Colorado’s Democratic-controlled House on Sunday passed a bill that would ban the sale and transfer of semiautomatic firearms, a major step for the legislation after roughly the same bill was swiftly killed by Democrats last year.
The bill, which passed on a 35-27 vote, is now on its way to the Democratic-led state Senate. If it passes there, it could bring Colorado in line with 10 other states — including California, New York and Illinois — that have prohibitions on semiautomatic guns.
But even in a state plagued by some of the nation’s worst mass shootings, such legislation faces headwinds.
Colorado’s political history is purple, shifting blue only recently. The bill’s chances of success in the state Senate are lower than they were in the House, where Democrats have a 46-19 majority and a bigger far-left flank. Gov. Jared Polis, also a Democrat, has indicated his wariness over such a ban.
Not really what this post is about, but can we get rid of the “common sense gun laws” mantra already? It’s implying that anyone who disagrees with it, for ANY reason, doesn’t have common sense. It’s not good for having a meaningful discussion on how we can work together to deal with this problem.
Personally, I don’t think guns are the underlying issue here. While I am not against regulation, I think plenty of events show that without firearms tragedies will still occur. So it would only be a small part of preventing these sort of events.
Gun culture is a major issue, even beyond the guns themselves. “Come and take em” and “fuck around and find out” are symptoms of a mentality that guns are a solution to solving problems that’s on par with discussion, leaving, or de-escalating. When ultimately, guns are the final answer that should only be used when all other options have been exhausted.
Socioeconomic pressures and inequality issues need to be addressed to deal with most gun crimes, since mass shootings are the minority cases in which gun deaths occur. Yes, when they happen they are atrocious and make headlines and everyone hears and talks about it, but when people are dieing literally every day from guns we can’t only focus on the events that catch media attention.
Mental health, and by extension, all health needs to be made a priority. Suicides by guns is by and far the most common method.
Media needs to stop stoking fear and divisiveness. We see too often than someone reacts with extreme actions to perceived threats that aren’t really there. They’ve been primed to be afraid ALL THE TIME. So when someone knocks at the wrong door or uses their driveway to turn around they violent “protect” themselves from a threat that never existed.
Stop the worshipping of property. It is NEVER worth the taking of life to protect property. This goes back to gun culture where people believe that using a gun to protect their own shit is somehow a valid solution. This also extends to the police. Fuck them for violently protecting property over people.
Fix the police problem. At the very least, teach them fucking patience. At every point they try to end a non-violent interaction as fast as possible that they are often the ones to escalate to violence. Unless someone’s life is directly and immediately threatened, chill the fuck out.
Yes but it’s literally the magnitude of it, which I covered.