Shooting in Texas

[DanDeFool]

I agree entirely. Of course, I'd prefer we try something that actually has some chance of success rather than something that is doomed to failure from the get-go. Of course, civilization has been trying to stop this kind of shit for millennia (and have been way more successful than they get credit for, by the way), so I'd be happy to hear an alternative that isn't based on myopic, reactionary bullshit.

You mean gun control? So are you one of the people who writes off Australia's success as an anomaly?

I mean the US had an assault weapons ban for 5 years via Clinton and because of a lack of definitive evidence that it was effecting a solution, people use it as definitive proof that such measures wont work. Has no one considered the possibility that such measures need to be used long term, or that perhaps it wasn't strict enough, etcetera.

Before you call Australia's gun ban a "success" you should read [URL="http://www.snopes.com/crime/statistics/ausguns.asp" (title,target)]this[/URL]. Sounds more like "slight modification to the status-quo" than "success" to me. And if you believe [URL="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323777204578195470446855466.html" (title,target)] this guy[/URL], Britain's attempts at strict gun control laws have been an outright failure.

I also agree that gun control won't work unless you're strict enough. Unfortunately, I think being strict enough for this to work means declaring martial law, suspending our protection from unreasonable search-and-seizure, and ordering the military and municipal police forces to do a rigorous house-by-house, building-by-building search to make sure they get ALL the guns.

It's not enough to just make law-abiding citizens turn in their registered weapons. Who knows how many illegal and unregistered weapons there are out there? Bottom line, exorbitantly expensive, hugely time consuming, throws out ALL of our constitutional rights, and no certainty if it'll stop mass violence from happening (as I said before, you don't have to use guns to kill lots of people).

And even if you do affect a complete and thorough civilian disarmament, can you keep everyone disarmed? The Mexican cartels are masters at making a profit on exporting illegal goods. They would jump at the chance to make a few billion dollars re-arming our nation's criminal element. Before the weapons ban, these guys had to be careful they didn't try to car-jack the wrong guy, or break into the wrong house; that law-abiding citizen could be armed, after all. Now, they don't have to worry; the government has made sure that a gun-wielding criminal will meet with no substantial resistance. One problem solved (maybe), other problems worsened.

I don't see why this is so hard to understand. If I'm going to commit a crime, why do I care about what our gun laws are? I'm already going to break the law by killing/robbing/raping/kidnapping/etcetera-ing someone, what do I care about adding possession of an illegal weapon on top of that? The only difference is I have to give a couple thousand dollars to my local dealer for my weapons instead of the gun shop down the street, with an added benefit that I can now commit this crime with a weapon that cannot be traced back to me.

You want to crack down on guns? How about cracking down on trafficking in illegal weapons before you go after people who just want to defend themselves... and maybe shoot at some ducks or... something.

 

[Ryotknife]

It's really bugging me. It's like some obnoxious meme that everyone suddenly accepts without question. I mean hell we have studies linking video games and violence and people will go and be skeptical about those, and I am to a small degree though as long as it's not jumping to shooting sprees I would be so quick to condemn some link(may not even be causal), but when we find a target that's not video games and not guns? Then jump all on the bandwagon and just start throwing it out as practically an accusation without so much as knowing the situation.

It's the path of the lazy. To accept a problem would mean to change and to change would mean to make an effort.

Unfortunately, it works. Remember when Bush shamed the coverage of the war in Iraq?

I'm not exactly sure what would stop them from loving their guns.

Damn it, I'm stumped. Socialised guns?

The worst crime in the US tends to be in areas with strict gun control. various NY cities, Baltimore, Chicago, Washington DC, Detriot.

New York has seen quite a decrease in violence, and in terms of gun crime, New York is one of the safest.

Although to be fair, even if guns disappeared tomorrow washington DC would still be dangerous as hell. The drivers there are crazy as hell.

And when cars are the favoured method of killing someone....

Also, our crime has been going down in the country, not up. It has been going down for decades

Of course, gun crime is a different issue. when Breitbart tried to pull the "baseball bats kill more people than assault rifles do!" crap, he linked to statistics that put the gun crime rate at relatively stable. It's almost like non-firearm crimes seem to be the bulk of the decrease....

