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Of 1000 Americans Polled, Most Would Ban Home Printing of Guns
An anonymous reader writes "In results that may signal some discomfort with the enormous DIY promise of 3D printing and similar home-manufacturing technologies, a new Reason-Rupe poll finds that an otherwise gun control-weary American public thinks owners of 3D printers ought not be allowed to make their own guns or gun parts. Of course, implementing such a restrictive policy might be tad more difficult than measuring popular preferences." This poll is of only 1000 people, though; your mileage may vary.
Watch out for the guy printing a pointed stick...
I don't know what the law is, whether there is a federal law or if state laws apply, but what's to stop a machinist from making an AK-47 type of gun in his or her shop? That particular style of gun was designed to be simple to manufacture, and that's why you see them all over the world. If making one yourself in a machine shop is currently illegal, how would 3-D printing be legal? If it's not currently illegal, then on what basis do we make 3-D printing illegal?
I'm going to guess manufacturing your own guns are already illegal, and that this is a lot of media attention grabbing.
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
Whatever happened to the concept of Personal Responsibility? Of being held accountable for your own actions, instead of the knee-jerk reaction of "it's the firearms fault, ban them everywhere we can." This mass punishment, this taking away of people's ability to use their time and money as they see fit, is crazy. If someone proves that they can't handle a level of responsibility, then I can understand rights being taken away, but to punish everything, to take away abilities from everyone? I find it insulting, that I am automatically assumed to not be responsible off the bat.
It shouldn't be that hard to have a 3d printer determine if it is making something with a hole the size of a standard bullet. For example, is it drawing a circle that's 9mm or one of the other common sizes. If it were to make the hole say 9.2 mm all the gasses that should be propelling the bullet would escape on the sides.
Good for them. I want a unicorn, and I'm not going to get that either.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
I sincierly doubt that there is an issue where 1000 Americans can be of one voice. Specially if the theme is guns and right to defend yourself. Seriously? have you covered only liberal and democrats in this survey? What about population where there are mostly prepers , teapartiers, GOPies ....?
They also concure that 3d printing of weapons should be banned?
What is next, home chemistry labs for kids, home biology labs, open sourced PCRs, home smitheries ?
What else should be banned because your fear of other people.
People kill, not tools.
Well of course you can make an crazy AI with general purpose for depopulatin earth so since we still don't recognise AI rights that would be the only tool which could kill people on its own.
Thankfully my rights aren't governed by popular opinion.
Dallas Real Estate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wySaC_z12GY
Most Americans wouldn't have joined WW2 (at least until Pearl Harbor).
Most people don't know which came first, the Revolutionary War or the Civil War.
Most states have passed anti-gay, one-man/one-woman marriage laws.
Most people generally fear change of any sort.
There's a reason we're not a democracy, we're a democratic republic. "Most people" are rather dumb.
-Styopa
And after 9/11, you could probably have gotten the same results for warrantless wiretapping, indefinite detention, etc. This is why we have a republic, not a democracy. The rightness of a public policy is not measured by popular support. The only real reason to go by what is popular is that if you constantly ignore the popular will on things that are neutral or right, you risk delegitimizing the government.
Guys and gals, we made zip guns in Jr. high shop in the 1950s. They might not have been very accurate, but guns they were, and shoot they did. Any attempt to keep people from building and owning guns is a waste of time and money. We do have the right, not priviledge, to keep and bear arms. Just how many tax dollars are we going to spend to deny rights?
I think the whole point of developing a technique to print a working gun in the first place was not specifically to make a weapon, but rather was to demonstrate that the ever increasing rate of technological development and scientific discovery is launching humanity headlong into a realm where we will have to address questions that we as a species are not prepared to answer.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
It doesn't need to cover all walks of life. It only needs to cover a representative sample of them.
Barely a majority, 52%? Isn't there something in the founding fathers statements regarding "tyranny of the majority" and hence the reason for the Constitution/Bill of Rights? Any technology can be used for good or evil, people are often killed with wine bottles (a 200 year old technology) yet we don't see a mass effort to redesign/restrict them for "safety". As always the focus should be on the INDIVIDUAL committing the act of violence, not the piece of hardware they choose to commit it with.
