Mass Shootings and Gun Debate 2018 Thread

[JessFR]

I don't think most people ever cared about freedom over quality of life. It was always about quality of life, it's just different people's at different times have tied the former to the latter to different degrees.

 

[JGrimez]

This would have been interesting and maybe settled some issues but unfortunately:

A Parkland high school student who agreed to a live debate over his conflicting views over gun reform with fellow Marjory Stoneman Douglas student Kyle Kashuv has pulled out of the deal.
Cameron Kasky, an organizer of the pro-gun control March for Our Lives movement, tweeted Monday night that he won?t debate Kashuv, a pro-Second Amendment voice, following a tweet Kashuv seemingly disapproved of.

?Kyle, I?ve enjoyed my discussion about gun laws with you so far, but after seeing this, I think I?m out. For personal reasons,? Kasky said, adding that while he ?disagree on certain policies with some family members of some victims,? he would ?never go after them, especially not like this. This is low.

 

[JGrimez]

Killer Mike, Colion Noir: The Gun Conversation You Need to See
https://youtu.be/ZXtpUE1b2NY

"I know why it's being done. It's systematic. But this idea that because I'm a gun owner or I'm hardcore about the second amendment - that doesn't mean that I lack the empathy or the ability to sympathize with what happened. If anything it's quite the opposite. We disagree about how we both want to save these kids' lives. Period. But somehow because my method doesn't agree with your method, I'm a monster, or there's something wrong with me".

 

[swilow]

^I'm finding it very hard to understand what you are saying here. It seems to be mainly pro-gun and conspiracy theory stuff. I'll just say flat out that we don't have much tolerance for that sort of shit here.

 

[cduggles]

As someone who has several guns, supports the Second Amendment (although not to fight against tyranny or the threat of tyranny), I don't understand why it's so difficult to listen to the kids from Parkland High about gun violence without attacking them.

Presumably we are all humans who are attending or have attended school. Should a kid have to worry about being shot? We are way past Columbine and anyone who doesn't think it's possible in their neck of the woods is to some degree unrealistic.

The only defense that politicians and gun nuts seem to have is that it's in the Constitution, which doesn't mean anything unless the Supreme Court rules that their current interpretation of the Constitution supports limiting or not limiting a freedom in question, such as freedom of speech. Which is limited.

Here are the other suggestions:
1. Fix mental health care system
2. Fix law enforcement
3. Fix video game violence (Trump)
4. Fix school system/warning system for at-risk students
5. Arm teachers and I guess teach them how to take out active, possibly multiple, shooters preferably without collateral damage. Also keep gun secure but ready to use at all times.

Do any of these things seem more feasible than gun control? I'm thinking no.

I'd like to hear some more ideas from someone other than JessFR (I think your ideas are really interesting and sensible Jess, but I'm addressing others.)

The opinion that mass shootings are happening and gun laws are fine as currently written and enforced has been expressed. If that's your opinion, you are entitled to it. Just say so.

Dumping on kids who are too perfect/not perfect enough who are courageous enough to speak out when I would be under my bed is just pathetic. As if.

 

[JGrimez]

^I'm finding it very hard to understand what you are saying here. It seems to be mainly pro-gun and conspiracy theory stuff. I'll just say flat out that we don't have much tolerance for that sort of shit here.

I'm sorry? Why do you not understand it? What exactly is a conspiracy theory? Is this a gun debate thread or an anti-gun thread?

 

[cduggles]

Show me the manner in which a nation cares for its dead and I will measure with mathematical exactness the tender mercies of its people, their respect for the laws of the land, and their loyalty to high ideals. - Sir William Ewart Gladstone

Wonderful quote.

true. the government also knows to take away guns from it's citizens it would make them so numb and blind they wouldn't put up a fight and that is why supply lines are their ammo: keep giving americans the latest conveniences, excitement, show them the big words that mean empty promises while concealing the fine print and keep patting them on the back for absolutely nothing at all to ensure the average person doesn't understand that something has changed until it's too late. (<-- funny how the word american can be replaced with human being)

"We've won. People no longer care about their civil liberties. They care about their standard of life. The modern world has outgrown notions like freedom. They're content to follow." Ellen Kaye (fictional character)

it's a coin toss on ugly and thorough or slow and painless. i think it depends on who occupies the white house that term.

