Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools

Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (Full Version)

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jlf1961 -> Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/17/2012 11:51:43 PM)
In the various threads since Friday people have posted various ideas to prevent what happened on Friday. A couple the NRA would fight on grounds of infringement and with the supreme court we have, they would probably win. In one thread I posted the most comprehensive worded ban that would cover every rifle that has the same capabilities as the one used Friday. Everyone agrees something has to be done, something comprehensive, effective and workable. If you don't think we can get the guns, then come up with a way to protect our schools. Come on, we are, after all intelligent adults, and considering the attitude in Washington, I would venture a hell of a lot more intelligent than who we have elected.

jlf1961 -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 12:00:53 AM)
quote: Gun control debate begins to shift Congressional Democrats showed signs Monday of a more aggressive push on gun control in the wake of the Newtown, Conn., killings, while Republicans and gun-rights advocates remained largely silent on policy matters. Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-W.Va., the pro-gun-rights senator who drew attention in 2010 after running a commercial that showed him firing a rifle at an environmental bill, said that "everything should be on the table" as gun control is debated in the coming weeks and months. Rep. John Yarmuth, a moderate Democrat from Kentucky, held a news conference to say he backed new legislation. "I have been largely silent on the issue of gun violence over the past six years, and I am now as sorry for that as I am for what happened to the families who lost so much in this most recent, but sadly not isolated, tragedy," Yarmuth said in a statement. "The National Rifle Association has spent untold millions of dollars instilling fear in our citizens and our politicians." He added, "I believe it is more rational to fear guns far more than the illusory political power of the NRA." source What did I say about house republicans?

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:01:13 AM)
Yes. Let's get SERIOUS about gun control and safety in our school. Point 1: Machine Guns were developed in WWI. Assault Rifles were Developed at the end of WWII. BOTH were legal to own by the American public since their inception until the Machine Gun Ban of 1986, yet there were no rampant UZI maulings in schools during the 60s and 70s. Thus, if one is SERIOUS about the issue (s)he understands that guns are obviously NOT the factor of these epidemics. Point 2: The school shooting trend became "en vogue" during the mid-1990s, when not only did a MG ban exist, but a federal Assault Weapons AND High-Capacity magazine ban was in place as well, demonstrating that these bans do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to stop these horrific outbreaks, because even the deranged don't call off a murderous rage because the weapon of choice is illegal. Point 3: Even when legal, virtually all, if not, EVERY single school shooting occured on a campus that displayed a "FIREARMS FREE ZONE" sign making possession or carry of such weapons illegal. Fascinatingly enough, these signs and the force of law behind them did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to stop ANY of these murderous rampages. However, they actually were effective for something: these Firearms free zones effectively enjoin(ed) qualified students, faculty, and employees from lawfully carrying the firearm they have a legal permit to carry... the tool that used in that instant could have turned a tragedy of 17, 30, or more dead to perhaps 3. Thus, as with point 2, the ONLY effect this idiodic legislation has is on the people who stand to defend these bystanders. Point 4: Ignoring the fundamental Right behind the Second Amendment (and why it was drafted in the first place), Regulating and banning firearms is an impossibility in this country. The Machine Gun Ban and the Assault Weapons ban (that expired in '04) did not elimate firearms. They prevented the manufacture and sale of new weapons to the public. ALL this accomplished was made the pre-existing weapons more expensive to those who would legally buy the pre-owned weapons while the would-be criminals could choose between buying the expensive pre-existing ones or illegally converting/stealing these tools. Point 5: In furtherance of point 4, consider the war on drugs. This nation, local law enforcement and the federal DEA have had no success in keeping our streets and our schools free of illicit narcotics. We cannot keep undocumented aliens out of this country, we cannot keep illicit substances from flowing across the border(s). Once a market existed for firearms (under the delusion law enforcement could claim all the domestic ones), how difficult would it really be to smuggle weapons into this country. Thus, when looking at gun control and the safety of our schools SERIOUSLY, we find it is a nonsensical distraction that has ZERO effect in keeping our children safe and even acts as an obstacle from a qualified and legally permitted individual or employee from saving our children's lives, preventing him/her from carrying that permitted weapon and stopping the crime as it unfolded. If in fact you do want to be SERIOUS about this issue, quit scapegoating the instrumentality and look to the conditions that are actually causing these deranged individuals to act this way.

