Florida lawmakers pass take your guns to work law

[wildman]

The biggest problem with guns is what the military calls friendly fire. This is when you shoot the wrong person. Yea I know you all think that would never happen. Well, it can happen and it does happen quite often. Combat is fast and things happen.

The second problem is that people tend to get shoot by their own guns in close combat. If the opponent is only a foot away, it is really dangerous to pull a gun. I is very likely that your opponent will grab the gun (and he has 2 hands and you only have one since you must keep hold of your gun!) and point it back at you just as you are pressing the trigger. That happens about 75% of the time.

 

[Poop-Loops]

I'd like to see a source for that "75% of the time" claim, even though I know what you are saying. I believe even police departments do drills like that to determine how close someone can be before drawing your pistol isn't viable anymore.

Anyway, the point about friendly fire is a good one. If a random Crazy started shooting a public area, and innocent bystanders 1 and 2 join into stop the guy, then bystanders 3 and 4 who come in later (even a few seconds) will just see 3 guys with guns, not knowing what is going on. Police Officers 1 and 2 will likewise have no idea.

If it's a situation like protecting your home, when you know you are pretty much alone, then yeah, it make sense to be armed.

But there's a reason soldiers have uniforms and there is a reason why they are trained in units, not individually.

 

[wildman]

The source is my boss who has A LOT of close combat experience. He also sleeps with his Glock under his pillow so he is not an anti-gun nut. Of course, the 75% number does not apply to people trained in close combat such as police. They know enough not to do it.

Actually, friendly fire situation at home does happen when people get woke up by a relative who was not expected. Combat is not as easy as it looks in the movies.

 

[drankin]

Yep, it's important not to shoot yourself or relatives unintentionally. Good points.

 

[NeoDevin]

The source is my boss who has A LOT of close combat experience. He also sleeps with his Glock under his pillow so he is not an anti-gun nut. Of course, the 75% number does not apply to people trained in close combat such as police. They know enough not to do it.

Actually, friendly fire situation at home does happen when people get woke up by a relative who was not expected. Combat is not as easy as it looks in the movies.

Second hand anecdotal evidence is always the best kind. No doubt he heard it from someone else, so it's even better than second hand.

 

[drankin]

According to the 75% stat and the fact that he has ha A LOT of close combat experience tells me that he has shot himself at least 2 or 3 times.

 

[wildman]

Second hand anecdotal evidence is always the best kind. No doubt he heard it from someone else, so it's even better than second hand.

Ha! Ha! Isn't that so. He heard it in combat training so you are right!

 

[wildman]

Yep, it's important not to shoot yourself or relatives unintentionally. Good points.

This makes trivial a very serious problem. I'll tell you another second hand story. This one may or may have happened, but it Illustrates an important point.

There was an old colonel who went to the War College to obtain some training. A young captain pulled out some maps of a make believe battle and said this and that happened and this happened…. Who won?
The colonel, who by this time had kind a glazed look to his eyes turned to the captain and said, “Who panicked?” The captain said, “No one panicked!” The colonel sighed and said, “Look son, in real combat, who ever panics first loses.”

Drankin, I sure you think that in combat, you will be Rambo. And maybe you will. Some people are. But most people panic. That is why the military trains and trains and trains. Most civilians with a gun panic and when you panic you are as likely to shoot your relatives and friends as the bad guy.

 

[turbo]

Most civilians with a gun panic and when you panic you are as likely to shoot your relatives and friends as the bad guy.

Where did you get that idea? When you are motivated to protect people from attack, you are as likely to shoot the victims as the attacker? That's ridiculous and entirely unsupportable.

My wife is almost as good a shot as I am, as long as she's shooting .38s or 9mm, and we have a .22 pistol that seems to fit her hand so well that her aim is almost instinctive. She doesn't like shooting my Glock 20 because the 10mm auto has too much recoil and her hands are small. I can guarantee that if someone was trying to break into our house, she would shoot the intruder and not me. We have friends and relatives (male and female) who enjoy target-shooting and plinking as well, and we get together occasionally at local sand pits to practice and re-affirm familiarity with the loading process, arming, safety, etc with each type of firearm - revolver or semi-auto. None of these civilians would panic when they have familiar tools of self-defense at their disposal. Certainly, nobody is going to be happy when confronted with a home invasion, for instance, but that is not going to prompt any of us to turn a gun on our families instead of the real threat.

