E.g. abortion rights, anti-LGBTQ, contempt for atheism, Christian nationalism, etc.
I can only speak for my friends who fit your criteria: they’re single issue voters (like many Americans) and they’re afraid the Dems are coming for their guns.
The dilemma being that anyone who acts this way probably shouldn’t own guns.
Placing gun ownership over all other personal freedoms is an unhealthy obsession.
People who think they need weapons in case are not so different than those who think the rapture will occur in their lifetime.
People think they need guns just in case only because so many other people have guns and because our gun violence is out of control.
It’s an arms race leading only to more gun deaths.
It’s also a delusion for the most part. None of the scenarios they carve out in their minds about why guns are essential tools has much basis in any rational threat profile. Otherwise these nutters would be walking around with helmets on all the time.
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I’m not an expert by any means, but I want to say that something similar happened in Australia. Basically, they gave everyone the deal of, say, $500 per gun if turned in voluntarily, or seizure and no money if found. Then they simply restricted ammo sales and eventually the problem fixed itself. (Source: my ass)
You’re pretty much right. The big difference is that gun ownership in Australia was never widespread. America literally CANNOT afford to do a buyback.
I’ve broken down the numbers here and on Reddit before and I always get downvoted to hell and back so I cant be fucked. But if every last American just gave their guns back, at an average buyback price of $1000 per gun you’re looking at 332 Billion dollars. Thats before you add the other costs like collection, destruction and disposal.
Not even coming close to mentioning the costs involved in handling the “Cold dead hands” crowd, the preppers, the militias and the illegal unregistered firearms.
Aaaaand the destruction of a vast multi billion dollar a year peripheral industry of shooting ranges, gun stores, accessory manufacturers, ammunition manufacturers.
In short, while America needs to do SOMETHING the “Just ban guns” crowd are infuriating in their naivety.
The federal government spent something like 6 Trillion Dollars last year, meaning the cost would be about 6% of our national budget. Knocking off 1/3rd for the people who would refuse to participate, 4%. If the process happened over 5 years, you’re talking about <1% increase to our annual budget. And practically speaking, 15 years might be a more reasonable time frame simply given the enormous scale of the thing.
Sure, $332b is an absolute fuck-ton of money. But it’s not an inconceivable amount of money. That’s not to say we should do it, simply that the argument we can’t afford it doesn’t really check out.
Like I said, Ive broken down the numbers much more comprehensively before and it always results in arguments that I cant be fucked getting involved in on social media, last time I did it it was effectively a research paper. Its napkin math but you’re right, the U.S COULD afford it hypothetically, but it would take a literally unbelievable culture shift in the way 100% of the country sees guns to make it possible.
To get what I think I estimated out to 1.5 trillion over 5 years out of a federal government that cant agree on budgets to pay federal workers for a policy that effectively 50% of the population will be highly opposed to and many will actively and violently resist…
In short, while America needs to do SOMETHING the “Just ban guns” crowd are infuriating in their naivety.
As someone that is firmly against the free access to guns I cannot agree that it is naivety.
You guys got a serious problem with gun violence, your children are dying in, quite frankly, absurd numbers.
And you keep on letting it happen for decades now.I am not someone that says just banning the ownership of guns outright from one second to another is the best solution there is. Off course it’s not.
But dude, even that strawman solution that pretty much noone actually proposes would be better than your status quo.
“Just ban guns” is the slogan for demonstrations. Any politician who is elected for doing that will obviously need to have a better plan. Usually such plans don’t fit on a poster.
Im not American, I’m Australian. I have problems with anyone that wants to run around screaming for solutions that are impossible to implement. It might come from a good place but its just virtue signalling. That goes for people on both sides of any argument, the only thing it does is detracts from any meaningful dialogue on actual solutions.
The gun problem in the U.S is way more cultural than financial, but even if you take all the culture and set it aside like it isnt the core of the issue even the basic numbers of doing a buyback and compensating every person and industry now out of work becomes an insane number very quickly.
If you want to stop children from dying, banning cars and sugary drinks would go a lot farther.
That’s such a stupid take, I am not even sure where to start responding.
Of the many, many, many things one might reply I will just pick the simple facts that a sugary drink alone doesn’t kill anyone and cars have a real and tangible use to our society, while selling murder-tools at Walmart does not.
And btw I am very much in favor of measures to reduce the damages caused by the sugar industry and putting strict restrictions on dangerous traffic.
So, you agree with me in the last paragraph, but called me stupid first? Get away from that reddit mentality, friend.
Cars are not useful to society, though, they are actively harmful. They create sprawl and discourage walkability, pollute with participate as well as light and sound, and as we were discussing, are the leading cause if death for children in the US. Cars are useful only to individuals, at the expense of wider society.
Not with that attitude ;-)
You can if you want to, but I bet the problem is more “cultural”, so a shift in people is needed. Like make it illegal to make publicity about it for under 21 yo. And show the grim aftermath in stores selling guns. Then no publicity at all and so on. Tax guvs and bullets, educate people.
We did it with cigarettes, and it worked out really well IMO. Today cigarettes are not “cool” anymore and usage has been falling sharp.
Isn’t that more or less what happened in Australia after the Port Arthur massacre?
On the other end of the spectrum, Allende basically sealed his fate by disarming his own supporters.
Civilian disarmamends happened in various countries, i.e. Australia in 1996/97, UK after the Dunblane school massacre in 1996, Japan post WW2, South Africa in 2000, Colombia in 2000 and 2016, New Zealand after Christchurch.
Strategies and success vary, but it’s not unheard of.
You can still own guns in Australia, at least. It just requires applying for permits. I don’t get why people would be opposed to that
Introducing regulations usually doesn’t mean complete and utter ban.
From the mouth of my dad “you’ll be in a list and they’ll know you have guns. I shouldn’t have to register for a right that’s in the constitution”
There’s a ton wrong with that statement, but he’s willfully blind to any of it. He hung up on me when I pointed out all the issues that statement had XD
I believe Australia is one such example.
And look at how many mass shootings they’re having now.
Unfortunately, there was a gunman yesterday. He was apprehended, thankfully.
