A new study has found that Americans, including traditionally pro-gun groups, are averse to living near AR-15 owners and neighbors who store guns insecurely. This consensus highlights potential local-level agreement on gun safety practices.

A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals that across all political and social groups in the United States, there is a strong preference against living near AR-15 rifle owners and neighbors who store guns outside of locked safes. This surprising consensus suggests that when it comes to immediate living environments, Americans’ views on gun control may be less divided than the polarized national debate suggests.

The research was conducted against a backdrop of increasing gun violence and polarization on gun policy in the United States. The United States has over 350 million civilian firearms and gun-related incidents, including accidents and mass shootings, have become a leading cause of death in the country. Despite political divides, the new study aimed to explore whether there’s common ground among Americans in their immediate living environments, focusing on neighborhood preferences related to gun ownership and storage.

  • HelixDab2@lemm.ee
    72·
    7 months ago

    How is having a pistol grip that improves comfort and hip firing not make the weapon easier and more comfortable to use?

    In all of the PCSL, 2-gun, etc. matches I’ve been to, I’ve never seen anyone shooting from the hip.

    A ‘traditional’ stock offers certain benefits that an AR-15 stock doesn’t; you can sometimes get different comb heights (or an adjustable comb height) in order to make it easier to get a good sight picture. Since an AR-15 has a buffer tube in the stock, you can’t really do much to move it up or down, and your charging handle limits your ability to have a stock with a comb that goes very far forward or up. Neither is “right”, but is going to be at least partially preference and purpose of the firearm.

    But fundamentally, a gun that is difficult and uncomfortable to shoot is a bad design, regardless of how the stock is designed.

    How is being less visible at night not make a black gun more dangerous than one with a bright wooden sheen?

    So, it turns out that black isn’t actually less visible at night. Nor are bright colors more visible at night. If you wear solid black at night in the woods, you’re going to be more visible than if you were wearing camouflage. No joke. It has to do with the way that you perceive color.

    Do both guns have the same exact default trigger pull, or is the ar-15’s lighter and easier to fire?

    They’re both roughly the same out of the box. Both should be in the 5-6 pound range. An AR-15 trigger assembly can be replaced fairly easily by anyone that wants to spend the money ($200-500, depending); I replaced mine with a flat-faced 2.5# trigger since I use it for competitions. Ruger uses a lot of MIM parts, so you’d need to start by replacing the guts with something made from tool steel, and then go to a gunsmith to get the detailing done to safely reduce trigger pull weight. (Done incorrectly, you can end up with things like a gun that is no longer drop safe.)

    These guns are different enough in actual use to make one more dangerous than the other. They both can kill you dead, but one literally is designed specifically to be deadiler in several ways. [emphasis added] It’s one of the reasons mass murders keep using it specifically to mas murder people.

    Exactly how do you mean this? Both have the same rate of fire. Both use the same cartridge. They have the same overall length. You can change the furniture on the Mini-14 to black plastic if you want. It’s literally the same bullet, at the same speed, and producing the same number of foot-pounds of force. How, exactly, is one deadlier than the other?

    • dual_sport_dork 🐧🗡️@lemmy.world
      6·
      7 months ago

      How, exactly, is one deadlier than the other?

      It’s not. You’re never going to get a non-disingenuous question to this answer. You can easily get a 30 round magazine for the Mini 14, too, so the notion that the Armalite platform is somehow inherently has more “rapid fire capacity” is nonsense, too.

      FWIW you can get aftermarket stocks to go on an Armalite buffer tube with adjustable combs. I’ve seen them. Like, in catalogs. I’ve never actually seen anyone install one in real life, but at least they exist. You can even get a lower for a monte carlo style “sporting” stock for an Armalite upper receiver, if you really want to.

      You’re ultimately correct in that it’s just cosmetics.

      • HelixDab2@lemm.ee
        3·
        7 months ago

        FWIW you can get aftermarket stocks to go on an Armalite buffer tube with adjustable combs

        Sure, the Magpul PRS, for instance. But you can run into issues with LOP and the cheek riser interfering with the charging handle. It’s not really an ideal solution. Mostly you just need to get used to a different cheek weld than you might otherwise have. (Specifically, you use something closer to a chin weld on an AR.) That type of stock is more often used by people that are trying to make an accuracy-focused rifle, with a 20-22" heavy barrel, etc.

        • dual_sport_dork 🐧🗡️@lemmy.world
          2·
          7 months ago

          Or run a slickside upper.

          I suppose this illustrates another point, though, in that the Armalite platform is so popular because it’s so easily customizable. And it’s easily customizable because there are a ton of parts available because it’s popular, so it’s popular because there are a ton of parts available, and there are a ton of parts available because… etc.