Emmeran wrote:

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/12/14/us/connecticut-school-shooting/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

I hate our current world

Don't despair. These things happen now and then in a free society like America. It's part of being free.
And surely you and Phreddy would agree that as bad as it gets, the world is still filled with beautiful things.

Please, this is not the appropriate time to talk about this.

And sailor is right--guns are only tangentially related to gun violence.

When I was young, a playmate of mine was bludgeoned to death by an NES 'game' cartridge. I opened his mouth and blew out as much dust as I could, but it didn't work; he was gone.

I'm not even going to bother getting in to the gun thing again.  The regulars around here all know each other stance, and I doubt any of us are going to switch ides based on this or any other tragedy.

The shooter has been identified as a 26 year old male from New Jersey.  Amongst the dead is the shooter's mother. There is nothing sane about someone who is willing to kill their own parent or children. This is no crime of passion, no spontaneous act.  This is a calculated systematic murder committed by a madman.

We REALLY need to fix the mental health infrastructure in this country, guns or no....

I heard a statistic a couple of years ago stating that the U.S. rate of gun violence would be well below those of other western countries, including Canada, if we remove black on black shooting incidents from the data.  Unfortunately, I cannot run it down at present.

Here is a interesting study on the geography of gun violence. Below is a quote from the study which supports my first statement.

Criminologists have noted that crime — especially violent crime — is more likely among young males. Interestingly, this does not appear to be the case according to our analysis of metros. In fact, we find a modest negative correlation between the share of young males and the overall rate of gun death (-.10).

Race, unfortunately and tragically, factors into gun death at the metro level. The share of the population that is black is positively related to both the overall rate of gun death (.56) and even more so with gun-related homicides (.72).   

The rate of gun deaths is negatively correlated with states that ban assault weapons, require trigger locks, and mandate safe storage requirements for guns.

So y'all realize where this idiocy transpired...

Lesbian Sex, Incest, And Video Tape!

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phreddy wrote:

choad wrote:

So y'all realize where this idiocy transpired...

Lesbian Sex, Incest, And Video Tape!

Yes, I saw your post.  However, rather than whip the poor folk of Connecticut in a thread titled Lesbian sex, etc, I thought it needed a new thread.

Yeah, agreed.

I know this place is for jedi-level cynics, but this story is really bothering me.

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China barely brings home the Bronze.

MSG Tripps wrote:

China barely brings home the Bronze.

No, no, no. The NRA will tell us that knives are just as deadly as guns, so we needn't worry about regulation.

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If there were a bill saying "Osama bin Laden cannot own guns" the NRA would oppose it.

Not me.  When the time comes I'm renting the most expensive damn Ferrari I can afford and taking it out on the West Coast Highway, dropping a brick on the loud pedal and seeing just how long I can keep the fucker on the hard.

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whosasailorthen wrote:

Not me.  When the time comes I'm renting the most expensive damn Ferrari I can afford and taking it out on the West Coast Highway, dropping a brick on the loud pedal and seeing just how long I can keep the fucker on the hard.

You watch too many movies.

I gotcher hard right here.

Bigcat wrote:

sigmoid freud wrote:

I'd shoot up an NRA convention.

Now THAT is being part of the SOLUTION. Great idea.

Hope you don't mind if I use that quote - whom should I make out the royalty check to?

There is no more, or no less evil in the world. 

Nowadays;  1) we hear graphic instantaneous reports of every single fucking thing that ever happens, 2) our technological efficiencies have made it possible for a single person to maximize his 'kill potential'.

I personally believe the federal gun law should be 'single load' guns only for civilians.  no barrels under 24"L.  No handguns.  Exceptions only for soldiers and the police. 

Now, here's the fun part;  these gun nuts, who cringe at the thought that there will be any restrictions on building your own arsenal, have this whole dystopian fear that there's gonna be a 'shootin' war' with the gov't.  Their beliefs are centered in the 18th century.  Nowadays, If the gov't wanted to 'wipe you out', they would just do it electronically.  It's much more efficient.

XregnaR wrote:

Htom Sirveaux wrote:

Tall Paul wrote:

Why did no one here predict this? Was it because we're nowhere near as cynical as we like to think, or did we all just subconsciously know it was going to happen but hoped we were wrong?

Oh, I saw it coming--I just figured it went without saying.

If the chrilden were armed, this never would have happened. It would have turned out like Ft. Hood--a room full of armed, trained professionals prevented any killing.

Besides, if you ban guns, you're taking them away from the good guys--bad guys won't care that they're illegal. Think of all the shootings that wouldn't have been prevented if good guys didn't have their legal guns.

We need to enforce the laws we have. That way, all these shooters couldn't have had access to their legally acquired firearms.

You and I have danced to this song before, so we know where the other stands. If the principal or school shrink had been armed, they might have been able to stop the further slaughter. Of course arming the kids is not the premise.

