today two muslims killed a dozen french folks

[Mereni]

You do realize that a anybody with a lathe, a free day, and a $2.00 Chunk of scrap metal can and do create single-shot fire-arms? You realize that with 3D printers and technology the way it goes 'making a gun from home' will be even easier and more available to the public?

I've done better than this. At a former job where I designed metal parts, it wasn't uncommon for someone in the shop to bring in an old gun and use the shop machine tools to rework or replace worn parts to restore the gun. I even wrote a couple programs for the CNC lathe and mill for that purpose. The owner, being a gun collector himself, let the guys do this openly so long as their real work got done, but it easily could have been done secretly. It's not like there was a lot of supervision as long as everyone was doing their job well.

As far as making a gun from scratch goes, we never did that there, but it would have been possible. It would have easily been possible. And it's not like you need a special shop like that. Places like that go out of business all the time or replace their old equipment and sell it. It's not difficult to get pretty good quality used machines like that. Not to mention at a recent convention, I saw some very impressive, accurate, prototyping machines making items out of very sturdy plastic for fairly low prices.

I have the skills. I have the knowledge. These things aren't difficult to acquire. If I had $50,000, probably less, I could crank some fairly nice, multi-use guns out easily. I'm not even talking about single shot throwaway crap. And any group with a beef could raise such a sum of money and learn the skills easily.

My point is: For the most part, gun laws don't keep guns out of the hands of 'bad guys', only out of the hands of those willing to obey the law.

With a gun shoot the legs or the arms. It will incapacitate someone just fine.

A statement made by someone who's seen many movies, but not really handled a gun. Getting shot in the leg or arm is very likely to kill you as there are major arteries which will almost certainly be hit and you will bleed out quickly. Furthermore, its is incredibly difficult to aim a gun. Unless you have a lot of practice, like weekly practice, you'll want to aim for the largest target you can find in order to have any chance of hitting the person at all in a stressful situation. That means aiming for the torso.

[Argentis]

With a gun shoot the legs or the arms. It will incapacitate someone just fine.

A statement made by someone who's seen many movies, but not really handled a gun. Getting shot in the leg or arm is very likely to kill you as there are major arteries which will almost certainly be hit and you will bleed out quickly. Furthermore, its is incredibly difficult to aim a gun. Unless you have a lot of practice, like weekly practice, you'll want to aim for the largest target you can find in order to have any chance of hitting the person at all in a stressful situation. That means aiming for the torso.

I handle my guns just fine (at least I did when I was in the US now I can't shoot but with my bbgun, so nothing close to a real gun ;p). If you want a weapon that is highly inaccurate to someone untrained try a longbow ahah. But true I didn't take into account the stress factor as I'm not the stressful type. But also most gun encounters in those terrorists attacks, home invasions or what have you, are not at long range. Most often they go as close as they can to hit you and no further than a room away (if you manage to watch the video of the police officer getting shot in front of Charlie Hebdo you can see that they start shooting when they are two parking spots away from the officer. Then they close off and shoot at point blank (horrible I don't advise you to watch if you havent)). At this distance it's fairly easy to aim at what you want (and legs are almost as easy to shoot as the torso).
But most importantly guns are efficient not because of their ability to inflict high damage but on the dissuasion factor. You are less likely to get robbed if the robbers know you are a gun enthusiast and will not hesitate to shoot them.

[Mereni]

I handle my guns just fine (at least I did when I was in the US now I can't shoot but with my bbgun, so nothing close to a real gun ;p). If you want a weapon that is highly inaccurate to someone untrained try a longbow ahah. But true I didn't take into account the stress factor as I'm not the stressful type. But also most gun encounters in those terrorists attacks, home invasions or what have you, are not at long range. Most often they go as close as they can to hit you and no further than a room away (if you manage to watch the video of the police officer getting shot in front of Charlie Hebdo you can see that they start shooting when they are two parking spots away from the officer. Then they close off and shoot at point blank (horrible I don't advise you to watch if you havent)). At this distance it's fairly easy to aim at what you want (and legs are almost as easy to shoot as the torso).
But most importantly guns are efficient not because of their ability to inflict high damage but on the dissuasion factor. You are less likely to get robbed if the robbers know you are a gun enthusiast and will not hesitate to shoot them.

So, you would rather try to get insanely close to a dangerous man with a gun, shoot for a limb so that he is 'incapacitated', and for what? He'll be more likely to shoot back in this case. He still has a good chance of dying from blood loss. We're talking about a situation where someone is trying to kill you or someone else. Just come to grips with the fact that if you're going to shoot at someone, you're probably going to kill them. Center of mass, aim for it.

