Universal Background Checks Suck

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Who said anything about Registration but a Background check to try and stop the nuts and mass killings.
OK - review the last dozen or so reported 'mass shootings' and tell us how many of them would have been stopped if only UBC had been implemented. The answer is pretty much guaranteed to be the square root of zero - almost every mass shooting in recent record was conducted by an individual with no prior disqualifying characteristics, or by someone who did not obtain their gun through legitimate means in the first place. Offhand, I can think of only one instance in which a mass shooting would have been stopped by a proper NICS check - the Virginia tech shooting in 2007, in which a known mentally disturbed student was able to legally buy a gun (including undergoing a NICS check at the time of sale) because the NICS record failed to include his mental illness disqualification.

Moreover, every time that the DoJ has studied where criminals get their guns, the answer is almost NEVER a gun show or a legal private sale. Feel free to take a peek : https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16.pdf
An estimated 287,400 prisoners had possessed a firearm during their offense. Among these, more than half (56%) had either stolen it (6%), found it at the scene of the crime (7%), or obtained it off the street or from the underground market (43%). Most of the remainder (25%) had obtained it from a family member or friend, or as a gift. Seven percent had purchased it under their own name from a licensed firearm dealer.
Bear in mind that this seven percent number are folk who were NOT prohibited at the time of sale, but who went on to Do Bad Things subsequent to the sale. They underwent a NICS check, and passed.

We, as a community, need to be very clear on this - UBC is a red herring. It diminishes the ability to freely exchange a durable good, under the premise that managing the durable item somehow will make dangerous people less dangerous. It will fail in the stated goal, because it's actually not a root cause. And when it fails to achieve the presumed goal, it will be posited by the gun control community that it failed because people are circumventing the law, and the only rational way to address that is by keeping centralized records to really know for sure who has guns and if they're the 'right sort' to have them.

And that is how we get to registration.
 
Without REGISTRATION, how would you KNOW?

You WOULDN'T.

That's why REGISTRATION is the NEXT stop. And EVERYBODY knows what comes after THAT.

I'm more than willing to have a civil and intelligent conversation on this topics, but such a conversation takes two. And repeatedly ranting the same thing in a mixture of upper and lower case, really isn't giving me much to work with.

How do you know a stop sign causes people to stop at an intersection when you're not there to see it? You don't. But you know that it causes the vast majority to stop, because you know fear of negative repercussions is a strong motivator to modify behavior.

But I understand why you don't want to answer the question. You either don't want to admit you'd break a federal law, or you don't want to prove my point.
 
Without REGISTRATION, how would you KNOW?

So let's say you bought a 1911 from a guy named John using a bulletin board at your local range in 1990- no 4473, no BCG, no receipt, just cash and carry.

Fast forward to now, in a UBC era. Your co-worker mentions that his adult son is looking for a 1911. You know you co-worker quite well and he is a good guy. Your old 1911 has long lost it's pole position in the safe, so you decide to sell it down river. You have met the son a few times and he seems like a good guy too. You exchange $$$ for the gun with the son in your office parking lot, both commenting how the UBC law is a pain in the butt for law abiding citizens.

Unbeknown to you and the co-worker, the son has an active restraining order filed by an ex-GF, making unable to buy from an FFL. The son uses the 1911 in a criminal matter and directly fingers you for providing him the weapon. The co-worker backs up the story that you sold the son the 1911. You are now charged with transferring a weapon without a BCG, including some enhancement because the weapon was used in a criminal act and you "should have known" the son was ineligible.

That how they would KNOW- no REGISTRATION necessary.
 
I'm more than willing to have a civil and intelligent conversation on this topics, but such a conversation takes two. And repeatedly ranting the same thing in a mixture of upper and lower case, really isn't giving me much to work with.

How do you know a stop sign causes people to stop at an intersection when you're not there to see it? You don't. But you know that it causes the vast majority to stop, because you know fear of negative repercussions is a strong motivator to modify behavior.

But I understand why you don't want to answer the question. You either don't want to admit you'd break a federal law, or you don't want to prove my point.

I agree the rate of non-thinking folks in this Thread who don't get that unless the gun community finds a way to stop the gun violence we WILL lose. Reciting the same thing time after time accomplishes nothing. Solutions not anger against folks presenting common sense. Not wasting any more time here... go for it guys, the answer is already written.
 
So let's say you bought a 1911 from a guy named John using a bulletin board at your local range in 1990- no 4473, no BCG, no receipt, just cash and carry.

