Why are there so many Damm shootings

[realm505]

Why are there so many dam shootings recently, tonight I turn on the T.V. and there is another shooting, this time at a church. God-dam! I hate it when someone thinks the only way to get his point made, is to shoot people at a school, where they work or where people worship.

Is society really that cracked within? Do we glorify violence too much? Or does society put too much pressure on the individual?

Get a fucking hobby.

First shootings started at postal offices, then at schools, and now at synagogues and churches? (Not to exclude other shootings)

But why all of these dam shootings? They happen more often now.

What the fuck is up with black trench coats?
(he was wearing a trenchcoat)

I just think the media gives bad ideas to the fucked-up-beyond-psychological-help. These guys are already lost their "reality switch,"

We don't need the media giving in-depth coverage in all we see is a helicopter view of a building, going on and on about it. I don't know what makes me sick, the media or the shooting.
(I'm not trying to diminish the shooting's tragity, but think of how the media jumps on shootings and doesn't want to let go)

What do you think?

[Contestant #3]

Too many fucking guns...too fucking easy to get...

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Contestant #3

[Satan]

C#3: You sound dangerously like a liberal there, or am I failing to detect some sarcasm?

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Yer pal,
Satan

[Contestant #3]

I'm not easily defined as either liberal or conservative overall, but rather I take each topic individually. On the topic of guns, my stance aligns somewhat with the liberal position.

The OP asked "Why are there so many dammed shootings?"

It's easy for me to see that with the amount of guns in the US today, and the continued proliferation of their numbers added to the ease at which one can obtain one (either legally or illegally), we can be sure to expect a regular diet of shooting catastophies.

I don't know what the ultimate answer is to stopping the shootings, but I know that both guns laws and NRA memberships don't solve the problem.

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Contestant #3

[Byzantine]

realm505
Member
posted 09-02-1999 01:26 PM (To MPSIMS-Put away your modesty and share)

I'm not popmpus &
I don't have my head up my ass

As I responded in that thread: It's pompous and you are.

Why am I repeating that? Well, let's start off with this is just IMHO. Now that that's out of the way...

If more people took the time to know or maybe to share with other people what was GOOD about themselves instead of focusing on what's wrong with themselves or others, we wouldn't have people acting out with guns. Simplistic? Sure. But no well adjusted, self-accepting person, goes around blowing the hearts out of other human beings.

You really made me angry with your post to that thread. A lot of posters (myself included) shared the very best of themselves and you come out there like a complete troll and say, "Hey, anyone who thinks anything good about themselves is pompous and if they share it then they must have their head up their ass."

If you meant it as a joke I sure as hell didn't see it that way. I wish MORE people would have posted out there and really thought about what makes them special, unique, or just a good person. I think it makes a major difference in how you see the world as to how you see yourself.

If you think you are shit then believe me, the universe will echo that right back at you and make it far easier for you to see the rest of humanity as nothing but shit. But if you know, if you like yourself, love yourself, know that you are a good person, then the universe will echo that back to you and you will see others for their beauty and worth as well.

These "fucked-up-beyond-psychological-help" people are the way they are because they don't have any clue as to what makes them interesting or unique so they sure as hell can't see it in anyone else. They hate themselves so deeply that they project their anger onto other human beings. When they kill others they are really, symbolically, killing themselves.

I'm sure there is something good within you, realm505, something that you know you can do better than 90% of those around you. Why don't you go back to that thread, share it, and make me feel a lot better about this and about you as another human? I don't like carrying around this anger at you and I thank you for letting me post it and get it out of my heart. I hope you won't just flame back at me but seriously consider what I've written.

In case my point has slipped up with my anger: EVERYONE out here has wonderful, unique, amazing, silly, funny and just plain great aspects to their personalities. I invite, nay, beg you, to really think about it, go to that thread, and share. I'd love to read it. The more we accept ourselves, the more we can accept others. That includes my accepting you, realm505. I've let go of my hate with this and plan to move on. I hope you will too.



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The moon looks on many flowers, the flowers on but one moon.

[realm505]

Oh boy, how do I respond to that?
(foot entering mouth)

here comes the apologies

first off byz, I'm sorry for trolling that discussion.
I was not making fun of everyone in that thread, it is good to see people with original talents and such. I just went off on the ones who were bragging way beyond decency, sorry about that one. I was just feeling a bit pissed off that day. I can be a bit spiteful sometimes, I just want to make myself clear that I didn’t mean any harm by that remark. I wish I tell everyone I'm sorry, but somehow I can’t find that thread in the MPSIMS

Now about this thread,
I felt frustration in what happened last night. I always try to point out the good in others, but when that shooting happened only a few blocks away from where I live (ie I live in Ft. Worth, just four streets down from that shooting). I was hacked off, I feel so violated. So full of anger. You try to help others, and yet you can’t help them all.
Why did he do that? What made him mad at Baptists. He was cursing at the kids and telling them stuff like “Baptists are evil, and mean”—according to the kids on TV. how can you respond to a remark like that?
I also wrote in a fit. I should have cooled off before I posted it. Oh well, nothing like “racken’ the muck” to get a thread going, but this is in the pit.

I hope y'all under stand.

[Sam Stone]

This may sound callous, but when you have 300 million people, if there's even the tiniest probability of something happening, it will. If one guy in a million is a psychopathic killer, then you have 300 of them running around.

The notion that you can somehow 'fix' this problem is probably wrong. With numbers this large, stuff happens. People get hit by lightning, freak accidents take place, and crazies shoot up things.

