And we don’t require that to buy a gun either.
It is fairly objective that guns have a quantifiable negative cost to society. It is subjective that uninformed voters have a cost to society, and not quantifiable.
I think it is justifiable to take action for something objective and quantifiable. I don’t for something subjective.
I think we could do better. I’m in favor of some changes, but I absolutely think regulations on one right should pass the smell test of application to other rights. I do think there are ways you can do that in gun regulation though.
First and foremost all burden on any human right must be carried by the government. What I mean is that ideas like having to pay money to exercise a right is unconscionable. Gun permitting should be free and the duty to prove an exception should be on the government to remove your right. If we want background checks for personal sales, it should be free and accessible and efficient. It also can’t require or store data on who owns what guns (much like we don’t store data on who you voted for). I like the idea of a free gun buyers ID you could pick up at the DVM or get stamped on your drivers license that notes for personal sellers you are allowed to buy a gun. I also like increased penalties for straw purchasers. Again all burdens should be on the government.
I also largely think the gun control legislation is mostly besides the point. For general gun crime and general gun deaths, domestic policy is far more important than gun control. For mass shootings mental health and drug policy is more important.
So you are positing that domestic abusers and the mentally ill may in fact have positive effects on our government? That’s a bold strategy cotton…
That is not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is that barring anyone from voting leads to even worse effects on our government.
No. It isn’t. Or at least it’s shallow enough a thought to propose the possibility of a world without weapons.
I don’t know if you’re being willfully facetious. Idiotic policy decision have very quantifiable costs. Nor does an inability to calculate it exactly make it smart to ignore.
Like children? Murders? Illegal aliens? straight up foreigners? You’re against all voting restrictions?
School children dying isn’t a cost to society?
And you can’t tie that to uniformed voters. That’s the problem. Informed voters vote differently from each other. Uninformed voters do so to.
We generally vote for who we think is best. How can that be right or wrong?
That’s a good catch – my wording was inaccurate. I meant barring certain subsections of adult citizens, not actually “anyone”.
Solid correction.
This makes intuitive sense to me. I’ll have to think more about it before I weigh in further, though.
I agree.
I agree here as well, I’m just open to the idea of gun control legislation in addition to other interventions – assuming we have good evidence that it might work.
I don’t think that’s quantifiable at all.
https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6853&context=jclc
More so than misinformed voters.
We know the existence of guns has resulted in death of innocent people. How much value we give them is tough to determine, I’ll give you that.
Both are Important, but only one is Urgent.
To discuss “either, OR” expresses a lack of system thinking.
Enter the Genius of the AND.
I read that as net negative. There are negative costs to everything.
The voting patterns in Chicago alone cause the deaths of thousands of people a year. There is a very direct link between idiotic voting and those deaths.
People can vote for evil things. People can vote for self interest at the expense of others, or human rights, or the life of another. The vote is not the law of the land, the constitution is. Votes against constitutional protections are by nature against our fundamental legal contract. Letting a murderer vote on the legality of murder is IMO not a good thing for the country.
Why does stopping murderers from voting not undermine democracy, but domestic abusers would?
I’m opposed to stopping murders from voting.
This is the crux of most of my issues with gun control regulation. In this very specific situation in Texas, they damn well need to look at the big picture. Mass shootings are horrible but regular gun crime is absolutely more important. I’m not saying nothing should be done, but I sure as hell wouldn’t be rushing off to get Houston to copy Chicago’s anti-gun violence plan. While the mass shooting is terrible, 30 people dead is like 2 average weeks in Chicago.
oh. does that go for all criminals?
I think so. I started this conversation by posting an article about gun control. I wasn’t expecting a thorough investigation of my views on the voting rights of criminals, so I may be missing a corner case or two. Haha
IDK. It could also be worse. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that is the cause, because I can’t show that to be true.
Subjectively, yes.
Sure. I am not going as far as assuming everything in the legal contract is “good”.
I’d agree with @TrevorLPT here with the condition that they served their time. I am not for voting rights while in prison.
Oh, I tend to drive conversations wherever I find anything interesting. And I don’t mean that as a gotcha question. I’d think that an analysis of human rights, especially as enumerated in the BOR is reasonably pertinent. You seem to want to regulate rights in proportion to your fear of them. I fundamentally try not to do that. All the rights have a cost to society. It’s why they were written down for protection. I think you grossly underestimate the costs of voting anyway and overestimate the danger of a firearm. It’s highly unusual for a legal gun to be used in a negative way. It is incredibly common to the point of majority for votes to be misused. Pick your poison. I’ll take going up against an individual with a gun to a corrupt oppressive state.
Though I think you need to reconsider voting a bit. You seemed to agree that general domestic policy is not only more generally important than gun control, it’s even more important than gun control when it comes to gun violence. What is that policy driven by? The vote. You’ve pretty well admitted the danger of the vote in those statements if you put them together. If you don’t want a gun in your face, you should be a lot more afraid about who is voting.