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[Morrigi]

Nope, one I'm talking about was at a train station. 29 dead, 130 injured.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/01/world/asia/china-railway-attack/

Great exemple. Look how it took 10 people with knife to manage that dead toll. Now, imagine the bloodbath if those ten had guns. See?

Of course you can kill without a gun, but not nearly as efficiently. And of course you can organize illegal guns, but that requires more organisation, contacts and an organized group, meaning the police has more time to arrest you.

Now, you can argue that letting people have the guns they want is worth making life easier for terrorists. And I would not disagree. But it's kind of ridiculous to argue that letting anyone buy machines honed for efficient murder doesn't make it easier for people to kill other people.

Have you ever shot a gun? Ever killed something with one? They aren't magic, don't make you a god. The vast majority of gun wounds don't kill. You have to hit something important and that is very hard to do.
The Orlando shooter probably followed Breivik's example and "finished" people.

There is a reason that the 21 foot rule exists and ever hunter carries a knife to finish off game.

The FBI found that more officers were killed with guns, but knife attacks were 3x more lethal.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-2013-statistics-on-law-enforcement-officers-killed-and-assaulted (This isn't the exact study so you'll have to dig in a bit)

And I love how you ignore all stats. The US has lax gun ownership and a (relatively) high homicide rate, ok. UK has strict gun ownership and has a bit lower homicide rate, ok. The Swiss have lax gun ownership and have a much lower homicide rate than both. My corner of south west Missouri (region with the highest guns per capita in the world) has 1/14 the homicide rate of gun-free Chicago and 1/2 of London.

Look at the graphs. Gun ownership and homicide rate are not related.
http://i.stack.imgur.com/eEGky.jpg

Facts and logic?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!!

[Vilanat]

Hunting with an AR-15? Protecting your self from robberies with the most popular military assault weapon? Recreational use?

Maybe it's, again, the dumb "restriction on fully automatic mode" that managed to make that an acceptable reality, but people with bit of an experience with an AR15/M16/M4 would certainly tell you that the fully automatic mode is the "recreational" mode while the semi automatic is the one you use if you actually want to hit your targets. there is simply no actual use for the automatic mode since it is aimed at suppression, essentially, scaring your opponent to lower his head so he can't shoot back which is kinda redundant giving that every squad has SAW that far better serve that purpose. even, if not especially, in a club full of people, firing on semi automatic is far more deadly which is partially why that killer had such a high casualty rate. removing the full auto mode so it could be sold is just a cynical spin by the NRA.

The twisting feature of the AR15 barrel makes it a bad hunting-for-food rifle because it raises the chances the bullet will bounce inside the animal's body and leave poisonous led fragments, unless the hunter uses a led free ammunition which i bet is something most AR15 owners don't use. regardless, even if it can be used as a hunting rifle, so what? an FN MINIMI can also be used as a hunting weapons.

An AR15 is a bad weapon to serve as a defense against home intruders. its size makes it impossible to get into the cupboard's drawer near the bed so it's less likely to be easily accessible. its longer frame and heavier weight gives a slower twist arc, which is why in close quarters soldiers prefer other weapons. its only advantage is in its fire power, but any 9MM handgun would suffice at those ranges.

A Collectors item? i carried an M4 for 3 years, literally day and night and there's nothing i wanted more than to get it home with me and keep it for the sentimental values. but who gives a damn what i or others want? assault weapons should not be collectors items just like Claymore mines, mobile mortar launch pads and hand held rocket launchers shouldn't be. it might upset some people but that's very acceptable in my opinion.

I am not strictly against licensing hand guns for protection but allowing civilian people to buy military assault weapons for that purpose is taking it way too far.

Btw, If you want a good example for mass shootings getting contained have a look at the recent terror attack in Tel Aviv where after less than 5 minutes it was over because of the readily available armed guards who managed to contain two terrorists, which resulted in 4 kills, 1 of which wasn't even hit by a single bullet but died of a heart attack.

[Frumple]

The FBI found that more officers were killed with guns, but knife attacks were 3x more lethal.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-2013-statistics-on-law-enforcement-officers-killed-and-assaulted (This isn't the exact study so you'll have to dig in a bit)

And I love how you ignore all stats. The US has lax gun ownership and a (relatively) high homicide rate, ok. UK has strict gun ownership and has a bit lower homicide rate, ok. The Swiss have lax gun ownership and have a much lower homicide rate than both. My corner of south west Missouri (region with the highest guns per capita in the world) has 1/14 the homicide rate of gun-free Chicago and 1/2 of London.

