Is these "laws" something we should worry about?

[Davo]

Actions should be illegal, not objects.

Best. Post. Ever.

[curious aardvark]

that's right: so trying to establish who will perform the illegal actions and stopping them getting the objects that will help them - is a good idea :-)

It's called positive discrimination and it should be used a lot more.

In the uk we're so bloody liberally backwards we refuse to use positive discrimination.
Which leads to the situation we had last week at dover.

Instead of just checking swarthy looking nervous folk boarding the ferry from france to the uk - which is logical and positive discrimination.
They instead stopped and checked every single vehicle going from the uk to france.
Leading to 18 hour delays for people going on holiday.
That's 18 hours stuck in the middle of a bloody motorway with no facilities.

Given that getting hold of firearms and explosives on the continent is an absolute doddle now there are no border checks or controls and given that getting hold of same in the uk is extremely bloody difficult.
And also given that cars full of mixed age british families and all their luggage are around 99.999999999% less likely to be terrorists than a car with a single or couple of asian blokes in who look a bit nervous.

The situation was just ludicrous.
What is the point of criminal/terrorist profiling if the information recieved from the profiling is just going to be totally ignored in the face of bureacratic and officious political correctness.

It's the same nonsense that means everyone boarding a plane has to be checked down to the composition of their fillings, instead of just the ones more likely to cause problems.

The annoying thing (what just the one ?) is that the millions of pounds has been spent on profiling and intelligence on who is likely to do what - is just ignored in the desire to show the world we're not racists, religionists and biased.
When By rights using the available profiles and intelligence does not mean you're being racist, just sensible.

And that's thursday's rant :-)

[Ama-fessional Molder]

that's right: so trying to establish who will perform the illegal actions and stopping them getting the objects that will help them - is a good idea :-)

It's called positive discrimination and it should be used a lot more.

That's why felons aren't allowed to buy and own guns, or people with diagnosed mental health problems, or histories of violence. How exactly do you intend to stop someone who has no negative history? And even if you do, how do you intend to prevent them from getting a firearm illegally?

You can stop them from buying them from legal sellers, but you wont stop them from getting illegal guns.

I understand the whole "well just get rid of all the guns and problem solved" but then you are punishing everyone who's never done anything wrong, and that will probably never happen in this country.

And it's been proven time and time again that you don't need guns to kill a BUNCH of people. In china, at least twice now, there have been mass stabbings that make 95% of our "mass shootings" look like accidental discharges. And by the way, what they (the reddit users who started this tracker that the media is using) call a mass "killings" these days in the US is 4 or more *injuries*during an attack, regardless of what weapon was used, including the attacker. You don't even need to get shot. You could trip over a curb running away and break your neck and you will be counted towards that number. That's why it "looks" like we have almost 400 mass shootings a year but in reality most of those are gang violence, and a fair amount of them are self defense cases - a couple armed people break into a house, shoot the homeowner, homeowner shoots back, the kid falls down the stairs, and somehow that counts as a "mass killing" even though everyone survived. There doesn't even have to be a gun involved, and in one case a bunch of kids were messing around shooting each other with pellet guns (still super dangerous) and their tracker counted that incident.

Now, the former LEGAL definition of that is 4 or more deaths NOT including the perpetrator.

So now they are applying any assault that injures 4 or more people to these statistics of "mass shootings", because they are tracking these attacks as "mass killings", and defining them as "mass injuries", and the media just rolls with the old word for it because sensationalism.

[curious aardvark]

you do know that buying guns at gun fairs - gets round all the checks ?
All you need is a driving licence.

Might not be all states.

[Davo]

Aardvark, please go to a fair and try to buy a gun with no background check, and tell me how that works out.

[Ama-fessional Molder]

As I have said, most of those people are not stupid enough to not do a basic check, and a great deal of them are dealers who would lose their licenses.

And by the way, it's still illegal to sell a gun to a felon, no matter where it came from. You can't really make it MORE illegal.

[Wes@MachWax]

you do know that buying guns at gun fairs - gets round all the checks ?
All you need is a driving licence.

Might not be all states.

This is true for all private sales. Not just at gun shows. Regular citizens are allowed to sell a firearm as long as they have no knowledge or reasonable suspicion that the potential buyer is not allowed to legally purchase a firearm.

In gun shows, the majority of people who are selling are licensed firearm dealers. The procedure for them to sell at a gun show is no different than they way they sell in their store front. This includes a background check. Which is more than a questionnaire, as previously mentioned. They are legally obligated to ask for ID, fill out the proper paperwork, and call a national database for approval before the transaction can be completed.

While some state laws may require more steps, this is in the minimum that applies to all 50 states here.

[Ama-fessional Molder]

Every private sale I have ever witnessed or in some way been involved in, we did a quick circuit court lookup to see if anyone had a criminal history. It's public information.

Most of us don't want our hands, names, or fingerprints anywhere near a gun that might be used for a crime, so we don't sell to shady ass people, and I've never met a gun store sales person or owner who wont straight up deny someone just for saying the wrong thing or even looking suspicious.

[djprinter]

I didn't realize that the background check was just lying on a piece of paper and didn't have anything to do with actually calling a specific organization and checking criminal history, which is a thing that happens. It takes about 20 minutes to go through the whole process over the phone as a gun dealer.

And most people selling a used gun will do a basic online check to verify that someone is not a felon. Not to say that you can't just sell a gun to anyone, but it's a 5 year minimum sentence if you get caught so people tend to cover their asses.

You see, we don't believe in restricting anyone's rights BEFORE they commit a crime, so if the background check is clear, then why should they be stopped from buying something?

But I am sure you know all of this from firsthand experience and not just what you've read online.

EDIT: For minimum sentence accuracy.

Actual background checks are done by computer and fact checked. You'd need a false ID to get past one.

Private sellers don't have to do any background check at all--which is referred to as the "gun show loophole" since gunshows are full of private sellers.

[Graham]

Buying a gun at a gun fair
Given the form you used to have to fill out when entering the states - that's not as daft as it sounds.
There was ALWAYS a question asking if you were a terrorist.

First the questions ask in various, multiple forms whether or not you have associated with terrorist (et al.) organizations, giving a normal person reason to wonder what kind of idiot terrorist would say yes.

BUT remember that in the US, the constitution technically protects your right to associate with whomever you choose. By asking this question, and the applicant lying about the answer, the perjury laws now provide grounds for action. When the application is signed, you are acknowledging these perjury restrictions and they can be very severe.
Graham