The evidence to support the position you would prefer to hold is, well, what? :rolleyes: It’s just ridiculous to claim otherwise. Yet you, oddly, insist.
If you have something to offer on this topic other than denial and derision, please begin. Or you can continue to stamp yourself merely as part of the problem that must be overcome.
Old enough to be a target for a nut shooting, maiming, and killing your peers? Old enough to have an opinion on the state of the world that leads to such possibilities.
And saying they’re too young and naive to have useful opinions? Just a way of avoiding the painful fact that they’re all real people with real lives in real danger, not abstractions or statistics.
When I was in 10th grade there was a strike related to issues at the public universities, which eventually the public high schools band-wagonned onto.
One day as my class was leaving the local private HS, a group of students from the public HS were coming up the boulevard, completely closing it to any traffic and chanting a mixture of slogans supporting the university teachers with others insulting our school and yet others that were directly imbecilic. One such slogan said that if you agreed with them you’d bounce.
One of my classmates was the first to sit down. Me second. An old man sunning himself on a bench asked “why are you sitting down, and what are they about?” We explained. The old man said “if I sit down there I’ll need help back up, will you help me?” Of course, we said. And the old men from the benches and the students from our school and the neighbors from the businesses and homes all sat down, and before we’d finished sitting down the people chanting decided to bring their music to more receptive audiences.
I don’t think we were too young, or the old men on the benches too old, but maybe we were. Whichever the case, anybody who thinks we couldn’t decide by ourselves whether to bounce or sit down is welcome to kiss my backside - while it’s on the ground.
Let’s review. Your claim was this:
I certainly wouldn’t dispute the bit about them being eligible to vote, but then you said “they’re pissed”. The “they” there is either “Most current high school seniors” and / or an unqualified “Juniors and sophomores”. Reasonable evidence to support this claim might be something like a poll showing they are more agitated / angry / “pissed” as a group than they have been in the past. I’d even accept something like a poll showing they’re more enthusiastic about voting than in previous years, or that they’re planning on voting more D than they have in the past because of gun control.
“It’s just ridiculous” is not evidence.
IOW, just denial and derision, as already discussed. You needn’t have bothered, really.
You have simply confirmed that you’re part of the problem, and can expect to be treated as such.
Is asking for a cite now considered “denial and derision” around here?
If that’s all you needed to know, then you either didn’t read the rest of my statement or were whooshed by the deep sarcasm in it. There is no “guessing” about how someone feels who’s just watched their friends and teachers shot to death while dodging a hail of bullets themselves in yet another American gun nightmare that replays itself over and over again.
His claim was based on either “Most current high school seniors” or (a generic and unqualified) “Juniors and sophomores”. What % of those groups do you think the statement “just watched their friends and teachers shot to death while dodging a hail of bullets themselves” applies to? .01%? .001%? Ok, let’s just grant your contention that every single one “who’s just watched their friends and teachers shot to death while dodging a hail of bullets themselves” is pissed, is fired up, and ready to vote the evil R’s out of office for good. How much does that move the needle on election night?
Your arguments seem to be high on emotion and short on facts.
Do you need a *cite *that life is good and murder is bad, or is that simply “emotional”? :dubious:
No, I think we both agree that life is good and murder is bad. We do not agree that “most high school seniors” are pissed.
If you want to think you’ve scored a point, go right ahead and think so. :rolleyes:
There’s still a good discussion, despite your strenuous derailing attempts, about what the survivors have to tell us and how worthwhile it is. You’re welcome to participate.
No, the fundamental thing that we don’t agree on is whether easy access to guns is more important than preventing children from getting killed, and thousands of other preventable deaths every single year, and what never ceases to amaze is that this belief persists no matter how many tragedies like this occur, over and over again.
I accept a great many things that lead to “preventable deaths” every single year. People are allowed to own their own swimming pools, even though I know that it’ll probably lead to some tragic, unintentional (and preventable if we were to ban swimming pools) deaths. People are allowed to drink alcohol and own private vehicles, even though we know that these will be combined in some cases with tragic consequences. We allow private aviation even though every year there will be some preventable fatal plane crashes that could have been prevented if we’d just ban the scourge of evil privately-owned aircraft and just leave it to the professionals to handle our air transportation needs. I suppose one could try to make the argument that we think privately-owned swimming pools are “more important” than the children that will drown in them every year. I don’t find it a very convincing argument, but if that’s what you’ve got, go with it.
This is the point at which your side normally complains “but guns are different”. Feel free to proceed.
Eh??? You want me to proceed as if there is some sort of “debate” going on here? Fine, I’ll proceed with the observation that every single country in the civilized world has all the things you mentioned – they have cars and, believe it or not, they have swimming pools. What they uniquely do NOT have is a plethora of guns. And what they also uniquely do NOT have is anywhere close to the degree of gun violence that the US does. They don’t seem to be missing anything, they’re just able to send their kids to school and go out in public themselves without fear of anybody getting shot.
That’s how guns are different. Cars are a transportation necessity, swimming pools are just an artificial lakeside that can substitute for a cottage and be good for the soul. Guns are great for shooting beer cans off fence posts or perhaps disintegrating the fence posts themselves, pretending that they’re enemy aliens. At best, guns function as protection against other guns in an endlessly escalating arms race.
Wouldn’t the low rate of gun violence in civilized countries be a worthy goal for the USA?
If you feel you can answer that, feel free to proceed.
Wow! Whadaya know I agree with Shodan. Start up the pork wing futures market.
Wait. All of those other things are already sufficiently regulated to the degree that they pose significant threats to innocent lives. Yes, guns are regulated too, but people want some more of that regulation in the case of guns because…
…we draw cognitive lines between accidental deaths (pool/aircraft) and recklessness (alcohol) and deliberate gun murders. Accidental deaths are inhibited to the degree that we can do without causing too much of a burden on people.
It’s the gun side that says “but guns are different” because of 2A.
But they’re old enough to enlist in the army and die for their country, right?
No, the consensus is that they are too young to consent to sex with an adult. Because of the power imbalance.
They can have sex with each other.
Do not personalize your arguments in this fashion. If you feel you must, the BBQ Pit is right around the corner.
I do note this is a frequent reminder that is necessary for you. If this continues, these notes will be escalated to more severe actions.
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