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School shooting: but don't mention guns!

varwoche said:
It's these patently ridiculous false equivalencies you recite that impress me as "silly at best".

I'm in favor of strict gun control by the way.
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I have no problem with strict gun laws. That makes it even less likely that I will ever have to use mine to defend myself.

However, with the "false equivalencies" label, I think you've missed the point.

The comment was made, more or less, as "guns kill people - so give up your guns".

So I gave examples of other readily available items that "kill people". Are we prepared to give up everything that kills? No we're not. So to make such an opinionated statement such as above is silly, and I responded in kind with equally silly remarks.
 
Ben Adams said:
If I had a dime for every person in America that got pissed enough at someone over the last month to want to kill them, I would be a rich man.

And a homeless one for every person that actually did it.

You people think so much of yourself and the sanctity of the human experience.

Oh 25 people oh no it's a tragedy lets take everybody guns THAT will fix it!

Too bad you cant fix the 10,000,000 people in Africa who are dead from aids because the pope doesn't like condoms....

Get a grip on yourselves, Jesus Christ.........
It aint the end of the world YET..............

You people should be PROUD that so many people own guns in this country and we STILL only have THIS FEW of incidents like this.
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What's the gun crime rate in the UK?
 
News 8 Connecticut is reporting a Security Policy that went into effect at Sandy Hook Elementary at the beginning of this school year, with the following letter having gone out to parents from the principal, Mrs. Hochsprung (reportedly a victim of the shooting):
Dear Members of our Sandy Hook Family,
Our district will be implementing a security system in all elementary schools as part of our ongoing efforts to ensure student safety. As usual, exterior doors will be locked during the day. Every visitor will be required to ring the doorbell at the front entrance and the office staff will use a visual monitoring system to allow entry. Visitors will still be required to report directly to the office and sign in. If our office staff does not recognize you, you will be required to show identification with a picture id. Please understand that with nearly 700 students and over 1000 parents representing 500 SHS families, most parents will be asked to show identification.
Doors will be locked at approximately 9:30 a.m. Any student arriving after that time must be walked into the building and signed in at the office. Before that time our regular drop-off procedures will be in place. I encourage all parents to have their children come to school and return home on the bus and to remain in school for the entire school day. The beginning and ending of our school day are also important instructional times and therefore we want all our students to reap the benefits of full participation in our program.
We need your help and cooperation for our system to work effectively. Our office staff is handling multiple tasks. Though they will work diligently to help you into the building as quickly as possible, there may be a short delay until someone can view you on the handset and allow you to come in electronically. There are times during the day when office personnel are on the telephone, addressing student concerns, or in the copy room; there are other times when only one person is in the front office. Please help our staff by identifying yourself and provide your child’s name. Keep in mind we will be following our district guidelines which may need revision once we test the system.
Please know your involvement continues to be critical to our school’s effectiveness and your child’s success. We continue to encourage and value your presence in our classrooms and are counting on your cooperation with the implementation of this safety initiative.
Sincerely,
Mrs. Hochsprung
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It does look like a reasonable security policy to me, and one which showed foresight in assessing potential threats to the school; one wonders if it was indeed implemented and enforced today. Perhaps the alleged fact that the shooter was a parent of one of the students (and thus presumably could display the proper credentials to get himself in the building) rendered this security protocol ineffective in this case.

Regardless, I think it underlines how powerless we are over increasingly random violence. We prepare, and make regulations that impinge on our convenience and freedom, but horror still manages to happen. On planes, in the workplace, and now in the most innocent of environments, elementary school. I don't know if gun control is the absolute answer - if there were much tighter restrictions on gun ownership and distribution I think the number of these incidents would undoubtedly drop. But there are just so many guns already distributed throughout the population that I think it would take a generation or two before the effects of new restrictions were felt. I don't know, just my gut. I think it is more a symptom of the diseased, violent psyche that is infecting this country. It was always here but it just seems to be getting worse.