[Argentis]

No I wouldn't go as close as possible if I saw the danger coming from afar but think on how the attacks happens. IN the case of CHarlie Hebdo they broke into the building and the meeting room and starting shooting everyone. Unless the room is a big ass amphitheater, it was probably fairly small (still larger than your average living room ahahah). My point is that the scenarios where you could be led to use your firearm often happens in small enclosed spaces. Even if it happened in the road the guy won't get his gun out 100 meters away from his target. People will notice and start to run.

[Kandarim]

If I ever end up in that situation, I sure hope I'm not stupid enough to aim for his hand.

If you want a weapon that is highly inaccurate to someone untrained try a longbow ahah. But true I didn't take into account the stress factor as I'm not the stressful type.

Sorry, can't let this one pass. I am an (practiced, if not very good) archer (true, recurves and compounds both, not longbows) and shoot more or less regularly in a range, so I know what a novice archer up to an expert archer are like to get in terms of accuracy. I also once had the opportunity to go to a gun range (remember this is belgium and we don't like guns here yada yada) and I distinctly remember my disappointment when I was confronted with the kind of accuracy I could get with a hand pistol. I'd say the accuracy for novice shooters for both is very similar.

Fun fact: in belgium, bows follow the same rules as handguns. You can't carry them in the open on the street, you can't keep your arrows next to a strung bow, and so on and so forth. At least we don't need permits for THOSE yet

[Claeyt]

-Prove your need

Tried again.

Kept getting sad.

Clearly every one of the deceased 'needed' it. Guns are one of those things you simply do not 'need' until the exact moment that you do, and then, when you find yourself without one you may never find yourself again. Trying to make people prove they 'need' a gun would be like trying to force people to prove they 'need' a helmet when riding a motorcycle. Surely if everybody were to stay in their lanes and you were to drive super careful you would never crash, thus never 'need' the helmet. We are not talking about those times though. I find it a bit silly that plenty of societies will force you to wear said helmet, even if you can prove that you are only riding for recreational use on private lands and can prove you in fact do NOT need the helmet. Meanwhile, when it comes to guns which in the same rare circumstances could save your life you all of a sudden have to prove why you can have one. I believe we should be grown ups and realize we don't live in a world where every car is going to stay in their lane, nor do we live in a world where every human is going to be void of violent action.

Nobody needs a gun to protect themselves. People need 'A Bike Helmet' to prevent injury from an accident. People do not need guns to prevent things like this from happening. They need terrorists like this to not be able to get guns and they need police to respond quickly and effectively to prevent and stop these attacks. The Police and strict gun laws are 'The Bike Helmet'.

More guns mean more deaths. Many, many more deaths.

Well I have no interest in picking apart your post as it sounds like we are mostly on the same page. I'm for regulated gun ownership, and so are you. So long as "I need a gun because there are crazy people in the world who might hurt me" qualifies your 'need' test then I no longer see an issue to get hung up on it.

Bottom line, make guns available and they will be in the hands of people that want to kill.

This guy .

I think the latest tragedy does at least highlight that outlawing them certainly doesn't keep them out of the hands of those that want to kill.

You do realize that a anybody with a lathe, a free day, and a $2.00 Chunk of scrap metal can and do create single-shot fire-arms? You realize that with 3D printers and technology the way it goes 'making a gun from home' will be even easier and more available to the public? Pretending you can regulate guns from people who need them is as functional as regulating water in the rain. Sure you could set up large tarps over an entire city to try to keep all the rainwater from the people. But somebody thirsty enough will simply poke a hole and get their hands on it while the rest of the city dehydrates.

Drop me anywhere in the world and I promise you within 72 hours I could have a fire-arm. Now, realize that somebody who wishes ill-will knows the same thing and all your advocating is regulation of firearms away from the prey, not the predators.

These 2 guys smuggled fully automatic AK-47's in from Yemen. It was incredibly hard for them to get guns into the country. A single shot fire arm is useless for an attack like this.

There is absolutely no way you could buy or get a gun (and a bullet) in Japan in 72 hours if we dropped you in there.

[Kalliokamu]

Nobody needs a gun to protect themselves. People need 'A Bike Helmet' to prevent injury from an accident. People do not need guns to prevent things like this from happening. They need terrorists like this to not be able to get guns and they need police to respond quickly and effectively to prevent and stop these attacks. The Police and strict gun laws are 'The Bike Helmet'.

