What is it With You Guys?

[zippy1]

Deepest condolence to the families of the staff members and children gunned down.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sandy-Hook-Elementary-School-Massacre-Memorial-Page/142591449223701

Connecticut police have released the names and birthdates of the victims. All of the children were in first grade: Eight boys and 12 girls, police said. The youngest of the children were six.

 

1. Charlotte Bacon 2/22/06

2. Daniel Barden 9/25/05

3. Rachel Davino 7/17/83

4. Olivia Engel 7/18/06

5. Josephine Gay 12/11/05

6. Ana M. Marquez-Greene 4/4/06

7. Dylan Hockley 3/8/06

8. Dawn Hocksprung 6/28/65

9. Madeleine F Hsu 7/10/06

10. Catherine V Hubbard 6/8/06

11. Chase Kowalski 10/31/05

12. Jesse Lewis 6/30/06

13. James Mattioli 3/22/06

14. Grace McDonnell 11/4/05

15. Anne Marie Murphy 7/25/60

16. Emilie Parker 5/12/16

17. Jack Pinto 5/06/06

18. Noah Pozner 11/20/06

19. Caroline Previdi 9/07/06

20. Jessica Rekos 5/10/06

21 Avielle Richman 10/17/06

22. Lauren Russeau 6/1982

23. Mary Sherlach 02/11/56

24. Victoria Soto 11/04/85

25. Benjamin Wheeler 09/12/06

26. Allison N. Wyatt 07/03/06

 

May their memory be blessed and may they rest in peace. All family members are kindly asked to post photos and stories of their loved ones on this memorial page. God bless.

[cwericb]

I am somewhat torn on this debate.

 

Allowing the ownership of automatic military weapons by ordinary citizens of a civilized country makes little sense. Of course it probably follows that if one truly believes in the necessity of having the right to own those weapons, then that probably defines how he sees his country.

 

However, as one with some past military training in the use of firearms, I cannot conceive of the helplessness and frustration of being caught in one of these shooting incidents, defenceless and without access to some type of  gun.

[jeffmori7]

Guys, just one question for you, do you know if there are statistics showing if it is really useful to bear a gun at anytime for "self-defense"?

 

There is a lot of people killed by guns each year, but if there was no gun, then you would't even need to defend yourself as often with a gun, but that is not my point here...

 

In different situations where there is a crazy shooter like this, has the right to bear a gun really helped someone?

 

I would tend to think that the "benefit" is completely destroyed by the drawbacks arising from the large presence of firearms in the society.

 

 

Personally, I think I would banned all  firearms except those for hunting, and you shouldn't be allowed to keep them loaded at any other time.

[ubuy2wron]

"Gun control laws will not eliminate mass shootings it will reduce there incidence, end of story."

 

Maybe but, Montreal proves otherwise. I can't think of any other North American city with 4 mass shootings in just over 20 years. Can you think of any? This despite some of the tightest gun laws, especially to get access to assault weapons. Maybe it is just an isolated case and that there have been fewer mass shootings overall in Canada on a per capita basis? Remember that you need 1/10 the occurrence and I doubt it is the case, although I don't have stats on it.

 

Better gun control will reduce what I tried to explain and what Parsad mentioned: per capita number of gun-related injuries or deaths. Unfortunately, that part gets into the self-defense mentality in the States. The majority of people down there who buy a gun (hand gun, shotgun or otherwise), purchase it to defend themselves, not to go hunting. There is a mentality that you can self defend yourself.

 

Up here in Canada, if you kill someone even if proven that you did it in self defense or to protect your own life, you are subject to a sentence of 3 years in jail. I can't think of too many up here who go buy a gun to primarily protect themselves. It is mostly to go hunting. We are being raised with the idea that you can't do your own justice. It is a very different mentality.

 

The other thing that is truly screwed up in the States, is that some States are now legalizing pot which will mean more consumption and less control over other drugs also including chemicals or pills. These things have been proven to help develop disorders in younger adults such as schizophrenia. If you want more trouble, keep having more of these in society and I guarantee you that the number of mass shootings will skyrocket. The guns, they will always find them one way or the other.