Fast forward to now, in a UBC era. Your co-worker mentions that his adult son is looking for a 1911. You know you co-worker quite well and he is a good guy. Your old 1911 has long lost it's pole position in the safe, so you decide to sell it down river. You have met the son a few times and he seems like a good guy too. You exchange $$$ for the gun with the son in your office parking lot, both commenting how the UBC law is a pain in the butt for law abiding citizens.

Unbeknown to you and the co-worker, the son has an active restraining order filed by an ex-GF, making unable to buy from an FFL. The son uses the 1911 in a criminal matter and directly fingers you for providing him the weapon. The co-worker backs up the story that you sold the son the 1911. You are now charged with transferring a weapon without a BCG, including some enhancement because the weapon was used in a criminal act and you "should have known" the son was ineligible.

That how they would KNOW- no REGISTRATION necessary.
The VAST majority of transfers will have no readily available trail.

It's just a stalking horse for REGISTRATION and CONFISCATION.
 
I'm more than willing to have a civil and intelligent conversation on this topics, but such a conversation takes two. And repeatedly ranting the same thing in a mixture of upper and lower case, really isn't giving me much to work with.

How do you know a stop sign causes people to stop at an intersection when you're not there to see it? You don't. But you know that it causes the vast majority to stop, because you know fear of negative repercussions is a strong motivator to modify behavior.

But I understand why you don't want to answer the question. You either don't want to admit you'd break a federal law, or you don't want to prove my point.
A conversation about 2+2 either results in "4", or it's utter nonsense.

Thinking that so-called "universal background checks" will result in ANYTHING besides REGISTRATION and ultimately CONFISCATION is utter nonsense.

The proponents aren't even pretending otherwise anymore.
 
Correct, I love my guns but not enough to want my 10 year old grandson murdered in his classroom. There is not a whole lot of thinking going on here. IF we as responsible gun owners do not do something, they will ban and take away the AR15's, Mini 14s and the rest. I have owned many AR's in the past even took one prairie dog hunting and that was a waste. They are fun to shoot and own, but if things keep on they will all be history. Australia did it and will happen here if we let it.
I see it as the other way around, to some degree at least. UBCs could significantly reduce the number of guns that make their way into the hands of prohibited criminals. Thereby reducing the use of guns in violent crime in places like Chicago. All those guns criminals get come from somewhere, and they can't all be stolen. I'm betting a significant number of them are aquired through private transfers.

On the other hand, UBCs won't do much to stop mass shooting if most of the mass shooters aren't prohibited prior to the event.
None of it will ever work because guns are not the problem. The method of murder is irrelevant.
 
I agree the rate of non-thinking folks in this Thread who don't get that unless the gun community finds a way to stop the gun violence we WILL lose. Reciting the same thing time after time accomplishes nothing. Solutions not anger against folks presenting common sense. Not wasting any more time here... go for it guys, the answer is already written.
The FASTEST way to lose is to SURRENDER. You're advocating SURRENDER.

So-called "universal background checks" are the Sudetenland. NO APPEASEMENT. Bullies NEVER stop being bullies because they get what they want by BEING bullies. NOTHING short of CONFISCATION will EVER be acceptable.

And of course it's errant nonsense to think I have to allow my rights to be stripped from me to "solve" a problem I didn't cause, and in which I play no role. It's as foolish as giving up my right to speak freely in order to prevent war between Russia and Ukraine.
 
unless the gun community finds a way to stop the gun violence we WILL lose
How can we stop things that are, by definition, outside of our control? That's a nonsensical starting point. Gun violence cannot be stopped, even when individual gun ownership is heavily regulated and/or prohibited .

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/12/europe/paris-hospital-shooting-intl/index.html
Paris (CNN)One person was killed and one critically injured in a targeted shooting outside a Paris hospital on Monday, the city prosecutor's office told CNN. The attacker fled the scene outside the Henry Dunant Hospital, in the 16th arrondissement of the French capital, using a two-wheeled vehicle. The prosecutor's office said that initial investigations suggests the deceased, a 33-year-old man, was "intentionally targeted by the gunman."

If we want to change the behaviors in society, then we have to sanction bad behaviors and reward good ones. Trying to change human behavior by making objects responsible for the outcome is, well, ludicrous.
 
None of it will ever work because guns are not the problem. The method of murder is irrelevant.

Not in the eyes of the majority of US citizens. It doesn't matter that you and I both know people will kill each other with rocks in no more effective weapon is available. What matters is that we reduce the number of firearms used in such violence. Partly to expose the root issue, and therefore prevent even more legislation restricting firearms ownership.
 
