Another mass shooting in the U.S

Manic Moran

The other problem is that 'homicide' =/= murder. Though, granted, the vast majority of homicides are murders.

Piliger

robbie7730 wrote: »

The gun culture is likely an integral part of the amount of these massacres that happen, and in many school massacres its possibly entwined with relentless school bullying, hence the reason the perpetrators want to carry out the killings in person with guns.

Any idiot who looses his temper can reign death on anyone they chose within minutes in the US. An insane culture of gun worship, and gun fetishisation.

Perpetrators knowing they are going to kill themselves wont worry about such matters. Guns are not outlawed here, but the average person is not familiar with a gun here to the extent that its like an extension of their arm, and its the last thing on the average anger filled person`s mind here.

The average person here wouldn't even know how to load a gun or take the safety catch off. People here go crazy exactly like in the US, but they end up boxing a few people or slashing around with a knife. That's the limit, thank goodness.

I think that would all change if it was an automatic right of every civilian here to own a gun. Half our drivers would be shot in a few weeks with the anger on our roads.

In other words .... we'd be just like the States ..

So then, whats the difference between the US and other countries? Mere coincidence that the country with the highest gun ownership is probably the one with worst massacres?

Indeed ... hardly a coincidence.

Over here, someone annoys you badly, you want to give them a box. Over there, they just think, I`m going to get my gun and show them. Disgruntled ex employees and relentless school bullying victims, imo, are possibly big factors where a person bubbling away with anger, eventually decides they had enough, get the guns, and target their primary victims along with everyone around them.

And even then that leaves out the thousands of kids and adults killed in their own homes accidentally by guns in the US.

It is an insanity and no amount of half arse'd rationalisation will change that.

kincsem

tumblr_mf1r7zoWjg1qiwfcvo1_500.jpg

Suryavarman

EmptyTree wrote: »

Your graph refers to murder rates in the UK, which did peak in 2002 and is now in decline. Dr Harold Shipman is suspected of carrying out 172 murders alone in 2002: lots of things can skew the numbers.

http://http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9411649/Graphic-how-the-murder-rate-has-fallen.html#

I'm fairly sure Harald Shipman's murders aren't included in this graph. this graph includes Shipman's in 2003 and the number of homicide's are still up 30% by 2002. That graph gives total homicides as opposed to the rate so it doesn't account for changes in population.

I'd be genuinely interested to know where else this has been the case.

Convert me Suryavarman, I want to believe.

Ireland and Jamaica

Washington D.C.

markesmith wrote: »

The US needs to look at outlawing these automatic and semi-automatic weapons, assault rifles, and all that. Most of these guns have no place outside of a war zone or a zombie apocalypse.

The US outlawed "assault weapons" from 1994 to 2004. It didn't do anything. There's plenty of recreational reasons to own these weapons as well. Banning assault weapons is similar to banning cars that can break the speed limit.

Rascasse wrote: »

That's a poor graph to prove your point. For example, in 2000 58 Chinese immigrants found dead after suffocating in a shipping container. In 2001 and 2002 murder rates are skewed high because of Harold Shipman. It seems the murder rate is the detection of murders (not when they occurred) so there were a lump of his found in 2001 and and an even larger number (170+) found in 2002, hence the big spike. Your graph does not account for these anomalies

The graph also conveniently stops at 2002, whereas the murder rate has drop significantly in the UK since.
http://i.imgur.com/aL5cr.png


Edit: EmptyTree got there before me re Shipman

This graph accounts for anomalies in the rate yet it still shows a ~25% increase in the homicide rate. What is the explanation for the fall? If it's the handgun ban then why is there a 5 year lag?

kincsem wrote: »

I've noticed a fondness for USA guns ownership supporters to talk about "homicide" gun deaths.
There are many other deaths in that 220 million gun society. To date in 2012 the USA police have killed 525.

Manic Moran wrote: »

The other problem is that 'homicide' =/= murder. Though, granted, the vast majority of homicides are murders.

