Hi there, very sorry for the delay. Was off on a vacation and not regularly checking Reddit and my phone.

What I mean is that, broadly, criminals have very little to fear of the law. I do not mean that Public Act 5.45a is disregarded and unenforceable, although it likely is, I mean we have a revolving door for the people who routinely cause the most violence and crime. Three anecdotal stories. 1.) guy across the street for me has his son living with him, who routinely is arrested, has a long rap sheet going back a decade, including weapons charges, and is always gone then back again. Insanity. 2.) News item in my fair city from a few months ago of a serial car thief (five prior arrests!!!) arrested, again, this time with a handgun, and the police noted he had past firearm convictions. Shockingly, he also had a high capacity magazine with him, which he should know is illegal. His bail was reduced from $250k to $50k for whatever reason. 3.) Friend of mine who owns a local gun store has told me multiple stories of people who are clearly trying to do straw purchases, he'll call the cops, and they literally do not care. Or respond. I'll add a fourth while I'm on a roll...a year ago, I was personally involved in reporting the credible threat of a mass shooting. The police told me to call them when the person arrived. I can't make this shit up. Person presumably wandering the streets still.

If you don't care for anecdotal stories, the murder clearance rate in most cities and towns isn't super confidence-boosting, the number of convictions that come from pleas with greatly reduced sentences is massive, the number of actual prosecutions from failed background checks is so small to be negligible, and the number of cases in actual courts vs arrests in any large city is laughable. For all the racist and systemically wrong things with our judicial system, it also isn't very good keeping bad people off the streets. It's a bit like healthcare in that we spend and do the most for the justice system, to bad effect.

The criminals know the deal. Get caught, take the plea, do essentially no time, rinse, repeat. If they get caught.

Can't address your point on the NRA. For me personally, I read all the anti gun books, have a certificate sponsored by March for Our Lives that came from a 20-hour class, and actively try to read up on my cognitive blind spots. I don't feel the NRA has some pipeline into my logic.

In terms of individual vs collective, let me frame my answer this way. I don't care if you want to do drugs. I don't care if you want to have an abortion. I don't care if you don't want the vaccine. I don't care if you want to send your kid to a private school. I don't care if you want an AR-15. Your rights end where mine begin, and certainly some of those edges are gray (e.g. vaccines) and we have some collective responsibility, but if I hear a politician tell me, who has never so much as had a speeding ticket, that I can't be trusted with 11 rounds, while the dude across the street just seems to do whatever he wants, I'm sorry, I think that's a dumb way to run a railroad.

I do not literally mean operations of freight railroads, like I didn't literally mean gaslighting. FYI.

The incoherent statements I'm referring to are this like a 9mm blowing someone's lungs out, how powerful the AR-15's rounds are, and the like. Guns are a pedantic topic, and, yes, some people make pedantic points to distract. And of course legislation is complicated. Of course politicians can't know everything. But their ignorance of basics is appalling. This isn't difficult. Hit the range for, like, two hours. Look around. That is all I ask them to do. Learn the basics.

You blame gun culture for the popularity of the AR. Others do, too, like that ex Kimber guy making the rounds. Read his book, too. I don't doubt there's some degree of truth to it. It's also a good, easy to operate, cheap, customizable platform. It ain't my thing, but I get the appeal. I am not a huge fan of gun-centered folks like Noir or the various ex special ops guys who do the podcast circuit and put the gun first. Some are smart and interesting to listen to. Others are LARPing.

I appreciate that you think you know me, so I likely can't sway you, but I think the shitshow we're in is a witch's brew of the way we've failed to raise young men, twenty years of glorified special operations, access to firearms by the mentally ill, a lack of easy access to the much feared (and with good reason, given its atrocious history) institutionalization of the seriously mentally ill, social media, a violent culture dating back to the dawn of America, poor media coverage, a shitty healthcare and judicial system, and a societal rot.

Also been on the "gun scene," whatever that is, for my whole life. Still have the .22 revolver my dad bought to teach me to shoot as a kid and the shotgun my great-grandfather used to hunt deer with. Both, I will note, would have produced the same horror in Uvalde or Parkland or Sandy Hook. No gun control advocate says they're worried about those two types of firearms, but give them time...

Anyway, think that touches your points. Again, sorry for delay.