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[linnea]

lfm, I respect your position. My cousin was murdered when she was an MP in the military over some shit .22 handgun. The fug who did it took the handgun and tried to go kill more people for insurance money, including beating a father to death in front of his two-year-old son. The murderer got two death sentences and was executed in 1995. 

You are correct in that many firearms have taken many lives. As the slogan goes, guns don't kill people, they just make it real easy. That being said, I am an advocate of gun control. It's TERRIBLE that your cousin was able to buy that gun. I really wish that he had been able to get help. I wish there had been some sort of way to prevent him from buying that gun. I think that some good things have come out of gun control, like the fact that many states have a waiting period before you can purchase a firearm.

Like I said, I figured that I would go through the rest of my life without ever touching a gun. Then I became a stalking victim.

Now I have a .357 and badass friends that I go to the range with. At last count I had about 500 rounds and 2 speedloaders for the revolver. My firefighter friends joke that they're going to hang back if there's ever a fire call at my house, which they should! 

However, firearms are pretty much a way of life out here in rural Alaska. The natives go on seal hunts with rifles, not with harpoons. We have a bowling pin shoot every year at the shooting range where the best shots in town all get together. For me, there are few pleasures greater in life than drinking a diet Coke and watching your surrogate father-figure yelling at a bowling pin, "It's coming RIGHT FOR US!" and knocking down all 5 pins before his opponent hits one. Next year I'm going to participate in the pin shoot. Even if I don't hit any of them, it's fun to hang out with everyone.

Ash, I have a pretty basic setup. My surrogate-father Dan prints up targets and we staple them to pieces of driftwood or pallets that are at the shooting range. I have only fired a shotgun once, all my experience thus far has been with handguns. I have a Smith & Wesson 6-shot .357 revolver. I have hollowpoint Magnum bullets for here at the house, but I usually take the .38 special bullets that Dan pours for me to the range.

I usually just wear my glasses for eye protection, and I have earplugs because I don't have enough scratch lying around to buy cans (all my money goes to rent, kitty food, perfume, cosmetics, and internet costs, in that order). I usually start at close range, maybe 15-20 feet from the target. Dan's a ridiculous shot and he'll do all kinds of silly stuff, like shoot patterns into the targets, shoot while moving, set up empty shotgun shells on the edge of a piece of wood and shoot them from 40 feet with a handgun, etc.  He and his wife are wonderful people, and he was the one who took me aside and asked me if I'd like to learn gun safety when all the court case bullshit blew up.

Fortunately for me, Mr. Stalker Asshole is thankfully too smart to mess around any more - he's on probation for felony charges and he does not want his pansy ass to get sent to the Big House.

[littlefallsmets]

Well, it was my cousin's best friend who got the gun but...

Y'know, I just watched "The Prestige" and I think that prompted this line of thinking.

And there is this sort of... situation... where the only two people who could say exactly what happened there who admit to being there, my cousin and his killer and... one is dead and the other fell so deeply into schizophrenia that he claims to not remember.

It could have been that he flipped out and killed Al over a perceived slight with his girlfriend or... it could've been that Al was trying to stop him from killing himself and the gun went off or... it could've been any number of things.

Like, no one quite knows to this day. There was no trial because... in a small town when one kid is dead and the other is drooling in the psyche ward in Cooperstown, you tend to not press charges, everyone decides that looking into it would only make things worse and...

Questions are never answered, y'know.

This... thing from which I've never completely recovered, from which my father's entire family has never recovered, the loss of the kid I've spent my young manhood trying to live up to... it's like a magic trick that I never got to figure out.

In go two boys, out come a corpse and a lunatic. Shazam, y'know?

I dunno. Thanks for listening, anyway.

...but I will say that it is an interesting cultural disconnect.

When someone from anywhere else in the world says that someone is going to Cooperstown, it means that they were one of the best baseball players of all time.

When someone from where I grew up says that someone is going to Cooperstown, it means that they are going to Imogene Bassett Hospital in Cooperstown, the best hospital between Albany and Syracuse, where they are either going because they have gone mad or are going to die.

My mother's brother went there to go mad and so did Alan's killer. My grandpa died there and so did Alan. There are nights I wake up thinking that my father's heart condition has sent him to Cooperstown, out there on the other side of the world.

