The wisdom and foresight of Tomfurbs and Trish here on H.A.

[InHouston]

Perhaps we could continue down this civil path and learn something from each other. The ball is in your court.

I don't think so. Pissing you off is too much fun. Plus, you started this lame bogus thread in an attempt to call me and trish out, so the gloves are off.

Dude, you can't really expect to suddenly turn yourself into the voice of reason after the completely mad shit you've been spewing in both gun-law threads. I'm an agnostic, and equally aware of the finality of death, and no, I don't want to be killed by someone with a gun. Whether that someone is a 'black man with a shotgun' as you so charmingly put it, or your own arsenal-owning ass, is pretty much academic. (p.s white people commit crimes too y'know, sometimes even with shotguns)

America is a country that has problems, as all countries do, but what that country doesn't need is more guns. Getting bent out of shape over you're right to bare arms, while so many other rights of yours are getting roughshod over, seems kind of mental. Allowing someone a quick and easy and relatively guilt-free means of killing people isn't a good idea, even if their nation is a peaceful as Canada. People get drunk and crazy and do stupid things. Even the best of us do.

I think of gun bans as damage limitation. And all I can say is, from personal experience, I am fucking glad I don't live in a country where any old twat can walk into a supermarket and buy some heavy artillery.

As for all that rubbish about 'firing warning shots'...who are you kidding? You come across as a pretty prejudiced and paranoid individual, so I imagine your 'warning' shots will probably depend on who you've got in your sights.


Also, why do you need so many? You've only got two hands. Are you in active service in the military or Law Enforcement? Is your house (I bet you call it a 'compound', right?) constantly under siege by all these 'black men with shotguns'?

So be it.

[SarahG]

My overall concern with the “gun problem” in America is simply the attitude of the youth in this nation now. There is a prevalent “thug culture” in this nation now and West Coast style street gang mentality is running rampant in this nation. The attitudes are horrible and downright dangerous.

Right, I which is basically what I was saying.

Welfare in this country has encouraged single mothers to raise many children with no father in the home. Coupled with drugs and the lure of easy money, young people in this country are easily seduced and intoxicated into a lifestyle of gangs, drugs, and crime. .

When all else fails, blame the "degradation of the American family." Sorry, not buying that argument. Disillusionment, inescapable poverty, ruined education facilities, and other such problems I'd argue have had a far larger role.

If it is as simple as divorce and welfare programs, we'd have seen utopias in our urban slums in the eras where divorce was unobtainable for the lower SECs. Crime then, in these areas were no more or less different from today- serial killers, murders, rapes, thefts- violence was a major component in impoverished urban life long before social welfare programs existed.

If anything it was easier for men back then to just disappear and abandon their families, its not like you could easily track someone down and make them pay child support in the 1870s.

Violence and militant radicalism cannot as easily thrive where people feel optimistic about their future IMHO.

People get drunk and crazy and do stupid things. Even the best of us do.

Which is where accountability comes in. If you get reckless with something while you're drunk and kill someone, your ass should be dealt with by the justice system for it.

I don't care if its a gun, knife, car, or a hammer. More cops here die from car chases than gun violence, but you don't see people (other than Nadar) pushing for a prohibition of automobiles.

I think of gun bans as damage limitation.

Damage limitation? That argument is kaput if, in response to gun bans:
1) people just turn to other ways of hurting people (sticks, stones, knives, bats, skateboards, etc)
2) criminals get their hands on firearms anyway.

Boss, criminals will always be there. Criminals having access to firearms has little to do with discussing a gun-ban, because if they want to they will always find ways to get them, gun-ban or not.

[Tomfurbs]

I think of gun bans as damage limitation.

Damage limitation? That argument is kaput if, in response to gun bans:
1) people just turn to other ways of hurting people (sticks, stones, knives, bats, skateboards, etc)
2) criminals get their hands on firearms anyway.

Kaput? Not really. At Dunblane, Tom Hamilton killed sixteen children and a teacher. He was able to kill that number because he was firing a gun.
The columbine killers where able to continue their spree because they were ar,ed with fireamrs

Shortly after the UK ban was passed the year after Dunblane, a maniac attacked a church with an axe in Surrey (I can't remember his name, I was a teen at the time). The fact that he was armed with an axe and not a gun meant that he was able to inflict a lot less damage, even though, of course, every death is tragic.

