Ustwo: If you haven't purchased your shotgun yet I heartily suggest checking out the Benelli Nova Pump. A couple years ago I decided to replace my Mossberg defender with an 870 because I remembered how much more I liked it and didn't want a "tacticool" gun anymore for when the gun grabbers came.

I walk into The Gun Room (a great shop) here in Lakewood and say, "Hi, I want a Remington 870." The guy behind the counter says, "Heh, wait till you get a load of THIS! I haven't sold an 870 since I got them in!"

Holy Crap, I see why. Superior in every way, IMO. Chamber clear feature, 3.5in magnums (as opposed to 3in), apparently better sight rail (opinion) and it even came with chokes. Parkerized and nylon instead of blued and wood. All for the same price as a bare bones 870. The weapon is more balanced and points very well.

The only "minus" is that the receiver and rear stock are integrated so you can't put tacticool grips on them. Hey, that was a bonus for me.

You can get a mercury filled recoil reducer which I have demo'd and will probably purchase eventually. Highly recommended for 3.5in magnums! Spare barrels are very expensive but they are available in the wide range shotgun enthusiasts expect. Benelli quality at Remington pricing.

http://www.benelliusa.com/firearms/novaPump.tpl

An added benefit of owning a shotgun is that you can shoot clays with them... perhaps the most fun you can have with a firearm.

I'm not going to get into the politics of this debate any more than to say, "The second ensures the first!" I can see the framers sitting around saying, "Hrm, we need freedom of expression but someone will eventually try to take it away. I've got it! Weapons!"

Similarly, the US crime rate has nothing to do with gun ownership either. Trying to prevent gun crime by further regulating firearms is like using a Band-Aid in an attempt to treat ebola. Sure, technically blood and bandages might seem like they should logically be related, but in this case the bandage won't do shit.

Suave, we won't know that until we start using smart gun control. Right now we have a gun ban in DC next to an area with virtually no gun control, West Virginia. This is an example of DC trying to do something to lower their crime rate, and WV deciding to be stubborn. It has to happen on a federal level. Had WV gotten stronger gun laws or had DC not been the staging ground for a gun ban things could have been much different.

Can you imagine if the gun ban was in Hawaii instead of DC?

I can't imagine. Don't know enough about Hawaii (though I wouldn't think they have TOO many issues with violent crime ;) too nice).

I can, however, state the oft-quoted information that Canada and Switzerland both have similar per capita gun ownership to the US yet significantly lower gun crime rates. I can also tell you that I have done a partial historical analysis of Canadian (federal) gun control since the 1970s when it was first strengthened in a major fashion, and that there has been no evidence for an effect on gun crime or violent crime.

Violence is not a pathology of the tool, but of the person, be it individually or culturally. Guns do make it more efficient to kill another person, but they do not increase the likelihood that someone will attempt to kill another, nor does the fatality rate increase significantly beyond other means of weapon-involved assault.

I'm not saying that violence is due to the tool. What I'm saying is that a man with a knife is not as dangerous as a man with a gun. In fact, I could kill 10x as many people with a gun as a knife. They make killing quite easy.

why does everyone go for 12 ga?

if someone is in your home i would think that they would be pretty close, so wouldnt a 20 ga. work just as well?

just asking because i have my 20 ga sitting next to me for home protection and not my 12 ga. / 3 and a half inch magnum.

For me it's because of readily available ammo. I can handle the 12ga and the shells are cheaper when I want to go bust clay. I don't know the ballistics but I think a 20ga with 00 buck would be just fine. I just don't own one.

And? I can kill more people with an IED than I can with a gun. They make killing even more easy. Shall we ban diesel fuel?

(Oh crap, I just got sucked into the political argument)

The possibility may be there, but people don't do it. And as our good friend smoore pointed out, there are many ways to kill large amounts of people if one so desires. Vehicular homicide, IED, poison, and so forth. In fact, they're easier for the average person to use than a firearm, as it's is significantly harder to hit ones target with a firearm than one might believe from watching movies.

hawaii has nearly the same laws as DC does. A permit is required to purchase any weapon and these permits are RARELY issued, unless you're connected.