 

[Poop-Loops]

turbo-1 has a point. You have no evidence to support the claim that people panic when under heavy stress.

I think instead we should all accept turbo-1's unsupported claim that in a life-threatening situation all of his friends wouldn't panic. It just makes more sense to assume people keep their cool when the s*** hits the fan.

 

[luben]

i wonder if gun can be completely banned in US, except military and police. Then there will be much less gun-murder. A stun rod is enough for civilian i think.

 

[turbo]

turbo-1 has a point. You have no evidence to support the claim that people panic when under heavy stress.

I think instead we should all accept turbo-1's unsupported claim that in a life-threatening situation all of his friends wouldn't panic. It just makes more sense to assume people keep their cool when the s*** hits the fan.

People may not keep their cool, and may in fact be in heavy adrenaline-rush mode, but when these people are thoroughly familiar with their handguns, shotguns, or whatever they might choose for home defense, I would NOT want to be the stranger breaking down the door. To assert that the victims are likely to start shooting one another instead of the intruder is ridiculous.

 

[wildman]

People may not keep their cool, and may in fact be in heavy adrenaline-rush mode, but when these people are thoroughly familiar with their handguns, shotguns, or whatever they might choose for home defense, I would NOT want to be the stranger breaking down the door. To assert that the victims are likely to start shooting one another instead of the intruder is ridiculous.

Once again, you make trivial of what I said. Of course, you won't shoot your wife who is next to you. Friendly fire incidents are very rare within the the same unit. More common is this that happened near my home:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15199221/page/3/

Read the link, but basically what happened was that Harold Fish panicked and shot Kuenzli. Fish wasn't a murderer in spite of what the jury found. He was someone with a gun that panicked. This kind of stuff doesn't make the American Rifleman, but it happens and more commonly than people think. The military spends LOTS of time and money trying to figure out ways to prevent friendly fire and if they have problems (and they are very well trained), then civilians are going to have even more...

It is not that I am anti-gun, but you have to realize that a gun is a give and take thing. It increases the chances of Fish - Kuenzli type incidents while reducing the chances of home invasion type incidents. It depends on the situation whether it actually makes you safer or not.

 

[turbo]

Once again, you make trivial of what I said. Of course, you won't shoot your wife who is next to you. Friendly fire incidents are very rare within the the same unit.

I am not trivializing what you said. I'm pointing out that you have made a broad generalization that is irrational and is not supported by any facts. You have not cited any support for your statement, but are changing the subject big-time. There are very few home-invasions in Maine because we have one of the highest rates of gun-ownership in the country.

People who are familiar with their guns and are aware of their competence in their use are NOT going to panic and start shooting friends, family, and co-workers instead of the person(s) who are threatening their lives. If you'd like to cite some studies that support that idea, I'd be happy to review them, but I'm not holding my breath while you try to dig up something.

 

[drankin]

i wonder if gun can be completely banned in US, except military and police. Then there will be much less gun-murder. A stun rod is enough for civilian i think.

A complete ban on firearms is impossible in a Constitutional US. Now, if the Constitution were removed, then it would be a possibility. But, that would require a revolution that would surely bring a death toll that all the civilian firearm fatalities that every happened would not touch. IMO of course.

 

[drankin]

Wildman, I'm not sure what you are getting at other than accidents DO happen. We have had firearms for hundreds of years in this country and "panick" accidents like you describe hardly rank as a statistical concern.

 

[wildman]

Drankin,turbo-1

I'm asking my cousin who is in law enforcement about your statement so it will be a while before I get back to this interesting discussion. In the mean time I included a gun/Hillary joke in your private mail which you all will find very funny but is unfortunately a bit too off color for the public forum.

 

[Poop-Loops]

Wildman, I'm not sure what you are getting at other than accidents DO happen. We have had firearms for hundreds of years in this country and "panick" accidents like you describe hardly rank as a statistical concern.

