Er... personally I am always amazed that conservatives heads don't explode from the massive cognitive dissonance.
A kid raped by her father who gets an abortion is a despicable murderer. But... we should arm more people with guns whose only real purpose is to kill another human being.
Life is sacred 'till you're born. Then you're fair game?
But... we should arm more people with guns whose only real purpose is to kill another human being.
This Pandora's box has been open for a very long time. I'm afraid that even hope will escape it should we try to close it.
The mere existence of these weapons in the population makes them a deterrent for some crimes against the elderly and disabled. Even if it isn't a deterrent for some criminals, I would rather see the scumbag criminal breaking into an old person's home die than the old person getting killed, robbed, or otherwise abused. Dead criminals don't commit additional crimes.
The problem I see with most deterrence arguments is that they assume criminals are rational, and weigh the costs and benefits of a crime the way a lawful person would. I don't think they do. I think that violent criminals don't weigh consequences the way ordinary people do, they're a lot more impulsive and aggressive.
Now I'm a liberal, and I don't have anything wrong with people owning guns. I think that people who have good reason to carry concealed firearms should be able to, although I'm not a big fan of everybody carrying concealed firearms (because for the reasons above I think it only makes it worse). However, I would not like to see anybody who needs to carry a firearm carrying one of these.
The main problem I see is that it is a single shot. The ammunition had better be pretty powerful then, given that the user is presumably physically unable to shoot a conventional pistol, and the situations the user is supposed to be using it in, we can't count on accurate shot placement. Even against a single, unarmed assailant, I wouldn't count on this making anybody safer. If anything, brandishing one of these things may provoke a more aggressive attack, and maybe even provide legal defense for the assailant.
No, I think this is pretty clearly a publicity stunt for a novelty toy of a gun. Anybody who takes this seriously as a way of improving the security of the elderly who are too physically frail to use a better weapon has to have a screw loose somewhere.
God, please let this be true. (Score:5, Funny)
I want to see liberals' heads explode when they realize that Socialized medicine is being used to buy people guns.
LK
Re: (Score:5, Insightful)
A kid raped by her father who gets an abortion is a despicable murderer. But... we should arm more people with guns whose only real purpose is to kill another human being.
Life is sacred 'till you're born. Then you're fair game?
Re: (Score:5, Interesting)
But... we should arm more people with guns whose only real purpose is to kill another human being.
This Pandora's box has been open for a very long time. I'm afraid that even hope will escape it should we try to close it.
The mere existence of these weapons in the population makes them a deterrent for some crimes against the elderly and disabled. Even if it isn't a deterrent for some criminals, I would rather see the scumbag criminal breaking into an old person's home die than the old person getting killed, robbed, or otherwise abused. Dead criminals don't commit additional crimes.
If guns were banned t
Re:God, please let this be true. (Score:2)
The problem I see with most deterrence arguments is that they assume criminals are rational, and weigh the costs and benefits of a crime the way a lawful person would. I don't think they do. I think that violent criminals don't weigh consequences the way ordinary people do, they're a lot more impulsive and aggressive.
Now I'm a liberal, and I don't have anything wrong with people owning guns. I think that people who have good reason to carry concealed firearms should be able to, although I'm not a big fan of everybody carrying concealed firearms (because for the reasons above I think it only makes it worse). However, I would not like to see anybody who needs to carry a firearm carrying one of these.
The main problem I see is that it is a single shot. The ammunition had better be pretty powerful then, given that the user is presumably physically unable to shoot a conventional pistol, and the situations the user is supposed to be using it in, we can't count on accurate shot placement. Even against a single, unarmed assailant, I wouldn't count on this making anybody safer. If anything, brandishing one of these things may provoke a more aggressive attack, and maybe even provide legal defense for the assailant.
No, I think this is pretty clearly a publicity stunt for a novelty toy of a gun. Anybody who takes this seriously as a way of improving the security of the elderly who are too physically frail to use a better weapon has to have a screw loose somewhere.