At the edge of gorgeous Lake Otswego, the lake the Natives called the Glimmerglass, where Abner Doubleday was nowhere near when it was claimed that baseball was invented.

[KeithHernandez]

Guns don't kill people, bullets do!

And, sorry to hear about your alls tragic stories.  I have lived a life of relatively few tragedies.  One major one, but still, not like that.

[wombat]

LFM, you need to spend less time writing messageboard posts and more time writing a book.

[side_show]

So here goes.

I hate guns.  I absolutely hate them.  My dad, grandpa and uncle were all huge gun nuts.  There was some occasional hunting, but mostly handguns.  My dad was a major player at his gun club, made his own bullets and actually built the premier local shooting range.  There were plenty of guns around - hand guns and riffles.  They did nothing to protect me growing up.  One awful night while out camping my best friend and I's tent was surrounded by teen boys who were planning to rape us.  I single handedly saved both of us thanks to intensive self defense training.  The use of guns, which were within attainable reach, would have only ruined things.  I would have killed some stupid boys who learned their lesson very well without their heads exploding.  I'll never forget my friend's father charging off into the woods with a rifle, seeking revenge, and just desperately not wanting things to be made worse by killing.  Thankfully he didn't catch up with them. 

While my dad was in the height of his gun obsession, his father went down to the basement to shoot himself dead in the stomach - not explainantion, no note.  In his family, no one talks about their feelings - they go out and shoot a gun.  My dad's gun obsession strangely didn't get any better after this.  He struggles a lot with issues of "manhood" and is still trying to prove himself worth to his long dead father even now.  After my grandfather shot himself is when my mother's own mental illness spiralled, and dad started taking jobs that took him out of the city for 20 days a month.  Having a father who's dad shot himself, a mother off the deepend and me with my own problems - it was not the environment to have guns available.  But the fucked up-ness of my life isn't the sort of thing caught by the (far more stringent) gun controle rules of my country.  It was a dark night of the soul in my late teens when I thought about the handgun in my dad's sock drawer.  I know for some people guns make them feel safe, but for me they are only a destructive and threatening force with no value.  I've had other occasions where I've had to defend myself, and I can't imagine a single situation where a gun would've made things anything but worse.  I personally have no situation in my mind where I would feel justified in killing another human being.  Even in a "kill or be killed" situation I'm 1) fairly confident I could save myself and 2) wouldn't want to live with having killed someone else.   

There are many times where people don't recognize that they should not have guns around.  Having witnessed several situations where a person's mental state has deteriorated without them recognizing the severity of their situation, I oppose guns in the home.   

As for hunting, I'm not opposed, but as a feat of sporting prowess, and as a tie to traditional Aboriginal hunting, I find bow hunting far more admirable.  It's nice to not pick buck shot out of your venison also.

[Nabubrush]

I like a .30-.30.

[Sub_Topical]

When I was 14 my favorite cousin was at her fast food job when three assholes busted in at closing time. They lined her and her three co-workers up on the floor while getting the evenings cash. After getting what there was to get, these nice fellows shot 'em all and left them to die. My cousin and two others did.

I don't blame guns.

I blame the dudes who were so twisted inside that it was a doable thing to shove innocent strangers into the floor and then execute them.

I kinda line it out like this:

Gun ownership carries a greater burden of responsibility because of the potential impact on others irresponsibility can cause. This burden of responsibility applies to manufacturers and dealers as well. Because of this, penalties for misuse/misdealing should also carry a great weight.

Those who show stupid ass behaviour get the hammer. Those who exhibit responsible behaviour do not lose possesion because of the actions of a minority of fucktards (or, if you want nice, the mistaken actions of those temporarily not in full control of their faculties).

I respect what others have shared here and do not intend to shit on your beliefs and opinions. We just disagree on what I think is a very basic level.

Some folk are comfortable with the concept of limiting peoples access to certain things (not just weaponry) in order to promote greater societal safety.

Some folk (this is my camp) are more comfortable with fewer legislative restrictions but greater penalties for abuse of this lack of restriction.

Feel free to change these statements up, add to 'em or tear me a new arsehole. I think I could develop my own opinion a little clearer with some feed back from other perspectives.

