LA Grant

Well, it is. I don't mind being predictable, we're both being predictable. The slope can also go upward, you know. If there are no restrictions for semi-automatics, why should there be restrictions for automatics? If we don't restrict automatics, why do we restrict grenade launchers? Why can't my 18-year-old buy napalm if the pimply little psychopath wants to use it for hunting? Why control anything at all? After all, isn't control the opposite of freedom?? <gets scared, buys 10 guns>

They won't. We can only change the future, not the past, so the guns you own in your home would be untouched. Illegal guns on the black market will still be there. They don't evaporate overnight. But you need to stop the bleeding. Need to stop making it easy for psychos (not you, of course) to get dangerous weapons. Need to stop feeding the black market. Controlling and restricting access is the obvious corrective measure. Boyst, I know you're not engaging in any kind of honest debate with me, but f*** it, I'll pitch ideas again, because that's what Progressives do, right? They propose solutions, always opposed by their sisyphean counterparts, the Conservative, an ideology defined by "nah, not my problem, don't tread on me, not my responsibility." The Conservative Counterpoint: "Drugs are banned and people still get drugs on the black market!" — True. But you can't buy heroin in a store two blocks from the school, k? You can't buy heroin on craigslist — or at least, not from a post labeled "For Sale: Heroin." "What about opioids? They are drugs, they're legal and restricted, still a problem." — True. Part of what could help is making prescriptions for these drugs, Valium etc., more difficult to get, instead of giving them out so indiscriminately. Same with guns. "But you have all these guns still out there from before UBC/registration laws, what about those?" — There are different ideas on what to do. Let's say those guns are grandfathered in. If you buy additional guns or ammo, though, then you need to go through the hoops. Imagine this scenario: Illegal Drug Dealer in Chicago has black market guns, right? Scary guy. But now that you can't bring them in from gun shows in Indiana, the black market for more guns is drying up — thus, driving the price up, making it more difficult. Perhaps to get cheaper ammunition, one of IDD's 'clean' associates buys legally in Illinois. This person has to register & take tests & let's say he passes, and legally gets weapons intended for illegal use — system is flawed, right? But now it's easier for police to track, right? Here's someone buying only ammo, and a year later, he decided to not re-new any licenses for weapons. This should set off a red flag for police. When you sign up to register/test for weapons, perhaps you check a box to agree to make it easier for police to get a warrant to search your home for illegal weapons & seize them. This allows for police to find the 'bad guys with guns' a helluva lot easier, which is the whole point. Thus: In this scenario with UBC, if you, Boyst, buy no new guns/weapons/ammo, you don't have to deal with anything. If you do, then you agree to registration/testing process. If you let the license expire, then you open yourself up to agreeing to cooperating with law enforcement if they need to make sure you're not possessing illegal weapons, and Blue Lives Matter, right? Win. Win. The only "lose" here is the inconvenience. If you're using guns the way you're using them, it's a mild inconvenience. If you're hoarding guns, it will be a bigger inconvenience, aka, prison. The Progressive v Conservative argument often feels like the societal version of "what should we do for dinner" debate writ large. Progressives are like, we could cook, we could do delivery, we could do postmates, we could hunt a rabbit. Conservatives whine at each one. "But I don't wannnnnt to cook, I don't wannnnnt to spend money on delivery." Okay. Well at some point we need to eat. And if you can't make up your mind, we'll just cooking crow.

Uhhh... so this guy going on a feminist killing spree in 1989 is your rebuttal that Canada is equal in gun crime? I could see half of PPP arguing in favor of murdering feminists, actually. But no, sorry. The USA is alone w/r/t gun crime. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/10/upshot/How-to-Prevent-Gun-Deaths-The-Views-of-Experts-and-the-Public.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/23/us/politics/fact-check-mass-shootings-gun-laws.html Again. Whenever you're done pretending this "impossible situation" is sooooo hard to solve, there are solutions available that we all agree on. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/10/upshot/How-to-Prevent-Gun-Deaths-The-Views-of-Experts-and-the-Public.html As for your false equivalency argument about a license for free speech, tell you what — when school kids are dying because of mass yellings, then I'm happy to talk about giving you a formal process to apply for an official license to use the "N" word whenever you'd like. Win-win.