Err... how often do citizens bust out their guns to stop a crime or to defend themselves?

How often do citizens fire their guns to defend themselves or to stop a crime?

It could very well be that simply pulling out a gun can end a conflict peacefully (i.e. someone trying to rob you, but runs away, someone assaulting someone else and runs away), but when shots are fired all hell could break loose. As far as I can tell, these incidents don't happen very often at all, so to draw any kind of conclusion from them would be hard.

 

[drankin]

Here are some raw stats: http://www.justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp
I don't think anything really addresses panic shootings though. ("panic shootings", a new term! LOL)

 

[vanesch]

I have to say that when I read this, I get a most un-real feeling. This must be a cultural thing, so it is difficult to argue rational over it - I guess John Wayne is part of the culture.

I would say that a country where you have to walk and drive around and go to your work with a gun just to protect yourself, is a highly insecure place! So, or this insecurity is imaginary, or it is real. If it is imaginary, then, well, it is just in the mind of course, and carrying a toy gun would help just as much as a real one, and be less dangerous However, if the insecurity is real, then I'd say for a rich country such as the US, it is high time to invest a bit more in police protection ! This is on the verge of craziness: you are spending fortunes to capture the bearded lunatic who might eventually plan a terrorist attack half a planet away, but you are under *constant attack* from your fellow citizen without doing anything about it.

I can eventually understand the need to take your physical protection in your own hands in remote places with very low population density, but in cities and highways and so on, this sounds totally un-real to me!

 

[drankin]

I have to say that when I read this, I get a most un-real feeling. This must be a cultural thing, so it is difficult to argue rational over it - I guess John Wayne is part of the culture.

I would say that a country where you have to walk and drive around and go to your work with a gun just to protect yourself, is a highly insecure place! So, or this insecurity is imaginary, or it is real. If it is imaginary, then, well, it is just in the mind of course, and carrying a toy gun would help just as much as a real one, and be less dangerous However, if the insecurity is real, then I'd say for a rich country such as the US, it is high time to invest a bit more in police protection ! This is on the verge of craziness: you are spending fortunes to capture the bearded lunatic who might eventually plan a terrorist attack half a planet away, but you are under *constant attack* from your fellow citizen without doing anything about it.

I can eventually understand the need to take your physical protection in your own hands in remote places with very low population density, but in cities and highways and so on, this sounds totally un-real to me!

Van, the deal is that you are not familiar with guns. They are not common to you. They are common here. Guns are everywhere here. It's really not a big deal to own pistols and rifles in the US. It's common. Noone is under "constant attack" from their fellow citizens. There are wacko here as there are among all human populations. We just refuse to let wackos determine whether the rest of the law abiding public can maintain rightful ownership of firearms. To disarm the common people is to simply leave them defensless against the lawless. Even though it is rarely necessary for someone to ever need a firearm in their lifetime for self-defense.

In order to "invest" in more police as you suggest would require us to deputize a large fraction of our population. Which would require more government, which requires more burauecacy, which requires more regulation, which requires more money, which requires more taxes. And so on...

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I have to say that when I read this, I get a most un-real feeling. This must be a cultural thing, so it is difficult to argue rational over it - I guess John Wayne is part of the culture.

You got it backwards: "John Wayne" was the personification of [some aspects] of our culture, not the other way around. The wild west really did exist.

I would say that a country where you have to walk and drive around and go to your work with a gun just to protect yourself, is a highly insecure place! So, or this insecurity is imaginary, or it is real. If it is imaginary, then, well, it is just in the mind of course, and carrying a toy gun would help just as much as a real one, and be less dangerous However, if the insecurity is real, then I'd say for a rich country such as the US, it is high time to invest a bit more in police protection! This is on the verge of craziness: you are spending fortunes to capture the bearded lunatic who might eventually plan a terrorist attack half a planet away, but you are under *constant attack* from your fellow citizen without doing anything about it.

I can eventually understand the need to take your physical protection in your own hands in remote places with very low population density, but in cities and highways and so on, this sounds totally un-real to me!

