Thread: Interesting clip on gun/public safety

Originally Posted by 19Badger

I recently read an article about trends in firearm ownership and the author wrote that when he was younger the majority of people he knew owned lever action firearms and all his friends that bought firearms the first one they bought was a lever action. He put it down to the number of cowboy and western programs and movies that were common when he was growing up, making the lever action "normal"
He followed through to today and everyone wants a AR style firearm, after all that is the predominant firearm featured in films and programs that have been normal viewing since I was in my teens or maybe earlier.

When you look at society shooting people has been normal viewing fare for years, then you have computer games that allows people to act out what they view and it normalises shooting people even more.

Firearms have been around since they were invented, they haven't just become recent possessions, and the firearm, being an inanimate object, it isn't going to jump up and shoot people without the assistance of a human.
So the firearm isn't the cause, it is the change in society, but the firearm is easier to target than it is to try and remedy what has changed in society.

Remedying the societal change would affect the way everyone lives and impact a whole lot of people and industries in society..........this is not an easy fix, but to fix/remedy the problem you have to identify the cause and nobody wants to do that.

Agreed. Drink driving is a similar issue but 30 years further along ....In the 70s and 80s it was as illegal to drink and drive as it is now- but cosiety did not see it that way. The social concensus seemed to be you were unlcky if you got caught and that he police had it in for you if they did anything more than warn you- no harm no foul crime and the only person hurt was the drunk driver usually (supposedly) ina single vehicle 'accident'.....After much education, painful reminders and a shift in societites attitude towards booze, now it is very frowned upon by most parts of society and you are seen as an idiot if you choose to drive drunk... This did not come about because someone legistlated a ban of any sort- it came about as society figured out that booze is no nesacarily evil and driving is not either but combining the two is never a good idea. Guns themselves are not evil, mental illness is not evil, and idiocy is not evil, but combining two of the three can be very dangerous so as a society we have to figure out the best way to keep these things separate- you cannot ban idiocy, it just wont work that way, you cannot ban mental illness as it does not work that way either, and banning firearms sounds like a start but that wont work either.....only those who are willing to comply will obey the ban and if they ar ewilling to comply then they are NOT in the first two groups and they are not the problem so it will make no difference to anyone except impinge on their rights....

Edit- 30 years ago shoudl be 50 as it seems the 70s and 80s are further back than I would like to admit....It certainly feels like it was the 80s just a couple decades ago.......