I don't support specific weapon bans as policy. They're a half-measure. If individual retailers like Dick's want to stop selling certain types of weapons, that's great & commendable. For policy, I support what most people support: universal background checks & registration.

The reason they do this is to avoid the actual discussion as long as possible and hope that we'll move on and do nothing.

K. Then is mental health related to gun crime or is it not? Is a societal problem with recurring symptoms untreatable? Unfathomable to study? Someone studying gun crime somewhere is an infringement on your rights? If not the CDC, then who would you like to research, precious? Who's your preference, besides nobody? Or make the case for why gun death simply should not be studied. What've you got that we're not seeing, big guy? "We" being the majority of people who support such measures, despite what this thread might suggest. Just because it isn't already, therefore it shouldn't? Or is there another bumper sticker you haven't shown me yet? "Not my responsibility, don't tread on me"?

Correct, words have meaning. dis·ease dəˈzēz/ noun noun: disease; plural noun: diseases; noun: dis-ease; plural noun: dis-eases a disorder of structure or function in a human, animal, or plant, especially one that produces specific signs or symptoms or that affects a specific location and is not simply a direct result of physical injury. "bacterial meningitis is a rare disease" synonyms: illness, sickness, ill health; More a particular quality, habit, or disposition regarded as adversely affecting a person or group of people. Gun violence is uniquely an American problem for a reason. As you noted rightly earlier, mass shooters aren't ideological but there are recurring symptoms. Attraction to guns & weaponry is certainly one we've seen consistently. Is there provably a correlation between "attraction to guns" and "definitely a mass shooter"? No, because most gun hobbyists are not mass shooters. But if it is part of a causation, part of this mental health approach I keep hearing advocates for, is this not worth researching? What compelling argument do you have to present against simple research, Sir Thomas of the District of Columbia? https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/upshot/compare-these-gun-death-rates-the-us-is-in-a-different-world.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/10/upshot/How-to-Prevent-Gun-Deaths-The-Views-of-Experts-and-the-Public.html LMK if you're out of free NYT articles & need me to copy/paste. GOP even supports CDC research, as well as the person who authored the ban in the first place, for goodness sake http://thehill.com/homenews/house/374149-gop-chairman-congress-should-rethink-cdc-ban-on-gun-violence-research

Aha. Well, there's the issue, right there. First step to recovery is admitting you have a problem in the first place. I suppose you could argue guns are neither a substance nor abused, or that gun violence is not a disease. I've seen every other kind of mental gymnastics through the last 20 pages so wouldn't be shocking. Certainly this is what the Founders hoped American citizenry would do — obstruct researchers by any means necessary.

We have to deal with their judgment either way. Make it simpler by giving the rules narrower, clearer lines. Not complicated.

Thinking more on the tiers — It should be a three strike system with the real possibility of ejection. PI i — The common version of it. Defender gets too grabby, puts hands on receiver before ball arrives, likely unintentional or, no obvious intent to harm the player. 15 yard penalty, results in replay of down, or 1st down if less than 15 yards. PI ii — Defender intentionally hits receiver before ball arrives to prevent reception. "Hit" and "intent" are the major distinctions between i & ii, which are human judgment calls, obviously. If the current refs get too bogged down by the philosophical question of "what is a hit? what is intent" then replace them with a child, because any 6-year-old can show you the difference between hitting & touching during playtime, and 'on purpose' and 'on accident.' PI iii — Defender intentionally hits receiver before ball arrives to prevent reception in a way that could injure the receiver. In other words, an obvious cheap shot. This results in ejection and potentially a suspension. You have it where if the same defender gets up to to level 3 in one half (if they get three PI is, or a PI ii and a PI i) then they're ejected. This way, the CBs shouldn't want to get the calls in any strategy, and the refs would be less inclined to call it just for the hell of it to make it interesting, unless it's a serious warning that, like, hey Gregg Williams or hey Belichick — we see you, we see what you're doing, and you'd better get your players to stop, or you're going to start seeing them ejected, or they're going to stop playing your strategy for their own good.

