Darunion
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Oct 6, 2010
- Messages
- 5,374
Being required to prove you own your guns or that they were transferred legally? When nearly 40% of criminals got their guns from friends or family? If you can't prove you own your firearms or they were transferred legally, then you pay hefty penalties. Obviously it would have to be worked on. There would have to be an entire bureaucracy created to manage it. That would have to be paid for (perhaps with fees for transfers of gun titles and taxes on gun sales). People would have to register each and every fire arm they own which presents logistical problems but it could be done on a time line. Give people X amount of time to complete registration and do it in blocks of people somehow. Etc etc. It could be done.
Will it prevent all of the problems? Nope. Would it probably have a significant impact? Maybe. Would it make people realize how serious guns and gun ownership are? Hopefully.
It would never happen though. If everyone is such a responsible owner, then there shouldn't be a problem. There would be no fees to maintain ownership of guns. You would just need to prove that you own them by presenting them once a year or something like that.
I made that up in one day. I'm some random guy on the internet. If people truly had a conversation about gun ownership, then something that worked very well could be created that didn't infringe upon the right to bear arms but also helped to ensure all gun owners are responsible.
The whole "criminals don't follow the law" is a cop out. I've already demonstrated that the majority of inmates are not obtaining their firearms illegally (see BOJ statistics) and that a large number (nearly 40% get guns from friends and family; again see BOJ statistics). Deterring that with further measures would be a good idea. If only illegal guns were the problem, then things would be much better. That's not the case though. Illegal guns were about one third I believe (check BOJ for exact numbers). That's still a lot, but stopping people from getting guns illegally seems like it would be more difficult than making sure legal guns don't end up committing crimes.
I have nothing left to say. No one here agrees and some even mock using actual evidence and citing sources. I'm not interested in discussion with these types of people.
I feel there could be measures added to create awareness but that should come from education not paperwork. I see a huge potential for people to just move more toward private sales just so they don't have to deal with registration of their firearms. Also it would be near impossible to do. To prove I have the guns I would have to show them, now you are transporting mass amounts of firearms to a government building? Also if this is something that has to be done yearly or more likely ever 3years, what is the potential gain here?
The best thing is education and conversation. If no one agrees with you , that doesn't make everyone wrong and closing your eyes and pouting until someone says what you want to hear, is not even close to the solution. The best thing is to hear all ideas, not tell people they are wrong but understand why they feel the way they do. It really is hard for people to place faith in government regulation of things because in most examples, it doesn't appear to help. We have made drugs illegal, and the 'war' on that is costly and is still a far greater problem than firearm abuse in this country. Though that doesn't get media attention at the moment, maybe next year it will be spotlight again. Back to gov' regulation, is really having more paperwork and fines going to change anything or just put more in the shadows? I am an owner myself, have all of them safely stored and don't even have kids at the house. I have thus far followed all laws (that I know of) in regards to my collection. Honestly if it became a thing that I had to fill out paperwork for all of mine and register, then these would slowly 'accidentally fell into a lake while out fishing/hunting'.