• brygphilomena@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    My opinion is that these shootings are a greater failure in this country than simply gun control. There is a LOT we need to work on to decrease mass shootings. While I admit, I am more on the personal responsibility side of the gun control debate, I am not against well thought through legislation. I don’t think that most of the proposals for gun control are rational, detailed, and written with an even cursory understanding of firearms.

    To start to address mass shootings, I believe that we need to expand our healthcare in this country. Both physical and mental healthcare. If people are physically well, and can get treatment that doesn’t threaten to bankrupt them, then they will have more opportunities to develop better coping mechanisms. They will be able to seek healthcare options and not feel like they are left to fend for themselves. The isolation from a society that doesn’t care or help them is detrimental, and while I have no studies to back it up, I would think that a society with a healthcare system thats prerogative is the patient instead of profit would help.

    I think the aspect of mental healthcare speaks for itself. So people don’t lash out and can seek other means of dealing with issues. I also believe that the stigma of seeking mental healthcare and it’s ability to impact people’s rights and job prospects is a hindrance. We should not make it so that if someone seems help, that they are punished for it.

    I believe we have a big culture shift that needs to occur. Too much do we use rhetoric that reinforces that firearms and gun violence is the ultimate solution to a disagreement. “Fuck around and find out” when used in the context of firearms is terrible. Firearms should be considered the last resort to protect life. Not property and not your feelings.

    Firearms are not conflict resolution! We need to work to give people better ways of solving and deescalating conflicts.

    We need to work on our wealth disparity. We should be elevating our poorest so that they don’t have to resort to violence or crime. As most firearm crimes are not mass shootings, we need to address the other parts of firearm use.

    We need to work on our community involvement. Bring people together, break down the walls between us, and get past the cliques.

    There is a lot we need to do, but gun control is only a small piece of solving gun violence.

    • aidan@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      I agree there needs to be a culture change. But on a global scale, the US is basically one of the leading countries in mental healthcare. Which, kinda shows a lot of isn’t evidence based

    • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      universal healthcare and basic income, paid with increase in the top 1%'s marginal tax rate, would solve a LOT of Americans problems.

      • Sludgeyy@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Fear of losing basic income is a great crime deterrent.

        Are you going to steal from that gas station if you could lose your basic monthly check for 20+ years?

        You think kids would drive drunk if you told them that if they were caught, they would lose their basic income for life? Most think it’s a slap on the wrist, maybe some community service, IF they get caught.

          • NιƙƙιDιɱҽʂ@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Y’all realize what you’re describing is just a poor tax, right? Anyone with significantly higher income over base income would…just break the law anyway.

            If we’re talking using money to deter crimes, it needs to be a sliding scale. You’re a millionaire and got a speeding ticket? That’ll be $50,000.

            • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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              3 months ago

              Aw dang it, we are only allowed to use one punishment as a country so I guess you are right. Maybe we could like, lock the rich people that commit crimes in a small room with a bed and a toilet.

          • Clent@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            Losing it for life is too drastic and isn’t what any behavior specialist would suggest.

            There needs to be a path to earn it back. For example, hours of community service based on the offense and that increase with each offense.

            It would also want to incentivize future legislatures excluding people by targeting groups. The drug war and its imbalance towards treatment of minorities as an example.

    • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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      3 months ago

      So we just need to solve all depressive disorders, schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, etc., across the entire country. Only then can we solve gun violence.

      In the vast majority of instances, having a gun in the home is more dangerous for those living in the house than for any potential threat. Its irresponsible at best and at worst it will cause the deaths of those closest to you.

      And before you say it, I do believe some people need guns, but you should be required to have a valid reason to own one, and it should be appropriate amount of firepower for that reason.

        • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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          3 months ago

          It was sort of meant to be rhetorical.

          Even if I agreed with you, gun control has been proven to work across the world, while not a single country has yet to solve mental health in a meaningful way.

          • brygphilomena@lemmy.world
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            3 months ago

            I’m not saying that it’s not a part of what needs to happen. Well thought out, thorough gun control is something thats going to be a part of this.

            But as shit as it may be to say, with current gun culture, the 2nd amendment, and the 4th amendment protection from unreasonable searches makes the sort of gun control adopted in other countries improbable here.

            The suggested legislation that I hear typically revolves around storage, which leading up to a tragedy is unenforceable (4th amendment) and therefore can’t prevent a mass shooting. The banning of firearms wholesale, which is unpopular in so large a part of the population it would be practically impossible. Restrictions based on features that are so ubiquitous it would be like banning smartphones; it’s not that there aren’t guns without them but it’s most guns made within the last few decades.

            My perspective is that gun control is the surface level way of dealing with a growing symptom in this country. One that taking away guns doesn’t actually fix. It’s the knee jerk reaction “quick fix.” That doesn’t really fix anything, just hides how deeply broken our society has gotten.

            So personally, I’m not against gun control in principle. I’m against the “common sense” gun control proposals. Because many of them are formed with minimal understanding of firearms or from a narrow viewpoint on how people use guns.

            (As an aside, I’m against the term “common sense” gun laws because it insults anyone that disagrees, puts them on the defensive, and makes having a good discourse on ways we can work together to solve the issue.)

    • Dasus@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      There is a lot we need to do, but gun control is only a small piece of solving gun violence.

      Weird how other countries haven’t solved these “other issues”, yet have managed to curb gun violence.

      “No way to prevent this, says only country in the world where this regularly happens

      Gun control works on gun violence as surely as antibiotics do on infections. Now can proper hygiene and a healthy populace make it so there’s less need for antibiotics? Yes. But are they still extremely necessary exactly because of how well they work in bacterial infections? Yes.

      Gun nuts never have any science to back up their indirect nra propaganda. Gun control advocates do. Here.

      https://epirev.oxfordjournals.org/content/38/1/140.full.pdf+html . https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/

      I’ll stay here to wait for any science at all, but it will never come. What I will get is angry gun nuts using shitty “rhetoric” instead of having a single peer reviewed study.

      • brygphilomena@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        I never said there was “no way to prevent this” I’m saying there is a fucking shitload we need to do to prevent this and gun control, in whatever form it takes is going to be only a piece of the puzzle.

        And no shit, does getting rid of guns get rid of guns violence. You aren’t spouting something revolutionary.

        I’m not even against gun control. I’m against the knee jerk reactionary bullshit and narrow viewpoint of anti-gun individuals that don’t want to engage in any serious discussion of HOW to enact gun control other than take away guns.

        I’m not a gun nut, and that’s just a rude thing to say. It’s divisive, insulting, and worst of all, it means you’ve already made an opinion and written off anything that I may say.

        • Dasus@lemmy.world
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          3 months ago

          I’m tired of people pretending they’re for gun regulation while they’re pretending “it’s only a small part of the puzzle”.

          Like honestly, you feel gobsmacked in how you can have such high gun violence rates with similar mental health issues as countries which do have proper gun control and for some reason don’t the issues that the US does.

          It’s purely about gun regulation ffs. Oh no, am I being insulting to someone who doesn’t think gun control would really help. Someone who pretends mental health program would do more.

          Fucking ridiculous man.