If you want to increase the liability risk to gun owners, then I want something in return:
I want strict liability to attach to the operators of establishments in "gun free zones". You want to remove my ability to defend myself using the best tool for the task, fine, then the risk is 100% on you, with no argument permitted for "superseding criminal acts". Schools, hospitals, libraries, cities, businesses, whatever. If I'm walking in a park that's a gun-free zone and a dog bites my ass, the city pays. The estranged hub/bf of a woman comes in and kicks her ass, then the premises owner pays.
"But for the fact that gun possession was prohibited, plaintiff suffered injury" and the defendant pays. Any waiver of liability would be void for public policy reasons.
For public transit systems that ban weapons, the liability attached the moment a plaintiff leaves their home to the moment they return. Even if they go downtown and then work or shop, the transit system is liable for every frakking minute.
If We’re Standing Still, It’s Not For Nothing
2 hours ago
12 comments:
Sorry Comrade.
Take your shoes off at the airport.
I say again, sorry, but there's got to b a limiti.
I'm trained ( and proficient - I "carried" for 21 years; and you are, I expect), trained and proficient but there have to be limits.
The fact that an establishment does not allow a firearm, is not license to consider it a free-fire zone. I had enough problems with this 35 years ago in Europe.
I'd love the party of "personal responsibility" to legislate some "personal responsibility" into existence, sort of what Jim Wright put out there - the NRA rules as laws, enacted nationwide and enforced. I've been around weapons and weapon systems long enough to know that it is when rules are broken 'stuff happens'.
Yes, there is a mental health component to many of these incidents, but ever since the 80's when funding for mental health was cut at the federal level and moved to the state level in block grants, our piss poor mental health system got hind teat when state budgets were squeezed, and pushed dealing with the issue further to the community level. There have been strides made in caring for mental illness, but until a more even application and availability of help is in place, there will be people who go with out help. The stigma of mental illness is still strong in this country, and the barricades thrown up against such a national program (when we have much more worthy things to spend the money on, like the F-35, or bomb, bomb, bomb Iran...) would go up so fast that it wouldn't be funny.
Conversely then, any violation of those prohibited areas must have an absolute, and significant, penalty. Carriage of a gun or other prohibited weapon in a restricted area by a non-security/police officer, 10 years in jail. No excuses, no negotiation. little excessive, eh? I think your "suggestion" could have some merit as a basis for,negotiation when paired with that.
Actually there is no cause for additional regulation/sanctions on bad conduct on Gun Free Zones. IF anything all the existing rules apply.
Save for one the "enforcers" if they fail are not responsible.
Right now you can be arrested for a whole slew of crimes, brandishing, criminal trespass, assault, and the list goes on. Convicted at felony level and you loose the right to own and carry.
However if you one of the people there and get beat, stabbed, or shot
your defenseless by fiat, so the responsibility falls up to those creating that so called "zone". Which is only gun free, knives, fists, fire and other weapon ware still in the game.
I don't know about all you... I'm responsible for me and those close to me. I can not depend on others to keep me safe nor can they. There are not enough of them.
So Gun Free Zones are fantasy of safer when really they are not.
They are condition white zones, after all being aware of hazards
is not needed there is a GFZ.
I for one will not waltz into one unless pressed as in airlines.
But fair is fair, I get hurt and someone pays... why because my health insurance says no pay if act of crime or dog or all those other exceptions.
If I have to be responsible I demand it of others or those that claim
sovereignty over me. If they do less makes my a slave and expendable.
I do feel strongly over the stupidity of so called gun free zones.
I for one do not trade treasure for your feeling or safety and the reality of mine.
Eck!
Well, we've at least at a point where we can negotiate, Comrade Misfit. How 'bout this counter-proposal, then:
No law shall be made against possessing a firearm in a gun-fee zone such as a school, or a crowded subway train. But any well-meaning gun-toter who discharges a firearm, whether for "self-defense" against a perceived threat, or to apprehend a felon, whose bullets whether by accident or deliberately strike and wound or kill an innocent bystander, shall be hung upside down by the feet, stripped naked, and skinned alive. Preferably on television.
