Bondi beach (Sydney) terrorism shooting

DaveC426913 said:
Did Sarkus explicitly say he is arguing for a gunless society, or are you inferring that's what he meant?

If you are inferring it, then you are not arguing what Sarkus' argument actually is. In which case it is either a strawman fallacy or a Nirvana fallacy.
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" I would not be okay with any deaths rather than have a gunless society. " You decide.
 
Seattle said:
It's not going to happen in the US. If I could push a button and erase history, culture, in that regard and make that the case, sure, I'd be for it.
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How about doing what Australia did after Port Arthur in 1996 or what the UK did after Hungerford in 1987? And again after Dunblane in 1996?
 
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Pinball1970 said:
How about doing what Australia did after Port Arthur in 1996 or what the UK did after Hungerford in 1987?
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I guess you just don't get it.

It’s like telling Americans that the UK’s speech laws or Australia’s COVID enforcement model should work here. Even if you think those policies are effective, the U.S. simply wouldn’t accept or comply with them.
 
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Seattle said:
I guess you just don't get it.

It’s like telling Americans that the UK’s speech laws or Australia’s COVID enforcement model should work here. Even if you think those policies are effective, the U.S. simply wouldn’t accept or comply with them.
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Get what? That reducing guns after a massacre is the right thing to do? It is not as if we do and did not not have gun owners in the UK pre Hungerford, with semi automatic weapons.
 
Seattle said:
I guess you just don't get it.

It’s like telling Americans that the UK’s speech laws or Australia’s COVID enforcement model should work here. Even if you think those policies are effective, the U.S. simply wouldn’t accept or comply with them.
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1988 fire arms act did not stop Dunblane so they amended it again after that in 1997.
It is possible to amend laws, it is what we have bills in parliament for.
 
Pinball1970 said:
I did not say make it the same I said reduce.
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My point is that US culture is such that what will work in the UK or Australia won't work here. That's what you don't get. The law wouldn't get passed, if it did the reactions and compliance would be the same. You don't believe that, so, that's what you don't get.
 
Pinball1970 said:
Get what? That reducing guns after a massacre is the right thing to do? It is not as if we do and did not not have gun owners in the UK pre Hungerford, with semi automatic weapons.
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I'm not commenting on what "is the right thing to do". Those laws wouldn't be passed here or complied with.
 
TheVat said:
There is likely not one functional adult in the US who actually argues that we could become gunless.
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Seattle said:
Sarkus and James aren't from the US and they do make that argument.
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Seattle, you're arguing about practicalities. Most people - myself included - accept, and have said as much, that the US could not become gunless. At least not without some significant event changing people's minds. As I said in post #153: "And given the USA being wedded to their 2nd Amendment, it's never going to happen, at least not unless there is some significant change in society."
So, no, I am not arguing that the US "could become gunless".

What I have been talking about, however, is ideals. Would you rather live in a gunless society, for example, or a gun-toting society, knowing that the latter comes with greater gun-deaths and mass-shootings? If the latter, how many deaths are acceptable before you might think it too many? For some people, no number of deaths is too many, and the "right to bear arms" should be absolute. Some might think that 500 mass-shootings a year is too many and given the choice between a gunless society and a gun-toting society that has 500 mass-shootings a year, they would instead choose the gunless society. I even quoted what Charlie Kirk once said: "I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational." - C. Kirk - 5 April 2023. So he is clearly someone whose ideal is of a gun-toting society - for reasons he gives - and is willing for society to incur some (unstated) level of gun-deaths as a trade-off.
Do you share Kirk's view on that, even if for differing reasons than the ones he gives?

This is all a matter of ideals, not practice. So please stop conflating them.

Would you rather live in a gunless society or a gun-toting society? If the latter, how many gun deaths would be acceptable given the trade-off between levels of gun ownership and mass-shootings etc? If the former, great, we're on the same page. Now it might be that you're apathetic on the question of which society you'd rather live in, but that only puts you in the accepting of a gun-toting society, and then the question remains of what level of trade-off you'd accept.


So please stop obfuscating questions about your ideals with matters of practicalities. Yes, you can "accept reality", but that doesn't speak to what you would actually like from your society, what your ideal society on this matter would be.
 