OK It can't possibly cover a representative sample of them, thank you Mr.Pedantic.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Since gun reminds me of that one. (Supposedly you could build a sten in a bicycle shop.) Is a sten much harder to build than printing a gun from a 3d printer?
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
A Grizzly gunsmith lathe and mill combo costs around $4000, less than a 3d printer. The steel and aluminum rods and blocks are also cheap and available. Anyone can machine a REAL gun cheaper than they can make a plastic one. You make bullets out of lead/tin tire rim weights. If you use an older cartridge that was originally a block powder round like .45 colt or 45-70 govt. you can make your own powder. The only part that I'm not sure of is how one would make brass shell cases or primers.
Wasting mod points to post, but: US Americans are not that heterogenous. What specific groups (with dissenting views relevant to the matter at hand) are systematically excluded from the sample?
They offer up their sampling procedures and methodology here.
A larger sample size is not inherently better. 1000 isn't much different from 10,000 or 10 million. If the sampling method would be unrepresentative with 1000 cases, it wouldn't be any better with more.
semantics are everything!
My grandfather, a WWII vet and a hunter, held me upright and helped me to shoot his 12 ga. when I was four years old. It's not a hobby for some of us; it's a tool and a normal aspect of everyday life. From that age, I learned to respect firearms. As a child, I never so much as touched a gun without permission in part because I knew what they could do and I knew I could shoot them with supervision. Contrast this certain of my peers from the suburbs, who would not be allowed to use guns until they were much older, would do things like shoot BB guns at each other. They basically considered guns toys. Do not forget that we live in a country of over 300 million people. There are many different cultures here and ways of life different from your own.
WHO THE FUCK IS "WE"
Why do you get to control us?
You control what we print, our children (mandatory schooling, cps, etc etc), age of girls we can marry.
Fuck you.
In other news, a majority of those polled responded that the barn door should be closed, despite the horses running free in the pasture.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
Let's make printing our own guns illegal...that should stop the criminals and terrorists for sure, they are groups highly regarded for obeying the laws.
Nearly a third of this sample would not allow you to own a 3d printer at all. I'll take their opinions on guns with a grain of salt.
Q.E.D. Most Americans (hell, most people anywhere) lack any sort of philosophy or reality-based worldview of their own and are forced to turn to mainstream media (which is all too eager to hand out their convenient, pre-packaged version with super-sticky adhesive backing).
To quote James Bovard (sorry, folks; this one doesn't get credited to ole' Ben Franklin after all):
"Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote."
A well done poll of a 1000 people is actually pretty acurte. The Law of Large Numbers kicks in well shy of that. Apparently a stats class is not necessary to be a Slashdot editor.
1000 people is a statistically significant sample size as long as there's no sample bias.
From TFA:
_______________
Some Americans own 3-D printers, which can make a variety of plastic objects. Do you think Americans should or should not be allowed to use this technology in their own homes?
Should 62%
Should not 29%
Don’t Know/Refused (Vol.) 9%
Total 100%
______________
Who the hell were the 29% that thought "Private 3D printers should not be allowed in general"?
This number does not seem realistic and brings the entire poll into question.
29% of people are just idiots.
Did we get it down to 29%?
This is exactly why we have a constitution. The fear of the framers was that a "passing majority" could remove our freedoms/rights out of fear or anger.
Are you kidding me? You can't get from county to county, let alone state to state with any hope of finding a uniformity between them that could be construed as an average. You couldn't poll 1000 homeowners out of 750000 in a city over taxes and have it work. This is the equivalent of closing your eyes and tossing a dart over your shoulder to win the teddy bear.
Just because they offer up their cockamamie methodology, doesn't make it any the less; smoke pumped up your butt.
Interesting theory about sample size,let me make it clear for you. Take a digital picture with the same number of pixels as the adult population(we'll even narrow it down to adults) then, pick a thousand random pixels to represent the picture. Hell, I'll make it even simpler, squeeze that same picture down to 1000 pixels. Whadda ya got? Crap. What did Rationalize-Ruse produce? Crap. What happens when you digest their info? Disgusting picture isn't it? Another good reason to question everything by those professing to be experts.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Interesting theory about sample size,let me make it clear for you. Take a digital picture with the same number of pixels as the adult population(we'll even narrow it down to adults) then, pick a thousand random pixels to represent the picture. ... Whadda ya got? Crap.
Try it, then. This example is really easy to simulate with code.
