I have, but it’s because I’m trans and I lived in a bad place for trans people.
I've never been in a situation where me having a gun would have made things bettter.
Submitted 3 days ago by miked@piefed.social to showerthoughts@lemmy.world
Comments
zeroday@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
WorldsDumbestMan@lemmy.today 2 days ago
Give it a bit, we all will.
Chippys_mittens@lemmy.world 2 days ago
You’re lucky and part of the majority then.
Widdershins@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Let me ask you this: a guy breaks into your house, but you don’t have a gun. How are you going to shoot him?
TherapyGary@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 days ago
Idk if this was supposed to be funny, but it made me laugh
Widdershins@lemmy.world 3 days ago
I added a little context because in hindsight not everyone will recognize that quote.
jerkface@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
You don’t know that!! Just think how tyrannical the USA would be if its citizens WEREN’T armed!!!
miked@piefed.social 2 days ago
When have the citizens of the US used weapons to stop tyranny?
ChillPenguin@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Never. A vast majority of them clap when the tyranny pushes their boots on the citizens necks.
shalafi@lemmy.world 2 days ago
How do you think the fascists would be operating at this moment if they knew they could attack anyone, anywhere, any home, with absolute impunity?
“But they’re already doing that!”
Nope, not so much as they would. Notice the places they’re snatching people, public spaces where arms are not allowed, in typically unarmed states and cities. Why the hell are they not raiding Texas and Florida where there are shitloads of immigrants?
Not that I think the actors in Ruby Ridge and Waco were saints, but notice we haven’t seen anything like that since? These fuckers are much more cautious now. Which, I will allow, can make the same fuckers more dangerous. I get that too.
shalafi@lemmy.world 2 days ago
They’d already be kicking down doors with impunity. People seem to thinks guns are kill machines when they’re often a deterrence.
WizardofFrobozz@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
They already are.
Americans are cowards.
E_coli42@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I think guns make sense if you live in the wilderness and need to protect yourself from bears
Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
The city is a concrete jungle. We already said we’d choose the bear. Its not the bear we need guns for.
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
Not just bears and really there’s better ways to deal with bears generally to avoid confrontation with them as well as other critters. Still, there’s definitely instances where people will want to be carrying regardless for self protection. Hiking in remote areas you should have a rifle, farmers in the more rural areas of the country are likely to have something to deal with coyotes, wolves, bears, etc. that may threaten them or their live stock. I remember seeing a youtube video about living far north in Alaska that when it’s time to take the dogs out to do their business they bring a high powered rifle for polar bears. But me going to my local game store, there’s no real reason to be packing. ESPECIALLY open carry.
doingthestuff@lemy.lol 1 day ago
Yeah I’ve had the tent I was sleeping in broken by a bear while solo backpacking. I didn’t end up needing to shoot it but I always carry bear spray and a gun when I’m solo camping in bear country.
Donebrach@lemmy.world 1 day ago
But what if you wanted to shoot a gun? Surely that would make that situation better.
Glory to Mankind
Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world 2 days ago
And Iam thankful that in my life this is true. But not everyone is so lucky.
Semester3383@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I have. I’ve been in places and situations where being able to get someone to back down and slow their roll would have been a better outcome than what I was able to get without being armed. Shit just happened around me, and I couldn’t exit the situation in good conscience. It’s terrifying to try to stand up to stop shit from going really sideways knowing that if it does, there’s not a lot you can do except be a meat shield for someone else. Almost all defensive gun use doesn’t involve shooting; it involves having a gun, knowing how to use it, and using the threat of force to stop someone else from escalating a situation.
People say that when seconds count, the police are only minutes away, and fuck me, that is extremely optimistic. I’ve never had the cops show up in under five minutes; the closest was about ten minutes, and that was after a shooting in my 'hood in Chicago. CPD showed up after the ambulance.
Drun@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Let’s imagine that the weapons are extremely hard to get, and normal people can’t afford even legal ones (because of checks and prices), not to say about illegal. Wouldn’t your place be better one if that was so?
BootLoop@sh.itjust.works 3 days ago
Let me try to convince this rabid raccoon into killing itself by talking to it.
absentbird@lemmy.world 3 days ago
A lot of the other hypotheticals make more sense to me than this one. The raccoon is dying already, you just need to avoid it. A gun isn’t even the most effective tool for this problem, it’s a small moving target. Trap it.
87Six@lemmy.zip 3 days ago
Pepper spray exists…
Or you know a billion other methods of fending off a racoon
Can’t tell if this is satire tbh
Gonzako@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Picture, stick
Akasazh@feddit.nl 3 days ago
How often do you come across rabid raccoons?
pixeltree@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 days ago
I have! If I’d had a gun a year ago, I’d’ve shot myself instead of half assing it
Zetta@mander.xyz 2 days ago
Domt unplug urself man
shalafi@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Been confronted in the woods by angry rednecks twice in the last year or two. Simply amazing how polite they were to my scrawny ass when I was visibly armed. LOL, one dude was so fucking mad he was vibrating, yet oh so polite.