It’s not up to the “gun community” to come up with the “solution” for “gun violence” any more than it is the responsibility of the “vehicle owner community” to come up with a solution for vehicle deaths, except to abide by the law (like, don’t do illegal things with firearms, like murder). To say that if we don’t, then a “solution” will be forced upon us is no answer. They are trying to do that anyway because they want no guns owned by private citizens. That’s the endgame. How about we come up with a solution to murder? Let’s make it illegal!!! There, problem solved.

It’s not like this is uncharted territory. Just look at other countries. We’re dreaming it we think they will stop at magazines and semi-autos.
 
Compromise only leads to more compromise. It seems to me that we have been giving up and giving up and giving up for decades, and getting nothing in return.

Not only should we say no to any new infringements, we should be actively working to roll things back. It has been shown, time and again, that there is no correlation between the number of guns in the hands of the public with violent crime, as well as the fact that the places with the biggest problem are also the places with the most stringent infringements.

If we wanted to save lives, protect children, and everything else that the antis clamor for, we ought to be rolling back gun control laws. However, as we are all aware, they really don't care about children, or for the safety of anyone other than themselves, those things are just useful foils for their ultimate goal of complete disarmament and unfettered control.
 
A conversation about 2+2 either results in "4", or it's utter nonsense.

Thinking that so-called "universal background checks" will result in ANYTHING besides REGISTRATION and ultimately CONFISCATION is utter nonsense.

The proponents aren't even pretending otherwise anymore.

I'll try this one more time with you.

I understand your point. If two guys meet after dark in a walmart parking lot to buy/sell a gun, who would know? Probably just those two guys. But my point, is that your point doesn't matter. If the buyer is actually a cop, with half the department ready to move in and arrest the seller, the seller is in trouble.

You don't want to be that seller, risking heavy penalties for what would be an illegal private firearms transfer. Neither do I. Neither does any law abiding gun owner. At that point, the time and cost of a UBC doesn't seem so bad. So law abiding citizens stop selling guns to strangers without conducting background checks, and that keeps a lot of guns out of criminal hands.

It's not important that some illegal transactions take place. What makes the difference is that far fewer transactions take place where guns leave the hands of the law abiding and enter the possession of prohibited individuals. Because all the guns in the hands of criminals were first sold to people who legal could own them.

If you still don't understand, I don't know how better to explain it.
 
It’s not up to the “gun community” to come up with the “solution” for “gun violence” any more than it is the responsibility of the “vehicle owner community” to come up with a solution for vehicle deaths, except to abide by the law (like, don’t do illegal things with firearms, like murder). To say that if we don’t, then a “solution” will be forced upon us is no answer. They are trying to do that anyway because they want no guns owned by private citizens. That’s the endgame. How about we come up with a solution to murder? Let’s make it illegal!!! There, problem solved.

It’s not like this is uncharted territory. Just look at other countries. We’re dreaming it we think they will stop at magazines and semi-autos.

The problem with your argument is that it's not working on the majority of people. It seems like every year more and more people are siding with the anti-gunners. That's in part because the gun rights community is perceived to be selfishly interested only in their guns and their rights, and unwilling to help come up with a solution. Perception is important.

Compromise only leads to more compromise. It seems to me that we have been giving up and giving up and giving up for decades, and getting nothing in return.

I think CCW permits and Constitutional Carry are a lot more than nothing. And whilst compromise may lead to more compromise, not playing the game won't stop the opposition winning. See my comment above. Stonewalling isn't a valid tactic when you're on the back foot, and we are.
 

You want me to prove something that can't have happened yet because we don't currently have a Federal UBC law? Sure I'll get right on that.

So how does a legally owned gun get into the "underground market"? Call an Uber? You're sure people aren't just selling them without verifying the buyer is not prohibited?

Have any 'before and after' studies been taken on a State level, from States that implemented UBCs? Or is one study from 4 years ago all we have to go on?
 
You want me to prove something that can't have happened yet because we don't currently have a Federal UBC law? Sure I'll get right on that.
Did you read the Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes: Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016 at the link?
 
Did you read the Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes: Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016 at the link?

I scanned it, but I'm not going to read the whole thing. Why don't you direct me to what is relevant to your point? And tell me what you point is as well.
 
If the buyer can produce a Real ID showing they are not prohibited, any sale with a FFL, or individual to individual should be fine.

There's already law in place that covers all these points.
Gods' and mans'.
The hints are and have been for some time already in play. Digitizing everything including medical records, insurance, bank records, yer' drivers' license are all part of the same package ready and available to the fusion centers.
At the point they strip away the last perceived obstacle, namely that the UBC does not do enough for the children.
We are DONE.

