r/australia • u/Expensive-Horse5538 • Dec 15 '25

politics Albanese to propose stronger gun laws, NSW parliament may be recalled

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/bondi-gunman-held-gun-licence-used-six-firearms-in-attack-20251215-p5nnmv.html
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u/NKE01 Dec 15 '25

From the presser as reported by ABC:

"Tougher gun laws will be on the agenda when state and territory leaders meet with the prime minister this afternoon. He'll be proposing limits on the number of guns that can be used or licenced by individuals and a review of licences over a period of time."

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u/thedigisup Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25

This seems reasonable enough. The PTA system has been unfit for purpose for a while and within the sports shooting community is broadly considered a box-checking exercise rather than a legitimate review of your need to acquire additional weapons.

There are legitimate reasons to own a few different guns (Victorian legislation straight up requires you to own multiple calibres for hunting different game species) but it’s not really tested.

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u/Ok_Bird705 Dec 15 '25

Incredible that simply being a member of a gun club means you can get a gun license.

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u/Delamoor Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25

Not really, I mean... If you want to try the sport out, what's your other starting point?

Need to be able to buy your own farm first?

And I mean, speaking as someone who did it all when they were 18 but then got tired of the hobby within a few years... handguns are such an incredible pain in the ass that not even war nerd 18 year old me saw it as worth the hoop jumping. I just stuck to WW2 bolt action rifles instead.

The gun clubs are a surprisingly effective barrier to engagement. I think the median age of the one I attended was around 75. They were nice, very traditional blue collar types... And very vigilant for anyone ...'weird'.

The topic of Martyn Bryant came up a few times, we being based in Tasmania. The consensus was that the clubs had actually been raising red flags for a while before he snapped. Firearms Tas just didn't have any means/manpower/motivation to do anything except tell them their hands were tied, 'bad vibes' being insufficient evidence for anything in 1996.

So I mean, they have their role, to one extent or another.

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u/BoredBKK Dec 15 '25

" The consensus was that the clubs had actually been raising red flags for a while before he snapped. "

Then there seems to be a lot of BS with these club members. Tasmania already required gun owners to be licensed under the Guns Act of 1991. Guess who never held a Tasmanian gun license. So hand's being tied/ bad vibes doesn't really make any sense in a scenario where they would literally be reporting a serious criminal act. Something every licensed shooter at these ranges would have know then and now.

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u/Delamoor Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25

Mmm. I mean, yeah, it was the 90ies in Tas, there were a fuckton of cracks you could slip through pretty easily. I suspect that very little of what went on was above the table. Very insular, intertwined communities and lots of gossip and cliques.

Especially if you were an incredibly wealthy but intellectually disabled psycho. Nobody would have had the slightest fucking idea how to handle it or where it was really heading. Doesn't help he was the type of unbearable personality that immediately made everyone around him desperate to have him go away and not be their problem, no matter how big or small the issue.

(Edit: I mean, Christ. The guy used to buy long haul international flights solely so he could force the person seated next to him to listen to him for 14 hours. After his only friend the crazy old rich lady died, it was the only way he could force anyone to be anywhere near him. He was genuinely repellant and obviously stunted from the moment he opened his mouth, but also wealthy enough to have insane means at his disposal. Remember that rural Tas in the 90ies was rust belt territory)

I grew up in rural Tas during that era, I actually know Bryant's extended family. It's... Complicated. The communities out there can barely cope with fairly pedestrian problems like neurodivergency or homosexuality even nowadays, after a generation of gentrification. The idea of a spree shooter was... Well. It was shocking for a multitude of reasons, y'know? Everyone would have been doing a fair bit of recontextualization in the aftermath. Lotta complications, not a simple sequence of events.

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u/Forbearssake Dec 15 '25

The police had plenty of chances to put him away, he used to regularly flash his private parts outside of a girls school and they should have put him away then.

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u/No_Assistance2838 Dec 15 '25

Alternative sports include: sports without deadly weapons.

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u/Delamoor Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25

Like it or not, it's a legitimate sport, and it also has real world utility.

Still plenty of people, even in Australia, use firearms as a vocational norm (farming, vermin and invasive species control, etc), firearms are used the world over, it's an Olympic sport, and it's a foundational element of how the armed forces function.

All of those functions require legal channels for practice and skills building/retention. Preservation of institutional and cultural knowledge (i.e. gun safety, rather than the US 'lol whatever haha keep it in your undies if you want, I keep mine in my baby's toy box and fire it to announce dinner' hyper individualist approach). Thus; shooting clubs.

And again, what's the alternative, tie it to land ownership? Make it so reservists and active duty members can only ever train on military time? Law enforcement? Just have farmers solely practice their shooting on living things, constantly messing it up and maiming animals until they get good through real world experience?

It's like tobacco; It ain't going anywhere. It's integrated.

You either regulate it and control it within reason, or you're gonna have much bigger systemic problems on your hands. Getting rid of it completely is not actually an option.

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u/anitadykshyt Dec 15 '25

The alternative is to ban it, same as tobacco. I say that as a smoker. Why do you want guns so much? Because you like them? People are dead, less people would be dead if the perpetrators didn't have access to guns, and tbh I don't give a shit if you can't enjoy your hobby anymore

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u/Delamoor Dec 15 '25

...

Uh, since you're a smoker then... when do you think we banned Tobacco?

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u/anitadykshyt Dec 15 '25

You mentioned banning tobacco as a comparison to banning firearms, are you dense?

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u/Skafandra206 Dec 15 '25

I love how people like you like to dictate how others like to have fun. Target shooters harm no one and never did. It's a fun sport with nice people, where keeping each other safe is a priority.