Yours very crankily,
The New York Crank
Eck!, gun free zones were created to allow action to be taken against those possessing guns in the area (students and such, most oftem) who didn't fall conviently into another violation. As more laws have been passed, the need for this designation is reduced, but since the new laws also prohibit carriage, there was no move to adjust the GFZs and signs.
I certainly concur with responsibility, for both sides. The problem right now is irresponsible owners make hay for controllers, besides resulting in inconvient bodies of children and such.
I'm just waiting for an idiot to propose remote control turrets in schools...yea, nothing will go wrong with that!
CP,
When I went to school people carried .22s in cases around the halls. No one
really cared save maybe to yell something like beat the pants off xyz school.
We had a rifle team, basketball and football too.
Now with GFZ, don't point with your thumb up. Everyone might likely hit the floor screaming "gun sign".
They didn't need the law. The problem with the law is you you can convict the
criminal harder... if he wasn't there for fame and suicide by cop. So in the end the good guy taking due care is made to leave it home and the bad guy shoots a hole in the sign. The law is meaningless because it makes people feel good, even if it accomplished little to nothing.
What we don't control is that very small fraction that law is meaningless,
and be it mental illness or just criminal action they are indifferent to the law.
The law despite all "good intents" is punitive to those that do respect
even stupid laws. Hence stupid laws have a cost and that cost must be as hung on the creators or it is pointless. After all I don't have secret service working for me.
For the rave elsewhere about the good guy using the tool and hitting others. Welcome to NYC where being in the crowd is seriously dangerous. They have a significant rep for that something like 1 in 5 chance if the NYC cop shoots a bystander will go down. That's on a per bullet basis! In the end its "your"
[the writer] projection that other people are as dangerous as you or clumsy
or worse. Once you try to put emotion into law your working hard to undermine
its meaning. That and it doesn't make the cop in NYC that shot a bystander any
more responsible after all he has privilege and has the sanction.
Turrets, why not, schools go on lock down. Like most prisons shcools now have zero tolerance. Are the turrets to keep the little truants in or the bad out after they've been punted for chewing a poptart into an L, was it an r, yikes "gun sign"?
Maybe the next law will declare argument free zone. After all the 1A don't give you the right argue with someone. After all free speech should have limits.
In the end yes. we have to deal with problems in the world. Some like mental health
are not going away as it has both stigma and begrudging support.
One last thing. A gun may have been used but like a shovel it did not dig the hole
with out a person with intent. Maybe instead of focusing on the gun, knife, bat, or
other device we need to focus on the the perpetrator. Maybe you can get him to the negotiation table assuming he doesn't bludgeon someone with it.
Eck!
Eck!, so we both understand things have chanced since we went to school with gun racks, and weapons on them, in the parking lot. Things have changed, we see argument after argument that X person needs a gun to feel safe because of Y, something that wasn't true decades ago. Things have changed. Everything changes, the Second Amendment is no different...as weapons became progressIvey move capable, some small restrictions were introduced to mitigate the risk (e.g. fully automatic weapons require additional licensing). Today's society is measurably more violent, and has tragic concequences because of easy availability of weapons, especially guns. Do you feel comfortable with the direction of society, within the US?
I don't, and the issue with guns is huge. I wish we could make the majority of guns disappear...but I also do not wish to stop people from enjoying hunting, target shooting, etc. I wish we could rely upon police...but I'm not too sanguine on that front either. What I wish is that some rational move could take place so we don't have kids killing kids, accidental shootings, mass shootings and such...but both sides are too entrenched for a rational discussion.
CP,
Fully auto have been restricted since the 30s. Some banned since but, they are not a factor. Look at the stats, long guns are rare and full auto are eve rarer when it come to use in crimes.