Sarkus said:
Seattle, you're arguing about practicalities. Most people - myself included - accept, and have said as much, that the US could not become gunless. At least not without some significant event changing people's minds. As I said in post #153: "And given the USA being wedded to their 2nd Amendment, it's never going to happen, at least not unless there is some significant change in society."
So, no, I am not arguing that the US "could become gunless".

What I have been talking about, however, is ideals. Would you rather live in a gunless society, for example, or a gun-toting society, knowing that the latter comes with greater gun-deaths and mass-shootings? If the latter, how many deaths are acceptable before you might think it too many? For some people, no number of deaths is too many, and the "right to bear arms" should be absolute. Some might think that 500 mass-shootings a year is too many and given the choice between a gunless society and a gun-toting society that has 500 mass-shootings a year, they would instead choose the gunless society. I even quoted what Charlie Kirk once said: "I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It is rational." - C. Kirk - 5 April 2023. So he is clearly someone whose ideal is of a gun-toting society - for reasons he gives - and is willing for society to incur some (unstated) level of gun-deaths as a trade-off.
Do you share Kirk's view on that, even if for differing reasons than the ones he gives?

This is all a matter of ideals, not practice. So please stop conflating them.

Would you rather live in a gunless society or a gun-toting society? If the latter, how many gun deaths would be acceptable given the trade-off between levels of gun ownership and mass-shootings etc? If the former, great, we're on the same page. Now it might be that you're apathetic on the question of which society you'd rather live in, but that only puts you in the accepting of a gun-toting society, and then the question remains of what level of trade-off you'd accept.


So please stop obfuscating questions about your ideals with matters of practicalities. Yes, you can "accept reality", but that doesn't speak to what you would actually like from your society, what your ideal society on this matter would be.
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Learn to not resort to condescending remarks and you might get better responses. If the gun situation in the US was suddenly like the UK or Australia, that would be fine with me. SInce history and culture don't allow for that, it's not going to happen. Would I rather actually live in the UK or Australia, no but if we are just referring to lack of a "gun totting" culture..yes.

The reality is that it isn't going to happen and therefore, depending on what the proposed law was, I might not even be for it but the situation on the ground isn't going to be like the UK or Australia. The reality is that there are 400 million guns here and most are going to stay here regardless of what laws are passed..
 
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Seattle said:
Some of the people want tougher laws after every shooting but nothing ever changes because not enough of them want it. That's my point.
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This reminds me of a Jim Jeffery sketch, he went over some of this, Oz and the US not UK, the NRA solution to the problem of mass shootings in schools after Sandy hook, was to put armed guards in there. So the problem of nut jobs walking around with guns was to throw more guns in there ..
 
Pinball1970 said:
This reminds me of a Jim Jeffery sketch, he went over some of this, Oz and the US not UK, the NRA solution to the problem of mass shootings in schools after Sandy hook, was to put armed guards in there. So the problem of nut jobs walking around with guns was to throw more guns in there ..
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I think I've seen that routine as well.

The main issue is just the culture, existing gun base and who might give up their guns and who wouldn't. The criminals wouldn't and in reality, not many other people would either.

The other problem, as you've seen even on here, is that after a mass shooting the emotional response is to press for things that feel good but wouldn't actually do anything about the next mass shooting. They may do something else (reduce suicides...maybe?) but the solutions rarely would do what they are supposed to address so the hunters and more gun minded people just don't trust the politicians who push for that stuff.

It's complicated:) It's like I mentioned regarding freedom of speech in the UK and Covid controls in Australia....that's just not happening here either. Cattle can be herded, cats can't. Japanese are more like cattle.....Americans are more like cats, for example. The UK and Australia are more in between.
 
