• PatFusty@lemm.ee
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    8 months ago

    Not trying to minimize the bump stock thing but I would wager that having 23 different guns and hundreds of rounds of ammo is why so many people got shot that night. This guy had it all planned out including bipods, red dots, cameras etc. this guy even went as far as to nailing his door shut so in any case someone got to his hotel before he was done, he would have extra time.

    Yeah the bump stocks made a difference but I don’t think it was by that much.

    https://www.ktnv.com/news/las-vegas-shooting/list-guns-and-evidence-from-las-vegas-shooter-stephen-paddock

    • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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      8 months ago

      Can someone who’s more into gun stuff tell me why people are always talking about the number of guns someone has?

      What makes 23 different guns better than one good one? I can see the point of having like two, in case the first jams, but based on my (limited) experience I would much rather have a single HK416 than a dozen of anything else.

      Also with fewer guns you need fewer ammo types (unless you for some reason have 23 guns with the same ammo, which to me makes even less sense).

      • aidan@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        Can someone who’s more into gun stuff tell me why people are always talking about the number of guns someone has?

        Can be one of several things, or usually a combination:

        • to show how prepared they were
        • to imply the person was crazy because they had that many guns
        • to imply people having that many guns somehow itself makes them more dangerous

        A lot of it is just rhetoric

          • aidan@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            That is true, maybe he thought he was going to have a multiday standoff, but I don’t know why he’d need so many guns for that.

      • skyspydude1@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        Because it grabs attention and sounds scary, which really what media outlets care about. My other favorite is when they talk about someone having being caught with “hundreds of rounds of ammunition”, which clearly indicates that’s how many people they were planning on murdering, and isn’t just a pretty typical range day, or in the case of reallly common stuff like 9mm, 22LR, or even 223, can literally be a single box of ammo.

      • PatFusty@lemm.ee
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        8 months ago

        The guy just had a lot of guns. He had 23 with him and he had like another 20 at home.

        But I would also imagine that him having them all loaded put into a row each mounted on its own bipod in his suite is faster than reloading.

        • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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          8 months ago

          A lot of people this thing about reloading, but honestly, my reload time after a couple weeks of basic training was under the five seconds you need to pass, and after a couple months of service plenty of people were closer to three seconds. I have a hard time imagining that swapping weapons is quicker. I guess the reloading thing might be the reason to have many guns, but it strikes me as a strange one.

          And really, I’m not only talking about this specific case, I get the feeling that people that are into guns will often focus on the number of guns someone has, also outside this case, which seems a bit of a strange metric to be talking about in general.

      • phoneymouse@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        He brought all those guns to the hotel room he shot from. I imagine it was so he could shoot as many rounds as possible at the crowd with out the need to reload.

        • skyspydude1@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          But that really makes no sense. Unless you have them all set up in a row pointed exactly where you want, you’re probably not even saving half a second vs reloading. The old “switching is faster than reloading” thing doesn’t apply nearly as much when you’re at a static position and can have all your mags out in the open at arm’s reach.

          • 24_at_the_withers@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            He was operating a significant number of his weapons on bump stocks. Bump stocks allow firing at a much higher rate than the weapons were designed for. Operating at a higher rate causes the weapons to overheat. Overheating causes misfires and jams (and inaccuracy and can permanently damage weapons, but I doubt he was particularly concerned about those things). He did have them all set up in a row and many on mounts. He broke out the overlooking windows of his hotel room before he started shooting. It seems he was shooting with one until it jammed and then moving on to the next rather than trying to clear misfires.

            • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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              8 months ago

              If that is the case, that he was using a gun until it jammed, it makes more sense to me. At the same time, how often does an ordinary gun jam? I’ve used an HK416 and an MG3 during a year of army service (conscription training) and to my memory you could fire many hundred rounds (thousands in the case of the MG3) without a single jam, and a misfire takes about a second (max) to clear.

              Also, I’ve seen people talking about the number of guns someone has also in other settings, as a kind of metric that people who are into guns seem to care about, I guess I’m more wondering about the phenomenon in general than just this specific case.