You're absolutely right, DK. And in 2006 only 21 people were murdered in a state that not only has about 1.29 million people but also sees tens of thousands of vacationers a year. That's less than half the murder rate of West Virginia, which has virtually no gun laws.

whats the rest of the violent crime stats for hawaii?

http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/hicrime.htm

BTW, do you have gun crime stats for Hawaii? I can't find any.

i'm looking, but they are hard to find.

http://www.census.gov/statab/ranks/rank21.html

Vermont, a state with some of the laxest gun laws in the country, has a lower violent crime rate than Hawaii.

Check out the murder rate.

399 murders to a population of 7.6 million. That's 1 murder for every 12,155 people. Hawaii? 1 of 61,214. Vermont has over 5 times the murder rate per capita.

Fuck all that murder rate stuff, I just want to know if Ustwo checked out the Binelli or if he had already decided on some other shotgun.

Neither, I still need to get my firearms card, required in the peoples republic of illionis and I haven't filled out the paper work yet.

I also owe my wife a .223 I promised her a few years ago.

Odds are I will wait about a year until we are able to move.

Woh, you have to register to own long arms there? Weird. I need to go check that out.

I suppose that registration will come in handy for the govt. when they need to start collecting the weapons.

Illinois is the most anti-gun state that there is. They'd ban them all if it weren't for 1/3rd of the population being hunters.

Its illegal to carry one in your car, in your trunk if its ready to fire. I don't mean as in loaded I mean as in together in such a way that I COULD load it.

Fucking democrats, first up against the wall when the revolution comes...well after the lawyers.

... and after the socialists. I mean comon. I've gotta be scarier to you than some wimpy Democrats.

I'm counting on you getting into law school.

That's better.

Okay so I'm late getting in on this and I'm not going to point out individual arguments that I disagree with but I will say this:

-statistics can be made to say whatever you want..for the most part
-outlawing guns won't solve anything
-neither will arming everyone (there are some people that just should not own guns)

I don't think that the "lower crime rate" means too much because there are many things that influence crime rates and just because one type of crime was lower doesn't mean that less people were victims or attackers.

The problem of crime isn't centered around guns anyways, people tend to use the easiest weapon they can find, at the moment that happens to be guns.

What, in your opinion, would be the second easiest weapon behind guns?

WORDS!

But really, knives (or other sharp objects) seem to be up there. Hard to get guns into prisons, and what do inmates use for weapons? Sharp objects.

According to this: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/homicide/weapons.htm it would appear that knives as weapons has lost second place to whatever "other" is.

Just out of curiosity, how do you think Columbine or VTech would have gone down had the kids only had access to knives or swords?

Ya know, I don't know that it would have happened at all. At least, not on as large a scale. What makes you think that school shootings are relevant though? The incidence of school shootings is lower than it was a decade ago, they've just been getting more media attention.

Evidence:
http://youthviolence.edschool.virgin...shootings.html

Would you ask the families of the victims if the shootings were relevant? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad the number is going down, but it's still a problem until it reaches zero.

It won't reach zero. I don't understand how you can make that argument. It's like saying that the world isn't okay until it's perfect. Never gonna happen.

And by the way, my sister went to Columbine.

From what I've seen there's only one type of crime that is directly affected by gun laws and that is spur of the moment, rage killings. Guns are there so they're used. But even the affect on that type of crime seems to be minimal.

and by the way..my sister was attending Cleveland Elementary school..
San Diego area...
in 79..when Brenda Spencer let loose ..no shit ..for real..

I go back to the OP question.....and try to relate it to other statistics
that have been around far longer..and are still in question.

We don't know...
we don't have a fuckin' clue
but we pretend,

then we can sleep.

Man, I wish I could pull the "firearm education" card but it never flies with upper class white bread yuppies who only see guns on TeeVee and perhaps figure they're magical death machines manufactured in hell by Smith & Satan or something.

We used to teach our kids sex ed, driver's ed, phys ed, etc... good, useful life skills classes.

Oh well.

...

Human problems that reach zero? You're such an optimistic weenie.