... UK has a homicide rate about a forth that of the US. That is... not a "bit" smaller. You'd have better luck making a case for violent crime in general in a comparison between those two, just be careful about the differences in categorization (What the UK calls violent crime is significantly broader than what the US does... something along those lines, anyway. UK's actually a bit more violent or around par once you correct for that, iirc, but again, somewhere in the ballpark of 3-4x more likely to walk away.) Switzerland also has pretty strict bullet control measures, even if their gun ownership laws are fairly lax. It's basically never the example you want to bring up to say gun control laws don't have an effect, because it actually has pretty strong ones, just not centered around the guns themselves.

Uh. Also, that link says that none of the officers killed that year were killed by knives. Maybe you were intending a different link? Digging a bit more both on FBI's site and google has provided nothing supporting th'claim that knife attacks were 3x more lethal. Got no clue how you'd even come to that conclusion, especially using US statistics. Will see if I can dig up where the statement is coming from, but maybe you just linked to the wrong article?

E: Okay, checked pretty much everything those 2013 FBI statistics had to offer and... you couldn't get knives being more lethal than firearms out of that data pretty much regardless as to what you did (short of multiplying by negatives or somethin', I guess.). Firearms killed more and they killed more relative to the number assaults. Compare tables 30 and 70. Cops were more likely to be injured by knives, but were almost never killed by them; firearms are several dozen times more lethal by the data on officer deaths and assaults, and significantly more likely (to the tune of somewhere between 2 and 3 times) to be encountered even if they're less likely to injure in comparison (by around a forth, if I'm offhand mathing right).

[Erkki]

The twisting feature of the AR15 barrel makes it a bad hunting-for-food rifle because it raises the chances the bullet will bounce inside the animal's body and leave poisonous led fragments, unless the hunter uses a led free ammunition which i bet is something most AR15 owners don't use. regardless, even if it can be used as a hunting rifle, so what? an FN MINIMI can also be used as a hunting weapons.

I'm not sure if anyone here has suggested AR-15 for hunting or self defence, but I want to correct this: M4 has high rate of twist to stabilize heavier bullets. 1:7" twist stabilizes up to 80-ish grains I believe and the mk262 mod0 is 77gr hollow point. I guess thats was one of the things changed to help with the bit of lost muzzle speed when moving down from M-16's 20" barrel to 14½", ie. so at least the M4 would stabilize the heavy, high ballistic coefficiency bullets.

The higher the twist rate and muzzle velocity the faster the bullet spins and stabilizes, but the less stable the bullet is, the easier it'll tumble when it hits tissue, then fragment or at least make major permanent cavities if it remains in one piece. Led core bullets have been used in hunting for centuries literally... not an issue. Just leave out everything you suspect may have tiny bits of led. For all birds the bullet will usually exit the target before it fragments any way and if the hunter wants to lessen the risk of bullet fragmentation, he'll use iron jacketed(but copper surface) bullets, most of the bulk ammo(Tula Wolf, Barnaul, S&B, TopShot) is like that any way so they're also the cheapest option. You can test it out with a fridge magnet: the bullet should stick, casing not. That said I wish they sold lead free here here for .223 Rem, I'd like to see how they behave.

But the problem in case Orlando I really dont think is the AR-15. Its just one of the many products fairly easily available to Americans that are both highly powerful, controllable and have high capacity. He might as well have gotten a semi auto .308 or a semi auto shotgun. Would the death toll be any different? He should have been stopped by FBI prior to the night.

[MasterFancyPants]

The twisting feature of the AR15 barrel makes it a bad hunting-for-food rifle because it raises the chances the bullet will bounce inside the animal's body and leave poisonous led fragments, unless the hunter uses a led free ammunition which i bet is something most AR15 owners don't use. regardless, even if it can be used as a hunting rifle, so what? an FN MINIMI can also be used as a hunting weapons.

An AR15 is a bad weapon to serve as a defense against home intruders. its size makes it impossible to get into the cupboard's drawer near the bed so it's less likely to be easily accessible. its longer frame and heavier weight gives a slower twist arc, which is why in close quarters soldiers prefer other weapons. its only advantage is in its fire power, but any 9MM handgun would suffice at those ranges.

