Faulty premise. The most violent areas in the USA have practically banned guns outright; areas which have liberalized gun possession by the law-abiding have seen violence plummet.
I know this sounds silly at first, but it's not if you are the one involved: the right to be armed allows you to protect 1/300,000,000th of the USA - you. That's pretty serious if you're being attacked and in fear of your life.
About 15 years ago, the US government started showing signs of wanting to ratchet up violent assault against dissidents of a certain stripe, executing SWAT/commando-type raids against citizens for paperwork violations (failure to document & pay a $200 tax). In two high-profile instances of such raids, the citizens fought back; many died, but the government agents suffered such losses that in the decades since, such "Gestapo tactics" have not been used. As such, armed citizens took a meaningful stand against the government, teaching it to use its police powers tactfully & sparingly,
What you, and many like you, fail to discern is the difference between armed law-abiding citizens vs armed criminals. The former aren't a problem, proven by the fact they have >200,000,000 firearms + trillions of bullets yet aren't a problem above statistical noise. The latter ARE a well-documented problem, and are by-definition quick to violate ANY law to obtain & retain the ability to kill as they see fit. The "line in the sand" is between those two groups; disarming the former only enables the latter by presenting no resistance.
I know I've done well when I've got both sides mad at me. Here is where I see the similarity between you and those guys on the other side who are also arguing with me: you want a perfect solution. My initial comment poses gun rights as a tradeoff between violence and the limitations on governmental power. This makes your side start commenting about how guns are a perfect solution, they'll lower violence. And it causes the gun-controllers to start talking about how gun control is a perfect solution because it will lower violence and it's pointless to try to overthrow the government.
Now it's hard to have a fact-based debate about guns considering the polarized discourse. I ask three things.
1) Consider that just maybe, access to a device which allows you to kill quickly, cleanly and with lessened emotional involvement (versus say a knife) leads to more people murdering.
2) Consider that people are not cleanly seperated into law-abiders and criminals, people move back and forth all the time and there are various degrees of law-breaking and criminality. When you turn people who commit gun crimes into an other, it's a lot easier to seperate yourself from their actions. I would also say that saying that criminals are all these extreme monsters who will violate ANY law to be able to kill however they want is just a complete mischaracterization.
3) Consider that I support the bill this thread is about and reread my initial comment.
I know this sounds silly at first, but it's not if you are the one involved: the right to be armed allows you to protect 1/300,000,000th of the USA - you. That's pretty serious if you're being attacked and in fear of your life.
About 15 years ago, the US government started showing signs of wanting to ratchet up violent assault against dissidents of a certain stripe, executing SWAT/commando-type raids against citizens for paperwork violations (failure to document & pay a $200 tax). In two high-profile instances of such raids, the citizens fought back; many died, but the government agents suffered such losses that in the decades since, such "Gestapo tactics" have not been used. As such, armed citizens took a meaningful stand against the government, teaching it to use its police powers tactfully & sparingly,
What you, and many like you, fail to discern is the difference between armed law-abiding citizens vs armed criminals. The former aren't a problem, proven by the fact they have >200,000,000 firearms + trillions of bullets yet aren't a problem above statistical noise. The latter ARE a well-documented problem, and are by-definition quick to violate ANY law to obtain & retain the ability to kill as they see fit. The "line in the sand" is between those two groups; disarming the former only enables the latter by presenting no resistance.