Here's a workable experiment for 'Red Flag' Laws

On the subject of Red Flag Laws pertaining to removing guns from people alleged to be incompetent by neighbors, friends, family, etc., I understand the sentiment. It's really tempting to want to know the hearts and minds of those around us, or to want to think that we can accurately diagnose and predict who is problematic and who is not without getting that wrong.

So, let's run an experiment on this:

Let's go into medical hospitals and figure out through peer reporting which doctors are unfit to treat patients and remove their medical licenses. You know, just until a proper review can be conducted (however long that takes), after which, licenses could be restored for any doctor deemed safe. With medical malpractice being at cause in several hundred thousand deaths per year, surely this has to be worth consideration and would save far more lives, if effectively implemented, than the paltry few dozen that might be saved by removing guns from our neighbors based on amateur observation from neighbors, friends, and family. (And surely those doctors, being conscientious professionals, wouldn't make any false or frivolous allegations for personal or professional gain, would they? Surely not.)

Let's try that first. Because if we don't, people are going to die! Right?

Calm down, no one is taking your fancy metal penis extender away from you.

That’s true. Peer review never results in referrals to licensing boards resulting in loss of license.

Really dumb analogy in the OP.

The problem with gun ownership in the United States is that it's a right, by virtue of the second amendment. Being a medical doctor is not a right.

The United States of American is the only western liberal democracy that makes owning an inanimate object a right. Two other countries have enshrined gun ownership in their constitutions: Mexico and Guatemala. And the idiot in your White House is hell-bent on building walls to keep those dirty bastards out of your country. Which is kinda funny, because you'd think the NRA would love more members...

It is ok, we already know.

To explain this yet again, for the benefit of the willfully ignorant . . .

Altho it says "keep and bear arms," what the Second Amendment is really protecting is the right of the people to defend themselves, either individually or collectively, against any threat that might arise. Be that a tyrannical government or the chaos following a natural disaster or a gang of thugs terrorizing the neighborhood. It recognizes the fundamental human right of self-defense, without which no other rights can exist.

What you're saying is in places where "keeping and bearing arms" is not a right, all rights are illusory.

It's delusional to think personal firearms are keeping any rights intact.

Except it doesn't say that. If your founding fathers wanted to enshrine the right of self-defense, they would have said so.

Instead, they said ,"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." And as a result, they've given ample work to lawyers and judges over the last two centuries.

The amendment was written in language that was perfectly clear at the time, and in fact written by one of the premiere wordsmiths of the founding era. That generations of agenda-driven lawyers have obfuscated it since is of no moment. In modern idiom it might say something like "since the freedom of the people can only be preserved by the people, they have a right to bear arms in their own defense."

It isn't the guns themselves that keep right intact. It is the concept that individuals have a personal right to protect themselves that does that. Not everyone needs a firearm to protect themselves or their rights.

That's because the SHTF scenario hasn't visited you as yet. Count your blessings. Ask the Korean shop owners in L.A. during the King riots if the 2nd is something that should be taken for granted.

it has nothing to do with how many people die! It's HOW THEY DIE that matters!
Opioid overdose from high octane Chinese fentanyl? We all have to go sometime! Your doctor had the x-ray flipped around and removed your good lung instead? That's life in the big city! A five time DUI party girl with no license or insurance ran you over? Get over it you big baby!

Do you go looking for riots? Armed or otherwise? Got any anecdotes about how you protected yourself during the riots or anywhere else?

If I were a Korean shop owner I'd close up shop, go home, and call my insurance agent.

In principle I see little wrong about "Red Flag" laws.

In practice I see enormous problems. You're basically giving a community of people an opportunity to disarm someone they do not like.

Imagine what would happen to my right to own a firearm if Wordforge was an actual group of people who lived around each other.

Oddly enough, it was a Korean shooting (and being acquitted of) a black teenage girl the previous year that was a secondary source of ignition for those riots.


"On March 16, 1991, a year prior to the Los Angeles riots, storekeeper Soon Ja Du physically confronted black ninth-grader Latasha Harlins, grabbing her sweater and backpack when she suspected she had been trying to steal a bottle of orange juice from Empire Liquor, the store Du's family owned in Compton. Latasha hit Du in an attempt to get Du to release her arm and coat. Subsequently, Latasha turned to walk away and Du shot her in the back of the head, killing her. (Security tape showed the girl, already dead, was clutching $2 in her hand when investigators arrived.) Du was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and forced to pay a fine of $500, but not sentenced to any prison time.[103][104] Relations between the African-American and Korean communities significantly worsened after this, and the former became increasingly mistrustful of the criminal justice system.[105] Racial tensions had been simmering for years between these groups. Many African Americans were angry toward a growing Korean migrant community in South Central Los Angeles earning a living in their communities, and felt disrespected and humiliated by many Korean merchants. Cultural differences and a language barrier further fueled tensions. The probation Du received for killing Latasha Harlins, combined with the acquittal of the four LAPD officers in Rodney King's trial, resulted in the ensuing Los Angeles riots, with much anger directed at Koreans."

Du was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and forced to pay a fine of $500, but not sentenced to any prison time.

I'm amazed that Du was alive more than five seconds after that court decision! 250 pound enraged guy coming straight at you and you feel your life is in danger? I can see that.
Shooting a girl who was heading away from you? Not buying it - a lengthy prison term no doubt about it. Fucking justice circus for you!

Only that isn't remotely what it said, and pointing out that the author was able to write good English makes it less, not more likely that he accidentally failed to say what you believe he should have said instead.

We seem to have lasted quite a few centuries that way. In fact we did have tyrannical governments at times despite being allowed to go armed during those same periods.

Of course guns have entirely helped in NI....

Why the 2nd Amendment was written as it was? Because the Stuart Kings (the Catholics) had previously destroyed the militia that opposed them *not* by disbanding militias, but by taking away their guns. The reference to that militia language in the bill of rights is explained by a history that was well known to all those participating in the debate and the drafting.

It's not a question of reading or writing the English language by some multilingual German in the 21st century, or his interpretation of some English passages written a few centuries earlier.

So it needs updating?

You do not understand why Americans hold the U.S. Constitution with such veneration do you? People need something to believe in. With the decline in organized religion, it has left millions of American citizens with a need for something fixed and unchanging in their world. Thus the U.S. constitution.

we'll have to agree to disagree. I have plenty to believe in that has zero to do with religion, and there is nothing fixed or unchanging in my world.
Change powers existence.

Then you are not typical.

It has been updated. Twenty seven times.

And there's room for more updating - it comes complete with a process for updating it right there in the document.

But the language is very plain - the law doesn't state "the people shall have the right …" It was a pre-existing right. So instead it states: the right of the people.

Damn straight I'm not typical! Typical is a sucker's game - typical has no worth, no value. I try to rise above typical at every opportunity.

Then you agree reviewing the second is a reasonable suggestion?

All laws written should be subject to review. But you must tread very, very carefully when you start talking about restricting rights as opposed to fixing adminitrivia.

That's always a great point of departure for interpreting a written document.

I love how 'multilingual' is apparently an insult to you. But if reading and writing is already suspicious, no doubt doing so in several languages must be anathema.

So anyway. You say that the 2nd amendment was written -- sorry, dreamed up -- with Stuarts' disbandment of militia in mind, rather than individual self-defense. That would pretty much prove @spot261's point.