I agree with the whole only see guns on tv thing. There's always a big difference between people who have been raised around guns and those who know them only as weapons. It's the people who only know them as weapons who'd like to see that they're illegal but some of us know that it would never work.

Gun: noun, 1.a weapon consisting of a metal tube, with mechanical attachments, from which projectiles are shot by the force of an explosive; a piece of ordnance.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/gun

A gun is a weapon. You can play with weapons, a la Cromp, but that doesn't make it any less of a weapon. A shovel is a tool, a sandwich is food, and a gun is a weapon. It's really that simple.

Don't make me argue against the sandwich. I'll do it!

...

Define: "Weapon" 1. An instrument of attack or defense against an adversary.

...

"Play." I play with guns? "Play." Wait a friggin' second.

Thing is: Homie don't play that. I engage in a sporting activity as fun and dangerous as motorcycle racing, full contact martial arts, or driving a souped up Eclipse.

Attitudes that gun owners "play" with their firearms is part of the problem here. I'm highly responsible with firearms and always follow the firearm commandments of "Thou shalt not point a gun at that which thou doesn't wish to destroy." and "Thou shalt not place thine finger upon thy trigger lest thou wishes the firearm to discharge." I was a part of a profession that required me to carry quite a few devastating weapons (heavy machine guns, grenade launchers and anti-tank rockets, for example) and I take their power seriously and respect them. Kids play with action figures. Responsible adults don't play with guns. Ya won't see me around my apartment pretending to be Rambo. I have a gun safe where my sporting firearms are locked up when they're not being maintained or used. I don't cuddle them or have a special pillow for them, but I could be persuaded if someone wants to buy me a S&W 629. When I engage in lawfully carrying a concealed firearm for personal defense it remains concealed. Where's the playing here?

I'm using your own words. When you go to a range, you're enjoying using the gun for entertainment. That's playing. It doesn't mean that you're irresponsible or anything, just that they are fun for you.

Some people play with guns, some people hunt with guns, some people have guns on their walls like art, but despite all of these uses, guns are weapons.

So is a car, will.

And lemme tell ya... hunting deer with a rusted out Datsun pickup is fucking stupid.

/cue West Virginians I know

Cars are FAR more fatal, will, if you really want to discuss the dangers of weapons.

The National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (part of the CDC) has a very neat tool which allows you to break injuries and deaths down numerically, and generate tables like: "10 Leading Causes of Injury Deaths, United States
2005, All Races, Both Sexes". I prefer the raw numbers to statistics like "you're twice as likely to die in a car accident than as the result of a firearm", because, although true, it tends to be misleading without the original data.

Seeing the actual numbers is pretty interesting.

I made one for illustrative purposes, and highlighted what we're talking about in red:

http://img380.imageshack.us/img380/4366/deathsdz4.jpg

I think if you're really concerned about unnecessary deaths in the United States, it would be time and money MUCH better spent working on number one killer, in some cases doubling the amount of deaths by firearm.

Check it out here: http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/leadcaus10.html

A quick number crunch with my calculator; If I include suicide AND homicide by firearm, men and women between the ages of 5 and 34 were one and a half times (1.4886) more likely to die in a car accident than as the result of a firearm in 2005.

560+763+10657+7047=19027
44+143+4499+3780+8466 + (84 + 1962 + 2269 + 4315) = 12781
19027 / 12781 = 1.488694

If you don't include suicide, they're 2.2476 times more likely to die as a result of a car accident than at the hands of someone else's firearm.

In the finite economy in which we live, should we spend more money on preventing death by vehicle, or preventing death by firearm? The math here is pretty simple. To drive the point further, which are you more worried about? Being killed by a man with a gun, or being killed by a car? You should be more worried about the car, as it is more than twice as likely to kill you. If you're more worried about the gunman, it's sure not based on the numbers.

This is why it's difficult to have debates on TFP. Do people pay attention to what they post? I'll make it crystal clear:
Gun: noun, 1.a weapon consisting of a metal tube, with mechanical attachments, from which projectiles are shot by the force of an explosive; a piece of ordnance.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/gun

Car: noun, 1. an automobile. 2. a vehicle running on rails, as a streetcar or railroad car.

