The CA law requiring a fixed magazine was an attempt to make weapons like the AR too difficult to reload to be an effective weapon. So technology that was used to more quickly reload firearms more than 100 years ago was adapted for use in the AR, negating the purpose of the law. demonstration video (@ 0:22) You simply can't overcome innovation with legislation.
I live in CA and have had to modify my ARs. Apparently, if the webbing between your thumb and forefinger is below the level of the top of the trigger, you are more likely to commit murder. Maybe we can ban webbing!!!
Let's be real, clearly semi-automatic rifles and pistols are capable of killing lots of people. Let's say you're taking time to aim between shots and are shooting 40 rounds per minute. If your shots are on center mass you will definitely kill dozens of people. The issue is that us Australians have legal semi-auto pistols too and people don't go on Virginia Tech style shooting sprees and kill 38 people. Clearly it is more than the gun. Guns do not jump out of your hands and go on shooting sprees. We have legal handgun ownership, but it takes 6 months of club membership to get one. I doubt this would seriously deter any malicious actors, but it's not a deal breaker as a competition shooter. I spend a lot of time at the club anyway. Chances are you do more than 6 shoots a year. In a country where guns are viewed with suspicion at best this ain't too bad of a system. We're lucky to have any, we dont have the 2nd Amendment.
When the targets are unarmed and petrified with fear, being able to fire a little faster isn't that big of a difference. If we managed to get all the semi-autos and magazines away from the public, crazy folks would use revolvers and lever actions with similar results. They dont because ARs and glocks are 'cool', not because they need an extra shot per second to get a high body count. One stark stark difference between America and countries with less spree killers (aside from gun rights) is how we treat our mentally ill.
That 7% of the population that commits 50% of the violent crime is a unique issue too. The Czechs have shall issue concealed carry and legal MSR's. The Brits have neither. Yet the Czechs have equal or lower rates of both gun homicides and mass shootings. Clearly there is something going on in the US beyond firearms.
Then if handguns are truly legal in the nation of Australia, why exactly are they not being utilized in the commission of mass shootings, despite being available and easily for such purposes by those who own them?
Virginia Beach was handguns, two of them, with the element of surprise. Add to that a disarmed public by city law and you got a recipe for disaster. Because the bad guys don't give a hoot about laws, mere words on paper.
So you admit people are the problem, since that is true then why do you insist going after the tool versus going after the actual problem and solving it? Seems to me you really don't want to solve the problem, you are just using the problem as so many anti-gunners do, to harass law abiding gun owners. Which is becoming very clear with each of your posts is your true goal.
Well these days you can imagine some geek building a robotic gun and programming it to go on a rampage.
Most of our gun crime is gang or drug crime related. Most of the remainders are murder suicides and the like. Mass shootings make up a fairly small amount of the total. They are also mostly preventable by allowing the victims to be armed. So says the FBI.
