Designed to kill

S

SHE3PDOG

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One of the arguments frequently fielded by people with an anti gun rights agenda is that "assault weapons" were designed to bring about maximum carnage in the least amount of time possible. After thinking about it for a long while, I came to the conclusion that I have never seen a gun slogan that read, "For when you need a kill." or "More time. More destruction." In fact, most are quite the opposite, GLOCK has "Perfection", Sig has "To hell and back", and FNH has "Distinct Advantage".

Most of these simply imply reliability, accuracy, or just being better than the competition. I don't think that when a gun designer sits down the only thing running through his head is how he can better kill people. I would imagine that they think about reliability, accuracy, durability, ergonomics, compactness, and versatility.

I certainly know that when I buy a gun, those are the qualities I am looking for. Anybody else have thoughts on this?
 
Almost anything sounds sinister when you exclude intent when stating the design purpose.

Antibiotics are designed specifically for the purpose of killing things.

Matches are designed specifically for the purpose of setting things on fire.

Steak knives are designed specifically for the purpose of cutting flesh.

A surgeon's tools are designed specifically for the purpose of slicing open human beings and removing their vital organs. :eek:

Laws are designed specifically for the purpose of restricting the free will of citizens.

Intent matters.
 
So called assault weapons are designed to be accurate and reliable, they are not designed to kill people any more than cars are designed for people to drive them drunk.

All products can but used against their intended purpose.

The "maximum carnage" is simply a phrase that the anti gun folks use and hope the uneducated swallow it. When confronted with such nonsense, I usually explain that those guns are less powerful than a common deer rifle and functionally they operate no different than any other semi auto gun.
 
With all due respect to Sanity Challenged, intent is irrelevant. (With the exception of laws. We do need to know the intent of legislators in interpreting a law.)

My response to the "it was designed to X" argument: so what? Do we really need to delve off into the mind of the initial designer to determine how we'll craft legislation in regards to a specific item? No.

This argument seems to be specific to arms. When discussing automobile legislation, you won't hear anybody saying, "but cars were designed for X, Y and Z." Nobody cares why a thing was designed, or its intended purpose, except as to weapons.
 
Using ball ammo as it's called, it's not unusual to need 200 shots to kill 15-20 people. It's designed not to expand, just pass through and incapacitate. Thsi goes way back to earliest Geneva Conventions.
War is a financial endeavor. Killing somebody only costs a bullet, or 50, and is frowned upon. Wounding somebody and causing all the logistcs of saving them on the field, and then sending $$$$$ for recovery and rehab is the goal and has been for decades.

The fable of a 223 hitting somebody in the hand and going out his heel is alive today when describing a hit on an upright person. Take the same person and put him in the prone position and yes, that non-expanding round will go in one end and out the other.
 
It's the Hague conventions. Also, no one has come up with an official military doctrine or document that supports the view that they wanted to wound rather than kill.

It's all second hand - no first source or documented design criteria.
 
Nobody cares why a thing was designed, or its intended purpose, except as to weapons.
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I was really hoping someone would bring this up. As far as weapons killing people goes, it would not be too implausible to say that modern day weapons are designed for the purposes of hunting, sporting, or self-defense.

Even military arms, like my M16, have a design criteria centered around keeping me, the user, safe. If I am on the defensive, I want to know that my rifle will shoot every time I pull the trigger and that it will hit where I am aiming. Even if I am on the offensive, a weapon that is accurate and reliable is a weapon that is keeping me alive. Commanders care a lot more about keeping their men alive than they do about killing other men.

Obviously someone who commits a crime with a civilian model firearm is not using the weapon for its intended purpose anymore than someone who drinks and drives is using alcohol for its intended purpose.
 
Gun are designed for the benefit and protection of people

Designed to kill
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Have you ever noticed that people who sprew this tripe, did not come up with that thought and instead read it or heard it some place. ..... :rolleyes:

The last time I faced that comment, I asked the lady where she got that and she replied, that she wasn't sure. I complimented her by saying that it was obvious that she did not come up with that on her own because she was smarter than that. Just didn't care for guns and that was an easy way to express those feelings. She agreed ..... :eek:

I always come back by saying that guns are designed for the benefit and protection of people. All my guns are working as designed and none have hurt anyone. God forbid that ever happens and if it does, they would be working just fine. ..... :D

Be Safe !!!
 
At the risk of going off on a tangent, I am fond of pointing out that cars, which were not "designed to kill," kill, on average, MORE Americans every year than guns, and nearly all those deaths are accidental, whereas, even intentional firearm deathsrun far behind.(Call it roughly 30,000+ automobile deaths -vs- probably < 10,000 intentional homicides.) So, arguably, cars are far more dangerous than guns, and guns really aren't all that good at their job, if their sole reason for existence is "to kill."
 
However we try to spin it, a gun is not a teddy bear.

It is a device that projects something hard at high speed with some degree of accuracy. That makes it very efficient and effective for damaging things -- whether what is damaged is piece of paper, a clay disk, a locked door or living flesh. It is a means of projecting force.