Precisely this. But the problem of refs making unreliable judgments is a problem that comes with refs being human. Just needs to be clearer rules, imo. I don't understand why the NFL is incapable of having a centralized officiating system with the NY office or whatever essentially calling every play through the officials on the field. Which is kind of what they're doing now, just not the full version of it. Or, better yet, just find and employ the most consistent referees you can find, instead of the same old saggy jokers we've been watching for 20 years, and just let the call be the call, and move on. Booth or Coaches can still challenge, but I'd like to hear the debate. That'd be more fun than listening to Collinsworth get it completely wrong and then double down on it, and just seem like a complete fool. If we're going to see a call challenged, then put the coach or OC/DC on the phone with a ref and the central NY office, and let the audience in on why this should or should not be a catch, or a fumble, or a touchdown. I don't think that will ever happen but it'd be more fun for the audience, more straight-forward, more educational. I feel like there's less ambiguity or reasons to suspect corruption if you can just hear the decision-making process for how & why the call is the call. It's not like this would be technologically difficult, nor would be it any more time-consuming than it is now. It would just require NFL refs, coaches, and officials to be more transparent with the audience. Don't think it will happen, but it would be better. Unless there was a counter to that strategy: the Flagrant/volume II version of the penalty where a flagrant cheap shot results in spot foul and, depending how flagrant, an ejection. Seems like a win-win proposition. NFL gets more scoring + CBs get a bit of a break when PI is called for a little bit of grabbing not costing them 40 yards on 3rd and long. I would also suggest that the vol I tier does not automatically result in a first down, in the case that it's 3rd and 20 or something, and it gets called. In that scenario, a CB can choose this, if they're coached by someone like Belichick to go right up against the rules — if you think your WR is getting open, get grabby, just don't flagrantly knock them down or knock their hands away or something. The offense then would likely send WRs on go routes to prevent this, leaving the CB to either do their best to properly cover, or if they get grabby or go for a hit on the player before the ball arrives, then they're giving up the spot-foul and perhaps an ejection depending on how obvious they're mugging the WR. But say it's an incompletion on 3rd & 20, but the 15-yard PI is called. This wouldn't result in 1st down, but instead to 3rd & 5, and back to a 'normal down' where intentionally comitting PI is a bad strategy either way.

You're right in the sense that refs are unreliable, but that's inevitable unless we find a replacement for human judgment. Maybe in Whaley's all-Robot league? Like the one from the ad bumpers on Fox? haha But I think a tiered-penalty rule would prevent what you're saying, right? Bc obviously corners shouldn't want to commit PI. If the corner is beat, and then he grabs the receiver down before the ball arrives to prevent the TD — well, its like a penalty shot in hockey, except instead it becomes a spot-foul instead of a 15-yarder. The more I think about it, shouldn't there be tiered-penalties for most fouls?? Holding, both on offense & defense, similar to DPI, is too often a major factor in the success of drives. It'd be nice if the penalties reflected the actual impact it had on the play instead of too often seeming entirely arbitrary. The only issue with it is the same as with any penalty, which is the human judgment factor. EDIT — Part of the tier needs to include ejections, to prevent the kind of "head-hunting" strategies described in this thread. The NFL is horrible about punishing cheap shots. See: Rob Gronkowski, Jarvis Landry, Burfict, etc.

This seems like the obvious solution. 15 yards for non-intentional, run-of-the-mill, grabby but not violent Pass Interference. Spot foul for "tackling the guy because he beat you" or other such flagrant violations. Personally I'd also add on an ejection to that kind of cheap shot, too.

Some of this can be handled as public policy, but you're right, you could draw causes from basically anything, and as such, policy will only get us so far toward the solution. One simple, practical, tangible answer is that as parents or teachers, we need to make sure we are really paying attention to our boys & understanding them.