I'm usually outcome driven, but the insidious nature of gradual numbing and unraveling of civil liberties seems so much more chilling!

 

[swilow]

Cduggles, I personally think guns are not needed in civilised society, so my 'solution' to the problem of mass shootings would be to remove as many guns as I could from it.

I dunno, I think that guns and humans do not mix so well.

I'm sorry? Why do you not understand it? What exactly is a conspiracy theory? Is this a gun debate thread or an anti-gun thread?

Okay then. Thanks for clarifiying

 

[BehindtheShadow]

I am a gun owner and in my opinion it's not the gun that is dangerous it's the person behind the gun.
I don't know why America has these school shootings, here in SA I don't even think we have had a school shooting (I stand to be corrected) and my country is very high in stats in terms of extremely violent crime but not in our schools.

It really is a mind boggle

 

[Xorkoth]

To JGrimes:

Last time I checked, teenagers are allowed to speak their minds, and shouldn't be silenced if you don't like what they're saying. Just because they're under 18 doesn't mean they don't have coherent ideas or that it's not valid for them to exercise their rights as Americans. You think they're shills? Look at the politicians, those fuckers are shills. These kids are just doing what they feel is right in response to 17 of their friends and peers being slaughtered. I've heard the argument used that their protesting dishonors the memories of their dead friends and even that it dishonors the memory of all previous school shooting victims. To me that like of thought it baffling. How does it dishonor anyone? The surviving kids (they are survivors after all, despite some people's insistence on trying to frame them as something else) are doing what they feel most strongly honors their memories. They're trying to get this craziness to stop, because their whole lives they've been living in fear of it while seeing that it's happening consistently all across the country. Maybe their proposed solution isn't right but I can't understand where you get off insulting them/trying to invalidate their reasons/trying to undermine their character? To say the behavior is cruel and callous... would be describing it perfectly.

Again, disagree with them all you want, that's your right and I can respect that. But what do you think gives you the right to be cruel and callous to them, to try at every opportunity to undermine their worth? How can you explain yourself so I can understand how this behavior is acceptable and justified? I haven't seen you (or anyone on your side) address or explain this yet.

 

[alasdairm]

Exactly, if you're going to give immature political activists a platform then give a voice to both sides.

both sides have a voice so what's your point?

a common response from right-leaners when discussing free expression is, crudely paraphrased, "yes you're free to say that but i'm free to disagree/tell you you're an idiot for saying it/whatever" but they seem to get very bent out of shape when the shoe is on the other foot...

alasdair

 

[alasdairm]

I am a gun owner and in my opinion it's not the gun that is dangerous it's the person behind the gun.

of course the person behind the gun is dangerous but would sandy hook and parkland have been the incidents they were if the perpetrator had a sharpened stick? of course not.

guns don't kill people. people kill people! yep, they do. and they do it with guns.

given all the alternatives to guns are readily available - knives, etc. - why do the perpetrators of these acts tend to always choose a gun?

alasdair

 

[Xorkoth]

The important thing about what they're saying is this: "wake up people, we're getting desensitized to this. School shootings happen and we all wail and moan for a day or two and then forget all about it. It's becoming normalized and no policy decisions are happening that are solving anything, and the "solution" proposed so far is bringing far more guns into schools. We need to do something. No one is doing anything and we feel like we need to do something since no one else is and we're getting slaughtered over and over again." In a nutshell. No, kids should not be allowed to make policy decisions. But do you agree that something needs to be done, and no one has been doing anything? That's the heart of this thing. Trying to mobilize society to do something. Obvious they think we'd be better off without guns. That's fine, it seems incredibly unlikely that's going to happen, but we can't just hum along and hope the problem goes away by itself.

