CT school shooting - Horrible

[Jetfire]

The problem is that focusing on the guns is the obfuscation.

Forget the guns. Forget the knives. Forget the other weapons. The media and public are so busy foaming at the mouth to do something about them while just sweeping the one unifying factor under the rug as if regulating all our rights away will somehow keep people from going crazy and going on a rampage.

^-.-^

"If regulating our rights away..." therein lies part of the problem. People get so hung up on putting ANY sort of reasonable controls on guns, that they won't even start a proper discussion. You have limits and controls on driving a car. Even more limits and controls on driving buses, trains, planes, ships, etc.... But raise the hint of putting a limit on weapons, and the Star Spangled Banner drowns out any possible discussion.

And when Guns weigh down the violence stats so heavily compared to other types of violence, you can't ignore them as a factor. Your burying your head in the sand and pretending they aren't an issue and looking for any other reason to explain it.

[Andara Bledin]

There are already limits on guns.

Plus, there was no breakdown in the process in this instance to even be raging against. The attacker stole the guns from the rightful and legal owner and killed them in the process.

How is more regulation going to stop that from happening?

^-.-^

[Greenday]

And when Guns weigh down the violence stats so heavily compared to other types of violence, you can't ignore them as a factor. Your burying your head in the sand and pretending they aren't an issue and looking for any other reason to explain it.

So then when we ban guns all together, the rate of knife crimes will go up as seen in the UK. Then what? Ban all knives? Then it'll be a new weapon that'll get banned and a new one. Eventually we'll all be defenseless against criminals but at least people will be happy with their false sense of security.

[fireheart17]

So then when we ban guns all together, the rate of knife crimes will go up as seen in the UK. Then what? Ban all knives? Then it'll be a new weapon that'll get banned and a new one. Eventually we'll all be defenseless against criminals but at least people will be happy with their false sense of security.

Actually, Australia has gun control that is just as tight as the UK.

Knife attacks are very minimal.

[Gravekeeper]

So then when we ban guns all together, the rate of knife crimes will go up as seen in the UK. Then what? Ban all knives? Then it'll be a new weapon that'll get banned and a new one. Eventually we'll all be defenseless against criminals but at least people will be happy with their false sense of security.

Geez, dude. Back the hyperbole train up. The straw men missed their stop >.>

[AmbrosiaWriter]

Geez, dude. Back the hyperbole train up. The straw men missed their stop >.>

Does Rule #1 apply in Fratching too?

[Duelist925]

So because guns are the best option for killing people, they are the only ones we should focus on. Got it.

The UK has proven that stabbing people is quite easy. Yet they cry so much about how horrible the US with guns.

Why are guns the only ones being focused on? Because media porn.

Duelist, you act like the things you listed are impossible to use to kill lots of people. You could certainly do it with knives, swords, or bows.

You're right that guns need to be more regulated. People shouldn't be able to go to a show and buy a gun without being checked out. But on the other hand, those of us who are mentally sane, have no criminal record, and are responsible people should be able to own guns and carry them. There's no balance in the US. In most states, it's one extreme or the other.

I act like nothing of the sort. I freely admit you can kill people with knives, swords, and bows--thats why swords and bows were bloody well invented, after all.

But it is a fact that none of these weapons has the range or capacity for killing that a gun has. You can't walk into a room with a bow and mow down everyone in it within one or two minutes. It takes more effort to swing a sword than it does to pull a trigger.

And thats not even taking into account the training necessary for those, as opposed to the fairly minimal training needed to properly fire a firearm.

Fact of the matter is, I'm focusing on guns because that's what needs to be focused on. As Jetfire said, the lethality of these other weapons isn't even in the same ballpark as a common gun.

And I never argued for a ban.

Actually, we've already had several mentions of mass knife attacks in this thread. China is suffering an epidemic of guys going off their nut and taking a knife to their local elementary school. The 2010 incident I mentioned above had a victim count of about 70, with just under 20 of those killed outright and another 50 injured.

You're right, there have been quite a few in China. However, the two cultures are hard to compare, being very different--different social norms, different cultural histories, different make ups. I admit, I'm having trouble finding larger scale crime stats to comparison purposes.

However, if we compare to a culture a bit closer to our own:


But speaking of knife crime...

332 stabbing related deaths in the UK. Seems high.