This isn't uneducated. These are the common sense reforms that most of us support. The only key thing you left out is that we also need to stop needlessly preventing additional research on the issue from the CDC. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/06/opinion/how-to-reduce-shootings.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/10/upshot/How-to-Prevent-Gun-Deaths-The-Views-of-Experts-and-the-Public.html http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/375797-key-lawmaker-unlikely-congress-lifts-cdc-gun-research-limits

you, smart: "snopes " snopes, dumb: Sources: Montagne, Renee. “Who Was John Wilkes Booth Before He Became Lincoln’s Assassin?” NPR. 15 April 2015. Hermann, Peter, Noah. “‘Navy Yard Shooter Aaron Alexis Driven by Delusions.” Washington Post. 25 September 2013. Rothman, Noah. “‘He Was More of a Liberal Type’: CNN Guest Identifies Aaron Alexis as Having ‘Liked’ Obama Admin.” Mediate. 17 September 2013. Reuters. “Connecticut Gunman had Large Weapons Cache.” 28 March 2013. Tampa Bay Times. “Frustrating Search for Newtown, Conn., Shooter Adam Lanza’s Motive.” 24 December 2012. Walsh, Paul. “Gunman Lost His Job, Then Opened Fire, Killing 5.” Star Tribune. 29 September 2012. Silverman, Craig. “ABC News, Breitbart Fall Short in Owning Up to Mistakes on Colorado Theater Shooter.” Poynter. 20 July 2012. Condon, Stephanie. “Jared Lee Loughner a Registered Independent; Didn’t Vote in 2010.” CBS News. 11 January 2011. Fader, Carole. “Fact Check: Email was Wrong About Recent Mass Killers Being Liberals.” The Florida Times-Union. 14 March 2013. USA Today. “Plant Gunman ‘Mad at the World’.” 7 August 2003. Ross, Brian. “Lockheed Workplace Murders Targeted Blacks.” ABC News. 12 May 2005. Sanger, David. “Officer Shoots Armed Man Near White House Fence.” New York Times. 8 February 2001. CBS News. “Who is Pickett.” 7 February 2001. Arter, Melanie. “White House Shooter Sued the IRS.” CSN News. 7 July 2008. Biema, David. “Terror in the Sanctuary.” Time. 20 September 1999. Kolker, Claudia. “Texas Gunman Tied to Hate Groups; Writings Show Persecution Feelings.” LA Times. 18 September 1999. New York Times. “6 Die in Texas Office Shooting.” 4 April 1995. Chin, Paula. “A Texas Massacre.” People. 4 November 1991. Smothers, Ronald. “Hazy Records Helped Florida Gunman Buy Arms.” New York Times. 20 June 1990. Associated Press. “Car Repossessed, He Kills 7 : Gunman a Suicide After Rampage in Jacksonville” 18 June 1990. Lamar, Jacob. “Crazy Pat’s Revenge.” Time. 24 June 2001. Bovsun, Mara. “Mailman Massacre: 14 Die After Patrick Sherrill ‘Goes Postal’ in 1986 Shootings.” New York Post. 15 August 2010. Houseman, Martin. “Mass Murderer James Huberty Tried to Get Help From…” UPI. 2 August 1984. Brown, Ronald. “Dying on the Job: Murder and Mayhem in the American Workplace.” Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 15 November 2012. Newsweek. “John W. Hinckley Jr.: Inside the Mind of Ronald Reagan’s Would-Be Assassin.” 27 July 2016. Parker, Ryan. “Flashback: What John Hinckley Jr. Wrote to Jodie Foster Before He Shot Ronald Reagan.” The Hollywood Reporter. 27 July 2016. Conradarens, John. “The Leftists are the Haters and Assassins. Let’s Look at History, Shall We?” The Red State. 28 March 2010. Breslow, Jason. “8 Things You May Not Know About Lee Harvey Oswald.” PBS. 19 November 2013. Resnick, Brian. “This Is the Brain that Shot President James Garfield.” The Atlantic. 4 October 2015. Biography. “John Wilkes Booth.” Retrieved 16 June 2017.