Remember that the pixels in your picture can only have one of two values ("yes" and "no" -- map them to blue and red or whatever), and the question you're trying to answer is "are there more red pixels than blue pixels?", using 1000 randomly-selected pixels.
considering that out of the 1000 people 75% probably didn't hear about 3D printers before the news talked about 3D printed guns then yea there is a sample bias.
3D printers are a niche. they aren't talked about very often. Most people don't realize that you can upload a design and have a computer build a plastic model of something in an hour. Even things like CNC machines and laser cutters in the minds of average citizens are more hollywoodized than reality.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Guns are the worst that could happen to 3D printing. Because of it, all those greedy megacorps and not-so-megacorps have the perfect excuse to regulate the crap out of a 3D printer just so we don't pirate their supervaluable patented locked-in screws or connectors or whatever. We won't reach the day of affordable 3D printing without copy protection mechanism, DMCAs and whatnot. If they aren't downright outlawed.
Of course that's the reason it will be regulated, as they give 0 sh*ts about someone gunning down someone else.
No, the assembled "cartridge" is the explosive device, nor is there much barrier to making those.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
violently against regulating firearms in any way are the most vocal about regulating 3D printers because they can print guns.
Trust, I don't contribute monies to disinformation factories that would result in sitting in something useless as a statistics course.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Your 1000 tosses would be fine in this case , if you were polling 1000 coins. Pathetically short of variables.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Here's a video of a homemade 12 gauge zip gun, better then anything from a 3d printer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1wV3lmbSv4
Hmmm, statistics about guns, what could possibly go wrong? Money is usually my answer. Money makes the world go round, greases the tracks for a night on the town. It picks you up when you're feeling down, when you're out, you'll wear a frown. So step right up and pick the card and lay your money down.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Good Idea, we'll work with monochrome.I'll predict it'll produce a turd long before it's whittled down to 1000.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Nobody is trying to say if you print a gun and use it, it's the gun's fault. The blame still falls wholly on the person who committed the crime. What you don't seem to understand is that laws are meant to keep people safe and secure, not just punish people after the fact. Nobody needs to prove they can't handle drinking and driving to be told not to do it, there's no reason to wait until people get hurt to stop something. Treating rules and regulations as an attack on your person is just being childish. As for 3d printing guns in particular, I'd support a method of stopping it as long as it didn't interfere with anything else, I just don't know if that's even possible. The reasoning is straightforward: Guns are regulated, making them at home bypasses regulation. Nobody would think twice about shutting down a lab producing alternatives to prescription drugs, it's really the same thing. Somehow with guns people get it in their heads the rules should all be different, that because they're mentioned in the constitution we can't regulate them. This is not the case. Even freedom of speech is regulated to some degree, primarily to keep people from inciting violence. Laws are not there because somebody assumes you can't be responsible, laws are there because it's been proven time and time again that in a group as large as this country, there are enough people who can't be responsible to justify regulating dangerous things. If that wasn't the case, we wouldn't have crime, everyone would just be good and responsible because it's what's right.
Your reply is well reasoned, insightful, and calm. It is a shame that it is in reply to a rabid anti-gun zealot. Unfortunately, logic and reason will never appeal to those who are terrified of other people and their own mortality.
Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
C.S. Lewis
I think the AC is right. If 3D printers were as ubiquitous as the PC has become, opinions would be different.
I could see my wife doing 3D printing if it were made easy enough to just do. That dress that never hangs in her closet right because there's never a properly sized hanger that can hold it in the right places? No problem, make a new hanger in a unique style just for that dress - more likely she would sketch out an idea and ask me to do it but the concept remains. 3D printing is a useful technology.
Patience is a virtue, but haste is my life.
Well, how about Reservations?
Seastead this.
Perhaps it's worth noting that, when the Second Amendment was instituted, gunsmithing and the manufacture of firearms was a cottage industry. On the flip side, it's probably fair to say the founders were most interested in the protection of long arms, not handguns. The pistol was developed for the sole purpose of the destruction of human life; not so with long arms, though initial development mainly concentrated on that purpose. .
1. Most polls are only of around 1000 people are so, they are done statisticly to reflect the demographic they are meant to represent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampling_%28statistics%29#Sampling_methods
2. Speaking of 1, given the poll was done by "reason.com" themselves, i want to know the sampling method used and its error rate.