How about over 8000 firearm related murders in the US.

Admittedly, the population of the uk is roughly 1/5 of the US. But that is a gap of FAR more than 1/5 when it comes to murder.

So then when we ban guns all together, the rate of knife crimes will go up as seen in the UK. Then what? Ban all knives? Then it'll be a new weapon that'll get banned and a new one. Eventually we'll all be defenseless against criminals but at least people will be happy with their false sense of security.

-_- That is one damn slippery slope those strawmen are falling down.

There are a thousand and one uses for a knife outside of sticking it in someone in a fight.

[siead_lietrathua]

while i agree with Andara that the issue in this case was definatly a mentally ill person that didn't have proper treatment snapping... i do find the "right" to own heavy artillery in the states is way out of control. the justifications are bullshit. people want military-grade weapons for bragging rights and freudish dick-comparisons. not for "protection" or "hunting". you can do that with a revolver or a basic rifle.
and the "oh we need to have military weapons to protect ourselves from our own military" is also pretty bullshit. it's the 2000's, not the 1800's. you can't out-arm a drone or a bomb.

[violiav]

I wonder if the stats take into account the type of crime committed using these weapons. Domestic violence as opposed to a thief, for example. A person that murders their family committed a crime, yes, but they didn't become a criminal before they did the deed. Also (as far as knives) where the knife came from. Did they get it from an outdoors store, or was it a really nice kitchen knife?
Like, when you saw "knife attacks" how exactly is that qualified?
Some told me a loooong time ago that women were more likely to use knives as a weapon, simply because they were more accessible. I wonder if the statistics bear that out?

And like other people have said, all the gun control in the world would have been moot in this case. From what I've read (yahoo news) the woman liked guns and got them all legally. The whole"Zen through shooting" thing. She probably never foresaw that her kid, while he had issues, would kill her while she lay in bed. So, even with tighter regulations, she still would have owned the guns, and he still would have killed her.

[Fuzzykitten99]

You're telling me by banning and making things illegal, such as guns, then that will make everyone safer?

Well Hell's Belles! Let's make heroin and cocaine illegal too! That should stop most of Hollywood and the rap music scene from dying early! Lindsay Lohan will be grateful for the laws and that would stop her from buying her drugs because she obeys the laws already in place. Poor Whitney Houston... if drugs had been illegal like people want to make guns... she wouldn't have ended up like she did. If drugs were illegal, Amy Winehouse would probably still be alive!!! Yes, that is totally the answer!!!

Oh, and while we're at it, we should make it harder for law-abiding citizens to buy Sudafed to prevent meth-houses and meth sales/consumption.

Funny, how many of the laws that exist now for guns (and many others), never existed even in the 40's and 50's... but there weren't the types of shootings that you see now.

Yet guns existed, and very much so. I have a customer who remembers his high school principal coming out and admiring the rifles and pistols that were sitting in his truck, ready to go target shooting with his dad after school.

And bullying has always existed. It has since the early days of man. Why now are kids turning into a puddle of goo vs sucking it up and learning from it?

So tell me again how banning or making super-restrictive laws on something solves the problems?

EVERY single one of these shootings has happened in GUN FREE ZONES.

Did that magic 'Gun Free Zone' stop the killers?

Funny how no one is talking of the Oregon mall shooting that was reported not long before this one. Two (some reports are saying three) people died there.

How was that killer stopped? One of the patrons was carrying, confronted the shooter, who then realized that he had run into someone who might actually challenge him... then promptly ran away, and ended up shooting himself.

[Jester]

But go ahead and say guns are so much dangerous than knives.

As others have said, guns ARE more dangerous than knives. You can kill more people from further away more quickly with a gun than you can with a knife.

Again, in case you missed it:

Guns have more range.
Guns work faster.
Guns are generally deadlier, especially if they are high-powered guns.

And what laws, precisely, are going to stop a mentally deranged young man (who nobody was aware was mentally deranged prior to his snapping) from visiting his gun-owning mother who had no mental issues and stealing her guns and killing her when she tried to stop him?

Plus, again, he wasn't allowed a gun from a gun shop, so the gun laws actually worked in this instance, so I'm not sure why beefing them up is on the table for this particular event.