There is such a competitive, polemical divide in the US that I wonder if any lawmakers can muster the political will to have a rational discussion about how to deal with the disease.

I am just heartsick. I can't help but dwell on my kissing my kids as they left for school today and wondering how I would manage to continue functioning if that kiss was the last I ever felt of their warm, wonderful cheeks.
 
Some thoughts short of outright confiscation. Any or all of these:

1. All autoloading firearms subject to the NFA ($200.00 tax stamp, fingerprints, photograph, background check, LEO approval)

2. Raise the minimum ownership/purchase age for autoloaders to 25. (30?)

3. Mental health evaluation? (renew every 5/10 years?)

4. Ban on private transfers.

All onerous but still allow for private use/possession.
 
Polaris said:
Expect the news media to be responsible?! :jaw-dropp
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Yes, I know but, geez, erroneously labelling someone a mass murderer of kindergarten children and plastering his photo all over the place prematurely (i.e., without proper confirmation) is pretty outrageous if that is, indeed, what has happened here. Even worse, if it is as it currently appears, the fellow named and shamed is actually a victim (in that it sounds as though both his mother and father were murdered today, possibly by his brother).
 
scarlettinlondon said:
I know. That's why you keep getting these school shootings.

it's your right. It's just not rational
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What is rational is using this horrific incident as a catalyst to have a meaningful discussion on what to do about it. Banning every gun outright - as has been suggested quite a bit both outright and by implication - is as hysterical and emotional a reaction as the other side suggesting or outright saying the discussion shouldn't even be brought up.

It should be obvious - and it is obvious to a number of posters here and in the (gag, puke) blogosphere - that the common factor in the mass shootings is that the shooters are mentally ill, to say the least. That to me seems like the best route for the discussion to take: how to keep weapons out of the hands of the insane, and beyond that how to treat the insane in the first place (and reduce the stigma, if not eliminate it).
 
scarlettinlondon said:
I don't want to take them away from you.
I want you to give them up yourselves because you can see that you don't need them in a modern civilised country.
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But I don't see or agree with that, and I am very much civilized, thank you.

Removing my guns from me would require passing a law. That would take my guns away from me. Guns that have never shot at anything other than tin cans and paper and other typical recreational targets. Guns that have done nothing but provide fun and entertainment to me and my friends and family.
 
LTC8K6 said:
But I don't see or agree with that, and I am very much civilized, thank you.

Removing my guns from me would require passing a law. That would take my guns away from me. Guns that have never shot at anything other than tin cans and paper and other typical recreational targets. Guns that have done nothing but provide fun and entertainment to me and my friends and family.
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You'll get over it.
 
One Skunk Todd said:
Some thoughts short of outright confiscation. Any or all of these:

1. All autoloading firearms subject to the NFA ($200.00 tax stamp, fingerprints, photograph, background check, LEO approval)

2. Raise the minimum ownership/purchase age for autoloaders to 25. (30?)

3. Mental health evaluation? (renew every 5/10 years?)

4. Ban on private transfers.

All onerous but still allow for private use/possession.
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That would excessively restrict poor people...

That would excessively impact young people as well...

No way the excess fees or age are going to fly, imo...

In my state, NC, you can't privately transfer a handgun without a handgun permit from the buyer.
 
TragicMonkey said:
You do realize that not everybody lives in safe neighborhoods, right? There are parts of my city I wouldn't live in unless I owned a gun. Heck, there are parts of it I wouldn't go through unarmed, in broad daylight.
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is it because they might have guns?
 
LashL said:
Yes, I know but, geez, erroneously labelling someone a mass murderer of kindergarten children and plastering his photo all over the place prematurely (i.e., without proper confirmation) is pretty outrageous if that is, indeed, what has happened here. Even worse, if it is as it currently appears, the fellow named and shamed is actually a victim (in that it sounds as though both his mother and father were murdered today, possibly by his brother).
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Oh I agree, it's a new low even for a media that pretty much all by itself set nuclear power back by decades after the Sendai Tsunami.
 
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