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School shooting: but don't mention guns!

Explorer said:
Very disappointed I only received evasions re my question on the statistics, however imperfect they may or may not be. I was hoping for at least a few theories that could be developed, but ho hum, I guess I'll take my question elsewhere.
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Again you mistake me. It isn't an evasion, as I'd think my chicken posts made clear. You are asking "Why did the chicken cross the road?" and, from the number of jokes based on that exact question, I think you'd see there can be a million answers and without more data the only response is, "I don't know."

In fact, with the stats you showed, the answer isn't even that - it's "I don't even know if a chicken DID cross the road."

The first thing people should do in response to those stats is ask if they are even accurate - because if they aren't, no amount of theorizing is going to come up with an answer.

To put it another way - Some on this board might ask, "Why do ghosts pass through walls, but not fall through the floor?"

Now, I can theorize that ghosts who appear to pass through walls are actually walking on paths that, during their time, did not have walls blocking them.

Or I could say that the afterlife's ground and the real world's ground happen to be in the same place, and that, as we catch glimpses of the afterlife, we simply don't realize that on the other side there is no house. This would additionally explain ghosts who appear to walk through mountainsides.

But the thing is - I haven't proven the existence of ghosts, and therefore speculation is pointless.

You haven't yet illustrated that people on the east coast are less likely to support protection of gun rights.
 
Explorer said:
Very disappointed I only received evasions re my question on the statistics, however imperfect they may or may not be. I was hoping for at least a few theories that could be developed, but ho hum, I guess I'll take my question elsewhere.
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Excuse me? I answered your question to the best of my ability. Did you have a theory you wanted to posit?
 
Explorer said:
Very disappointed I only received evasions re my question on the statistics, however imperfect they may or may not be. I was hoping for at least a few theories that could be developed, but ho hum, I guess I'll take my question elsewhere.
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Trying to extrapolate intelligently about the psychology of millions of human beings from one poll where we don't even know exactly what question was asked nor exactly where it was asked is inherently pointless. There's just not enough data to say anything worth saying.

Your question isn't being evaded, it just wasn't a very good question.

We could speculate about cultural and socioeconomic differences between the two regions, vaguely, but all we'd be doing is airing our existing preconceptions.
 
RemieV said:
The point was that driving is largely a necessity of the modern world, whereas gun ownership isn't.
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Firearm ownership seems to be the ONLY issue where 'need' is employed as a counter-argument.

Or is it just me???
 
Autolite said:
Firearm ownership seems to be the ONLY issue where 'need' is employed as a counter-argument.

Or is it just me???
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I didn't say I hold that position. I just said that is what the position IS.

To my mind, a more apt comparison would be alcohol.

You must be 21 to buy it, they have no real way of checking your level of crazy before it's sold to you, underage folks will find a way to get it anyway, lots of people die or are seriously injured either directly by alcohol or tangentially, creating stricter laws doesn't really address the problem, and, for some people, alcohol is a hobby. Others view it as a right. Still others view it as a need.
 
fuelair said:
and at the time I wrote that I thought it was sarcastic-now it appears to actually be true!!!!!
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I haven't yet read anything about whether or not the mother's firearms were properly secured. Some seem to be implying that nut-guy's access to the guns is the mother's fault.

It's not unreasonable to suggest that the firearms might have been properly, legally and securely stored. Media reports claim that Adam Lanza was 'smart'. Perhaps he was able to figure out a way to defeat the security safeguards.

I suspect it ain't rocket science...
 
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fuelair said:
and at the time I wrote that I thought it was sarcastic-now it appears to actually be true!!!!!
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Yes. And now entering realms of pure speculation;

The mother was a "prepper" who believed that civil order was going to break down, and she had stockpiled guns, water, and food against that possibility.

She also appears to have bought in to the "Mayan Curse" end-of-the-word stuff.

Her son was not emotionally and intellectually normal, and was fiercely protected by the mom.

He likely believed anything she did.

Now, if you think the end of the world is coming in a week, and if you think it's going to be horrible, wouldn't you want to spare anybody you could the pain and horror?

I think it's possible he thought he was doing mercy killing.
 
Autolite said:
I haven't yet read anything about whether or not the mother's firearms were properly secured. Some seem to be implying that nut-guy's access to the guns are the mother's fault.

