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ORIGINAL: cloudboy

Some commentators recently pointed out in the PRESS that its easier for someone to buy a gun in the US than it is to buy prescription drugs.

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ORIGINAL: popeye1250

Hey, I shot a Deer with my Glock!
He pulled a knife on me!

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Meatcleaver, I thought you could appreciate this article from THE NEW YORKER. Adam Gopnik pretty much describes the cold reception you received here on the CMMB from America's freedom-loving, gun-toting, denizens.

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ORIGINAL: meatcleaver

LOL My crusade is gathering momentum cloudboy. The problem for the American image is that the glassy wild eyed, gun toting redneck shouts the loudest and gets most attention but the following snippet is revealing.

And every country has known the horror of having a lunatic get his hands on a gun and kill innocent people. But on a recent list of the fourteen worst mass shootings in Western democracies since the nineteen-sixties the United States claimed seven, and, just as important, no other country on the list has had a repeat performance as severe as the first.

What is that saying about the definition of madness, something about keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result?

This is paragraph is also revealing. Let's talk about anything but guns. I wonder why? Normally those people who believe guns put spunk in their pencil can't stop talking about guns as a solution to a myriad societal and world problems. Some even see them as a solution to gun crime.

If the facts weren’t so horrible, there might be something touching in the Governor’s deeply American belief that “healing” can take place magically, without the intervening practice called “treating.” The logic is unusual but striking: the aftermath of a terrorist attack is the wrong time to talk about security, the aftermath of a death from lung cancer is the wrong time to talk about smoking and the tobacco industry, and the aftermath of a car crash is the wrong time to talk about seat belts. People talked about the shooting, of course, but much of the conversation was devoted to musings on the treatment of mental illness in universities, the problem of “narcissism,” violence in the media and in popular culture, copycat killings, the alienation of immigrant students, and the question of Evil.
 
Maybe one day the pro-gunners will realise that being intelligent and going for prevention rather than cure (cure being everyone else armed to the teeth) is a lot better solution, even if it is more boring and makes Dirty Harry redundant.

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ORIGINAL: seeksfemslave

MC, I sympathise with your anti gun stance and the idea of people walking the streets armed to the teeth is madness
but
In the US it is their tradition, there are arguments in favour of weapons being available IMO and in practice it would be  impossible to bring about changes given the number of arms available.
Tilting at Windmills I think its called.

Dont forget, banning handguns in the UK didn't achieve much did it ?

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ORIGINAL: LadyEllen

Its written into the Constitution. The only point for argument in that case, absent dissolving and reforming the US, is who should not be legally permitted a weapon - although legal and permit are not words recognised by those who want to and can obtain weapons regardless of any control - and it seems that the legal permit holders are far less represented than their opposites in much of the gun crime I hear about.

E

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ORIGINAL: Real0ne

Like you totally miss the point.   we are not the same culture.  Even if it were not written into our constitution it would not make any difference.  y9ou seem to think things will be better without guns here and the reverse would be the case.

your solution is atypical of the approach of society in general today.  Instead of getting to the root of the problem and producing a "cure" you would rather put a bandaid on it so it changes its face.   Then you can tell us that we have 50 times the violent crime that the uk does and ban hands just in case people might become a psychopathic serial murderer.

Banning is the wrong approach, especially sinmce "everyone" or at least i thought "everyone" knew that "when guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns"  that only common sense.

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ORIGINAL: meatcleaver

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ORIGINAL: seeksfemslave

MC, I sympathise with your anti gun stance and the idea of people walking the streets armed to the teeth is madness
but
In the US it is their tradition, there are arguments in favour of weapons being available IMO and in practice it would be  impossible to bring about changes given the number of arms available.
Tilting at Windmills I think its called.

Dont forget, banning handguns in the UK didn't achieve much did it ?

The two biggest gun crimes in the UK were by people who possessed legal weapons. Cho's were legal and I'd be interested to know in how many of the other mass killings the killer posssessed legal weapons.

UK gun crime is low but seems large because when used they are headline news and don't forget the use of replica guns are also gun crimes, anything that looks like a gun is a gun crime. A cucumber in a sack is recorded as a gun crime which one bloke used in robbing a building society in Rotherham some years ago. You need to look behind the headline statistics. Most inner city youths (who are the biggest culprits) think guns put spunk in their pencil until they are staring at 5-15 years. On the whole guns are confined to small areas and those that suffer from gun crime are usually those that possess guns. The psychology isn't such that guns are acceptable and I've seen enough of these tough guys knees shake when they are in custody and aren't going to see their mothers for a long time. The pressure needs to be kept up that they are seen as lowlife as long as they possess and not import the American psychology of guns being hip and kool.

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ORIGINAL: farglebargle

The Constitution actually fell apart in April of 1861, when Congress recessed, and didn't set a date for reconvening, as 1/2 the states had withdrawn.

Lincoln re-animated the corpse of the Old Republic by unconstitutionally appointing Senators and Representatives to rubber-stamp the acts of Lincoln's military dictatorship.

The situation continues to this day.

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ORIGINAL: meatcleaver

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ORIGINAL: Real0ne

Like you totally miss the point.   we are not the same culture.  Even if it were not written into our constitution it would not make any difference.  y9ou seem to think things will be better without guns here and the reverse would be the case.

your solution is atypical of the approach of society in general today.  Instead of getting to the root of the problem and producing a "cure" you would rather put a bandaid on it so it changes its face.   Then you can tell us that we have 50 times the violent crime that the uk does and ban hands just in case people might become a psychopathic serial murderer.

Banning is the wrong approach, especially sinmce "everyone" or at least i thought "everyone" knew that "when guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns"  that only common sense.

Hmm Just done a little quick research (I might not be 100% right here). It doesn't seem to be outlaws that are committing these mass killings but people with legally held guns.