Then add in the 'copycat' factor. If the last shooting causes one person in 100 million to decide to do it too, you're going to have three more. Some things are just inevitable.

[Sam Stone]

BTW, gun control isn't the answer. Even if you could ban them all, it would just change the mode of attack of the lunatic. Perhaps to something even more deadly. In Japan guns are next to impossible to get, so Sarin gas was introduced into the subway by some lunatics, killing a lot of people. A crazy woman drove her car at high speed through an outdoor mall a few years ago in the U.S., killing a bunch. Guys that can't get handguns might start using shotguns, and believe me that will kill a LOT more people. Or fertilizer bombs, or pipe bombs, or a chlorine gas bomb, or...

[Byzantine]

Hey, I know how that goes too. Some days I just come out here and sorta spew all over the place. I'm glad I got that anger out and I'm glad you read my post. Thanks! Maybe now we can be friends? I like that so much more than being pissy!

As for this topic.... I agree that gun control probably wouldn't accomplish a whole lot but I don't think a few restrictions would hurt either. I remember all the hassle and time it took to get my drivers licence; I think you should have to do the same for a gun (or to have children or a dog, but that's another topic!).

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The moon looks on many flowers, the flowers on but one moon.

[Persephone]

I don't like guns. I don't keep them in my house. But that is just my personal thing. I will not infringe on anyone's right to legally purchase or carry one. I believe some stronger gun control laws are probably in order.

But I do not think that this shooting had anything to do with the availability of guns. I think the guy was just nuts, decided Baptists were the cause of his problem, and started shooting.

That's just my opinion.

[tracer]

AuraSeer wrote:

Oh, sorry. I though this thread was asking about Van Damme shootings.

No, it's about D.A.M.M. shootings -- which are tragedies that happen when irate, disgruntled members of Drinkers Against Madd Mothers finally snap.

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I'm not flying fast, just orbiting low.

[Satan]

Well, the way I see it, things of this nature have been going on for eons. Only recently have we had such a proliferation of media, all of whom wants to put their own spin on events, none of whom are happy to let the story go away very quickly.

Anyone old enough to remember whatever media coverage happened when that dude went up into that tower in Texas in the '60s?

Things like that go past even that, but it's not old enough where someone here won't recall coverage, yet far enough back where the media was not quite as intensive and saturating as it is now.

I am not mentioning this to bring up the "copycat" syndrome that many blame the media on, BTW. Though that undoubtedly happens sometimes, I'm of the belief that crazies will do eventually no matter what, and that the media is that much more intent on keeping us all inindated with details of these matters for far longer than ever before.

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Yer pal,
Satan

[realm505]

Cristi,

I agree with you for one thing.
No amount of gun control will ever stop these things. hell, no legislation that the goverment proposes will stop these things. people will always kill. but what can people do?

But why place the blame on "decided Baptists?" how does someon's faith decide what another person does in anger?

sure, he was anti-baptist; but just because someone doesn't agree with someon else's faith. That dosen't give someone a good reason to shoot up someone else. I believe that everyone is responsible for their own actions.

[Sam Stone]

When freak events like this happen (and the miracle is that there are so FEW of them, given the societal tension in the U.S. and the number of people there), it's essentially randomness. Noise. It has no cause and effect. If you limit guns, maybe some nutbar will go off his gourd because he's mad about not being able to buy one. If you make them all available, maybe some nutbar will grab one on a whim and shoot up the joint. There are always going to be random events, live with it. And whatever you do, don't pass laws to stop it. There is an old saying that exceptional cases make for bad laws. This is an extreme example of that.

[Persephone]

realm505:

Please forgive the bad grammar in my post--I did not intend for it to come off sounding the way you took it.

What I meant was this: he was nuts, and he decided that Baptists were the cause of his problems, and started shooting them.

I have no clue as to why he chose Baptists. I have no idea why anyone, anywhere, anytime, does things like this man did. It was a nasty, horrible thing to do.

Also heard this evening that he purchased his gun quite legally, at a trade show, in 1992.

[Sealemon88]

Hey there...

Ya know, when I was growing up there was always at least one gun available in my house, be it a rifle, a 357., or a shotgun.

I was a loner growing up, with no social skills and deadly shyness.

I was messed with a lot, and held in my rage year after year all through middle and high school.


But it never occured to me to actually go to school or church or some random building and start shooting people.

I don't understand it, and I don't really know why it's coming in waves. Millinium fever? Copy cat Columbiners? Ignorant racists?

Honestly, this is one thing I don't understand. All I can do is grieve for the lost, and hope my family, friends or I don't become the next statistic.

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You say "cheesy" like that's a BAD thing.

[AuraSeer]

Because he's in a lot of action movies, and action movies usually involve guns.

What...? Oh, sorry. I though this thread was asking about Van Damme shootings.

[ChrisCTP]

Wow. I get to be the first to correct the misspelling of the word "damn."

I'm a spelling nut. So shoot me.

Wait... I didn't mean that ... the way it sounded...

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Veni, Vidi, Visa ... I came, I saw, I bought.

Even more chilling was (as I heard on the news)that he had three more magazines for the gun he used. Also, from what was said about his relationship with his father (deceased a couple of months ago, and the shooter's sole means of support), I have an idea that the father probably 'hit him over the head' constantly with religious diatribes and this was the guy's way of exacting final retribution.