The only thing missing is for a great enough divide between gun owners.
We are having trouble agreeing on the position we're in on that slippery slope. I think we're close to the bottom.
The last time we were divided we lost mail order purchases and then machine guns.
We are surely facing registration and confiscation if we continue divided.
:fire::scrutiny:
 
But you know that it causes the vast majority to stop, because you know fear of negative repercussions is a strong motivator to modify behavior.
The law abiding will stop at the sign. The non-law abiding, likely won’t. However, stopping at a stop sign doesn’t even come close to comparing to a mass shooting where the intent is to inflict harm on as many as possible.

I can pass a UBC no problem. Prove tomorrow I won’t be a mass murderer. You can’t. And you know you can’t. Even I can’t. But until you can, a UBC is worthless. People commit mass murders or shootings because they aren’t concerned with following the law. If they were concerned, they wouldn’t commit the act. It’s a complete disregard for the consequences of their actions. Their feelings and/or emotions have nullified the law in their minds. So now, show me how you legislate emotion. Is that a question on a UBC?

“Can you say, with absolute certainty, that you will not have a mental breakdown, become overly excitable, or in a rush of emotion, use this weapon in an unlawful manner? Check yes or no.”

C’mon man. I don’t want prohibited persons to have firearms anymore than you do. But you can’t stop it. And you can’t stop mass shootings. Neither can the government. Not without registration and subsequent confiscation of ALL firearms. Last I checked, that kind of goes against the 2nd Amendment and freedom in general.
 
I scanned it, bug I'm not going to read the whole thing. Why don't you direct me to what is relevant to your point? And tell me what you point is as well.
Sigh. OK. Let's go back your assertion that private sales are used to funnel 'lots of guns' to people that were prohibited at the time of the transaction, making UBC's reasonable.
law abiding citizens stop selling guns to strangers without conducting background checks, and that keeps a lot of guns out of criminal hands.
You said this. It was/is an unsupported assertion, in the absence of proof. It could be true, but so far we have zero proof that it *is* true. So we turn to the DoJ data, as best that we have it.

In 2016, a prison survey conducted across both state and Federal inmates, showed that more than half of the folk that used a gun in a crime and subsequently went to jail for that crime had acquired the firearm via obviously illegal means. A UBC would have zero impact on this population. The remaining minority either acquired their gun via legal transactions (bought from a licensed dealer, and clearly passed a background check at the point of sale) or via a private transaction that may or may not have passed UBC checks when it occurred.

Now - we don't know how many of the folk that got them through private transactions would have been disqualified at the time that they acquired the gun had a UBC been applied, nor do we know how many 'friends-and-family' transactions are simply alternative expressions for "obtained it off the street or from the underground market'. Any assertion to that end, in either direction, is conjecture. The only thing that we can take away from the data is that the majority of Bad Folk In Jail For Using Guns In Bad Ways got their guns illegally in the first place, outside of the bounds of any potential UBC, and that some additional percentage of these folk actually DID pass a background check when they acquired their gun and subsequently went on do Do Bad Things.

An additional analysis of mass shooters finds that most all of these folk were, in fact, not prohibited at the time that they acquired the gun. In example after example, the shooter was able to go to a gun store and legally buy a gun, NICS check and all, because they were not prohibited at the time that they acquired their firearm(s).

So the challenge is simple - prove your assertion that private transactions are a funnel for guns from Good Folk to Bad Folk. We all wanna protect the RKBA, and have the best facts available to do that.

Make us smarter.
 
The law abiding will stop at the sign. The non-law abiding, likely won’t. However, stopping at a stop sign doesn’t even come close to comparing to a mass shooting where the intent is to inflict harm on as many as possible.

I can pass a UBC no problem. Prove tomorrow I won’t be a mass murderer. You can’t. And you know you can’t. Even I can’t. But until you can, a UBC is worthless. People commit mass murders or shootings because they aren’t concerned with following the law. If they were concerned, they wouldn’t commit the act. It’s a complete disregard for the consequences of their actions. Their feelings and/or emotions have nullified the law in their minds. So now, show me how you legislate emotion. Is that a question on a UBC?

“Can you say, with absolute certainty, that you will not have a mental breakdown, become overly excitable, or in a rush of emotion, use this weapon in an unlawful manner? Check yes or no.”

C’mon man. I don’t want prohibited persons to have firearms anymore than you do. But you can’t stop it. And you can’t stop mass shootings. Neither can the government. Not without registration and subsequent confiscation of ALL firearms. Last I checked, that kind of goes against the 2nd Amendment and freedom in general.

I totally agree with you that UBCs won't stop the exhibitionist mass murders (the ones that shoot up grocery stores and schools etc). I mentioned that up thread somewhere. I don't understand why anyone who listens to the news would think that, knowing that most of the shooters bought their guns in gun stores and passed background checks. I'm not talking about those at all.
 
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