AliceMajesty -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:16:21 AM)
Take a look at Swedish gun related crimes and deaths, compare them to the USA, then come back and tell me gun regulation doesn't do any good. If there's a smuggle problem - then focus on solving it, don't use it as an excuse to do nothing.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:33:05 AM)
mmm hmmm. And I should do this why? Does Sweden have the same population, resources per population, system of government and economy, demographics, culture, social issues and geography as the United States? There is ZERO valid comparison whether you substitute the UK, Continental Europe, Aus, Asia or Mars for that matter. The conditions in the US are purely unique and cannot be substituted by injecting a country with little if anything in common other than a "western, industrialized facade" and think a valid comparison can be made. However you CAN if you wish tell us how well those laws worked for Norway and Mr. Breivik http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anders_Behring_Breivik

Lucylastic -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:35:05 AM)
bollocks does it...unique, YAY MERICA I hope you are so proud of your uneekness

meatcleaver -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:44:27 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Pulpsmack mmm hmmm. And I should do this why? Does Sweden have the same population, resources per population, system of government and economy, demographics, culture, social issues and geography as the United States? There is ZERO valid comparison whether you substitute the UK, Continental Europe, Aus, Asia or Mars for that matter. The conditions in the US are purely unique and cannot be substituted by injecting a country with little if anything in common other than a "western, industrialized facade" and think a valid comparison can be made. However you CAN if you wish tell us how well those laws worked for Norway and Mr. Breivik http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anders_Behring_Breivik When facts become inconvenient, dismiss them. No one is saying Europe doesn't suffer from the same phenomenon, the west has a lot of shared culture, particularly the glorification of killing and violence advocated as a solution for violence, the mythologized macho idiot et al but there are reasoned voices which prevale and guns are regulated to varying degrees and stats do point to the stricter the regulation, the less gun crime and deaths there are.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:48:28 AM)
Quite. I live in a wonderful country that despite certain issues and certain citizens' viewpoints, I hold in high esteem. As for the actual ISSUE, Regulating guns in the United States fails for the reasons I have cited (and to date nobody has effectively countered). Moreover, waxing poeting about converting the US to that of "your country of choice" is not going to happen either nor should it given the original topic and how in fact mass murders can happen in European gun-restrictive Utopias. quote: ORIGINAL: meatcleaver When facts become inconvenient, dismiss them. No one is saying Europe doesn't suffer from the same phenomenon, the west has a lot of shared culture, particularly the glorification of killing and violence advocated as a solution for violence, the mythologized macho idiot et al but there are reasoned voices which prevale and guns are regulated to varying degrees and stats do point to the stricter the regulation, the less gun crime and deaths there are. Ah, yes... well as above, feel free to throw a dart at the European Utopia, remove our government, remove this economy, remove these pesky ethnically, culturally, and religiously diverse people and all 99 other differing variables that make America different from "X" and yes, I am sure somehow everything will magically solve itself. Meanwhile, you can take the "facts" I have laid out in points 1-5 and address those, or do we continue to play "World Geography for $800, Alex"?

Lucylastic -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:49:45 AM)
Oh so you would be willing to do something if all mass murders were only committed in america??? adding as you added more bullflop I never stated I was for converting the US to a country of my choice, so dont strawman me... Since dunblane in the UK, there were gun restrictions put into place there have been no school shootings since. Since the montreal massacre in 89, and changes made, there have been zero school massacres either. You aint the only country in the world without diverse populations or similar economic issues either. How many have you had since columbine???

AliceMajesty -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:55:40 AM)
Well, if you can't learn from the success of others, then I guess you're just..... Typically American. I am not at all saying that these tragedies are an impossibility in Scandinavia, obviously they aren't since Breivik was able to kill 69 kids on Utøya, but we don't have several mass shootings every year. Our crime rate in general is only a fraction of what it is in America! If you had actually bothered to check up the laws and statistics I mentioned, you'd also find that Sweden has more guns per capita than USA - we're just a lot better at regulating them and making sure they're used to kill moose and not people.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 3:59:21 AM)
If you read my initial post, which actually addresses the RELEVANCE of the OP, the state of affairs in the world is of no consequence. The fact is that in the United States (with all its assets and faults) has a problem with deranged individuals harming innocent people. The other fact is that for all the points laid out above in the initial post, the guns are not the mitigating circumstance. This is a complex societal issue that has developed long after firearms (of all kinds) were introduced and privately owned here.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:03:23 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: AliceMajesty Well, if you can't learn from the success of others, then I guess you're just..... Typically American. I am not at all saying that these tragedies are an impossibility in Scandinavia, obviously they aren't since Breivik was able to kill 69 kids on Utøya, but we don't have several mass shootings every year. Our crime rate in general is only a fraction of what it is in America! If you had actually bothered to check up the laws and statistics I mentioned, you'd also find that Sweden has more guns per capita than USA - we're just a lot better at regulating them and making sure they're used to kill moose and not people. Wonderful. Well since this typical American cannot seem to wrap his head around this success, I would like to hear from the deligate from the land of success. Kindly enlighten us as to how we can with the stroke of the pen prevent the idocy that occurs in Newton, CT (and Norway). What magic laws can we enact that can be read by some deranged man that are so potent he gives pause to his murderous rage and abandons the pursuit of a mass killing spree with firearms?

