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If Guns Are a Public Health Issue…
… then liking guns is mental illness. That’s the endgame.
It’s obvious in the terminology. There can be no such thing as “gun violence,” because an inanimate object cannot be violent. It can be used in a violent manner but it cannot be violent in and of itself. Admit the use of the term and the discussion is lost.
Any restriction on firearm ownership that is based on the firearm and not the owner is unsupportable. I will grant that certain people should not be allowed to own firearms. I will not grant that those who may own them should be restricted in any way from owning whatever firearm they are inclined to own.
Declaring gun ownership a form of illness is all too clearly a prominent strategy in the current debate. Once that’s established, forget about rights. You have no right to let your illness threaten the body politic.
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I think that’s where they’re headed, Doug. Over my dead body!
Be careful, the government will accepts those terms. We learned during the Scandemic that your civil rights are non-existent, when the tyrants are acting in the name of public health. They will not declare you mentally unfit, they will create a gun-free passport system and exclude gun owners from participation in commerce.
-I notice the guns they fear the most aren’t the ones used in crime, for they have personal security, but the guns they deem as military and could be used against them by an angry populace.
The guns I own must be different from those in the news. I can leave them lying around next to boxes of ammunitions and they never try to load themselves. In all the years I’ve had them they’ve never left home looking for an opportunity to engage in random violence. Where did I go wrong? Well, at least the S & W was willing to be used in an act of self-defense. I’d better watch it closely.
The leftist playbook is set. The CoronaScam “public health crisis” and subsequent government lockdowns and control is the new playbook. Everything the Left hates will be a “public health crisis” and will require emergency powers. Cuomo seems to be the Dear Leader of this playbook.
Anything to take the focus off his record. What is happening to the investigations into his “problems?”
Douglas,
This was very insightful, perfectly logical and even-handed, and elegantly expressed. A fine example of using moral argument to express the liberal/conservative view.
Thanks for taking the time to write; it appears that you must have worked hard to distill your thoughts into such a few pleasant -to-read words.
Thanks, but it’s just reflecting on things I’ve seen happening over the years. The public health strategy was a big deal for Lenin and Stalin. If you weren’t a Marxist obviously you were insane.
Another excellent observation, thx.
I do think this is the key – even Leftists were surprised at how compliant large swaths of the American public became to totalitarian rule in the name of a “public health crisis,” and so now see many opportunities to try to impose more extensive totalitarian rule. I only hope that enough people saw how overbearing rule in the name of Covid became that they actively resist any other imposition of totalitarian rule in the name of any other “public health crisis,” whether “gun violence,” “climate change,” “racism,” “white supremacy,” or whatever other pretend “crisis” the powerful make up.
I don’t know if at this point people would recognize what’s happening. Have they been conditioned to accept those kinds of restrictions by what they’ve already gone through. Also, if the restriction is framed in “danger to life” terms, it will be tough for people to fight back. So much fear of death dominates the culture now.
That’s the big unknown. Have people come out of the Covid “public health emergency” saying, “Hey, the government said we would have limited restrictions for no more than two weeks, but the government put severe restrictions on my life for more than a year, so I’m not going to let the government do that again.” Or do people say, “I didn’t die during the Covid emergency, so I’ll let the government control my life for any other public health crisis.”
Is anyone aware of a study showing for x number of shootings with injury, or death, where the perps were caught how many were legally obtained? If a small fraction, which I assume is the case, why can’t this be publicized? Mayor Lightbrain could then be confronted with stats showing the South Side gangs do not care about gun control rules as they have their supply.
Just look at how people behave when the restrictions are lifted. At least 50% of the people in stores I notice are still wearing masks when there are no restrictions anymore. The majority of the people will go willingly right back into lockdown soon, when the next “deadly variant” arrives.
“Not I”, said the Free Person.
Public health can’t control an epidemic or even promote healthy behavior in the US. Now it is going to deal with gun violence?
This is stupid beyond words, but fine. I’ll put on my public health hat for this.
The actual statistics on mortality associate with gun violence do not favor gun control. In fact, they favor more widespread ownership of guns. Anytime people try to use public health to justify a measure, ask for the data. Where is the study showing the measure is effective? Public health is about evaluating measures and using the approach that saves the most lives for the least cost. That’s how screening measures are evaluated.
Gun control is like giving kids regular colonoscopies – you inconvenience people who are not a source of mortality, at a high cost, in a way that d0es not save lives.
If Cuomo lives up to his record on the Wuhan Coronavirus, he’s going to make Chicago look like a peaceful small town.
Here’s a good story from Washington State.
Man who builds working cannon gets 2-year prison sentence.
The CDC’s inept handling of coronavirus at first, especially when it came to testing, is something I blame on its departing from its mission to instead obsess about guns. Think how things might have been different if those personnel who had been trying to make a health issue out of guns had instead been doing the work they are paid to do, i.e. preparing us to deal with infectious diseases.
This astounds me, too! I see people walking around the streets, outdoors, all alone—wearing a mask! In the grocery store, there will be a mom and two or three small children—all masked. Why do you put a mask on a two year old??
My favorite it the solo car occupant, driving along with their windows rolled up, no one in the car but themselves, MASK ON!!
It doesn’t surprise me, I start each day – and remind myself several times in the course of each day – that most people have an IQ of 100 or less, by definition.
Ridiculous. Whatever happened to mens rea?
Unless, of course, your illness is gender dysphoria, social anxiety, or an irrational fear of CoVid-19 in which case we have to reorder all of society and restructure our politics and understanding of reality to accommodate you.
Taking a guess here, but I’d be willing to wager that almost all of the “gun violence” happening in the country is in the inner cities, and is gang-related. Why doesn’t Cuomo declare “gang violence” a public health hazard? That’s something he could actually fight, if he had the stones. And every law-abiding citizen with a gun would then be an asset – an armed populace is worse for gangs (and every other criminal). But fighting gangs is hard, and dangerous. And, gasp, you might be called a rrrrrrrracist!
Gangs are increasingly taking over parts of America, moving those areas outside of any kind of control or protection by legal authority. We are being invaded by hostile powers, and they seem to be taking over without any resistance. Cuomo’s strategy? – disarm the good guys. What a contemptible a**hat that man is.
This idea is nothing new. Remember the government requested docs to ask if you had a gun in your house when Obama was in office. What exactly does that have to do with me getting a routine physical?
The dem socialists love to use Law of the Land, at least when it comes to Abortion … however, not so much as it comes to:
Heller v. District of Columbia [link] A landmark decision that protects the individual’s right to own guns, specifically highlighted in the Second Amendment to the Bill of Rights.
Heller deserves as much deference to precedent, actually more based upon the soundness of its legal position, than does Roe v Wade. Liberals are such hypocrites, liars and completely irrational in their beliefs.
https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16.pdf
They will just keep doing what they do already: blame Indiana and other states.