Oy, don't post dumb memes. https://www.snopes.com/democrat-shooters-list/ Also please stop electing people who get their information from dumb memes http://thehill.com/homenews/house/374941-gop-lawmaker-many-mass-shooters-end-up-being-democrats <from the back of the house> Background cheeeeeeecks http://www.chicagotribune.com/g00/news/opinion/commentary/ct-perspec-mass-shootings-video-games-politics-0917-story.html?i10c.encReferrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8%3D&i10c.ua=1&i10c.dv=13

They should, and I think will, sign Coleman. Makes perfect sense for both to do a reasonable short term deal, 2 years, incentives. That is a strong backfield and you have a lot of picks in the draft. Defense could be right next year.

Garbage player all around. In a theoretical league that actually punished cheap shots, Jarvis Landry wouldn't be in it. Hopefully he's traded out of the division, but ideally he's out of the league. to paraphrase one D. DeVito — "Jarvis Landry retire b*tch"

lol this sounds like a Dennis Miller joke from when he did Monday Night Football, just need to add "babe" on the end.

The other thing about Barkley -- he's such a slam dunk that of course the Browns will go QB at #1, and the f---in Giants will get him. Barkley's name even fits with the Dawg Pound thing. It would be a very Browns-like to pass on a generational talent at 1, to pick whoever is the biggest bust of the top 3 at number one. If the Browns do take Barkley and he does pan out, that's great for everyone because the AFC North needs a shake up and the division is pretty open. If he goes to the Giants, it's better for Collinsworth, I guess... ugh Of course Cleveland is going to Browns this up: http://www.cleveland.com/browns/index.ssf/2018/02/what_about_saquon_barkley_at_n.html

Saquon Barkley seems like the surest thing ever, right? Everything I've seen from him makes it seem like it's the real deal. I feel like the confidence is justified, there's no way Saquon Barkley doesn't become MVP level right away. Barkley could save the Browns single-handedly. He'd be the kind of back that you could make the insane Rickey Williams trade for, and it'd actually be worth it. Except... Except who knows. It's possible that he gets stuck in the quicksand blackhole of the Browns, or he gets hurt, or he's just CJ Spiller. But aaaahhhh idk man, I'm excited to see what he can do in the NFL. Either way. It's nice to see the so-called "running back resurgence" with the last few drafts of rookie RBs.

Yes. Chicago proves the point. Specific bans don't work because, as you point out, the guns are coming in from too many other sources. Across state lines. On craigslist. Indiana is a huge supplier of legal guns that become murder weapons. To have any chance of fighting the black market, you have to stop feeding it. There needs to be a consistent, rigid system in place to weed out the bad guys from the good guys, and it needs to be across the board. Let's say — put it on the books, universal, give it 10 years. And let's see what the data suggests. If it does nothing, then fine. We tried. You win. Sorry about that. Everyone gets 10 free guns on us as reparations. But if the data suggests that these measures do drastically reduce the mass shootings, and the lives of Lawful Gun Owners are virtually identical to the way it was before, then hey, congrats to the graduating class of 2029 on everyone surviving HS.

