[gruez]

>Most carbon offsets for example are a scam, in the sense that one of the most common 'offsets' is for example paying people to not cut down trees - that they may or may not have been planning to cut down in the first place. [...]

>The whole concept is silly, we don't offset crime for instance. I can't just pay someone in advance to not punch someone so that I can do it.

Governments do something similar though: gun buyback schemes are basically the same thing. Sure, maybe that gun that the government bought would have been used to commit a crime, or it was held by a responsible gun owner who wouldn't have committed any crimes to begin with.

[arcticbull]

Not sure guns are the same thing. 200-500,000 guns are stolen each year in the US and then used to commit crimes. Really anything you can do to reduce the number of guns in the US is strictly a good thing. [1]

> The large number of guns stolen each year suggests that theft may be an important source of “crime guns.” Indeed, it appears that while gun theft is often not the proximate source of firearms for most criminals [...], it is often the ultimate source-the way guns initially enter into the illegal market.

It's not 'maybe a responsible gun owner would or wouldn't use it for crime' so much as reducing the surface area of a massive vulnerability.

[1] https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/32630640/5385318...

[SV_BubbleTime]

Harvard sounds like a reputable source. But I didn’t even need to click it to know that would be a David Hemenway link.

That guy is an absolute propagandist. A complete fraud given a platform by Michael Bloomberg who single handedly funds the majority of gun control efforts in the USA.

If you do any research on him at all, you’ll find he was center of the Clinton Admin and 1994 Congress efforts to push gun control, including weaponizing the CDC, funding compete junk studies where data was never released and extremely unethical methodology like a phone survey of 250 people who filed police reports that mentioned someone was shot in a home to conclude that for all people and all reasons “you are x% more likely to die if you own a gun in your home” (eneter Hemenway, and data never released), and all the other lies they used to push the Clinton AWB, which they were severely punished for in the 1996 elections.

Hemenway is a liar and a hack. I would highly suggest finding sources that stay far away from him.

[arcticbull]

Without addressing anything you wrote, here's three other sources that yields the same results, including one from the ATF. Regardless of your opinions regarding the author there is plenty of data that backs up this assertion.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5385318/

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/stolen-gunsare-fueli...

[2] https://www.atf.gov/firearms/national-firearms-commerce-and-...

[yonaguska]

If you're trying to convince someone that is pro 2a of anything, the ATF is hardly a source of authority. They're pretty high up there in the list of reviled 3 letter agencies.

[arcticbull]

heh, it's sort of a cult at this point. It's more for the audience.

[SV_BubbleTime]

If you are OK with no addressing content; For your reference… NIH, ATF, and Washington Post are all anti-gun organizations.

For your ATF link, it’s all University criminology depts sourcing data, typically universities are anti-gun; and the sociology depts especially so.

It is very difficult to get unbiased results on guns. And ultra easy to see authority and confirmation biases. If you are mindful of that fact, the landscape and topic takes on a new dimension.

[lhopki01]

Why is the link that direction? Could it be that universities, etc are anti-gun because the data shows they are harmful?

Overall I find it odd that this standard is applied this way. No one accuses Universities of being anti cancer when they publish a study on how cancer harms the body. Or for example dismissing any study on the effectiveness of a vaccine because the group doing the study are pro vaccines.

[arcticbull]

Yes thanks to the power of imagination guns actually shoot candies and rainbows, thanks for setting me straight. The number of stolen guns shouldn’t be controversial lol

[rs999gti]

Exactly this is a feel good program that does nothing to address or resolve the actual issues.