[wombat]

What you say makes sense to me in a purely logical sense but as soon as you apply those points to guns, I think a real cultural difference comes into play. I have always lived in big cities, so to me, guns are what people commit crimes with. I understand in the abstract that people use them for sport, but my gut reaction will always be - guns are what people commit crimes with.

So while I understand not wanting the government to tell you not to own something that you will use responsibly - when it comes to guns, my gut will always say that it doesn't make sense. I'm sure you would use a nuclear weapon responsibly too, and I'm sure you'd be careful if you owned a tiger for a pet, but why would you want one?  Why would you tolerate the risk involved to yourself and others? There are other pets you can own, there are other ways you can get meat and other sports you can play, which are safer. So why should society tolerate the risk?

By the way, I apply this to things other than guns. A coworker of mine - a nice guy but not the most level headed - is taking flying lessons. And this reminds me that I also don't think there's any reason for nonprofessionals to be allowed to fly planes around over my head.  It's the same as with the guns - there are plenty of other ways to go places, so what is the point of the risk of letting nonprofessionals fly planes? There are plenty of other sports, and other ways to get dead animals to eat, so why take the risk of letting nonprofessionals have guns?

Yes, I do live in a home for scared people. That's where I'm coming from. Better safe than sorry is my middle name.

[CortJstr]

So while I understand not wanting the government to tell you not to own something that you will use responsibly - when it comes to guns, my gut will always say that it doesn't make sense.

The other issue is that the main reason we're allowed to have guns is so that we can fight back against our own government when another revolution becomes necessary.

[littlefallsmets]

Again, the caveat: I do not attempt to be rational on this issue.

However. As per the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" issue.

I offer you the scenario as follows...

You are given the ability to stop time and you are given a loaf of french bread. As time has been stopped, after wandering around for a while, you come upon a man with a gun in his hand, about to pull the trigger and kill a man begging for mercy on his knees.

You take the gun out of the man's hand and replace it with the loaf of french bread... you then back off into a position where neither man can see you and you restart time. What happens?

Other than the man on his knees getting some crumbs in his hair?

Yes, a person pathologically determined to kill a man or a woman or a child can kill that person eventually, unless someone finds out and intervenes first. This was true when we were doing it with a rock, it is true today when we can do it by putting a single grain of plutonium in their lunch.

What a gun does is make killing people maddeningly easy.

What a gun does is make killing people disgustingly quick.

What a gun does is make killing people instant and completely irrevocable.

What a gun does is make killing people possible from the distance of a football field where you never have to touch them, feel their breath, see their hands or eyes the same as yours or give them any possibility of self-defense.

What a gun does is allow you to not face your victim's humanity.

What a gun does is make you a god by however many times over there are bullets in the clip.

In a half-second of madness, a shotgun makes you two times a god. A horrible god. A vengeful god. An Old Testament god of hate and war. A revolver and a half-second of madness and you are six times a god. You can strike down on lesser beings with impunity six times before anyone can even move toward stopping you.

If a half-second of madness, you are Odin, you are Zeus, you are goddamn Y-hw-h to two fuck*ng ants or six fuck*ng ants... and only when you run out of lightning bolts are you a goddamn human again.

A gun is a superpower, a gun is a deadly miracle, unanswerable in its swiftness and lack of mercy.

Come at me with a knife and you might kill me, sure.

But I'll get a chance to fight back. And you'll have the time to come to grips with the fact that you are trying to kill someone with the self-same essential spark as you have, whatever the fuck that spark is. And there's a good chance that you'll hurt me with the knife and get whatever you want out of me without killing me. That you'll get my... wallet or my keys or my ass or whatever it is that you want without having to probably kill me.

Come at me with a Rawlings Adirondack bat grown ten miles north of where I was grown, shaped five miles north of where I was shaped and you might kill me. But you'll have to see me bleed. You'll have to hear me call out for my mother with my last breath. And you'll have to goddamn fight me for it.

When death is quickly accomplished, is easy, requires no planning and only a snap decision, is done from a distance like a goddamn comic book character shooting fuck*ng lasers out of his eyes from the moon, is accomplished as a god on high unto a heretic...

Then the mechanism of death is in danger of claiming not only your victim's essential humanity but yours as well.

And, yes, he could kill that man with a french loaf, too. Over weeks of planning and forethought, poisoning it and slipping it into his lunch. Sneaking into his bedroom and stuffing it down his throat and hoping that he can't overpower you in the minutes it would take you to suffocate him.