Those properties make a gun useful for recreation, putting food on the table, forcing one's will upon someone else and defending against victimization.

A gun is a tool that makes a person more formidable. If he's an evil person intent on crime, it increases his power to do evil and further his criminal desires. If he's a good person, a gun increases his power to defend himself and others.

A gun is what it is. Debating whether it was designed to kill leads nowhere. The real issue is that it is something that can be useful for ordinary people to have and know how to use; it is something that has been useful to ordinary people; and it's something that ordinary people have used responsibly for worthwhile purposes.
 
If he's a good person, a gun increases his power to defend himself and others.
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The real issue is that it is something that can be useful for ordinary people to have and know how to use; it is something that has been useful to ordinary people; and it's something that ordinary people have used responsibly for worthwhile purposes.
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These words are very true. Another argument that I see often is the "If it only saves one person" debate. As you said, a gun's intended design qualities do not necessarily matter if the purpose of the design is still a projectile launching tool. However, that does not change the thinking that the intended design is specifically to kill mass numbers of people in short periods of time.

Regardless of our thoughts on the design, which are still pertinent to the argument, a firearm is still capable of doing bad things in a bad man's hands, but good things in a good man's hands. So, while it is possible to say that banning a specific weapon might benefit the mass populace on the basis that one person is every bit as important as every other person, it is equally as prudent to say that the mass populace would gain so much more benefit from good men keeping and bearing those same firearms.

There have been multiple studies showing, or at least attempting to show, that the amount of deaths caused by firearms is far outnumbered by the potential amount of violent crimes deterred by firearms. Given that information, murdering, especially of the mass variety, seems as though it is not the overall main purpose of firearms, and certainly not the priority in design.

To me, it appears that guns are far more suited for defense. Unfortunately, there will always be bad men in the world, but why should we give up our ability to be a good man with a gun when the ability to be a bad man with a gun will never go away?
 
I see a trap, but I see traps a lot. I think guns are designed to kill And some are better designed than others. But so what?
 
SHE3PDOG said:
I see a trap,
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In what manner?
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Well, it really is a sort of "Have you stopped beating your wife?" kind of question.

Guns are about projecting force. We can't make them something warm, fuzzy or benign.

The point is that there are real and legitimate reasons for ordinary people to have the ability to project force with a gun.
 
I did not know guns were designed to kill. They just make my wife get angry when she finds I spent too much on guns. Then she makes me wish I was dead.:p

When people say that I also say, "Yes, and Jack Daniels is designed to kill as well.":p(Sarcasm there. While I sip on a single malt low land scotch that was barreled for 20 years.:D)
 
The point is that there are real and legitimate reasons for ordinary people to have the ability to project force with a gun.
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True, which is why I said that a firearm enables bad men to do bad things and good men to do good things. I just find this to be an interesting argument because I rarely see it discussed.
 
The anti-gun anti-second amendment folks only wish to demonize firearms, (assault weapons in particular) and denigrate Americans.

I'm sick of all the political correctness and BS. Maybe we should start associating assault weapons with other items keeping America safe from terrorism, like drones, and the Patriot Act. (And yes I know that both drones and the Patriot Act aren't necessarily something which can't be put to an evil use even by our own government).

So how about something patriotic like - "Assault weapons - Helping Americans reduce terrorism one terrorist at a time.":D
 
There are several traps we gun folks walk into. The one I notice most often is the protection of gun rights based upon sporting use of guns. The argument that guns don't kill, people do, is another one. And then comes this one, guns are not designed to kill.

As a hunter I peronally would not purchase a gun that was not designed to kill. Likewise for home protection or personal carry my gun better be carefully designed to kill. For deer steaks or personal protection I choose the gun for its ability to kill.

We have the right to own and use guns. There is no need to apologize for the intended purposes of the gun.
 
Don't kid yourselves, the M-16/AR-15 was originally designed for military use. It's gonna have features to make it more efficient at putting down an enemy. Even the Garand was designed to give the average soldier a leg up on bolt actions being used by a potential aggressor.

Civillians have taken advantage of this platform and molded it to peacetime use, such as HD, hunting, competition, sport and defense against tyrrany. I'm actually surprised Colt, Armalite et al was allowed to make these for the civillian market all those years ago, but here we are. And yes, I have one.

Don't call them assault weapons, fine. But don't sit there and tell me they weren't specifically designed as efficient military rifles to best answer a threat from a potential enemy as originally designed with larger mags, rails and various other features specified by milspec.
 
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Maybe we should start associating assault weapons with other items keeping America safe from terrorism, like drones, and the Patriot Act.
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I think that would be an utter disaster. Drones and the Patriot Act are symbolic of infringements on our rights for people on both sides of the aisle. Lumping guns in with them invites the idea that guns are the tools of government tyranny and oppression.

While guns have been the tools of oppressors since their invention, they have also been the tools of liberation. The same can't be said for warrantless wiretaps and surveillance drones.

Assault weapons - Helping Americans reduce terrorism one terrorist at a time.
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It may generate a chortle in some quarters, but that phrase can also be used to make us look like a bunch of saber-rattling slackjaws as well.
 
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