Gun Collecting: Is It Ever Innocent?

[Circe]

So, Jay Leno is weird because he has way more cars than he could ever drive? People who have more teapots then they will use are weird now? How about those nefarious stamp collectors....did you know that some of those folks have hundreds of thousands of those things?

Shocking!

No, those are wildly bad examples. There is nothing murderous or criminal or perverted about cars, so why shouldn't Leno have all the cars or yarn or books or horses he can collect? Teapots and stamps, too.

The problem is when you collect evil things meant to hurt people: assault rifles, perversion toys, torture instruments.

You know -- or it may not be the sort of book you would read -- how 1930s classic English mysteries ALWAYS had country houses with weird collections of weapons on the wall? Usually foreign curvy dagger types from the Empire, or maces and battle axes from the Middle Ages of England itself.

Without exception, if the collection was described, a weapon from that wall was snatched up by the murderer and used to kill someone at some point during the house party. Point: collections like that are FOR killing people, and therefore are to be used for that.

In Joe Hill's wonderful "Heart-Shaped Box" his retired lead rock singer collects mass murderer memorabilia -- Seven Dwarfs drawn by John Wayne Gacy, the clown killer of little boys, and several others including a real snuff film. He gets into soooooooo much trouble because of those --- because basically, they are evil. And he's responsible for owning the evil.

Same deal with assault weapons.

 

[M14 Shooter]

No, those are wildly bad examples. There is nothing murderous or criminal or perverted about cars,...

Or guns. Of any kind.
XXXXX

 

[Circe]

That out of the way, I would say that you are verging on not upholding your responsibility under the second amendment. The second does not exist so you can get rid of pests and hunt a rabbit or a pheasant. It exists so that you, a mindful and patriotic citizen can forcibly change the government should it become tyrannical and you and sufficient of your fellow citizens decide to remove it. You should have at least one rifle that would allow you to meaningfully participate in that activity.

Cute. I KNEW youse guys were fantasizing being Big Men in the Revolution.

I am not convinced that the next revolution is going to come looking for me to help out, though in fact, they probably could do worse. At least I can ride a horse AND fire a gun, can't say that about everyone these days.

That's an interesting argument, and I think I haven't heard it before, congrats for that.

 

[Tech_Esq]

So, Jay Leno is weird because he has way more cars than he could ever drive? People who have more teapots then they will use are weird now? How about those nefarious stamp collectors....did you know that some of those folks have hundreds of thousands of those things?

Shocking!

No, those are wildly bad examples. There is nothing murderous or criminal or perverted about cars, so why shouldn't Leno have all the cars or yarn or books or horses he can collect? Teapots and stamps, too.

The problem is when you collect evil things meant to hurt people: assault rifles, perversion toys, torture instruments.

You know -- or it may not be the sort of book you would read -- how 1930s classic English mysteries ALWAYS had country houses with weird collections of weapons on the wall? Usually foreign curvy dagger types from the Empire, or maces and battle axes from the Middle Ages of England itself.

Without exception, if the collection was described, a weapon from that wall was snatched up by the murderer and used to kill someone at some point during the house party. Point: collections like that are FOR killing people, and therefore are to be used for that.

In Joe Hill's wonderful "Heart-Shaped Box" his retired lead rock singer collects mass murderer memorabilia -- Seven Dwarfs drawn by John Wayne Gacy, the clown killer of little boys, and several others including a real snuff film. He gets into soooooooo much trouble because of those --- because basically, they are evil. And he's responsible for owning the evil.

Same deal with assault weapons.

Cars kill more people than guns, you've just decided to ignore it.

 

[Tech_Esq]

That out of the way, I would say that you are verging on not upholding your responsibility under the second amendment. The second does not exist so you can get rid of pests and hunt a rabbit or a pheasant. It exists so that you, a mindful and patriotic citizen can forcibly change the government should it become tyrannical and you and sufficient of your fellow citizens decide to remove it. You should have at least one rifle that would allow you to meaningfully participate in that activity.

Cute. I KNEW youse guys were fantasizing being Big Men in the Revolution.

I am not convinced that the next revolution is going to come looking for me to help out, though in fact, they probably could do worse. At least I can ride a horse AND fire a gun, can't say that about everyone these days.

