Statesian here. There are a CRAPTON of mass shootings here. If we do nothing about guns, the shootings will still happen. What is the leftist answer for reducing mass shootings without disarming the proletariat?
Community ownership of weapons. If you want to do a mass shooting or whatever, you have to convince your local community.
Specific details discussed later
Ooo, will there be debates or targeted ads by each side; for and against the mass shooting?
A door-to-door grassroots campaign to stir up support?
I mean, it would probably alert someone that you’re planning on doing a mass shooting. Which is the point, yeah? If we know it’s going to happen, it probably won’t? Because you can be like “Uh, I think Josh is going to do a mass shooting at a school, we shouldn’t let him into the community armoury for the next while.”
If you want to both have a civil militia AND low gun crime, you’ll probably have to do this (and also have low poverty/inequality etc etc).
This would be true because militias don’t mean everyone has a gun, or every type of gun, say at their bedside or residence, right? Having open access is still a kind of ownership.
Damn why are you getting downvotes that’s basically the most based answer so far.
Maybe some people haven’t got the idea that, precisely, no one in going to convince their local community to hand them guns and ammunition with no scrutiny or to commit mass murder.
What’s a downvote?
This was one of my ideas from anarchism that I carried over to Leninism that I think is applicable to any citizen’s militia. Obviously, I could point to reactionary militias in the US to see how the idea could be corrupted, but if you’re at that point already…
It also means that the community has a Space for regular training of skills relevant to insurgency, in case a larger state rolls by.
Idk, I’d be happy to bash out more ideas regarding this.
Downvotes are when people click the arrow pointing down to say that they don’t like what you’re writing. Maybe it’s because your idea is a bit utopian since I’m not sure it could be implemented in practice in any near future but at the same time the same general idea can be adapted with stronger political structures like a revolutionary party so I’d say it’s worth discussing!
I wonder how much of this can be achieved under capitalist rule. Maybe something like limiting firearms use and ownership to active members of hunting or marksmanship clubs. If you are able to handle guns safely and responsibly around other people on a regular basis you might be less likely to shoot random people.
Cuba does something similar from my understanding.
Basically, stockpile weapons in a secured location, and in the event that they’re necessary, give em out to civilians reasonably expected to handle them with care.
I say “give em out to civilians”, but it’s civilians who decide when and why they’re distributed anyway. How a DOTP functions.
We need accountability beyond those who pull the trigger, and for people to accept that Rights requires responsibility, those not willing to bear those responsibilities do not get to exercise those rights.
In order to operate a firearm you would need to join a WELL REGULATED militia, if the arms master of that militia see you fit to operate a firearm than they can provide one with no restrictions. No private sales of guns are allowed but militas can purchase a tank if they have the means.
In order to operate a firearm you would need to join a WELL REGULATED militia
Who exactly regulates this militia? The government? If so, we’ve just reinvented the police but made it a volunteer position
If the point is that an armed populace is a deterrent against a tyrannical government, giving the government carte blache to restrict and control them defeats the purpose.
A militia is a far far far better deterrent to a tyrannical government than a bunch of unorganized citizens, or loners stock piling some rifles.
Our current situation only serves those who enforce the status quo, or who want to commit acts of terror against countrymen they politically disagree with.
But who enforces the regulation? Who decides what is a militia vs “a bunch of unorganized citizens”? Who appoints a militia’s “arms master”? The problem is that if it’s the gov, that same government can take away those privileges or only appoint/approve militias they politically agree with.
cracking down on the right-wing. seriously. the vast majority of US mass shootings that i can remember are done by violent white supremacists and fascists. the right is dangerous and will always use extreme and horrific violence to achieve their ways. so the leftist answer would be to suppress the activities and organizing of fascists heavily.
This. The circulation of fascist propaganda in particular must be curtailed and cracked down on to the greatest possible extent. Only a proletarian state can do this since a bourgeois state knowingly tolerates and cultivates fascism as a weapon against the working class and working class unity.
This… Only a proletarian state can do this…
Sounds like not “This” at all? You don’t agree with him. He’s suggesting fixing it somehow within the current system.
I didn’t read SU25 as saying that it could happen under the current state, just that that’s the action that would need to be taken.
Edit - sorry, just realized this is an old thread. Feel free to ignore!
Red flag laws for extreme behavior (domestic abusers, those making active, credible, and targeted threats against themselves or others), allowing psychiatrists or psychologists to place holds on a persons ability to own guns, cracking down on straw purchases especially for known “under the table” gun distributors.
Mandating that firearms be purchased with either a gun safe or trigger lock as to prevent accidental discharge and to keep them out of the hands of children.
Mandating first time gun owners take a short class in proper gun storage, handling, cleaning, and safety.
All of these things can be reasonably done without disarming the proletariat and they would reduce the gun death statistic SIGNIFICANTLY. The disarming of the suicidal or those in psychological distress along with domestic abusers would cut the amount of guns deaths by nearly 2/3rds.
In general, I would also support additional barriers for firearm ownership under the age of 25. Not make it illegal persay, but give some extra hoops to jump through.
Most of these mass shooters are men in their early twenties, where the decision-making part of the brain is not fully developed and most are in a very vulnerable transition stage in life.
Ehhhh I’m not sure about this one either. If a person can sign up for the military at 18, own a car, vote, sign legal contracts, etc, or buy alcohol and tobacco at 21, then limiting firearms to 25 seem infantilizing and misguided.
It’s a similar argument that a lot of right wingers use to say “raise the voting age”.
Also the brain development is a decent point, but its a lot more overblown then people make it out to be. 25 is actually the general average as people can be done at 22 or need until 27, and the level of development relies more on life experience and education then it does on some brain wiring.
If a person is hellbent on killing people like a mass shooter, then they will use anything they can get their hands on, hence why they’ve used cars before for example. Limiting everyone based off of a handful of the most deranged people is a bad idea.
Ehhhh I’m not sure about this one either. If a person can sign up for the military at 18,
Well… to add some context to this, if you’re in the military you don’t walk around every day with a weapon/ammo. You are not allowed to keep personal firearms on your person while one duty or on post without a really REALLY good reason. You are not allowed to store privately owned firearms in your barracks or on post housing (and probably off post housing too but you’d have to piss off all sorts of people to get them to comb through your house looking for stuff to gig you on). So its not that far out there.
Realistically? Nothing.
