(03-02-2018, 06:47 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I used cigarettes as an example of a product that is similar to guns. Similar in that it they have a legal age that is required and associated with their purchase. You're right, selling cigarettes, selling guns, selling alcohol, selling drugs, selling Bounty paper towel's and appliances are corporate decisions. However, the legal age that's required to legally purchase ISN'T a corporate decision.
Tobacco is more addictive than some illicit drugs, but at least nobody is compelled to buy them. I do not like being in the presence of lighted cigarettes; I loathe the smoke. But one cigarette is not going to kill me unless it starts a fire that I can't escape -- which is unlikely. One wound from gunfire from an AR-15 could easily be fatal, One victim of the Parkland shooting came close to dying from a gunshot wound to his angle due to blood loss.
You can't buy on credit until you are eighteen because you are assumed unable sign a contract, You cannot vote, you cannot enlist in the Armed Forces, and you can't legally buy cancerweed products until you are eighteen. In some states you cannot legally drive until you are eighteen. There is some assumption of a need for some maturity to do certain things. It is 21 for liquor (and in some states, cancerweed products).
Because firearms are so deadly and that misuse of them is unlikely to bring personal pain (as is driving recklessly) an age of 21 as a threshold for buying them might soon be seen as reasonable. This might make it more difficult to get weapons to minors, especially in juvenile gangs; for an analogy, once cause for raising the legal age for buying liquor from 18 to 21 was that 18-year-old men were getting liquor and inducing 15-year-old girls to get inebriated so that the men could remove the girls' inhibitions against sex. Change in legal standards rarely occurs without some immediate precedent. Much regulation arises because business wants clarification on standards for the safety of customers from harm (as with tampering with medicines such as cold remedies)and to make decisions that some companies pioneer mandatory for competitors.
This is a Crisis Era, and social change comes quickly -- and irrevocably if support for change is strong. As with same-sex marriage and adoption, so it will be with certain aspects of gun control. A 21-year-old threshold for buying firearms and ammo will be far easier than banning firearms altogether even if largely as a measure for reducing gang violence..
Quote:Hypothetically. I'm 18 years old. I have the legal right to purchase a firearm (shotgun or rifle) as a legal adult according to the law. I am recognized and treated as a legal adult Is it legal for Walmart to raise the legal age and legal for them to enforce their decision? I don't think so. I don't recognize Walmart or Dicks as legal entities or as lawmakers who have the authority to change laws. What would I do if I was 18, I would try to buy an AR-15 and if they're dumb enough to refuse, I would get the legal authorities involved. Honestly, this is hard to believe.
It is perfectly legal for a business to require that persons wear at the least a shirt and shoes to get permission to enter. It is perfectly legal for a business (especially one selling food as a market or as a restaurant) to deny me the right to bring in a pet dog or cat. (A service animal might be a different issue). A seaside business has a reasonable right to deny entry to people in wet swimsuits, and of course any business has the right to deny the entry of people bearing firearms. A retailer can demand the people not bring in objects that make shoplifting easy. It can oust me if my behavior becomes disorderly. Surely you know that you have no right to go over the fence at Target Field from the stands without permission from the Minnesota Twins Baseball Team -- and the Minnesota Twins never grant such permission; you will be arrested.
What businesses can't get away with is discriminatory behavior. Hotels used to get away with asking whether anyone in your party was 'a Hebrew', and all sorts of ordinary businesses used to ban 'colored people'. That is all illegal now, but it is not much harm to businesses. "NO DOGS ALLOWED" is legal, and movie theaters generally will not allow people under 17 to attend an NC-17 (formerly X-, and occasionally "XXX"-rated) movie on the assumption that the viewing of gratuitous, overt sex is harmful to children.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.