Purely academic discussion about gun control

You are not proposing an Acedemic debate, but one where you want to dictate the terms and bounds. You lost this debate long ago.
As for the Constitution’s acknowledgement and imposed constraints on the government, the 2A is the result of that debate by those far more capable than you.
To say something is wrong with society is to assign an value judgement based on your set of biases and further, you imply what is wrong is somehow linked to the gun debate. I will counter, it is that kind of thinking that is wrong.
The issue of changing the constitutional constraints on the Government to infringe on one of the fundamental rights recognized in the Constitution is not an acedemic exercise; the process is prescribed in the Constitution. Just get enough people to agree to what you want, get the votes and do it...simple...always has been.
As for a debate over the moral questions related to liberty, recognized rights of the individual, the right of self defense, etc.... the debate has raged through out this formum and others for centuries.
Then too, given your level of bias, you aren’t open to a debate where you’d accept the potential you might be persuaded out of the hole of your bias.

 

C'est possible that was some time ago? Not all is currently as it would appear to Americans.

https://www.businessinsider.com.au/does-switzerland-give-every-citizen-a-gun-2018-2?r=US&IR=T

 

About 19 years ago.

I know things have been changing in Switzerland since then, and the laws are different in different cantons.

Most of those things in that article you cited were not the case in this situation.
For one thing, he had already served his mandatory 2 years military time, but he was still in the age range (up to 46?) where could be called up at any time and still had certain obligations. There were at least six rounds right besides the rifle he was required to keep, and I believe it had a setting for automatic and 2-round bursts, but I might be remembering wrong because this was a long time ago. It was kept locked in the shelter beneath the house. I think there was a large safe kept in the shelter, but he didn't bother keeping it in the safe, which in any case didn't matter because the shelter room had a very secure bomb-proof vault-style door that could be kept locked. (All homes and structures in the country were legally required to be built with these type of bomb shelters up until the 90s)
Also I seem to remember some sort of plastic seal tag that was wrapped around the rifle, and he could get a big fine if this seal was broken. It definitely wasn't there for his own personal use.

The man had a psychiatrist and was on mood stabilizers, but from my understanding (at least at that time and in that canton) you'd either have to be certifiably psychiatrically insane or have committed a serious violent crime to be exempted from the requirement. (I don't think women were subject to that requirement either, only all male citizens in that canton between a certain age range)​

 

Thank you - that was a lifetime ago for me, having been born in the late nineties! In fact the gun bans in the UK and Australia had only recently been enacted at that time.

However, you make a valid point about Switzerland - it has a relatively low gun death rate, given the relatively high incidence of firearms.

It is not however, as relatively low as popularly imagined. Here are some gun death rates per 100,000 citizens.

USA. 11.9
South Africa 8.3
Mexico 7.64
Argentina 6.9
Switzerland 3.0
Austria 2.9
France 2.8
Israel 2.1
Canada 2.0
Norway 1.8
Italy 1.3
Denmark 1.2
Germany 1.0
Australia 1.0
UK 0.2

Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

 

We should be discussing how to prevent murder, not how many guns a non-violent person may buy. I do not believe that grenades are legal to own, but they are not complicated. Should we regulate ball bearings and pressure cookers? Gasoline?

When it comes down to it, gun control discussion are about disarming non-violent people and do not address the real issue. Non-violent people should be able to buy all the guns, gasoline, fertilizer, they want.

 

Indeed, many things were different in all our societies two decades ago.

 

everybody starts out being non-violent.

every criminal was born a non-criminal.

 

oh great, so you oppose rules and regs for automobiles too?

they reduce the risk of accidents and deaths, but I guess that's not a good enough reason for you.

 

well that is ****ing dangerous and insane.

if that person ends up killing himself or others due to his illness that the military is now fully aware of, that's a MASSIVE lawsuit that they deserve to lose.

shameful.

 

Many things in our societies were different seven decades ago.

Lots of stories on that, stories many here might have trouble believing, but those stories are for another time, another thread.

 

criminals get guns from folks who are not banned from getting guns.

 

And those straw purchases continue even with a ten year prison sentence for the seller? Why do straw purchasers ignore the threat of 10 years in jail?

 

It wasn't for home defense. I believe the rationale was that in the event of a sudden unexpected invasion, the citizenry might not be able to get to the militia center in time and would have to be prepared to fight it out.
Realistically, the chance of being invaded at that time was very slim to non-existent, but the government had that mentality and it was their policy to be prepared. The shelters all had state of the art air filters that would be able to filter out radioactivity in the event of a nuclear attack.
Their national defense strategy was to make it so costly and difficult for any occupying force to invade that nobody would even think about it.

 

Not entirely true. There are actual brain differences in people like serial killers.

 

and in doing so, break the law-

so using your logic, guns should be banned and then people who already are banned from owning guns cannot get them from those who would follow the law

 

That is false. Violence is wired into our DNA. If a toddler takes a toy away from another, what happens next?

We start out violent, but modern society requires humans to process the signals from the amygdala differently. Most of learn over time, but others just learn to hide it to avoid consequences. As they grow, hiding it becomes more difficult, so we end up medicating them. As in many of these murders, we knew there was an issue long before they pulled the trigger.

 

I don't think they are lawsuit crazy in that country.

Despite your imaginings about lawsuits and whacky ideas holding entities responsible and squeezing money out of them when they aren't really the one responsible for what happened.​

 

And in some countries like South Africa, and even certain cities in the U.S., those folks who criminals get guns from are police.

 

The crime rate in that country has been going up. Let's just say the Swiss are not the ones responsible.
When you have a successful economy, it begins attracting a lot of people from other parts of the world.

The total homicide rate in the country is still only 0.6 per 100,000.
(source here)

It would appear then that the vast majority of gun deaths in that country are not homicides.

 

Guns aren't dangerous. People are dangerous.

 

so guns are as dangerous as an apple? as a banana?

please...

 

no one is born a killer.

no one is born a criminal.

we all start out with a fresh, clean slate. We all can become serial killers or Mother Theresa.

 

Yes. Including rocks, frogs, & feathers all of which are found in my back yard and to date none of those objects have killed anyone.

 

yes, its illegal for convicted felons to possess a gun.

but that doesn't stop them from possessing guns.

so clearly folks who are NOT convicted felons, are selling guns to convicted felons.

we need to make this more difficult.

one way would be to limit handgun purchases to 1 per month, so no one person can become a 1-man gun running enterprise.

the vast majority of gun owners would not be affected one ounce by such a rule.

 

comparing feathers to guns, is absurd and logically dishonest.