Rental companies carry their own insurance policy to cover these liabilities. Let's be realistic.

And like free speech, bearing arms is a right. If you do anything to affect that right, you are endangering other rights. And btw, there was a big debate on what right should be listed first, free speech, or bearing arms. Many said bearing arms should be first because it protects all other rights. In the end, it was stated that order didnt matter, all rights were of equal importance.

The constitution is not carved in stone for a reason. Things change...

"Altering the Constitution consists of proposing an amendment or amendments and subsequent ratification. Amendments may be proposed either by the Congress with a two-thirds vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate or by a convention of states called for by two-thirds of the state legislatures."

Defective? You mean 'dangerous', right?

Your example is exactly what I was referring to. That was careless. Ever think about the people who were said to be 'cleaning their gun' when they died from a gunshot? That explanation was to deny the reason for their death- it was suicide, not an accident. It's impossible to fully clean a loaded weapon but if they looked down the barrel to find out if it was loaded, that's their fault.

Not sure how a firearm today is any less safe than a firearm from 200 years ago, I would actually argue the opposite.

BTW, despite what the media is telling you you are safer today and half as likely to be shot today as you were 20 years ago and that likely hood has been on a steady decline for decades despite the record number of firearms being sold today.

That info can easily be found on the FBI website listed under their Unified Crime Report that they put out annually. They also have plenty of historical graphs that show crime trends, one of which depicts murders committed by any type as well as murders committed by firearm and other graphs that show trends in violent crime as well.

Here is one of the report options you can bring up:
[Link: ucrdatatool.gov]

^^ apparently you can't hotlink to the generated graph, just click on "united states Total" in the left box and then "number of violent Crimes" in the right box and then click "get table"

As you can see the murder rate (all forms of murder) peaked in 1991 at 24703 murders of all type with a population of 252 million people. When you convert this to murders per 100,000 people which is the most common way that crime statistics are reported you get 9.8 murders per 100,000 people. As of 2014 (the latest this particular report would let me choose though I have seen reports up to 2016) there were a total of 14249 murders of all type with a population (having increased in that time period) edging close to 319 million people. The murder rate you get with these numbers is 4.4 per 100,000 people. If you look at 1960 and see that there were only 9110 murders that looks great on paper but when you figure per 100,000 people it comes to 5.08, still higher than the murder rate today.

So in a span of 23 years the murder rate decreased by 10454, almost half of what it was at it's peak while at the same time the population increased by almost 67 million people so the actual murder rate when compared to a ratio of murders per 100,000 people has actually been drastically reduced even further than the "perceived" rate of simply looking at the total number having been halved.

Now, if you want to delve deeper in to the FBI stats in the unified crime report you can see that more than half of the murders committed each year are in relation to gang activity and while being involved in another crime at that time. You can take that as if you are not involved in these activities the chances of you being gunned down might be less than winning the lottery.

As for schools, another touchy subject and rightly so, if you follow the numbers of children killed in schools on a yearly basis due to violence those rates are less now than they have ever been as well and generally follow the national trend when looked at a rate of per 100,000 students. School was actually more dangerous years ago than it is today. NPR even had a professor that specializes on mass shootings and crime on one of their shows that relayed these numbers and stated that schools and students are safer today than they were 20-30 years and more in the past.

NPR piece:
[Link: npr.org]

I don't know where other people on this board live but I pretty much walk around each day without a single thought in my head that I might be in any danger of being shot at any moment..



Abridged Table results from above pasted below:

Year Population Murders
1960 179,323,175 9,110
1991 252,153,092 24,703
2014 318,857,056 14,249

If someone in a self-defense situation has to jump through a lot of hoops in order to fire their weapon, that's the last we'll hear from them. If they have a "smart gun" that uses some kind of biometrics, expect that system to fail when they need it to work.

The problem isn't guns, it's behavior. Bad behavior, allowed to continue and not be penalized for it. People are killing just a few hours after being released from prison and it happens a lot. That has nothing to do with the design of a gun, it's the defective mind of the shooter.

But some people think that dealing with bad behavior makes the person carrying out the act(s) feel bad.

While it wasn't a violent act, the right to privacy of the shitbag who used my credit card number took precedence over my rights as the victim when an inline purchase was made on ATT's website, then the product was picked up at the store close to my house. I couldn't view the video in an attempt to identify the turd and if the PD wanted it, they had to get a subpoena.

Didn't want to prosecute the little dear, apparently. They did, however, lose me as a customer.

No, I mean defective. If it were anything other than a gun, which is currently protected by an antiquated constitutional amendment and corporate lobbying, there would be a pile of lawsuits and it would have have been deemed defective by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. https://www.cpsc.gov/

One day people in this country will come to their senses like the rest of the world. Unfortunately, many more people will have to suffer until that happens.

I'm not afraid of direct attack and that may be due to the fact that I'm a bit on the larger side, but it would be more likely that I could be hit by a stray bullet. One entered the bedroom window next door and landed on the bed when the woman was asleep next door- they moved out so fast they had a vapor trail coming out of their asses. I went to an auto parts store two weeks ago that's in a bad part of MKE- so bad, in fact, that the Black biker gang that had its headquarters across the street moved out. We don't have much Black on White or White on Black crime here, other than property crimes.

If possible, can you post a direct link to the info, rather than just to the site?

How is a gun defective if it fires a bullet only when the trigger is squeezed? That's what it's supposed to do! If it fires when made safe or for no reason, THAT'S defective. Also, when a government-run consumer protection agency says a gun is defective, it either is, or they're promoting an agenda.

When will you realize that it's past time to address peoples' behavior?

Not possible, due to the 2nd amendment and the NRA. That is why there are no lawsuits and safety challenges at this time to the injuries and deaths caused by guns.


I am arguing that if any product, that does not have the legal protections guns currently have, caused the damage that guns cause, it would be deemed defective based on normal public safety considerations.

How does our likelihood of being shot compare to countries that do not sell guns willy nilly?

The real solution is between wild west free for all and total confiscation. We cant outlaw guns. We cant tell guns to stay away from criminals. We cant put guns in prison. Guns by themselves are not responsible for anything. I just think it should be harder to buy one. In Illinois...a blue liberal state...you can get a FOID card without ever speaking to anyone in person. As long as you can pass a background check...most young people can...and come up with the $20 or whatever the processing fee is...you get mailed a card that lets you buy any/as many guns you want.

IF everyone were stand up law abiding adults this would be fine...but have you seen black friday videos? You know that all those people can and do own guns? Does that seem logical to you?


There are already gun laws in place that affect the 2nd amendment. Altering them, updating them isn't like eliminating the bill of rights.

And why not license journalists? They do way more harm than any firearm has ever done.

This is an incorrect comparison because you are not taking cultural factors into account.

Oh yeah, bullets are part of our proud culture...pardon me...

I’ve seen the Black Friday videos. And while a good majority of those people do own guns, Black Friday shootings are relatively low. Personally, I think many people shouldn’t be allowed to vote. But we don’t pick and chose who has rights. But the fact is, without an amendment, rights can’t be restricted. As for journalists, I’m sure trump would love to have them licensed.