Pro gun argument I never hear

[Vepr 54R]

What a lot of these anti's are defining as an "assault weapon" (centerfire, semi-auto with detachable mag) has been around for about 100 years. If you loosen your definition of "AW" then you could go back about 160+ years (Henry Repeating Rifles). Also starting in 1919 you could get a full auto Thompson at your local hardware store.


These mass homicide / suicide rampages have only become an epidemic in the last 18 years (Port Arthur and Dunblane) and even accelerated in the last 8 years.

Why doesn't anybody make this argument?

[Vin63]

Unfortunately, I don't think it matters to the gun grabbers. They obviously are unaware of logic, rational/meaningful discussion, or facts.

[Mitch]

People make this point all the time. This guy does, for example.

[NotEnufGarage]

In 1919, kids weren't told they are "special" everyday, Jesse, Al, and Louis weren't agitating one race against all others, and we put people with mental issues in rubber rooms.

[teetsjones]

Because at the heart of the matter gun control is not about public safety. It is about control of the populace in order to create a peaceful utopian society.
/me vomits

[Hoooper]

These mass homicide / suicide rampages have only become an epidemic in the last 18 years (Port Arthur and Dunblane) and even accelerated in the last 8 years.

thats actually terribly inaccurate, and not a talking point that should be used. I know that fighting the antis with statistics seems impossible as they will just make them up as they see fit, but agreeing with their falsified statistics is even worse

From FBI reports

[M. D. Van Norman]

They are not and never have been an epidemic.

[joe_gman]

Homicide/ suicide rampages have actually decreased in the last 18 years. The only thing that has increased has been the coverage of such incidents and the speed and scope that the coverage has been distributed.

Before electronic media, most news was posted on paper. An expensive and labor intensive process that limited its range to just a localized area. Word of mouth spread the news beyond the localized region at a very limited rate.

Radio allowed information to be spread to vastly larger audience, but this is still turn of the century technology with limited range. TV increased the range, but before media outlets like CNN and other cable news companies, media was still fairly localized.

With the advent of the World Wide Web, information can now spread across the globe at the speed of light. (Fiber optic). We now know when a bee farts in Africa, seconds after it occurs.

We are now more aware of mass shooting incidents that occur than we have ever known in the past.

[bernieb90]

They cherry pick shootings to show an upward trend. For example MSNBC only counts a shooting where over 12 people were killed as a mass shooting.

[Mitch]

They cherry pick shootings to show an upward trend. For example MSNBC only counts a shooting where over 12 people were killed as a mass shooting.

I wonder if they ever mention the worst school rampage in American history, which happened a long time ago and where firearms were only minimally involved.

[00Medic]

Over the last 20 years the media has made mass shooters "instant stars".

[Hoooper]

They cherry pick shootings to show an upward trend. For example MSNBC only counts a shooting where over 12 people were killed as a mass shooting.

lol. nevermind the fact that its a well defined statistic produced by the FBI. Nice work MSNBC, accurate as always

[AceGirlsHusband]

They cherry pick shootings to show an upward trend. For example MSNBC only counts a shooting where over 12 people were killed as a mass shooting.

Was that magic number picked by NBC to conform to the last "massacre" so they could count it in their summary?

[omgwtfbbq]

I think the reason why this argument fails is that the logical response to it is the world isn't the same place today as it was in 1919...And that's completely true.

I don't think saying back in 1919 you could have machine guns,why didn't they have mass killings then is valid argument myself, but it really doesn't matter. There are plenty of other valid and legitimate arguments for the increase in violence that have nothing to do with guns.

[Hoooper]

I don't think saying back in 1919 you could have machine guns,why didn't they have mass killings then is valid argument myself, but it really doesn't matter. There are plenty of other valid and legitimate arguments for the increase in violence that have nothing to do with guns.

it wouldnt be valid from a societal standpoint for one, but most importantly it would be just factually incorrect. If you look at mass shootings over time, the only thing that has really changed is the number of mass shootings per 100k population. That number has decreased significantly since the number of deaths (and shootings) has remained mostly constant (since 1976, no real stats before) even though the population has increased more than 40% since then