That's an interesting argument, and I think I haven't heard it before, congrats for that.

I think being a little guy in the revolution is plenty should it ever come to that. Not that I have any plans..... But, that is the point of the 2nd and as citizens we should be mindful of it and not shirk our responsibilities even if it seems unlikely that it would ever come to that.

 

[sitarro]

No, of course they don't. Because those are tools, too, and if you've got them, people assume you want to use them and may well use them, just as when you've got AR-15 rifles and lots of high-capacity magazines people assume you want to mow down as many civilians as possible.
Because that IS what these tools are for.

Ignorance, at its purest, most primitive level.
Keep up the good work.

What is a AR with a 30 round clip for if not to inflict as much damage as possible?

Sure you can use it for targets and blast the shit out of whatever you like for fun. But he isn't wrong about their design.

The AR is designed to essentially be as close to the military equivalent as is possible within civilian law. Like it or not, those guns were designed to kill people. Obviously they can, and often are, used for other things. But there is no arguing with the design intentions of these kinds of weapons.

Hunting rifles are designed for hunting. Pistols for various forms of portable protection.... these things aren't really debatable. There are plenty of guns that blur the lines. But I'm reasonably sure that isn't what he is talking about.

The P-51 Mustang was designed to shoot down German fighters which it did very well. Today, anyone with enough money to buy one can. Are you in favor of taking that person's right to that airplane because of it's original purpose?

 

[westwall]

So, Jay Leno is weird because he has way more cars than he could ever drive? People who have more teapots then they will use are weird now? How about those nefarious stamp collectors....did you know that some of those folks have hundreds of thousands of those things?

Shocking!

No, those are wildly bad examples. There is nothing murderous or criminal or perverted about cars, so why shouldn't Leno have all the cars or yarn or books or horses he can collect? Teapots and stamps, too.

The problem is when you collect evil things meant to hurt people: assault rifles, perversion toys, torture instruments.

You know -- or it may not be the sort of book you would read -- how 1930s classic English mysteries ALWAYS had country houses with weird collections of weapons on the wall? Usually foreign curvy dagger types from the Empire, or maces and battle axes from the Middle Ages of England itself.

Without exception, if the collection was described, a weapon from that wall was snatched up by the murderer and used to kill someone at some point during the house party. Point: collections like that are FOR killing people, and therefore are to be used for that.

In Joe Hill's wonderful "Heart-Shaped Box" his retired lead rock singer collects mass murderer memorabilia -- Seven Dwarfs drawn by John Wayne Gacy, the clown killer of little boys, and several others including a real snuff film. He gets into soooooooo much trouble because of those --- because basically, they are evil. And he's responsible for owning the evil.

Same deal with assault weapons.

Really? 300,000,000 guns kill 30,000 per year of which 80% is bad guy killing bad guy.
62,000,000 cars kill 45,000 per year of which 26,000 is drunk driving related.

Sooooo, if we go just by numbers cars ARE FAR MORE murderous than any old gun could ever be.

Facts don't back up your assertion.

But, to address the primary angle of your post, cars, nor guns, are "criminal", "perverse", or "murderous". That is the realm of people dear. You can choose to die when the bad guy comes for you, or you can fight. If you fight, the government suggests you defend yourself with scissors against some loon with a gun. We suggest that it is better to defend yourself with what the bad guy is arming himself with.

In Mexico guns are very heavily controlled but youread every day about loons with machine guns killing police officers in their police stations. Yep, that gun control works GREAT...

 

[chikenwing]

I've heard the -- bad -- argument that what a lot of people call "gun nuts" are just...collectors. Hobbyists. I have a lot of hobbies, none of them involving guns, so that got me thinking.

There are tools, and collector's items, and materials stored up to have options. Having too much yarn or spices or books is having lots of options. Collector's items are mostly historical in the case of guns or anything else, I think --- dueling pistols or flintlocks would be a reasonable collector's item even for guns. But modern functional assault rifles? Calling them collector's items is phoney.