Americans always say that their country has such awful social problems, and this is why they have the gun crime they do, as opposed to other gun-owning nations like Canada or France. Firstly, what an embarrasing admission. Secondly, Americans are people just they same as everyone else. No more crazy or violent then the rest of the world. Therefore, when a country with a ban, like the UK, shows such proportionally lower crime stats than the US, it is irresponsible for Americans to say 'Oh, we have more sever social problems...the fact that guns are readily avaiable has nothing to do with it'. It is always easier to blame it on the poor and the blacks, though

Sarah said :

Which is where accountability comes in. If you get reckless with something while you're drunk and kill someone, your ass should be dealt with by the justice system for it.

I don't care if its a gun, knife, car, or a hammer. More cops here die from car chases than gun violence, but you don't see people (other than Nadar) pushing for a prohibition of automobiles.

1) Of course everyone is accountable for their actions. I never said otherwise. Not allowing people access to a simple and easy way of killing someone is a pragmatic social safeguard. In a country with a ban, even owning a gun is a crime and people who do so should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. That in itself is a good counter-measure against crime.

2) A car is designed to get people from A to B. A gun is designed to kill people. If someone kills someone with a car, they are misusing it. If someone kills someone with a gun, even if it is an accident, the gun itself has performed the task it has been created for.

That is why there is no place for guns domestically during peace-time.

[InHouston]

That is why there is no place for guns domestically during peace-time.

Ummm Hmmm ....

http://www.criminalsgonewilddvd.com/...ht-on-tape.htm

[SarahG]

At Dunblane, Tom Hamilton killed sixteen children and a teacher. He was able to kill that number because he was firing a gun.
The columbine killers where able to continue their spree because they were ar,ed with fireamrs

But these incidents are largely extremely rare. I am sure more people (including children) die in your country, as is the case in ours, from other means.

Ok sure, a crazy guy went and shot up a bunch of kids and 16 were dead, I am sure this tragic event was extremely hard on their families, their community, maybe even their country.... but it means nothing if in the grand scheme of things, removing those guns caused a surge in violence where other implements were used (such as knives).

Shortly after the UK ban was passed the year after Dunblane, a maniac attacked a church with an axe in Surrey (I can't remember his name, I was a teen at the time). The fact that he was armed with an axe and not a gun meant that he was able to inflict a lot less damage, even though, of course, every death is tragic.

Expect you have no idea if he would have had access to a gun without Dublane, and you have no idea if he'd have used one if he had that access.

As you said, it was shortly after the event- even extreme gun regulatory measures aren't going to make an IMMEDIATE change to such a point that someone cannot access a gun when they want to. How do you think the criminals gain access to guns (you've said yourself they can today, and that's years after gun "reforms" were put in place in your country). It is a single event, all we can do is speculate.

Americans always say that their country has such awful social problems, and this is why they have the gun crime they do, as opposed to other gun-owning nations like Canada or France. Firstly, what an embarrasing admission.

We have the VIOLENCE that we do because of a combination of painfully obvious problems, economically, and socially. If you HONESTLY think that our cities' crime will just go and evaporate if guns were magically removed from our entire society, you're insane (or just really really out of touch with what it is like in the impoverished urban districts). That crime problem doesn't go away by controlling what weapon they have to use in committing it... and that is assuming that gun regulations would be able to remove enough guns from our society to actually prohibit criminals from accessing them. Given that you've said your own country can't achieve that end, then that's a pretty damning observation for any reform whose justification is precisely that (removing guns from criminals).

Secondly, Americans are people just they same as everyone else. No more crazy or violent then the rest of the world.

That's being intellectually dishonest if you at the same time acknowledge that other societies with the same (or higher) guns per capital stats have no where near the same stats involving violent crimes, or crimes involving guns.

Believe it or not violence DOES vary from society to society. So does crime.

It is always easier to blame it on the poor and the blacks, though...

It is absolutely linked to poverty, and all the stats our country has involving crime will show that poverty is the single most important factor in dictating how much crime a given district will have. This is true rurally, and urbanly... furthermore take a look at the cities that have the HIGHEST rate of violent crime and tell me what their economies are like.

2) A car is designed to get people from A to B. A gun is designed to kill people. If someone kills someone with a car, they are misusing it. If someone kills someone with a gun, even if it is an accident, the gun itself has performed the task it has been created for.