Some stark honesty here: chances are high that stricter, more intelligent gun laws, which I have been promoting, would have done pretty much nothing in this instance. That is not to say such laws would have had no effect on the epidemic of mass shootings in general. I dare say they would have.

But I am already on record as saying that, even with the most intelligent gun laws out there, there ARE probably still going to be mass shootings. No laws are perfect, nor can they prevent ALL tragedies. In all likelihood, they would not have prevented this tragedy.

But we can't focus on just THIS tragedy. This tragedy is merely a spark to get us to focus on ALL of these tragedies, and do what we can to reduce their likelihood and their frequency.

One problem with this country is we focus on what JUST happened, and how to prevent THAT again, when we need to be broadening our focus, and looking at the bigger picture of how we prevent and reduce such tragedies in general.

Whether or not this particular tragedy was preventable is a moot point in the bigger picture. Perhaps it was not. Does that mean we should not focus on how to deal with such tragedies as a whole? Of course not.

Again, it's not the weapons but the mental health of the people that is at issue and that we need to focus on. Seriously, focusing on the guns is absolutely the worst thing we can do, even if we do try to couple it with advances in our mental health coverage because it pulls resources away that need to be spent on something other than gun control.

I disagree.

Yes, we absolutely need to focus on mental health care, and reverse the idiotic situation in this country where obtaining mental health care is far harder than obtaining a gun. Because, while gun laws might not have done anything in this case, access to mental health care might have. And it certainly would have helped prevent other tragedies as well.

But focusing on JUST mental health care and access to it does not negate the fact that guns are WAY too easy to obtain in this country, for anyone who decides that they've had a bad day, and want company for their misery. I have to jump through hoops to get a decent decongestant when I have a bad cold; why is it so much easier to get a deadly firearm?

I just find it so absurd that people harp on how dangerous guns are, but make no effort to go after all the other deadly weapons. How come no one is going after knives, bows, nightsticks, swords, tazers, etc.? Rage porn is what this is.

No. It's reality. Guns are able to inflict more damage, more quickly, and from furhter away than knives, bows, nightsticks, swords, tazers, etc.

Are guns the problem? No. Is easy access to such deadly weaponry the problem? You betcha!

Just means it can fire single fire or burst (Three rounds normally). The AR-15 is a very versatile gun that can have all sorts of modifications and additions to make it a very efficient weapon.

Yes, more efficient at killing more people more quickly from greater range.

Can you modify knives, bows, swords, nightsticks, tazers, or other deadly weapons to be so efficient?

So because guns are the best option for killing people, they are the only ones we should focus on. Got it.

In a nutshell: yes. That is exactly the reason we should focus on guns.

Why are guns the only ones being focused on? Because media porn.

Or perhaps it's the fact that there have been so many mass shootings over the last several years. Just a guess.

In most states, it's one extreme or the other.

Which is precisely WHY the federal government needs to step in and enact and enforce intelligent gun control laws.

Forget the guns. Forget the knives. Forget the other weapons. The media and public are so busy foaming at the mouth to do something about them while just sweeping the one unifying factor under the rug as if regulating all our rights away will somehow keep people from going crazy and going on a rampage.

Intelligent gun control laws will not keep people from going nuts and going on a rampage. They will, however, make it more difficult for such people to obtain such deadly weaponry as easily as they can now.

And regulating firearms is NOT "regulating all our rights away." We regulate other things without people screaming about having their rights stripped from them. Would you be okay with allowing anyone without training or a proper license to drive a car? A truck? To operate on your loved ones? No? Then why are you okay with someone, anyone, having the ability to purchase a deadly weapon? Please, explain.

There are already limits on guns.

With massive loopholes.

Plus, there was no breakdown in the process in this instance to even be raging against. The attacker stole the guns from the rightful and legal owner and killed them in the process.

How is more regulation going to stop that from happening?

In this instance, it might not have. But overall, it could definitely reduce the number and severity of tragedies currently sweeping the nation.

Look, I agree with you that we need to focus on the mental health care angle. But that is not to say we should then just ignore this other part of the equation. Guns are deadly, they are efficient in their lethality, and they are far too easy for people to acquire. This needs to change just as certainly as the mental health care system needs to be overhauled.

So then when we ban guns all together...

You're telling me by banning and making things illegal, such as guns, then that will make everyone safer?