[smilingjaws]

I read in the paper this am that the shooter had written a letter to the paper saying he was being persecuted by the FBI because they believed he was a serial killer. Sounds like a clear case of severe mental illness to me. I wonder if the newpaper reported it to the FBI. I am totally convinced that some (some not all) of these killings would not happen if people would take action to get mentally ill people help, if treatment for mental illness was a priority in this country instead of being ignored and underfunded and if we could develop some humane committment laws to get dangerous people out of society. I think it would help, too, if some of the effective drugs were administerd via implants so that if ill people were released, there would be some assurance that they would take their medication and thus stay reasonably sane. I also think we need to fund research into mental illness--especially the very serious mental illnesses like schitzophrenia--so that the underlying causes of the disease can be understood and so that effective treatment methods are developed.
I appreciate the chance to vent. Everyone of these shootings scares the hell out of me. Ever since San Ysidro(sp?) when the guy shot up the McDonalds I worry about this kind of thing happening. Sometimes I think it would be advisable for me to buy a small pistol and learn how to shoot just because I think there are so many angry, ill, sick people out there plus all the criminals.

[pldennison]

smilingjaws, the proportion of mentally ill people who pose a threat to anyone it all is extremely low. There are a number of posters to this very MB who have been diagnosed as schizophrenic. The idea that all the "crazy" people are dangerous, or vice versa, is easily disproveable.

Furthermore, it is not up to you or me or anyone else to force anyone to take medication that they don't want to take.

[smilingjaws]

Mr. Dennison,
I know the number of mentally ill people who are a threat is low. I'm not stupid. But, there is a real need for supervised care for a certain number of diagnosed mentally ill people who are a threat to society. Every state in this nation has been dumping people out of mental institutions and cutting funding for them in the last decade. People are begging for help and not getting it--there is no safety net for the mentally ill or their families. We need to take mental illness seriously--and admit that some people need institutionalization for more than the 6 weeks funded by health care plans. The vast majority of people with mental illness don't need to be institutionalized--that goes without saying. But there are some who need to be put in places where they are safe, get treatment and where society can be protected. We need more research on how to identify those who need this type of treatment so we don't unnecessarily confine people.
The current program where people with mental illness are pretty much thrown on the street or left to family (many of whom are desperate for some sort of help) is failing not only society but the individual.

[Sam Stone]

Guys... 3, 5, or 10 shootings in a year makes for a VERY low risk to the average person - not worth worrying about. If 100 people are killed by mass murderers every year, your risk of being injured or killed by a lightning strike is about 5 times higher.

The mass media feeds on these stories *because they are so rare. In California 7 people were killed in a shooting last year, while 5000 died in auto accidents.

It's simply not a big problem for society at large, and I'm sick of the media turning it into one so that they can boost ratings.

[zoony]

3, 5, or 10 shootings in a year makes for a VERY low risk to the average person - not worth worrying about. ... It's simply not a big problem for society at large

Well, that's a spectacular fucking attitude! Why don't we treat all of society's problems the same way. Seems to me getting murdered has pretty low per-capita odds, let's not worry about that either. Hell, why's it even illegal?

Even with population factored into it, the United States has an awfully large number of these "rare" shootings every year. Granted, the media does make ya wanna hurl with their coverage - anything for ratings.

I have no idea nor any answers as to why these things happen with the frequency they seem to in the U.S., but I'm damn glad I don't live there.

Z

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"Always forgive your enemies, but never forget their names."
- John F. Kennedy

Re: violence in the US.

Reference texts: Asbury's " Gem of The Praires", "Barbary Coast", "The French Quarter", et. al.

As the aboves histories of crime in American cities bear out, America has always had more than it's share of violence. Gang crime , armed robberies, common domestic murders of husband & wife, serial killers. We have more of them across the board. A free society is a chaotic society, & a free & heavily armed society.....well....

Prohibiting firearms has been discussed before, in the 1920's & 30's.

I dunno. There doesn't seem to be one good answer. But the need to improve our mental health system is real enough.

Geneticallly inherited defects caused by illegal drug use & resulting in mental illnesses in the children of drug users? Maybe, but I'm blowing smoke, here.

Other environmental factors? Maybe.
Mental illness is on the rise. Nobody is talking about it. An election is coming up, so if you SD loyalists get a chance, see if you can get a candidate to publically pledge to look into our national mental health crisis.

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We have met the enemy, and He is Us.--Walt Kelly

[smilingjaws]

my alma mater was one of the schools where the shootings happened. It's not random or isolated to me.

[Sam Stone]

You know, the idea that everything bad that happens in a free society is a 'problem' that has to be 'treated' is exactly what leads to less freedom and ultimately, less security. It used to be perfectly acceptable to say, "Wow, that's horrible. I really feel for the people that were hurt" without having to propose a government program or radical change to society along the way.

For the record, it's very sad that people are killed sometimes by psychopaths, and I do feel horribly sorry for the victims and their families. That doesn't change the fact that these occurances are so infrequent that they just aren't a significant societal problem, nor are they indicative of any serious faults in society as a whole.

Before we had zillions of cable channels and agressive news reporting this stuff still happened, but you just didn't hear about it. I remember around 1980 in Saskatchewan a guy killed his whole family (5 people), killed two police officers that responded to the emergency calls his wife sent in, then vanished into the woods. I remember it well because it was the farmhouse down the road from us and we spent a worried night locked up with my Grandfather keeping the guns near. But it barely made the news, and only started getting significant coverage as months went on and kicked off a very large protracted manhunt. Today, it'd be all over the news and everyone would know about it.

[Markxxx]

Here is one theory (OK not GOOD one but...) There aren't as many wars now a days. Think about it 30 years ago you felt like killing you went to Vietnam. Before that Korea, WWII, the Spanish Civil War, WWI, and there was always the French Foreign Legion that was taking somebody on.

