Why are gun owners afraid to admit they own guns?

[Gameface]

Using the term good guy/bad guy attaches moral absolutes to issues that are almost always not so black and white. For instance, the police and the military use the terms extensively, when the reality is that the U.S. military often kills enemies who are very possibly perfectly wonderful people. But if they are the enemy, if they pose a threat or stand between our soldiers and their objective they must be destroyed. Being a good guy or a bad guy is completely irrelevant.

Or consider a situation where there is an active shooter. Okay, call the shooter a bad guy. I don't get why people feel the need to do that, but fine. Do it. Let's say a career criminal with multiple homicides out of prison for three days is close to the scene because he's picking up a shipment of meth to sell to elementary school kids. Of course he's also got a gun. The "bad guy" rounds the corner and points his gun at the criminal, the criminal draws, fires and kills the active shooter before he can hurt anyone else. According to the good guy/bad guy rules I guess in this instance he was a good guy with a gun that stopped a bad guy with a gun.

When in reality it was just one person using justified deadly force in their own defense against an active shooter. I feel more comfortable calling the active shooter an active shooter. The term "bad guy" is not part of how I process that situation.

When in the military I was more comfortable calling targets "targets" but most everyone else wanted to refer to a target as a "bad guy" and it annoyed me. Especially because, for what I did, they were calling enemy missiles and aircraft "bad guys."

That's all. That's why I think it's dumb to use that term.

 

[BTP]

Using the term good guy/bad guy attaches moral absolutes to issues that are almost always not so black and white. For instance, the police and the military use the terms extensively, when the reality is that the U.S. military often kills enemies who are very possibly perfectly wonderful people. But if they are the enemy, if they pose a threat or stand between our soldiers and their objective they must be destroyed. Being a good guy or a bad guy is completely irrelevant.

Or consider a situation where there is an active shooter. Okay, call the shooter a bad guy. I don't get why people feel the need to do that, but fine. Do it. Let's say a career criminal with multiple homicides out of prison for three days is close to the scene because he's picking up a shipment of meth to sell to elementary school kids. Of course he's also got a gun. The "bad guy" rounds the corner and points his gun at the criminal, the criminal draws, fires and kills the active shooter before he can hurt anyone else. According to the good guy/bad guy rules I guess in this instance he was a good guy with a gun that stopped a bad guy with a gun.

When in reality it was just one person using justified deadly force in their own defense against an active shooter. I feel more comfortable calling the active shooter an active shooter. The term "bad guy" is not part of how I process that situation.

When in the military I was more comfortable calling targets "targets" but most everyone else wanted to refer to a target as a "bad guy" and it annoyed me. Especially because, for what I did, they were calling enemy missiles and aircraft "bad guys."

That's all. That's why I think it's dumb to use that term.

Well I tend to agree.
I think black and white moral is just very popular because of education and human nature.
Polarizing allows you to be lazy in your thinking. For some ppl it comes down to an unwillingness to discuss something they're biased about and risking the possibility of being wrong and/or angered about other views, while others may just lack the practice and/or education to dissect a matter into specifics.
I guess there are more reasons or motives that won't enter my brain during breakfast. My experience is that many will fall in the grey area between those two I mentioned.

 

[babe]

I think it's cute that you have such a simplistic cartoon image of your imaginary enemies. You could certainly argue that their policies and philosophical outlook will lead to the horrors you mention, but you really think "globalists" seek to destroy this world? Like just if they really admitted what they wanted it would be humanity enslaved?

So like if there was another path to the enslavement of humanity they would abandon their current ideology and switch to something completely different, just so long as it lead to their goal of a world police state of enslaved people?

I mean you don't sound like you're kidding, but what you're saying is a joke.

I think it's cute you believe you have the capacity to evaluate, intellectually, "cartoon images".

perhaps when you paint the world in your mind, everything is stick-figure drawings.

Seriously, of course the self-image carried by sociopaths who like to get on the world stage and speak expansively on the problems of mankind and their solutions for everyone, is no "stick figure" or simplistic cartoon. The problem is, therefore, how can we describe succinctly the net effects of their proposals, if pursued purposefully and consistently. In real life, humans have no long-term track record for being either consistent with their purposes or principles, or honest about their actual public characterizations of their real intents.

Here is how they talk publicly:

https://www.un.org/en/development/d...pulationfacts/docs/MigrationPopFacts20155.pdf

When they meet privately, it probably doesn't come off quite the same:

https://blogs.wsj.com/wealth/2009/05/26/billionaires-try-to-shrink-worlds-population-report-says/

It might be a "cartoon image" of reality that the elites of this planet want it cleared and preserved as a sort of "Royal Hunting Preserve", but that also might be what the elites really care about.

 

[LogGrad98]

Freaked out? I used the term "bad guy" in my own post and I mention that I think it's a stupid term to use.

Also, I said that you will be able to get over -->my<-- feelings on the subject.

We good? Did I piss you off somehow? Are you super attached to using the term "bad guy" and took my comment personally? I'm not getting what's going on here.