I grew up near a housing project in the Los Angeles area that the fire department wouldn't enter without a police escort because people would shoot at the firefighters.

Many of our cities are a real mess. Poverty and illegal immigration have driven services to the breaking point in many areas. And if you want to talk about craziness: Since 911, about 2 million people have entered the US illegally. Although most of these people are just looking for work, many are associated with dangerous gangs like MS13. Some of these gangs require that new members kill someone as part of the initiation process.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mara_Salvatrucha

Some of these gangs are better armed than the police. And no, the weapons they have, like fully automatic weaspons, are not legal. In short, our cities are full of little terrorists. People have good reason to fear for their safety.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

You got it backwards: "John Wayne" was the personification of [some aspects] of our culture, not the other way around. The wild west really did exist.

The wild west was nothing like what is depicted in Westerns. More people die violently in an hour and a half on film than in a decade of the real thing.

 

[vanesch]

Van, the deal is that you are not familiar with guns. They are not common to you. They are common here. Guns are everywhere here. It's really not a big deal to own pistols and rifles in the US. It's common.

Yes, this is what I meant with a "cultural thing". Visibly it is important to many American citizens, as a principle, to have a gun. But to most Europeans, for instance, this sounds very bizarre (as most cultural differences do, I understand that). It must be some "liberty feeling" or something, which is totally absent in most European populations. I'm just guessing here, but I would think that most of my fellow citizens would bluntly *refuse* to have a gun even if one offered them one legally. Just as a matter of principle.

Of course, weaponry can be job-related, and police and security functions might require one to have a gun available, and can even provide for some real protection. Also, as I said, sometimes one can feel quite insecure, like when one is alone in a remote place, and having a weapon can, in certain cases, provide for extra (true or imagined) security.
But these are normally rare cases. Most of the time, there is no objective need for a gun. Personally, I prefer not having a gun, and knowing that my rather bizarre neighbour also doesn't have a gun. I tend to think that most of my fellow citizens think about the same, although this is guessing.

Noone is under "constant attack" from their fellow citizens. There are wacko here as there are among all human populations. We just refuse to let wackos determine whether the rest of the law abiding public can maintain rightful ownership of firearms. To disarm the common people is to simply leave them defensless against the lawless. Even though it is rarely necessary for someone to ever need a firearm in their lifetime for self-defense.

So this argument is rather: guns have only in rare occasions a *real* use, but we adhere to our right in principle to carry one. Ok, this is the cultural thing I talked about. Here it would rather be: I prefer not to have a gun, but if it is really necessary for my security, then I will, if I really have to, take one.

In order to "invest" in more police as you suggest would require us to deputize a large fraction of our population. Which would require more government, which requires more burauecacy, which requires more regulation, which requires more money, which requires more taxes. And so on...

Personally, I'd prefer to pay a bit more taxes, and walk around in security, rather than pay a bit less taxes, and having to walk around armed, with the genuine risk of being shot every minute...

But we are mixing here apparently two totally different topics. One is a cultural thing, and is "we Americans, enjoy the right to carry guns, and we don't like to give it up, we feel naked without".
The other point, not much related to this, is: "there's a lot of insecurity, and police protection isn't adequate to protect me and my relatives ; I need to be armed to protect them, for real".

I would say, if I were in the second case, I would also carry, reluctantly, a gun, but I would prefer the situation to normalize, and to delegate physical protection to police forces, rather than do it myself. I am totally strange to the first case, but I can understand that this is different in the US.

 

[Evo]

I feel absolutely no need to carry a gun. I don't not feel that I live or drive in an unsafe place. Do the people here that feel they live in an unsafe place live in a dangerous inner city gang area? That's a relatively small portion of the US.

 

[drankin]

I feel absolutely no need to carry a gun. I don't not feel that I live or drive in an unsafe place. Do the people here that feel they live in an unsafe place live in a dangerous inner city gang area? That's a relatively small portion of the US.

Evo, it dawned on me as I was driving back to Seattle from Spokane (300miles, I do this every weekend) that you might be thinking one feels they might need a gun to protect themselves while driving. This is not what I meant. I don't even think the police are allowed to fire their weapons while driving. That's extremely crazy and an unsafe use of a firearm. Maybe that isn't what you meant, but just in case...