I'm sorry maybe you were in the military, but you have no idea what you are taking about.
.223 or 5.56 is a very common hunting round. Most AR-15 have shorter barrels than other .223 rifles such as the M77, Rem 700, or Savage Axis. This leads to the bullets having a slower velocity, resulting in less fracturing. And if you are really concerned just buy steel core ammunition.

Are you really suggesting that 9mm is as effective as .223? 9x19mm has ~382 foot-lbs of energy out of a 4 inch barrel. 5.56x45mm has ~1303 foot-lbs out a 18" barrel. Not to mention you have double the ammunition. Are you saying soldiers pull out their side arms in CQB?
A rifle always beats a pistol. Honestly pistols kinda suck.

An AR-15 or Semi-auto 12 gauge like the Auto-5 are the best options for home defense.

[Sonlirain]

Because i like to keep a full sized rifle in my drawer instead of a much more practical pistol that is more than enough for scaring off anyone not wearing armor.
Right.

[Shadowlord]

Because the NRA would be all over that shit making sure it made the news. ("Mass shooting averted by good guy with a gun!")

http://controversialtimes.com/issues/constitutional-rights/12-times-mass-shootings-were-stopped-by-good-guys-with-guns/

It happens. How is the NRA supposed to make sure it gets on the news? Most media has anti-gun leanings and the NRA can't force them to do anything.

And yet Trump manages to get on all the news (and news-ish shows) repeatedly with his controversial opinions, despite them not agreeing with anything he is saying.

I know nothing about that site, but assuming it didn't make any of that stuff up, that's 12 times out of how many hundreds of mass shootings? And three of those 12 were stopped by cops/rent-a-cops/"school resource officers"/etc who were either there as security or just happened to be there.

What is up with this "you can't keep a rifle in your drawer" nonsense? You can't keep a pistol in your drawer either. It's completely illegal*, and even if it wasn't illegal, it's completely unsafe (for children etc).

* It's possible it's only completely illegal here and in similar states. I don't know whether the you-must-secure-your-guns-in-a-safe-or-locked-container-or-have-a-trigger-lock-or-whatever thing is a state law or a federal one.

[Frumple]

But the problem in case Orlando I really dont think is the AR-15. Its just one of the many products fairly easily available to Americans that are both highly powerful, controllable and have high capacity. He might as well have gotten a semi auto .308 or a semi auto shotgun. Would the death toll be any different? He should have been stopped by FBI prior to the night.

The last bit is fairly true -- FBI or ATF or something, at least. It's not entirely difficult to understand some of the reasons why they didn't (ATF, in particular, is basically crippled in regards to anything related to tracking firearms or firearm users, if nothing's changed when I was looking), but yeah, ideally something like that would have happened.

... that said, as far as we know it wasn't an ar-15, but a sig sauer mcx. It's actually not particularly unlikely that if it had even been your average AR-15, the death toll would have been lower to some degree or another. Nevermind something with an even smaller consecutive shot limit. There's a hell of a difference in what you're able to do with a 10 round (which is, say, the legal limit for AR-15s in cali) and 30 round magazine (which is what the gun he used had).

And it's state, SL. I'm not even sure if there are legal restrictions on storage inside your home in florida.

[Loud Whispers]

Honestly pistols kinda suck.

Spoiler: unless you make them impractically large (click to show/hide)

That one also has a funny name, being the compensated hunter - fitting

[Ghills]

Hunting with an AR-15? Protecting your self from robberies with the most popular military assault weapon? Recreational use?

Maybe it's, again, the dumb "restriction on fully automatic mode" that managed to make that an acceptable reality, but people with bit of an experience with an AR15/M16/M4 would certainly tell you that the fully automatic mode is the "recreational" mode while the semi automatic is the one you use if you actually want to hit your targets. there is simply no actual use for the automatic mode since it is aimed at suppression,

I have heard that automatic weapons are the weapon of choice for hunting wild hogs.  I do believe this, because wild hogs are terrifying, near impossible to stop without serious firepower, and the goal is usually extermination not hunting. But I haven't actually seen it, so YMMV.

[penguinofhonor]

I get that burglars plan around locks nowadays, but why does that mean locks don't prevent crimes? It could also mean that they're a very effective deterrent, because people won't even plan to steal something unless they're also willing to break a window/door or threaten a person's life.

