What is natural?

@kellyjay said
Again it is not the gun it is who is shooting so it wouldn’t change anything.

Well, I think this statement is obviously wrong. The choice of weapon obviously matters.

If the Uvalde shooter had access to a rocket launcher, I'm sure many more than 19 would have died.

As much as you might wish, pure evil alone can't produce results.

@bigdogg said
If the Uvalde shooter had access to a rocket launcher, I'm sure many more than 19 would have died.

I think the Uvalde mass murderer had two AR-15s and almost 300 rounds. I've been trying to talk to KellyJay about this on another concurrent thread and it would appear that his position is that the Uvalde mass murderer had a "birthright" to "keep and bear" an FN P90 ~ if he had so wanted to ~ which is a weapon that can fire more than 1,000 bullets in 60 seconds.

@bigdogg said
Well, I think this statement is obviously wrong. The choice of weapon obviously matters.

If the Uvalde shooter had access to a rocket launcher, I'm sure many more than 19 would have died.

As much as you might wish, pure evil alone can't produce results.

Yes, he could have used gas, a bomb, and all sorts of things if he intended to
murder a lot of people. Taking away one choice of many is not going to alter the
end result of someone who is fixated on killing as many people as possible, and
innocent kids to boot. Who thinks like that? Seriously taking a life is huge; it isn't
something those who are trained to do it want to do, but to look at kids and just
want to murder them, that guy's heart was so broken and given over to evil it isn't
funny, and to spend all of this time thinking about his weapon of choice instead of
his choice to murder and why is not looking at the root cause, but a side topic.

@ghost-of-a-duke said
Some of us of course live in societies and have developed a shared morality. Even without a God, it is not permitted to go around eating children.

Good for you, and since others develop to do what they will, which could include
a variety of things on their menu; if it is all developed from the ground up who
can say one way is better than another since they come from shared morality?

@kellyjay said
f it is all developed from the ground up who
can say one way is better than another since they come from shared morality?

Two thoughts. [1] You have to use your moral compass to make your subjective moral judgements about whether A is better than B etc., and [2] your moral values come from "shared morality" too, one that is rooted in your family, your neighbourhood and community life, your congregation, your workplace.

@fmf said
Two thoughts. [1] You have to use your moral compass to make your subjective moral judgements about whether A is better than B etc., and [2] your moral values come from "shared morality" too, one that is rooted in your family, your neighbourhood and community life, your congregation, your workplace.

Do you think as we use our brains to process what is good and true and what is
not that our brains are the sole source of this knowledge, am I right?

@kellyjay said
Do you think as we use our brains to process what is good and true and what is
not that our brains are the sole source of this knowledge, am I right?

Well, yes. Of course. What do you use to process "what is good and true"? Your leg? Your pancreas? Your wrist? And where do you store your knowledge? Is it not your brain?

@bigdogg said
Guns make it much easier to kill lots of people. This is obviously true.

Yes, guns cannot kill of their own accord, but they enable the most psychotic and violent among us to carry out their most depraved, murderous fantasies with little opposition, until it is too late.

I'm all for addressing mental health issues, too, but why can't we attack the problem on multiple fronts? Why can't we consider taking away all the assault rifles?

Every single government in all of history where the ruling class has no fear of the people, degenerates into a brutal regime that abuses and brutalizes it's subjects.

Tell me, what will you do when your own police state starts robbing you and raping your daughters, and they have all the weapons?

@bunnyknight said
Tell me, what will you do when your own police state starts robbing you and raping your daughters, and they have all the weapons?

Who is proposing to take away "all the weapons" away?

@fmf said
Well, yes. Of course. What do you use to process "what is good and true"? Your leg? Your pancreas? Your wrist? And where do you store your knowledge? Is it not your brain?

How we end up there is thinking about it, what we think is not the truth, it is only
our thoughts about it.

@kellyjay said
Yes, he could have used gas, a bomb, and all sorts of things if he intended to
murder a lot of people. Taking away one choice of many is not going to alter the
end result of someone who is fixated on killing as many people as possible, and
innocent kids to boot. Who thinks like that? Seriously taking a life is huge; it isn't
something those who are trained to do it want ...[text shortened]... choice instead of
his choice to murder and why is not looking at the root cause, but a side topic.

You'd be surprised how many humans will not actually do a thing if they cannot do it in a way that appeals to them.

Or, to put it another way, why didn't he take the time to make a bomb? I'm sure he could have killed many more people that way, which should have been much more satisfying to his evil heart.

This "side issue", as you call it, makes a huge difference in the amount of lives taken. I happen to think that matters, even if you do not.

@kellyjay said
Yes, he could have used gas, a bomb, and all sorts of things if he intended to
murder a lot of people.

When they banned assault weapons for a few years ~ and the number of mass shootings fell precipitously ~ and then when the Republicans rescinded that ban ~ and the number of mass shootings almost immediately tripled ~ during that period of no new assault weapons and far fewer mass shootings ~ why wasn't there an increase in mass killings with gas and bombs?

@kellyjay said
How we end up there is thinking about it, what we think is not the truth, it is only
our thoughts about it.

All you have, KellyJay, are your thoughts about "the truth" and knowledge of the law - all of which emanate from your brain.

@fmf said
All you have, KellyJay, are your thoughts about "the truth" and knowledge of the law - all of which emanate from your brain.

Actually that is all you have, you have rejected anything outside of you coming in, so your universe stops at your nose. It is also why you fail to see anything contrary to your opinion as anything other than “faith speech’ or some other demeaning term. You by definition keep reality from invading your life. You totally reject what others tell you if it runs contrary to your views, so even when we tell you your missing the point you don’t care.

@bunnyknight said
Every single government in all of history where the ruling class has no fear of the people, degenerates into a brutal regime that abuses and brutalizes it's subjects.

Tell me, what will you do when your own police state starts robbing you and raping your daughters, and they have all the weapons?

This is ridiculous and stands as a baffling apologism for an industry which garners profit from the wanton death of American citizens.

What is your little "pew pew" gonna do against rocket launchers or tanks?