Pfft rookie numbers. Here in the US we had 2 mass shootings today (11/23/23). https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/reports/mass-shooting
Australia also had a peak gun ownership ratio of 6.52%. America’s is closer to 125%. Literal order of magnitude of difference there
They are unfortunately correct. I can’t count how many failed attempts I’ve made to try to convince many of my liberal peers that trying to kill the 2nd Amendment or functionally prevent people from buying guns is doing more harm to our collective efforts than good by alienating independents who are otherwise liberal-leaning, but staunchly support 2A. Many liberals have terrible views about gun violence in general IMO, and a serious lack of comprehension of the problem. Conservatives aren’t much better, unfortunately, and they’re three times as stubborn, so here we are.
Many liberals have terrible views about gun violence in general IMO, and a serious lack of comprehension of the problem.
Could you elaborate that a bit?
Sure. For starters, they keep going on and on about mass shootings and how we need to cut access to guns to stop all the mass shootings.
First of all, gun laws have been more or less the same for the past 100 years in the U.S., so how can they be the cause of the recent rise in mass shootings? Simple answer: they’re not. The rise in mass shootings is unfortunately an aspect of modern American culture and copycat-ism.
Secondly, mass shootings make up a tiny fraction of gun violence; the fact that so many White liberals harp on mass shootings really just shows that they only really care about the gun violence that threatens to affect them and their kids. If they were serious about curbing gun violence, their focus wouldn’t be on mass shootings so much as smaller-scale gun crime.
Third, many liberals are openly willing to kill a hobby that most gun owners enjoy without harming anyone, because they personally find said hobby unsightly and stupidly think they can stop gun violence in the U.S. by getting rid of gun stores—because that’s always put a stop to gun violence in other countries wherein it’s illegal to buy/sell guns (/s).
I personally want to see many improvements to our gun laws in the U.S., such as more stringent background checks, laws against people with histories of serious psychiatric illness having access, laws against people with violent criminal histories having access, etc, but getting rid of all guns? No, total overkill, and such hardline, unreasonable stances are costing Democrats much-needed votes and ironically helping right-wing Nazis get closer to taking over the country. These views make no fucking sense when you scrutinize them and are clearly fueled by emotion rather than logic.
I am what the Americans consider VERY far left (A centrist by European standards), and I, for the most part, agree with the idea that the issue is not one of access to firearms necessarily, but of a cultural problem
But what’s the cultural problem? Could it be the gun fetishization we have (perpetuated by conservatives)? Perhaps its roots go in further back, to our founding as a nation built on a violent rebellion. Maybe it’s even further back then that, developed from a puritan heritage
I agree it’s a cultural issue, but where we’re gonna disagree is that the culture that promotes this degree of gun violence is one that loves guns so much it absolutely refuses to try and take any steps to fix the issue. The people who love guns the most, who want that shit on all their media, is conservatives
Besides that, I’d call America a uniquely desperate place. We are taught to believe this country is great and incredible and can do no wrong, but for all its affluence, everything is expensive as shit, we are always just a missed paycheck away from homelessness, medical issues, psychological problems. The cultural issue here is that America doesn’t care about its people; It cares about its companies. Most conservatives would probably side with the working man over the business suit, but it is the Republican party that overwhelmingly supports the rights of big businesses over the actual working people. I’ve seen the country described as a 3rd world country wearing a Gucci belt. The cultural problem is in this dissonance of swearing we’re in a good spot when we’re actually not
Furthermore, you don’t actually know what leftists want in regards to gun control, since you’ve likely heard a lot of it from right-leaning sources. The idea that we want some “abolish all guns” thing is a strawman. I believe that people should be able to own guns. I believe that other countries have gun ownership, and like their guns, and don’t have the issues we have. We vary quite a bit from people who want stricter stuff, to people who want lighter stuff. People who say ex-cons shouldn’t have guns, to people saying you can’t take away rights from criminals because it incentivizes political jailing (If you don’t want your opposition to own guns, arrest them). I personally believe that gun ownership should be relatively lax in terms of what you can get, but that they should have very stringent requirements
Really, the complicated web of cultural issues would require a whole book in order to cover, so I’d just leave it at that. A complicated tapestry of religious, historical, and sociological factors that contribute to our peculiar brand of gun violence, and this course must change. “Copycatism” doesn’t just exist in a vacuum. We cannot stay the course–we cannot conserve the course. We must alter American culture fundamentally, and that is exactly what conservativism inherently and necessarily opposes
I agree it’s a cultural issue, but where we’re gonna disagree is that the culture that promotes this degree of gun violence is one that loves guns so much it absolutely refuses to try and take any steps to fix the issue.
I wholly disagree. What Europeans don’t seem to understand about gun violence is that the largest predictor is the gini coefficient of an area, which is a measure of income inequality. The US has the highest gini coefficient of any developed/western country, and because of that correlation you see the largest rates of violent crime.
If you want to want to reduce the rates of violent crime down to match that of Canada your best bet would be to enact legistation to reduce the gini coefficient to a comparable level to Canada. Achieving that by reducing gun ownership in the US would require removing more guns than actually exist in the country.
Furthermore, you don’t actually know what leftists want in regards to gun control, since you’ve likely heard a lot of it from right-leaning sources
No. Just… no. First off, this discussion started off about Democrats, not leftists. And they are definitely not the same.
Second, go look up quotes from Democratic political candidates like Beto O’Rourke. There’s a rather prominent one where he promised to take away people’s ARs - exactly what you’re claiming doesn’t happen.
Third, go look up some of the legislation that has been pushed into Congress over the years. Particularly House Bill 127 in 2021.
I am what the Americans consider VERY far left (A centrist by European standards)
I’m really tired of this claim, because it’s not true and it gets more superfluous the more it gets repeated. The US has a decent share of extreme left-wing individuals, even by Europe’s standards. I know several avowed socialists and communists and the only reason I don’t know more is because I don’t want to wade further into that mess. Not only that, conservative parties in Europe have been growing in popularity, especially in Italy and Spain.