The real problem is not violence but the level it reaches. When I was a kid the worst you would get was beat up. Someone called you a name you got in a fight and when it was over who ever won knew his place. Who ever lost knew his place. A black eye, bloody nose, maybe a chipped tooth and it was over. Now a days the loser kids runs to KMart buys a gun and suddenly he's equal to the kid who beat him up.

And the biggest reason is kids and their parents are pushing this "Everyone's a winner self esteem crap." People simply don't know how to deal with losing. Children aren't being taught OTHER PEOPLE COUNT. No matter how much self esteem you have, OTHER PEOPLE'S feelings matter too.

Without no sense of this you have a lost cause.

[pldennison]

zoony, I'm sure you'd much rather live in a nice, stable region like Mexico, or Israel, or Belfast, right? Maybe you'd like to put up with that stuff?

[zoony]

pldennison wrote:zoony, I'm sure you'd much rather live in a nice, stable region like Mexico, or Israel, or Belfast, right? Maybe you'd like to put up with that stuff?

Quite frankly, I would. The idea of that level of violence is apalling, but the redeeming quality of sectarian violence is that it tends to be less random. As a member of a terrorist organization, I would be a little more prepared to be killed than if I were simply praying in church, attending high school or picking up my children from daycare!

If, from the evident facetious use of 'stable' you mean to imply that the relative stability of the US is superior to that of the nations you cite, then I'd say you missed the bus on that one, too. While the US may be politically more stable than Northern Ireland or Israel, the obvious lack of mental stability of an alarming number of the citizenry, coupled with an all-but-unfettered access to weaponry hardly add up to form the cornerstone of societal cohesion.

The fact that these shootings occur with tragic frequency is ultimately secondary to the rampant societal ills from which the US suffers. And that is the stuff with which I could not put up.

Z

[pldennison]

Quite frankly, I would. The idea of that level of violence is apalling, but the redeeming quality of sectarian violence is that it tends to be less random. As a member of a terrorist organization, I would be a little more prepared to be killed than if I were simply praying in church, attending high school or picking up my children from daycare!

Actually, those are exactly the kind of people who often die in those kinds of violence. Or do you think those Israeli school buses are full of blue-bereted soldiers?

If, from the evident facetious use of 'stable' you mean to imply that the relative stability of the US is superior to that of the nations you cite, then I'd say you missed the bus on that one, too. While the US may be politically more stable than Northern Ireland or Israel, the obvious lack of mental stability of an alarming number of the citizenry,

I hope your next post provides a cite concerning the "obvious lack of mental stability of an alarming number of the citizenry," with some concrete numbers, or I will have to assume you are simply opining here based on what you see on the news. I didn't see anyone get shot today on my way to work. Did you? Could you live in Jerusalem and say that?

The fact that these shootings occur with tragic frequency

I bet that pound for pound they actually happen less frequently than earthquakes or floods. You just hear about them more than you used to.

[zoony]

Whether or not I'm opining based on the media coverage afforded the 'rare' shootings in the US is irrelevant (although I see pldennison is allowed to 'bet' on the 'pound for pound' frequency of shootings vs. natural disasters). Certainly Mexico or Northern Ireland or Israel may be less politically stable, but the US is not currently engaged in the types of internal sectarian violence witnessed in those countries.

The fact that Israel and N.Ireland are home to armed militias with real or perceived grievances against other nationalities is miles removed - literally and figuratively - from the violence occurring in the US. Those two dipshits in Colorado were neither bombing for the IRA nor engaged in jihad against the infidels at Columbine High. Ditto the guy in LA shooting up a daycare or the postal employees who've licked one too many stamps.

In a society which professes some measure of law and order, these types of random and all-too-frequent tragedies are harder to accept.

If you want some proof as to the mind-set of a certain segment of the American population, wander over to the Gun Control thread in Great Debates and check out the lucent arguments of the supporters of a clause in the constitution born out of the circumstances of a two-hundred year-old war. And these people represent the better-educated segment of society. I shudder to think of the thought processes of some of the less cogitatively competent members of the NRA.

Two things:
1. Comparing deaths from shootings to deaths occuring via natural disasters is just about the most ridiculous and facile argument I've ever heard. That's like saying the only reason you hear abot the Holocaust is because of the media. After all, the Black Death killed more people - pound for pound.

2. I am 'opining' based upon a combination of media exposure, a seven-year residency in the US where no fewer than 11 of my high school classmates were shot during a three-year span (I know, I know - pound for pound, that's probably pretty light), and the fact that I've never seen anyone killed on the way to work in Canada, which except for permissive access to weaponry is probably the most culturally similar nation to the US in the world.

"Guns don't kill people, people kill people."
If the catch-phrase of the NRA is right, then I guess they would agree with me too.


Z

[Mr.Zambezi]

Zoony, you are using anecdotal evidence. I could point out that I have lived in the US a lot longer than you and have not known one person who was injured by a firearm.

But that aside, the stats on death for 1996 in the US are:

Annual Totals Firearms & Murder 17,000
Suicide 32,000
Auto Accidents 42,000
AIDS 42,000
Other Accidents 48,000
Pneumonia/Flu 82,000
Cancer 537,000
Heart Disease 734,000
Abortion 1,529,000
Statistics from National Center for Health Statistics, U.S. Dept. of Health & Human Services, published in World Almanac 1996

If you want to save the US from itself, I strongly suggest that you lobby to make fatty food illegal. I would also suggest making unprotected sex a felony.

Smoking should be considered attempted suicide, and suicide....well there are almost twice as many people who want to off themselves as there are people who want to off others.