That's the thing, I'm not saying that no one should be allowed to have guns; I'm saying that people need to be more responsible with their guns.

Of course, this is America, where because we can we should.

Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester, and Albany, the 4 major cities after New York City, has crime comparable to Chicago. NYC is a lot safer than it used to be 20 years ago, but then you have to remember how effing dangerous it was back then. Still higher than average, but not bad all things considered. Probably the ONLY "safe" major population center in the entire state. Course it helped that their police department significantly increased in force whereas the rest of the state has to cut their budget....must be nice.


crime, in general, has been going down in the US. From NY to Texas. The country's homicide rate has dropped by 50% since the 70's. Which is why it is funny that non-americans ae saying how US is becoming more and more dangerous when the OPPOSITE is true. But what they dont understand is that our population is BURSTING compared to just about anyone else. From 1980 to 2010, our populaion increased by nearly 50% from 220 million to 313 million.

by comparison, UK's population has only increased by 10% in that same time period. The US population is increasing at the rate of 3-4 million per year.

thankfully we have a crapton of habitable land that is still barely used. The entire middle of our country is practically empty.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

You know, I was talking with my Dad after hearing about the Sandy Hook shooting and I was saying how I wonder how many shootings it'll take before the USA realizes that maybe letting every Tom, Dick, and Harry have a gun is not such a brainy idea.

when the issues in which owning a gun is no longer the most feasible option are solved. Many more lives will be lost if guns were banned or severely restricted like NY state. The amount of lives that will now be lost to wildlife ALONE will probbly outnumber those lost to mass shootings.

The worst crime in the US tends to be in areas with strict gun control. various NY cities, Baltimore, Chicago, Washington DC, Detriot.

Although to be fair, even if guns disappeared tomorrow washington DC would still be dangerous as hell. The drivers there are crazy as hell.

Also, our crime has been going down in the country, not up. It has been going down for decades

by the by, every Tom, Dick, and Harry can NOT have a gun.

That's the thing, I'm not saying that no one should be allowed to have guns; I'm saying that people need to be more responsible with their guns.

"America" and "Responsible" do not go in the same sentence. You should know that by now!

I wasn't going to go there, but okaaaay...

You know, I was talking with my Dad after hearing about the Sandy Hook shooting and I was saying how I wonder how many shootings it'll take before the USA realizes that maybe letting every Tom, Dick, and Harry have a gun is not such a brainy idea.

when the issues in which owning a gun is no longer the most feasible option are solved. Many more lives will be lost if guns were banned or severely restricted like NY state. The amount of lives that will now be lost to wildlife ALONE will probbly outnumber those lost to mass shootings.

The worst crime in the US tends to be in areas with strict gun control. various NY cities, Baltimore, Chicago, Washington DC, Detriot.

Although to be fair, even if guns disappeared tomorrow washington DC would still be dangerous as hell. The drivers there are crazy as hell.

Also, our crime has been going down in the country, not up. It has been going down for decades

by the by, every Tom, Dick, and Harry can NOT have a gun.

That's the thing, I'm not saying that no one should be allowed to have guns; I'm saying that people need to be more responsible with their guns.

thats perfectly fine, I even applaud it. Even though im pro-gun, I do not own one nor have a desire to. The gun safe thing im kinda iffy on. On the one hand it will help against accident and gun thefts, on the other that makes home defense that much harder.

The real question is how do you ensure that gun owners handle their guns responsibly, ie keeping them unloaded and locked up in a secure cabinet when not in use among other things.

 

[Ryotknife]

The real question is how do you ensure that gun owners handle their guns responsibly, ie keeping them unloaded and locked up in a secure cabinet when not in use among other things.

