UCSD Lecturer Releases Geotagging Application For "Dangerous Guns and Owners" 976
NF6X writes "UCSD Lecturer Brett Stallbaum has released an Android app called Gun Geo Marker to allow people to 'Geolocate Dangerous Guns and Owners.' The app description states:
'The Gun Geo Marker operates very simply, letting parents and community members mark, or geolocate, sites associated with potentially unsafe guns and gun owners. These locations are typically the homes or businesses of suspected unsafe gun owners, but might also be public lands or other locations where guns are not handled safely, or situations where proper rights to own or use any particular type of firearm may not exist.' I question how the motivation behind developing this app differs from, say, developing an app to allow others to publicly geotag homes of people believed to belong to a particular religion or political party."
All guns are dangerous... (Score:3, Insightful)
Geotag those military bases! (Score:2, Insightful)
The most dangerous people in society with guns are the police and the military. The police kill far more civilians with guns than any other single group, other than the military.
So, geotag the bases and locations of known members of the biggest gangs around! The occupation is rough, let's make it rougher for them.
Lets go after law abiding citizens (Score:2, Insightful)
But make sure not to do this for criminals, right?
Who chooses the "dangerous" sites??? (Score:4, Insightful)
"As a crowd sourced information tool, the information about dangerous gun sites comes from users." In other words, if I have a grudge against my neighbor, or just want to mess with somebody, can I just post that they are "dangerous" and their home/location appears in the app??
Fear Mongering (Score:2, Insightful)
How about police stations? Will they be tagged?
I've seen this before. (Score:5, Insightful)
Good intensions, bad idea. (Score:5, Insightful)
Criminals rejoice! No longer do you have to randomly break in to houses to see what there is to steal. There's now an app to tell you exactly which houses to rob.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:5, Insightful)
aren't they?
Not as dangerous as lecturers at public universities. I think I will write an app that allows you to geotag your local professors, track their license plates, and give you hints and tips on how to heckle them and ruin their lives for doing things that you may or may not agree with.
Because its not like you couldn't call the police if people are doing unsafe things with guns. In a lot of places there are laws about the safe handling of weapons.
Re:Wrong strawman (Score:5, Insightful)
This is worse. At least the latter were proven to be sex offenders in court (flawed as the process may be) according to the summary, no actual proof is needed to end up on the map.
Re:Who chooses the "dangerous" sites??? (Score:5, Insightful)
"As a crowd sourced information tool, the information about dangerous gun sites comes from users." In other words, if I have a grudge against my neighbor, or just want to mess with somebody, can I just post that they are "dangerous" and their home/location appears in the app??
In other words, this will last until the first politician gets tagged.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:3, Insightful)
Only when democrats use them*
1. Ft Hood~~~ Registered Democrat ~ Muslim
2. Columbine ~~~ Too young to vote; both families were registered Democrats and progressive liberals.
3. Virginia Tech ~~~ Wrote hate mail to President Bush and to his staff ~ Registered Democrat
4. Colorado Theater ~~~ Registered Democrat; staff worker on the Obama campaign;
Occupy Wall Street participant; & progressive liberal.
5. Connecticut School Shooter- ~~~ Registered Democrat; hated Christians.
Re:The Last Lonely Man ? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's ok. (Score:5, Insightful)
Hadn't you heard? After a persistent astroturfing campaign, more Americans think Edward Snowden is a traitor than otherwise. They're obviously fine with a surveillance state, so this app is perfectly acceptable.
Right?
I'd like to see the results of a survey that correlates opinions of Snowden with opinions about this database. Wanna bet there's a substantial overlap of people who can simultaneously believe Snowden is a traitor while believing this database and app are wrong? While being blissfully unaware of the contradiction.
Such is the power of the modern propaganda machine.
Re:Kind of Lawsuits a Lawyer will love (Score:4, Insightful)
Uhh...
You do realize that in the US "Invasion of Privacy" is perfectly legal as long as the invaders aren't the government? The first amendment says that if I find something out about you legally you have no right to stop me from telling everyone else about it.
