Guns are designed to destroy, period.

[Cosmoline]

primary purpose of firearms

Firearms are chunks of steel and wood. They have no purpose of their own. Purpose requires a mind, and it's the human who provides that.

For example--if you fire blanks out of your firearm to scare birds off a field or start a race, are you MISUSING the firearm or going against its PURPOSE? You see the absurdity of trying to impose any "purpose" to a firearm. The firearm holds the shell, and allows a user to ignite a primer. It may also launch a projectile. But the firearm ENDS AT THE BARREL. Its design does not extend beyond that point. Nor can a firearm operate itself.

 

[antsi]

-----------quote----------
Firearms are chunks of steel and wood. They have no purpose of their own. Purpose requires a mind, and it's the human who provides that.
--------------------------

What about the human being who designed them?

Tools - including firearms - are designed and made with a specific purpose or purposes in mind.

I'm going hunting next month. I'm taking a rifle with me. Hopefully I will get a chance to shoot and kill a deer with it. It isn't just an accident that the rifle is a uniquely well adapted tool for this purpose. Its designer had just that use in mind, and everything about it is adapted to that task. This was true before I ever picked up the rifle.

It is not the case that the rifle was an amorphous blob, just sitting there, that suddenly became an efficient deer killing tool because I had that thought. That thought was built into it from the beginning. That thought was what shaped it and determined its form and function. Everything about the rifle reflects that purpose.

I could also use the rifle to pound nails into a two by four. This would not be the purpose the rifle was designed for, even if that's what I happened to have in mind at the time. It would be a very poor tool for the job, because that wasn't the thought that shaped its design and construction. And even if I did successfully drive the nail, it would seem a very silly thing to say "the intended purpose of this rifle is to drive nails into two by fours."

 

[Thorn001]

I disagree with the idea that guns are made to destroy. They are tools plain and simple. It is the mind behind them that controls what they are used for. In the hands of law enforcement, they preserve the peace and protect lives. In the hands of our military they defend our freedoms from outside agressors. In the hands of law abiding civilians, they protect life and property, put food on the table, provide hours of enjoyment, and are used to teach responsibility etc.
Although in the hands of criminals, they are used to steal, destroy, murder, etc.

If guns are made only to destroy, than so are knives, scissors, axes, matches, etc.

 

[greener]

For all the semi-science about propelling projectiles of some type by rapid oxidation of some material, guns have, and have since their invention, one primary purpose: to kill or destroy. That's the purpose whether the projectile is 16" in diameter or .17" in diameter. When I took my artillery unit to the field, we practiced the primary purpose of 155mm howitzers, .50 caliber machine guns, 7.62 caliber guns, .223" caliber, .45 caliber, 9mm and so forth. Are you telling me that there is something different in the 1911 I carried "under arms" and the 1911 I take to the range?

The fact that I own and use "guns" for purposes other than going out and committing murder and mayhem is totally beside the point. What am I practicing when I go to the range other than being better at using the gun for it's intended purpose, whether I ever use one for that purpose or not. I didn't buy my .22's for the purpose of killing, but I am not dissuaded by any argument that their root purpose is just that.

The fact that guns primary purpose is death and destruction, doesn't in any way make them inherently evil. As said, ad nauseum, tain't the gun that does bad things, its the person using the gun. I'm not ashamed that I own them, carry them, and, if necessary, am willing to use them for their intended purpose.

 

[deadin]

Antsi,
I understand your point but what I ‘m having trouble with is your insistence on assigning relative values to a firearms use. You contend that the primary purpose of a firearm is to kill or incapicitate. Any other use is merely secondary.
I am very uncomfortable that, in your world, if firearms “triage” were to occur, my Hammerli would be one of the first to go because it is just an unimportant, secondary segment of the firearm world and your Glock is much more important because it is used for killing/incapicitating, SD, etc..
A firearm is a firearm and whatever the owner chooses to use it for is no more, or less, legitimate than any other use. Therefore, trying to assign a “what a firearm is really meant for” label is not only biased, it is counterproductive.

 

[cassandrasdaddy]

funny thing

My wife is pretty anti. she daid much the same about pistols .That they were only for killing people.My reply was that she was part right, that i chose to see it as making sure that god forbid we're in a bad spot that the one killed is not her, myslef or our kid. When i brought the kid into it the lil light went on over her head i think she got it then

 

[10-Ring]

I very rarely address comments to confront like that one. It's an invitation to argue with someone who doesn't intend to change their minds or even listen...why waste your breath?

 

[Atticus]

What LawDog said.

A good reply- "And you were designed to deplete oxygen, food and water and to create feces...so go away."

 

[antsi]

Deadin,

I don't support banning any kind of guns. I'm not triaging anything.

The reason I say that hunting and/or defense is the primary purpose of firearms is that these are the underlying reasons they were invented in the first place. Target shooting came about as a subsidiary to these original purposes. If firearms couldn't be used for killing things, I very seriously doubt that there would be a lot of target shooting going on today. Hunting and defending oneself are life-and-death necessities (or at least can be, under certain circumstances). Target shooting is purely recreational, unless from the standpoint of preparation for defense and/or hunting. Therefore, I do consider target shooting to be a secondary, less important purpose of firearms and firearms ownership. Although I have myself competed in high power rifle and enjoyed many hundreds of rounds of skeet shooting, those purposes aren't as important as defending myself and my family, nor as important as the ability to hunt for food might become should our social-economic structure change and food be not so easy to obtain as it is now.

Again, target shooting, hunting, and defense are ALL legitimate reasons for owning guns. NONE of these purposes should be infringed.

If we defend our right to keep and bear arms on the basis of all legitimate purposes - including defense, hunting, and recreation - then we don't have to do any "triaging" or choose which guns will be banned. If we defend our right to keep and bear arms on the basis that target guns aren't very well suited for killing, then we DO have to triage and we WILL face the prospect of gun bans. Worse yet, the first guns to be banned will be those that are best adapted for the most important life-and-death purposes.

 

[ctdonath]

Tools are designed for a purpose. There may be variations on that purpose, and what the tool actually does can be coldly & clinically & mechanically described. One may come to enjoy a class of tools because using them may be fun (regardless of whether fun use matches the originating purpose), because one admires the quality & artistry in some tools, because one enjoys making such tools, etc. One rarely encounters a class of tools which, while marvelous at doing some mechanical action, has no initiating application.

Hence the problem some here have with responses of the kind "guns merely throw a piece of lead with a certain amount of accuracy and energy". Ok, it does that. Why does one go thru such trouble to build a machine to do that? Fun, art, sport, etc. may be the dominant actual use, but the core purpose - which many cannot bring themselves to acknowledge - remains.

 

[crazed_ss]

Guns are weapons IMO.. they're for making stuff die. They can be used for sport and recreation, but I think their primary use is to be used as a weapon. In the Marines, we always referred to our issue rifles as "Weapons"

I do not believe weapons arent inherently evil though. It depends on the person wielding it.
The fact that guns are for making things die is not necessarily a bad thing. Murder is wrong, but killing is not necessarily wrong

 

[XLMiguel]

A gun is just a tool, it's application is up to the user.

Assault is a behavior, not a device.

Look up the definition of "deterrence".