The AR15 is a military weapon

This post will be re-posted every time I hear about a mass shooting using an AR-15.

Reposted on March 24, 2021 after a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, CO was attacked by an immigrant with a history of serious mental illness using an AR15 he’d purchased legally only days prior.

Re-posted on April 8, 2019, after the Congregation Chabad synagogue in Poway, CA was attacked by an anti-Semite weilding an AR-15 style rifle.

Re-posted on October 27, 2018, after the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA was attacked by an anti-Semitic white supremacists wielding an AR-15.

Originally posted on Scholars & Rogues on March 25, 2018

With the March for our Lives yesterday, I’ve been thinking a lot about guns. So I did a bit of research on the M4 carbine vs. the M16 rifle vs. AR15-style rifles. Here’s what I found:

M4A1 carbine: 5.56x45mm NATO calibre, ~550 yd effective range, ~3000 ft/sec muzzle velocity, semi-auto/burst/full-auto. From what I’ve heard from vets, soldiers are trained not to fire in burst or full-auto except as suppression fire because it’s too inaccurate.

M16 rifle: 5.56x45mm NATO calibre, ~550 yd effective range, ~3000 ft/sec muzzle velocity, semi-auto/burst/full-auto. From what I’ve heard from vets, soldiers are trained not to fire in burst or full-auto except as suppression fire because it’s too inaccurate.

AR15-style rifles: 5.56x45mm NATO calibre, ~550 yd effective range, ~3000 ft/sec muzzle velocity, semi-auto only.

The M4A1 (and variants), the M16 (and variants) are military only. The AR15 may be owned by civilians.

From what I can tell, the three weapons are essentially the same with respect to lethality. The semi-auto only for the AR15-style rifle is a distinction without a difference given the military trains soldiers/airmen/seamen/marines to fire semi-auto anyway.

We regulate military weapons in the US, legally, under the Second Amendment (which does have the words “well-regulated militia” right there in it). The AR-15 is, for all intents and purposes, a military weapon, even according to veterans.

So why do we allow civilians to own a military weapon again?