As far as I'm aware homicide includes the most types of killings for any one year. It includes both justifiable and unjustifiable killings. I don't personally see anything wrong with using the homicide rate over any other rate.

MetalDog

Da Shins Kelly wrote: »

Apparently those fcukers from the Westboro Baptist Church are planning on making their way to Connecticut to picket the school in order to "praise God's judgement". Ugh. :mad:

What an absolutely vile shower of bastards. I hope they get the sh1te beaten out of them.

Bruthal

Suryavarman wrote: »

Banning assault weapons is similar to banning cars that can break the speed limit.

We don`t see too many mass murders carried out with cars though.

Suryavarman

robbie7730 wrote: »

We don`t see too many mass murders carried out with cars though.

Yes but cars can cause deaths. About 2-3 times as many deaths in the US as guns do.

If you ban "assault weapons" there is nothing to stop people using shotguns, hunting rifles, handguns, knifes, bombs or even cars.

Witcher

Suryavarman wrote: »

If you ban "assault weapons" there is nothing to stop people using shotguns, hunting rifles, handguns, knifes, bombs or even cars.

Or the 'assault rifles' that would be grandfathered under the ban and remain legal. Last assault weapons ban only blocked future sales, I think people assume they would be totally..banned both new and existing rifles.

Bruthal

Suryavarman wrote: »

Yes but cars can cause deaths.

So can stairs, swimming pools, airplanes, gob stoppers, peanuts, and on and on. None of these were used in the school this week. And their design purpose is not to kill.

About 2-3 times as many deaths in the US as guns do.

Take all accidents of every type into account, and guns are way down on number of deaths. So when the next fella decides to try out-do this massacre and kills 35 or 40, we can just say, "a sure, more were killed on the roads this week than that".

Imo, the key word there is accidents.

If you ban "assault weapons" there is nothing to stop people using shotguns, hunting rifles, handguns, knifes, bombs or even cars.

My points were not about banning. Shotguns, rifles etc are not banned here. But a person does not get automatic entitlement through being born. No pun intended

Witcher

Interesting article, mother's view on her child's mental illness and violence

Daroxtar

I cant trawl through 40 odd pages to see if this has been posted before so apologies if it has but here goes....
Robert Holmes and Peter Lanza were due to testify in the US senate over the LIBOR scandal where banks and financial institutions fixed rates for buying and selling currency, artificially manipulating the money market worldwide. The exact cost of this is well in the billions, perhaps trillions and implicating senior level executives at the largest banks and financial institutions across the US and Europe.
On the 20th of July Robert Holmes son James walked into a crowded movie theater in Aurora during the premier of The Dark Knight opening fire with an assault rifle killing 12 and injuring 58. On December 14th Peter Lanza's son Adam walked into a school in Connecticut with an assault rifle......

Sunnyisland

Daroxtar wrote: »

I cant trawl through 40 odd pages to see if this has been posted before so apologies if it has but here goes....
Robert Holmes and Peter Lanza were due to testify in the US senate over the LIBOR scandal where banks and financial institutions fixed rates for buying and selling currency, artificially manipulating the money market worldwide. The exact cost of this is well in the billions, perhaps trillions and implicating senior level executives at the largest banks and financial institutions across the US and Europe.
On the 20th of July Robert Holmes son James walked into a crowded movie theater in Aurora during the premier of The Dark Knight opening fire with an assault rifle killing 12 and injuring 58. On December 14th Peter Lanza's son Adam walked into a school in Connecticut with an assault rifle......

One might start to think there sons were being programed to do this....No no way

storker

Some thoughts, not really coming down on one side or the other...

The right to bear arms was put into the US constitution when the only firearm was the single action flintlock musket or pistol. Anyone planning a mass killing with one of those would really need to have a bayonet on the end of it. After the first shot, most of the targets would be gone. I wonder if the founding fathers had foreseen the technological advances in weaponry, would they have had second thoughts? Maybe, maybe not.

If, however, the purpose of the right to bear arms is to enable citizens to defend themselves against a tyrannical regime, then it kind of makes sense to allow the sale of semi-automatic or automatic weapons, as these will be the the bad guys' army would be carrying.