And for all of those homicidal bastards that have flu vaccine and wont give it out freely, well, I say we hang 'em.

100 people killed in mass shootings out of a population of 250,000,000 is not statistically significant.

There was one shooting in Canada this year. I think there were about 8 in the US. Weighing for population, the rate of school shootings in Canada is .33 HIGHER than it is in the US.

But as I said, with numbers this small, statistics are insignificant.

Better to watch where you are driving than to watch what your neighbor is doing.

[zoony]

Mr.Z,

Well, duh I'm using anecdotal evidence. Can't form an opinion based on your life, can I?

In all seriousness though, anecdotal evidence is about as useless as statistical evidence. The OP's question was why are there "so many" shootings, not why are there so many car accidents or why are there so many abortions.

Cancer, abortion, heart disease, car accidents (Christ I'm tired of the comparisons to the evils of motor vehicles) are all problems shared by the entire industrialized world. The gun related violence in the US is not.

Quite honestly, I have neither the interest nor the desire to save the US from itself. Now that I'm told that the gun violence problem is statistically insignifcant, I guess there is no problem.

I'd like to see you explain the statistical insignificance of the dead to their families.

Z

[Sam Stone]

I never said that GUN VIOLENCE was statistically insignificant, I said that mass murders were. This is a difference between tens of thousands of incidents and less than a dozen.

[Mr.Zambezi]

the problem with fixing the school shooting "epidemic" is that the various solutions pose wide ranging changes that sometimes infringe on the rights of people in order to eliminate something very small.

For example, the fall of the Berlin wall may have been a good thing in general, but not if it fell on your foot.

Private gun ownership may be a good thing, but not if you are the one who gets shot. The same for the lack of school uniforms, the internet, violent movies, Doom, etc.

I know a little girl that was blinded because of a reaction with Ibuprofin. That does not mean we should take the drug off the shelves.

The problem is that everyone wants to make the argument "if it saves just one life, it is worth it." This is an insane basis for making any decision.

After all, If anyone doesn't like things here, they can go to the parallel but less dangerous universe of Canada ;-)

[zoony]

The problem is that everyone wants to make the argument "if it saves just one life, it is worth it." This is an insane basis for making any decision.

I think 'insane' is a little strong, but granted, the overall good needs to be addressed before the individual.

And again, Ibuprofen was not designed with the intent of causing harm, thus reactions and side-effects are unfortunate. But how do we deal with these problems? We enact legislation to test products and ensure that every effort has been taken to minimize harmful effects for the bulk of the population.

While I know you'll insist that guns are kept by the law-abiding citizenry for self-defence in strict adherence to the highest standards of nobility and reason, the fact remains that guns have one function: puttin' holes in whatever you point 'em at.

Leastaways, that's how it appears from the confines of my parallel universe. However, given the recent election of socialists in my home province, I'm considering my options in crossing the dimensional plane. The only thing worse than random acts of violence are the clueless acts of far left.

::: trying on my shoulder holster :::

Z

[pldennison]

Whether or not I'm opining based on the media coverage afforded the 'rare' shootings in the US is irrelevant

But it isn't irrelevant. Not at all. The news isn't going to report things that don't happen, after all. Do you expect to turn on the news and hear them say, "Today, 15 million U.S. schoolchildren attended classes without any of them being shot?" If they did say that, and were able to say it for 360 days out of 365, would you still think there was a big problem?

Those two dipshits in Colorado were neither bombing for the IRA nor engaged in jihad against the infidels at Columbine High. Ditto the guy in LA shooting up a daycare or the postal employees who've licked one too many stamps.

You sure about the LA guy? He was looking to kill some Jews, IIRC.

In a society which professes some measure of law and order, these types of random and all-too-frequent tragedies are harder to accept.

More days go by when they don't occur then when they do. I think you are missing that. How frequent is "all-too-frequent"? Once a year? Twice? Five times? How safe do you want to make it? Crime is on a downturn, you know, and has been for many years.

If you want some proof as to the mind-set of a certain segment of the American population, wander over to the Gun Control thread in Great Debates and check out the lucent arguments of the supporters of a clause in the constitution born out of the circumstances of a two-hundred year-old war.

Which Amendment? The First? Or the Third? Most of the Constitution was born of those circumstances; the framers may have been visionaries, but they weren't psychic. Are there some loons among the gun crowd? Sure there are. There are some loons in any crowd. That doesn't mean that anyone who opposes a total ban on guns is a loon. And it doesn't mean that anyone who supports nothing less than a total ban is reasonable.

1. Comparing deaths from shootings to deaths occuring via natural disasters is just about the most ridiculous and facile argument I've ever heard.

No, see, the same folks who think we need a new law every time a shooting takes place are often the same folks who want to make preposterously restrictive building codes after natural disasters.

2. I am 'opining' based upon a combination of media exposure, a seven-year residency in the US where no fewer than 11 of my high school classmates were shot during a three-year span

But, see, I've lived in the U.S. all but 3 years of my 30 on Earth, and I don't know anyone who's ever been shot. So, I mean, who's got better evidence? Where did you live? Did your classmates hang out with people who are likely to commit crimes, or in places where crime was likely to be occurring?

and the fact that I've never seen anyone killed on the way to work in Canada, which except for permissive access to weaponry is probably the most culturally similar nation to the US in the world.

Well, so? I never have either. OTOH, someone in my bulding was killed with a baseball bat recently. What does that prove?

I'd like to see you explain the statistical insignificance of the dead to their families.

While I'm sorry for their loss, appeal to emotions rarely makes for a cogent argument, and usually makes for bad laws.