So, to make things as clear as possible: a gun is a weapon, and a car is a vehicle. While they can be other things (in addition to their primary role), they are always these things. A gun is never not a weapon and a car is never not a vehicle. A car is only rarely a weapon, therefore suggesting a car is a weapon is completely and totally 100% incorrect and anyone who says otherwise needs to be shut down as hard as possible so there's never any confusion.

I expected a lot more than this from you, Jinn.

Edit: and just to put a bow on my argument, heart disease kills many, MANY, times the amount of people that cars do, so we should probably call the human heart a weapon? Or maybe McDonalds hamburgers? How about high fructose corn syrup, considering that diabetes also kills a lot more than cars.

I don't go to the range for enjoyment or entertainment. I go to hone my skills of dropping some violent criminal faster than he can do harm to me. :expressionless:

Oh comon. Of course you have fun there. And don't you try guns that you don't own? Isn't that even more fun? You act like gun ranges are somber or something.

Actually, they kinda are...

You should go sometime.

I dont' try guns that I don't own, simply because I can't afford rental fees. It certainly isn't fun with the cost of ammo as it is. I hate the loud noise, that's not fun. so, to me, ranges aren't somber, they are just a place to train and practice at.

If I paid for your ammo (out of the kindness of my heart), would you then enjoy it?

while I would certainly enjoy taking the extra time away from having to mow my yard or do the dishes, probably not. To be honest about it, the only enjoyment I get is when i'm done shooting and see that i've improved my accuraccy. then it's on to the other million things in my life that need to be done.

I'm not a fan of guns (REALLY, WILL?!), but I'm totally in support of something people can enjoy so long as it's safe. Crompsin really enjoys going to the range. Even I'd probably have fun at a range. Maybe this is a symptom of your taking guns too seriously.

Tell you what, the next time you hit a range, really try to enjoy opening fire on your target... the same way one might enjoy playing basketball or playing chess. This isn't even about whether I approve of guns or not.

Back when I used to go down to Laguna Seca, there was a guy in a '76 Porche 911 who was all business and no fun when he raced. He was a good driver, but he didn't enjoy driving. He was considering leaving. He and I had a similar conversation to the one we're having. He started to enjoy himself and stuck with racing.

The point I'm trying to make is that you should be happy with your hobbies and pursuits.

It's hard for people to enjoy shooting considering all the bad publicity it gets.

But what I meant was that people think if guns as only being used as weapons for killing other people when in reality, only a fraction of bullets fired from guns each day are aimed at people.

maybe i've given you the wrong impression of me then. I'm only serious about guns when it comes to the whys of having them. To me, it is a tool. A tool of self defense and in the broader sense, a tool of freedom.

NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING, beats a good game of chess. :thumbsup:

So it's a chore? Like vacuuming?
Finally something we can agree on. :thumbsup:

Will is correct that guns, rifles and pistols are weapons. They are designed to destroy.

Will, you are incorrect that you are "playing" while shooting. It's like saying that racing is "playing with your car." Playing with either of them can get you or someone else hurt. Kids out drifting on public streets are playing with their cars. People that go to the track to seriously race are not playing, IMO.

Another way to put it, my wife enjoys crochet. When she does it she isn't playing with yarn.

Both are. You play a game. Whether that game is to see who can drive fastest or to see if you can shoot better, it's still a game.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game

I think you're reaching here. A race is not a game, it's a race. By this loose definition I'm playing a game when I ride my bicycle for enjoyment.

no, but the vacuum itself is a tool, THE vacuum itself is a necessary tool. without it, you can't vacuum, right?

will, we may just have to get together online somewhere online and play. :lol:

racing is a sport. shooting is a sport. sometimes sports are games and sometimes games are sports. it seems to me that there is an olympic event about shooting......i think they call that a sport. just saying.

Huh?
You'd likely kick my little white ass. I'm really out of practice.
Whoa, we've agreed twice in a gun thread? :eek:

I still say that shooters don't play with guns and racers don't play with cars.