Cops at my door were also extraordinarily polite after they walked up and say my pump shotgun leaning on my desk.
MAGA neighbor came stomping down the street to kick my ass. (OK, I started that one.) I spun on my heel, walked inside, grabbed my Colt .45 and waited. He got the idea and went home. (He never saw it, and I never threatened.)
Contrast those with other such encounters where, well, let’s say it went much worse for me. And if you don’t believe that, you’ve never had your ass kicked or had the cops fuck you up.
While guns can be excellent deterrents, please no one think they’re magic “get off me machines”. You never draw your concealed weapon to “scare them off”. If you draw, you shoot to kill. And if you weren’t scared enough to kill, why the fuck did you draw a weapon?! The court will be asking, I assure you.
Conceal carry instructor told the class, “If you shoot someone to stop a thing from happening, you better be sure stopping that thing was worth risking life in a concrete and steel box, because that might well be the outcome.”
MajorasMaskForever@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I think it’s a perception and noticeability problem.
I’ve been around a lot of guys who cc, and I only knew because it happened or come up in conversation or someone else told me. If I walked by them on the street, never would have noticed.
Former friend from highschool, his whole family was military, gun nuts, who all cc and they made sure you knew it. The dude went into national guard and was ecstatic about getting deployed to the local large city during a police brutality protest.
For a lot of people, I feel like the later is the more common experience with cc than the former, despite the former being the truly more common one
PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
I’ve definitely had some rural evenings that would have been better with the ability to shoot some cans.
I don’t think that’s the kind of “better” you were talking about
Jhex@lemmy.world 2 days ago
outside of the movies, there is RARELY (as in astronomically small percentage) one… the problem is that most Muricans live in a fictional reality with the reasoning capacity of a teen boy
Skankhunt420@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
I have, but its because of where I live.
BigTuffAl@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Same, been in multiple life or death situations and none were improved by a gun. Staring down the barrel is so fucking funny when the only reason you’re there is because it is freedom or death. Like they don’t expect you to pick death if you don’t get freedom?
TheV2@programming.dev 3 days ago
I will gift a water bottle to anyone named “Mike D” who posts a picture of their gun within the next five minutes.
tourist@lemmy.world 3 days ago
hello Mike D never showed up
may I have the water
rekabis@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
I have always been of the opinion that if you cannot solve a violent/dangerous situation with six or less bullets, it is vanishingly unlikely that anything will materially change in your favour if you had more.
brygphilomena@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
Ive considered conceal carry.
People would say my .38 special with 6 rounds isn’t enough. If six rounds ain’t enough to create an opening for me to run like a little bitch, shits really hit the fan and more bullets isn’t gonna solve it.
I just want to run away.
rekabis@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
My statement has two interpretations, yours is the one that most people just don’t cotton onto.
Honestly, “running away” is the best possible solution in most any conflict. And when the bullets are flying, you want your opponent to duck and cover just long enough for you to skedaddle and get out of range or into an escape route out of the fire line. Hell, in that circumstance blanks would be sufficient to get that job done.
kossa@feddit.org 2 days ago
You can skew the results if you’re accounting for bad aim.
SharkWeek@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 days ago
What if you found yourself with a perfect vantage point from which to snipe modern-day Hitler?
Pumafred9@lemmy.world 3 days ago
I’d probably miss so hard, but I have zero sniping experience.
SharkWeek@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 days ago
And this is why practice is important …
dreadbeef@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
coward
mech@feddit.org 3 days ago
If I had a gun in that situation, I’d likely be killed by his bodyguards within seconds.
Line of sight goes both ways.
And I wouldn’t even want to shoot. I’m no assassin and also don’t believe that assassinating him would magically solve all the problems his movement causes.SharkWeek@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 days ago
That’s why I said snipe, namely to shoot from a long distance from a concealed location.
Also, while it wouldn’t fix any structural problems it would break the cult of personality, and mean that whoever wants to follow in his footsteps in he immediate future would be aware that if they go too far there might be repercussions (unlike at the moment, where people are being killed and nobody is taking physical action to stop it).
MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 3 days ago
Summary: get a pepper spray instead of a gun.
nomy@lemmy.zip 3 days ago
Summary of this thread: hey literally nazis are taking power and planning on putting marginalized groups into camps eventually, but also wanting a gun makes you a pussy you fucking degenerate just talk it out
butwhyishischinabook@piefed.social 3 days ago
It’s okay bro, when they come for you just call the police. Totally not an extremely privileged take.
masterspace@lemmy.ca 3 days ago
In this thread: Americans who literally cannot comprehend that they are not the only country on earth.
shiroininja@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Let’s stop kidding yourselves, gun owners in this current regime situation are like a bunch of idiots standing at the cliff edge waiting for someone to jump, when you all know none of you are going to do shit.
miked@piefed.social 2 days ago
My post was about my specific past.