That is tough. Yea, you can pass measures like the ones you are suggesting, but then that makes guns for self defense kinda....useless. Oftentimes you will not be able to unlock the cabinet and load the gun in time (and call the police) before the assailant is upon you. And if you do have minutes, you might not even need the gun because you can escape/barricade until the police arrive. Course this all depends on the layout of your house and the purpose of the intrusion obviously. But someone in a small house or apartment (which is what most establishments in bad neighboroohds are) is not going to have much warning. I am not against it per se it is just a "damned if you do damned if you dont" in my eyes.

At my old place, someone could break in, stab me in the throat, and be out in less han 15 seconds.

It would be nice if we had guns with some sort of biometric scanner so that only the owner could use it. or gun cases.

 

[TheLogicalGamer]

I decided to write up a copy-paste thing to stick on these forums whenever gun issues come up. Takes too long to write new ones with how frequently gun control comes up around here.

---------------------------------------------
Haven't even bothered to look at anything past page 2. I'm calling it now that by page 5 this will be about Gun Control, so here are my two cents before I address the actual topic this Thread is supposed to be about.

This country is practically built around firearms, and was literally built with them. Guns are so finely ingrained in our culture that to remove them would change us on a fundamental level, and I can't see a way to accurately predict if the change will be positive or negative.

On one hand less guns means less shootings. That's a given. On the other hand, I don't think it will reduce violence in general. Violent individuals will move to more brute-force or sophisticated methods. People who would have tried a shooting will move to other weapons. Knives, machetes, and other bladed weapons. Blunt ones like bats or just your average piece of lead pipe. That's the best case scenario. Its also fairly likely from where I stand. Blunt instruments are easy to learn to use, and bladed weapons aren't much more complicated to use on people who don't know how to counter them.

Worst case scenario, they move to more dangerous things than guns. Improvised explosives is a possibility there. Which would cause more destruction after all? A single shooter in a school, or bombs set up outside of classrooms that are set to go off at the same time? Cutting out guns would just force mass-murderers to become more sophisticated in their methods. Look up columbine, they tried to use explosives in the cafeteria made from propane tanks in conjunction with their shooting, people just got lucky that the bombs were defective. Imagine if those two had actually bothered to make sure the bombs were assembled correctly?

Even next to that, there are probably worse alternatives to a shooting. From where I sit, current gun control isn't enough. But we are far from the worst case scenario. As it is I would say the mental healthcare system and gun laws need to be reviewed. Weaknesses need to be addressed and things need to be altered. We should also look at how our media sensationalizes these events. Laws on what they can cover, and when they can cover them, should be put in place. Perhaps banning the release of the name and image of a shooter in custody would be effective.

I'm out.


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Now, in response to the main topic. This was a fight between individuals, not a mass-shooting. Its not that unusual, and there are no fatalities. The shooter will probably get a decade in a cell, bit less if the courts go easy on him for it being a heat of the moment decision.

Just for you guys who aren't from Eagleland here, our court system isn't built so much around punishing criminals as rehabilitating them or keeping them locked away from those of us who aren't criminally inclined. Most shooters could probably be rehabilitated, or were victims themselves that struck back at people who were tormenting them when they thought there was no other way out. Thats why we have a crime of passion, or heat of the moment, defense. If you weren't in your right mind, say if you were in a fit of rage, then rehabilitation should be much simpler. Its also why we are more lenient on second time offenders.

Sad bit is that with the state of our prisons the guy will probably come out having learned something in there. Which means he will run the risk of becoming a legitimate threat. There might be a, cure worse than the disease risk there.

Anyway, this is depressing me.
Hacket Out...
Oh wait- that's the other guy.

 

[Hagi]

There's actually quite a few more outside the US:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting

The main point is though that the US isn't on that page. It's got it's own separate page. Which is larger than the entire rest of the world combined. Several times larger in fact.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_the_United_States

I'd personally say that's a bit odd to say the least.