Libel could conceivably be an issue, but a) the safe harbor provision should protect him, and b) if the person saying it believes it to be true it's not libel. Since many, many Americans define unsafe gun ownership to mean any gun ownership it's gonna be mighty tricky to prove that they should have known that keeping the damn things unloaded in a gun safe is safe.
That last bit is also why the list won't be terribly useful. If people start using it it will basically be a map of suspected gun-owners, because most people who post to something like that don't know/care whether you've got the damn things locked up in a case or not.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
Why isn't the argument basis for geotagging potentially violent people of any stripe, no matter what their weapon of choice? Ah, it's the ideology. Bound to stir up some flamage.
You know? Yesterday, there was a bit of a protest as the local longshoremen decided to clog up our building and get noisy for a bit (the business they were protesting occupies a floor in the building). After seeing one of the protesters walking in with a sign nailed to a baseball bat (and a rather agitated look on his face), not to mention the rather battle-ready attitude of most the strikers (and then seeing this article today)? I kind of wonder why everyone fixates on weapons, when the problem is people... I mean, if the argument was about dangerous weapons, then maybe someone ought to geotag all the farmers who live next to truck stops, since a mixture of diesel fuel and fertilizer is way the hell more dangerous than a gun could ever be.
Given all of that, the argument is, IMHO, nothing more than a way to agitate for an ideology centered around what the guy considers to be a scary weapon... and nothing more. It's a means to put a stigma on gun owners that someone, somewhere thinks to be 'dangerous' (whatever that may mean) - much like one would geotag sex offenders or other 'undesireables' (in that person's mind).
Well, fair enough I guess, if that's what floats his ideological boat. Then again, I hope he can afford the potential lawsuit that would come from someone being incorrectly 'tagged'...
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:2, Insightful)
And I'm sure the police and those laws were a great comfort to all of those victims of gun violence and rampage shootings, and 100% effectively prevented any deaths.
Re:Who chooses the "dangerous" sites??? (Score:2, Insightful)
1. anonymously list them in the database as a "dangerous gun owner".
2. then you call in a domestic violence report to the police.
at the very least, his door gets kicked in, his dog gets shot and he gets zip-tied and thrown to the ground with a boot on the back of his neck.
If he IS a gun owner, he get shot dead.
3. Lawsuit!
Re:The Last Lonely Man ? (Score:5, Insightful)
First Amendment > Second Amendment.
Constitutional amendments are not arranged in a hierarchy.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not as dangerous as lecturers at public universities. I think I will write an app that allows you to geotag your local professors, track their license plates, and give you hints and tips on how to heckle them and ruin their lives for doing things that you may or may not agree with.
Exactly...and who's deciding who these "suspected" unsafe gun owners are? Sounds like nothing better than a malicious rumor mill app to me. Let's just start something similar for everyone we think is a closet alcoholic or the like...I mean FFS...
Because its not like you couldn't call the police if people are doing unsafe things with guns. In a lot of places there are laws about the safe handling of weapons.
Exactly!...instead we have people with a clear anti-gun agenda taking a total vigilante approach to this...oh the irony.
Re:your nearest gun is here (Score:4, Insightful)
We end up with old dudes in suburbs getting tagged because somebody saw an antique rifle hanging on the wall during a dinner party and luckily could still start the app on their iPhone with their trembling hands, while gang-affiliated teens in urban neighborhoods go untagged because nobody cares about 5000+ black/latino teenagers getting shot every year, it's the 20+ white babies every year that we need to save.
Re:Wrong strawman (Score:4, Insightful)
> At least the latter were proven to be sex offenders in court
How is this insightful in a country where 90% of convicts never even get a trial? Most people are not proven anything in court, most people are threatened with so many charges and years in jail that they will plead guilty whether they are actually or not rather than take a chance of ending up behind bars for a significant portion of their life.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
"it easy and efficient to cause death, while having no other redeeming legitimate purpose"
Causing death is not ipso facto bad, if the person on the receiving end was performing or threatening violent assault, and thus triggered lawful self-defense. Context matters.
more insidious than that (Score:4, Insightful)
aren't they?