Aren't guns really just tools? They have a function, and if you buy them for tools, you should want to use them for their purpose, but if you use an assault rifle for its purpose, you'll be arrested by a SWAT team. I garden a lot and thinking about this I realized I have ten shovels. I never "collected" them -- I just acquired them at need throughout the years. And I use all of them, every year, for their actual purpose: the go-to pointed shovel for regular digging, the light grain shovel for snow and straw-mixed light manure and black compost, the little Sears shovel as a sort of large trowel for big pots, and so on through the list.

We have guns and I view them as tools, and so I don't expect to use many!! There's the 22 for foxes and dogs in with the livestock and a shotgun and a pistol for home defense. I'm not expecting to stand off an army, who would need more?? Well, a hunter might need a more powerful rifle, but I don't hunt. I accept packages of venison shot on or near our land, and very pleased to have it, too.

My point is that if people have more guns than they can actually USE, there is something very, very weird and suspicious about that. One wonders about their motivation, and their anger level. And whether they are fantasizing arming the neighborhood when the riots or the revolution starts. It's not an innocent hobby, buying lots and lots of guns and high-capacity magazines and ammo: it's basically about wishing and hoping to kill people. Right? Is there any other motivation besides wishing for the chance to kill lots of people?

So now your the collector police?

You don't get to make the call on whats an ok number and type to collect,I know many collectors that have all kinds of different guns,and they are not nuts or dangerous.
The dangerous ones are people like yourself.

 

[sitarro]

What is a AR with a 30 round clip for if not to inflict as much damage as possible?

Sure you can use it for targets and blast the shit out of whatever you like for fun. But he isn't wrong about their design.

The AR is designed to essentially be as close to the military equivalent as is possible within civilian law. Like it or not, those guns were designed to kill people.

Sure. That's obvious and why I said this "hobby" isn't innocent. These AR-15s are designed to kill as many people as possible, people They aren't for hunting, they aren't for target practice, they are only for killing large numbers of people in one rampage mass murder.

Some hobby.

High capacity magazines are great for the range, you load them up the night before and never have to waste time reloading. A 6 shot magazine in a pistol is a pain in the ass. Just when you are getting into the groove you have to stop and reload.
As for slowing down a killer by regulating the size of a magazine..... they are criminals, they will get a magazine either on the black market or have a machinist build one. Even if you are successful, watch a Laura Croft movie and see just how long it takes her to change magazines out and begin re-firing. The Sandy Hook asshole had 4 handguns with at least 10 in a mag. Even when changing out the mag in one he had 3 more weapons to cover himself. You accomplish nothing but pissing off millions of gun owners....... that's a bigger voting block than you want to piss off.

 

[PaulS1950]

Guns are not "designed" to kill people. Military guns are designed to wound the enemy because it take two other enemy soldiers to take care of the one you wound. Sniper rifles are "dedicated" to killing and they are the same weapons most of us use to hunt with. They have a longer range, are more accurate and use a large, fast moving, bullet.
Guns are "designed" to fire a cartridge - with over two thousand different types of cartridges. The most lethal cartridge at close range is the shotgun. After the shotgun the most lethal would be the larger hunting cartridges. All guns, in the hands of a person intent on harming can be lethal - even the diminutive 22 short. Having said that none of these guns is evil or capable of killing without the operator behind them. I have kept a revolver on a table for over 40 years (when I wasn't wearing it) and it has never jumped off that table and tried to kill anyone. It has knocked over a rather large number of metal animals at ranges out to 100 yards when I was shooting in competition and helped me tie the range record for accuracy - just two of us ever hit 40-40 of thetargets and I managed to do it twice with an "out-of-the-box" revolver competing against some very finely tuned single shot pistols with scopes. Could I kill a man out at 100 yards with it? I suppose I could if it was necessary but I would probably grab a different gun for that use. If I was at home and a mobe was coming down the street throwing fire bombs or shooting into houses would I grab my shotgun? NO! I would grab a semi-auto rifle and start shooting before they got to my house. I would try to stop them from injuring my neighbors.
The guns are the tool of the shooter. If the shooter is evil then evil things happen but if the shooter is good then only the evil suffers.

 

[Underhill]

Ignorance, at its purest, most primitive level.
Keep up the good work.