Well contributing to that pages length is that it's got every single freaking incident on there. No matter if it happened 79 years ago, didn't involve pupils but a murder just happened to take place at a school, or was an accident, it's on the list. Whereas the other list is more of a "greatest-hits" if you will[footnote]forgive my choice of words there[/footnote]

Second, we've got more people in the US than Canada, Germany, Italy, the UK, and France combined. Obviously, there's other factors, but part of the large volume in the US is just that there's more people here, and more wacko's

I'd personally chalk it up to a mental healthcare system that basically only exists in prisons when it's already too late, a rabid media that goes to lengths unseen in most every other country to glorify any killers and gun laws that allow firearms to be sold to drunks (it's officially recommended not to, but that's just a recommendation). That's an unique combination not found anywhere else.

Europe is a lot bigger than those four countries and in total there's twice the people there than in the US even when not counting Russia.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

The real question is how do you ensure that gun owners handle their guns responsibly, ie keeping them unloaded and locked up in a secure cabinet when not in use among other things.

That is tough. Yea, you can pass measures like the ones you are suggesting, but then that makes guns for self defense kinda....useless. Oftentimes you will not be able to unlock the cabinet and load the gun in time (and call the police) before the assailant is upon you. And if you do have minutes, you might not even need the gun because you can escape/barricade until the police arrive. Course this all depends on the layout of your house and the purpose of the intrusion obviously. But someone in a small house or apartment (which is what most establishments in bad neighboroohds are) is not going to have much warning. I am not against it per se it is just a "damned if you do damned if you dont" in my eyes.

At my old place, someone could break in, stab me in the throat, and be out in less han 15 seconds.

It would be nice if we had guns with some sort of biometric scanner so that only the owner could use it. or gun cases.

The thing is I wasn't suggesting the passing of any measures because it really isn't possible to force gun owners to take those kind of precautions when it comes to their guns. You can pass whatever laws you want, but unless you're able to effectively enforce them there really isn't much point; and I don't see how you'd effectively enforce that.
As for self-defence, well sure I guess; but leaving a loaded gun laying around just increases the likelihood that it'll fall into the hands of someone who'll go and shoot up a school.

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

According to this [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/22/lone-star-college-shooting_n_2527806.html#26_lone-star-says-situation-under-control] the situation is under control. Apparently it was an altercation between a few students. Doesn't sound like a premeditated shooting, but who knows at this point.

*Facepalm* Ugh. That's pretty pathetic, not to mention dangerous. How does bad an argument have to get before people start pulling guns on each. Am I in some sort of alternate universe where we still think shooting each is the best way to solve a disagreement? Fuckin' ridiculous.

 

[DanDeFool]

-snip-

I give up... You'll just use any excuse to spout your lies about how globally proven methods of gun control do not work and how the world will be MUCH safer if every person in the world had access to at least 5 firearms regardless of age, gender, race or mental stability. I look forward to reading more of your trolling in a couple of months time at the next mass shooting in the USA. Just make sure to never come over here to Australia. It's been 11 years since the last shooting and frankly we would like to keep it that way!

I give up too. You'll continue to think of gun control as a one size fits all solution for every country, ignoring the fact that geography and crime dictate how well, if at all, gun control will work for a given place. You'll also somehow continue to believe that a ban on firearms will somehow make all the crazy people not decide to kill people with fire or explosives or something else like that.

I don't know how you got it in your head that I thought children should be allowed to buy RPGs and machine guns. That's stupid. I am opposed to disarming mentally-stable, law-abiding adult citizens, which is currently how Australia does things. Judicious gun control is okay, but to emulate Australia we would be repealing the second amendment. That's not gun control, it's a ban on firearms.

P.S. :Nobody was talking about gun control after the Oklahoma City bombing. Think about it.

 

[Loonyyy]

So wait... news media "sensationalization" of these events, causes more of them, but pop culture like movies and video games doesn't?

So, Columbine inspire shooters, but Scarface doesn't? So Virginia Tech inspires more, but GTA doesn't? So Sandy hook inspires more, but Matthew Reilly doesn't?

Really gamers, come the fuck on, you're embarrassing me. Stupid speculation about games causing these acts is bad. Moronic defenses by Jim Sterling make us look foolish, and then making exactly the same claim about other forms of media makes us look retarded. The critics of violence in games say it inspires violence, and then we say that the news media reporting on it inspires violence. So, media representations of violence, and the making of celebrities from violent characters inspires violence? You don't see the parallels between the two lines of reasoning?