So first off, no, Americas extreme left is not all that extreme. The tankies we have here are few and far between, meanwhile people with nazi iconography are openly protesting in front of Disney World. We don’t have any significant population of soviet-style communism here, and all of our communists are about labor rights and reducing that wealth inequality. I knew one guy who was actually sad about Castro’s death, and everyone in our lefty-as-fuck circles called him stupid for it. No one here is advocating for the forcible seizure of everyone’s property to be redistributed. You have no idea what actual extreme far left is. Americas left just wants socialized health care and a decent living wage, and to maybe have rights even when they’re trans. We can talk about the Democrats all you want, but now we’re talking about conservatives, who for the most part still don’t want to do anything about police violence, and the prison-and-military industrial complex that lets them benefit from being the world police. They’re not left, or even centrist, and the Democratic party doesn’t accurately represent what American leftists want, they’re just a compromise–limp-wristed do-nothings playing tug-of-war with Republicans, and letting the rope slip further and further, loosing because they refuse to fight dirty against an opponent that fights dirty
So you wanna reduce the Gini Coefficient? Stop voting Republican. Democrats will suck the dick and lick the boots of corporations too, but not nearly as much, and they’re weak-willed enough to cave when we call them out on it in time if they don’t have Republicans to keep shifting the overton window. It is Republican policies since at least Ronald Reagan that have consistently benefited corporations. Republicans are the source of income inequality
Just, I don’t understand how you can throw your lot in with neonazis, and the KKK, and think you’re voting for the right people. The 20 or so Tankies we have in this country voted for Biden, sure, but they weren’t happy about it. Donald Trump got a fucking cult
Just, I don’t understand how you can throw your lot in with neonazis, and the KKK, and think you’re voting for the right people. The 20 or so Tankies we have in this country voted for Biden, sure, but they weren’t happy about it. Donald Trump got a fucking cult
This paragraph completely invalidated everything you said, because it’s painfully clear yhat you have no idea what you’re talking about and built a strawman in your head.
Go read my comment again: where the fuck did I ever say I voted for Republicans? I’ll tell you: fucking nowhere.
Do I hate Beto O’Rourke? Yes, but I also don’t live in Texas where he ran for governor. I vote pretty much straight-ticket in favor of Democrats even when they have terrible candidates like Hillary Clinton.
I recommend you sit down and shut up until you learn how to actually read/listen to people’s arguments. Then you won’t go off the rails on a strawman and make yourself look like a fool.
First of all, gun laws have been more or less the same for the past 100 years in the U.S., so how can they be the cause of the recent rise in mass shootings? Simple answer: they’re not.
So guns changed over the past 100 years, but the laws did not adjust. Sounds like a bad idea. How can a new technology a cause for a new problem? Did that ever happen???/s
Semi-automatic rifles were not overly widespread before the 1990, and when they became, in 1994 there was a time-limited ban for semi-automatic firearms, which then expired in 2004. And what are the major concerns for mass shootings in recent years? It is semi-automatic firearms.
If they were serious about curbing gun violence, their focus wouldn’t be on mass shootings so much as smaller-scale gun crime.
Why do you think they want to ban all guns? But when you’ve a gun proponents such as in the US you gotta get real about what you can achieve. So it is not hypocrisy to focus on assault weaponry.
That hobby thing can be said about many forbidden things, for example smoking cannabis.
First of all, gun laws have been more or less the same for the past 100 years in the U.S., so how can they be the cause of the recent rise in mass shootings? Simple answer: they’re not.
But they are, would your laws be stricter the appearance of these mass shootings would drop significantly since they perpetrators would have to go through a much mor rigorous screening process before being allowed near a firearm. The copycats and emulators are able to repeat these crimes ALSO because they have easy access to firearms, don’t act like this wouldn’t be a root cause for the mass shooting problem
Secondly, mass shootings make up a tiny fraction of gun violence; the fact that so many White liberals harp on mass shootings really just shows that they only really care about the gun violence that threatens to affect them and their kids. If they were serious about curbing gun violence, their focus wouldn’t be on mass shootings so much as smaller-scale gun crime
Those who commit small-scale gun crime use the same laws in place for mass-shooters and everybody else to access firearms used in their crimes
Third, many liberals are openly willing to kill a hobby that most gun owners enjoy without harming anyone, because they personally find said hobby unsightly and stupidly think they can stop gun violence in the U.S. by getting rid of gun stores—because that’s always put a stop to gun violence in other countries wherein it’s illegal to buy/sell guns (/s).
The Australian experience after the mass shooting in Port Arthur at the end of the 90ies tell a different story and it shows that guns buyback/confiscation can and will reduce crime committed by guns
I personally want to see many improvements to our gun laws in the U.S., such as more stringent background checks, laws against people with histories of serious psychiatric illness having access, laws against people with violent criminal histories having access, etc, but getting rid of all guns? No, total overkill, and such hardline, unreasonable stances are costing Democrats much-needed votes and ironically helping right-wing Nazis get closer to taking over the country. These views make no fucking sense when you scrutinize them and are clearly fueled by emotion rather than logic.
Tell that to the republicans, who see any intervention on the existing gun laws as an attack to the second amendment. More background checks? No thanks. Red flag laws? No thanks. Limiting firearms possession to those convicted of violent crimes? No thanks.
Who is the party operating according to feeling and who is the one operating according to common sense and logic? Let me give you a hint, it’s not the blue one who is using scare tactics to keep everything as it is
Third, many liberals are openly willing to kill a hobby that most gun owners enjoy without harming anyone
I honestly think a lot of the left’s stance on gun control stems from culture wars. Otherwise you wouldn’t see people reacting so much to pointless things like foregrips, suppressors, or painting guns black.
laws against people with histories of serious psychiatric illness having access
Tbf this is already a thing. If you’ve been involuntarily committed to a mental hospital (morning brain is preventing me from having the right term, sorry) that will show up on a federal background check.
Also, interestingly this and red flag laws can have a negative consequence: it can lead to individuals trying to hide their symptoms and not seek treatment to avoid having their rights taken away, which merely exasperates the problem.
I’m not opposed to having restrictions on gun ownership based on mental health, but there needs to be some way for affected individuals to gain their rights back after seeking treatment (similar to felons regaining their voting rights after a few years), in combination to making said treatment significantly easier to access (preferrably bia universal healthcare).