More guns mean more deaths. Many, many more deaths.

These 2 guys smuggled fully automatic AK-47's in from Yemen. It was incredibly hard for them to get guns into the country. A single shot fire arm is useless for an attack like this.

There is absolutely no way you could buy or get a gun (and a bullet) in Japan in 72 hours if we dropped you in there.

A broadside of claeque. You must be living in a bottle or look the world through extra-pink glasses.. In your world criminals would get their guns no matter what (through illegal means because they are criminals). Law-abiding people would have no means to defend themselves. As terrorists are looking for only soft targets (no fear of retaliation) they could easily kill as many as they like. Police force has a reaction time and can't guard all the people 24 hrs a day. But knowing your history you will ignore all the facts and go ranting about racism in your next post.

Only countries that will suffer less from terrorism in the future are USA, Israel, Russia and China. And we all know what they do with terrorists.

[Claeyt]

A broadside of claeque. You must be living in a bottle or look the world through extra-pink glasses.. In your world criminals would get their guns no matter what (through illegal means because they are criminals). Law-abiding people would have no means to defend themselves. As terrorists are looking for only soft targets (no fear of retaliation) they could easily kill as many as they like. Police force has a reaction time and can't guard all the people 24 hrs a day. But knowing your history you will ignore all the facts and go ranting about racism in your next post.

Only countries that will suffer less from terrorism in the future are USA, Israel, Russia and China. And we all know what they do with terrorists.

Soft target attacks like this are happening constantly in the United States. One of them happened at an Army base with thousands of fully automatic guns and armed soldiers around.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Fort_Hood_shooting

The way to stop terrorists is through law enforcement and prevention of them being armed. If these two men in France had been unable to get guns into the country they wouldn't have been able to do what they did.

But most importantly guns are efficient not because of their ability to inflict high damage but on the dissuasion factor. You are less likely to get robbed if the robbers know you are a gun enthusiast and will not hesitate to shoot them.

Guns are not, in any way a sufficient deterrent to terrorists or criminals. Gun stores and gun owners are specifically targeted if they're known gun owners because the thieves want their guns. If criminals and terrorists are not able to get guns easily then they will not be able to commit crimes.

Most guns in America used in crimes are actually obtained through legal straw purchases. This is when one person buys a gun and immediately sells it to another person. There's no background check, no law enforcement notification or anything like that. The Gun Lobby and Republicans specifically stopped changes to this after the Sandy Hook massacre gun law changes were tried. This is how criminals get guns.

The idea that someone else owns a gun is not going to stop a criminal and it's certainly not going to stop guys like the 2 in France. America is the most heavily armed country in the world (we have more than one gun per person in this country) and we still have many, many attacks like this one here.

[Procne]

The way to stop terrorists is through law enforcement and prevention of them being armed. If these two men in France had been unable to get guns into the country they wouldn't have been able to do what they did.

This! Those terrorists in France had no right to carry those weapons. If this lack of right was properly enforced there would be no problem.
If all laws were properly enforced then no crime would ever happen, because crime is against the law! Genius!

Now seriously, the whole point is to make laws which can be enforced easily. "Guns are forbidden" law doesn't help much with terrorists because it's not something you can enforce, unless you can remove weapon smuggling, theft etc.

[Claeyt]

The way to stop terrorists is through law enforcement and prevention of them being armed. If these two men in France had been unable to get guns into the country they wouldn't have been able to do what they did.

This! Those terrorists in France had no right to carry those weapons. If this lack of right was properly enforced there would be no problem.
If all laws were properly enforced then no crime would ever happen, because crime is against the law! Genius!

Now seriously, the whole point is to make laws which can be enforced easily. "Guns are forbidden" law doesn't help much with terrorists because it's not something you can enforce, unless you can remove weapon smuggling, theft etc.

Guns don't have to be forbidden. The have to be heavily regulated and known and licensed by the police. They need to have safety features like the new wristband armed guns.

The guns used in this case were smuggled into the country. There were plenty of ways to stop it. Countries stop guns from getting into their country all the time. The French Police failed to stop these two guns from getting in.

People don't have to be armed to stop attacks like this. The Fort Hood shooting here in America that I referenced earlier happened on an Army base. There were many, many armed guards around. It didn't stop the person from doing it. It didn't even slow him down. America is unable to stop things like this with many, many guns around. The only thing more armed people do is kill each other. More guns mean more fatal arguments, more fatal domestic fights, more fatal gun accidents. It only leads to more and more death.

Heavily regulated gun ownership is the only way to stop it.