[Ghills]

Because the NRA would be all over that shit making sure it made the news. ("Mass shooting averted by good guy with a gun!")

http://controversialtimes.com/issues/constitutional-rights/12-times-mass-shootings-were-stopped-by-good-guys-with-guns/

It happens. How is the NRA supposed to make sure it gets on the news? Most media has anti-gun leanings and the NRA can't force them to do anything.

And yet Trump manages to get on all the news (and news-ish shows) repeatedly with his controversial opinions, despite them not agreeing with anything he is saying.

I know nothing about that site, but assuming it didn't make any of that stuff up, that's 12 times out of how many hundreds of mass shootings? And three of those 12 were stopped by cops/rent-a-cops/"school resource officers"/etc who were either there as security or just happened to be there.

What is up with this "you can't keep a rifle in your drawer" nonsense? You can't keep a pistol in your drawer either. It's completely illegal*, and even if it wasn't illegal, it's completely unsafe (for children etc).

* It's possible it's only completely illegal here and in similar states. I don't know whether the you-must-secure-your-guns-in-a-safe-or-locked-container-or-have-a-trigger-lock-or-whatever thing is a state law or a federal one.

Most gun laws are state level, IIRC.  That's part of the problem with current gun laws, really. Some state police and FBI engage in turf wars over this, not least because federal agencies often pretend that everywhere in the US is the same and try to apply blanket policies that simply don't work in local conditions. 

Trump gets airtime because he's massively controversial among reporters and important politically, so every news network has a good excuse to run him and they know it'll increase their viewership.  Gun control isn't controversial in the news industry so gun events gets much less airtime outside of immediately after a horrible mass shooting.  Also, 'we narrowly averted a disaster' is way less likely to get viewers than 'look at this horrible disaster!', so the media is heavily biased in favor of showing disasters and not system-working-as-intended.

[Erkki]

--
... that said, as far as we know it wasn't an ar-15, but a sig sauer mcx. It's actually not particularly unlikely that if it had even been your average AR-15, the death toll would have been lower to some degree or another. Nevermind something with an even smaller consecutive shot limit. There's a hell of a difference in what you're able to do with a 10 round (which is, say, the legal limit for AR-15s in cali) and 30 round magazine (which is what the gun he used had)

How would there have been less victims? It was an AR-15 based/family rifle, in the big picture functionally the same thing. Advantages and disadvantages compared to an M-16 without burst or automatic fire mode are small. For short range use the difference is basically in just the ergonomics. A typical rifle of its kind.

The number of shots one can shoot before reloading with these weapons is limited by magazine size, and the magazine wells tend to be standardized so that they all fit the STANAG 30 rounds for .223 Rem semi-autos. You can buy things like this: https://www.magpul.com/products/firearms-accessories/pmag-magazines/pmag-d60-ar-m4

[Shadowlord]

Hunting with an AR-15? Protecting your self from robberies with the most popular military assault weapon? Recreational use?

Maybe it's, again, the dumb "restriction on fully automatic mode" that managed to make that an acceptable reality, but people with bit of an experience with an AR15/M16/M4 would certainly tell you that the fully automatic mode is the "recreational" mode while the semi automatic is the one you use if you actually want to hit your targets. there is simply no actual use for the automatic mode since it is aimed at suppression,

I have heard that automatic weapons are the weapon of choice for hunting wild hogs.  I do believe this, because wild hogs are terrifying, near impossible to stop without serious firepower, and the goal is usually extermination not hunting. But I haven't actually seen it, so YMMV.

Sarah Palin would probably advise sniping them from a helicopter.

Erkki: Because the MCX is a better gun, of course. 

[LoSboccacc]

And I love how you ignore all stats. The US has lax gun ownership and a (relatively) high homicide rate, ok. UK has strict gun ownership and has a bit lower homicide rate, ok. The Swiss have lax gun ownership and have a much lower homicide rate than both. My corner of south west Missouri (region with the highest guns per capita in the world) has 1/14 the homicide rate of gun-free Chicago and 1/2 of London.

Look at the graphs. Gun ownership and homicide rate are not related.
http://i.stack.imgur.com/eEGky.jpg

apples to oranges. you are comparing countries with complete different culture, population mix, wealth divide, police training, international visibility and border rules.

the only valid comparison you can do are in those graph that have been posted over and over because those are about the same countries before and after gun bans.

we aren't ignoring stats, we only know how statistic and correlation works, beyond what media tells you to believe.  "oh look a blip on this rando year in homicide! surely means causation! "