You beat me to it. I guess people are smart enough to write ZOMG think of the children apps but aren't smart enough to remove redundant adjectives.
On another note, something more insidious from either this app or this article's title is the following: Dangerous Guns and Owners. What is "dangerous" being applied to here? Is just describing guns as dangerous (which is idiotically redundant) or does it stand for "dangerous guns and dangerous owners"?
More importantly, what about this:
These locations are typically the homes or businesses of suspected unsafe gun owners,
How do you determine if a home or business contains an unsafe gun (or unsafe gun owner, whatever the fuck that means)? How do they become suspect? What warrants people to be tracked over a mere suspicion? Funny how the right to privacy is shunned equally by the left and the right (and every punk in between) wherever it turns to be ideologically convenient.
I for one don't care if someone were to track me and label me unsafe.
Bolt action rifle with good enough caliber to take anything in the North American continent? Check, locked and with the bolt disassembled.
Revolver? Check, with a trigger combination lock.
Ammo? Check, plenty of it, locked and secured.
But hey, don't let that stop you (the generic you) from suspecting me of being dangerous or unsafe or whatever adjective that makes you feel safe and progressive and in charge of doing something positive for society or some shit like that. Once I add a 12ga scatter gun and a 1911 to my collection, that Android app is going to go beep-pause-beep-pause-beep-beep-beep-beeeeeeeeeeeeeeep like Ripley's tracking device back on LV-426.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
Stigma? My first thought was "I better tag my house" because even though I don't actually have a gun, I would like any potential thieves to think I do. Plus, where I come from (yes, Texas) gun ownership is seen as a good thing. People use their concealed carry permits as their preferred bragging type of state issued ID around here.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
And this is less true of an SUV than it is of a gun? I don't think your distinction between items you categorize as "causes death only" and ones you categorize as "not built primarily for killing" is the most important one here.
The person you replied to made a valid, logical point about the person operating the killing device being the deciding factor in whether it causes a death. That's just as true for a driver running over her estranged lover repeatedly or plowing through a crowd at a mall in her SUV as it is for a shooter trying to see how many first graders he can kill.
That doesn't mean it's *only* the people at fault, just that they are a bigger factor than their chosen implement of destruction. Claiming "false dichotomy" is convenient and could be viewed as correct for a certain interpretation of the statements you replied to, but misses the point.
To paraphrase a fictional character from a popular movie, "A *person* is reasonable. *People* are dumb, stupid, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it.", the weapon used, whether purpose-built or not, is a distant second to the wielder, in terms of what constitutes a danger.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
I am not a Gun Owner, but if I were, I don't want to be on a public list to say I am one of "those people".
The biggest problem I see is a lack of Gun Education, and proper handling of a firearm. For the most part (Yes they are exceptions) the Kids who grew up with parents with a Gun and were taught how to use a gun, actually tend not to be involved in Gun crimes. Because things like "Never point a gun (doesn't matter if it is loaded or not) at or near a person", "Take the Ammo out when you're done", "Put the gun in a safe place when not in use". After training these things become such a habit, that the idea of using a gun for violence is unthinkable. But Kid often grow up in area and are not taught gun safety, and politics tell people these things are bad, and you are bad if you have on or your parents does. So once the Kid grows up a bit, he sees this gun as a source of power over other people, and not a tool that needs to be respected so he will be far more willing to point it at people and shoot people he is angry at, as he doesn't have the habit of gun safety.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:5, Insightful)
When seconds count, the police are only minutes away. In my area, we have waited for thirty minutes and more for emergency personnel to arrive where they are needed. I sat with three badly burned boys for half an hour, before a first responder arrived, followed soon after by a policeman.
Had someone not already called for police and ambulance services, I would have loaded those boys into my car, and driven to the hospital. Ignoring posted speed limit signs, I could have had those boys at the regional medical center in about 25 minutes, where they would have received trauma unit care immediately upon arrival.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:4, Insightful)
No.
Here's a gedankenexperiment for you: imagine a gun sitting on the floor in the middle of a room. Now, try to think of all the ways that gun could cause harm to someone, without their direct intervention (i.e., picking the gun up and pulling the trigger).