[Mr.Zambezi]

Zoony, THis is not the place for an argument on guns.

Besides, it is not just the 2nd that folks want to shred. Try free speech and freedom from illegal search and seizure.

My point is that if a few incidents occur the proper response is not to start dismantling our rights. The proper response is to weigh the objective data and figure if it can be stopeed while maintaining the rights of the people.

The Chicken little approach makes for a great story, but a crappy government.

[threemae]

What pisses me off is that when two bank robbers fail to kill anyone with automatic weapons but are able to withstand multiple hits from police, the media clamors for police to get bigger guns based on an isolated incident in which the robbers ended up anyway while hundreds of thousands die of cardiac arrest every year and the police are not even required to get BLS certification from somebody reputable like the ARC or AHA, no a 2 hour class on a Saturday afternoon just dose not cut it. The police are usually able to react faster than any emergency personnel but when I asked my former "DARE" officer what steps her police force was using to get BLS and ALS along with responding officers, she could only respond that she had a rescue breathing face mask in her car and a reasonably good idea as to how to find the landmarks for open-chest massage but no real idea as to the decision tree to go through in a cardiac or respiratory arrest. Getting AEDs into police cars would save more lives than giving the police 10 cm mortars but I suppose it just is not as exciting.

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There is no safety for honest men but by believing all possible evil of evil men.

--Edmund Burke

[zoony]

pldennison,

If we're going to discuss the relative merit of argumentative styles, let's examine some of yours.

If you're going to bring in the fact that you've haven't seen anyone killed on the way to work, or known anyone who'd been shot, then dismiss the instances cited from my personal experience, then let's just dispense with the irrelvancies. The fact that neither of us has ever witnessed anyone get gunned-down is not the issue.

I'll dispense with the sweeping generalizations if you will. While I made reference to the mindset of the SDMB supporters of the 2nd Amendment, I make no connection between their beliefs in this arena and their views on abortion, euthanasia or restrictive building codes. Assuming that the advocate of one type of reform is a blanket revolutionary right across the board is facile.

You sure about the LA guy? He was looking to kill some Jews, IIRC.

That is precisely the problem - somehow we find this kind of violence easier to accept if the wacko in question has some sort of half-assed rationale for his action. "Ohh, he didn't like Jews...Good thing I'm not Jewish." I'm not saying we need to jump off the deep end and become a police state, but hell, if our only response is the 'glad it wasn't my kind' one, then things will only get worse.

Mr. Z,

I'm trying to steer clear of the gun control debate, and I don't disagree with your assessment of the proper response. But if you're going to bring up the homicidal effects of nictoine, motor vehicles and over-the-counter medicine - which have no relevance here - then I'll rejoin with a similarly veined response.

Z

[matt_mcl]

There was one shooting in Canada this year. I think there were about 8 in the US. Weighing for population, the rate of school shootings in Canada is .33 HIGHER than it is in the US.

I presume you're being facetious. What you mean is that there were 8 FAMOUS shootings in the United States. I'm pleased to report that in general our urban centres don't suffer from the sort of endemic warfare which seems to plague those in the United States.

"Among those ages 15 to 24, the U.S. firearm homicide rate is 5 times higher than in neighboring Canada....A teenager in the United States today is more likely to die of a gunshot wound than from all the 'natural' causes of death combined." (from http://www.ojjdp.ncjrs.org/pubs/gun_violence/sect01.html

According to the US Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics (http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/homicide/hmrt.htm), the US homicide rate in 1997 was 6,8 per 100 000 population. The rate in Canada in that year, according to Statistics Canada (http://www.statcan.ca/english/Pgdb/State/Justice/legal12b.htm), was 1,92 per 100 000 population.

The US, therefore, has an overall per-capita homicide rate nearly 4 times larger than that of Canada. As mentioned, youth firearm violence specifically is 5 times greater in the US than in Canada.

And yet, we in Canada are exposed to the same movies, music, and video games that you in the United States are! So much for that argument.

[Sam Stone]

Canada has very low levels of gang violence, which make up a pretty high percentage of shootings in the U.S.

Here in Edmonton we have some rival Asian gangs acting up, and our murder rate has increased because of it. We've also had a bunch of drive-by shootings, and one spectacular shootout where two cars sped down a busy street while thugs hung out the window and shot at each other.

[pldennison]

That is precisely the problem - somehow we find this kind of violence easier to accept
if the wacko in question has some sort of half-assed rationale for his action. "Ohh, he
didn't like Jews...Good thing I'm not Jewish." I'm not saying we need to jump off the
deep end and become a police state, but hell, if our only response is the 'glad it wasn't
my kind' one, then things will only get worse.

I'm not saying that it makes it easier to accept, simply that it was not random; he had particular targets in mind, unlike the kids at Columbine (who may or may not have).

But it seems to be you want to play both sides of the field here. When I asked if you'd rather live in Belfast or Jerusalem, you said you would, specifically because you are unlikely to be in a targeted group. If you're going to use it as a criterion, you have to accept that the person who shot up the Jewish day care center may be the result/harbinger of a different phenomenon than a guy who shoots up a McDonald's, and not just "another damm[sic] shooting."

[Byzantine]

Okay, I got into this because of a personal beef with Realm505. That is now a dead issue. But as for gun violence not being of interest to me because I have not personally seen someone gunned down or somehow it doesn't relate to me because the statistics are so low.... let me share. Skip this if you don't want to know my side of the story.