Whether one feels they need to carry while going to and from work isn't so much the point. It's whether we have the ability of protecting ourselves in public or if our employer can determine that we cannot because he/she doesn't want them in their parking lots. Because we are in public before we get to work and in order to get home after work, it makes sense that those who are licensed to carry shouldn't be restricted by their employer during those times.

 

[drankin]

Yes, this is what I meant with a "cultural thing". Visibly it is important to many American citizens, as a principle, to have a gun. But to most Europeans, for instance, this sounds very bizarre (as most cultural differences do, I understand that). It must be some "liberty feeling" or something, which is totally absent in most European populations. I'm just guessing here, but I would think that most of my fellow citizens would bluntly *refuse* to have a gun even if one offered them one legally. Just as a matter of principle.

Of course, weaponry can be job-related, and police and security functions might require one to have a gun available, and can even provide for some real protection. Also, as I said, sometimes one can feel quite insecure, like when one is alone in a remote place, and having a weapon can, in certain cases, provide for extra (true or imagined) security.
But these are normally rare cases. Most of the time, there is no objective need for a gun. Personally, I prefer not having a gun, and knowing that my rather bizarre neighbour also doesn't have a gun. I tend to think that most of my fellow citizens think about the same, although this is guessing.



So this argument is rather: guns have only in rare occasions a *real* use, but we adhere to our right in principle to carry one. Ok, this is the cultural thing I talked about. Here it would rather be: I prefer not to have a gun, but if it is really necessary for my security, then I will, if I really have to, take one.



Personally, I'd prefer to pay a bit more taxes, and walk around in security, rather than pay a bit less taxes, and having to walk around armed, with the genuine risk of being shot every minute...

But we are mixing here apparently two totally different topics. One is a cultural thing, and is "we Americans, enjoy the right to carry guns, and we don't like to give it up, we feel naked without".
The other point, not much related to this, is: "there's a lot of insecurity, and police protection isn't adequate to protect me and my relatives ; I need to be armed to protect them, for real".

I would say, if I were in the second case, I would also carry, reluctantly, a gun, but I would prefer the situation to normalize, and to delegate physical protection to police forces, rather than do it myself. I am totally strange to the first case, but I can understand that this is different in the US.

Yep, that is a good objective view of it. It's a difference in cultural or our social environment.

 

[lisab]

I feel absolutely no need to carry a gun. I don't not feel that I live or drive in an unsafe place. Do the people here that feel they live in an unsafe place live in a dangerous inner city gang area? That's a relatively small portion of the US.

The few people I've known who are what I would call "rabid" gun people don't live in what I would consider dangerous areas, but they all seem to live with a generalized, vague fear of being a victim.

One guy in particular, a former coworker, was absolutely irrational about having his guns "taken away." He called in one day, saying he wasn't going to make it in. Turns out he heard a sound in his house in the middle of the night, so he grabbed his gun and spent the whole night slinking room to room looking for the boogeyman.

We all got a laugh comparing him to Elmer Fudd...what a dork.

 

[edward]

In Arizona a person can carry a weapon just about anywhere as long as it is in plain sight; In a holster, stuck in your belt, you name it.

Recently a state law maker came up with a guns on campus bill.

The lawmaker, State Senator Karen S. Johnson, has sponsored a bill, which the Senate Judiciary Committee approved last week, that would allow people with a concealed weapons permit — limited to those 21 and older here — to carry their firearms at public colleges and universities.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/05/us/05guns.html

Since concealed carry is limited to those 21 and older I was wondering who was going to protect the underclassmen.

The law didn't pass, but the legislature did pass a law that allows a person without a concealed carry permit to have a gun concealed in a vehicle.

 

[drankin]

In Arizona a person can carry a weapon just about anywhere as long as it is in plain sight; In a holster, stuck in your belt, you name it.

Recently a state law maker came up with a guns on campus bill.



http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/05/us/05guns.html

Since concealed carry is limited to those 21 and older I was wondering who was going to protect the underclassmen.