Ahhhh well fair enough, and, you know — the reason I am on PPP as opposed to whatever the politics board is on some other team's board is because we are Bills fans, that is the tie that binds, we are all dumb enough to root for this hopeless franchise and can't help but love the broken-ass city we come from or live in. ("It's gotten better actually I really like the waterfront area"). LA or elsewhere, its... whatever, but Buffalo is Buffalo and can't help but love the Bills whether it makes sense to or not. And it never makes sense to. The best player in franchise history is OJ Simpson if we're being honest with ourselves, or one of the top three at worst. So, like hoping the Bills find the franchise QB this year, it's coming from a place of useless optimism in the sense of, like, PPP may not be my community but TSW is, a little bit, whether it knows it or not, just by virtue of having the misfortune of being a Bills fan at a certain time. I feel like the only "no gun control" arguments I hear elsewhere come from proud nazis, abject a**holes or morons on social media, but they're often even more remote and anonymous, even if you know their names and faces. On TSW, I don't know your name or face, but I know you're a Bills fan, and that's all I need to know, really. That's all it is. Two Bills Drive: sharing the misery since 1998. There's a certain amount of credit just for the pure loyalty of sticking with a losing cause for no good reason because that's the binding thing, the Bills. And I'm not often having this debate in real life because, though I grew up with guns around, grew up around gun people, familiar with the gun rhetoric, they're not in my present day. So, to even have the discussion with the other side means you have to seek it out. For guns, I want to have the debate honestly with 'the other side.' If the arguments that are presented are dishonest BS, then I want to clearly call it as such & why. Doing so often means being harsh in response to harshness. To have the discussion honestly means being bluntly honest. It's why I don't always want to have that argument with my family or friends and acquaintances. Not to mention, most of the people I choose to have in my real life would already agree on this issue. Most, not all. And those ones, it's like... ah, it's not worth it, let's not talk about it, it's Thanksgiving. It's an intense argument. It should be! You're talking about guns. That should have weight. It should not be such a flippant thing. The argument I have with liberal friends is that I also really think gun glorification in media is grossly irresponsible. I know way too many indie directors who have made gun movies simply because they don't have a budget and they're too lazy to think of other storytelling stakes besides guys shooting each other. Not that I don't love tons of gun movies, games, books, etc — the best example of that type of movie is Reservoir Dogs which is a great movie, but we're way too casual about how we present guns and shooting people. Not to mention, as gun hobbyists would know better than I would, movie/game depictions are also wildly off-base with how the weapons work in reality. The podcast I linked to several times earlier in the thread had a great joke toward the end, because they also wound up on the subject of media depiction. They proposed this rule: "For every gun or gun death you show in a movie, you also have to show full frontal male nudity on screen. One dick per gun. John Wick is an entirely different movie. Actually, Boogie Nights does this ratio perfectly." lol That makes me laugh even just typing it out. It's entirely absurd but its so funny because, it really is the same thing, it is just a goddamn phallic power fantasy. Guns are so insanely masturbatory to the ego, especially for men. Again — not a gun guy, obviously, but firing is fun. Holding a gun, carrying a gun, everything involved with it provides a tangible, palpable amount of power. Both the left and the right are guilty of being plainly dishonest about guns and about gun death to protect the satisfaction of the fantasy. I'm not saying that NRA is gay for guns, but... if the holster fits. Haha, that should be their new tagline... & inclusive is the new