I work in mental health and I’m very sympathetic to what you’re talking about. I’d actually be opposed to any law that used a psychiatric hospitalization as a criteria alone for restricting gun rights. I said “serious mental illness,” because I meant things like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, not major depression. And even within those diagnoses, people aren’t always a risk. It’s a delicate subject, but I think whatever solution, we need laws that (a) have an impact on gun misuse and (b) are flexible enough that they don’t trap people unnecessarily in the net.
You’re entitled to your opinion, but “mass shootings aren’t the worst gun violence in the US” is just a shitty argument especially when the US is the only country that it regularly happens. I’d rather there be no gun violence anywhere, but I definitely care more about kids getting slaughtered than I do criminals shooting at each other. I don’t think that’s unreasonable at all.
I’ll also add something that’s changed is the radicalization of the likes of the NRA and right-wing groups starting in the 80s. When my father joined the NRA it was an organization that pushed for safety and training of firearms. Now they a practically a political arm of the Republican Party who just fear-monger and drive people to hoard guns and ammo, which I’m sure make the manufacturers happy. A large number of mass shooters have listened to these radicalized propaganda machines.
If we want to have a conversation about preventing the radicalization in the first place, I’m for it. Hold those people responsible instead of all fun owners is a topic to discuss.
There is one huge change in gun laws that has occurred in the last 100 years
1986
Mental health is the issue. Just like anyone who would drive a car through a school yard mowing down kids, that person has mental issues. The vehicles driver should be licensed and the owner should be registered. I am a gun toting liberal in a state with essential zero gun laws. I believe in the second ammendment, but not absolute. You should be able to have a gun, but you should be licensed (psyc eval, background check, gun safety classes requirement) and your guns should be registered. If a gun you own ever kills someone, you are responsible. Your gun is your responsibility to keep locked up and if it’s stolen you should have reported it.
Just like anyone who would drive a car through a school yard mowing down kids, that person has mental issues.
No, mental health issues are specific and do not encompass simply “being fucked up.” You can be plenty fucked up and not be mentally ill, and most of the people who get violent in the way you’re describing are simply extremists, not people suffering from a psychological disorder.
You should be able to have a gun, but you should be licensed
The issue here is that gun ownership is a right, while driving is a privilege. Privileges can require licenses, but if you require a license to exercise a right then it’s no longer a right.
Requiring every gun owner to have a license would have to be done as a constitutional amendment, and invalidating part of the Bill of Rights is unprecedented
Then owning a gun in a civilized country with no legitimate threat from outside forces to it’s individual civilians and a military that has higher funding than the next 10 countries combined should not be a right in the 21st century. It should however be a privilege that you have the most basic of accountability for.
If the claim here is that these people would vote straight Blue if the Democratic Party came out tomorrow supporting guns I don’t buy it at all. They’ll move the goalposts. Half the rhetoric they believe about Democrats taking their guns is entirely fabricated to begin with, a large chunk of the rest amounts to paperwork.
My personal stance is is a combination of an observation that an armed population is harder to oppress, and that gun control tends to have a disproportionate impact on minorities and oppressed groups.
Since LGBT and minorities are the most likely groups to be attacked by political opposition, we shouldn’t be trying to hamstring their ability to defend themselves.
Plus, a contributing factor to why the alt-right and fascists have gained so much ground in the past decade is because of the perception that only the political right has guns, and therefore they think that they’ll win in a fight
You sure are making a lot of brain twists to keep school shooters shooting school kids!
If you go far enough left, you get your guns back.
And get paid for it. The difference is that it is no longer your guns but our guns
That and monetary issues. The “temporarily embarrassed millionaires” out there who want to keep R in power so when they finally get rich, they won’t have to pay taxes.
These are called dumb fucks in my book
In Australia I know a lot of people who vote purely based on how their parents voted. That includes people voting against their own interests and refuse to do any research that might change their minds…
We have that in the US too, there’s just a less than subtle rebellion phase that lasts roughly 2.5 presidential election cycles before regressing.
A single issue for their single brain cell.
Some users have come to this thread to answer this question honesty and openly. Without cussing or name calling or anything.
I think it’s shameful for people to be downvoting them. Downvote something for being off topic, or for being violent or hateful that’s fine. But for having an opinion that’s different from yours in a thread specifically asking for that?
There are always going to be people who you disagree with. On every topic.That kind of behavior will only push people away.
I agree.
I asked this question because I really want to try to understand people who are different than me and hold other opinions than me. Broaden my horizon. Maybe help people question their own reasonings.
So, I asked a question on a topic I don’t understand. I hope people will answer honestly and that people who disagree will avoid persecuting that honesty.
We all need to find common ground somewhere.
I think for a lot of people its very similar to religion.
If you grew up in the church, the priest/pastor was a nice guy, church events were very central to the community, he spoke at Nannas funeral. You might not be religious but the broader concerns about “the church” ring a lot more hollow because you have seen the positive side.
If you grew up somewhere that was very republican and your local and state reps did the meat and potatoes of their jobs well, why would you have anything against them? Your community was nice, nobody was racist or homophobic (that you noticed), the schools were funded, people had jobs. You have seen with your own eyes that Republicans arent evil.
Good for you that’s a great attitude to have. Having honest and open conversation in good faith is so valuable and healthy. Keep it up and don’t let those types get you down.
I totally agree about the common ground. Understanding has to occur on both sides. You must be willing to listen before you expect anyone else to.
Will someone please think of the fake Internet points of oppressive
theofascists?
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They are basically just democrats except they like guns.
Tbf, there’s liberals like that too, myself included. There’s a joke going around that “once you are far enough left you get your guns back”.
The Second Amendment by definition and history is a liberal invention.
This.
It’s caused plenty an awkward turn in conversations with friends as well as friends of my girlfriend’s who are almost universally Classic American Liberal Democrat™
I’m with them on domestic policy, marriage equality, LGBT rights, racial justice, electoral reform, and abortion.
Then we get to guns.
And I’m certainly not some kind of NRA nut or Y’all Qaeda tacticool dope, so it’s a lot tougher to make a strawman against gun owners when there’s one sitting there across from you that you know, like, and respect.
