Winter Regular Final: Gun Ban

SuicideCon did a fairly good rebuttal of this, but conceded a lot of my points such as suicide being more likely to occur with a gun. Con appeals to the people that will attempt suicide over and over and over, and how a gun gives them a way out of this “world of self inflicted mental trauma”. What we must realize is how small a percentage of the total suicides this is, and how the thousands of lives that can be saved outweigh these few. First of all, Con seems to suggest that people with psychoactive depression symptoms are very hard to treat, and they should just be able to give up and kill themselves with a firearm, instead of continue trying for treatment. The fact is that if someone is cured, getting their life back and living it through is worth all the trauma that they experienced getting there. It makes it all worth it. Putting a gun into the situation takes away this redeeming possibility. Secondly, the percentage of people like this is so small. Only about 7% of people who survive suicide attempt it again [1]. When someone attempts suicide, they almost die. When someone almost dies, they are rushed to the hospital. The hospital sees that the person attempted suicide and prescribe them depression treatment. This cures them of the depression 80-90% of the time [2]. When the fatality of suicide is so high, not as many people are given the opportunity to be cured, and thus get their life back. The amount of suicides that could be deterred, and the amount of people that could be cured and get their life back far outweighs the few who have psychoactive depression symptoms. I win this argument by impact calculus. Con also argues that self-harm issues are not a government’s business. But the government inherently has a duty to protect its citizens. If a gun ban helps save thousands of lives, the government has every right to save them; it is its duty to do so. HomicideCon says that I dropped his argument on an increase of homicides after a gun ban in a different country. But I did not drop it, I explained how it was self-refuting because Con explained in the beginning of R1 that data from different countries was irrelevant. This data was raw data from a different country; thus it's irrelevant. Con then says that I have no statistical evidence to prove that people with the intention to kill will choose not to carry it out when there is a gun ban. I never said this would happen. My argument is simple. A firearm is a criminal's favorite tool, evidenced by the fact that more than half of crimes are committed with it. If we took away firearms, criminals would have to use a less effective weapon such as knives, or clubs, etc. These are less effective in carrying out crime, making more people able to survive attempted homicide. As well as making crime less effective overall. So to answer Con’s comment, they would merely be less likely to succeed. Con then defends his quote about higher gun ownership leading to higher crime. He quotes the website, but the quotes he used did not prove that gun ownership leads to lower crime. It cites other countries which Con already pointed out was irrelevant. I was referring to the part of the site that Con was referring to, the the part he quoted. It has no footnote, no sources. The rest of the site’s facts are irrelevant because Con did not cite them, and they use raw data from other countries. Black MarketCon rejects my nirvana fallacy by saying that banning guns would not make guns any less available. Even if we accept this is true, it's irrelevant. What matters is not the availability of guns in this context, but rather the volume. Since the majority of citizens are law-abiding, it would follow that only premeditative criminals would have guns. This would be a reduction in the amount of guns, and a reduction in the amount of crimes committed with guns (as premeditative crimes are only a fraction of total crimes). This reduces violent crime because (see homicide). Thus a gun ban would reduce the amount of guns (as the majority of citizens are law-abiding), and would decrease violent crime. Con is throwing this out because it doesn’t take away all guns and doesn’t reduce all guns. This is a nirvana fallacy. Con then says that the gun ban would only take away guns from the victims of mass murderers. This is the same as before, the majority of crime is not done by mass murderers. The majority of crime is done by less-hardened criminals, therefore a gun ban would deter the majority of crime. Deterring the majority of crime is better than dettering no crime at all. Con challenges my source:1) Con says that the online black market is much different than the street black market. Why aren’t these two black markets compatible? He doesn’t say. 2) Con says that there was already a ban or something? It was really confusing...can’t really respond. 3) In regards to the black market being more expensive. The majority of criminals are poor [6], paying three times the amount of already expensive firearms is tough. And it deters criminals. Referring to the disruption of black market influx. The majority of guns are made in the US, cutting off this resource shatters their number one importer, which harms the influx. Harming the whole operation. Banning guns would hurt the black market, not promote it. AccidentsCon argues that his trigger-lock counterplan would reduce the amount of accidents created by firearms. Con argues that people wouldn’t use a trigger-lock on a loaded gun because that is stupid. But people are stupid. As my study shows, people are not responsible with guns.“Many gun owners report storing their guns loaded and unlocked. Gun training is often associated with an increased likelihood of storing firearms in this manner... some 400 parents with firearms in the home responded to questions about firearms storage. Over 20% of parents had a loaded firearm and 8% stored at least one firearm loaded and unlocked. Households with teenagers were somewhat more likely to store firearms unsafely.” [3]The most common reason people have guns is for safety [4]. How the hell is your gun supposed to keep you safe when in the event an intruder walks in, you have to go down to the basement, unlock the safe, find the key to the trigger lock, unlock the trigger lock (which is difficult [5]), load the gun, and then face the intruder. This process at best might take 10 minutes. By that time, the intruder is already on you. Since gun owners have guns for safety reasons, they would keep it stored in a way to maximize that safety; leaving the gun loaded and without a trigger lock. Therefore, the majority of gun owners are unlikely to use this counterplan. And gun accidents will continue to prevail. CounterplansCon fails to address why his black market argument and his counterplans contradict each other. If Con is going to argue that people would still be able to get firearms through an online black market if guns were banned, it is viable to believe that people would still be able to get firearms through an online black market. If Con argues that the online black market is so easy and accessible, isn’t it still easy and accessible by Con’s counterplans? People who are not allowed to acquire firearms by Con’s counterplan (those that don’t meet psychological tests), by Con’s own reasoning, easily get some by the online black market. This is something Con fails to address in his defense. I apply this same logic to all of Con’s proposed gun control counterplans except for trigger-locks, as the same logic negates all of them.In order for his counterplans to work, he must drop his online black market argument. [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov...[2] http://www.save.org...[3] http://www.hsph.harvard.edu...[4] https://www.theguardian.com...[5] http://www.slate.com...[6] http://www.jacksonfreepress.com...