Winter Regular Final: Gun Ban

Suicide 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. The fact that there is a blurry line at all demonstrates how much this shouldn't’t be a governmental issue. Just as the government doesn’t have the responsibility to help every addicted alcoholic that isn’t harming other people by driving, it shouldn't’t forcibly take a role in removing means for self-harm. The government should have no role in whether an individual harms themselves or not, because the reasons to why they do it are so vast and different, it’s impossible to say who it really helps and who is just being forced to live in a cruel world for the sake of others. Just because someone is treated after surviving a suicide attempt doesn’t mean depression symptom’s just go away. We can manipulate people to believe there is some purpose to life that they just cannot grasp, but that doesn’t make their pain go away in every circumstance. Pro is arguing that we force people to live in pain, and if they want to escape, they must do so by following a more painful route than necessary that pro admits may not even work. 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. I am quoting this because it is completely untrue and is blatant manipulation of my stance. People should seek help for depression. But as I said, when the treatment doesn’t work, or if someone refuses to take treatment it is wrong to simply force people to suffer. Taking away the freedom to end our own misery is the almost the same as forcing someone to be tortured. Let the family and the individual be in charge of a suicidal person’s choices. If the government has a duty to protect it’s citizens, it should do so in a way that doesn’t violate their freedom of choice. They can offer free mental therapy programs, or any other such means for help, so long as it is the individual’s choice to attend them. Homicide Con mis-interprets me. I don’t think I ever accused him of dropping an argument. The purpose of the link isn’t to prove that a gun ban always means more or less homicide, just that homicides rates can’t be proven to be based on a gun ban alone. Pro keeps insisting that a criminals favorite weapon is a gun, and I agree whole-heartedly that homicide crimes are easiest with a gun. Where we dis-agree is on pro’s naïve assumption that criminals will suddenly start using knives and club’s to carry out these homicides, when Pro’s own source tells us criminals can continue to get guns on the black market for only an extra 100-200 dollars or so. Next Pro continues to go on about the irrelevant part of my first round quote saying that it had no sources or footnotes. While I suppose it’s his prerogative to try and derail once again the main point of the quote (that gun ban’s do not effect homicide rates), I have already posted the sources for the part of the quote that he is saying is unsourced. Pro is blatantly refusing to read and scroll down by saying it has no footnotes and sources. Black Market I don’t know why this point needed to be separated from the homicide point by pro, seeing as they go hand in hand in relevancy, but oh well. The major point in this point that pro seems to be missing is the negative effects of the black market on crime. Pro seems to realize that the black market exists but seems to mark it down as an issue of less importance by applying it to only pre-meditating criminals. Then without so much as a source citing how many of these criminals are pre-meditative, ignores the negative repercussions of taking away that sense of safety from law abiding civilians. Pro needs to stop equating this point inaccurately to a nirvana fallacy, seeing as again, it is only a fallacy so much as it supports his point. To be more specific on this, he is equating my point to saying that guns themselves are a problem (which I have never said ones) and that the black market isn’t a solution to that problem. In order for this point to be work, I would essentially have to be agreeing with him that guns are a problem, and not the mis-use of them through human mis-judgement. What I am actually saying is that the black market exists meaning that the pre-meditating criminals (that pro tries to down-size the impact of based on an un-sourced assumption that they make up only a fraction of total gun crimes) have their hands on weapons where law abiding citizens don’t have a means for protection. Pro is advocating that we reduce the benefits of protection self and government for the hope that less impulse crimes occur; Crimes that he also admits can still occur with “Clubs and knives”. The benefits of a gun ban simply don’t outweigh the con’s. On the source challenge: Pro asks why the street black market and the online market are not compatible. There are multiple obvious reasons why they are not. First, ease of use. Is it not much easier to log onto a home computer than to seek out individuals who sell illegal products? There is also a risk factor in criminals being caught looking to buy weapons illegally on the streets that isn’t so strict in the online world, as I proved in round 1. Having something delivered to your house via fed-ex is ten-fold easier than going through the lengths of getting hands on illegal merchandise through the black market, and that is why they are so different. Pro next mis-understands how his source is inaccurate because it doesn’t apply to the current situation in the United States. To reiterate, Pro is attempting to use a source to draw a conclusion when guns are currently already legal, meaning that the Agent in his source is only looking for black market buyers seeking out illegal weaponry in the heavy arms category. It has no relevance to what an online black market would produce, and has no applicability. The third part of this, I am confused on how Pro interpreted me. His own source in Round 2 shows that guns aren’t that expensive, and now he is contradicting that by saying firearms are “three times more expensive”. His source contradicts his own point. On disrupting the black market con makes another assumption that all guns are made in the U.S. Accidents Pro completely ignores my counter argument to this, and continues to repeat his point that people will still trigger lock loaded guns. My argument was that even if people are stupid enough to trigger lock a gun with a clip in it as opposed to waiting to put the clip in afterwards (seriously, that's what my opponent is saying lol), that my counter plan is that it is still the law. Again, he completely ignores my comparison that drinking and driving is illegal, yet people still do it and there are still consequences. Just because people break the law doesn't mean that they won't get caught and punished for doing it. Next Pro makes a point about safety alternative's are counter-productive to real life situations of home invaders. I agree completely, however some protection is better than no protection at all. My counter plan is simply adding an alternative that satisfies pro's problems of safety, while giving the regular civilian the ability to protect themselves. It's impossible to say exactly how every real life situation would play out, but there is a good chance that having a gun even trigger locked would deter an unknowing would-be criminal on sight. I am not saying that I think gun's should all have to be locked up (unless their are children in the home with access to the firearm), but rather saying that this is a better alternative than a complete ban on weapons. This way constitutional values can keep their integrity, civilians have some semblance of peace and mind rather than none, and accidents are more likely avoided. Counter-plans Again, quite annoyingly, Pro dismisses my ENTIRE rebuttal to his "contradiction argument". I am half tempted to just re-copy and paste the argument until he actually responds to it. But since their is some comprehension troubles, I will re-iterate it. My goal is to satisfy potential deterrence problems while satisfying gun freedom. I am just essentially making Pro's value viable without enforcing a gun ban. I AM NOT SAYING THAT PEOPLE WHO FAIL THESE ALTERNATIVES CAN'T ACCESS A BLACKMARKET. Just that it accomplishes what Pro wants, in making it harder for people with criminal history and medical illness history to get their hands on weapons. That's it, that is the whole point. Reducing the problem of gun crime in a way that satisfies both Pro's arguments as well as my own. In a Con world you have the best of both worlds, and other than the safety argument, pro simply drops all of this because he refuses to understand that crime deterrence and gun freedom can work hand in hand. As it currently stands, many people can walk into a gun store with a criminal history, or a mental treatment history, and buy a gun. I am saying make it harder for them, where Con is saying take ALL guns away. This does not contradict my black market argument in the slightest. I ask that if Pro refuses to respond to this point properly in the next round, that voters consider this a concession and extend this point. Back to Pro.