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I'm already off the train.
Certainly many of the type of people who are involuntarily committed are not safe to own guns. However, I know one person who was involuntarily committed as a result of a drug reaction (to prescription drugs); while the commitment may have been correct at the time, they certainly shouldn't have their gun rights taken away forever.
Yes. Taking someone's constitutional rights away, especially on a lasting or even permanent basis, is a Big Deal. It shouldn't be done without a trial.
We already have this; the problem is that just being held means they lose their gun rights forever.
The relevant fence is Schelling's, not Chesterton's. There isn't one on this slope, as the NJ gun laws demonstrate. And when I bring up NJ gun laws, the first argument from many "2A advocates" I get is "they aren't the way you say". If I demonstrate they are, the answer is "good". That's not being a 2A advocate.
This is not about NJ gun laws this is about the more general involuntary commitment process.
How do you want to prevent people who want to hurt themselves or others from owning firearms?
If you don't like the current state what do you want instead?
For other rights we prohibit people from abusing them (see: restrictions on free speech such as harassment).
It's not about the more general involuntary commitment process. It's about whether entering into that process should carry the same stigma as a felony conviction with respect to gun rights.
We don't, however, take away their typewriters, computers, or pen and paper.
You have not proposed an alternative.
If your neighbor goes off of his medication and keeps following you around as you leave your house saying "Nybbler you raped me, I'm going to shoot you."
What do you want to do with this guy? Sure you could get him committed, but he'll be admitted, get stabilized, go home and go off his meds again and then go buy a gun and shoot you.
Especially in NJ the cops won't get involved because it is clearly a psychiatric matter not a criminal one.
Nor do I need to. If you're actually a 2A advocate, it's not somehow the "default" that if a psychiatrist thinks a person deserves to be committed that they lose their gun rights forever. If you think that for gun rights to apply, the proponents of gun rights must come up with a solution to all crimes which could be prevented by taking away someone's gun rights, you're not a 2A advocate.
The constitution is not a suicide pact, case law establishes restrictions to constitutional rights, 1A is the biggest place we see this. You aren't allowed to say anything and everything. This has been tested in a court of law to make sure that deranged actors do not ruin society and devastate the rights of others (admittedly with varying success and priorities).
The same for 2A. Jihadis can't have a right to nukes just because they are American citizens. That is not sensible. You can still be pro-2A and think that murders have lost their right to guns.
Ultimately your right to live supersedes my example crazy guys right to own a gun. If you believe otherwise you are in a gross minority.
If you think this guy doesn't have a right to kill you then you need to come up with a different way to prevent that because the legal system has already come up with their approach and you criticizing it can be easily blown off with "okay but like, how are you going to be sure you/your family doesn't get murdered?"
If you don't like the solution propose a different one that doesn't get you shot in the head for no reason.
So we've reached the "There are limitations, therefore this limitation is OK" stage of vitiating the Second Amendment.
American citizen Jihadis absolutely have the right to guns if they haven't been convicted of crimes. We can't just have a member of the priesthood point to them and say "Man, those are some BAD muzzies" and no guns for them.
You're not asking for a right to live; it's illegal to shoot you. You're asking for a right to safety, by taking away the guns of those who you think might shoot you based on some very lightweight procedure amounting to the word of a doctor. There's no such right.
There are always limitations. If I state that I have the right to murder people I disagree with because murder is expression of my speech. I will get laughed out of court for making this argument.
For 2A there are limitations..... well first of all what is a gun? I say a tank, a Warthog, and a fissile device are all guns. The court may say they are not guns and therefore I have no constitutional right to them. Some fictional guns are gun shaped and launch projectiles but are sufficient to destroy the planet. The government better ban them, I live on the planet.
Limitations must exist, else you live in a society where I can murder you legally for no reason because I assert it is my constitutional right to do so.
I don't think you believe that no limits should be placed on constitutional rights though, I think you are mad at the current limits, which are more expansive than what I'm asking for.
This is in bad faith. I didn't say Jihadis couldn't have guns. I said they couldn't have nukes. That is an example of a common sense limitation.
Certain people can't be trusted with certain powers. Determining this adequately is hard and frustrating. Nearly nobody should be trusted with nukes. Nearly everybody should be trusted with a fork and knife.
If you want to criticize an aspect of the current plan you need to either assert that no rights limitations are appropriate (which you have alluded to but not actually done) or come up with an alternative solution to the problem.
As I said, you are not a strong 2A advocate. You are not willing to, shall we say, "bite the bullet" and accept that there may be bad consequences to that right that cannot be fully ameliorated.
No, postulating Jihadis with nukes was bad faith, because it conflated the subject we were discussing -- people who should be denied Second Amendment rights -- with the extent of the Second Amendment for everyone, in a way attempting to make limits on the latter justify limits on the former. Anyway, Jihadis have so far killed more people with guns than they have with nukes.
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