That being said, those occasions also give me pause because I know if we’re falling into that easy line of thinking on guns, we’re probably also doing that sort of strawman on the issues we all agree on too, there’s just nobody present to challenge that view.
Honestly, I feel like it’s so easy, especially in gun crazy states like Texas to run a Democrat who includes enjoying days at the range in their campaign advertisements, that Southern Dems have to be throwing their campaigns on purpose for some reason.
That’s not to say we should be advocating for unlimited magazines and fully auto weapons. But there should be a candidate who is like “Hey, you like your constitutional right to protect yourself? Me too. How about we start funding/investigating the programs that are already supposedly in place to catch red flag purchasers, and find out where the issues are there?”
I feel like a pro-choice, pro-LGBTQ, pro-immigratjon candidate would actually make some headway if they just let go of the gun argument, or at the very least dialed it back substantially.
or at the very least dialed it back substantially.
From what I’m aware, Beto O’Rourke completely dropped gun control as a campaign issue when he ran for governor in Texas. Granted, he was also the biggest advocate for gun control of all the candidates vying for the Democratic nomination for the 2020 election, so I don’t think anyone trusted his reversal
Yes I was a huge Beto Stan. Had his sign in my yard. But even after his reversal, I kept seeing his “HELL YEAH IM TAKING YOUR GUNS” quoted in headlines all over the state 🙄🙄🙄🙄
Of course Abbott was drowning out all the more sensible shit Beto actually said.
Eh, for me, when he said that he lost my support. Ever. For any office.
Sorry, you can drop it from your platform but you already told me where you stand.
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What you described is literally the Democratic party platform https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/healing-the-soul-of-america/
I bet you’re closer in opinion than you think. I think most Dems would settle for universal background checks and no super weapons type rules. The same basic rules we have for other dangerous stuff. You need to buy insurance and you’re responsible if someone uses your gun in a crime. Stuff to encourage careful ownership.
How incredibly presumptive of you to assume.
And of course you’d be wrong about how similar we are on guns, since most of them are part of the crowd that doesn’t own or use guns and therefore feel that because they’ve survived without them just fine that the only obvious and reasonable course of action is that of course we should simply outlaw all guns and just have everyone all over the country turn them in (not buybacks, not voluntary, just everyone come hand over all their guns). And they feel that anyone who doesn’t see how that’s the obvious choice is just crazy.
Also, I don’t even agree with what you’ve laid out here. So you’re off on both sides of your assumption of similarity.
Lol, y’all Qaeda, I’m stealing that one
Lmao. I’ve never heard that one. What’s the thought process there?
LiberalGunNut™ here! It’s because of quotes like these:
Karl Marx — ‘Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force if necessary’
Ida B. Wells advised, that “the Winchester rifle deserved a place of honor in every Black home.”
There are more, can’t think of them ATM.
Just curious, registering as democrat or republican, what does that do?
Note: I’m not U.S. American
In my non-USian understanding, it means you can vote in the primaries (the party-specific elections that choose candidates for the actual election).
American here to confirm that @JoBo is basically right.
Some of the smaller parties have “Open Primaries” (which is to say that you can vote for who gets to represent the party in the real election, regardless of your party registration), but the big two (Democrats and Republicans) have “Closed Primaries” which means that if you want to vote for who will be the Dem/Rep candidate in the main election, you have to be a registered member of that party.
That system is like if I declared myself transwoman just to access the ladys room and see some boob and butt.
Boy, I sure do hate that analogy.
But it is the reason I’m registered with a major party vs the one I actually like; I can always have a voice in the one I like, and I want to be able to have my microscopic amount of influence on a larger party. It’s as much of a “have your cake and eat it too” in the less-than-optimal environment of American Politics as I can get.
There’s a northern politician like that. I think they call him Adam Kinzinger.
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This may be true, but may also just say that continuously throwing facts at someone is the wrong approach
You’re being down voted for facts lol. We’re emotional, often irrational beings. How/when we present facts matters
Social beings as well. I wouldn’t even say it’s about how you present facts. We are pretty bad at interrogating our own reasoning for things. We will quote facts when asked for our reasoning, but once you start really digging in it’s often not really about that.
I actually just finished reading “How minds change” by David McRaney and would recommend it to anyone.
But if I had to summarize my biggest takeaway: you can’t really change someone’s mind, you can just facilitate convo with them that leads to them changing their own mind to some degree.
Better than throwing bullets at someone?
So…. Schools are dumb?
The context there is obviously very different
How so?
Kids generally don’t have ingrained opinions or social groups formed around whether or not 2+2=4 and generally they’re really just concerned with passing tests
Now this isn’t always true and in cases where it is you WILL have trouble teaching. But the vast majority of school curriculum is not this way.
There is nothing wrong with throwing facts at people. Thats how learning happens. Somewhere along the lines, the MAGA clowns decided that they can argue that 2+2 isn’t 4 anymore.
Essentially, just because they managed to lean how to un-learn everything that requires basic logic, doesn’t mean that we need to rewrite the rules.
Nothing wrong except it doesn’t work.
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What country is that?
Probably the Netherlands, going by his numbers.
What country is that?
Right wing in my country is also non religious, religion in politics is really frowned upon, to the point that one of our former PMs ‘came out’ as a Catholic after he left. Everyone is pretty pro LGB… less so on the T though, our conservatives are very anti-trans, our left party less so. I think our only anti abortionists are on the right? It’s a rare viewpoint to say out loud though.
I used to consider myself republican, and I think I’m still closer to republican than democrat. I prefer small government, which is at least sometimes a republican ideal. I am also against identity politics of any kind, so I am against affirmative action. I am in favor of gun rights, with regulations that allow for appropriate tracking of who has guns where, how they are stored, how they are transported etc. However, regulations that prevent particular people from owning guns or ban any particular weapons should be very conservative. Even felons should regain gun rights after an appropriate period of time. Only ridiculously dangerous weapons, like nukes, should be outright banned. Stuff like full auto weapons should be legal, but restricted to only be stored at a gun range or something. As far as LGBT goes, I don’t think the government should have anything to do with them. Let them do what they want, let people react how they want (as long as it isn’t violent of course, which is already illegal under other laws). I’ve never been really sure about abortion. My gut reaction is to just let people do what they want, but I struggle to logically justify it as anything but murder. Not to mention the impracticality of banning it.