Grew up with guns used for hunting in the house. I’m not anti-gun and have shot as an adult.
The current political situation in the US has had me considering buying one.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 3 days ago
Did you know pepper spray as effective on some people as others? Even more so if the person is on certain drugs? Did you know that if an assailant is pretty close to you already or the wind is blowing at you, the pepper spray may leave you just as bad off as an attacker, or that pepper spray won’t make a person drop a knife?
Hitting someone with pepper spray is fairly likely to stop an attack. Hitting someone with bullets will stop an attack.
MrFinnbean@lemmy.world 3 days ago
How many school shooting has been done using pepper spray vs guns?
How many unintentional discharches has let to death with pepper spray vs guns?
How many drive by’s have been done with stolen/illegal pepper sprays vs guns?
How many times police officers have been killes by a pepper spray vs gun, that perp took from the victims house?
How many times officers have mistaked victim as threath when they have had pepper spray vs gun on them?
Did you know that if assailant is pretty close to you or if you panic even a little, you might shoot yourself or miss the assailant completelly when pulling the trigger? Missing a shot won’t make a person to drop a knife. Using gun may lead to somebody elses death than attackers.
If normal civilians did not have so many guns there would be less guns in rotation in the streets. The less there are guns in rotation the more expensive they are. Normal thugs wont use guns in petty robbery if they costs 15 000$ in black market, but if they can buy one from the street with 300$ you bet your ass the robber will bring the gun.
Also when its likelly that the perps have guns police will always act like they have guns leading to police using violence and excess force also in situations where its not needed.
dreadbeef@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
you a woman?
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Victims of assault and abuse are overwhelmingly people closely related to the victim.
So this does raise the question… do you feel safer living with your abusive partner if there’s a gun in the house?
dreadbeef@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
that’d be a question between them, no?
AnnaFrankfurter@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
Sure it can you just have to get through WH security and all the secret service agents \s
the_grass_trainer@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Damn they at Waffle House, now, too?
WizardofFrobozz@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
Sounds like you need to put yourself in different situations.
titanicx@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Why, being safe isn’t a bad thing.
Zetta@mander.xyz 2 days ago
Because this guy wants to kill people.
phoenixz@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
Guns are fun toys, never a solution
laranis@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
They say every gun enthusiast has their scenario they’re planning for: home invasion, civil war, post apocalypse/disaster, mass shooting event, mugging, etc. When I think about what my scenario might be there isn’t a single one where I don’t end up dead, with or without a weapon. There is no number of weapons or amount of ammunition that would change that for me.
I struggle with that reality when I think about my own relationship with guns, but I can’t help thinking that “prepared” is better than “helpless”, even if the outcome is the same.
captainlezbian@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Yeah even when I awoke to a home invader, what was I going to do, groggily shoot someone I didn’t recognize that had started running?
SippyCup@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
And I can say with confidence you never will be.
Prior to a bunch of vets coming home from Iraq where they served as local police forces and getting jobs with their hometown police force, 99% of police officers never fired their weapon on duty. Outside of training anyway. Most rarely even drew their weapons. People who’s job it is to intervene when things are dangerous rarely needing a firearm, means almost no one will ever actually be in a situation where having a gun makes things better.
At the time I believed I wanted to be a cop and was a member of a program to guide young people towards policing as a career. Of all of the police I spoke with during that time, one or two knew a guy who’d fired his weapon on duty.
Then, veterans who had been acting as police in a city where they were literally an invading military give, started getting jobs as police officers and the culture dramatically shifted towards violence. Literally it went from “question and negotiate” to “shoot first.”
phoenixz@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
prior to Iraq, no police officer ever fired their gun
Somewhat paraphrased, but still, wut?
US police officers always have been corrupt as shit, and violent. None of that is a new thing
SippyCup@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
Corrupt, yes. Violent, absolutely. But shooting Brown people was much less common then just beating them with a club. Police had to, and likely still do, answer for every round they discharge.
fartographer@lemmy.world 2 days ago
When I’m feeling really stressed out or overwhelmed, I like to get my guns out, disassemble them, admire their engineering, do a gentle cleaning, and then put them back. Of course, double checking that they’re not loaded at every step where they’re effectively guns.
silentjohn@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
How do you plan on doing the revolution without a gun?
“Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun” -Mao
“By any means necessary” - Malcolm X
“I don’t care if I fall as long as someone else picks up my gun and keeps on shooting.” - Che Guevera
etc, etc…
modus@lemmy.world 2 days ago
“Hold mah beer. I gotta go to work.” – My Uncle defending his home.