So tell me again how banning or making super-restrictive laws on something solves the problems?

NO ONE is talking about banning guns. I certainly am not. No intelligent person I've heard commenting on the subject is. Stop throwing this phrase around, because that is not what is under discussion. It never has been.

Funny, how many of the laws that exist now for guns (and many others), never existed even in the 40's and 50's... but there weren't the types of shootings that you see now.

On the flip side of that, funny how many of the guns that exist now never existed in the 40's and 50's...but there weren't the types of shootings that you see now.

OR....funny how the ease with which one can get a gun today never existed in the 40's and 50's...but there weren't the types of shooting that you see now.

Should I continue?

And bullying has always existed. It has since the early days of man. Why now are kids turning into a puddle of goo vs sucking it up and learning from it?

I have heard nothing about this kid being a bullying victim. But if he was, I agree with you that this is ridiculous.

I have talked often about my situation with bullies, and how I dealt with them by retaliating quickly and brutally. And by "brutally" I mean punching them square in the nose or slamming their head into some large blunt object, NOT by taking an automatic weapon into a school and shooting a bunch of first graders.

How was that killer stopped? One of the patrons was carrying, confronted the shooter, who then realized that he had run into someone who might actually challenge him... then promptly ran away, and ended up shooting himself.

There is NO evidence, other than the story of the gun-carrying patron, that his presence had anything to do with the gunman ending his own life. It may have happened that way. But then again, it may not have.

[lordlundar]

As what's been said before in both here and in other discussions, America is the only first world nation where it is easier to legally get a gun than it is to legally drive a car or get mental (or even physical) health care. What's sad about that is that there are people in he country that think that it is a good thing.

[siead_lietrathua]

NO ONE is talking about banning guns. I certainly am not. No intelligent person I've heard commenting on the subject is. Stop throwing this phrase around, because that is not what is under discussion. It never has been.

agreed. regulation doesn't equal banning.
one person doesn't need 30 firearms and hundreds of rounds of ammo at one time for "protection" or "hunting" when you can only use one efficiently at a time.
limiting gun ownership to a reasonable number of weapons is not banning.
requiring training with a set of guidelines uniform across the nation is not banning.
requiring the same sort of strict testing with levels of use, like driving, is not banning.
requiring an age limit on guns, like with driving, is not banning.

i frankly don't care if it's a right to bear arms. it's not about keeping guns away from law abiding citizens, it's about making it harder for those that should't have them.

[Andara Bledin]

That is not to say such laws would have had no effect on the epidemic of mass shootings in general. I dare say they would have.

Stricter gun laws would most likely turn it from an epidemic of mass shootings to an epidemic of some other violent crime. All it's doing it slapping a band-aid on a slashed artery; it'll slow things down a bit, but won't really have much effect beyond making the people who made it happen feel better, leaving us just as wounded as we were beforehand.

I have to jump through hoops to get a decent decongestant when I have a bad cold; why is it so much easier to get a deadly firearm?

Unless a person has a private seller available right where they are at the time they snap, they have to jump through hoops to get a gun, which is why this guy had to steal the ones he used. Otherwise, they've taken the time to plan, meaning that unless it's known that they're crazy, I'm not sure how stricter gun laws aside from a total ban are going to stop them.

Which is precisely WHY the federal government needs to step in and enact and enforce intelligent gun control laws.

Define "intelligent gun control laws."

With massive loopholes.

Defined "massive loopholes."

I keep seeing those phrases thrown out all over, but I don't know what they actually mean and since I'm not arguing that side, I'd like some citations from those who are.

^-.-^

[siead_lietrathua]

I keep seeing those phrases thrown out all over, but I don't know what they actually mean and since I'm not arguing that side, I'd like some citations from those who are.

^-.-^

i posted a list on possible ways to controls guns. age limits, levels of licencing similar to driving, mandatory training for each type of firearm, and limits on numbers of guns able to be owned by one person. (say, 3 handguns, 2 shotguns, 3 rifles, NO machineguns or etc unless previously trained on handling them through work ie: military or police)

and it's not just mass shootings that's a problem in the states. every day there is gun violence that just never makes national news because it wasn't a mass killing. those acts of violence, committed by gangs or people that didn't handle a weapon right and accidently killed someone, are also part of the problem.