I wouldn’t really call myself a republican anymore though. This is largely because of the religious aspects. I don’t know if republicans have actually become more authoritarian or if my perception has just changed, but either way they don’t seem to prioritize the same things as me anymore. Things like right to repair, net neutrality, and E2EE are important to me, but they don’t align with that at all. The party also keeps embracing identity politics, just with different identities than their opposition. Religion should be a non-factor from a governmental perspective. It doesn’t need any special protections, just to be ignored.
If I had to call myself something, I guess I would be a ‘libertarian socialist’, however much of an oxymoron that seems to be. For instance, I like the idea of UBI, largely because it would allow almost all welfare/social programs to be eliminated (including social security). Doing so would reduce government control, because they no longer have an ability to tweak who gets what, since everyone gets the same amount.
Thank you for your response and your perspective.
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I don’t think that this is necessarily where you’ve landed, but “libertarian socialism” is very much a thing. (more in line with the original use of the term “libertarian”…)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian_socialism?wprov=sfti1#
Not really what your criteria is being that I’m a pro life libertarian as far as ideals I align with most on what you’re looking for.
Even though I am religious, my argument against abortion is firstly a scientific one then on moral principal second. On the science side it’s a human from the moment of conception. On the moral side it’s that I believe all humans deserve human rights no matter at what stage of development there are. Just as soon as you make exceptions to kill for one type or subset of humankind you open the door to others. Usually this is done by labeling a certain group as not human to justify oppression of said group. Terms usually used to justify acts of violence against other humans are property, subhuman, animals, savages, clump of cells, parasite, etc. Usually for libertarians it boils down to having a code called the non-aggression principal which is essentially don’t fuck with other people. This is also why I’m anti capital punishment.
I hope that helps. Also, good luck at your family get togethers, lol. It feels like you’re looking for ammunition for debates.
On the science side it’s a human from the moment of conception.
Citation needed
This basically underpins the whole thing and is pretty hand waved away
Personally I think the whole ‘life/humanity begins at conception’ thing is a smoke screen. Life began a long, long time ago, and the cell line you belong to became human deep in prehistory.
The actual question is “does the state have the right to use one person’s living body to support the life of another?” It applies to organ transplants as much as it applies to the unborn.
Citation needed
I’m not seeing how this in anyway even really touches on this issue at hand. A paper on human development to show that “science says” we have a “human” at the moment of conception?
At the end of the day this is going to just be about what your definition of a “human” is rather than anything “science” has to say.
This one goes to the embryo
https://www.britannica.com/science/human-body/Basic-form-and-development
But at far as from conception goes, it has DNA distinct from both parents and starts developing until stopped. Even if not developed to whatever your standard is, it’s like a picture developed from film. The picture (or in this case, the human) is still there, it just needs to be developed.
I see justifying violence on certain humans as opening the door for society to justify violence on other humans. We look back on times when slavery or genocide was condoned and abhor that time and the humans that gave their approval to it. I truly believe that will be the way humanity will see society as it is now when medical technology advances enough to not need a human womb to develop a human to birth. That in and of itself begs the question, when a human is viable outside of the womb from no matter what stage of development, does that change how you view its rights from the earliest stages of its life?
Imagine the 'Trolley Problem" where there is a toddler on one track, and on the other track there is a cooler containing 100 in-vitro embryos. Which would you save, and why?
Derail the trolley.
Oh no! There were 2 toddlers and 200 frozen embryos on the trolley. Derailing it has destroyed them all.
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It wouldn’t because I have criteria, most specifically the ability to suffer, that underpins how I feel about abortion. This is independent of wombs or even DNA potentially.
I mean, I understand not wanting to allow violence on humans. But this still tied back to the definition of human. And, for me, if we take it back to ability to suffer, it makes a direct case for the way I feel about any entity’s (human or non human) rights
As far as I can tell you see abortion as an “exception” that allows killing of a specific type of human.
While I am not really concerned with humanness. But of the underlying phenomenon that make protecting humans something we should want to do.
If you think about why we want to protect humans and tie to to consciousness and ability to suffer. There’s no exception and we can use our knowledge of human fetus development to inform abortion policy to prevent abortions that would infringe on those conditions.
Not that you’re asking for an argument, but I do want you to know why I, and many like me, find this whole life-from-conception argument totally ethically unpersuasive. And it’s not the usual nonsense of “it’s just cells” because, as you well know, that’s an unimpressive and pointless debate. Whether a fetus is a human or not is fundamentally subjective. And so I’ll grant that it is, because I have total confidence in my pro-choice position even then.
The issue with the pro-life position is not that it asserts that abortion is bad. Frankly, I don’t give a crap if you or anyone else thinks it is bad. Again, that is subjective. A personal preference. The issue with the pro-life position is that it always seems to assert that abortion must be banned and even criminalized. That’s what pro-life is. It doesn’t mean “I think abortion is bad”, it means “I think abortion should not be allowed.”
My position isn’t that abortion is good. Mine is that the pregnant person has a right to choose. I think the moral calculus on when and whether it is good or bad is FAR too complicated to form a rule, and so we must leave it up to the biggest stakeholders to figure that out privately.
I think a lot of things are bad, but having a preference against something is different than justifying use of the state’s violence to prohibit it.
A Defense of Abortion by Judith Jarvis Thomson, PDF - 1971. Hardly new, and I doubt you’ve never seen it, but ultimately it is still the line of argument that I do not think has been convincingly rebutted. This essay is still probably the most sound and straightforward work of philosophy that shows that banning abortion is impermissible in an ethical society, and it presumes life from the moment of conception just as you do.
My extreme summary of the point it is making: at the end of the day, you have two competing human rights. You have the right to autonomy of your own body against another’s right to life. Both are undeniably rights a person has – and highly related ones, at that. When these rights are in tension, we need to make a choice as to which is supreme. And the consequences of giving life supremacy over autonomy are disastrous compared to the consequences of giving autonomy supremacy over life.
