Hard News: These things we must now change
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simon g, in reply to
"Well, I believe you may get your headlines, Mr. Ismay." ( Titanic )
Let's name and fame the reporter who delayed Seymour's arrival in the House simply by twirling her hair with her fingers, gazing at him dreamily and whispering "Ooh, David, tell us more ... ".
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Free countries don’t typically feature armed po-po do they? What exactly are the military style weapons they see fit to flaunt in public at every opportunity?
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Tom Semmens, in reply to
Because semi-autos allow you to dice the animal as you kill it? Our laws will still allow five and seven shot magazines.
Given that there are some people who think the only acceptable weapons with which men should fight boars is a plastic spoon and a couple of hellhounds named “Adolf” and “Satan” that even their owner won't pat unexpectedly, anyone who can’t hit an angry pig with a seven round mag deserves to be tuskered.
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I suppose, it might feel a bit like:
You're not allowed to drive the holden commodore anymore, now you have to drive the barina.
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Moz, in reply to
one of these things transports us from A to B, whilst the other gives its owner the ability to extinguish life on an industrial scale.
It’s cars that are used to “extinguish life on an industrial scale”. Even this year guns will kill far fewer kiwis than cars do, it’s not even close – the “right to drive” costs 380 lives a year just in direct kills. And “industrial” is the right term, they don’t just chop us up a few at a time, they spread a layer of toxic crud across the whole country while being supported by a network of dodgy companies funding secretive lobbyists.
People arguing for public health based restrictions need to be very selective if they want to keep cars.
That said, I think gun laws in NZ are ridiculously lax, I think the Thorpe report should be implemented and if anything tightened rather than loosened. Guns in Australia are straightforward to get for those that need them, and there’s a problem here with private arsenals as well as city boys going into rural areas and blazing away without thinking that “the bush” has people in it. We should aim for "significantly more restrictive than Australia" not "nicer to gun lovers than...".
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Moz, in reply to
Free countries don’t typically feature armed po-po do they?
By that measure there are almost no free countries. You've excluded UK, Australia, Aotearoa, Sweden. I'm struggling to think of countries where the Police rarely carry firearms.
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BenWilson, in reply to
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People arguing for public health based restrictions need to be very selective if they want to keep cars.
Well, you need to bring up the enormous utility of cars to counterbalance their obvious social cost. I don't think anywhere near the same argument can be made for guns. Most NZers use cars every single day and would be drastically affected if they couldn't, involving massive lifestyle changes. The entire layout of cities is built around them and infrastructure presumes their existence.
Yes, there is a case for car reduction, and direct harm from accidents is part of that, but it's a many times more complicated. Sustained efforts for many years, probably decades would be needed to eliminate cars without humungous social cost. Whereas rounding up a class of firearm is a matter of a few months and is only a minor cost to anyone who needed them for their work (they can pay a pest controller, or just use other methods themselves).
OK, there is probably a considerable loss in pleasure for some gun lovers who had become attached to their military style assault rifle. That is unfortunate for them, they will only be able to play with shotguns, hunting rifles, small mag semi-automatics, etc. This is much like boy racers complaining of restrictions applied to their vehicles, or speedway lovers believing they should be able to make an insane racket in a densely populated area at will. No, sorry, your rights to entertainment don't outweigh other peoples rights automatically. In the case of the kind of guns the Christchurch murderer had, the right to not have an entire community slaughtered is quite a strong counterbalancing right.
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Moz, in reply to
you need to bring up the enormous utility of cars to counterbalance their obvious social cost
Ah, no. I think the cost is too high for the benefit. It's *you* that needs to overstate the benefits in order to justify the costs, since you're the one pretending cars are worth the sacrifices we all make so you can drive.
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Richard Stewart, in reply to
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So you're supportive of entitled tossers who move into an area fully aware of a local activity that has existed for nearly 90 years, and then expect said activity to move away because they don't like it?
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Ah, no. I think the cost is too high for the benefit.
Sure, I understand you feel that way, but perhaps you could at least admit that the benefit is at least an order or magnitude more than military style assault rifle ownership, in order to keep this thread slightly on topic.
So you’re supportive of entitled tossers who move into an area fully aware of a local activity that has existed for nearly 90 years, and then expect said activity to move away because they don’t like it?