 

Cardboard

Cardboard, Montreal PROVES nothing about gun control laws and the frequency of mass shootings. The only thing that Montreal proves is that probability is a bitch.(Every wise investor understands this). I have a very large bone to pick with The NRA in the USA which most would argue is the single most powerfull lobby in existance. At its core is an unholy alliance of "gun lovers" and the fire-arms industry. My favorite recent travesity is the extension of the stand your ground laws.  The gun lovers often argue that if every one was packing then these mass shootings would not occur which may or may not be true but ignores the unfortunate fact that many more are killed in oneseys and twoseys because of accidents and domestic heat of passion type situations.  I advocate for sensible laws that restrict the publics access to fire-arms for reasons that are pretty much self evident.

[jeffmori7]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2012/12/16/feinstein-will-introduce-assault-weapons-ban-in-senate/

[Parsad]

Seeing that the handguns were owned by the mother, I wonder how secure they were in the house? I imagine they should have been locked up, but I know gun philosophy is different between Canada and the US. I read that CT has some of the tighter gun laws in the US. So was the kid just really screwed up and had easy access to the guns that weren't locked up?

 

In CT, you only have to secure your weapons if there are children 16 and under in the home.  The mother was a gun collector.  She had several other weapons as well...you notice I call them weapons.  Cheers!

[Parsad]

In different situations where there is a crazy shooter like this, has the right to bear a gun really helped someone?

 

I would bet that as many times as a weapon has helped someone defend themselves, there have been at least equal, if not more, times were the weapon ended up being used against the victim, or even forcing the perpetrator to shoot the victim...think about how many security guards have been killed while trying to draw down on a perp.  How about how many people have been shot by guys like Zimmerman as well?  Cheers!

[west]

Disclosure: I feel myself agreeing more with rkbabang and ragnar here.

 

That being said, just to turn this on it's head a little, if we banned *all* gun ownership, could that result in burglaries and gun related violence going *up*?

 

I know there are plenty of places in the US where the police are of marginal benefit.  If all of a sudden criminals, who may still have guns despite any bans, don't have to worry about being shot when breaking and entering, and the police are so worthless they might as well not even be in the picture, wouldn't banning guns, in all probabilty, result in more crime?

 

If I needed money for crack, or if I just felt like it or whatever, and I knew if I broke into a house in all probability I wouldn't get shot, and I knew I could easily get out in time before the police showed up, what would be my incentive *not* to break into someone else's house/property?

 

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something with the gun control argument.  Are people generally arguing for a complete gun ownership ban?  If not, could people be more specific on what they want done?  I have a feeling there are shades of grey here.

[Parsad]

Disclosure: I feel myself agreeing more with rkbabang and ragnar here.

 

That being said, just to turn this on it's head a little, if we banned *all* gun ownership, could that result in burglaries and gun related violence going *up*?

 

I know there are plenty of places in the US where the police are of marginal benefit.  If all of a sudden criminals, who may still have guns despite any bans, don't have to worry about being shot when breaking and entering, and the police are so worthless they might as well not even be in the picture, wouldn't banning guns, in all probabilty, result in more crime?

 

If I needed money for crack, or if I just felt like it or whatever, and I knew if I broke into a house in all probability I wouldn't get shot, and I knew I could easily get out in time before the police showed up, what would be my incentive *not* to break into someone else's house/property?

 

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something with the gun control argument.  Are people generally arguing for a complete gun ownership ban?  If not, could people be more specific on what they want done?  I have a feeling there are shades of grey here.

 

They haven't gone up in large metropolitan cities in Canada.  We have plenty of crackheads and drug addicts here.  We have a few burglars, serial killers and just plain psychopaths too.  Cheers!

[west]

Disclosure: I feel myself agreeing more with rkbabang and ragnar here.

 

That being said, just to turn this on it's head a little, if we banned *all* gun ownership, could that result in burglaries and gun related violence going *up*?

 

I know there are plenty of places in the US where the police are of marginal benefit.  If all of a sudden criminals, who may still have guns despite any bans, don't have to worry about being shot when breaking and entering, and the police are so worthless they might as well not even be in the picture, wouldn't banning guns, in all probabilty, result in more crime?

 

If I needed money for crack, or if I just felt like it or whatever, and I knew if I broke into a house in all probability I wouldn't get shot, and I knew I could easily get out in time before the police showed up, what would be my incentive *not* to break into someone else's house/property?

 

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something with the gun control argument.  Are people generally arguing for a complete gun ownership ban?  If not, could people be more specific on what they want done?  I have a feeling there are shades of grey here.

 

They haven't gone up in large metropolitan cities in Canada.  We have plenty of crackheads and drug addicts here.  We have a few burglars, serial killers and just plain psychopaths too.  Cheers!