I'm not getting what is going on either. I made a comment tongue-in-cheek and you went super-serious with feelings and stuff. I said "bad guy" in a comment mocking a fake situation, you went all philosophical about the esoteric meaning of "bad guy" and the societal and intellectual impact of the term. Not sure how you got something so heavy from a comment so light. I couldn't care less about the term to be honest, use whatever you want. By telling someone they will "get over" something you imply that the person is over-reacting and it is border-line condescending and patronizing. Why go down that road at all? Did I offend you by using the term "bad guy" in a flippant manner? Do you need a hug?

 

[Gameface]

I'm not getting what is going on either. I made a comment tongue-in-cheek and you went super-serious with feelings and stuff. I said "bad guy" in a comment mocking a fake situation, you went all philosophical about the esoteric meaning of "bad guy" and the societal and intellectual impact of the term. Not sure how you got something so heavy from a comment so light. I couldn't care less about the term to be honest, use whatever you want. By telling someone they will "get over" something you imply that the person is over-reacting and it is border-line condescending and patronizing. Why go down that road at all? Did I offend you by using the term "bad guy" in a flippant manner? Do you need a hug?

Read your first response to me. You're talking about me being condescending? Maybe I missed the humor in your comment and in re-reading it I'm still not seeing it as a comment meant to be a fun joke between you and I. Then, when I responded to your comment, and yeah I was a little annoyed with your first response, I wasn't being super nice. I'd even go so far as to say maybe I was rude. But then you post something that to me doesn't even make sense based on our conversation. I don't think I was ever freaking out.

I apologize for being rude and escalating things rather than taking the high road. My bad.

 

[moevillini]

new study shows that states with stricter gun laws had fewer deaths and injuries to children

...The new results bolster the argument that gun restrictions may help avert some of the 4,250 deaths that occur each year among Americans under age 21, already the second leading cause of death in children after traffic accidents. States with stricter gun control laws had 4% fewer pediatric deaths, and those with universal background checks for firearm purchases in place for at least five years had a 35% lower risk, the study found....

...Each state in the nation is allowed to implement its own regulations around buying and carrying guns. The Brady Campaign reviews them every year, gathering an expert panel to assess each state based on 33 gun policies and rate them on a 100 point scale. The higher the score, the stricter the firearm legislation.

In the new study, every 10 point increase in a state’s gun law score correlated with an 8% drop in firearm-related deaths. The protective effects remained even after the researchers took into account other variables, like gun ownership, education levels, race and income levels, registering a 4% drop in firearm-related deaths.

“These data suggest that strict firearm legislation may be protective of children even in areas of high gun ownership,” the researchers wrote....

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...merican-kids-die-study-shows?srnd=politics-vp

 

[RandyForRubio]

I'm not getting what is going on either. I made a comment tongue-in-cheek and you went super-serious with feelings and stuff. I said "bad guy" in a comment mocking a fake situation, you went all philosophical about the esoteric meaning of "bad guy" and the societal and intellectual impact of the term. Not sure how you got something so heavy from a comment so light. I couldn't care less about the term to be honest, use whatever you want. By telling someone they will "get over" something you imply that the person is over-reacting and it is border-line condescending and patronizing. Why go down that road at all? Did I offend you by using the term "bad guy" in a flippant manner? Do you need a hug?

I need a hug.

 

[Gameface]

Interesting that children are at lower risk of gun violence in states with stricter gun laws and it doesn't matter if those states have higher than average gun ownership rates.

So the number of guns isn't the more significant factor. The more significant factor is how seriously firearm responsibility is taken according to the law.

That's a big part of what I've been saying all along. The biggest reason I don't really support current pro-gun movements is because they don't seem to be interested in holding people accountable for irresponsible gun use. They aren't first and foremost advocating for gun safety, responsible ownership and a disciplined approach to gun use. Instead they simply seem to advocate for all guns all the time, to the exclusion of any other consideration.

 

[outerspacefan]

<...>
Why would a Dr need to know? BECAUSE IT IS A GUN. It's dangerous.
<...>

A hammer is dangerous too. I can use it to build something useful, or I can smash somebody's head.
Should someone ask me if I 've got a hammer?
Logic/arguments based on "dangerous things" can be really... dangerous.
That's the way I see it, just MHO of course.

 

[str8line]

A hammer is dangerous too. I can use it to build something useful, or I can smash somebody's head.
Should someone ask me if I 've got a hammer?
Logic/arguments based on "dangerous things" can be really... dangerous.
That's the way I see it, just MHO of course.

What can you build with a gun? Asking as a gun owner.

 

[Miggs]

What can you build with a gun? Asking as a gun owner.

A pile of dead bodies.

 

[outerspacefan]

What can you build with a gun? Asking as a gun owner.

Oh, in a broad sense I can build safety, for instance as a "last resource protection" for my family as I live in a kind of isolated place.
But your question seems more related to the narrative of my argument than to the argument itself.
The focus of the argument is the "dangerousness" of the things in itself.
It is enough of a condition that something is "dangerous" to allow or force quiestions into your private life?
Anyway, it was just a little, humble take...