General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: "This Is What a Gun Control March on Washington Looks Like" [View all]BainsBane
(53,026 posts)Among the proposed changes is banning magazines over ten rounds, which will require murderers to stop to reload. It also proposes some bullets, like those that can pierce armor, be banned.
I hear a lot of excuses why you all don't want anything done. Your concerns may indeed be legitimate, but if you don't suggest alternatives the only conclusion we can reach is what I have proposed throughout this subthread--you all don't want any changes in the availability of guns.
I was talking with one member who initially convinced me that any meaningful legislation would need to ban all semi-automatics with detachable magazines. He had said he didn't support the existing law because the bans were purely cosmetic and therefore meaningless, but he would support one that banned all semiautomatics with detachable magazines. When I asked him why he thought Feinstein's legislation didn't do that, he said he didn't know but suspected sinister political motives. Then in a subsequent conversation with him I learned that virtually all pistols manufactured in recent decades are semi-automatics with detachable magazines. I said that answered his question about why Feinstein wouldn't propose such a ban: it would encompass too many guns to be a viable proposal. I asked him what he suggested as an alternate way to frame the legislation. He disappeared and didn't answer my question. My conclusion is that he may have been dissembling in an effort to spread false information to undermine the ban. I suspect he doesn't really want any ban at all.
I understand that not every gun proponent on this site is the same, but I do hear the same arguments from many of you.
The fact is something has to be done. If a compromise can't be reached, we are going to continue to have unacceptable levels of gun carnage in this country. If gun activists don't cooperate in reform, people are going to grow increasingly impatient as more and more children die. You may find subsequent proposals far more draconian.