Gun owners need to understand that it isn’t a right, its a privilege the rest of us allow only if conditions are met.
If something happens that alters the situation those conditions are set for, they need to respect changes that may come.
Setting themselves up as victims, like they have here, makes me question the participants mental capacity to evaluate their own behaviours, therefore their own risk to those around them.
Two people were killed by a gun owner in circumstances where his ease of access to guns greatly increased the severity of the consequences. Communities have a right to expect gun owners to seriously appreciate the risks of their firearm possession.
Also screw the Nationals for making this a political fight, especially a rural v metro fight. This is bigger than you’re never seen dirt akubra hat and white pressed shirt with rolled up sleeves country cosplay.
@Gorgritch_umie_killa Last I read the limit was going to be 10 guns per licence holder. I’m not a firearm owner but to my ignorant ass, that seems enough. Happy to be educated on why it isn’t.
I think I read that it was ten and five for a hunting license. I’m with you on the other perspective thingy: This sounds entirely reasonable.
I’d actually appreciate a simple explanation of the law, what is changing and why it’s bad. I have found the legistlation but it’s in some dialect. I don’t really follow what is different.
Limiting the number of firearms won’t improve safety. The same people who currently own firearms will still own them. Just less of them. And they can only use one at a time when they go hunting or target shooting. So whether they have 5, 10, or whatever number in safe storage, they are all locked away where they can do no harm. Reducing the numbers is more about PR than improving safety.
I’m all for more detailed background checks and more frequent inspections. There needs to be a process to red flag firearm owners with mental health issues, or any sort of violent offence so that access to firearms can be taken away from them either temporarily or permanently. Making firearms harder to obtain and to keep in a way that doesn’t punish the majority that do the right thing will make a difference. Not a PR stunt like reducing numbers.
As to the limit of 5 firearms for hunters. I think that’s a little low. It might be just enough to have one hunting rifle in each calibre suitable for the range of animals being hunted. But a lightweight hunting rifle isn’t suitable for much practice at a rifle range. They can be punishing to shoot on a bench for practice. Target rifles are much heavier and more comfortable to shoot for longer when practicing, but that makes them too heavy to hunt with. Practice makes you more accurate, which means much less chance of wounding an animal. It might surprise people how important it is to hunters to be able to make a quick kill. Anyway, a limit of 5 for hunters will be too low for many.
These aren’t drivers licenses we’re talking about that are relatively easily to get, and where a mistake will get you a fine and the loss of some points. They take effort to get and keep, and the consequences of making even a minor mistake are much more serious. You might not understand why we own them, but we take safety and not breaking any laws way more seriously than the average driver.
Apologies if I rambled on a bit. Also, I’m not from WA, so these changes don’t affect me personally.
I think thats right. No disagreement here.
I had a friend that worked in the industry, a lot of what the industry people say about genuine need is a load of bull. Just like any other hobby they wanna get the latest whizz bang thing and show off their collections. Fine, but guns aren’t just any hobby.
Setting themselves up as victims, like they have here, makes me question the participants mental capacity to evaluate their own behaviours, therefore their own risk to those around them.
They didn’t do anything wrong, someone else did.
And now they are going to be impacted in some uncertain and arbitrary ways.
They get to whine.
Questioning their mental health says far more about your own ability to empathise than theirs.
If some idiot wraps his car around a tree and government decides to reduce the speed limit on that stretch of road, do you whine about how you’ve been unfairly targeted? “It wasn’t me that had an accident!”
Some idiot ran some people over deliberately and now I have to get rid of my ute and buy a sedan.
At my own expense.
And this is going to stop another idiot how?
Yeah, I’m going to whinge.
So, related, but not a direct result and i’m not sure where its at. But theres been rolling gun buybacks for a few years now, to reduce the cost impact on gun owners of getting rid of some of their guns, especially old easily forgotten ones. So cost mitigation has been and should continue to be a component.
Comparing guns to cars seems like bit of a stretch, however, I fully understand that more people die or are seriously injured in car-related incidents than guns (and that is fairly similar in the US (where there are lots of guns), however according to [1] in 2020 35/(50+1) states (+ district of columbia) had more gun related deaths than vehicle-related deaths). I’m not saying we shouldn’t control cars more effectively either - some of my family were involved in a multi-vehicle crash recently caused by an idiot (in a big ute) who couldn’t do the speed limit and also fled the scene, unsure whether police have found them yet. We should be making investments in public transport so we can make car licensing requirements stricter.
Unfortunately cars are still a requirement for the current transport needs, that is until public transport is constructed to take their place. Guns, however, are a luxury/hobby item with only practical uses for pest control and farming. Guns were also designed for the purpose of killing and have arguably done much less good for humanity than cars.
I understand your point about how it will affect gun enthusiasts and how group punishment is necessarily unfair, however the harder it is to own a gun, the less likely an idiot will own one making it less likely that an idiot will operate a gun. It sucks but I guess the risk comes with the hobby
[1] https://vpc.org/regulating-the-gun-industry/gun-deaths-compared-to-motor-vehicle-deaths/
They didn’t do anything wrong, someone else did.