Before someone gets the wrong idea-I love my violent video games. I split my time between Mount and Blade, Skyrim, Gmod, Red Orchestra and CoD. But we don't need to get all scared about defending them. If they try to ban them, we can stop them. If they say something that's factually in error (Fox on Mass Effect, Jack Thompson on GTA), we can shut them down. When they make stupid connections between things, we can point it out. But try to claim similar things about the news is ridiculous.

Especially when you get all anti-science about it. Here's a list of things that cause aggression:
-Loud violent music
-Swearing
-Violent films
Really, I'd be suprised if violent video games didn't cause aggression. It still wouldn't show that they caused actual violence, and it still wouldn't show that they needed to be banned over anything else. See, science has no problem with it! Of course there are the dodgier people out there (*cough* Susan Greenfield), who are attempting to, with flawed studies, inform people that video games cause violence. Who tears them apart? Science and science media.

Here's some food for thought-maybe they make violent video games because they sell. Maybe they cover school shootings, because that's what people watch above other topics. It's convenient to call the news media leeches and the like, but seriously, we'd expect these things to be reported on. It's the quantity and the availability of the reporting, and the period over which it happens that gets to us. But as long as people are still interested, the news media gets money by doing it, so they keep doing it. The reporting is a by-product of the viewing habits. We can't just get away from it by scapegoating the media as the evil, it's simply giving us what they think we want. It'll change when enough people aren't interested in it any more.

 

[YCRanger]

-snip-

I give up... You'll just use any excuse to spout your lies about how globally proven methods of gun control do not work and how the world will be MUCH safer if every person in the world had access to at least 5 firearms regardless of age, gender, race or mental stability. I look forward to reading more of your trolling in a couple of months time at the next mass shooting in the USA. Just make sure to never come over here to Australia. It's been 11 years since the last shooting and frankly we would like to keep it that way!

I give up too. You'll continue to think of gun control as a one size fits all solution for every country, ignoring the fact that geography and crime dictate how well, if at all, gun control will work for a given place. You'll also somehow continue to believe that a ban on firearms will somehow make all the crazy people not decide to kill people with fire or explosives or something else like that.

I don't know how you got it in your head that I thought children should be allowed to buy RPGs and machine guns. That's stupid. I am opposed to disarming mentally-stable, law-abiding adult citizens, which is currently how Australia does things. Judicious gun control is okay, but to emulate Australia we would be repealing the second amendment. That's not gun control, it's a ban on firearms.

P.S. :Nobody was talking about gun control after the Oklahoma City bombing. Think about it.

Dude Australia = America. Clearly if we just had the same laws that they have on a completely different continent things would work out exactly the same. I don't know why you can't understand that.

 

[Something Amyss]

Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester, and Albany, the 4 major cities after New York City, has crime comparable to Chicago. NYC is a lot safer than it used to be 20 years ago, but then you have to remember how effing dangerous it was back then. Still higher than average, but not bad all things considered. Probably the ONLY "safe" major population center in the entire state. Course it helped that their police department significantly increased in force whereas the rest of the state has to cut their budget....must be nice.

NYState has some of the lowest gun crime per capita. So if all the major population centers are so dangerous (save NYC)...No, the math doesn't work. Sorry.

Oh, are you talking violence in general? Again, flimsy argument against gun control.

 

[Something Amyss]

It does seem to work. Though I was in high school during most of Bush's presidency and didn't pay much attention until a couple years later so don't recall that >__<

It basically came down to the media reporting all these deaths, civilian and military, and Bush (and his administration) complaining that they only talked about the negative elements of the war.

It's kind of like saying "but think of all the women I didn't rape," and it worked.

HUZZAH!

 

[WorriedSandwich]

Its like theyre trying to get as many shootings in before the assault weapon ban

I am most certainly going to hell for this.

 

[Edl01]

I don't get the point in these arguments. The people who don't want their guns taken away are clearly not willing to change their stance due to these crimes and if that won't do you think a forum debate will?
I am glad it seems it was on a small scale. But this is getting ridiculous.