 

Are the police halfway good in those places :) ?

 

So just to clarify, you believe guns should be banned outright?

[ERICOPOLY]

If I needed money for crack, or if I just felt like it or whatever, and I knew if I broke into a house in all probability I wouldn't get shot, and I knew I could easily get out in time before the police showed up, what would be my incentive *not* to break into someone else's house/property?

 

Well there are plenty of Western countries with far more restrictive gun laws.

 

Do people there just put up curtains around their beds so they can have some privacy while the perps are going in and out the windows all night long?

 

Shouldn't be too hard for the NRA to prove that the rest of the Western world is besieged by crackheads invading homes.  Unless... the argument is bullshit.

[west]

Well there are plenty of Western countries with far more restrictive gun laws.

 

Do people there just put up curtains around their beds so they can have some privacy while the perps are going in and out the windows all night long?

 

Shouldn't be too hard for the NRA to prove that the rest of the Western world is besieged by crackheads invading homes.  Unless... the argument is bullshit.

 

I live in San Francisco and spend a lot of time in (but do not live in, thankfully) the Tenderloin area, where there are a *lot* of sketchy people wandering the street.  Ditto with Oakland.

 

I wasn't just talking in hypotheticals.  I know that while there are a lot of places in the US (and Canada, of course) where the "crackhead" argument *is* "bullshit", there are a lot of other places, such as the Tenderloin or Oakland, where it does apply.

 

[ERICOPOLY]

Would you try to shoot up an NRA convention or would you go to the one place that you know even people with concealed carry permits are not allowed to bring their weapons guaranteeing you a building full of unarmed victims?    If guns caused murder, these things would constantly happen at NRA conventions, but never in schools.

 

I don't know.  Most public places in most Western countries guarantee you a building full of unarmed victims.  It seems fairly uncommon though to have these types of shootings -- less common than in the US.

 

Let's say we adopted their gun laws and (suspend your disbelief) people actually turned in their guns.  What is it about our society that would make public places relatively less safe than in other Western countries, where they are already safer than ours in the first place?

 

The deterrent theory should hold that public places are safer in a country like the US.  There should be less usage of guns by criminals who don't want to be shot by citizens like yourself.

 

[ERICOPOLY]

Well there are plenty of Western countries with far more restrictive gun laws.

 

Do people there just put up curtains around their beds so they can have some privacy while the perps are going in and out the windows all night long?

 

Shouldn't be too hard for the NRA to prove that the rest of the Western world is besieged by crackheads invading homes.  Unless... the argument is bullshit.

 

I live in San Francisco and spend a lot of time in (but do not live in, thankfully) the Tenderloin area, where there are a *lot* of sketchy people wandering the street.  Ditto with Oakland.

 

I wasn't just talking in hypotheticals.  I know that while there are a lot of places in the US (and Canada, of course) where the "crackhead" argument *is* "bullshit", there are a lot of other places, such as the Tenderloin or Oakland, where it does apply.

 

We do seem to have more social problems perhaps.  Unwillingness to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted.  Our prisons are an issue.  Plus we've had a lot of racial related social problems that perhaps some Western countries suffer less from.  The social issues could make our society more violent to begin with.

[wknecht]

I have a lot of respect for Mayor Bloomberg. Here's a recent clip of him discussing gun control.

 

 

[west]

We do seem to have more social problems perhaps.  Unwillingness to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted.  Our prisons are an issue.  Plus we've had a lot of racial related social problems that perhaps some Western countries suffer less from.  The social issues could make our society more violent to begin with.

 

I'm not sure what the point being made here is, but people are more than willing to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted in SF.  We have some amazing organizations to work with all these issues, including Glide (glide.org), the charity that receives the proceeds from Warren Buffett's lunch auctions.  It's located in the Tenderloin, the area I'm talking about.

 

However, drug addicts still do *lots* of crimes in the area.  "Crackheads" are unfortunately very real here.

 

[NormR]

Personally, I think there needs to be some reasonable balance when it comes to gun laws.  While they don't have much use in cities, they are still useful in some rural areas.  I know people in rural Ontario who hunt a good deal for food.  (We allow some hunters on the family hobby farm where the deer population is generally out of control and turkeys are getting there.)  Hunting can make a big difference in some family budgets in the poorer areas. 