The law didn't pass, but the legislature did pass a law that allows a person without a concealed carry permit to have a gun concealed in a vehicle.

That's unfortunate that students are required to be victims on an Arizona campus. If someone decides to initiate another massacre on a campus in Arizona, no one will be able to stop them.

 

[BobG]

Err... how often do citizens bust out their guns to stop a crime or to defend themselves?

How often do citizens fire their guns to defend themselves or to stop a crime?

It could very well be that simply pulling out a gun can end a conflict peacefully (i.e. someone trying to rob you, but runs away, someone assaulting someone else and runs away), but when shots are fired all hell could break loose. As far as I can tell, these incidents don't happen very often at all, so to draw any kind of conclusion from them would be hard.

Having someone know you have a gun before the situation develops can certainly defuse the situation, even if the other person has a gun. If the motivation is just money, a gun battle for the money isn't all that attractive of a proposition.

Having a potential victim pull out a cell phone can defuse the situation, as well, provided the situation hasn't developed very far. It doesn't take much time to dial 911 if a person feels sufficiently threatened.

If the other party has already drawn their gun, it's a little late for either option. If the other party has already assaulted you, even without a gun, it's a little late for either option since using a gun in that situation is going to be dangerous for both parties.

Of course, the other person wouldn't have near as much fear of trying to knock a cell phone out of your hand before you could dial 911 as they would of trying to knock a gun out of your hand before you could pull the trigger. So, a gun does have some benefit in self-defense, just not a lot. And, as you mentioned, these incidents only rarely occur in most places. The benefit of having a gun for self-defense is just very small.

How small is small enough is open to debate. I had my Jeep broken into just this weekend and I'd consider my neighborhood to be pretty safe, if you could call the first incident of any kind I've had in 8 years as pretty safe (in fact, one person or group of persons victimized quite a few vehicles in the neighborhood in one night).

 

[cristo]

That's unfortunate that students are required to be victims on an Arizona campus. If someone decides to initiate another massacre on a campus in Arizona, no one will be able to stop them.

Well, apart from the people you pay to uphold the law!

I just love the emotionally loaded comments that this sort of discussion brings. One can bet any money on any thread slightly related to gun ownership ending up in the "I want to carry a gun; it's my constitutional right" vs "You shouldn't carry a gun it's just asking for trouble" argument. :zzz: It's pretty dull hearing the same thing for the ninety-ninth time!

 

[wildman]

I'm not looking at this thread again and not answering any other input. However this is the input from my cousin who has been in law enforcement for quite a while:

"What I understood for a number of decades is that a person who buys a handgun (I do not remember it being other guns like rifles) is more likely to kill a dear one or innocent party (like a spouse coming home early from a business trip or a kid coming home unexpectedly late at night) than to kill a criminal inside their house. It has been a number of years since I read the latest stats, but that data held up for so long that I see no reason it would change now. The NRA denies it, but they haven't yet made a sound counter argument to my mind."

"Remember, the criminal is prepared to use lethal force without remorse or hesitation, "amateurs" aren't and that split second makes all the difference. When the homeowner brings a gun into the equation, the criminal will react with lethal force. If a gun is not brought into the equation, the criminal is more likely to flee. In a home invasion the homeowner very likely will have no time to arm himself."

"The NRA likes to publicize successful resistance by homeowners, but do you notice that they don't do that too often?"

"Unless stats have changed recently, homeowners are much more likely to kill some innocent with friendly fire than kill a criminal, but the NRA will never give on that point. Think of the remorse those fathers/mothers feel when they shoot their own children or spouse? It is very sad."

"We talked about this before at your house and there is one hell of a big difference between shooting at targets and panic shooting in a split second situation."

 

[NeoDevin]

Is anyone going to post an argument which is not subjective or anecdotal on this topic?

 

[drankin]

Is anyone going to post an argument which is not subjective or anecdotal on this topic?

Permit holders should not be restricted on campuses because they are already trusted to carry everywhere else. What makes a campus any different? It can only help. And there are documented cases where faculty and students have stopped school shootings. I'll dig up some sources.

Does that qualify?