• Rakonat@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    As an American who’s about as progun as you can get and still think the government has a responsibility to tax its wealthiest citizens and keep it’s poorest out of poverty, I’d welcome the same level of gun control as we apply to owning motor vehicles: license programs to ensure everyone who can legal own/operate one is familiar with safe use, practice and undergone a bare minimum level of mental evaluation so that a psycopath or sociopatn can’t just have a bad day to turn it on the general public. It would be a tough pill to swallow for some gun owners but if it was paired with removing a lot of the baseless restrictions (looking at you California compliant) with regular requirements such as yearly renewals and checkups with the ability for referrals to be made if a person starts acting in a way they could become a danger and law enforcement required to act upon it or face immediate termination if they were found to ignore it.

    Combine that with single payer/universal healthcare with a comprehensive mental health for every citizen and it could lead to better diagnosing people suffering from conditions that could make them a threat to public safety and get them treatment that would hopefully help them live and not suffer from such conditions to say nothing of lower the chances for these violent outbursts.

    Its a fantasy, yes I know. But the current system clearly doesn’t work, and prohibition and war on drugs has shown repeatedly that restricting everyone to stop the minority of abusers only makes a massive underground/black market for such things that actually makes it easier to people to abuse them in ways that are more difficult to track and prevent. I’d rather try to make the fantasy work than pursue a method I know is only goin to have short term benefits and long term problems.