[PLUG-TALK] Re: [PLUG] Mad SCO Disease

AthlonRob AthlonRob at axpr.net
Tue Jun 29 01:27:35 UTC 2004


On Mon, 2004-06-28 at 16:28 -0700, Jeme A Brelin wrote:
> On Mon, 28 Jun 2004, AthlonRob wrote:
> > On Mon, 2004-06-28 at 03:55 -0700, Jeme A Brelin wrote:
> > > Maybe just tha homocidal lunatics come in all different ideologies?
> >
> > The vast majority of gun owners... regardless of the OS they're running
> > (SCO, Windows, Linux, Slowarus, OS X, whatever), never shoot at a human
> > being.
> 
> Thank goodness!  If they did, we'd have many thousands more deaths every
> year.

I would estimate that number would probably be closer to millions... we
gun owners are everywhere.

> The concern, of course, wasn't with "most gun owners", but with folks who
> carry weapons on their person in public.  And while most may never
> _actually_ shoot at a human being, that is the intent of the weapon and
> the carrying.

I think it has been fairly successfully argued that a gun's intent may
not necessarily be to shoot at human beings.  Of the three guns I own,
two were certainly designed with killing varmants in mind, not shooting
at humans.  A .22 pistol is hardly an effective human-killing device (as
compared to virtually any other caliber).

The 'intent' of a gun, design-wise, is to expel a projectile with such
force as to do some damage to whatever it is aimed at.  Most of the
time, that damage is done to a target... the second most common thing
done damage to would have to be animals of one kind or another, and
humans probably the third.

Almost all of the people carrying weapons concealed on their person
carry the weapon in hopes they will never need to use it.  And, then, if
they're forced to use the weapon, it's far preferential the weapon works
as a deterrent rather than a killing device.  A great many people will
stop doing whatever bad thing it is they're doing when they see a weapon
pointed at their bodies.  If just seeing the gun pointed at them doesn't
stop them, the distinctive click pulling the slide back and releasing it
will convince them a lot of the time.

Worst case, you shoot the fucker.

> > Of those who do shoot at a human being, I'd have to guess most don't
> > kill the person they're shooting at.  Of those who do kill who they're
> > shooting at, not all would be considered 'homicidal' which is considered
> > analogous with murderous.
> 
> Homicide is killing another human being in my book -- the law of the land
> notwithstanding.  That hints at one of the major problems with capital
> punishment -- it is permanent while the law of the land is transient --
> and also one of the major problems with "vigilante justice" -- it
> eliminates any notion of due process.

Homicide is killing another person - but homicidal (you used the latter)
indicates breaking the law or being murderous.

The law of the land may seem transient to you, but there are a few
fairly permanent aspects of it; murder is against the law, rape is
against the law, kidnapping is against the law.  The only crime, today,
regularly punished with capital punishment is murder - a non-transient
aspect of the law.  The allowable sentence may change, but the crime
itself being a crime is constant.  The only problem I, personally, see
with capital punishment is that it is not used frequently enough.

"Vigilante justice" isn't horribly common - unless you refer to a woman
shooting a man attempting to rape her or mug her or kill her.  If you
consider that unacceptable vigilante justice, you may wish to re-think
your stance on the issue

> > I'd say calling gun owners homicidal lunatics is analogous to calling
> > gay men pedophiles.
> 
> Well, nobody called gun owners homocidal and I think the stronger analogy
> would be calling sexually interested people pedophiles (you'll find that
> most pedophiliacs are men lusting after young women, so "gay men" doesn't
> seem to apply -- unless, of course, you're hinting at the relative
> proportion of homocides committed by gun versus pedophilic acts committed
> by gay men, but I think that's unlikely because I don't think you consider
> the homocidal weapon of choice (the automobile) to be muderous and so what
> you'd call homicide is done by gun more often than anything else in this
> country).

I wasn't speaking specifically to exact ratios so much as public (mis-)
perceptions.  I was also going for a bit of a 'shock value' too.  :-)

Calling gun owners homicidal lunatics is as incorrect as calling gay men
pedophiles.  People assuming because you own a gun you're trying to kill
somebody is as incorrect as assuming because you are gay you're trying
to rape children.

-- 
Rob                                |  If not safe,
   Jabber: athlonrob at axpr.net   |    one can never be free.






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