              • 24_at_the_withers@lemmy.world
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                8 months ago

                I have no idea on a metric of how frequently an “ordinary” gun jams, much less these modified ones, but I can apply some logic from my knowledge/experiences. The weapons you mention having experience with are designed with appropriate tolerances to not bind up under heavy use, so are a bit different from the ‘consumer-grade’ type we’re talking about in this specific event.

                The type of semiautomatic rifles we’re talking about here use recoil to cycle the action. A bump stock allows the whole weapon to oscillate - and can have an effect similar to not securely shouldering the weapon. This prevents the needed energy from being transferred into the action for complete cycling, and that would make the weapon prone to jamming.

                I don’t know if I have much of value to add to or reply to your second paragraph, but yeah that fixation is weird.

    • Mr_Blott@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      For those of us who don’t wank ourselves to sleep every night to pictures of guns and have no idea what the fuck a bump stock is -

      Essentially, bump stocks assist rapid fire by “bumping” the trigger against one’s finger (as opposed to one’s finger pulling on the trigger), thus allowing the firearm’s recoil, plus constant forward pressure by the non-shooting arm, to actuate the trigger

      • Syn_Attck@lemmy.today
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        8 months ago

        For those of us who don’t wank ourselves to sleep every night to pictures of guns and have no idea what the fuck a bump stock is

        Interesting observation, I’d have thought anyone old enough at the time to follow news of the deadliest mass shooting in history would have known, especially since bump stocks became the largest discussion point of gun violence debate at the time, before Glock switches.

        Since you don’t watch news about gun violence wank yourself to sleep watching gun videos every night, here’s what that is:

        A Glock switch or Glock auto-sear (sometimes called a button or a giggle switch) is a small device that can be attached to the rear of the slide of a Glock handgun, converting the semi-automatic pistol into a machine pistol capable of fully automatic fire.

        • Mr_Blott@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          largest discussion point

          Ha ha you seem to misunderstand that most other countrys’ entire discussion of the matter was “Fucksake the backwards yanks are at it again, must be a day with a ‘Y’ in it” 🙄

            • Mr_Blott@lemmy.world
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              8 months ago

              Have you tried…not shooting people?

              If two people get shot in London or Paris, it’s massive news, and laws get changed.

              If ten people get shot in the US, we kinda just shake our heads, and yous do fuck all

              • Syn_Attck@lemmy.today
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                8 months ago

                No argument on that point, we’re pretty docile through years of bread and circus, and complacency conditioning propaganda¹. George Floyd protests could have been the outrage and protesting in Paris over a cheese manufactured getting wrongly fined by the government, but here it took mandatory lockdowns with everyone out of work and ruin-of-civilization pandemic fears.

                I get it. Wish I could personally change it, but the most I can do is vote, and call and email my representatives. If everyone did that every issue, we’d have a different country. Unfortunately see point ¹

                I own a gun, a revolver, it was my uncle’s service weapon. I’ve taken it to the range a few times but besides that it sits locked in the safe unloaded and safety on, and I don’t carry it around. I can’t see myself ever needing to actually use it, but it’s nice to know it’s there in case there were ever truly a threat to my family. In places like the UK, I assume people have home defense weapons in the form of knives, billy clubs, pepper spray, etc. I’ve seen the damage it can do at the range, and it’s scary. I’m scared of it. I don’t ever want to become not scared of it.

                • Mr_Blott@lemmy.world
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                  8 months ago

                  In places like the UK, I assume people have home defense weapons in the form of knives, billy clubs, pepper spray, etc

                  Jesus fucking Christ 😂

                  NORMAL PEOPLE DON’T HAVE HOME DEFENCE WEAPONS YOU FUCKING BARBARIAN 😅

                  • Syn_Attck@lemmy.today
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                    8 months ago

                    No?

                    You’ve never known someone that has had their house broken into?

                    Do you live in privileged suburbs or is the UK just a magical place with no home invasions?

                    Or is it just a matter of not caring if someone does?