Mr. Litton, however, could not legally buy a gun because he was a felon. Mr. Honea said investigators believed that the handgun that Mr. Litton used was a homemade, untraceable gun made of parts from different weapons, often called a “ghost gun.”
So, what did California’s gun control regime accomplish here?
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.crimedad.work/post/159095
Here’s the archive link: http://archive.today/2024.12.06-125212/https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/us/school-shooting-california-kindergarteners.html
The California gun control kept the crazy murderer and convicted criminal from buying an arsenal. He had to buy parts and assemble them into a functioning firearm, something that has yet to be regulated because gun advocates complain that restricting access to parts is an unnecessary government overreach.
If the shooter (not murderer, hopefully) couldn’t buy an arsenal, why didn’t he build one? A single weapon appears to have been enough for him and it wasn’t as if the attack stopped because his DIY gun was somehow significantly inferior to a store bought one.
We don’t know all the details surrounding the guy or the incident, so I’m willing to table discussions about what he built and what regulations might have prevented it until we know more. But building a ghost gun is significantly more difficult than buying a legal firearm, and the ability to circumvent a regulation isn’t an argument for removing the regulation. He wanted a gun to commit acts of violence, and he couldn’t buy one. He found another way, and we should be looking at additional restrictions, not looking to criticize the ones that functioned as intended.
Also looking at one data point where the regulation didn’t succeed in it’s aim is survivorship bias. We’re not considering any possible attempts at firearm misuse that were prevented because the regulation made it difficult or impossible to achieve.
That’s fair, but neither can we be certain that these regulations prevent gun crimes or similar crimes with different weapons. Regardless, it’s apparent that gun regulations as we know them lead to more incarceration and more incarceration does not decrease violent crime and may actually increase crime in some settings. (Interestingly, the shooter in this case was previously incarcerated, but not for any violent crimes.) Therefore, we have a reasonable basis for a hypothesis that gun control does more harm than good.
Similarly, criminalizing murder itself does not prevent murder from happening and leads to increased incarceration.
Apart from the fact that murder is different than possession of some contraband, what good is incarceration if it doesn’t reduce crime or actually increases it?
We should be reducing incarceration however we can and decriminalizing firearms especially. Gun control regimes have significant carceral components to them. In New Jersey, for example, mere possession of a magazine with a capacity greater than ten rounds is a straight up felony even if you don’t have a firearm to use it with. Incarceration, of course, puts antisocial pressure on society by way of family separation, mistrust of law enforcement, reduction of funds for pro social programs, etc. So people naturally respond by arming up. All we’re doing is filling prisons.
That’s debatable. It is for me, and probably you too, but for the shooter in this incident? Absolutely not, his felony federally prevents him from buying a gun legally, it becomes easier to buy the things you can legally buy and do a little crafting with a dremel which isn’t as hard as you think.
Source: Done both, made 'em and purchased 'em, and know the laws regarding it.
I mean, that’s exactly my point. Buying something is objectively easier than manufacturing it because anyone can buy something, while it takes skills, equipment, and materials to make something. That’s why you start with an 80% lower instead of mining raw ore in your backyard to forge a solid block that you mill yourself. If he could have bought a gun, it would have been easier for him to attempt to murder children.
We cannot know how for sure many crimes gun control regulations prevent, because you cannot measure what doesn’t happen. But in this case, we do know that the regulation forced this psychotic criminal to go out of his way to make his own firearm. The regulation didn’t stop him entirely, but it did act an an obstacle. It is absurd to criticize, as OP does, “the California gun control regime” that worked on the basis that it wasn’t entirely effective. If anything, it is an argument in favor of additional gun control legislation surrounding the manufacturing and sale of unregistered component parts.
And mine is that if you’re federally prohibited from buying it, it becomes easier to make it than buy it. You can’t just ban 3d printers and blocks of aluminum. You also can’t just wantonly make laws against parts that’ll be struck down by the supreme court, but good luck to you.
If an attacker is sufficiently motivated to harm, he will find a way, even if that means pressure cookers full of nails.
Right, because it’s harder to buy a gun. You’re saying it’srelatively easier, but nothing about building a gun is made easier.
And I agree, we shouldn’t be passing legislation that is unconstitutional, (although an entirely separate argument can be had about the relative validity of the current supreme court). I only mention new regulations because that’s the logical conclusion from OP’s complaint. Instead of fewer restrictions, their argument suggests more are needed.
It’s also a lot easier than you seem to think it is to build them, and also buying them illegally is fairly trivial as well, and making that harder to do is unconstitutional if we limit guns and impossible if we’re planning on limiting dremels, so the “make them harder to make” thing doesn’t pan out is what I’m saying.
We’ve made them harder to buy, making them harderer to buy won’t solve it.
It suggests that firearms should be decriminalized. Think of the years of sentences and enhancements handed down to people for possessing guns or gun parts they weren’t supposed to have, in a system that was found to have incarcerated people to the point of unconstitutionality no less. It still wasn’t enough to stop this guy from attacking a school. The shooter was himself a product of California’s prisons.