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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   28302 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 23, 2023

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And that’s the rub- a large majority of gun owners support licenses, registration, etc etc. The government just isn’t trusted to do it and well no one else even can.

a large majority of gun owners support licenses, registration, etc etc.

if we're talking about the US then no they don't; you see wild variance depending on question, poll, and polling firm with a wide variance in quality of polling

and even then, I would like to see what you're using to make this claim where "a large majority of gun owners" support "licenses, registration, etc etc" either as a group or each one of those individually

but even if it were true, "gun owners" aren't the ones stopping gun-rights violations; it's embedded gun-rights activists who form a substantial portion of any center-right political organization and who have a demonstrated ability to punish politicians who defect so they typically don't

the majority of states now have constitutional carry and it first passed in states where your typical gun owners do trust their state level executive bodies

This is why my pie in the sky fantasy has always been vesting local gun clubs, democratically operated by local gun owners as a QUANGO to perform all licensing. Require that all gun owners attend classes and meetings with the club. They will notice the weirdos, and will be incentivized to disarm them because they are in the community.

I think this would be reasonable, except that I still don't think gun rights activists would go for. Pretty much the only limitation on "shall not be infringed" that is widely recognized is that they don't think prisons have a right to carry guns while serving their sentence.

A large majority of gun owners support a compromise wherein restrictions on the kinds of guns a person can own are greatly loosened in exchange for making it harder to buy guns. This isn't on offer, and most gun owners know that "compromise" here means "we get nothing", but I'd wager that the typical gun rights activist leans towards the views of a typical gun owner.

Even me, not personally knowing any blue tribers, don't know anyone who would oppose licenses assuming the license granting authority was seen as not-hostile to gun rights and appropriate compromises on the kinds of guns you can buy with them were granted. There's legitimately more opposition to laws against concealed carry in bars or to safe storage requirements.

A large majority of gun owners support a compromise wherein restrictions on the kinds of guns a person can own are greatly loosened in exchange for making it harder to buy guns.

No, we don't. I want no restrictions on the kinds of guns and no restrictions on who can own them. Licensure of fundamental freedom is simply wrong.

being against licensure or registration is in the basic talking points of every major gunrights organization; a recent example is constitutional carry which has now been passed in the majority of states with the first ones passing in places where few see the state level bodies as "hostile to gun rights"

your claims about "a large majority of gun owners" let alone "gun rights activists" is not remotely my experience

don't know anyone who would oppose licenses assuming the license granting authority was seen as not-hostile to gun rights

having been involved in gunrights orgs across a number of states getting important wins with concealed carry and then constitutional carry as well as being involved in gunrights lawsuits, I haven't a clue how this could be a true statement without torturing the condition "was seen as not-hostile to gun rights" to the point where it couldn't exist in the real world

If you think that's reasonable, you've never had to deal with local club politics. Small group politics is terrible.

The fact that this is the most reasonable solution more or less guarantees it will not happen.

Well, that, and equity audits preventing them from doing their jobs anyways.

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