What is a AR with a 30 round clip for if not to inflict as much damage as possible?

Sure you can use it for targets and blast the shit out of whatever you like for fun. But he isn't wrong about their design.

The AR is designed to essentially be as close to the military equivalent as is possible within civilian law. Like it or not, those guns were designed to kill people. Obviously they can, and often are, used for other things. But there is no arguing with the design intentions of these kinds of weapons.

Hunting rifles are designed for hunting. Pistols for various forms of portable protection.... these things aren't really debatable. There are plenty of guns that blur the lines. But I'm reasonably sure that isn't what he is talking about.

The P-51 Mustang was designed to shoot down German fighters which it did very well. Today, anyone with enough money to buy one can. Are you in favor of taking that person's right to that airplane because of it's original purpose?

I've said multiple times I'm not in favor of taking anyone's guns away.

Someone claimed the AR was not designed to shoot people and I cried bullshit. Of course they were. As was the AK.

 

[Circe]

Cars kill more people than guns, you've just decided to ignore it.

This argument, on the other hand, is AWFUL. Cars are not intended as murder weapons, so they are "innocent." They may kill people by accident, but that is definitely not their intended purpose. It IS the intended purpose of assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.

You could, I suppose, bash somebody on the head with a large teapot and kill them; or strangle them with my best Japanese yarn. But that would not be what they are intended for and so the guilt would be purely yours, and no blame attaches to the collector of innocent objects.

But torture tools, S&M equipment, assault rifles and all that are intended to kill or hurt people: that's their natural function. So you can't just say, "Whoopie! I'm a collector, isn't it cool?" Because it's like collecting a lot of pit bulls or anything deliberately created to hurt people: it's wrong. It's immoral.

 

[Circe]

Here's another example of a non-innocent collection that is a serious ethical issue.

The current New Yorker has one of their long articles on child pornography. They are asking, is it fair to charge people with a crime they haven't done yet?

So here's this movie star, he's got a lot of photos of little boys being raped on his computer. He was tracked from a Website for trading these photos. The police come in and take his computer, search his apartment, research his life, and find that he has never acted on this, he just ----------------------------- has a collection! Of photos of little boys being raped.

This is very like the moral dilemma of the assault rifles. Because he himself doesn't rape the little boys, he just...enjoys the photos. But SOMEBODY has to abuse the children so he gets his photos. No abuse, no photos. This is like people stealing your assault rifles to shoot up the school or movie theater or mall. You didn't do it, but you were the one indirectly guilty. Everybody in the country blames Adam Lanza's mother, after all.

If there were no assault rifles, all these AR-15 rampage mass murders wouldn't have happened. If there were no child pornography, all those children wouldn't have been raped.

So I'd say no, if the "collection" is not innocent, if it is involved inextricably with hurting and killing people, no one connected with it can be innocent. These are not the good guys who have pornography and assault rifle collections.

 

[westwall]

Here's another example of a non-innocent collection that is a serious ethical issue.

The current New Yorker has one of their long articles on child pornography. They are asking, is it fair to charge people with a crime they haven't done yet?

So here's this movie star, he's got a lot of photos of little boys being raped on his computer. He was tracked from a Website for trading these photos. The police come in and take his computer, search his apartment, research his life, and find that he has never acted on this, he just ----------------------------- has a collection! Of photos of little boys being raped.

This is very like the moral dilemma of the assault rifles. Because he himself doesn't rape the little boys, he just...enjoys the photos. But SOMEBODY has to abuse the children so he gets his photos. No abuse, no photos. This is like people stealing your assault rifles to shoot up the school or movie theater or mall. You didn't do it, but you were the one indirectly guilty. Everybody in the country blames Adam Lanza's mother, after all.

If there were no assault rifles, all these AR-15 rampage mass murders wouldn't have happened. If there were no child pornography, all those children wouldn't have been raped.

So I'd say no, if the "collection" is not innocent, if it is involved inextricably with hurting and killing people, no one connected with it can be innocent. These are not the good guys who have pornography and assault rifle collections.