trend... isn't that horrible Milo Yiannaopolis guy looking for work? I have never killed anyone. I have no idea if anyone in this thread has. I wouldn't want to. I don't want firearms in the hands of non-military/law enforcement citizens who intend to use them to kill people. Gun culture needs to have more of a Bruce Lee mindset, man. Practicing it to know how to use it well, to defend yourself as the absolute last resort, is cool with me. If you fantasize about killing all of the classmates who bullied you, then you don't get it. That sh*t come out in some form if you know what to look for. Make a rigid and consistent behavioral and gun competency test, age 18 or 21, i dont care about the age, i see the argument for 18, same with specific weapon bans — its gotta be more about registration/background. You have to stop feeding the black market, and you have to stop feeding weapons to people who are telling you they're going to go murder people. If the Parkland kid wants to go try it with a samurai sword because he's able to get that on craigslist instead, then I like the chances of some dopey sheriff's deputy on miminum wage with a pea-shooter, or a coach with a baseball bat, taking him down before he kills nearly 20 people in 2 minutes. The gun debate is always ultimately framed around 2A and the importance of firearms in the Revolutionary War, but again, it's all part of this historical fantasy version of the war, there's this collective Hollywood dream of what it was like, but imagine the conversation if the war was won with something more obviously modernly destructive and less seductive. https://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/12/in-america-some-say-guns-are-in-our-dna-but-is-history-on-the-side-of-gun-rights-or-gun-control I'm exaggerating to make the point - we need to take our weapons far more seriously. And besides, the whole fundamentalist 2A approach has so many holes and flaws. For yet another thing on it, the militia was mandatory in the 1780s, so 2A was drafted with people in mind who'd be trained and knew how to use the weapons. Not just every jackass. Not to mention that gun restrictions were there from day one on other groups. The idea of using guns to stand up to tyrannical government is also like, why didn't it make a difference with WWII Japanese internment? Were there no good guys with guns then? The Supreme Court ruled in 2008 against defining 2A as arms necessitating militia service, but there's no denying it was part of the context and assumptions of the time. btw, that same decision also stated that regulations on 2A were necessary -- we just don't have the right regulations yet. EDIT -- There is the comprehensive conversation to "what makes somebody want to be a school shooter" which guns are only part of a much larger combination of factors, problems, and solutions, but guns are also too often pushed aside in favor of getting overwhelmed by the largeness of that. Because then again its like, the right just pushed against universal health care, so if its mental health, whats the answer then? And so it becomes that stalemate, and guns are ignored, the status quo accepted and we argue about different things, until it comes up again. At a certain point — at this point, maybe — it has to be about guns and doing the goddamn common sense universal background checks that everyone agrees about. It is both so simple yet also it's made to be this immovable, impossible task. As far as entrenched in two party duality, idk about that. I'm left, but i wouldnt self-identify as a Democrat. I don't think that gives an accurate representation of my overall views, not that it matters. A moderate socialist would be accurate, or independent maybe. I wouldn't self-identify as a Bernie Bro, if only for the misogynist connotation, but a moderate version of that. Whooooo cares. I know Lawful Gun Owners and could even see myself being one, but the idea of identifying as an NRA member is... i dont get it, the whole thing looks as bonkers as Scientology. Somehow people still sign up for both. Anyway, idk. Didn't intend to write a toilet paper novel but f**k it, there ya go, you did request it, and I appreciate your forthcomingness and honesty in return.