Let me know if you come up with anything better than, "someone might trip over it."
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
"All self defence?"
Good luck with that in court. But your hypothetical in no way invalidates the thousands of genuine instances of self-defense, including armed ones.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:5, Insightful)
And I'm sure the police and those laws were a great comfort to all of those victims of gun violence and rampage shootings, and 100% effectively prevented any deaths.
Oh I didn't realize this app was to help me avoid public shootings. Here I was thinking the point of this app was to demonize, harass, and annoy people who own guns. Right. Ok I will be sure to pull this app out next time I am worried about a school shooting.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
Your opinion implies a laudible goal; the removal of guns from society. But there is a glaring error in the arguments that you and your crowd continually ignore that I would like you to address. Guns are here, that particular geinie is out of the box. You want everyone to nod in agreement that corking a tidal wave is a good idea. Just as communism attempts to remove an aspect of human nature from the equation of economics (if everyone has what they need to live a comfortable life the profit motive should be moot), your suggesting that if no one has guns, then violence will be a thing of the past. Or are you limiting your argument to gun violence? If so that suggests other types of violence are OK to you.
People often crave power over others to induce them to do something that would be beneficial to the one seeking power. Some one's always going to decide that a gun will be nessessary, and they will obtain one. And they will. I don't see simply villifying gun ownership keeping the status quo.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
I would prefer to put my children in a school where all parents educate their children on firearms and are active in firearm sports. That way, kids a less likely to go rooting through bedroom drawers.
Ignorance of danger doesn't make the danger go away.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
I grew up with real guns and I was even told not to point toy guns at people. "What if a piece of plastic flies out of that and hits your eye?" was the common go to phrase. We now have nerf guns at work and I get anxious when someone points one of those at me fearing plastic shrapnel.
It's not that I'm afraid of guns now (I own several) but it is an example of a kid growing up with guns all around and being properly educated/aware of the dangers. I think those that have no awareness are the ones that cause real danger.
Obvious, no? (Score:5, Insightful)
There's one obvious difference: This kind of paranoia and bigotry is popular among left-leaning types, so it's all good.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
"Who the hell are you to decide when an action is grounds for the death penalty?"
Just to be crystal clear, are you saying that self-defense with a weapon is never appropriate? If so, you may wish to hold forth as to why the police should be armed, or exactly what posture someone being beaten to death should take to be most noble in your eyes. Is that the fetal position, or some sort of supplication toward the east?
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
Except pushing someone isn't self defense, its assault. The instant you lay a hand on them, you justify their violence. Thankfully, nearly all concealed weapon carriers know that distinction, so we don't have lawful gun owners go on illegal shooting sprees.
Re:All guns are dangerous... (Score:4, Insightful)
You left out some rather important information in the article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Lee_Loughner#Expressed_views [wikipedia.org]
Anti-government, with a particular irrational dislike of Giffords (but also GWB), 9/11 troofer, paranoid about New World Order.
But perhaps most importantly:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Lee_Loughner#Behavior_change [wikipedia.org]
Became unhinged, with suspected roles of drugs and/or schizophrenia.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
If only I had mod points - you hit the nail on the head. Lack of firearm safety EDUCATION is the biggest cause of accidental firearm deaths. Most gun illiterate people don't know they're gun illiterate - they think they know all they need to from watching TV (where some of the most egregious firearm-handling mistakes are taught to our youth).
It's disgraceful that the general public is so eager to watch (and let their kids watch) gun violence on TV, but is so unwilling to actually teach gun safety to it's youth.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
If you remove guns, then you would have a sword problem.
If you remove sword, then you'd have spear problem.
If you remove spears, then you'd have a rock problem.
Get rid of rocks and it would simply be the biggest guy wins.
The "gun problem" is merely another face of a violence problem.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
The biggest problem I see is a lack of Gun Education, and proper handling of a firearm.