3. the results of the poll where 53-44, so the reality is public opinions are really "mixed".
Is once the genie is out of the box, it's neigh impossible to get it back INTO the box. And legislation never helps.
"This poll is of only 1000 people, though; your mileage may vary."
Hey look -- it's the dumbest goddamn thing you can say about statistics.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Okay, the whole polling group was 1003 people, but the Slashdot blurb is speaking specifically about those who say they oppose the printing of gun parts at home. TFA says "Just those who agree that Americans should be allowed to own 3D printers were then asked... Do you think Americans should or should not be allowed to print their own guns or gun parts in their own homes?" Only 62% were okay with home use of 3D pritners, so in fact the number of people questioned about home manufacture of guns or gun parts was just 622 people, not 1000.
There's already SCOTUS precedent protecting the implements of rights: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Star_Tribune_Company_v._Commissioner Bans and taxes on ammo would be unconstitutional for the same reason. Additionally, no one believes they would do anything but punish lawful gun owners. Your criminals who commit almost all of the gun crimes don't go to the gun range and shoot 300 rounds in an afternoon practicing, and they don't join their local IDPA league and shoot 5000 rounds over the course of a season. Instead they shoot whatever was in the gun when it was stolen and sold to them out of the back of a van. An ammo tax would ONLY hurt people using guns for lawful purposes.
Skeptical -- citation needed.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
if your survey includes mostly people who do those things you'll get different answers but this survey was almost entirely of people who don't print 3D guns.
I wouldn't be surprised if surveys found that 53% of the population said any of these if the survey is mostly of people who don't do them
I don't buy 16+ ounce sodas. Nobody should.
I don't drink. nobody should.
I don't smoke. nobody should.
I don't vote republican. nobody should.
I don't get food stamps. nobody should
I don't own a gun. nobody should.
I don't send my kids to private school. nobody should.
Tempest in a Teapot of idiots. You can legally or illegally buy or steal a gun 100 times faster than doing it on a "3D Printer."
No criminal would waste his time. Only a person who is super interested in being a designer would take the time and expense to do this an exercise.
Reliable guns need metals for critical parts to function reliably for any length of time and they need to be done to tolerances and surface finishes that RP printers can NOT accomplish.
You seem well-meaning, but misinformed.
Please, go read about the definition of "well-regulated." (It doesn't mean what it means today)
Go read about the success of "gun-free" zones where almost every one of these shootings has taken place. (Newtown, Aurora, Ft Hood, Columbine, Virginia Tech.. all of them were gun-free zones)
Go read about how often these "high capacity assault weapons" are really used in murders. (less often than hands and feet and hammers)
And go read about crime statistics in the UK and Australia: after AND before their bans, gun crime AND all violent crime. (crime was decreasing before, and continued to decrease after with no uptick in the rate of decrease. Gun crime went down, and other violent crime went up because there were fewer guns available and fewer people able to defend themselves)
Your arguments are appealing on the surface, but every one of them breaks down under scrutiny. Take some time to read and become informed.
George Gallup and the other professional pollsters use a nationwide sample of about 1,000. It gives you an accuracy of 1% for a yes-no question.
There are limitations to polling but a sample of 1,000 isn't one of them.
There are 10 kinds of people who read Slashdot: Those who understand basic statistics and those who don't.
Irony:
N.B.:
[Emphasis mine, passim.]
The average person is a dullard.
If it were up to the average person in the 1700's, we'd still be British subjects. The average person was fine with British rule, and it was a bunch of "extremists" who wanted to revolt.
There is a reason the founders of this country did not want a "democracy" but rather a "republic". That reason is, the electorate is, by and large, composed of fucktards.
Mod down people who tell people how to mod in their sigs
Why predict when you can just do?
Here is a totally hacked-together and very poorly written JS implementation. It'll constantly take 1000-sample surveys of a 315m population. The actual distribution of the population is printed at the top, and the results of the surveys are printed underneath, color-coded to make it easier to spot the results.
It's kinda slow and may well need a 64-bit browser, so I also made versions with 100m population size, 31.5m and 3.15m. If you're going to argue that those are too small a population size, then suck it up and wait for the 315m version to finish. You can always just fiddle with the values yourself by saving the page; the population and sample size variables are at the top. I only tested on Firefox 24.0a1.