 

[alasdairm]

right.

alasdair

 

[Droppersneck]

^ we have Air Marshals too as a result tbf. Men with guns on virtually every flight! Folks sure did forget about the Maryland school shooting. Good guy with a gun prevented casualties.

 

[swilow]

i hate trying to learn about something and getting tainted info on it. i also agree with them on the gun not being dangerous but the person using it is. sit a gun in the corner of a room and it wont do anything besides sit there. it has no sentient consciousness of it's own.

That argument can be extended to all sort of weaponry. A missile is stable and 'safe' if unarmed. Why can't citizens own tanks or military submarines? Or binary nerve agents?

The thing is, we are not talking about guns sitting in the corners of rooms. We are talking about unstable humans who shouldn't even be allowed to drive SOMEHOW being able to legally purchase as many guns as they want.

There are two problems; one is the potentiality of a gun to be used as a weapon, and the other is a sort cultural creed which says guns are there to be used as weapons. Clearly, the latter is something that can only be changed wilfully and from within the culture, so children with novel ideals who will lead the world in the future are perfect candidates for this. The former issue could be partially mitigated by removing these potential weapons to the greatest degree possible.

I'm of the view that all the logic and reasons and invocations of the Consitution are effectively null and void in this debate or irrelevant, because the gun lobby has the money to influence politicans. This is considered fair play under US law which considers money a kind of speech or expression. The reason the gun lobby is trying to maintain this status quo is that under the out-of-control capitalism emerging from the US, there are small handfuls of people making fucking buckets of money from selling weapons and we've seen how money buys influence and, effectively, power. These people are not disseminating weapons out of some loyalty to the Constitution or for any deeper moral or ethical reason than raking in the dollars.

^ we have Air Marshals too as a result tbf. Men with guns on virtually every flight! Folks sure did forget about the Maryland school shooting. Good guy with a gun prevented casualties.

That's something of a red herring. Given how many guns there are in the US, there should be many 'good guys' at these massacres, and yet no-one really steps in, not even the police at times. If guns could stop gun violence, I think you would have the lowest rate of gun homicide in the world, not one of the highest.

 

[alasdairm]

Folks sure did forget about the Maryland school shooting. Good guy with a gun prevented casualties.

not forgotten at all. in parkland a good guy with a gun was useless. does that make it somehow even?

alasdair

 

[alasdairm]

^ we have Air Marshals too as a result tbf. Men with guns on virtually every flight!

virtually every flight?

not even close droppers.

there are approximately 30,000 commercial flights every day in the u.s. the tsa does not make public figures for the number of air marshalls but clay biles (an ex navy seal, who spent five years as a federal air marshal and authored a book about the service) estimates there are about 3300 fams, of whom about 30% don't fly (i.e. they are in admin, training, etc.). so that comes to about 2310 fams (8% of daily commercial flights).

alasdair

 

[Droppersneck]

^Even so that’s a lot of trained guns on those planes. Imagine if every school had an officer like the one in Maryland! You would have kids thinking twice about shooting up schools. Most of these people are cowards looking for a soft target. They would probably change tactics to pulling fire alarms and mowing down crowds with daddies f350 or just good old fashion arson. Too bad we can’t pass laws that would realistically stop evil. That would be the most effective thing you could do, though unrealistic.

 

[JessFR]

Umm.. You know droppers we often don't agree but I'm a little stunned you don't see the problem with this logic.

We know school shooters put a lot of thought into school shootings already, most of them commit suicide as soon as it's over and virtually none of them come out alive.

I don't think there is any chance at all that the fear that they might die in the process will stop virtually any of them because none of them seem to expect to survive anyway. Surely you see how obvious this is?

You wanna put armed cops or whatever to stop school shootings when they happen that's one thing but as a deterrence is a laughable failure of recognizing what you're dealing with.

They're not robbing people, thieves are looking for soft targets. Spree killers are virtually always already suicidal and want to take as many people down with them as they can.