Should an 18 year old be able to buy a semi-auto rifle with no training.....?

..... Or a background check?

*serious answers only, for debate*

Are you asking in regard to the law?  As in is it legal or should it be legal for the 18 y/o to buy one at all, training or not training?  What is the current law? 

Or are you asking from the standpoint of personal opinion?  Every 18 year old (or older) does not have the same personal characteristics, has not had similar influences in life, i.e. broken home, parental abuse, etc.  It is said that the human brain is not fully matured until age 25 (insight, problem solving, etc.).  

Does any (or every) gun merchant require proof of training when anyone buys a semi-auto rifle?  What is magic about the age18 years old...or older, other than the most recent mass shooting having been done by an 18 year old?  

Is the required training identical among all merchants?  Would proof of training assure good intentions of the purchaser?  Would it protect the merchant against legal action should the 18 y/o (or older) use it for a mass shooting?  In fact, would even the most rudimentary "training" insure against an evil act such as just occurred?

What aspect of the background check would qualify (or not) the 18 year old (or older) to buy the gun, and would it provide assurance of good intentions of the user? 

I know very little (nada, actually) about buying guns, but I pose my questions for serious debate. 

Candy 

I dont see why anyone should be able to buy that kind of weapon.   The dude who shot up Vegas was retired

There is no rational reason for civilians to have access to weapons designed specificially for mass casualties.

Umm, . . . what design features of the rifle were designed for "mass casualities" ?

Uhhhh....lots and lots and lotsa bullets...100-round magazines that can be changed in five seconds...a sustainable fire rate of 60 shots per minute. A single shooter can carry enough ammo to kill a thousand people. And it would take him less than twenty minutes.

As I'm sure you've read, the relevant laws and regulations vary greatly from state to state. In Texas, you have to be 18. That's it. In other states, you have to undergo a background check, there's a waiting period, etc. In still other states, you have to be four years old and write "GUN" correctly when the dealer hands you a crayon.

I don't know of any instances, anywhere, where a merchant has to train the purchaser in a weapon's use. I'm sure there's always a little bit of informal training and questions are answered if asked. There are some indications that the latest Texas killer wasn't particularly skilled at using his weapon--thank God.

I do, however, picture that interaction. The Texas killer kid--like the Buffalo killer--was obviously several sandwiches short of a picnic. Did the dealer suspect that at all? And if so, did he care? Did he just say "none of my business," shrug, and pocket the money? I guess you have to be kind of amoral, knowing full well that the products you sell will be used to kill people? (I've said before that the gun seller is and should be charged as an accessory to murder when a weapon he sells is used in a mass shooting, but that'll never happen.)

The intensity and thoroughness of background checks varies from state to state, and the disqualifiers can be certified mental illness, a felony conviction, or any of a host of other criteria. One thing I do know--there have NEVER been any successful prosecutions of gun sellers who failed to implement a background check, sold a weapon, and that weapon was used in a crime. Never.

The age of 18 is an arbitrary benchmark, and is most often used because that's the voting age, and if we let people vote, that means we consider them (responsible) adults. As you point out, 18-year-olds are actually far from being adults.

To answer the original question, NO ONE--18 or 80--should be able to buy these instruments of mass murder. Period. And let's not get into the stupidity of saying that evil people will do bad things no matter what. If you make it harder for them to do harm, less harm will be done overall.

As a thought exercise, imagine that twenty years in the future, the ruling RepubliQ gets the Supreme Court to decree that the Second Amendment allows citizens to purchase tactical nuclear weapons (they're "arms," after all). After some wacko blows up several city blocks, would Fox News argue that it's useless to forbid the sale of nukes, because evil/crazy people will always find a way to kill other people??

Gee...thats a real  head scratcher.      

We used to have an ban on  assault weapons law in this country which has since been discarded on the premise that there is no correlation between assault weapons and mass shootings.   Hows that been working out?

And...ummmm...the sponcers of that ban of assault weapons didnt pretend to be obtuse about the difference between civilian arms and military arms.    You might recognize the names of some of those sponcers as I'm pretty sure you voted for some of them:   Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford, and Geroge HW Bush.

We've come along way from common sense.

I believe that all guns other than "standard hunting" guns should require a background check.  I have mixed feelings if the legal age for a semi-automatic weapon should be 18 or older.  21 would be my max age.

There are 20 million AR 15 type guns in the United States.  Since 99% of these gun makers have zero chance of selling these guns to any government for military use, these guns are not designed for mass casualties, but instead for target practice, protection, and for hunting.

Who would design a gun specifically for mass casualties, when 99.999999999999% of the time they are bought and used for other purposes?

These are military weapons, and designed to kill as many people as possible in as short a time as possible. That people buy them "for other purposes" doesn't change that, any more than someone buying a HumVee or H2 or whatever it's called makes it any less of a military-use-designed vehicle.

That aside, many if not most of the people who buy these things buy them for the express purpose of killing other people. They're building their widdle arsenals to prepare for the great race war or the glorious revolution.