I support the second amendment...unless it's a %^&$ing smartgun

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I'll make it known that I don't support the government using precogs to arrest people before they commit a crime.

Okay, cool, but what about for citizens with criminal records or mental issues? Those on probation, maybe? We can add in baby steps to make this more palatable if you want.

[molson]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

I doubt this gun would sell much anyway, so why all the paranoid fuss?

It's not likely we get to a gun ban or gps gun tracking/kill switches any time soon. So in that sense it's definitely paranoia, but a lot of people do support those things, so I can understand why gun owners see that as the end goal. I don't know how prevalent those views are, but a few posters express them in every gun control thread here. And I'm sure I lot of other people hold those things as the ideal, but are strategic enough to know that the only gun control measure you should ever publicly support is the next one, not one 10 steps from now.

[molson]

Originally Posted by Mike D

Also, could you imagine if the watch had built-in GPS that sends the location of the owner and the gun back to the FBI or city police? That would be very helpful in proactive law enforcement. If a guy who lives predominately in the southeast side of town suddenly crosses the railroad tracks with his gun, we could send a car over to either arrest, survey, or at least do a search and seizure....drug checks, whatever. Why not? The technology exists, after all, to do it. Think of the lives we could save by strictly enforcing strong laws against ourselves.

That sounds scary. But I kind of appreciate the consistency of attacking crime with both a strict interpretation of the 2nd Amendment AND a loose interpretation of the 4th Amendment. It seems like the more common view is that crime is really bad, and we need to scale back gun rights to fight it but, in all other contexts - rights are more important that security. (I love how that Ben Franklin quote about liberty and security can be used by the NRA to defend gun rights, and by others to defend the Fourth Amendment) That's just so shallow and transparent to me. I think so don't care about gun rights because they don't use gun rights. They care about other rights because they do use them and might be impacted personally. It's like an old man who's never been on a computer being a staunch NSA proponent because he finds computers creepy and weird. That being said, I do think the 2nd Amendment permits a ton of gun regulation, more than we have, and I think there's plenty of reasonable arguments for more. I think you have to be a little more sympathetic and understanding to the other side to make progress though, like Bill Clinton was in the 90s. ("We want to ban assault weapons, but it's not because we look down on you and want to control you, we really do just want to battle crime, and to prove it, we'll also fund tens of thousands of new policeman, increase minimum sentences for federal crimes, build new prisons, etc.) The tricky part is that latter stuff is harder to swallow in an era of rapidly declining crime. But you have to give up something. "Compromise" isn't, "I want to heavily regulate guns, but I'll settle for regulating them slightly less".

[EagleFan]

Gun owners don't do logic well. It would only be gun owners BUYING these guns, thus the whole gun owner thing. If you don't want that technology... DON't F*CKING BUY IT!!!! It's not going to continue to exist if it's not making money, companies aren't in the business for the hell of it.

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by molson

It's not likely we get to a gun ban or gps gun tracking/kill switches any time soon. So in that sense it's definitely paranoia, but a lot of people do support those things, so I can understand why gun owners see that as the end goal. I don't know how prevalent those views are, but a few posters express them in every gun control thread here. And I'm sure I lot of other people hold those things as the ideal, but are strategic enough to know that the only gun control measure you should ever publicly support is the next one, not one 10 steps from now.

I think they express those views because history has shown time and time again that governments sometimes mutate into something different than what they were. Obviously that won't ever happen in America. So tracking guns should be okay here.

[JPhillips]

Originally Posted by molson

It's not likely we get to a gun ban or gps gun tracking/kill switches any time soon. So in that sense it's definitely paranoia, but a lot of people do support those things, so I can understand why gun owners see that as the end goal. I don't know how prevalent those views are, but a few posters express them in every gun control thread here. And I'm sure I lot of other people hold those things as the ideal, but are strategic enough to know that the only gun control measure you should ever publicly support is the next one, not one 10 steps from now.

Do you really want to go down a path where the view of small minorities justifies any extremism? Surely you'd agree the extremist gun control position is a small minority and wields basically no power, right? Saying we can't allow anything that a five or ten percent chunk of the population may abuse at some indeterminate point in the future would mean that basically nothing new can ever be sold.

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Do you really want to go down a path where the view of small minorities justifies any extremism? Surely you'd agree the extremist gun control position is a small minority and wields basically no power, right? Saying we can't allow anything that a five or ten percent chunk of the population may abuse at some indeterminate point in the future would mean that basically nothing new can ever be sold.

I'm pretty sure there's a lot of paths we go down, depending on the amount of damage it can do. For instance, nukes and biological agents- we're all pretty much in agreement that those should be illegal for the general populace (i.e. not military or doctors studying diseases). Not many people would use those wrongly but the ones that would could do a lot of damage.

SI

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by Mike D

I think they express those views because history has shown time and time again that governments sometimes mutate into something different than what they were. Obviously that won't ever happen in America. So tracking guns should be okay here.

I think another thing that history has also shown time and time again is that we rarely reach the bottom of every perceived slippery slope or every worst case scenario.

SI

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by sterlingice

I think another thing that history has also shown time and time again is that we rarely reach the bottom of every perceived slippery slope or every worst case scenario.

SI

Agreed, we cannot predict the future or the end goals of unstated end goals. History only allows us to be more weary. Are you at least allowing us that much?

[sterlingice]

Originally Posted by Mike D

Agreed, we cannot predict the future or the end goals of unstated end goals. History only allows us to be more weary. Are you at least allowing us that much?

If you had only asked for that much, it would have been perfectly reasonable. But it sounded like asking for a mile when given an inch and the compromise point between the two is much closer to two inches than a half mile because of how absurd the opening bid was.

SI