Oh darlin, you are certainly reaching here. Equating gun ownership with pedophelia. Wow, just wow. In the interest of keeping this clean I will answer this one time them place you on the confirmed troll list. To collect child porn children must be harmed to produce it. So, whether the "collector" partakes of the behavior or not is immaterial, the behavior would not occur if the "collector" didn't want it.

With 300,000,000 guns out there, the VAST majority never do anything but sit in a safe to be admired when the gun collector wishes to view them. I have over 100 guns in my collection, not one has ever leapt up and harmed anyone.

You on the other hand have insulted every legit collector the world over and you're probably not smart enough to realise it.

So good day to you and enjoy your trolldom.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

Cars kill more people than guns, you've just decided to ignore it.

This argument, on the other hand, is AWFUL. Cars are not intended as murder weapons, so they are "innocent." They may kill people by accident, but that is definitely not their intended purpose. It IS the intended purpose of assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.

You could, I suppose, bash somebody on the head with a large teapot and kill them; or strangle them with my best Japanese yarn. But that would not be what they are intended for and so the guilt would be purely yours, and no blame attaches to the collector of innocent objects.

But torture tools, S&M equipment, assault rifles and all that are intended to kill or hurt people: that's their natural function. So you can't just say, "Whoopie! I'm a collector, isn't it cool?" Because it's like collecting a lot of pit bulls or anything deliberately created to hurt people: it's wrong. It's immoral.

True, it is an awful ‘argument.’

But your argument is awful as well.

 

[whitehall]

So, Jay Leno is weird because he has way more cars than he could ever drive? People who have more teapots then they will use are weird now? How about those nefarious stamp collectors....did you know that some of those folks have hundreds of thousands of those things?

Shocking!

No, those are wildly bad examples. There is nothing murderous or criminal or perverted about cars, so why shouldn't Leno have all the cars or yarn or books or horses he can collect? Teapots and stamps, too.

The problem is when you collect evil things meant to hurt people: assault rifles, perversion toys, torture instruments.

You know -- or it may not be the sort of book you would read -- how 1930s classic English mysteries ALWAYS had country houses with weird collections of weapons on the wall? Usually foreign curvy dagger types from the Empire, or maces and battle axes from the Middle Ages of England itself.

Without exception, if the collection was described, a weapon from that wall was snatched up by the murderer and used to kill someone at some point during the house party. Point: collections like that are FOR killing people, and therefore are to be used for that.

In Joe Hill's wonderful "Heart-Shaped Box" his retired lead rock singer collects mass murderer memorabilia -- Seven Dwarfs drawn by John Wayne Gacy, the clown killer of little boys, and several others including a real snuff film. He gets into soooooooo much trouble because of those --- because basically, they are evil. And he's responsible for owning the evil.

Same deal with assault weapons.

Funny how the left wants to define "perverted" all of a sudden. Did you ever watch a collecting based reality show? People collect torture devices and mummified remains. Civil War replica cannons go for tens of thousands of dollars. People spend hundreds of thousands for real Thompson Sub-Machine guns and 1st and 2nd WW real machine guns and even surplus Flame Throwers are collectible.

 

[PaulS1950]

Is gun collecting ever innocent? Really? I have never heard of a collector killing anyone. Most collectors are just that - collectors. They buy the best examples of the manufacturing art and sell, trade for better examples all the time. It is a collection. If you take a collector gun out and shoot it you lose money. I am not a collector but I personally know two people who are. They do have guns that they shoot but the collectables are never fired in order to keep them as collector pieces.
Yes, in answer to your question. Gun collecting is as inoccuent as collecting stamps.

 

[OODA_Loop]

Aren't guns really just tools? They have a function, and if you buy them for tools, you should want to use them for their purpose, but if you use an assault rifle for its purpose, you'll be arrested by a SWAT team. /QUOTE]

No SWAT team arrests here.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Cars kill more people than guns, you've just decided to ignore it.

Cars are not intended as murder weapons...

Neither are guns.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Aren't guns really just tools? They have a function, and if you buy them for tools, you should want to use them for their purpose, but if you use an assault rifle for its purpose, you'll be arrested by a SWAT team. /QUOTE]

No SWAT team arrests here.

Been here. Do this. Often.
Even though I won money, since I did not murder anyone, I apparently used my AR improperly.