(To anybody who reads this post after the above links break: sorry. Slashdot wouldn't let be inline the data: URIs, so I had to use tinyurl.)
Where else in the world has more lenient gun laws than the US, that isn't a total shithole?
Seriously, consider what you're saying before you talk next time.
No machine can print bullets, yet.
a ban will surely work if the criminal would obey that law. oh wait...
while
A larger sample size is not inherently better.
Incorrect. Else, why "sample" the entirety of a group when running elections? Note that you're talking about random samples, and as we all know, randomness does not guarantee heterogeneity.
You need to be very careful to not introduce a bias into the poll be wording questions or by picking sertain subcategories of people from the population. Or in the other side you can easily introduce a bias by doing so if you wish.
It really isn't funny like that..
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
The YOUNGEST adult in the household??
That's what their methodology specifies, you know.
So in any household they picked that had high school aged kids, odds are good they'd get a high school student.
The mind boggles....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
... the beginning of the printable weaponry. The Liberator.zip http://thepiratebay.sx/torrent/8458218/
The files are in stl format http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STL_(file_format)
Can be converted to other cad formats via Accutrans @ http://www.micromouse.ca/
Of course the applicable legal warning in printing this gun is in order here: It may be a federal crime to bear such arms. Though the founders of this country would tell you its a crime to violate the second amendment.
What choice are people making? Support the unknown and changeable laws on the fly of current democracy government or Support the written in stone, honored, well published and unchangeable papers written by the founders of this Republic for which it stands. The guns they used then were made by who? And what technology existed then to match round with barrel?
Let me suggest. For those who have a problem with the Second Amendment they need to be one upped and given a problem with their use of the First Amendment until they accept the Bill of Rights in whole, not as a pick and chose what parts they want!
What does your post have to do with his? Oh wait you just wanted to insult the US. Carry on being a complete troll.
What you don't seem to understand is that laws are meant to keep people safe and secure, not just punish people after the fact.
No, most laws are in fact meant to punish people before the fact.
The speed limit laws are there because some people can't drive well or maintain cars, so they punish those who can with lower speeds than they could drive in perfect safety.
Gun laws exist because people have to "do something" when criminals use guns, even though criminals don't purchase firearms legally and ignore laws. So everyday people who just want to buy and enjoy guns have to jump through pointless hoops and delays.
Public nudity laws exist because some people are prudes and some people don't have a reasonable sense of when clothes are appropriate. So the people who just want a good tan at the beach or in the backyard are punished.
Basically most laws are no different than the stupid warnings you see on every packaged product to not drink a bottle of sunscreen or not to insert canned beans up your anus. They are not really there to protect anything, they are just there because it made someone feel good to pretend they were helping.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This is like arguing the Wright brothers' first airplane didn't change anything because it could only fly a few dozen feet.
That would only be the case if at the same time people were already flying twin engine cubs around.
People have been crafting guns at home for decades. The 3D printing aspect adds nothing to that truth.
What it does show is how easily people can be led into an irrational fear of technology.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I know the gun thing is the big boogieman now in regards to 3-D printers, but I can't help but think there's more mundane things that a 3-D printer can do that the powers-that-be are afraid of. It sure would be nice to print out a new head light bezel for my truck for ten bucks instead of paying over $200 from the dealership.
Methinks you replied to the wrong post, since I was actually defending the US system in the realm of gun control as being more lenient than the majority of the rest of the world...
People are afraid of people with stupid plastic extruding machines? What about all the folks with CNC mills and lathes in their garages, including those who have had them for decades (yours truly included)?
Americans are gullible, frightened creatures. Many of the folks I know with CNC or other metalworking equipment either have made, are making,or want to make firearms. While I do worry about the obsession with open ended tubes that allow expanding gas to propel a small lump of metal out the end, it doesn't make them terrierists.
People can make powerful bombs from items at their local Ace hardware store, or they can paint their home with the same stuff. People can use their 3d printers to make cute buttons for sale on Etsy, or they can make stupid, pointless guns. I've seen folks with incredible custom metal artwork or commercial side work coming out of their home metal shops, and have also seen many, many AR-15 rifles made entirely in the same places. Again, its not my thing, but all they can do is make it illegal...they can't get rid of it. And why should they?