Seattle said:
Learn to not resort to condescending remarks and you might get better responses.
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Learn to actually address what's being asked and discussed instead of the obfuscation you've recently engaged in, and you may get better treatment.
Seattle said:
If the gun situation in the US was suddenly like the UK or Australia, that would be fine with me. SInce history and culture don't allow for that, it's not going to happen.
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"Fine with me" is another non-committal, apathetic response that doesn't actually get to what your ideal would be.
Seattle said:
Would I rather actually live in the UK or Australia, no but if we are just referring to lack of a "gun totting" culture..yes.
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Finally you're getting round to giving a meaningful response to the questions asked. Note that noone is asking whether you'd prefer to actually live in the UK, or Australia, or, heck, anything to do with economics. But the fact that you would rather live in a gunless society, that at least says something. Thank you.
Given that, all other things being equal, you'd prefer to live in a gunless society than a gun-toting one, how many mass-shootings would there need to be a year before you'd consider moving to say, Canada, where the level is low single-digits per year? If there were 100k mass-shootings a year? Is there a figure of mass-shootings to counter all the benefits you perceive the US to have? And for the sake of this, ignore nationality issues, and let's assume you could live anywhere without issue.
Seattle said:
The reality is that it isn't going to happen and therefore, depending on what the proposed law was, I might not even be for it but the situation on the ground isn't going to be like the UK or Australia. The reality is that there are 400 million guns here and most are going to stay here regardless of what laws are passed..
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Everyone knows that it's not going to happen. Noone has said otherwise.
 
Sarkus said:
Learn to actually address what's being asked and discussed instead of the obfuscation you've recently engaged in, and you may get better treatment.

"Fine with me" is another non-committal, apathetic response that doesn't actually get to what your ideal would be.

Finally you're getting round to giving a meaningful response to the questions asked. Note that noone is asking whether you'd prefer to actually live in the UK, or Australia, or, heck, anything to do with economics. But the fact that you would rather live in a gunless society, that at least says something. Thank you.
Given that, all other things being equal, you'd prefer to live in a gunless society than a gun-toting one, how many mass-shootings would there need to be a year before you'd consider moving to say, Canada, where the level is low single-digits per year? If there were 100k mass-shootings a year? Is there a figure of mass-shootings to counter all the benefits you perceive the US to have? And for the sake of this, ignore nationality issues, and let's assume you could live anywhere without issue.

Everyone knows that it's not going to happen. Noone has said otherwise.
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I'm not moving. How low would productivity have to get in the UK before you would move?
 
Seattle said:
I'm not moving. How low would productivity have to get in the UK before you would move?
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Seattle said:
I think I've seen that routine as well.

The main issue is just the culture, existing gun base and who might give up their guns and who wouldn't. The criminals wouldn't and in reality, not many other people would either.

The other problem, as you've seen even on here, is that after a mass shooting the emotional response is to press for things that feel good but wouldn't actually do anything about the next mass shooting. They may do something else (reduce suicides...maybe?) but the solutions rarely would do what they are supposed to address so the hunters and more gun minded people just don't trust the politicians who push for that stuff.

It's complicated:) It's like I mentioned regarding freedom of speech in the UK and Covid controls in Australia....that's just not happening here either. Cattle can be herded, cats can't. Japanese are more like cattle.....Americans are more like cats, for example. The UK and Australia are more in between.
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Hopefully you guys will keep trying, obviously some of the population do want tighter gun control.
You may need a few more Columbine and Sandy Hooks before it happens.
 
Seattle said:
I'm not moving.
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Is that an absolute, or just a comment as to current levels of mass-shootings being insufficient for you to move? If the former, you're saying the US could be experiencing 1,000,000 mass-shootings a year, and you would not move? If the latter, the question was how many mass-shootings, not simply whether the current was beyond that level.

Yes, I'm talking hypothetically - as a thought experiment, if you will - where an absolute "I'm not moving" would say that there is no amount of gun-violence such that you would move to avoid it. Is that your position? You would not move even if roving armed gangs were shooting up your, and every other, neighbourhood, for example?
Seattle said:
How low would productivity have to get in the UK before you would move?
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It would depend on the government's actions, not productivity per se.
Productivity is a very weak analogy to gun violence as motive and role in human decision-making. It's government action in response to productivity that would be the motive, not productivity itself. I mean, even in the US you don't get robbed in the streets by someone wielding their productivity figures, right? :)
So maybe you want to come up with a more meaningful analogy? Or, better yet, drop it entirely as it is only serving to distract and derail.
 
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