RandomGraysuit wrote:
Well, damn. I guess we can't agree on a simple set of definitions, even for the sake of a layman-level discussion. 'Assault weapon' was nowhere in your list of acceptable terms, and once again it creeps in.
An assault rifle has a 'really fast mode.' It may be burst fire. It may be fully automatic. Whichever it is, you can do a 'spray and pray', 'rock and roll' or whatever you choose to call holding down the trigger and sending out lots of bullets. It's also a rifle, usually on the smaller side, that has a box magazine and a mid-size cartridge.
As a civilian, you effectively can't own one of those. It's possible, but it's so difficult as to be not worth the trouble unless you have a lot of money and patience.
An assault weapon is whatever the heck you want it to be. You could creatively re-define your average pistol as an assault weapon with the right law.
Since the two terms are so confusing that you're using them interchangably, and you'd like to come up with a standard set of definitions, why don't we say "scary assault weapon of OMG it's a gun so we'd better ban it" (Or SAWOOIAGSWBBI, prounounced 'saw-oo-ee-ags-wibbi') and "military-style gun"? That way we have one term that we know is really precise, and one term we know is meant to be scary and mean whatever you need it to mean.
As for which type of weapon to bring on a rampage, your own statistics that you helpfully linked to indicate what the preferred weapon is for a mass shooter. By a 2:1 margin over any other type of weapon, semi-automatic pistols are the clear favorite. Based on that, why are we discussing any other weapon type at all, given that the threat is so obvious and clear?
Umm, i used the wikipedia pages on the AR 15 and the wikipedia page on Assault weapons for these descriptions, and both look like they have been cut and pasted from the Ar15 website, and a governmental website respectively. From the definition of assault weapons on the wikipedia page, i am assuming they are calling them assault weapons due to the fact you can have guns that fit this criteria while not being a rifle. however, using the two pages, and the wording on them, you can see that an AR 15 will actually fit into the assault weapon category, so maybe i should have called it assault weapon catergory instead of assault rifle catergory to include selective fire pistols and such.
regarding ownership, it doesnt seem to matter how hard it is to get one, they are still being used in gun massacres in a disturbing amount.
and regarding pistol usage over assault weapon usage in massacres, the fact you pointed out about them being harder to obtain and more expensive then pistols is probably a major factor, as well as the harder difficulty in hiding them on the way to commit the crime. given lower restrictions on assault weapons like the AR 15, the percentage of massacres with assault weapons used would probably go up. And although pistols have a very high usage level, i am willing to bet that the majority of the deaths in the massacres are caused by long guns brought by the killer, who brought a pistol as back up and for close quarters.
