Negligent Discharges...x20...across the street...advice?

[t3rmin]

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Gordie wrote:

Yes, but firing into the air can cause death or injury.  These cases are well documented and known. 

There it is again: "can cause". Almost anything can cause death or injury. But you don't want to live in a padded box. It doesn't work anyway. Total government control does not equal total safety (prisons).

It is little comfort to the victim and their family if the person responsible is punished, it won't bring your loved one back.

Neither are arbitrary prohibitions that don't work. If firing into the air or within city limits or whatever is already illegal, why are we even having this conversation? Problem solved, right?

This is why it is illegal to fire into the air.  It is a risky behavior that has no real purpose to justify it.  What is one legitimate purpose of firing into the air that would justify the risk to others?  Banning bad behavior is not tyranny, banning the tools that may be used by some for the purpose of bad behavior, is. 

I won't defend firing into the air. It's obviously a bad idea. But the sentiment you express here is essentially "to everyone according to their need". Three guesses who else shares that philosophy...?

A free man has to justify nothing until his actions come into conflict with another person's rights. Does firing into the air qualify as such a conflict? Probably.

But the point is liberty is inclusive, not exclusive. I would contend the question of whether a behavior has a legitimate purpose has no place in a free society.

 

[jhow1nm2]

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Thank you all for all the input. I've also posted the same situation on the US Concealed Carry site. It's fascinating to me to see how the threads have taken on slightly different directions and completely different tones. Out of all the suggestions and comments on both sites, here's what seem to be the best and least confrontational way of approaching the subject soon (as soon as I can catch him at home).

"Maybe stop over and talk with them (seeing they are the new neighbors in this community)and say hey on news years eve late my wife heard what she thought was gun fire but did not see anything. I was so sick and in bed I did not hear anything but on my way out to the drug store early news years day I saw a lot of brass at the end of your drive way. I thought maybe it was a drive by shooting or something worse so I carefully picked up the brass and called the police. I didn't see any bullet holes so far on my house/property but I'm just trying to be a good neighbor and I thought I would stop to see if everything is ok with you. From his reply you should know what kind of people you have for your new neighbors."

Since the renter at this home is a biker, another commented that I need to be wary of possible colors being flown and offended with any confrontation.

Once I get with the residents, I'll post the response here. The story above is a sellable story especially since the young punks who moved out before this new renter moved in, were, in fact, involved in gang activity.

Thanks again to all...much appreciated, enjoyed the back and forth on the topic and all of your input!!!!

 

[t3rmin]

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jhow1nm2 wrote:

"Maybe stop over and talk with them (seeing they are the new neighbors in this community)and say hey on news years eve late my wife heard what she thought was gun fire but did not see anything. I was so sick and in bed I did not hear anything but on my way out to the drug store early news years day I saw a lot of brass at the end of your drive way. I thought maybe it was a drive by shooting or something worse so I carefully picked up the brass and called the police. I didn't see any bullet holes so far on my house/property but I'm just trying to be a good neighbor and I thought I would stop to see if everything is ok with you. From his reply you should know what kind of people you have for your new neighbors."

Kudos on going a non-confrontational route. I'd be careful about lying, though -- could come back to bite you. Depending on how anal the neighbor is, they could call the cops to inquire about the report and easily figure out your real motivation for reporting. Or the cop swings by to question them again and tells them everything. Or maybe just see through the story -- why the heck you didn't stop by and see if they were OK personally?

At this point, here's what I'd do: just tell the truth. Say you heard/saw what happened, had a knee-jerk reaction and called the cops. But now you realize that was wrong and you wanted to apologize, be neighborly, and handle it man-to-man. Just tell 'em how what they did made you feel. Work in some rapport with common gunnie ground. I wouldn't be surprised if they offered to knock it off without you even asking.

Also, you're A-OK for tolerating our shameless thread hi-jack. ;-)

 

[Gordie]

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t3rmin wrote:

Gordie wrote:

Yes, but firing into the air can cause death or injury.These cases are well documented and known.

There it is again: "can cause". Almost anything can cause death or injury. But you don't want to live in a padded box. It doesn't work anyway. Total government control does not equal total safety (prisons).

It is little comfort to the victim and their family if the person responsible is punished, it won't bring your loved one back.

Neither are arbitrary prohibitions that don't work. If firing into the air or within city limits or whatever is already illegal, why are we even having this conversation? Problem solved, right?