They say that guns don't kill people, people do. That's true, but it's easier to kill people with a gun and - here's the critical bit - from a distance. You might be able to outrun someone with a knife, machete or baseball bat, but it's much harder to outrun a bullet. It's also a lot less labour-intensive for the killer, particularly with an automatic weapon.

Having said all that though, if we also accept that gun laws aren't going to change in any meaningful way in the US, then perhaps arming teachers and allowing weapons into cinemas isn't actually that crazy. There's a reason why these guys pick schools and cinemas over say, the local police station - the job of disarming the intended victims has been done for them. Oh sure, you can say that more would be killed in the crossfire but that's speculation. Maybe they would, maybe they wouldn't. Maybe the gunman would be felled with the first shot. The odds of being able to stop the killer must be higher, though, if someone on the premises has the wherewithal to do so. I know if I was in a public place with some maniac spraying bullets I'd be hoping fervently for some gun-carrying non-maniac to turn up really soon.

I listened to some discussion about this on Newstalk today, and the panel consensus was that (a) gun ownership in the US isn't going to change and (b) arming schoolteachers would be mad. Those conclusions together make no sense to me, because this seems to accept that the only thing that will stop the gunman is when he runs out of (a) bullets or (b) targets or else stops for some other reason. Again, if I was in the line of fire in such a rampage, I'm not sure how happy I'd be with that.

I wouldn't advocate the kind of gun laws they have in the US, by the way, but the guns are out there, and a new ban isn't going to get rid of the ones that are. It would take an awfully long time for the existing ones to disappear too. I don't think guns come with a "shoot-by" date. Don't some people still own functioning Civil War era pistols?

I'm not a gun owner by the way; I've never even fired one unless you count (a) paintball gun and (b) a Brown Bess musket loaded with a blank cartridge*. If I lived in the US, I doubt very much that I'd own a gun, especially with young children in the house.

Stork

*A huge bang and smoke everywhere - great fun.

Daroxtar

realies wrote: »

One might start to think there sons were being programed to do this....No no way

No, I just see it a some wierd copycat coincidence. Reject rich kids, one goes nuts in Aurora and 6 months later the other decides to do the same. I can't find any direct link between them but it's a fcking bizarre coincidence

Suryavarman

robbie7730 wrote: »

So can stairs, swimming pools, airplanes, gob stoppers, peanuts, and on and on. None of these were used in the school this week. And their design purpose is not to kill.

A guns main purpose is to kill animals and to shoot targets not to kill people.

Now that you mention swimming pools, a couple of hundred young children drown in swimming pools each year. Whereas, despite being a bad year for mass shootings, only 88 people have died in said shootings this year. It would be a far better spend of congress' time to pass regulations making swimming pools safer than passing new gun laws.

My points were not about banning. Shotguns, rifles etc are not banned here. But a person does not get automatic entitlement through being born. No pun intended

It doesn't matter what your points were, I was originally replying to someone that had mentioned a ban on "automatic and semi-automatic weapons, assault rifles, and all that", then you jumped in to make a snide remark.

Sadly people don't have a right to bear arms in Ireland and that is something that should be rectified sooner rather than later.

Daroxtar

Suryavarman wrote: »

Sadly people don't have a right to bear arms in Ireland and that is something that should be rectified sooner rather than later.

??? Why? if you want a gun in ireland you join a gun club (By nomination of another member of good character), you get your license and you buy the gun. You use it for hunting, sport shooting or protection of livestock. We don't need to "bear arms". If you give people the right to use a gun as a weapon against other people then you will get maniacs shooting others for very little reason. Not a good idea. Gun laws here are pretty ok, perhaps a bit too tight in regards to getting a license for a pistol for target shooting but in general they work fine.

Witcher

storker wrote: »

The right to bear arms was put into the US constitution when the only firearm was the single action flintlock musket or pistol. Anyone planning a mass killing with one of those would really need to have a bayonet on the end of it. After the first shot, most of the targets would be gone. I wonder if the founding fathers had foreseen the technological advances in weaponry, would they have had second thoughts? Maybe, maybe not.