Rather than empower the state to take any and all actions necessary to protect life, we instead must impose a limit on the power of the state – it may not violate someone’s ability to make choices about their own body functions, even if to protect the life of another.
I’d prefer to be in a world that has no abortions at all. Just as I’d prefer to be in a world without contagious disease. One way to get rid of all contagious disease is to systematically euthanize every sick person at their first sniffle. Problem solved! Such is an abortion ban.
We get rid of disease by investing in research and healthcare and doing our best to use it maximize efficacy with fair triage, vaccination programs, etc… We get rid of abortion by preventing unwanted pregnancies from the get and by creating a world so supportive and safe for pregnant people that they do not want to terminate it.
So don’t fuck with other people, unless they’re fully grown women making decisions about their own bodies, or underage victims of rape.
There no caveat or exception. Don’t fuck with other people.
There no caveat or exception. Don’t fuck with other people.
But my hand is tired.
/jk
I won’t mention the rest of the text because I’m not interested enough on the discussion to do so. I’ll focus on a single thing.
On the science side it’s a human from the moment of conception.
What should be considered a human being or not is prescriptive in nature, because it involves ethics. Science - i.e. the scientific method - does not give a shit to prescriptive matters; science is descriptive, it’s worried about what happens/doesn’t happen. For science it doesn’t really matter if you call it a human, a tissue, a wug or a colourless green thing sleeping furiously, as long as you’re unambiguously and accurately describing the phenomenon being studied.
As such, no, science itself doesn’t really tell you “when it becomes a human being”.
[From another comment, after being asked for source] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33620844/
The only thing that it “proves” is that the author (not “science”) is referring to foetuses (from nine weeks after conception [not zero] to 16 weeks) as “children”. And it certainly does not back up your claim that [ipsis litteris] “On the science side it’s a human from the moment of conception.”
And no, “The growth and development are positively influenced by factors, like parental health and genetic composition, even before conception.” does not prove it either, given that the author is solely mentioning conception as a time of reference.
Sorry to be blunt but the way that you referred to science sounds a lot like “I’m ignorant on science but I want to leech off its prestige for the sake of my argument”. If you don’t want to do this, here’s a better approach:
- Show how certain actions generate certain outcomes. Science will help you with this.
- Explicit the moral and ethical premises that you are using, to judge said outcomes as good/bad. Science will not help you with this.
It’s also a nice way to avoid a fallacy/stupidity called appeal to nature (TL;DR: “[event/thing] is natural, so it’s good lol lmao”), that often plagues discussions about moral matters like abortion.
All very well put and saved me leaving a comment.
I think the responses from the conservatives in this thread have demonstrated what I’d expected, and hopefully what OP was looking for: abandonment of Christian dogma does not always result in abandonment of dogmatic values.
People who are happy to declare that the definition of something like science is anything other than what the vast majority of those accredited in scientific fields consider it to be are just as dishonest as hard-line Christians, and will vote against their own interests just as readily.
I like how you call out some terms used to dehumanization. Fetus, baby, and child also fit into that bucket imo.
So ,to clarify, you want the government to restrict and punish abortion? I thought libertarians were for less government.
Why should the government have a monopoly on violence and force in this case? Instead shouldn’t the enforcement of moral law like the NAP be up to their peers or free market hired private contractors?
Some libertarians are minarchist meaning as little government as possible, some are anarcho-capitalists. Pro-life minarchists would be fine having punishment of abortion be treated like any other killing of a human. Anarcho-capitalists would rather not have government have a monopoly on violence.
If the NAP could be easily dismissed by just reclassifying who is and isn’t a human, then yes some form of law setting clarifying what a human is would be necessary. You bring up THE most interesting debate though in libertarian circles IMHO. Tom Woods did an interview with Gerard Casey about this topic. I highly recommend listening to the interview and giving Casey’s book a read.
https://tomwoods.com/libertarian-anarchy-against-the-state-2/
Even though I am religious, my argument against abortion is firstly a scientific one then on moral principal second. On the science side it’s a human from the moment of conception.
This is true…literally everyone knows the instant a piece of pollen lands in the flower of an oak tree, a fully formed oak tree is created in that moment. Literally, no other steps between those things even worth defining with their own special words or meanings like book people use to try to sound special(smart).
That’s why I’m glad we’ve got the REAL science of Jesus and the almighty.
Appreciate the honest and (somewhat) applicable answer!
I also DO NOT appreciate the downvotes … we really need to get rid of those. Don’t agree, fine, move on or respond civilly. A downvote is a manifestly uncivil action sanctioned by the interface.
Otherwise … to respond to the abortion argument … where this falls down for me is the complete lack of any mention of the mother or woman in your reasoning.
Scientifically, this challenges the “humanness” of a foetus in the way it is tightly coupled and dependent on another human to live. Morally, it raises much of your reasoning in relation to not fucking with people once you consider what is effectively done to women by forcing them to carry any foetus to birth which is a massive, very active and obviously risky undertaking.
Whether these are convincing for you or others, the lack of any weight given for these considerations indicates that the act of birthing is presumed as a duty of all women. A presumption that IMO undermines the completeness of your scientific and moral arguments.
To take that a little further … should people be legally compelled to secure and save the lives of babies? As it is now, that’s not the case anywhere I know of. Causing harm would be criminal, obviously, but failing to save a baby or anyone else from harm is not.
In debating the legality of abortion you enter into similar territory. Only by presuming birth as a duty can you think otherwise.
While aborting a foetus is a positive act, there’s the complication that it’s purpose is to avoid the onus of pregnancy and birth, which can be easily seen as tantamount to “simply not doing the thing that would save the foetus’s like”, ie all the work of pregnancy and birth which is probably all too easily presumed by men (which I’m guessing you are) as a more passive and natural event than an act of effort, toil and cost.
The more fundamental issue is tying it to “humanness” at all. And I don’t think dependence on the mother really comes into play in terms of if it deserves protection. There’s really no reason you couldn’t have a concious parasite.
All of the highlights why it’s important to define what specific qualities we are looking for in determining the degree of rights an entity would have.
