Communities around the U.S. have seen shootings carried out with weapons converted to fully automatic in recent years, fueled by a staggering increase in small pieces of metal or plastic made with a 3D printer or ordered online. Laws against machine guns date back to the bloody violence of Prohibition-era gangsters. But the proliferation of devices known by nicknames such as Glock switches, auto sears and chips has allowed people to transform legal semi-automatic weapons into even more dangerous guns, helping fuel gun violence, police and federal authorities said.
The (ATF) reported a 570% increase in the number of conversion devices collected by police departments between 2017 and 2021, the most recent data available.
The devices that can convert legal semi-automatic weapons can be made on a 3D printer in about 35 minutes or ordered from overseas online for less than $30. They’re also quick to install.
“It takes two or three seconds to put in some of these devices into a firearm to make that firearm into a machine gun instantly,” Dettelbach said.
Gun violence is a symptom of socioeconomic inequality and a lack of mental health care. We could ban all guns today and while I’m sure there would be a reduction in violent events, people wanting to cause harm would switch to bladed weapons (see knife crime in the UK and axe attacks in China).
If somebody is going to try and kill me, I’d prefer they at least break a sweat in doing so.
UK knife crime per capita is lower than that of US knife crime and US has gun crime on top of that.
There is no evidence that overall rates stay the same if gun violence gets reduced, but there is evidence that reductions in gun crime also reduce other types of violence. Meaning you’re talking the opposite of truth.
https://epirev.oxfordjournals.org/content/38/1/140.full.pdf+html
It’s just silly NRA propaganda without a shred of evidence for it. Just like all rhetoric against gun control.
And even if he were right, when was the last time you heard of someone in the UK stabbing a hundred people at a concert, or thirty kids in an elementary school?
There’s been at least one organized mass stabbing in China, I don’t think everyone died but over a hundred people were stabbed by a half dozen or so attackers.
Exactly.
A knife is nowhere near as dangerous as a semi-automatic weapon.
The main point is that he’s completely wrong, though.
Depends who you ask and comparisons like these are almost definitely flawed by how different countries do reporting.
e.g. this site says the UK has slightly more knife deaths than the US https://wisevoter.com/country-rankings/stabbing-deaths-by-country/#united-states-of-america
Then you’ve also got to consider differences in treatment. Are there more stabbings but less deaths because they’re treated better in the US? Conversely, maybe the problem is even worse in the UK but because of their health care system they’re treated better resulting in fewer deaths.
Then we also need to consider repeat offenders and rehabilitation. Is the knife crime higher in the UK but repeat offenders are lower because of treatment?
Anyways, point being, this is the exact kind of statement that requires pointing out correlation does not equate to causation. In fact, this could be further evidence that guns are not the problem.
As for your source… These are the primary conclusions of the authors (direct quote):
I didn’t read the whole thing but … If you’ve got a specific page, paragraph, etc on the whole correlation thing, I’d be willing to hear you out.
Which leads to hundreds/thousands of people not dying every year due to being shot.
Even if it’s only one life saved, that’s great. But can’t we want to fix the systemic problems that lead to gun violence as well? It also fixes a lot of other bad things that don’t lead to gun violence, like homelessness, depression, preventable deaths, inadequate health care, etc.
What I’m saying is that guns aren’t the problem. They make the problem worse. I’d like to see us try to fix both instead of a half measure of different gun laws.
We can do both.
A knife battle sounds kinda better. I’ll have a greater chance to survive and some bad-ass scars.
The loser of a knife fight dies in the parking lot, the winner dies in the ambulance.
Keep thinking that. Meanwhile most people here wouldn’t be able to fight off someone with a knife.
It takes size and muscle, shooting the attacker takes a single trigger pull.
You may not like to hear it, but guns aren’t going anywhere. Maybe if we stop making out gun owners to be some raging lunatics. Then they may be more likely to give them up.
This is all pointless anyway.