/buy them, and have to be trained in using them. Yet, criminals obtain them easier than a law-abiding citizen can.

AR-15's and other "long-guns" make up a tiny percentage of gun crimes in the US, and yet they are constantly demonized and called "assault-weapons" or assault-rifles. AR stands for the brand name of origin: Armalite-Rifle, and in order for a gun to be an assault-rifle it would have to be automatic fire. These rifles are not automatics, yet people seem to think that they are. All automatic weapons are illegal in the USA.

Criminals get guns through illegal means, and preventing people from legally owning a gun just means people who don't want to cause harm won't have one.
When someone is committing a violent crime what do we do? We call the authorities who have guns, but they can't be there while a crime is taking place.
In the USA, the most shootings happen in the most gun-restrictive places such as cities. In states where more people own guns crime is typically lower with far less shootings.
An armed society is a polite society.

Thank you for your comment though. And I want to tell you that I also used to think of guns in a negative way, and now I see them very differently.
I have no desire to harm/shoot another person, but I also do want to be able to prevent someone from hurting myself or my family.
People have been shot and killed less than a mile from my home 5 times in the past 3 years unfortunately. All with handguns.

last year in #guns by ds-tech

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minus-pi last year

Thanks a lot for sharing your thought! I live in Europe and I can hardly think of anybody around me who owns any gun, neither hand guns nor rifles. The thought of having to own one to defend myself if needed feels disturbing to me. I've never been in a situation like this. And seeing how people sometimes turn from rational to emotional, a high barrier to gun access doesn't seem like the worst idea :) I did not research the crime stats around here, but I don't have the feeling that unregulated guns are a big issue here. Maybe that's a key difference, idk. It's interesting how you see the armed society as a polite society. I tend to say it's the opposite here. Maybe this is a culture/history thing? If you perceived my comment as "guns are bad, don't do it", that's not what I meant. I can't imagine how it feels to fear armed criminals or witness shootings around my home. I don't dare to judge your situation, only your post made me realize that mine is likely much different. All the best!

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ds-tech last year

I wasn't trying to assume anything about your comment. I used to feel very strongly against guns myself, but my opinion has changed the more I learned about the statistics surrounding legal/illegal gun ownership.
If you don't mind my asking, which country in Europe?

I personally have never witnessed anyone being shot, but I see it on the news/online, and
live just outside Baltimore(one of the worst cities for murder in the US).
I don't live in fear, but I don't assume it can't ever happen either.
And you're right, people can be very irrational and dangerous.
Despite that, most of the shootings that happen are usually tied to criminals in high crime areas/cities with guns obtained illegally. People who buy guns legally generally don't plan on harming anyone with them.

In the US you don't generally see people walking around with guns. People who have licenses to concealed-carry handguns have to conceal them, and criminals obviously want to hide them. In some states they have open-carry, but not very many.
Anyone without a felony conviction/certain mental-health diagnoses can generally buy/own a long gun, but need a license to own a handgun(because of it's small size).
In the US many people who never thought of owning a gun felt compelled to get one over the last summer because of the Black Lives Matter/George Floyd situation where mobs of rioters burned/looted cities across the country, and even murdered people while the police were ordered to stand down. The news/media called it "fiery, mostly peaceful protests", but you could watch cell phone footage that clearly showed a different situation.
People generally assumed before this, that they could rely on the police/national-guard to uphold the law, and protect people and property from riots.
Seeing them allow this to happen after months of making everyone stay home because of the pandemic made a lot of people realize that you can't always rely on the government.
Also in the US guns are sort of part of the culture because the Constitution guarantees our right to own them via the 2nd Amendment. The main reason for this amendment was so that the people could push back on a tyrannical/rogue government, but also defend themselves.

History also shows us that just before a government starts to commit atrocities they will pass laws to disarm the people.
There are often laws like this being proposed by our current government, and sadly our cities seem to be getting more and more dangerous as violent crime is up something like double the percentage it was before.
This isn't the case everywhere here, but generally closer to the big cities.

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