At the time the 2nd Amendment was made, a flintlock was the height of weapons technology. It was the HK416 of the day and those writing it saw fit to allow their citizens to hold them, people are looking back on it through modern eyes at a time when we have assault rifles and mocking the flintlock but back then someone with one of them was well armed and people with them succeeded in driving out British forces..no mean feat.

That theory has been trotted out many times and if it held any water then it would be acted on. The 2nd Amendment was designed to arm the citizenry in order to ensure a 'free state'...to be in line with that the citizenry have to be as well armed as those they might be opposing. That is what firearms owners in America live by.

I'm not saying that's right or wrong but that's how it is if one is to keep in line with the ideals of the second amendment.

Suryavarman

Daroxtar wrote: »

??? Why? if you want a gun in ireland you join a gun club (By nomination of another member of good character), you get your license and you buy the gun. You use it for hunting, sport shooting or protection of livestock. We don't need to "bear arms". If you give people the right to use a gun as a weapon against other people then you will get maniacs shooting others for very little reason. Not a good idea. Gun laws here are pretty ok, perhaps a bit too tight in regards to getting a license for a pistol for target shooting but in general they work fine.

So in other words, if you want a gun in Ireland you have to jump through a bunch of pointless hoops to get one. Unless of course you are a criminal, then you can easily get one. Our gun laws are stupidly strict and they deny hundreds of thousands the ability to defend themselves and to engage in recreational activities such as hunting or target shooting.

If you give people the right to own a gun, less crimes are committed because criminals are too afraid of getting shot to commit crimes.

Manic Moran

Blay wrote: »

Or the 'assault rifles' that would be grandfathered under the ban and remain legal. Last assault weapons ban only blocked future sales, I think people assume they would be totally..banned both new and existing rifles.

There is no legal alternative. Retroactive laws are unconstitutional. One cannot suddenly declare something illegal in the US which had been legal when purchased. They can prohibit future sales and future manufacture, but they cannot turn people into criminals by legislative fiat because of a purchase made years ago.

Daroxtar

Nothing pointless about the local gun club vetting you and then the gardai vetting you before letting you have a weapon. Criminals will get them anyway, it just makes it trickier for disturbed individuals with no criminal records to get them. The way you are going on about it being our "right" makes me worry what you'd be like if you had a gun...

storker

Blay wrote: »

At the time the 2nd Amendment was made, a flintlock was the height of weapons technology. It was the HK416 of the day and those writing it saw fit to allow their citizens to hold them, people are looking back on it through modern eyes at a time when we have assault rifles and mocking the flintlock but back then someone with one of them was well armed and people with them succeeded in driving out British forces..no mean feat.

That theory has been trotted out many times and if it held any water then it would be acted on. The 2nd Amendment was designed to arm the citizenry in order to ensure a 'free state'...to be in line with that the citizenry have to be as well armed as those they might be opposing. That is what firearms owners in America live by.

I'm not saying that's right or wrong but that's how it is if one is to keep in line with the ideals of the second amendment.

I think you're just repeating what I actually said myself in later paragraphs.

I'm not "trotting out" any theory, by the way, just making an observation. I'm not even sure what theory you're referring to. Nor am I "mocking" the flintlock. As someone with a keen interest in the Napoleonic Wars, I'm well acquainted with what a musket could do.

Nevertheless, reloading a flintlock requires going through a pretty complex process of priming, loading, ramming etc. Reloading a semi-automatic simply requires firing the first shot. While the flintlock is being reloaded for, say 15-30 seconds, it's not that much more dangerous than a baseball bat. Unless it's got a bayonet fixed, but then again, the shooter can bayonet or reload, but not both. Anyway the point of all this is simple, you can certainly kill 20 people or more with a musket, but it will take a lot longer, be a lot more work, and you'll be a lot more vulnerable while doing it.