This is the problem, no one but them are saying they did. They’re victimising themselves in this instance. There are feelings of loss being experienced by gun owners that they shouldn’t be feeling. They did the right thing, some other bastard didn’t, the laws have to be changed to cater for the idiots out there not the responsible people. Just like anything else in society the rest of us bear the cost.
For example, myself and i’m sure a lot of other people would probably enjoy shooting, but due to the idiots out there you need to take the hobby really seriously, and be really committed, therefore its too much for me and a lot of others. Its a small cost (of course) that I have to bear because people are idiots and the severity of possible consequence with guns is so high.
Questioning their mental health says far more about your own ability to empathise than theirs.
Refer to above, for my empathy, but the point is, no one should need to empathise. No one should be blaming responsible gun owners, but the cost of the hobby is directly impacted by its dangerous nature and possible misuses.
I wasn’t going to respond, but I have a few spare minutes.
My response isn’t even really to you, it’s just more of an observation on my part based on the sorts of messages I see in places like this about how “you can’t compare guns to other inanimate object” or “gun buybacks” or “meat is murder” or “shooters are psychotic” or whatever.
Let me start by saying, I’m going to obey any and all laws.
99.9% of gun owners will when it comes down to it, and the .1 were going to break any laws we make that gets in their way anyway.
Most of the community don’t think of guns at all, they’re a fictional thing of movies and tv and games, unless they see a cop on the street.
But there seems to be a small subset of people who think that gun owners just need to “get it” and stop.
That if “it” is explained to us properly, we’ll just hand our guns back and pick a “better” hobby.
That fundamentally misunderstands humans.
I drink alcohol.
I ride a motorcycle.
I eat sugary and fatty foods, especially meat (what kind of hunter would I be if I didn’t?).
I do lots of stuff that is objectively risky to myself and/or others, yet are legal and I enjoy them.
Trying to convince a gun owner that they should just give up their hobby isn’t a matter of offsetting the loss with a buyback or convincing us that killing animals is bad, or that the community would be safer without our dangerous weapons or whatever.
We already have something that we like, and will do it for as long as we are allowed.
Stopping me involves changing the laws out from under me, and I’m going to advocate for the status quo as hard as any anti argues for the change.
It’s not pretending to be a victim when someone threatens to change those laws under me.
Anti’s just think it’s ok for me to take the hit, in what they see as my and the communities best interest.
So I guess I’ll vote my way, and they’ll vote theirs.
To be clear, not an attack on you /u/Gorgritch_umie_killa, I’m just wasting a few moments offering some mental context for why I say “no”.
Given that I genuinely want to know and I don’t want to be in an echo chamber, what exactly about the law is bad?
It sounds like you have a gun for hunting. So if I’m reading the legislation right, if you are licensed, you can have up to five rifles. You are required to store them securely and can’t go traipsing down St George’s Tce toting your hunting rifle. This all sounds completely reasonable to me. I don’t get the controversy from the gun gang.
I have a mate who is a farmer and he needs a few rifles to protect his sheep, control feral animals, sometimes ethically put animals out of their misery. He also needs to store his rifles in a secure safe. That all sounds completely fine with me also.
I have two friends/colleagues who are into sport shooting and fire handguns at the range. They can’t take their guns home and need to store them at the range. Again, this sounds reasonable.
I was surprised that the dude who killed two women a couple of months ago could have handguns at home. he was a collector and had over a dozen handguns in his house. This does not sound reasonable to me. For obvious reasons. He was a law abiding citizen until the afternoon he wasn’t. Even under the changed law, he’d still be able to have handguns at home - just not as many.
Help us to understand what the actual problem is?
Oh boo hoo.
I guarantee the same people whining about this are dodge ram drivers whining about potholes, about solar, about getting vaccinated and bikes. And they’re the type who bully everyone onsite and call everything they think makes them seem less nacho woke
I believe there is a small subset of people who cause 99% of the problems
And that’s the target market for nationals
Gun owners need to understand that it isn’t a right, its a privilege
I was pretty upset, thinking that I was reading about Washington State, since it is explicitly a right, as defined in the 2nd amendment of the United States Constitution. We have some really tough gun laws in Washington State too, so although I was upset, I wasn’t really surprised. Anyways, I was glad to see the context was Western Australia, although I do feel for you guys who don’t like it. For those of you that do like it, congratulations, you got your wishes.
@Gorgritch_umie_killa
I was nursing on duty at Fremantle Hospital when bikers arrived and discharged an injured gang member at gunpoint in 1993. Even with the strictest controls, guns get stolen or sold to bad people. The fewer weapons, the better in my opinion.
Jesus thats heavy. Wanted to get him out of there before cops arrived i’m guessing.
@Gorgritch_umie_killa
yes. My father in law is a semi-retired farmer. two rifles in a cabinet. responsible ownership is no problem with the new laws.