Runners play with shoes, who'da thunk it?

Try it like this: Runners play, with shoes.

The runners aren't playing with the shoes and the shooters aren't playing with the guns.

I think you just want to use "play" to create a disparaging meaning where none exists, 'cause everyone knows you shouldn't play with guns. By saying we play with our guns at the range it creates the impression that it's childish and reckless.

If that's how you want to do it, I'm OK with it but it's silly.

Perhaps it's the Atlantic Canadian in me but I'm terrified when I read this. It makes me literally scared shitless that people feel the need to "practice" at a local range in case they need to defend themselves.

I'm also really confused with the idea of defense via gun power being a tool for freedom. Maybe it's just me and my crazy socialist logic, but aren't there less... deathy ways of resolving conflict. I don't understand the whole "I'll shoot him before he shoots me" mentality. Seems to just breed this idea that everyone is after everyone, so you might as well say "fuck everyone else, because they are going to fuck me anyways". It's all a little melodramatic to me.

The runners are playing a game when they run. They use shoes when they play. The shoes are tools, not toys, but the purpose they serve is a sport, or a game.

Yeah yeah. Rock climbers play with caribiners, surfers play with surfboards, kayakers play with paddles, skiers play with poles (heh, I even snuck in a double entenedre) and runners play with shoes. Fine.

We're just going to have to disagree, you're as stubborn as I am!

well, the logic would seem to satisfy those that think proper training should be required. But I guess that if someone actually pursues that proper training, then people should be scared. kinda circular there, isn't it?

A very long time ago a bunch of people tried less 'deathy' ways of resolving conflicts. It fell on deaf ears so they took up arms to defend their freedom. It may be melodramatic, but it also worked and could continue to work if people weren't more afraid of freedom than they are of death.

Part of my point is exactly that; the idea of gun use as a means of control is completely cyclical.

It kind of reminds me of how racism has escalated in my small town; see, the french and english in Canada seem to "hate each other". I put that in quotation marks because that's what the other side says about their counterpart; "Well he hated me first", etc. The thing is, NB is the only bi-lingual province in Canada and last week our minister of education, a guy I've known most of my life and thought was a borderline dick, Kelly Lamrock decided to completely decimate the early french-immersion program for children before reaching Middle School. A lot of people are not happy. But all it takes is for one person to say "he hates the french", then an english speaking citizen to say "Well you want to turn MY city into your own little french speaking town," followed by "We have the right to our language", and have an the aforementioned english person to say "well we are the majority". Protests follow. It's been that way my whole life here. So, do the French citizens of Fredericton shoot the English? Lord, I hope we've become more civilized then that.

In fact, the idea of saying "him before me" is super barbaric to me. I don't understand this paranoia and ingrained need to defend yourself against something that is a product of your own actions. That "your" isn't pointed at anyone person, but rather a general "your". It's like Fredericton's situation, one person feels threatened so they threaten the other side and it all escalates.

Maybe what you're saying is that we've gone past this point of no return, and there is no answer but violence. I hope not. Maybe it's simply the attitude we sport; maybe it's all our own perception. It all comes off very superior to me. You want to be better then the others and incase they raise to the level you are at, you can raise once again. When does it stop?

The problem with your perception is that you're painting everyone who carries or wants to carry with the same brush and in the same color. That's what ends up dividing the issue and making it so confrontational.

People need to understand that there are people who don't care about others and will use whatever violent means necessary to obtain their objectives over someone weaker than them.

For those people, having that gun means having control over those without one and so your perception for THOSE people would be spot on. For the others, they don't want to be 'better', they just want to not be controlled by the former. I don't think that's trying to be superior, it's just trying to protect ones self.

This is kind of what I was gonna say. Carrying isn't about control for everyone, it's about protection. For me, being a female, I've met way too many of the type that wants to control everyone. And a few that went about it through violence..personally, I'm not willing to just sit back and let that keep happening. I carry to protect myself, it's not because I think it's fun to walk around with a gun.

Crime may be scary to think about, but it's real.