Stork

Piliger

Suryavarman wrote: »

A guns main purpose is to kill animals and to shoot targets not to kill people.
Sadly people don't have a right to bear arms in Ireland and that is something that should be rectified sooner rather than later.

I suggest you're just a wind up merchant

Suryavarman

Daroxtar wrote: »

Nothing pointless about the local gun club vetting you and then the gardai vetting you before letting you have a weapon. Criminals will get them anyway, it just makes it trickier for disturbed individuals with no criminal records to get them. The way you are going on about it being our "right" makes me worry what you'd be like if you had a gun...

It also makes it harder for law abiding citizens to defend themselves, their families and their property.

You don't even know what I'm like without a gun, so I can't see why you are worried about what I'd like with one.

Suryavarman

Piliger wrote: »

I suggest you're just a wind up merchant

I suggest that your sole contribution to this thread has been to engage in hyperbole, insult people and display your general ignorance about guns and the facts about guns and crime.

EdenHazard

Blay wrote: »

Interesting article, mother's view on her child's mental illness and violence

Awful stuff. Sounds horrible for the family.

The issue isn't guns. Its MENTAL HEALTH.

Bruthal

Suryavarman wrote: »

A guns main purpose is to kill animals and to shoot targets not to kill people.

I think common sense would say guns were not designed to shoot targets. And are designed to kill. An m16`s purpose is to hunt rabbits is it?

Now that you mention swimming pools, a couple of hundred young children drown in swimming pools each year. Whereas, despite being a bad year for mass shootings, only 88 people have died in said shootings this year. It would be a far better spend of congress' time to pass regulations making swimming pools safer than passing new gun laws.

Yes, perhaps make the swimming pools 6 inches deep. And let the massacres continue until their victim numbers are greater than pool accidents. That will save congress even more time.

It doesn't matter what your points were,

No i guess it doesnt, when they say easy access to guns by disturbed people is dangerous.

I was originally replying to someone that had mentioned a ban on "automatic and semi-automatic weapons,assault rifles, and all that", then you jumped in to make a snide remark.

I guess assault rifles are designed for getting rabbits too. The poor oul rabbit is not having much luck, with ak47`s after him now.

And a snide remark? You compared massacre deaths with car deaths, and now swimming pool deaths. I said cars are not used for massacres, and you say that`s snide?
Easily upset people who like guns = trouble

Sadly people don't have a right to bear arms in Ireland and that is something that should be rectified sooner rather than later.

Even more trouble for mr rabbit.

Bruthal

EdenHazard wrote: »

Awful stuff. Sounds horrible for the family.

The issue isn't guns. Its MENTAL HEALTH.

Its a combination. The US is not the only country with mental health problems.

Piliger

Daroxtar wrote: »

Nothing pointless about the local gun club vetting you and then the gardai vetting you before letting you have a weapon. Criminals will get them anyway, it just makes it trickier for disturbed individuals with no criminal records to get them. The way you are going on about it being our "right" makes me worry what you'd be like if you had a gun...

He's just flaming in my view .. the truth is criminals who use guns in this country and in the UK mostly use them against fellow criminals. Criminals are criminals ... like duh ... that's hardly an excuse to do away with laws.
Disturbed nutters would find it incredibly difficult to get a gun in this country or the UK and they not even likely to know how to load it or even turn off the safety catch. People who flip the lid in the US have multiple guns lying around the house, along with mountains of ammunition - all ready to vent their anger and hate. This is simply not an option for those kinds of people here.

Guns are for killing people. Only people. They should be wiped from every country, outside vetted hands.

gavmcg92

Reading the Sunday papers this morning brought me to tears. Reading about how some teachers hid the children in cupboards and closets while staying in the classroom themselves only to be shot and killed. Really heartbreaking stories.

Bruthal

gavmcg92 wrote: »

Reading the Sunday papers this morning brought me to tears. Reading about how some teachers hid the children in cupboards and closets while staying in the classroom themselves only to be shot and killed. Really heartbreaking stories.

Yes its unimaginable.