This is why it is illegal to fire into the air. It is a risky behavior that has no real purpose to justify it.What is one legitimate purpose of firing into the air that would justify the risk to others? Banning bad behavior is not tyranny, banning the tools that may be used by some for the purpose of bad behavior, is.

I won't defend firing into the air. It's obviously a bad idea. But the sentiment you express here is essentially "to everyone according to their need". Three guesses who else shares that philosophy...?

A free man has to justify nothing until his actions come into conflict with another person's rights. Does firing into the air qualify as such a conflict? Probably.

But the point is liberty is inclusive, not exclusive. I would contend the question of whether a behavior has a legitimate purpose has no place in a free society.

So would you have us live ina world with no rules or laws? Do you really want anarchy? It can be pretty brutal.

As for the attempt to tie this into socialist beliefs, "to everyone according to their need", how about "the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness"? It's hard to pursue liberty and happiness without life. If you knowingly put someone else's life at riskout of sheer stupidity or selfishness,you have forfeited your rights.

Liberty comes with responsibility. Being a free man does not make you free to endanger others. The laws against certain behaviors are there to guide people who aren't smart enough on their own, or who would not be responsible on their own. Without the laws, there would be no recourse until it was too late.

As for "arbitrary prohibitions that don't work", if there is no law against the action, then there is no legalway to stop someone from doing itover and over again until it is too late. Some people never learn, or just don't care what may happen because of their bad decisions.

Do you have kids? Do you let them play in the road until they learn on their own that this is dangerous? No, you make rules for them to stay out of the road until they are responsible enough to know the danger. This is the same reason that we have laws for public safety,because some people never grow to learn responsibility for their actions.

Do we carry because we want to punish a criminal after they victimize us? No, we carry so that we won't be victimized if the first place.Assault is againstthe law. Under the law, assault is only the threat, or attempt to commit violence. If thethreat is carried out, it is battery. If someone assaults me (attempts to attack, or threatens to attack), I will defend myself accordingly, even if no harm has befallen me yet. Under your logic, (arbitraryprohibitionsdon't work and therefore should not be implemented), we would have no right to defend ourselves until after the BG had caused us harm (battery). I prefer to stop the BG before harm can be causedby his actions (only assault at this time).

I would contend the question of whether a behavior has a legitimate purpose has no place in a free society.

A game of tag among children has little or no legitimate value to society, but the risk of harm is very little, and the kids have a lot of fun. Shooting into the air puts anyone downrange at risk through no choice of their own, withlittle benefit to anyone besides the pleasure derived by the shooter.

Thebenefit must be weighed against the risk, lots of fun, little risk:celebrate, or a little fun, lots of risk.:uhoh:

 

[Doug Huffman]

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Gordie wrote:

Thebenefit must be weighed against the risk, lots of fun, little risk:celebrate, or a little fun, lots of risk.:uhoh:

The greatest good for the greatest number?

 

[marshaul]

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Isn't that socialism?

 

[Gordie]

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Doug Huffman wrote:

Gordie wrote:

Thebenefit must be weighed against the risk, lots of fun, little risk:celebrate, or a little fun, lots of risk.:uhoh:

The greatest good for the greatest number?

No, responsibility and common sense.

 

[marshaul]

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Gordie wrote:

Doug Huffman wrote:

Gordie wrote:

The benefit must be weighed against the risk, lots of fun, little risk:celebrate, or a little fun, lots of risk.:uhoh:

The greatest good for the greatest number?

No, responsibility and common sense.

Sorry, forcing people to comply with arbitrary regulation does not encourage or engender real responsibility. Quite the contrary.

Edit: This is equally true of common sense.

 

[marshaul]

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t3rmin wrote:

marshaul: can I ask what's on your reading list?

Hey now it's your turn.

 

[Gordie]

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marshaul wrote:

Isn't that socialism?

No, once again, being free doesn't give you the right to endanger others. Freedom come with responsibility. If you can't be responsible with your freedom, you will lose it.

 

[marshaul]

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Gordie wrote:

marshaul wrote:

Isn't that socialism?

No, once again, being free doesn't give you the right to endanger others.  Freedom come with responsibility.  If you can't be responsible with your freedom, you will lose it.

Your idea of "responsibility" is regulation-induced, but such a concept is inherently self-undermining if not self-contradictory.

 

[marshaul]

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The "bazooka freedom" thread was deleted, but in it AWDstylez made a post whining about the only way any of his (highly irresponsible, I might add) friends ever drive sober is when they are worried about a DUI, or something to that effect.

To stylez, this is why you need regulation. So that his friends will continue to be irresponsible clowns (Why do you even know any people like that, stylez? None of my friends behave in such a negligent fashion.).