As for Ft. Hood, you should know that nobody in that clinic was armed but the perpetrator, trained or otherwise. The military has a funny rule about not carrying around loaded guns on base. Probably because they don't issue Kevlar footwear...

I'm just not sold on the whole, "if somebody had been armed this might have been prevented or at least limited" argument.  In Texas here, where we're all crazy, yes.  In Connecticut, maybe but, probably not.

This is fiction, but still a valid point.  From The West Wing; the President has been shot and CJ reminds everyone that even the greatest security agents in the world didn't prevent it from happening. 

XregnaR wrote:

Well, all accounts indicate that the principal and school shrink both died trying to charge and stop the attacker.  I'd wager if either of them had been armed, things would have ended a little differently.

Let us check this out.  All school principals and guidance counselors should be armed?   

You did get your brains bashed out in the Rangers, hey XregnaR.

This argument reminds me of the "raising taxes is bad for the economy" argument--it keeps getting repeated and repeated, even though there's empirical evidence disproving it.

Look, you know that if guns were ever used to PREVENT violence, it would be thrown in our face every five minutes on Fox. If there was a single incident of a gun in school/concealed carry/whatever actually stopping a mass murder, we'd have been reminded of "The XXXtown Hero" dozens of times since Friday.

We're the only industrialized country pursuing this "more guns = more safety" route; it's clearly not working.

Htom Sirveaux wrote:

This argument reminds me of the "raising taxes is bad for the economy" argument--it keeps getting repeated and repeated, even though there's empirical evidence disproving it.

Look, you know that if guns were ever used to PREVENT violence, it would be thrown in our face every five minutes on Fox. If there was a single incident of a gun in school/concealed carry/whatever actually stopping a mass murder, we'd have been reminded of "The XXXtown Hero" dozens of times since Friday.

We're the only industrialized country pursuing this "more guns = more safety" route; it's clearly not working.

[i hate my source]
If you care to peruse the first few pages of any NRA magazine, they provide dozens of easily verifiable stories monthly where people use guns to prevent harm coming to themselves or others.  Oddly, most are from newspapers.
[/i hate my source]

As for the mass murders, do you ever wonder why they pretty much ALWAYS happen in places where the targets are more vulnerable, and either incapable of (children) or prohibited from (factories, malls, etc. gun free zones) being armed?

As for Fox, Well they basically just watch other networks, then try to find a liberal spin to attack. It's not like they actually read papers or do research.

Like I said, we've already danced to this.

Now what I'd really like to see is the NRA lobbyists start pushing for immediate action to rebuild a national mental health infrastructure that could help prevent people who shouldn't get guns from doing so.

By the way ranger, since you're reasonable and because it's hard to run into people who disagree but still listen, here's something you should know about anti-gun people. We're not used to guns, so we're not familiar with them and don't see them as tools. A lot of people look at guns with a mixture of healthy fear and profound distaste. Also, when you make the argument that an armed principal could have prevented that, you're going to touch a nerve--we DO NOT want to live in a country where everyone is packing and there's an arms races with 300 million competitors. You say arm the principal, arm the teachers, and we hear that we're going to be forced to carry these murder devices against our will, and live in a kill-or-be-killed society.

I'm not saying make anyone carry anything against their will. But allow those that wish to legally.

I'm also not saying that anyone armed on campus could have prevented tragedy, just reduced it. Even if the halls had been patrolled by armed cops, this person could have still killed children.

Ah the great society - a chicken in every pot and a gun in every hand. I fear that it's several decades too late to back down. You need to start arming your women and children, your cross-walk attendants and your principals, your pastors and your prostitutes. Only when every one of you carries a fully automatic weapon, loaded, with the safety off, will any of you ever be safe again. Whiners like Ahpoo are evolutionary dead ends. Die Zeiten andern sich jetzt.

XregnaR wrote:

[i hate my source]
If you care to peruse the first few pages of any NRA magazine, they provide dozens of easily verifiable stories monthly where people use guns to prevent harm coming to themselves or others.  Oddly, most are from newspapers.
[/i hate my source]

I know how you feel. Fox News has hours devoted to the War On Christmas and Karl Rove can still prove that Romney won Ohio. I'm sure fnord has magazines that has pages chock-full of tales of nigger woe in decent neighborhoods. Do those NRA rags also have data about how many accidental shootings, family murders and suicides occur per legitimate defense? If so I'd like to see them.

XregnaR wrote:

Now what I'd really like to see is the NRA lobbyists start pushing for immediate action to rebuild a national mental health infrastructure that could help prevent people who shouldn't get guns from doing so.

Now we have something to agree on. We have been around this dance before so you know I don't want to ban guns, I would just like a few common sense regulations in place. In a country where you can't drive a car without examination and licensing, where marrying anyone you'd like to is considered a direct assault on the Constitution, why are unlicensed concealed automatic weapons that you can hose anyone with so long as you 'feel threatened' such a fetish?