My neighborhood is called Rose Park. Doesn't that sound nice? It isn't. For a few years we were on the news every night because of drive-bys. Eventually, the shootings were so numerous that they no longer made the local news, let alone the national news. It was "just the way it was". Oh, and we did have one house-by (don't ask. The man was an idiot and figured, "They'll never find the house.") but it is personal and immediate to me because it's so close.

When I first moved in, my sister lived with me, and we would be talking, watching the tube and hear "pops". At first we thought "firecrackers" because we both grew up in the suburbs in Arvada. But then we got more "pops" and then screaming.

Just up the street from us folks were shooting it out over women, drugs, cars, territory. All kinds of stupid (to us) shit. We were horrified. At this point I was deeply in debt in order to get into this house and getting out wasn't even in the scope of what I could have done. I decided to stick around and change things.

Then, my sister joined the Navy and I was on my own. It got so bad with the break-ins to cars (and fights with a really interestingly psychotic neighbor) that I parked my car in back. Guess what? About two months down the road some gang-bangers lead by a "sweet little old mom type" move in next door and start to park their gang-bang mobiles in front of my home. Why? Because, they knew if they parked them in front of their house, they'd get hit. So they parked them in front of anyone's house but their own to avoid getting shot at. Bully for them but it left me and other neighbors a target. What to do?

Got in touch with the Gang unit here. Just by calling, fighting against them, I became a target. I spent most of my time in the back rooms because if they shot at the house they wouldn't hit me. Christ! I'm not talking about taking guns away from my neighbor (friend, ex-lover) who likes to hunt but these were 13 year old kids that didn't care about anything. They had automatic weapons that could have dumped 100's of bullets into me, my home, my dog, in a heartbeat. They are sociopaths that don't care about themselves, let alone me.

I don't know if you've ever been threatened by a kid half your size and age and felt fear turn your legs to jello because he drew a weapon. There is nothing in this world more frightening then being faced with someone who will blow you away in an instant, without so much as a brief flicker of thought, just because you asked them to turn down the stereo. You don't know what that is like unless you've been there. It's terrifying. Most people can't intimidate me with their size but a gun? Yeah, I'm intimidated. I was lucky enough to be able to back away to my home. I called the cops. They got busted. They came back to get back at me. Luckily, the cops were waiting for them.

Okay, this is long but my point is: no thirteen year old (or anyone under twenty-one) should be able to own a weapon. And no one, not even police officers, should own a weapon with automatic fire capabilities. The only thing a weapon like that is good for is killing a lot of people, really fast.

Sure, I could have got a gun of my own but I would have been faced with killing someone. I would hesitate. That's all it would take. I prefer to run, hide or take them down without killing them.

I didn't read this really closely but I can't imagine anyone here advocating the ownership of automatic weapons. If you do, I'd sure as hell like to know why.

[tracer]

matt_mcl wrote:

...A teenager in the United States today is more likely to die of a gunshot wound than from all the 'natural' causes of death combined."

This may be true, but it's a tad misleading. Automobile accidents, getting stabbed, getting strangled, etc., do not count as "natural" causes of death either. And death by automobile is a lot more prevalent in every age category than death by gunshot is.

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Visit the Internet Stellar Database at www.stellar-database.com (http://www.stellar-database.com)

[zoony]

I'm sorry, but in the US, it most certainly is a random act to wander into a daycare to shoot up pre-schoolers. In Israel, Arab/Jew hate crimes occur on a much more frequent basis, and enjoy a 'historical tradition' according to the perpetrators of these acts. By your rationale, I could walk into the nearest American Embassy, waste a few dozen Joe Schmoe Civil Servants, claim my victory in the name of Allah; and your stance would be that this did not meet the criteria for a random act? Maybe not in Iran, but in North America, I think it would. Certainly so in Canada.

That type of sectarian violence simply is not the issue in North America the way it is in the Middle East or Northern Ireland. The important thing to examine in these acts of violence is not the "rationale" of the perpetrator, but the circumstances surrounding his ability to commit said act.

Byz,

Chilling. I can't imagine the kind of fear you must live under, but I can imagine the response you're going to get over the auto-weapon bit.

Z

[elelle]

Two obvious questions for me :
Why don't women commit this type of atrocity ?
And why don't we see young black men in schools doing this type of thing ? If any group had built up frustrations... Perhaps the aforementioned war analogy fits that. Gang warfare is filling that need.
The profile of these killers is of alienated white men. All the statistics seem to say that this isn't an "epidemic", so perhaps we should then view it as a warning.
Steps to take to prevent this might include teaching young men to handle their impulses (not just medicating them away, as is all too common now ) as well as compassion for others. Of course,this may well put a damper on gung-ho soldiers and monomaniacal corporate assholes, but ya can't have everything...

[Byzantine]

elelle– interesting post. I did not check your stats but I'm fairly certain you are female.

I'll bet you are aware of this fact but I wonder if others reading this thread are: Most mass killers and serial killers are white males between the ages of 19-54. Few are women. Few are men (or women) of color (for lack of a better term).

White males seem to like to kill.

Oddly, no one has gotten into the automatic weapons debate on this thread: I wonder why?

[ExTank]

At first I thought this was a rant against Arnie Van Damm and his stupid movies....

I really get a bug in my ear when someone in another country starts slamming our Constitution and Bill of Rights, but if anyone has some reason/right to say anything, it would be our neighbors and cousins to the north, who have so much in common with us here in America.

I'm not going to enter into another debate, just restate my opinion.

While a credible argument might be made that firearms are too readily available without more stringent safeguards, guns and gun availability alone doesn't adequately explain the outbreak of mass-shooting violence.

