LogFAQs > #898265687

NightMareBunny posted...

"Hey, did you know all the worst crime in the US happens in the places with strict gun control?"

so actually enforcing regulations and rules on who can and can't get guns causes more people to get shot and killed apparently?....

what kind of logic is that....no sane person thinks "don't do anything about it and it'll fix itself"

1) If the argument is "We need to apply stricter gun control to reduce violent crime", and evidence exists to indicate that stricter gun control does not, in fact, seem to reduce violent crime, then that is a completely valid counter-argument to make.

2) If the argument is that increased gun control merely leads to decreased rates of gun ownership by law-abiding citizens (ie, the people who obey the law), while failing to significantly decrease the number of illegally owned guns in the hands of criminals (ie, the people who don't obey the law), thus placing innocent people more at risk, and evidence exists which could support said hypothesis, then that is a completely valid argument to make.

3) If the argument is that limiting gun ownership in the hands of law-abiding citizens increases the odds of non-gun related violent crimes (with the implication that violent criminals are more emboldened to commit assault or armed robbery when they know the people they are robbing or attacking likely do not possess guns for self-defense), and evidence exists which could support said hypothesis, then that is a completely valid argument to make.

Regardless of whether or not you agree with said stance, and whether or not evidence which supports it exists in sufficient quantity to justify it, it's a perfectly understandable position for someone to hold.

If anything, there are probably far more valid arguments against gun control as it currently exists in the US than there are arguments in favor of it, considering the #1 problem right now isn't a lack of laws, as much as it is how poorly existing laws are enforced, and how many of them are either incidental or actively detrimental to the overall problem.

Then again, "Let's slap a band-aid on the problem and pretend it's fixed" is pretty much the US politician's answer to every socio-economic issue these days, so it's not entirely surprising that we're fucking this one up as badly as we fuck up everything else.



Lil69Leo posted...

Hey did you know countries with proper laws and controls don't see anywhere near as much violence from guns as the USA does?

Population heterogeneity will always render that argument a logical fallacy, regardless of which particular bullshit hot-button political argument it's being wielded like a cudgel in.

Like it or not, socio-political solutions that work perfectly in a nation where the population is relatively homogeneous in terms of ethnicity/economics/ideology/etc. don't necessarily transfer over perfectly into scenarios involving one of the most biologically and economically diverse populations on the planet.

For that matter, the last 100+ years of human history have mostly been a litany of Western civilization attempting to force its ideals and way of life on the rest of the world, only to have it backfire spectacularly in a number of cases, in a multitude of ways.

And that's before we even start getting into specific situational differences or other established variables that render certain solutions untenable.

Humans are a complicated bunch of monsters. The societies we've built are equally complicated, and don't easily break down into identical modular parts.

And the most effective socio-economic solutions to problems (ie, blatant self-sacrifice) are almost always the ones we never want to resort to.


---

"Wall of Text'D!" --- oldskoolplayr76
"POwned again." --- blight family