I argue that this is what regulatory enforcement creates. Compliance, not responsibility. His friends will comply, as in "not get caught", but they won't be responsible -- that is, as soon as there is no enforcement they'll start driving drunk.

In a truly free society with true responsibility, nobody could afford the liability of drunk driving, or could afford to be trespassed off privately owned roads. As for the few who might have to actually get in an accident (with all its concomitant risk) to "learn their lesson", I would point out that such people exist even under our current regulatory system.

Of course liability still exists, but people are distracted from the reality of the situation by the abstract nonreality of the regulatory system. An example of how this is so is forced liability insurance: the reality of liability never hits home until they cause a drunk driving accident and all of a sudden their insurance won't cover them. And then the victims are also uninsured because they only were in compliance, and didn't bother to ensure themselves, because "Hey, the other guy is required to have liability insurance so he will and I'll be covered".

Insurance should be to protect yourself from the unpredictable world which doesn't always live up to its liability. Instead we mandate insurance for your own liability to "make everyone else safer" and in the process discourage anybody from coming face to face with their own liability, which historically was the tool our society used to encourage responsibility (as opposed to preemptive regulation).

I know I could probably spend effort to articulate this point a little more clearly, but simply put regulation encourages compliance and liability encourages responsibility.

Nothing works perfectly but one system is value-adding and the other is not.

Edit: Of course private roads would be free to regulate as much as they like. However, I contend that without artificial forces and play, and constrained by real market forces and real liability, companies would be forced to find models that work. Also, the toolset is more appropriate to the task at hand. Business would want to please its customers while keeping roads safe. Regulation would likely be result-oriented. No arbitrary limits, but if you're caught driving poorly enough or enough times you'll be banned from the premises, so to speak. Such a model would still be "regulatory" but would be very different from our current government-regulatory system.

 

[t3rmin]

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This is getting weird because we're arguing tangentially.

We're being abstract, you're being specific. We're speaking more about a firing into the ground (no aggression or specific/imminent danger) scenario, you're firing wildly or into the air.

No one here has said it's OK to launch injurious projectiles into other people's spheres. That's plainly an initiation of aggression and is legitimately addressed by law or self-defense.

This holds true whether they're intentionally shooting at you, shooting into the air, or ricocheting off rocks in the ground.

No, nobody actually has to get hurt or killed in order for a free society or individual to justifiably intervene.

I think we all agree on that much, right?

 

[Gordie]

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marshaul wrote:

Gordie wrote:

marshaul wrote:

Isn't that socialism?

No, once again, being free doesn't give you the right to endanger others. Freedom come with responsibility. If you can't be responsible with your freedom, you will lose it.

Your idea of "responsibility" is regulation-induced, but such a concept is inherently self-undermining if not self-contradictory.

No, as I said in my post, some people will not act responsibly on their own, I should not be required to wait until I have suffered harm to stop bad behavior.

Liberty comes with responsibility. Being a free man does not make you free to endanger others. The laws against certain behaviors are there to guide people who aren't smart enough on their own, or who would not be responsible on their own. Without the laws, there would be no recourse until it was too late.

As for "arbitrary prohibitions that don't work", if there is no law against the action, then there is no legalway to stop someone from doing itover and over again until it is too late. Some people never learn, or just don't care what may happen because of their bad decisions

I know that endangering other people is irresponsible. I don't need to be told that it is a bad idea. Some people are either too stupid or too irresponsible to consider their actions before they act, for them we make it official so that they can't come back and say "Well I didn't know it was a bad idea." Why should I be forced to accept their endangering of my life in the name of their freedom?

To say that liability is a better deterrent than "arbitrary regulations" is a catch 22. True,havingno arbitrary regulations would provide the greatest amount of freedom, but relying only onpunishing people for bad behavior that causes injury to others does teach a lesson to most, but not all. (Look at the number of people who have more than one accident because of DUI.) The problem with this approach is that the victims can't be undone. An injury can't be "un"injured, a death can't be "un"killed.

To say that to be truly free "arbitrary regulations" should not be allowed denies the rights that others have to be free from the consequences of someone else's bad choices. How do your rights to be "free" override my right tolife, liberty ,and the pursuit of happiness? These three rights are the very foundation upon which all others are built upon. Your right to be free from rules does not trump my right to live free from being endangered by actions which are known to be undulydangerous.

t3rmin

No, nobody actually has to get hurt or killed in order for a free society or individual to justifiably intervene.