Lucylastic -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:05:35 AM)
hahhahahhah not the mitigating circumstances? what is??? PUHLEEZE without the instrumentality, fewer people would have died.

AliceMajesty -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:09:18 AM)
I did read the original post. I agree that this is in base a mental health problem - what I'm arguing is that it's a lot harder for crazies to go around shooting people is the can't get guns. There is plenty of information about our particular laws that you can find for yourself - as I originally advised you to. As to the "Laws won't make a difference because criminals don't abide to them anyway" argument I only have one, tired, reply: Well then, why not make murder, rape, abuse, robbery, mutilation etc. legal? The laws against it don't do anything, because criminals don't care about laws anyway, right? As I said: make guns harder to get and it's automatically harder for people to shoot other people.

meatcleaver -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:09:48 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Pulpsmack Ah, yes... well as above, feel free to throw a dart at the European Utopia, remove our government, remove this economy, remove these pesky ethnically, culturally, and religiously diverse people and all 99 other differing variables that make America different from "X" and yes, I am sure somehow everything will magically solve itself. Meanwhile, you can take the "facts" I have laid out in points 1-5 and address those, or do we continue to play "World Geography for $800, Alex"? Oh And now Newtown was to do with a diverse ethnic mix? Come on, this is pure fantasy. There are lots of cities in western Europe where whites are in the minority and the none white population is very diverse. They still don't seem to have the massacres. ie. Brevik was about keeping Europe white so in his case you have inadvertently hit on something but I suspect not for the reasons swimming around your head.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:13:28 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Lucylastic hahhahahhah not the mitigating circumstances? what is??? PUHLEEZE without the instrumentality, fewer people would have died. Without the instrumentality, fewer people would have died... therefore, focus upon the instrumentality as the solution and ignore the actual factors that cause the behavior or instability in the first place. Gotcha, so ban alcohol because IT causes DUIs (or dare I say "Cars" and risk some yawn-worthy apologist tirade that cars aren't made to be evil monsters but guns are?). It's not the instrumentalities that cause the problem. If that were the case, there shouldn't be an armed officer in the nation.

Pulpsmack -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:20:04 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: meatcleaver Oh And now Newtown was to do with a diverse ethnic mix? Come on, this is pure fantasy. There are lots of cities in western Europe where whites are in the minority and the none white population is very diverse. They still don't seem to have the massacres. Wonderful. then let's knock that domino down. Now feel free to take your handful/armload of similary diversely (or uniformly) populated nations and move forward with ALL the other factors I have mentioned instead of sniping a single issue off the table and acting as if that that somehow equalized the two countries as analogues of each other.

Kirata -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:21:15 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: AliceMajesty Well, if you can't learn from the success of others, then I guess you're just..... Typically American. Our crime rate in general is only a fraction of what it is in America! ...If you had actually bothered to check up the laws and statistics I mentioned, you'd also find that Sweden has more guns per capita than USA - we're just a lot better at regulating them and making sure they're used to kill moose and not people. So two countries with high rates of gun ownership have very different murder rates. Fair enough. But, Hungary and Poland both have gun ownership rates that are less than a tenth of Sweden's (going by numbers from 2003) yet Hungary's murder rate is higher than Sweden's and Poland's is only a trifle lower. France's murder rate is lower than all of the above, and France has an even higher rate of gun ownership than Sweden. There's just no correlation here. It comes down to the usual suspects: culture and economics. K.

AliceMajesty -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:22:05 AM)
So both regulating guns and trying to better the mental health of the people isn't an option? We can only choose one? By that logic you can also argue that institutionalized suicidal people should not be kept away from sharp and pointy objects, because we should only focus on getting to the root of why they want to kill themselves... Cars were made as a means of transportation, guns were made to kill - you can't seriously claim to not see the difference here? As for your talk about diversity being the reason for the killings - I'm pretty damn sure that plenty of European countries are a lot more diverse than the states. Here in Sweden we have a single community in Stockholm that has received and accepted more refugees from the war in Iraq than the entire USA has!

Lucylastic -> RE: Lets get serious about gun control and safety in our schools (12/18/2012 4:23:13 AM)
Again, I didnt say that, STOP strawmanning. And making ASSumptions and PLEASE STOP using alcohol, cars, knives, broom handles, swords, ad nauseam because it is JUST Deflecting the issue with stupid. Talk about using talking points. GUNS have no other use. When loaded they only serve as a tool to put bloody holes in living things and making people feel brave. Stupid fucking analogies arent going to sway anyone. I have many times been in favour of psychological testing, and mental healthcare.... the thing is people like YOU dont wanna go with universal health care or decent access to mental health care, or address poverty and social problems . Costs too much money to spend on people who dont want to help themselves. You dont gotcha NOTHING except a bad case of the spins

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