The poll reported 53/44 against the 3d gun printing in a small poll with a 3.7% sampling error. Given the amount of press this received in the past two weeks and the novelty of the issue, that 44% favor allowing the use its actually quite impressive.
You do realize that survey consistently find 90% support for more substantial or effective firearms control, particularly background checks?
Still, it is to be expected that more people support a ban on home production than those who otherwise support gun control. An easily available technology for producing a wide variety of guns (which do not yet exist, as such) would subvert all existing controls on sales (background checks, magazine size limits, anything). So logically, anyone who supports any legal oversight at all has to support very strict controls if not outright bans on home production.
We've tried banning fermentation, narcotics, and various forms of love making. Most were designed to please a well funded, politically loud group of dunces who falsely believe we can promote social good or common good by merely passing a law and putting violators in jail. Yet none of these bans have worked. To ban gun printing would be to expect the police, FBI, ATF, etc to bust down every door in the country looking for illegally printed weapons. The Brits do this with their television license, spending quite a few pounds developing roving vans to bust violators.
Is this the kind of country we want? I'd vote for "no."
Only the dead have seen the end of War. - Plato
Some Americans own 3-D printers, which can make a variety of plastic objects. Do you think Americans should or should not be allowed to use this technology in their own homes?
Should 62%
Should not 29%
Soooo 62% of the 1000 americans think you SHOULD be ABLE to print ANY 3D object.. Yeah right. Then it goes with the gun question.
The first one is obviously flawed, thus I place no faith in the second one.
Morever.. the gun question has 44% "SHOULD BE ABLE TO", which means, nope.. its not "most" at all.
Q: Should I be able to go to the supermarket and buy assault rifles and a shitload of ammo?
A: Second amendment! U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
Q: Should I be allowed to make a shitty plastic gun myself?
A: Al keida terrorist!
Democracy does not work well if the people who vote are complete idiots.
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
However, banning 3d printing as a whole, or mandating devices to check what you are printing, or forbidding the publication of CAD designs, these would be problematic.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
Sometimes "most people" are just wrong.
Yes, one can make guns with a mill and a lathe, but not many people own those, or possess the expertise to turn raw stock into a working firearm.
However, a 3d printer is different - it's primary use is for constructing other household items, but if the country erupts in violent revolt, can print a gun on short notice. Perhaps not fast enough to thwart a crime in progress, but fast enough in cases of general societal decay.
And the government need not even know it exists.
The problem with owning a firearm before you need it is that it has to be registered with the government. Which means that should the government decide to implement some oppressive measures, they can collect the guns from everyone, one by one, without incurring significant political cost. They know how many guns there are, and who has them.
OTOH, someone with a 3d printer doesn't (yet) have a gun, is not registered, and could yet have one on short notice, if they needed it for governmental control purposes. This is what irks the government. Not that people could arm themselves, but that those willing to take up arms in a patriotic cause can be unknown to the government until they're exchanging rounds with the jack-booted thugs.
It's not the fact that you have guns that worries them. It's the fact that you don't need to have one now to stop them later.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Can we carry a gasoline sachet and a lighter for self-defense?
Casteism
People are stupid/ignorant depending on the scenario. People with a few more dollars than they should have earned rightfully or from the darkside represents a large part of our populous. This is not a freedom issue imho it's an issue that has issues, Just bought Johnny a 3d printer so he would be cool with his friends, damn, his cheap gun put a bullet in daughter/sister Sally's head on a test run. The world copies technology at a rate that what has been created is already a disservice globally. Just think Somalia, South America, plastic and money is everywhere. Yes, there is a technical aptitude to make it work, nobody lives in caves anymore. 9/11 was supposedly hinged on box knives, a crew with plastic derringers can fuck a nations day up quickly
The penis is used by 99% of rapist to perform a serious crime therefore those dangerous objects should banned first and owners of penises should be locked away imediately, without prosecution. Then ban knifes. Knifes have proven record of deadly behaviour in wrong hands. Clearly, the wide availability of those lethal objects in pretty much every house is a severe threat to humanity. By entering kitchen, even a nicest girl (boys were taken care of already) immediately turns in to killer waiting for an opportunity to attack, merely because the knifes are around. By taking care of penis and knife owners first, the risk of having a person with 3D printed gun out in the wild is minimal so there will be no need to ban 3D printing.