I don't see any logic in that. It's like saying "Carrying a bomb isn't about control (making people afraid), it's about protection." Considering that even well trained people accidentally shoot themselves so often and considering that if one were to engage an evildoer in a firefight how dangerous it would be for bystanders, the idea of associating guns and safety simply doesn't work.

Can you source your hyperbole?

I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over the sound of you being owned so hard before. Want another? BAM:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_vio..._United_States
Sourced to:
http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/nfirates2000.html

Wow! That was snotty. Are those accidental gunshot wounds caused by well-trained people as you suggested in your post? Also, how do these numbers compare to the number of times guns are actually fired?

Protection and safety aren't necessarily the same thing. You carry a gun hoping to never have to use it or put anyone in harm's way. Thing is, CCWs are around to be a deterrent and prevent crime. The idea being, a criminal might think twice before committing a crime because that person could be packing. Does that work? No, not enough people carry, but that was the idea.

Suggesting that accidental shootings are "hyperbole" without doing an iota of research is irresponsible.
Are all of the 23,237 wounds caused by people who are trained? Probably not, but statistically some of them are. If you look at my wording:
To clarify, I'm not claiming that it's some great number of well trained gun owners that shoot themselves, as that would be incorrect. I am simply suggesting that even when an individual is very well trained with a gun, accidents can happen. If you have an accident with a car, there are safety precautions taken by the manufacturer that can help to save you and anyone else. If you have an accident with a gun, aside from a safety there's very little to protect whomever or whatever is staring down the barrel.

Wouldn't it make more sense to not conceal the weapon, thus providing visual evidence to said criminal instead of simply giving them statistical odds that you have a gun?

You argued that even well-trained people accidentally shoot themselves "so often". This may be true. I don't know. The statistics you provide do suggest that people do accidentally injure themselves when using firearms. Does this mean that "well-trained people" injure themselves "so often"? It's hard to tell without data on "well-trained" people (whatever than means) and some means of putting that 23,000 number in a context (how many accidents compared to how many uses, etc.).
Agreed.

"So often" wasn't intended to give a specific amount, simply suggest that it's probably a lot more than one or two.

Unfortunately, the information on people who have official training (at a school or range) under their belt isn't available for some reason.

I wouldn't no where to look. It's quite possible that it's never recorded. Regardless, frequency of accidental injury per use is more interesting to me than frequency of accidental injury.

Yep. It's called open carry, which is very common in Az. And I do that too, but it increases the chances of your weapon being used against you.

The frequency isn't altogether inapplicable, though. 23,237 instances? That's quite a few.
So neither is a good option?

How?

Would the benefit of deterrence associated with open carry outweigh the costs?

It sounds like quite a few, but it's hard to tell without information about usage. It would be more compelling if we knew something like accident per user or accident per use.

Well, neither is ideal but you work with what you have. If more people had CCWs I think that the idea could work. But we all know that's not going to happen.

Are you asking how I open carry? In Arizona you can open carry without a CCW as long as the firearm is visible at all times. Most often, people use holsters attached to their belts.

And yeah I think the benefit outweighs the risks in many situations. But that only applies if you are trained, reducing the risk of being disarmed. Even in Arizona, if you open carry people notice and they are a little scared of you because of it. I don't see that as a bad thing.

Sorry I was unclear, I was wondering about how one becomes disarmed, how frequently that actually occurs in open carry situations, and whether in your opinion that frequency outweighs the deterrence benefits. You answered my questions despite my vague post.

I see your point. I have a problem finding the right words to describe how I feel on this site, I don't know why. Nevertheless, I think my internal thoughts, the ones I meant to convey, are being missed; I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. Weapons, in any form, are tools to achieve some sort of superiority.

So there are horrible people who would kill someone else, yes? And you're point is, if the time and place were somehow ever to come about, you would kill that person first?

You see my point as a broad generalization because you don't see yourself within that generalization. You take yourself out of that group, then label the others evil doers. What confuses me is you are both willing to perform the same acts. Yet, you are right, while he is wrong.

You can argue he was going to do it first. Why would he? He felt threatened, hurt, without rights? He was poor and felt his only path was the one leading to your door and your death and, eventually, to your cash. You are his superior, in his eyes, and he wishes to equal the playing ground.