But he would have to THINK about it, think about it and the consequences a goddamn long time before doing it and... do it as a man putting himself at the risk of getting killed in the act of another man.

There have been half-seconds in my life where if I had a loaded gun, I'd've killed someone. There have been more half-seconds in my life where if I had a loaded gun, I'd've killed myself. As an imperfect human being, I accept that that kind of power doesn't belong in my hands.

Either way, I've understood that when you feel that way, you need to have the time to let that half-second pass and stop thinking like a goddamned animal. Oh but for that shortcut that makes you a half-second god.

[Sub_Topical]

Beauty, eh.

I have some opinions and responses but I'm going to call this a slow motion response on my part thread because:

1. I'd like some more input from other viewpoints, whether or not they seem to reiterate similiar points.

2. We're getting pretty deep into heavily personal emotions type area so my responses will be considered and without personal vitriol.

::KISS::

[Nabubrush]

LFS, I'd get into this, but it's clearly a powerful issue to you, and no one gains if we debate it. You are a hell of a writer though. Also, I always parse your name oddly and think I ought to refer to you as "smets".

[littlefallsmets]

LFS, I'd get into this, but it's clearly a powerful issue to you, and no one gains if we debate it.

I appreciate that and... agree with you. That's why I keep laying down the "I admit I am not rational" thing and phrase it as just my venting on the subject.

My rational mind admits that as a last-resort self-defensive tool kept under the lock-and-key of a responsible sane and well-trained adult... and, in a few cases, as a rural food-gathering tool... the gun is a necessary evil in our society and...

The point is that what we need to do is not ban guns across the board but, rather, get tough about training and licensing and tracking guns and making them safer, restricting those guns clearly designed for purposes other than last-resort self-defense or reasonable hunting, educating the society as a whole... both about how to be safe and sane around the things but also to neuter the American cult of gun violence in the popular media and that...

If properly handled and viewed AS a necessary evil as opposed to this awesome god-power extension of a cock that Quentin Tarantino thinks is hilarious that American culture seems to see it as...

Maybe I can live with it.

That's my rational mind and that's probably a position that even a lot of red-blooded NRA members (such as my uncle and my grandfater) would agree with at-least shades of my rational mind's thinking.

It's just that there's my... irrational mind.

Which wants to steal a cop car, load it with explosives and drive it into a gun factory, knowing that I am going to the highest of motherfuck*ng Vahallas for saving so many innocent lives.

The key is, I suppose, venting my irrational mind occasionally, that I might continue to know the difference.

Ironically, though?

Until an absolute shitstorm of badness went down in my life, from about the age of twelve to the age of sixteen, I was a full-on young Republican. At the age of eleven, I had a goddamned subscription to Rush Limbaugh's motherfuck*ng newsletter. I believed every word of it.

And... on the other side of losing my cousin to a gun, my grandfather to cancer, my dad's political career ruined by local cops, one of my classmates O.D.ed, another crippled building pipe bombs trying to kill us all... I came out this bleeding-heart liberal, ranting and raving about compassion being the highest calling and... fuck logic and fuck achievement and fuck everything if someone is suffering.

So, like, if I come off as politically arrogant sometimes, I really do completely apologize.

Caught up in my... old teenage scars is this... slightly neurotic vision of myself as possessing a wisdom about political matters because I've seen both sides and I've crossed both poles, y'know, such as Tiresias crossed both poles of gender or Gilgamesh saw both sides of death and walked out with a third kind of view.

I do realize that that's probably an irrationality as well.

[theinevitable]

what I really really want... is a statistic about how often crime is stopped by guns. Owned by citizens.
I have never heard it. Maybe it will change my mind. Maybe the liberal media doesn't want me to know how good guns are for me, and america.
but I have never heard this statistic. And it seems like... if "people saved by owning guns" were greater than "people foolishly destroyed by guns"... I would have heard by now. Anti-gun types constantly spew facts and figures... but I've never heard an NRA member use a single one, past the 2nd amendment and crap about the number of NRA members.

[wombat]

What I really want... is a world where crime can be stopped by a loaf of french bread.  And where messageboard debates on controversial topics do not get out of hand overnight when I am sleeping and can't lock the thread. OK?