Take Japan, England, Canada and Australia: very stringent gun-control laws, strict availability of firearms, very little violent crime, almost no incidents of mass-shootings.

Or Switzerland and Israel: almost no gun-control, easy access to military-grade hardware, and next to no violent street crime, and no incidients of mass-shootings (not counting terorism in Israel; the Israelis classify terrorism separate from crime).

Or Ireland and Mexico: Very stringent gun-control, easy access to firearms through a thriving black market, and serious crime and terrorist activity.

To simply put the blame solely on the availability of firearms without also considering other social issues is nothing more than a paean to populist reactionary politics and simplistic solutions to complex issues, and another attempt to encroach upon the civil liberties this country (not just a few select demographic groups) hold dear.

Our Constitution and Bill of Rights (and not just the Second Amendment) are the closest thing I have to a religion; I look with a jaundiced eye at anyone who approaches those documents with white-out or a paper-shredder, with arguments like "it's outdated", "it's an anachronism", or "it was written 200 years ago by ignorant people".

The framers of those documents were a lot more intelligent, roundly educated and wiser than many contemporary politicians, legislators and liberal scholars give them credit for. To my way of thinking, it smacks of intellectual snobbery or elitism.

Some solutions that I see as being common-sensical:

1) More thorough background checks on prospective gun buyers. The ATF Form 4437 asks: "have you ever been judged mentally incompetent". Many people can truthfully answer "No" to that question while being under psychiatric care or medicated for a mental problem, and pass the background check. Even though I don't believe waiting periods have done a damned thing to deter crime, and this seems to be confirmed by some initial findings by law enforcement and social scholars, a waiting period could be used to perform the more rigorous background checks.

I see no reason why a law-abiding citizen should mind waiting a few days for a background check to be completed.

2) More widespread and vigorous application of Project Exile, which specifically targets for investigation and prosecution those who abuse gun laws, or who misuse firearms in the commission of a crime. Like the fellow that purchased the handgun for Harris and Kliebold, know as a "strawman" purchaser. Target these people, they are the criminals.

3) Firearms pre-emption laws. These laws will make gun-control more uniform throughout the country, and help investigators and law-enforcement track firearms used in crimes, and therefore aid in the apprehension and prosecution of people that abuse and/or break gun-control laws.

4) Performance-based firearms restrictions (as opposed to appearance-based restrictions). These laws will help to remove the weapons that are (f)actually more lethal/dangerous, as opposed to those that merely look cool.

5) A ruling by the Supreme Court to the effect that the Fourteenth Amendment applies to all ten amendments of the Bill of Rights, and the rigorous application of that ruling by the courts of the various levels of the Judiciary.

6) A concentrated effort on the part of pro-gun groups, gun-manufacturers and importers, gun dealers, the media and our politicians to reinforce the notion that with Rights comes Responsiblity; that every gun-owner or prospective gun-owner should take every available opportunity to get themselves educated about gun-safety and owner's responsibilities.

I ardently oppose:

1) National or State gun registration. This has been used too often in other countries as a precursor to all-out gun-bans, and would allow gun-banners to bypass the Fourth, Fifth and possibly the Sixth Amendments.

Executive "Regulations" are already infringing dangerously on the civil liberties of Americans and come very close to pre-empting Congress' Legislative powers and violating the Seperation of Powers Doctrine (in my opinion, that line has not only been crossed, but verily obliterated).

2) National or State Licensing. Licenses may be withheld, structured too rigorously, made prohibitively expensive, or outright revoked. A license implies that a privelege is being granted to an individual at the largesse of the State. It further implies that the privelege may be revoked, not just for criminal misuse of that privelege, but also by the whim of political and/or social pressures. The Bill of Rights doesn't grant anybody anything; it enumerates and protects against infringement from the Federal Government the inherent rights of American Citizens; and through the Fourteenth Amendment, it also protects the Bill of Rights from the States.

Besides, the Bill of Rights applies to all Citizens, natural or naturalized; not just those who can afford it, or the select few who have the political connections due to professional status or income levels to obtain "waivers" from their political patrons or judicial golf buddies.

I feel that the adoption of some of these methods will help to alleviate the criminal misuse of firearms while at the same time working to protect the rights of law abiding citizens.

It's a balancing act, and a difficult one at best.

But if we Americans want to try to protect everyone's rights while simultaneously trying to safeguard our society from both violence and over-eager politicians trying to show their constituents that they are "Doing Something", then it's a tightrope that we'd better get some practice at walking.

Or one day we're going to wake up and realize we're quite a bit less free than we think.

<FONT COLOR="GREEN">ExTank</FONT>
<FONT COLOR="BLUE">"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel."</Font>
Patrick Henry

[Earl Snake-Hips Tucker]

Murder is overwhelmingly a black-on-black crime.

Serial killers, while attracting headlines, are statistically insignificant.

[Sam Stone]

Extank: Canada's rate of mass shootings is higher than the U.S.'s on a per-capita basis. Has anyone forgotten Marc Lepine and the University of Montreal?

[Momotaro]

Small samples make poor statistics. It's like someone seeing a car crash one day and assuming he must see a car crash a day. Any reasonable sampling will show that Canada has a low rate of gun-related crimes compared with the U.S.

The death of one individual is a tragedy, the death of a thousand is a statistic. Is that why Canada has imposed severe gun control laws after the Lepine incident and the U.S. didn't after so many gun-related tragedies?


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Only humans commit inhuman acts.

[Sam Stone]

"Small samples make for lousy statistics"

Great point. Let's repeat it 100 times, and think again about drawing conclusions based on 3 or 4 mass shootings in a country with a population of 300 million people.