You see him and say "It is a crime for him to do this, etc". You see he has a gun, or access to them. Your thinking "The human race is certainly capable of this, so I need to defend myself". When he shows up, you're already to blow his ass to smithereens.

Don't you see that it goes both ways?

But, when I say there are better ways, I don't mean inviting the gun wielding man into your home for coffee, convincing him violence isn't the way, then giving him a pat on the ass and sending him on his way. I mean find a way to never have the situation happen.

I'm not perfect. I don't want my kids to be killed at school, or my wife raped and beaten, or have me be mugged and stabbed. But I don't want my neighbor to think I'm willing to do that to him. And I hope that he doesn't think the same about me. But, if I were to assume the worst about him, I think that gives him the right to assume that about me.

You justifying this, gives your potential "enemy" reason to justify their actions as well. Maybe I'm wrong.

Some people think that killing is morally acceptable when it's in defense, punk. It's something I suspect you nor I will ever agree with.

This should be moved to Politics, as it's clear that this is no longer about Weaponry, and that it no longer adheres to the purpose of this subsection.

From the Rules of Tilted Weaponry:
Discussing this here is like discussing why porn is evil in Tilted Exhibition.

Who are you calling pun... oh, wait, screen name! Got it.

MOST criminals are cowards at heart and will avoid even the slightest possibility they could be shot or shot at. Seeing the weapon can usually make this happen. Are there exceptions? Of course there are, just like every other rule of the world.

In my 4 years of studying guns, news, and laws I have heard of only one single incident where someone open carrying was robbed specifically for their carried weapon.

So why not carry a taser or pepper spray, things demonstrated to deter, but not (or very, VERY rarely) to kill?

because 'usually' those same criminals/cowards don't fear tasers (because it requires up close contact) or pepper spray (because you miss, you're done), but the thought that death could be imminent from the gun on the intended victims hip does drive home the point.

It's too bad you've not looked into alternatives for firearms recently (in the last 20 years). Most tasers now are projectile in nature, easily reaching distances beyond 15 feet. I wouldn't call that close contact at all.
Miss? I've gotten pepper spray on my jeans and my eyes teared up almost instantly.

If these were such bad options you wouldn't need to misrepresent their effectiveness.

I once sang the marines hymn in a tent filled with CS gas, which is stronger than OC spray, so for some it's effective, for others it isn't. A bullet stops nearly everything.

Yeah, I'm just gonna let dk talk for me. He gets it. Guns are by far a much more effective deterrent.

Note to self, do not fuck with dksuddeth.

I can get a ballistic vest of eBay for less than $120. Shipped. And don't bullshit me about shooting in the head. If you're trained, you're trained to hit the biggest target: the body.

The people you have to worry about almost never plan ahead that well.

Besides, the fact that you have a bullet proof vest doesn't mean a shot won't put you on the ground.

I would think that it's the people that plan ahead that one should be worried about.

If you're trained, you're trained to aim for the largest part of the target FIRST. That doesn't mean that you don't know how to double tap to the chest then head.

you should be concerned about both.

Assassination shot is a hard sell for self defense in court.

I'd argue that the majority of violent crimes are committed by the former. And even if that was the case, there's no reason you wouldn't notice after the first shot that hey this guy isn't stopping and if you had to then aim some place else.

How many people are going to get up even with armor after you double them to the chest? I've never been shot but from what I understand any decently powerful handgun is going to knock them the f out!

Having been shot without a vest, I can tell you that not all wounds are fatal. Had I been in a different state of mind at the time, I probably could have killed the guy even with a big hole.

It's important to remember that while movies are really entertaining, they don't always represent real life.

The irony of this statement is fucking delicious. Aside from your fateful and overused "bullet to the leg", everything you know and feel about how guns are used seems to be taken directly from the media. I'm not surprised, frankly, because most liberals and anti-gun nuts haven't ever seen a gun lawfully used or carried, nor knew someone responsible enough to lawfully carry or use.

I'd blame all the video games I play :thumbsup:

Headshot!