 

As an aside, a childhood friend lives in the unfortunate town and two of his kids went to the school.  Both are fine, but my heart goes out to the families who were less fortunate.       

[Parsad]

Well there are plenty of Western countries with far more restrictive gun laws.

 

Do people there just put up curtains around their beds so they can have some privacy while the perps are going in and out the windows all night long?

 

Shouldn't be too hard for the NRA to prove that the rest of the Western world is besieged by crackheads invading homes.  Unless... the argument is bullshit.

 

I live in San Francisco and spend a lot of time in (but do not live in, thankfully) the Tenderloin area, where there are a *lot* of sketchy people wandering the street.  Ditto with Oakland.

 

I wasn't just talking in hypotheticals.  I know that while there are a lot of places in the US (and Canada, of course) where the "crackhead" argument *is* "bullshit", there are a lot of other places, such as the Tenderloin or Oakland, where it does apply.

 

We do seem to have more social problems perhaps.  Unwillingness to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted.  Our prisons are an issue.  Plus we've had a lot of racial related social problems that perhaps some Western countries suffer less from.  The social issues could make our society more violent to begin with.

 

The 6 square block area of Hastings & Main in Vancouver is considered the poorest and most down-trodden zip code in all of North America.  At least it was until about 4 years ago, when alot of capital and social stimulus programs began providing more social housing and support. 

 

Once the main shopping area of downtown Vancouver, about 25 years ago it began an unprecedented downward spiral.  Shopping areas were replaced with crack houses, skid-row housing, rampant prostitution and unbelievable squalor and poverty.  For a city where the average house price is over one million dollars and the average family income is over $125,000 annually! 

 

There were crackheads and drug addicts shooting up in plain view, with police officers walking by and ambulances carrying overdose victims away on an hourly basis.  In fact, one of the worst serial killers in North American history, Willie Pickton, managed to lure away some 50 homeless or vulnerable women to his farm, where they were raped, killed, butchered and fed to his pigs. 

 

Yet in this putrid environment, an area that Vancouverites should be ashamed to have ever allowed to happen, there was very little gun violence relative to the rest of the city.  So, the fear of crackheads breaking into homes and shooting up victims is a fallacy.  It's rich, upper-class, mostly white, right-wing suburbanites that perpetuate this theory of protecting their homes with guns, so that crackheads don't break in and rape your wife or young daughters while the husband is helplessly tied to a chair...damn you raping crackheads who take buses to gated communities, walk past security posts, and then break into homes with alarm systems!   

 

Used to be black slaves 200 years ago, now it's crackheads!  ;D  Cheers! 

[twacowfca]

Are we asking the right question?  What if the crazy person had thrown a big Molotov Cocktail  into a crowded room?  Would we be talking about banning gasoline?  Shouldn't we be talking instead about why it is so difficult to get psychotic and potentially violent people into secure, involuntary custodial care before they do something terrible, not afterward?

[ERICOPOLY]

We do seem to have more social problems perhaps.  Unwillingness to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted.  Our prisons are an issue.  Plus we've had a lot of racial related social problems that perhaps some Western countries suffer less from.  The social issues could make our society more violent to begin with.

 

I'm not sure what the point being made here is, but people are more than willing to treat the homeless/and/or/addicted in SF.  We have some amazing organizations to work with all these issues, including Glide (glide.org), the charity that receives the proceeds from Warren Buffett's lunch auctions.  It's located in the Tenderloin, the area I'm talking about.

 

However, drug addicts still do *lots* of crimes in the area.  "Crackheads" are unfortunately very real here.

 

I was speaking about the country as a whole, not specifically about a neighborhood in San Francisco. 

 

We either just love to shoot other people so much that even the deterrent of armed civilians doesn't stop us... or...

 

We have social problems perhaps that other countries aren't having?  By this question I am being generous to the right to bear arms crowd by offering an explanation other than the guns themselves for why we have so many shootings.

 

Thus, I was looking at how we treat our potentially violent people.  Drug users for example -- the can be sent to jail which is less productive than sending them to treatment programs.  That's what I was referencing when I was thinking of the unwillingness to treat the addiction as a disease rather than a crime.

 

[NormR]

Are we asking the right question?  What if the crazy person had thrown a big Molotov Cocktail  into a crowded room?  Would we be talking about banning gasoline?  Shouldn't we be talking instead about why it is so difficult to get psychotic and potentially violent people into secure, involuntary custodial care before they do something terrible, not afterward?