I think we all agree on that much, right?

Yes, I would agree.

 

[t3rmin]

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marshaul wrote:

t3rmin wrote:

marshaul: can I ask what's on your reading list?

Hey now it's your turn.

Nothing with regularity/discipline actually. I did Atlas Shrugged on audiobook (abridged). ;-) And Ron Paul's "The Revolution: A Manifesto", of course. Great (short, easy read) primer on liberty.

Working through some David McCullough right now (mediocre) and maybe some Heinlein next.

 

[AWDstylez]

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marshaul wrote:

In a truly free society with true responsibility, nobody could afford the liability of drunk driving, or could afford to be trespassed off privately owned roads. As for the few who might have to actually get in an accident (with all its concomitant risk) to "learn their lesson", I would point out that such people exist even under our current regulatory system.

And the massive, sweeping difference is that our current system allows them to be taken off the road BEFORE they've done anyone harm. Your system allows them to do it as long as they can get away with it. Then when they can't, somone ends up injured or dead.



You fail to see the world as it is. People aren't jumping at the chanceto be responsible. In fact, they're so irresponsible that they'll currently risk injury to themselves, injury to others,ANDjail time. What makes you think that when you take away the jail time and leave them simply risking injury to themselves or injury to other that they're magically going to stop and say, "ZOMG!! DUI is perfectly LEGAL now!!! I'm never going to do it again!!! I wouldn't want anyone to get hurt!!"

 

[t3rmin]

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Gordie wrote:

No, once again, being free doesn't give you the right to endanger others.  Freedom come with responsibility.  If you can't be responsible with your freedom, you will lose it.

Again, nobody is saying people actually have to be hurt in order for a justified force-response. All that is required is the initiation of aggression.

If you endanger me by threatening with a gun, Lord willing I can take you out first with mine.

If you are caught driving dangerously (drunk or not), endangering those around you, and thus initiating aggression, I'd throw the book at you myself.

But the payoff for prohibitions on non-aggressive behavior just isn't there. Even if they made us marginally safer, which I don't think anybody's demonstrated, the liberty lost is intolerable.

And in reality, as marshaul said, "pre-crime"/"thought-crime" laws encourage irresponsibility. Why do I have to consider safety or liability if the State tells me how to act?

It's like moral welfare. We all understand how entitlement programs discourage hard work. How can you say whether we need these laws because of so much irresponsibility or we have so much irresponsibility because of these laws?

How many of these malum prohibitum issues like drugs and drunk driving were so acute 50-75 years ago? Has the nanny-state increased or decreased during that time? By your premise these problems should be getting better, not worse.

But these issues are deteriorating. And the solution is *more* of what isn't working now...?

No, as I said in my post, some people will not act responsibly on their own, I should not be required to wait until I have suffered harm to stop bad behavior.

I don't think you are the kind of person who waits for somebody else to take care of you. You carry a firearm, that's a start. Who's responsibility is your safety anyway?

Some people are either too stupid or too irresponsible to consider their actions before they act, for them we make it official so that they can't come back and say "Well I didn't know it was a bad idea."  Why should I be forced to accept their endangering of my life in the name of their freedom?

So you want to determine your freedoms, my freedoms, by the lowest common denominators in society? No thanks.

To say that liability is a better deterrent than "arbitrary regulations" is a catch 22.  True, having no arbitrary regulations would provide the greatest amount of freedom, but relying only on punishing people for bad behavior that causes injury to others does teach a lesson to most, but not all.

That's a straw man, my friend. I've seen nobody suggest punishing only after bodily injury occurs. Check this out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle

I think we're being more broad than you think.

 

[AWDstylez]

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t3rmin wrote:

And in reality, as marshaul said, "pre-crime"/"thought-crime" laws encourage irresponsibility. Why do I have to consider safety or liability if the State tells me how to act?

That's like saying you grew up to be a worthless loser because your parents made you follow rules. :quirky

 

[AWDstylez]

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t3rmin wrote:

How many of these malum prohibitum issues like drugs and drunk driving were so acute 50-75 years ago? Has the nanny-state increased or decreased during that time? By your premise these problems should be getting better, not worse.

But these issues are deteriorating. And the solution is *more* of what isn't working now...?

correlation =/= cause



Gas prices went down and it started snowing. I guess low gas prices cause snow. :quirky

 

[Citizen]

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AWDstylez wrote:

SNIP Gas prices went down and it started snowing. I guess low gas prices cause snow. :quirky

Only when OPEC or the futures market is about to raise prices and they want to justify it to us.