Your last paragraph is why I want nothing to do with killing humans just for convenience. Also look at my last comment with wantd. I posed a question about when a human is viable outside of the womb at any stage of development. Would it change how you view its rights?
Although I don’t agree with expanding government, I do agree with extending rights and protections to humans at all stages of development. I do consider that a different debate though mostly in line with who should pave roads, how police should work, and who should deliver mail (once again libertarian, not authoritarian Republican)
Also don’t worry about down votes. This topic is highly contentious and both sides generally see it the other side as a direct assault on their beliefs.
Abortion should be legal until the offspring is 18. “Son, this isn’t working out. Let’s go for a ride.”.
Not original replier, but personally viably outside the womb changes the entire game. A strong major of my support for abortion is “I’m a man, I can’t possibly imagine getting pregnant and birthing another human”. So much of the onus of birth is the woman, a human that we also have to consider the feelings and health of. If viably was possible outside the womb, I could probably be argued into agreeing to ban abortion with some key exceptions because the world isn’t black and white.
However, I am curious on your thoughts on medical euthanasia.
So do you currently think abortion should only be allowed in instances that are about the mother’s health?
Not OP but I think women are people, so yeah they should have basic bodily autonomy. Might not jive that well with the folk that view women as nothing more than property though.
I know it’s contentious, but the downvotes don’t help anything.
To your first para: viability outside the womb doesn’t, I think, affect my initial argument. If it’s viable outside of the womb, then so be it. Actively harming it would be illegal, but being legally compelled to care for it would be problematic.
Viability would alter abortion laws though, I think. In that it would make sense at some point to prohibit the mother from electing to terminate rather than submit the foetus to whatever the extra-womb viability state is. What happens then would mostly put the foetus in the same position it is now in that the onus of providing the viability of its life wouldn’t be something others are compelled to do, unless of course it’s trivial and withholding is tantamount to actively killing.
On the issue of convenience, I think that’s a misrepresentation. The thrust of the argument is consistency with the rest of social norms where the “convenience” is the freedom for a whole gender to not undertake 9 months of drastic bodily transformation and work and the remaining parental duties. If the rest of society were so committed to life and prosperity as ensuring every foetus gets taken care of, then that’s a different conversation, in large part because the mothers would be taken care of too. But consigning a whole gender’s major life experiences and burdens to a matter of “convenience”, I think, marks the dissonance that a libertarian outlook encounters when it tries to compel or outlaw actions. It’s not just convenience (in principle at least), and that this onus needs to be considered trivial indicates IMO the biases against women involved treating the issue as legally black and white.
Nonetheless, I agree with your general reasoning about not facilitating the depreciation of life. I personally extend the same reasoning to animals in my arguments in favour of veganism.
I don’t fit this description, but I know many that do.
You will not get a real answer to this question due to how biased it is being asked.
Good luck on your search for knowledge.
I tried to word it as non-biased as possible. How would you word it to make it less biased in your opinion?
This comment and my other in the thread are gonna get a ton of downvotes, so I’m just going to own it.
Also, this is entirely from my experience with republicans in real life. I am not one, but many of my family and friends are.
First, most are not anti-LGBT at all. Most that I know are against these laws that are being out into place. But these issues are not very important to them so they don’t have strong convictions that would dissuade them from voting based on this issue. They will not engage if you call them anti-LGBT because they are not.
Second, contempt for atheist. This is a perspective that comes from the online and media representation of republicans. I’ve never heard a single discussion about atheists with republicans. This is not an issue, period. They will not engage in discussion around an issue they do not see as an issue.
Third, Christian nationalism is, again, not relevant to these people. They do not see it as real nor do they see it as a real problem. They may engage with this discussion. So I don’t see a need to reword this one.
Lastly, abortion rights. This isn’t how republicans frame the issue. They view it as a human right and ending a human life early. I don’t agree, but they will not engage with someone asking why they are against “abortion rights”.
Again, let me repeat, I voted straight dem ticket last election. I am only giving my perspective based on interactions with real life republicans.
Third, Christian nationalism is, again, not relevant to these people. They do not see it as real nor do they see it as a real problem. They may engage with this discussion. So I don’t see a need to reword this one.
The literal current Republican speaker of the House stated outright that the USA is “depraved” and key parts of his reasoning for this was the prominence of LGBT people in modern culture and declining church attendance and religious observation.
I fully agree that your average random Republican doesn’t necessarily hate LGBT people, or non-theists but they’re simply not paying attention to the outrageous crap many elected representatives are saying.
Thanks for your response. Much appreciated.
Still, the things you say they don’t want to engage in a conversation about or even acknowledge are actual policies the party engages heavily in. And that’s really my question. How do they reconcile their non-religious convictions with those religious policies of the party.
Do you mean they just don’t care and vote for the party regardless because there’s one policy they like?
They honestly seem like any other voter. For me, I don’t agree with every position the dem party takes. They are the same, they simply agree with republicans more the democrats.
At least that’s my take.
Thanks for the clarification.
I read it as being a matter of phrasing. Which will make rewording potentially difficult. But for instance, you use the phrase “Christian Nationalism” to cover an umbrella of policies you see as related, I think OP is saying that your average republican doesn’t identify their policies and opinions as being part of the Christian nationalism umbrella. Since they don’t make that association, they don’t, maybe even don’t know how to, engage under that umbrella.
Having grown up in the rural deep south, this feels like more of a description of blue state Republicans than red state Republicans.
You can clearly see that plenty of states have Republicans that care about LGBT issues. In Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee, and West Virginia, less than 1/3rd of Republicans think homosexuality should be accepted. And it’s not like all the other states are blowing them out of the water. A majority of Republicans/Republican leaners believe gay marriage being legal is somewhat or very bad for society. Less than half believe it is acceptable for gay people to raise children. And that’s not even touching trans issues.
Honestly, this seems like the depiction of a bunch of people that are safe and prosperous and can’t imagine how their views could possibly be problematic, and don’t need to, and so avoid political discussions because it’s just a bit too yuck and they’d prefer to lead their happy lives.
Basically the conservative - privilege coupling that is so shit.
The one you list lastly seems like the only actual reason. The others are things they DONT care about