It's not unreasonable to suggest that the firearms might have been properly, legally and securely stored. Media reports claim that Adam Lanza was 'smart'. Perhaps he was able to figure out a way to defeat the security safeguards.

I suspect it ain't rocket science...
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This is a tough one. If you have a gun in your home for self defense, and you keep a trigger lock on it, it is NEVER going to save you. You simply won't have the time to unlock it before you're dead.

There's a case to be made for having it loaded in the home as well. The fastest way to self defense is open the bedside table and pull out a loaded gun.

Most people I have known who have guns in the home simply educate their family on their use and safety and leave it at that.

If, while you are educating your family on gun's use and safety, they are crazy enough to get the message "Here is how to kill people most efficiently," there's not a lot you can do. Crazy brains interpret things crazily.
 
Counselor and mental health professional Fred Erwin writes, "Spent the day with mentally ill folks whose lives, already hard, will be made harder by the association of this recent shooting with an autistic man, who killed because he was angry and could not control his emotional life, not because he had autism."

From his long experience working with traumatized populations, Erwin adds, "There is no more link between mental illness and violence than there is between red hair and violence, or green eyes and violence, or being tall, or short, or white, or black, or communist, or capitalist."
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'6 Ways to Replace Violence With a Culture of Caring'
 
RemieV said:
I didn't say I hold that position. I just said that is what the position IS.

To my mind, a more apt comparison would be alcohol.

You must be 21 to buy it, they have no real way of checking your level of crazy before it's sold to you, underage folks will find a way to get it anyway, lots of people die or are seriously injured either directly by alcohol or tangentially, creating stricter laws doesn't really address the problem, and, for some people, alcohol is a hobby. Others view it as a right. Still others view it as a need.
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Other view it as a dangerous and addictive drug, like violence and the power of guns.

Some societies appear more prone to alcoholism than others.
 
RemieV said:
This is a tough one. If you have a gun in your home for self defense, and you keep a trigger lock on it, it is NEVER going to save you. You simply won't have the time to unlock it before you're dead.
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I'm not familiar with the firearm storage laws in Connecticut or whether 'open' storage is allowed for self defense. Perhaps some one can clue me in on that.

Here in Canada, unsecured firearm storage in the home for the purpose of self defense is nearly almost always illegal. IIRC, the only exception would be for use as protection against predatory wildlife and I am not even sure where I first read that.

So unless you've got a herd of polar bears lodging under your porch, a firearm being store in an unsecured manner is a no-no...
 
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Dcdrac said:
I would draw the line at automatics and semi atuomatics no day to day average person needs one of those.
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I spent a couple of years working outside in remote bear country. Bear encounters were routine in the summer and we regularly took with us a medium calibre bolt action rifle, a pump-action 12ga shot gun and/or a semi-automatic medium calibre military type rifle.

I suppose we could have been reasonably safe with just the bolt action rifle and the shot gun but having the semi-auto provided extra peace-of-mind.

If our respective government(s) succeed in banning semi-automatics, I'm sure we'll still be fine. (But just let's not tell the bears about it, m-kay???)
 
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BenBurch said:
She also appears to have bought in to the "Mayan Curse" end-of-the-word stuff.
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Really!?!

And she was a school teacher?

Perhaps the gun control issue isn't the only thing that warrants immediate attention...
 
Nessie said:
The peacefulness of a country is the main factor.

Canada (30.8 guns per 100 people) is a more peaceful country than the USA (88.8 per 100 peopel) not so, Mexico (15.4 per 100 peopel) has a war ongoing. In the same way Switzerland with tons of guns per head (47.5 per 100 people) is a peaceful country compared to South Africa with fewer guns per head (17.03 per 100). Japan (0.6 per 100 people) has way less crime than England & Wales (6.2 per 100 people) and is generally regarded as a safer, more peaceful place.

Sorry Americans, you are not very peaceful and you have tons of guns.
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Or: "is religion important in your daily life: murders/10000: guns/100

84.5% 31.8 17.0 South Africa
72.0% 16.9 15.4 Simply Mexico
65.0% _4.2 88.8 USA
42.0% _1.6 30.2 Canada
41.5% _0.7 47.5 Switzerland
26.5% _1.2 06.2 United Kingdom
24.5% _0.3 00.6 Japan

Get the number of superstitious people below 50% and you're laughing - irrespective of the number of guns.

Yet after these events peoples call for more religion and fewer guns - Why?
 
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