I certainly think they do have rights, yes. I'm somewhat ambivalent about whether the speedway should move, as it does not affect me, but I acknowledge that the people who it does affect have rights. I mostly raised it as a way of showing how the right to an entertainment can change over time if it starts to affect more people differently, and I think that threshold got crossed with military style assault rifles long ago.
It's really a tasteless threadjack to continue this discussion of the right to automobiles in this thread, particularly since the last two are directly opposing viewpoints on the matter, and appear to be antagonistic. I'm out of all further discussion relating to car ownership/use rights here.
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To get it all back on track. I got held up by the Indian military last week when I was trying to enter an international airport. Something to do with my papers. I noted the officers side arm had a well worn looking handle, so I didn't argue to aggressively about needing to catch an airplane.
And the other track. Cars don't kill, its the people driving them:-)
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To be fair that's something that happens at every Indian airport these days, they've reduced some of the more aggressive security stuff inside the airports, but added a front line screening at the door, I guess to keep out the bombers.
Contrast this with NZ where normally you almost never see cops with guns, except that one guy at Dunedin airport who just seems so out of place
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steven crawford, in reply to
When I arrived at Wellington airport, I had my shoes decontaminated. I ticked the quarantine box: have you visited a farm? It did that just incase they hadn’t looked at the stamp in my passport.
Seen as how the thread is temporarily out of order, here is a film I made. Note: spot the cow sitting on the road and the cosmic dudes show up near the end.
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Alfie, in reply to
It’s really a tasteless threadjack to continue this discussion of the right to automobiles in this thread
+1
Meanwhile... David Tipple just doesn't know when to shut up.
"We didn't ban big white trucks after the Nice murders..."
Fuckwit!
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Tomorrow is the last day to submit to the select committee, so please consider doing so if you support these law changes. Apparently the NRA-spam is flooding in.
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Tipple’s just had his say in front of the finance and expenditure committee. And there’s nothing in the Herald report to suggest he’s developed any empathy over recent days. Guilt doesn’t seem to affect some people.
Tipple admitted that since March 15, Gun City has sold “dozens, not hundreds” of weapons similar to the ones his company sold to the terrorist. He also said “there were no loopholes in existing law” and called Newshub journos “terrorists”.
Nothing Trumpian and unhinged to see here folks.
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How is it he's allowed to sell guns in NZ? he was jailed in the US for attempting to smuggle guns (into NZ)
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Here's some more background on Tipple, c/ Reed Fleming on Twitter.
Fit and proper person? Jeez... he barely qualifies as human. It's hard to imagine how Tipple could get even the most basic gun license, let alone operate the biggest gun shops in NZ.
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steven crawford, in reply to
Jesus, thats the same guy! why has he even got a fire arms licence at all. I wouldn't give me a licence, and I don't even come close to his levels of magical thinking.
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Royal enquiry.
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
why has he even got a fire arms licence at all
Over 99% of licenses are approved.
One wonders if the police have the time to do the job properly.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
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One wonders if the police have the time to do the job properly.
I foresee a flying phalanx of frontline forensic clinical psychologists.
An authoritative touring Turing Test, enforcing the extraordinary ordinance for operating and using ordnance.. -
As mentioned on another thread, I don't think polling in the immediate aftermath of 15/3 is justifiable, but today's TVNZ poll was conducted 3 weeks later. In fact, it was during Peak Seymour, and (to their credit) when National were supporting the new gun laws going through Parliament.
Point being, if there were some political backlash, a real mood of protest bubbling under, you would expect at least some movement to ACT, or New Cons, the two current vehicles for disaffected ex-Nats or ex-NZF voters. The grandstanding was there for all to see.
Reality? Nothing. Not even one extra voter in a hundred.
So let's not pretend that the Tipples and Loders really represent a sizeable slice of the electorate. There's not the slightest evidence that they do.
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Moz, in reply to
Over 99% of licenses are approved.
Part of that is because there are people who don't even bother applying (the criteria are public), but mostly because there are easy ways to scam the system. But that's because we live in a free society, the police don't already have a tidy list of who you live with, who your friends are, what you post on antisocial media and so on. Thus the applicant nominates their own referees and you'd have to be mighty socially unaware to nominate people who will say "hell no".
I'm glad to see the poll results, like an overwhelming majority of people I was shocked at how silly the system was.
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