I assume the probability of the gun being used to kill your spouse is high enough that it makes sense.
But we have a black muslim president who’s coming for our guns and going to turn 'Murrica into Mogadishu!
Rifles for home defense has always seemed crazy to me. Shotguns, yes, semiautomatic pistols, maybe. Rifles? Why!?!?
Well, the arguments made aren’t that crazy. Most folks will be more accurate with them, and in cases where someone is super familiar with it as their primary firearm, then meh.
Seems kind of unweildly in that situation, but eh, the AR15’s pretty light as far as rifles go, so maybe not.
Honestly, the idea of getting in a gunfight in your own home seems kind of silly to me anyway.
It’s An Honor To Continue Being Valued Over Countless Human Lives
By an AR-15
I don’t want to get too sentimental or anything, but it really means the world to me how often you as Americans, through your words and your actions, make it known that I am more important to you than the lives of your fellow citizens.
You see, I’m just a humble lightweight, magazine-fed semi-automatic rifle; I never expected this kind of outpouring of affection. But time and time again, you’ve shown me how much I matter to you. To see so many people—people who could be working to protect and care for human lives—actively devoting their time and energy to making sure I’m the one who’s protected and cared for instead—it’s beyond touching.
Don’t think I haven’t noticed all this. Rarely a month goes by without all of you pausing to weigh me against a certain number of lives—often a dozen or more—and quickly deciding I’m more worthwhile. Gosh, you must really, really love me.
-Todd
One thing I’ve wondered about if I ended up using a rifle (or I guess any type of firearm) for home defense is what happens if I miss? Is my round going to penetrate the walls and hit the house or apartment next door? It seems like I would be taking a big chance if I have close neighbors.
Yup. Just like a camera, the best one is the one you have right when you need it. After that, it’s the one you’re the best at using. Then, as an overall recommendation, it’s the simplest and cheapest.
Another problem with people’s perception of home protection is that shotguns are room sweepers. Actually a normal 8 or 9 pellet shell will produce a single hole about 2 inches in diameter at 15 feet. So at inside of house ranges you’d better be able to aim it as well as a handgun.
And there’s a bunch more in my cursory search, but I’m too lazy to look at more of them.
To me, this is one of the many downsides to using a rife for home defense. The ideal self defense round is a hollow point round. They are made to strike and stay. Penetration in this case is bad. The projectile is designed to expand and dump all of its force into the target. Rifle rounds OTOH can and will penetrat real well, considering the power of the shell and the shape of the projectile.
Edit: What ^^^he^^^ said.
There was a good video that went viral a little while ago of Obama answering a gun control question at a town hall meeting and one of the things he expressed frustration with was the fact that the NRA is so opposed to anything that even hints of gun control that there are laws in place preventing government studies on gun violence as a public health issue. So it’s hard to know what solutions might be effective because we’re not even allowed to study the problem in any sort of a critical way.
For the record, I believe in the right to own firearms for self-defense, hunting and even as a hobby, but I support common sense gun control such as better background checks, closing gun show loops holes and etc.
I’ve heard quite a few interesting and surprising arguments, some quite compelling, from the gun side of this issue, but so far, not a single peep about why we can’t even STUDY THE ISSUE.
Anyone got something? Or is it just cynical bullshit?
I think the argument from the NRA et. al. is that preventing the study prevents anyone from making truly effective data based arguments in favor of gun control by drastically limiting the data available. And, frankly, while that’s super cynical, I imagine it’s a step that the fossil fuels industry wishes they’d been able to make against climate data.
That doesn’t sound like an argument. It sounds like basic obstruction. Am I wrong?
So, it looks like one powerful lobby wants to make research a top priority.
http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/news/news/2016/2016-06-14-gun-violence-lobby-congress.page
About fucking time.
There are special rounds you can get that wont really penetrate much, all the AR15 supporters Fish linked talk about them. Basically frangible rounds as far as I can tell. With standard ammo, you’d be shooting through an invader and then into your neighbor’s house probably. Hell, you’d likely be liable if anything happened and it went to court.
Yeah, I do. Especially an SBR. It is extremely maneuverable, very modular so you can attach pretty much any light/laser/optic you want, and with the right ammo over penetration is not an issue. All that while being much more lethal than a handgun.
I won’t argue with anyone that says a shotgun is the best home defense weapon, I agree with that in general.
I’d love to see 4 years of President Trump articles on the Onion…but obviously not enough to wish that it actually happens.
LG&M points out highly-unsurprising research from April:
Racial prejudice could play a significant role in white Americans’ opposition to gun control, according to new research from political scientists at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
In their paper, published in the journal Political Behavior in November, Alexandra Filindra and Noah J. Kaplan found that whites were significantly less likely to support gun control measures when they had recently looked at pictures of black people, than when they had looked at pictures of white people. The study, which surveyed 1,000 white respondents, also found that the higher they scored on a common measure of racial prejudice, the stronger negative effect the photos of black people had on the respondents’ support for gun control.
Taken together, those two findings “demonstrate that racial prejudice influences white opinion regarding gun regulation in the contemporary United States,” Filindra and Kaplan conclude. But why would that be the case?
To explain this, Filindra and Kaplan draw on a rich body of sociological literature about the language of racial resentment, especially among whites. Racial resentment, as Filindra and Kaplan define it, is a prejudice based in the belief that blacks don’t value independence and hard work and instead push for special rights conferred by the government. It upholds whites as morally superior while ignoring the structural advantages of whiteness.
At this point I’m pretty sure more people would agree with the statement “I am a duck” after looking at pictures of black people.