 

Speaking of gas, there was an even worse event in 1927, the Bath School disaster, where "The Bath School disaster is the name given to three bombings in Bath Township, Michigan, on May 18, 1927, which killed 38 elementary school children, two teachers, four other adults and the bomber; at least 58 people were injured. Most of the victims were children in the second to sixth grades (7–14 years of age) attending the Bath Consolidated School. Their deaths constitute the deadliest mass murder in a school in U.S. history."

[Parsad]

Are we asking the right question?  What if the crazy person had thrown a big Molotov Cocktail  into a crowded room?  Would we be talking about banning gasoline?  Shouldn't we be talking instead about why it is so difficult to get psychotic and potentially violent people into secure, involuntary custodial care before they do something terrible, not afterward?

 

That's probably part of the issue, but for example in this case, there weren't obvious indications that this lunatic was loony.  So how do you lock him up, when you have no clue?  One option is to not give him the opportunity to inflict mass casualties.  He was denied a gun of his own a few weeks earlier, yet simply just took his mother's available guns instead.  Cheers!

[ERICOPOLY]

But anyways, I'm one of the Americans who has several firearms.  Four pistols and a shotgun.  I even have a Washington State concealed carry license! 

 

Sport shooting only, not self-defense.  They are out in the garage, in a safe, and when I die somebody is going to have to hire a pro to forcibly open the safe to extract the guns because the combination to the lock is known only to me and not written down anywhere.

 

I don't live in a ghetto like the Tenderloin -- if I did I'd probably keep the shotgun loaded in the house with a few of those beanbag shells followed by buckshot. 

 

Should the government ever need to be overthrown, I'll be in Australia on the beach somewhere.

 

[west]

The 6 square block area of Hastings & Main in Vancouver is considered the poorest and most down-trodden zip code in all of North America.  At least it was until about 4 years ago, when alot of capital and social stimulus programs began providing more social housing and support. 

 

Once the main shopping area of downtown Vancouver, about 25 years ago it began an unprecedented downward spiral.  Shopping areas were replaced with crack houses, skid-row housing, rampant prostitution and unbelievable squalor and poverty.  For a city where the average house price is over one million dollars and the average family income is over $125,000 annually! 

 

There were crackheads and drug addicts shooting up in plain view, with police officers walking by and ambulances carrying overdose victims away on an hourly basis.  In fact, one of the worst serial killers in North American history, Willie Pickton, managed to lure away some 50 homeless or vulnerable women to his farm, where they were raped, killed, butchered and fed to his pigs. 

 

Yet in this putrid environment, an area that Vancouverites should be ashamed to have ever allowed to happen, there was very little gun violence relative to the rest of the city.  So, the fear of crackheads breaking into homes and shooting up victims is a fallacy.  It's rich, upper-class, mostly white, right-wing suburbanites that perpetuate this theory of protecting their homes with guns, so that crackheads don't break in and rape your wife or young daughters while the husband is helplessly tied to a chair...damn you raping crackheads who take buses to gated communities, walk past security posts, and then break into homes with alarm systems!   

 

Used to be black slaves 200 years ago, now it's crackheads!  ;D  Cheers!

 

Sounds worse than the Tenderloin!

 

It's a shame.  I kind of know how the Tenderloin got started out (*part* of it actually happened due to a public policy decision - we were bringing homeless and mentally ill people to the city to help them, and then allowing them to camp out without prosecution while simultaneously paying them), but I am curious how neighborhoods in general start to degrade.  I'm sure that almost none of them besides the tenderloin are shitty due to some old, weird public policy decision like we had here.

 

As far as crackheads getting onto buses to invade gated suburban homes, I agree.  It's probably not an issue, except for in a post-apocalyptic world kind of scenario.  And then I'm sure they'd find a way to take a car.  :D

 

Still, some of us hate the suburbs, and prefer to live where there's risk.  If I lived closer to the Tenderloin, or if I lived in Oakland, I would prefer to have the option to hedge my risk.  Probably with a shotgun loaded with few beanbag shells followed by buckshot.  :D

 

[Parsad]

Should the government ever need to be overthrown, I'll be in Australia on the beach somewhere.

 

Unless it's Australia's government that gets overthrown, and your guns are locked up back in Washington!  ;D  You can always catch a flight to Fiji in that case I guess, but then there is a coup there every 5 years.  Cheers!