 

[Edl01]

There's actually quite a few more outside the US:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting

The main point is though that the US isn't on that page. It's got it's own separate page. Which is larger than the entire rest of the world combined. Several times larger in fact.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_the_United_States

I'd personally say that's a bit odd to say the least.

This...just this.

 

[Lieju]

As for self-defence, well sure I guess; but leaving a loaded gun laying around just increases the likelihood that it'll fall into the hands of someone who'll go and shoot up a school.

Or, more likely, someone like a child or a drunk person gets their hands on it and inadvertedly hurts either themselves or someone else.

Really, I think that's a bigger problem than crazy mass murderers.
I live on the countryside, and see a lot of hunting. I agree hunting is necessary to control some animal populations, but a lot of hunters don't follow the safety procedures all that closely.

 

[LGC Pominator]

what if anti-gun activists are going out shooting ppl in the hopes of changes being made?

Wow... that is some Alex Jones tier crazy theory there, I love it!
Come to think of it the conspiracy theory by Beck that Alex Jones IS the conspiracy was also pretty damn funny, basically the idea was to make their side of the argument look so unhinged that arguing in their favour would look similarly crazy.

As for the topic at hand, does anyone else find it upsetting that our response to this now is just "oh no one died / only 3 people were injured, thats not news!" Kinda worrying when you look at it in context.
This whole gun thing is kinda mental, especially when you hear all the talk about "protecting second amendment rights" when most of these people don't actually seem to belong to an actual, well regulated, state militia... you know, like the second amendment provides you the right to belong to?

Oh wait the "second amendment" is just "the right to bear arms" nothing else, silly foreign me.

For the record, since I know I will probably get hate for this either way, I am going to just throw it out there that the whole gun argument is something that I would normally have no interest in, but whenever I hear some news coming out of the states these days it is ALL gun stuff, frankly its kind of annoying, can you all like... stop with the gun obsession or something? it really isn't helping any of us

 

[AgedGrunt]

This whole gun thing is kinda mental, especially when you hear all the talk about "protecting second amendment rights" when most of these people don't actually seem to belong to an actual, well regulated, state militia... you know, like the second amendment provides you the right to belong to?

Oh wait the "second amendment" is just "the right to bear arms" nothing else, silly foreign me.

First of all, there are militias (billed under "nuts" by many). Secondly, the Constitution doesn't say the people have to exercise every right. It is a blueprint of government, powers the people are entrusting to it and their rights. People are not required to form a militia any more than own a firearm. They do not need to petition government, redress grievances or join a religion; you are free to do so if you choose. Is the concept of liberty so difficult to understand?

...whenever I hear some news coming out of the states these days it is ALL gun stuff, frankly its kind of annoying, can you all like... stop with the gun obsession or something? it really isn't helping any of us

If it's all gun-related news, what does that say about media? Who is really obsessing over guns here? It couldn't be television, journalists, politicians and people, such as those on this forum, that make thread after thread, pages upon pages of Chicken Little freak-out responses stirring up all this controversy. Then the vitriol against guns, the second amendment, gun owners/culture and the NRA itself as if the objects, the Constitution and law-abiding, peaceful people put the guns in the hands of these mass shooters.

Do you know what the statistically deadliest thing to man is? Malaria. Who is talking about that? Certainly not the mainstream media, politicians and definitely not the Escapist. I mean, who cares about those millions dead?

One more thing, when politicians want to ban all AR- and AK- rifles, including a lot of other powerful weapons, what's the militia supposed to arm itself with? I'm surprised someone is even suggesting Americans can form a militia; many think the entire role of the amendment has been properly displaced by the government they adhere to and obey (read: cling to and lobby against all restriction, which sounds awfully familiar).

 

[Mcupobob]

On the subject of shootings, since that seems to be the topic. Why not start going Ancient Greek on these guys, stuff them in a bag throw them in the ocean and delete them form history making it a crime to say their name... Though in the age of the Internet that could be difficult.