School shooting: but don't mention guns!

[StankApe]

he didn't order 3 guns, they were his mother's guns. he just went to her house, took em, killed her an went to the school. None of these guns would have been covered under an assault weapons ban. and Many hunting rifles are semi auto too (most have a simple 5 rd mag though).

I think people's emotions get the best of them when these sorts of things happen and they kinda drop into the realm of irrationality.

Would it have mattered if he had a pump action shotgun? that's a lethal weapon that can be quickly reloaded after firing 6 rounds or so.

 

[Profanz]

he didn't order 3 guns, they were his mother's guns. he just went to her house, took em, killed her an went to the school. None of these guns would have been covered under an assault weapons ban. and Many hunting rifles are semi auto too (most have a simple 5 rd mag though).

I think people's emotions get the best of them when these sorts of things happen and they kinda drop into the realm of irrationality.

Would it have mattered if he had a pump action shotgun? that's a lethal weapon that can be quickly reloaded after firing 6 rounds or so.

She bought those guns for herself huh? Lets not talk about it I guess. Its too soon right?

 

[StankApe]

I don't think guns are the issue here. What WE as a society need to do is find ways to identify high risk people and get them treatment.

 

[StankApe]

She bought those guns for herself huh? Lets not talk about it I guess. Its too soon right?

I have no idea why she bought those guns. If she bought them for her son she obviously made a terrible mistake.

and I'm not saying we shouldn't discuss it. I'm saying that people's emotions can make them say things that are irrational and won't do anything at all to change a: what happened or b: prevent them from happening again, banning guns is one of these things.

 

[Autolite]

I brought up the age of 25 not because of those reasons, but because it is well after the age which schizophrenia typically manifests itself.

I've some friends who've suggested that I could be schizophrenic but the voices in my head are telling me to just ignore them...

 

[Amazer]

and pardon me for saying this, but anyone who doesn't live in the USA has no business telling us what we should or shouldn't be doing in regards to our constitution.

And? Americans aren't shy about telling other people (and nations) what to do (or not do) where it concerns their national laws.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

Now I'm going to inject Race into this debate .

We have over a hundred youths killed just in Chicago every year.

In Chicago, more than 530 people under the age of 21 have been killed since 2008 and many more have been shot or have otherwise suffered violence—often at the hands of their peers and particularly in the city’s African-American and Latino communities. Nearly 80 percent of youth homicides occurred in 22 black or Latino communities on the city’s South, Southwest and West sides—even though just one-third of the city’s population resided in those communities. The rate of youth homicide in West Englewood on the city’s South Side, for instance, was nearly five times higher than the citywide mark.

Linky.

(These are almost all gun deaths) People always respond that they need to get their act together.

And yet one White, suburban school gets shot up and all of a sudden Phil Plait is talking about how this is our problem that we need to solve. We are all to blame, somehow. Of course, I'm not saying explicit racism is at work. I suspect the "airplane crash versus many car crashes" mental effect is at play here. Or perhaps it is because these children are surely innocent, and those children are surely guilty of something to warrant a hanging.

And that's just a myopic "only Americans count" look at the world.

I was listening to the radio and the emotive blathering was unbearable. One guy is spouting about how childhood was so innocent in the Golden Days and then a woman was talking about how she wanted to make sure something like this Never. Happened. Again. Good luck with that.

And now I'm sure we are going to get a bunch of "warning signs" from our hindsight bias played by the media over and over again and have doctors give diagnoses post-mortem. And then we will have people shouting "We must do something about mental health/schools/guns!" But then offering no real suggestions, or even a failing that lead to the disaster. And then a whole lot more "should we be talking about guns?"

 

[StankApe]

And? Americans aren't shy about telling other people (and nations) what to do (or not do) where it concerns their national laws.

I'm not them, I would never tell you what to do in your own country

 

[Kestrel]

She bought those guns for herself huh? Lets not talk about it I guess. Its too soon right?

The front page headline on today's Denver Post was about Colorado's governor saying it's time to talk about guns. I was reading it when news of the Sandy Hook shooting came over the radio.

 

[BStrong]

Now I'm going to inject Race into this debate .

We have over a hundred youths killed just in Chicago every year.



Linky.

(These are almost all gun deaths) People always respond that they need to get their act together.

And yet one White, suburban school gets shot up and all of a sudden Phil Plait is talking about how this is our problem that we need to solve. We are all to blame, somehow. Of course, I'm not saying explicit racism is at work. I suspect the "airplane crash versus many car crashes" mental effect is at play here. Or perhaps it is because these children are surely innocent, and those children are surely guilty of something to warrant a hanging.

