It's a quiet hobby

Got all different sizes so he can play them like pan pipes.

With disappointing results!

Automakers trying to make airbags a subscription: furious note taking

I'd say its more akin to restricting muffler use on cars. Instead, we usually place upper limits on how loud a car's exhaust can be. Hearing protection is important and muffler/suppressor use should be encouraged.

My understanding is that the restriction comes from the great depression, when the government was worried about people poaching deer and decimating the population by hunting more than was allowed

And then we just never got rid of the exception.

Similar to how short rifles were restricted to create additional charges for bootleggers transporting alcohol during the prohibition, since being in a vehicle really benefits from having a shorter gun so bootleggers would cut length off their barrels so they could more easily handle their guns in the vehicle

Are airbags tax-exempt?

I think if you put 27 suppressors in series, the bullet wouldn't even make it out. You'd have to point your 12 foot long handgun down and shake it!

And why do I need 27 guns? That's right, for my 27 hands. Betcha feel real silly now, huh buster?

You'd think that, but it actually wraps around the bottom of the graph and BECOMES EXTRA LOUD!

I think I've been misconstrued by a few folks in a few directions.

I think silencers are a useful safety device, and not a tool of criminal enterprise at least at their current cost. I see no reason not to be allowed to buy as many as you wish.

I also don't think that most collections of things you can just buy in a store are interesting, personally.

I don't think that's accurate, but I understand why you say that.

The tax on suppressors (and automatic weapons) is often several hundred percent, because the legislature and regulatory agencies are not allowed (by the supreme court's opinions in the last few decades) to outright BAN them. The very high tax is pretty much the only way they have to restrict the sale of those items.

I've never heard a gun enthusiast say they shouldn't have to pay sales taxes. (Well, that's not true because there's some overlap between gun fanatics and libertarian tax radicals.)

Exempt from punitive taxes. Nobody is saying suppressors shouldn't be taxed like game consoles or dog food, they're saying suppressors shouldn't be taxed like gambling or tobacco

If there's a $200 tax stamp on blue eyes white dragons that needs to go too, but afaik now they're evenly taxed (sales tax alone). Neither are "exempt."

And they're still regulated, you just don't need to pay the $200 that was meant to be cost prohibitive when enacted in 1934, so what are you complaining about? That the poors can now have them easier? They should be entirely deregulated like France tbh.

Taxing something means it's only available to the rich

Suppessors are a common shooting accessory in many European countries because they do limit the noise for shooters and bystanders. And they are used with ear PPE while shooting. European shooters are often amazed that supressors require a special tax stamp for each unit in the US for something that they consider a basic safety device.

But what if, what if... you combined both, instead of an 'or' situation?

Good god Jameson, you're off the charts with the ideas this week!

I fail to see how a suppressor only being useful as an accessory for shooting doesn't make it a common sense accessory (for shooting). They're common sense in the same way that wearing a mask when you're sick is common sense. A mask helps prevent you from getting other people sick, it doesn't protect you from getting sick. Wearing a mask isn't "not common sense" because it only works while you're sick and not all the time.

It's like scraping snow and ice off your car. Cleaning your windshield will let you see when you drive, but cleaning off your roof will prevent a sheet of ice from slamming into the car behind you on the highway when the wind catches an edge, or will save you from having it slide down onto your windshield the next time you slow down and blind you. Calling a snow scraper a common sense accessory isn't a stretch because a lot of the world never sees freezing temps or snow. Tools are made to be used in context, and within that context it can be common sense to use them for that purpose.

I can't speak to other countries, but in the U.S., the greater part of our tax code is made up of tax credits and penalties meant to influence the behavior of individuals and companies. That's the result of our government not having other adaptable mechanisms for levying fines.

Ear plugs/muffs do the same thing

I reject the premise of your argument.

Ever use a set of bone conduction headphones? These sit on the temple, in front of the ear, and conduct sound waves directly through the bone of the skull. Wearing earplugs does not reduce the effectiveness of such headphones. Bone conveys sound waves exceedingly well. You can damage your hearing with bone conduction headphones, even while wearing earplugs.

The reality is that earplugs or earmuffs are not adequate for fully mitigating the harmful impulse noise of common firearms. Injury is lessened by ear protection, sure, but it is not eliminated. No amount of ear protection can prevent a sound pressure wave from being conducted to the cochlea by the skull bone. Earplugs and earmuffs limit sound passing through the auditory canal; not the skull itself.

Silencers reduce the harmful sound pressure wave before it can be conducted by bone. As such, they are much more effective at mitigating harm.

Guns make plenty of people safer, you have been lucky to be in a situation where one hasn’t been needed.