Knives are designed to cut things, but I don't see your country banning them under that logic, and if they did I would seriously question the logic behind it.

[Tomfurbs]

With all your points taken on board, I still cannot understand the need for such an unnecessary and lethal item being easily accessed by the general public.

Large knives are being phased out in this country, and you have to be over 18 before you can purchase any blade, even a kitchen paring knife.

The difference between knives and guns is that 1) a gun can inflict more damage and 2) it is very difficult to kill someone with a blade, whereas
shooting someone is pretty basic and does not require the same level of emotional envolvement.

Politics is supposed to be one part ideals and one part pragmatism. Just as harmful chemicals and food additives are banned for the good of the nation, it is the same with guns.

I cannot belive you really think that guns make anything safer. A we have heard from other posters, gun-owners are actually attractive targets for criminals, and most home-weopons get turned on their owners.

Guns only escalate the level of violence of a situation, which is one of the reasons Brit cops don't carry them.

TOPICAL ASIDE:

Right now the UK news outlets are full of a story of Millionnaire Chris Foster who has gone missing after (they suspect) he shot his wife and her lover with his legally owned shotgun. This dude owned a gun why? Oh yeah..for self-defence. When was it ever used in anger? By the owner himself against his own wife. Of course he could have killed them with a knife of otgher instrument, but would he have been so successful?

EDIT:

US is averaging about a 'columbine' a year. How many more incidents like that are you as a nation going to accept before you actually take sokme kind of action, rather than just pass the buck and blame the lastest scapegoat?

[SarahG]

US is averaging about a 'columbine' a year. How many more incidents like that are you as a nation going to accept before you actually take sokme kind of action, rather than just pass the buck and blame the lastest scapegoat?

I don't believe guns are the cause of that problem.

I completely understand why kids shoot up schools (understand, that doesn't mean I endorse shooting up schools, encourage shooting up schools, etc etc) having had a bad k-12 experience myself.

I don't see it as being a byproduct of guns, marilyn manson, doom2, rap music or any of that nonesense (hell after Columbine they were even trying to use "what clothes the shooters wore when they were in preschool" to escape goat what caused columbine)- what I believed caused columbine was the tendency of our schools to not give a shit when people repeatedly cross the line in terms of violence, abuse, harassment, and insults. Speaking to my own person experience, it was bad enough that the police had to step in on a regular basis because of the bodily injury I was receiving from bullies. Did the school care, do anything about it, or even pretend to stop it? Fuck no, in some cases the teachers themselves encouraged the behavior simply because I was different. And I'm not even talking about trans issues here, I was a target simply because of how different I looked in early k-12. That got me labeled as a target, and once that happened it stuck, moving, everything short of home schooling failed to make a difference.

I'm sure more students in our country die from suicides than ever have collectively from school shootings, even if the causes are often the same. Instead of trying to fix the problem, people escape goat it on guns thinking "ah, that's the reason why it happens..." That maybe the means in which students decide to react violent, but it isn't why they decide to do so.

Ever think about why people actually consider school shootings? It isn't just because "their family has guns laying around."

[muhmuh]

what I believed caused columbine was the tendency of our schools to not give a shit when people repeatedly cross the line in terms of violence, abuse, harassment, and insults.

its all the same... in a every man for himself evironment where everyone is afraid of everyone else these problems will automatically arise and the widespread gun ownership caused by that fear will amplify the effects 11-fold

Deputies are searching for two gunmen behind a deadly home invasion at a north Harris County mobile home park.

as expected from inhouston

[SarahG]

what I believed caused columbine was the tendency of our schools to not give a shit when people repeatedly cross the line in terms of violence, abuse, harassment, and insults.

its all the same... in a every man for himself evironment where everyone is afraid of everyone else these problems will automatically arise and the widespread gun ownership caused by that fear will amplify the effects 11-fold

Then why are they such a modern occurrence in our society? Why do societies with more guns per capital lack the school shooting stats that we have?

[SarahG]

Deputies are searching for two gunmen behind a deadly home invasion at a north Harris County mobile home park.

as expected from inhouston

LOL. But really, there is no way for us to know if InHouston really is a neighbor of the victim. InHouston may have, like most residents in Houston, read or heard about the crime. What cracks me up is that he did not want to post a link to the story, as if it would have been impossible to find. Ya gotta love the "internets."

Would anyone have honestly believed him if he did post a link at they very start?