This a thousand times. I really wish more non firearm owners were like you who don't have the crazy fear or hatred of firearms. There does seem to be a lack of training and respect for firearms among the general population and thus firearms really are very dangerous when not handled properly because they don't have a clue what they are doing. I own firearms and keep them properly stored (large fireproof safe bolted to the concrete floor in my basement), always handle them correctly (follow all the rules from all of the various safety courses I have ever had), and show them proper respect (it isn't something to show how tough I am and isn't an extension of my cock). I also don't believe in accidental shooting as every one I have ever read about that is called accidental is really negligent or outright reckless. Now granted I could probably contrive a case that I would consider an accidental shooting but there is probably a better chance of getting struck by lightning.
Re:Move to Europe. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
Most people who get shot in America are ultimately the victim of the illegal drug trade which is fueled by primarily economic factors.
If you are some white,clueless,middle-class spooner, then you have about as much chance of being shot as some Eurotrash.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
But a sword problem is less deadly than a gun problem, and a rock problem is less deadly than a sword problem. Yes, a dedicated psycho murderator can kill people with rocks. But, guns make it so much easier --- even a toddler can accidentally blow their (or a family member's) head off. Guns escalate violence, so, e.g., a drunken brawl that would result in a black eye or two turns into a multiple homocide when guns are available. While addressing the underlying violence problem itself is fundamental, fixing the gun problem at least significantly ameliorates the symptoms of the underlying disease.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:5, Insightful)
"Never point a gun (doesn't matter if it is loaded or not) at or near a person"
Isn't that a bit like teaching someone they should never drive their car on or near a public road?
You've demonstrated a profound misunderstanding of the millions of people who use firearms recreationally. For those, who are the overwhelming majority, basic gun safety principals dictate never pointing a firearm at a person.
One of the reasons gun control proponents have a hard time moving their agenda forward is because they're demonstrably uninformed.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
You were shouting in my face so I pushed you, you pushed me so I hit you, you hit me so I shot you. All self defence?
the problem is that this is normal behavior for anti-gun liberals, so they assume everyone acts like this. only irresponsible, immature man-children act like this.
i carry a gun every day.
i don't shout in people's faces.
if you were shouting in my face, i'd attempt to extricate myself from the situation.
if you pushed me, i'd attempt to extricate myself from the situation.
if you hit me, i'd attempt to extricate myself from the situation.
if you continued assaulting me to the point where i felt i was in danger of serious harm or death, yes, i'd shoot you.
and it'd be 100% self defense.
the vast majority of gun owners that make the decision to carry a firearm (legally) are responsible people and will take every possible measure to avoid escalating situations to violence because they know what it can lead to.
Re:1 2 3 4 I declare flame war (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Move to Europe. (Score:5, Insightful)
I did the same calculations after Sandy Hook, because I would see so many people screaming ridiculous things like "ban all guns!" or "arm school teachers!" And I looked up the stats from the department of education, and you're right, there are 100,000 schools. With an average of 180 days in a school year, and an average of two acts of gun violence at American K-12 schools per year since 2000, that basically means that 17,999,998 out of 18,000,000 school days each year, nothing bad happens.
Americans have a control fetish, where they think they can FIX AND CONTROL ALL PROBLEMS without incurring any other ill effects. If you "ban all guns," you will never find them all, and there will be law abiding citizens who would have used a weapon in self defense, who will instead be dead. So maybe you stopped a school shooting, but some shopkeeper died because he couldn't defend himself against a robber with a baseball bat. If you arm the teachers, fine, maybe those schoolmarms will instantly morph into SEAL Team 6 when some nut shows up at the school with a gun and take him out. But there will be another 1 in a million day when a teacher flies off the handle and shoots somebody, or fails to lock up the weapon safely and a kid gets a hold of it and kills himself or some kid on the playground.
The law of intended consequences always bites you in the ass. When the statistic is down to 2 in 18,000,000, you can't really do anything to fix those last two without causing something else awful to happen, instead. The answer isn't to turn schools into fortresses or to snatch every gun in America. The correct response to a school shooting is to weep, hugs your kids tighter, ask everyone to keep an eye out for friends or family who might be having mental problems and try to help them, mourn the dead, never forget them, and move on with life.