General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWe have had an assault weapons ban and it worked...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/wonk/wp/2018/02/15/its-time-to-bring-back-the-assault-weapons-ban-gun-violence-experts-say/
OhioBlue
(5,126 posts)and thinking how we need to make these statistics more widely known.
TomSlick
(11,100 posts)Well armed murders are more efficient.
Motownman78
(491 posts)There was never no real "ban". The only ban was the manufacture and import of NEW Assault rifles and high capacity magazines. I was able to buy a 17 round magazine for my Glock in 2001 even though the supposed ban had a 10 round limit on magazines. The reason was that the magazine was grandfathered legal for sale.
So, if there was no real ban, then why the decrease in shooting deaths during that time period?
Kaleva
(36,312 posts)Homicides commited with handguns peaked in the very early 90s, dramatically dropped during the remainder of that decade and into the early 2000s and started to rise again.
Compare charts showing gun massacres to homicides commited with a handgun and they follow a similar pattern.
kentuck
(111,103 posts)Thanks!
hack89
(39,171 posts)Once they were cosmetically modified to meet the new legal requirements. The rifle used at Sandy Hook would have been legal during the AWB.
krispos42
(49,445 posts)For reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with gun-control laws and everything to do with being able to have and advance environmentalism and women's rights. Now that culture-war gun-control attempts have given us a Repube president, a Repube House, a Repube Senate, and 2/3rds of state governorships and legislatures that are Repube, we can't advance our agenda. And things are starting to suck again.
Birth control gave women control over their reproduction in the late 60's. Environmental regulation took brain-damaging poisons (particularly airborne lead from gasoline) out of the air in the early 70's. Kids born after these events were more likely to be wanted, in families that could take care of them adequately, and less likely to have lead poisoning, which in short makes you violent, dumb, and shortsighted. These kids began to reach maturity in the late 80's... and that's when the crime rate began to drop. Fewer criminals entered the profession!
Even as the homicide rate halved, though, something else was happening. The vast bulk of homicides are single-victim incidents, but multiple-victim occurrences began to increase somewhat. Mass killings, being somewhat rare (statistically speaking) show a lot of year-to-year variation, at least in the time period studied.
You're also ignoring the fact that when the AWB was in effect, people were buying "almost assault weapons", or the same model of gun with "assault weapon" features removed. And the assault weapons bought before the ban were still in circulation; the bans were on sales of NEW guns only.
Nevernose
(13,081 posts)Try and buy a fully automatic weapon. Possible, but not easy.
Conversion is possible, but you either need a kit (which we could easily make a felony) or tools & skill. Either way, most people are lazy.