this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2025
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(As a general concept of how a society should run, not intended as a US-specific question.)

I sometimes see people on the internet saying that giving people easy access to guns is too risky and there should be stricter gun control, while simultaneously wanting to abolish the police? I'm just confused on what people really want?

You cant both abolish the police and then also disarm the citizens, gotta pick one. So which is it, internet? Self-policing with guns? Or reform the police?

[Please state what country you're in]

::: spoiler


(Also its funny how the far-right of the US is both pro-gun and pro-police, I'm confused by that as well) :::

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[–] BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 18 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

If you can get a gun to protect yourself, criminals are easily going to have guns too.

Simpler all around if nobody has guns.

Or, at the very least nobody should have a handgun. A full length rifle or shotgun is a lot harder to conceal when you are using it for nefarious purposes.

[–] subignition@fedia.io 6 points 21 hours ago (5 children)

Citizens not having guns is not going to stop criminals from having guns

[–] BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 9 points 18 hours ago

Japan says otherwise. Gun crime is practically non-existent, despite a population of over a hundred million people.

It's unrealistic to apply this to the US given how many guns already exist, but it's not actually impossible.

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 8 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) (1 children)

Yes it will. The idea thaat criminals will mass produce homemade firearms is nonsense. Even the cartels don't do this at any scale.

I'm Toronto it's like 13% of guns that are domestic, the other 87% are smuggled in from the unregulated shithole that is America, 0% are homemade.

[–] DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 4 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Guns can now be 3d printed as we can see Luigi Mangione allegedly printed that gun

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 2 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago)

Yeah, but they're not because no one wants to fire something that might blow up in their hand, and it's not actually that easy to mass manufacture illegal guns, even with 3d printers and CNC machines.

Like I said, we all know you can make a homemade gun with online information. That has been the case for literally the last 2 decades. And yet, underground homemade gun manufacturing is virtually non existent, because guess what, it's not that easy to do at scale in a way that won't get you immediately caught and all your equipment and supplies impounded.

Literally every developers western country that bans guns has not seen any noticeable rise in homemade guns being used at any regular pace. In what world do you think Norwegian clubs are being shot up with homemade uzis?

[–] meco03211@lemmy.world 7 points 20 hours ago

A lot of guns are stolen. Also if there isn't a big a market, manufacturers won't make as many. Supply drops so does criminal possession.

Not that I'm advocating either way, just a counter to your point.

[–] baggachipz@sh.itjust.works 4 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago) (1 children)

The genie is out of the bottle here, but a polite society would make guns unavailable for everyone. Guns have one purpose: to kill things. Who’s to decide who the “bad guys” and “good guys” are?

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 2 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago)

Let's just hope that there's no such thing as "mental illness", or "emotion", that could make a "good guy" want to do something "not good".

[–] lucg@lemmy.world 2 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

Not fully, no. My understanding is that the available data of countries with and without general-citizen gun ownership, all else being equal, shows that normal issues (crime, personal conflicts, ...) becomes gun-involved issues a lot more frequently so apparently it does help

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

Uninventing guns is not actually one of the options. The police are definitely going to have them, because if they didn't they'd be under threat from upstarts with a 3D printer or just a lathe, and they know it.

[–] BlameThePeacock@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Nobody said anything about removing them from police. I have no problem with police being armed.

It is technically possible to make every other gun illegal and force people to dispose of them. Again it's unrealistic but its not impossible.

It's also possible to eliminate all commercial ammo availability, and even most home production (by banning the sale of powder for reloading). Home powder products are inferior, and potentially even dangerous. Safe and functional casings are also extremely difficult to produce.

Would people try to get around these restrictions? Sure, but it would still dramatically reduce gun use.

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Ah. It wasn't clear your "nobody" excluded them.

I think there are people out there who are privileged enough they fully don't realise the police aren't just on TV or theoretical. All states must actively maintain a monopoly on violence.