More capable? Seriously, the AR15 packs far less punch than a M1 Garand or 1906 Springfield. A hand gun has gotten only slightly more power out of a short barrel and practical weights before recoil is the overriding factor.
The whole problem of "kids" killing "kids" is drugs and gangs. I use the term "kids" as in some studies it includes adults to age 24 and the gang bangers are typically over 15. All of them are criminals even if they are minors. Now remove known criminals and adults.
Yes, we do need a conversation on violence, not guns. The difference is the knife fights, beatings, and unarmed muggings that are the bulk of crime. The use of guns by criminals is about violence first and foremost.
Am I comfortable with that, no. You have to be kidding to ask. But self defense
is apparently not an option you feel comfortable with.
As to making guns, the majority even, disappear is a wish, a feeling. I will
always hold, anything you take from me better be paid retail and with option of replacement. Example, take my car, provide alternate transportation. Now if you could disarm criminals that would be significant but far from likely to happen
as we don't who they are, or what they have, or where. But john Q public that has to register and has a FID is an easy mark. The problem with the last is more than a few will get up and it will not be an argument, they see it as property rights and they are property.
One of the things about Concord and Lexington was that the Cannon, Guns and powder the British came for were privately owned cannon and hunting arms. Best I can find
there was never discussion of buy back or exchange. The British were sent to take
or destroy and get capitulation.
Things have changed. However The Constitution says I can have guns. The state I'm in has a constitution that says the exact same words. To be a legal gun owner here
will cost maybe 350$ and a local police chief giving the approval for licenses and required training and the list of guns are restricted and registered. There is also recent cases of guns being collected by the police without due course or recourse as well. Yet in Boston, the gun that is seen or goes off will likely be in the hand of a criminal using it criminally again.
We have enough laws. Yet we have an abundance of criminals on the street.
Eck!
Eck!, I'm trained,,have a CHL, and own a .45. Self-defense, check.
Violence, yep, big issue.
Confiscate guns, not my suggestion. But if we could remove 90% of the guns (especially handguns) from circulation, we'd reduce problems...just won't happen.
I'll take the M-1, but the AR-15 is (relatively) better suited to spray and pray or close range assassination of 1st Graders. The move to lower powered rounds in long guns was the result of the change in warfare to closer range, more rounds and who needs to kill at 600 yards. But, as you say, our problem is handguns.
I support your right, but I want you to be held, as I should be too, to responsible ownership and storage. My gun is not accessible to children, but is available to me in less than 5-10 seconds. Is that as fast as on my hip at all times, no...but it's also not at risk of misuse. I have decided this configuration meets my needs and is responsible. The father who stored his shotgun in an unlocked closet, loaded, make his own decision. I certainly hope he is held to task for that mistake.
CP,
I don't carry. Any guns I have would be secured. I live in MA, The CHL process
and cost is at the range of I can use the money for other things. Doesn't mean I'm unaware or gun stupid like the rabid gun-banners. I have no tolerance for them
as its stupid to the point of show a complete lack of critical thinking.
The 90% of guns from circulation comments still leaves me with which ones and how?
We haven't succeeded and that in a state that if your not papered and have a
gun you go to jail. Boston where getting a CHL is from what I've heard near impossible has the highest crime rate and its far from only guns. It would seem
recycling criminals is the real problem. The look at NYC, the Sullivan Act took most all guns off the street and only the connected or their private guards get
guns. It was sponsored by a corrupt politician so he would give his gang an advantage.
Eck!
Eck!, I have the same thoughts. I generally don't carry, but like the option (especially for travel). Which 90%, hell if I know either...but I know we have a butt load of cheap guns tossed in drawers and such that cause no end to problems...maybe some of them?
I will argue that the Boston crime rate is independent of gun limits, but is more socio-economic. Pack people in together with few resources and few way out, voila. But the whole mess is interconnected, and I just wish we could approach it that way...but politics as usual blocks that approach from both sides.
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