Okay. You want me to get to know you & you want to get to know me? Well, that is lovely, a wonderful gesture of friendship. It's not reflected well in this thread but generally I am friendly & affable. It doesn't matter to me if you believe that or not because I don't want to get to know you aside from the content of our posts here. Perhaps in another thread, you share a different side of yourself that we connect on — great. We can get to know each other that way. Here's the thing. This isn't the place for it. At the very least, not this thread, and not on page 20 after everything that preceded it. As they say on reality shows, "I'm not here to make friends." (It used to be unseemly to quote reality stars but then again now they get elected to Commander in Chief). I'm fine being the bad guy here. I accepted it walking in, I don't care, I can take it, it's fine. I see how "the left" is regarded on PPP; it's why I created this thread, rather than hijacking another one. I wanted the position to be specific & clear from the beginning. However. I'm not here to insult anyone personally, or any poster specifically — I will certainly return in kind. I'm not going to take crap without returning it. The original post specifically calls out "sensitive lawful gun owners," which is a label you can choose to ascribe to yourself, or choose not to. I'm posting it here because I suspected I'd find some that fit that label. I want them to know they are part of the problem and need to be part of the solution. They need to stop avoiding it. The reasons we do nothing are BS. We have to stop this conflation of "restrictions" and "bans," the various other conflations & dishonest arguments against changing gun laws in any way. The bottom line is that if we want to prevent mass shootings, the Lawful Gun Owners will need to accept a degree of added inconvenience into their lives, in some way. I am tired as hell of accepting "do nothing" as the solution. "Don't politicize the tragedy" doesn't make sense for this reason. In our society, everything is politicized. There is no avoiding it. The tragedy is politics. It's politics because, for a variety of reasons, we can't agree on action. When I was growing up, Republicans/conservatives were the party of "personal responsibility." It's been a looong time since the Republicans have been the party of personal responsibility, but it's disappointing that conservatives, as people, have also lost any sight of it. Lawful Gun Owners need to step up and take some responsibility to protect *(!#^)*( children and innocent people. They are not choosing to die for your right to own a gun. Yet often the same people will also tell you how important it is to ban abortion, empathizing with the fetus that they didn't choose to die. Or, the right won't support universal healthcare but will always blame "mental health" after shootings. It's never their fault, and never their responsibility. FOR ANYTHING, it seems. The amount of dishonesty, punting, and excuse-making from the right is often infuriating — but the carnage that has resulted from our collective laziness, for no better reason than an inability to address lax gun laws, is so dystopian and so preventable, that to do nothing is as much a political act as doing anything. I mentioned in another thread growing up with guns around. I mostly do have sympathy or empathy for gun owners. I'm not a military/hunting hobbyist so I don't pretend to be an expert, but I mostly understand or try to understand where they're coming from. As mentioned before, I think "ban" is wrong. I get why the AR-15 is popular, it's versatile, good for the price, I see that. I want it to be harder for some idiot psycho 18-year-old kid in Florida to get, or some psycho 60-year-old radical in Pennsylvania. It shouldn't only come down to "prior convictions" at the point of sale. Guns are too heavy of a responsibility to be given out so lightly. F*** the NRA, it's not your inalienable right to never be inconvenienced in acquiring an arm. Universal background checks/regulation/tests, etc., have widespread voter support and have for years. They are not on the books because of a number of reasons. One of the major reasons is the NRA quite literally owns a fair amount of our government. Y'know, if you're looking for conspiracy theories, "money in government" might be one to consider instead of fixating on Hillary & Soros doing some kind of Mission Impossible plan to take away Joe Schmo's hunting rifles. How do we lessen the NRA's control? Voting out Reps & Senators who take their money would be one. Another powerful one would be if Lawful Gun Owners stood up to them a little more, instead of just quoting their president. They have a vested interest in keeping their base scared, pissed, agitated. It benefits the gun industry tremendously. What I want — what most people want — are stronger controls across the board, more effort in weeding out the 'bad guys' from the 'good guys.' However, the 'good guys' are always sticking up for the 'bad guys' because the NRA has their members convinced that any regulations on guns is an apocalyptic assault on their individual rights & lives. It's madness. When Tasker compares my tactics to Saul Alinsky, he's not necessarily wrong. I read up on him more this afternoon, since I was only vaguely aware of him, mostly as his status as a right-wing talking point 'boogeyman' from Rush/Glenn, because Obama & Hillary had cited him as an influence. Well, I can see why. He seems fairly cool to me, lol. I agree with the idea that in our society, change does not come easy. Nobody wants to change. It can only come from agitation. If problems were solved by asking nicely, well... yeah, that'd be a better world, but it's not the one we live in. In conclusion: I am tired. I'm not so crazy that I'm expecting to get anything out of this. I'm not expecting to see messages of "oh wow you're so right" — but as someone who sometimes lurks on boards, I still think it's important to make the case even if there's not an immediate return. Who knows who you're reaching. Honestly, all I've done is waste my damn week arguing with strangers on the internet because I still have this misguided optimism that people are ultimately reasonable creatures. That optimism dies a bit every time I argue with the overwhelming cynicism of NRArs, a group who only have optimism in things instead of people, though. "So I got that goin' for me, which is nice." Again, though, it should not be about me— I'm a ghost. It's about making a point to people who need to hear it who really don't want to hear it. If my original post is mocking you, that's up to you. It doesn't need to be. But to anyone who feels it is them, I'm happy to tell them: "f*** you, grow up." So now you're going to tell me in full where you're coming from on guns, right, Rhino? lol EDIT — Some reading: Here is the Wikipedia article for the solution I keep advocating for. ("Wikipedia? That's not a real--") You can independently verify all of the sources with the links at the bottom. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_background_check From CNN (fake news): Universal background checks are being proposed right now. Not for the first time. Along with improving criminal background check laws. There are also weaker measures backed by the NRA which may pass instead, and then be cited down the line as why gun control doesn't work because they're useless half-measures. Schumer's is the only proposal that makes sense. https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/26/politics/chuck-schumer-background-checks-parkland/index.html But here are a list of the obstacles to action, also from CNN (fake news) https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/23/politics/congress-obstacles-gun-law-control/index.html