While it wouldn't stop them entirely, saying it's irrelevant is completely wrong. There's enough data out there from countries not buried in gun violence to prove there would be a difference.

[–] tox_solid@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Sure, it might have made an impact in other countries, but there are over 300 million guns in the US. That's almost 1 gun per living human in the country. In the event of a firearms ban those guns don't just go away, they go underground. The black market for firearms in an America where guns are outlawed would be massive and easily accessible, so I think the mass shooting angle of this argument is actually pretty irrelevant.

[–] matti@sopuli.xyz 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What makes America different from other nations that didn't spring up a massive black market for guns

[–] b3nsn0w@pricefield.org 2 points 1 year ago

it's mainly the overwhelming presence of guns prior to the proposed ban on them, and the culture built around them.

besides, how many mass shootings happened on the balkans which are also flush with leftover guns from the yugoslav wars? how many happen in the czech republic where you can legally own and carry firearms similarly to the american system? i'm not even gonna compare it to switzerland because while they have tons of guns, they heavily regulate ammo. something is just deeply broken with the united states and simply banning guns wouldn't fix it.

the real question imo is what drives a person to essentially end their life by shooting up some place? because whether you end up shot to death on sight, paralyzed, or simply stuck behind bars, that's the end of the road. a society that pushes people to do something this drastic will not stop being problematic if you just take the drastic tool away from people. they'll just stop taking roughly one other innocent person with them when they snap (which is the average if you consider a mass shooting as anything that injures 4+ people, which is the criterion by which the often cited "one mass shooting per day" works), which is, yes, an improvement, but it only masks the underlying problem.

i know "it's a mental health issue" is a right wing dogwhistle but that's because the statement is stupid, because it falls for the standard conservative bullshit of positing there are no systemic issues, just bad people. this is absolutely systemic. if predestined "bad people" in this sense existed there is no reason they'd be born at a vastly higher frequency in the united states than elsewhere.

the answer is likely deeply rooted in economic inequality and the total lack of a social safety net. which is probably why anti-gun rhetoric is pushed by rich organizations, and is therefore allowed to permeate mainstream culture and isn't stuck on the sidelines like right to repair or privacy legislations. not because it is actually a good solution but because it is cheaper than addressing the root cause. which would be ensuring people always have something to lose, like they have in all the other countries where we see different effects.

[–] Stoneykins@lemmy.one 4 points 1 year ago

I hate this argument, that criminal people sonehow have the ability to do anything anywhere unhindered by everything, and so making laws will only cause more crimes. It is the same type of thinking when people say "masks don't work", 90% efficacy is WORTH HAVING.

It is asinine. Making laws and properly enforcing them would absolutely reduce mass shootings. Some people certainly could still purchase unregistered guns illegally, but it would be a small fraction of the people who would/will do it under our current laws.