And that's just a myopic "only Americans count" look at the world.

I was listening to the radio and the emotive blathering was unbearable. One guy is spouting about how childhood was so innocent in the Golden Days and then a woman was talking about how she wanted to make sure something like this Never. Happened. Again. Good luck with that.

And now I'm sure we are going to get a bunch of "warning signs" from our hindsight bias played by the media over and over again and have doctors give diagnoses post-mortem. And then we will have people shouting "We must do something about mental health/schools/guns!" But then offering no real suggestions, or even a failing that lead to the disaster. And then a whole lot more "should we be talking about guns?"

You're not at all out of bounds.

San Francisco and Oakland have had serious drug/gang/violence problems since the late 1970's and it was pretty much black-on-black crime.

No big whoop...except for innocent victims. survivors and family members. No public outcry.

Along comes Patrick Purdy in '89

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_School_massacre

And California becomes one of the first states to restrict the ownership of semi-auto rifles (Never mind the fact that the state lets Purdy plea bargin out or otherwise weasel away from his previous criminal convictions, that had he been fully posecuted for would have resulted in him being in custody at the time of the shootings)

And then in '93, Gian Luigi Ferri

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/101_California_Street_shootings

And we get LCAV (legal community against violence - read as against guns, because that seems to be their only proposal) and the 1994 crime bill with the included "ban" (that wasn't a ban, previously owned weapons could be transferred, new rifles w/o the qualifying features could be transferred) on semi-auto firearms.

Moral of the story - kill brothers in the projects, no problem. Kill kids or lawyers, watch out.

 

[Travis]

I don't think guns are the issue here. What WE as a society need to do is find ways to identify high risk people and get them treatment.

Please explain how this would be done in a way that doesn't restrict rights in the same way gun laws would.

 

[WildCat]

Now I'm going to inject Race into this debate .

We have over a hundred youths killed just in Chicago every year.

But almost all of those are gang warfare, not random killing of innocents and sadly so common it's a dog bites man story.

 

[fuelair]

Would you consider yourself a typical gun-owner? I wouldn't.

I honestly do not know what a typical gun owner would be. As far as I know we are all individuals with lots of interests - including guns - and very few paranoids (paranoia is weird - especially self produced paranoia). Some of us like people, others unfortunately don't.

 

[lionking]

I'm not them, I would never tell you what to do in your own country

You're very quick to pass judgements on other countries though. If you don't like copping some judgements back, I suggest you unsubscribe from this thread.

 

[BStrong]

Just saw the photo of the shooter, looks a little too much like Phil Spector for comfort.

 

[StankApe]

You're very quick to pass judgements on other countries though. If you don't like copping some judgements back, I suggest you unsubscribe from this thread.

Aussies sure are a funny group of people!

 

[lionking]

Just saw the photo of the shooter, looks a little too much like Phil Spector for comfort.

The only photo I saw was 7 years old. Do you have a link to a later one?

 

[anglolawyer]

Couple of things about gun control in the US: (1) is it something to do with the relationship between citizen and state that in the land of the free the state should not have a monopoly of force? and (2) say private gun ownership were outlawed - how would you disarm everybody?

Someone made an interesting point about the dangerous and socially destabilising illegal arms trade that might break out if guns were banned, like prohibition. I think the US will keep its guns a while longer.

 

[StankApe]

anglo

Yeah I mentioned earlier that I suspect the Mexican Drug Cartels would start shipping guns into the USA the second a ban took place. I suspect I would be proven correct if a ban ever occurred.

 

[fuelair]

How can ownership of an assault rifle be justified? They are designed to kill a lot of people very quickly. Why would anybody want to own a weapon like this?

You do, I hope, understand that an assault rifle is no more designed to kill a lot of people very quickly than a regular rifle with a decent size magazine. It is designed to keep the barrel cooler, be light weight so it can be carried further by it's user and to be taken down for cleaning/maintainence quickly and easily.

An assault rifle that can be set for automatic is good for killing a lot of people quickly only if the people are grouped together moving straight towrd/away with you - I would far rather face a full auto in the hand of a not very practiced user with a five shot rifle , a pistol or a shotgun than with an auto myself. I first realized that in basic training and have verified/watched it verified in numerous hands over the years - This includes firing fully loaded 20 round mags myself in a Thompson .45 at a human sillouhette target - 3 magazines, 1 bullet in the paper outside the sillouhette 0 in the sillhouette - the others all missed. At 10 to 15 feet. The owner did only slightly better. BUT if either of us had been firing at a forest of people moving at us, we would have taken a goodly toll.