NY Times article on auto-seers/switches

[Markemp]

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/12/us/g ... vices.html

Features Dr. James Miner, the chair of emergency medicine at Hennepin Healthcare. Nice to have a local angle.

These makeshift machine guns — able to inflict indiscriminate carnage in seconds — are helping fuel the national epidemic of gun violence, making shootings increasingly lethal, creating added risks for bystanders and leaving survivors more grievously wounded, according to law enforcement authorities and medical workers.

The growing use of switches, which are also known as auto sears, is evident in real-time audio tracking of gunshots around the country, data shows. Audio sensors monitored by a public safety technology company, Sound Thinking, recorded 75,544 rounds of suspected automatic gunfire in 2022 in portions of 127 cities covered by its microphones, according to data compiled at the request of The New York Times. That was a 49 percent increase from the year before.

[jdege]

I did of googling, and it didn't take long to find a website that would sell me a Glock full-auto switch for $129.

No mention on the website of it being illegal.

Of course, no mention of the solvent traps they also sell being of questionable legality, either.

[Jackpine Savage]

Wow, they should be made even more illegal

[Grayskies]

I have read the switches can be 3d printed.

Criminals are going to criminal.

[jdege]

Wow, they should be made even more illegal

Well, they're not really illegal, because they're selling them as keychains. (Just like the solvent traps aren't really suppressors...)

Now, I can see fair arguments why suppressors shouldn't be illegal, or why full-auto should be legal, but selling the stuff online without mentioning that it's illegal strikes me as being irresponsible.

[Jackpine Savage]

I have to admit, I didn't read the article. Reading the NY Times rots your brain. And I refuse to give them even one click.

[crbutler]

75,000 episodes in 127 cities...

The auto sear is already illegal.

Just how many of the folks who already have full auto weapons illegally were arrested? I saw a bunch on the "expose" on channel 5 the other night... again, how many convictions EVEN WITH THE POLICE CATCHING THEM IN THE POSSESSION OF SOMEONE?

As someone who has fired a full auto handgun once... Have you? They are essentially useless at hitting something- they are essentially uncontrollable in full auto fire. Note that the cops demonstrating them are shooting at a target like 5 feet away and the gun climbs over it before the mag is empty.

Now that means that there are a bunch of bullets flying out that can hit an unintended accidental target over a mile away, but its hardly qualifying as "carnage".

The Glock 18 was developed as a suppressive item for dignitary protection, and really needs a shoulder stock to make it effective.

So I really don't understand the hoopla about it other than its a backdoor way to ban regular glock semi autos.

[Lumpy]

Many of the auto-seers don't even let you stop shooting, they just trigger an uncontrolled magazine dump. Strictly a gang-banger's weapon. And given that illegal possession of them is already a federal offense making them illegaler isn't going to help. Cheap and easily concealable, I don't see much prospect of these being eliminated*, but they will probably spur demands for completely unrelated gun-control measures, like banning semi-automatic pistols.

*unless, you know, we actually got serious about prosecuting assault and murder felonies to the full extent of the law.

[Lumpy]

I have to admit, I didn't read the article. Reading the NY Times rots your brain. And I refuse to give them even one click.

I gave it a look, the article is mostly factual and doesn't hype the reality much.

One thing that struck me: in the incident the article focused on, the assailant pled guilty "to battery with a deadly weapon". Duh, instead of being tried for what he actually did which was attempted murder. I guess gang violence is so prevalent in Los Angeles and other urban sinkholes that the courts can't even take all the charges to trial. Frankly I sometimes think gangs ought to be declared in rebellion against civil authority and membership in them treated as treason. But realistically that's never going to happen.

[rtk]

Now the true question is who is actually using these when crime is committed, it will be stone silence…

[Markemp]

I have to admit, I didn't read the article. Reading the NY Times rots your brain. And I refuse to give them even one click.

I gave it a look, the article is mostly factual and doesn't hype the reality much.

I know, right? It's a good article with a lot of facts and numbers. It discusses the problems that these auto-seers/switches/buttons are causing and how easy they are to get. It's quality long-form journalism from one of the best in the business.

Not every article from mainstream media is biased or fake news. People need to read them and come to their own conclusions instead of the knee-jerk reactions based on their feelings or what their bubble tells them to think. Thank you Lumpy for actually reading the article.

[daleamn]

KSTP did an article about full auto in the Twin Cities as far back as October 2021.

https://kstp.com/kstp-news/top-news/min ... atic-guns/

The pro gun control New York Times has changed quite a bit since it's owner/editor mounted Gatling guns on the roof of its building to fend off Civil War (the one in the 1860's) draft riots. Kind of an example of 'Guns for me, but not for thee."

At Newspaper Row, across from City Hall, Henry Raymond, owner and editor of The New York Times, averted the rioters with Gatling guns, one of which he manned. The mob, instead, attacked the headquarters of abolitionist Horace Greeley's New York Tribune until forced to flee by the Brooklyn Police.

[xd ED]

KSTP did an article about full auto in the Twin Cities as far back as October 2021.

https://kstp.com/kstp-news/top-news/min ... atic-guns/

The pro gun control New York Times has changed quite a bit since it's owner/editor mounted Gatling guns on the roof of its building to fend off Civil War (the one in the 1860's) draft riots. Kind of an example of 'Guns for me, but not for thee."

At Newspaper Row, across from City Hall, Henry Raymond, owner and editor of The New York Times, averted the rioters with Gatling guns, one of which he manned. The mob, instead, attacked the headquarters of abolitionist Horace Greeley's New York Tribune until forced to flee by the Brooklyn Police.

Quite typical of the elitist, racist left.

Bloomberg: We Need to Keep Guns Away from Minorities to Keep Them Alive

On September 28, 1868, a mob of Democrats massacred nearly 300 African-American Republicans in Opelousas, Louisiana. The savagery began when racist Democrats attacked a newspaper editor, a white Republican and schoolteacher for ex-slaves. Several African-Americans rushed to the assistance of their friend, and in response, Democrats went on a “Negro hunt,” killing every African-American (all of whom were Republicans) in the area they could find.

[Jackpine Savage]

Quite typical of the elitist, racist left.

Bloomberg: We Need to Keep Guns Away from Minorities to Keep Them Alive

On September 28, 1868, a mob of Democrats massacred nearly 300 African-American Republicans in Opelousas, Louisiana. The savagery began when racist Democrats attacked a newspaper editor, a white Republican and schoolteacher for ex-slaves. Several African-Americans rushed to the assistance of their friend, and in response, Democrats went on a “Negro hunt,” killing every African-American (all of whom were Republicans) in the area they could find.

If the left wing continues its current trajectory, they will be doing the same to whites this time around.

[jdege]

I saw a defense of Cruikshank just the other day.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2023/08/10/c ... d-rulings/

The Cruikshank case held that blacks who were killed by the KKK couldn't sue for civil rights violations. It's an abomination, but leftists still defend the decision.