Jesus, what a horror. prayers to all affected by this. One of several mass shootings of late..
People are gonna freak out over this enough irl guys. I know emotions are running high, but let's try to keep name calling, politics, and other such things out of this. Let us mourn together for now. Those of you with children, give them one of the big hugs they say they hate so much but loved when they were younger. It will help you both in this time.
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Saying that "cars and alcohol aren't designed to kill, whereas guns are" and thus the supposition that firearms should be treated differently doesn't really sit well with me, and I can't really give you a concrete reason why. i believe your statement is a fallicious position—straw man fallacy perhaps.
This is tough and it really sucks. The issue is so much more than guns. Will enacting more stringent gun control laws do anything? It would certainly make some people feel better, but it won't fix the underlying issues that cause these types of situations.
That's some f!#!ed up shiznit.
Now, excuse me [hides thread]
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According to the CDC, there were 10,228 deaths due to alcohol impaired crashes in the US in 2010. They further state that 1.4 million drivers were arrested in the same year for driving under the influence of alcohol.
Furthermore, the CDC states that there were 32,885 deaths in motor vehicle accidents in 2010.
Shall we adopt your stance against firearms and apply it to alcohol and/or motor vehicles?
We regulate both alcohol and motor vehicles. So, sure.
But what you're trying to do here is bad. Really bad. And you probably know better, but do it anyway.
See, you're setting up a false equivalency. You're saying, "Hey, guns result in deaths! But so does booze and cars, so why not treat them the same!" That's as far as your thought on the matter goes.
That's awful.
See, guns are not cars. Guns are not bottles of whisky. Guns are tools with a sole purpose - to deal bodily harm in cases where the intent is to either kill the target, or to stop the target without regard for the target's survival. That's all they're used for. You could claim, "But what about deterrence?" but that won't get you anywhere; it's deterrence by threat of the above.
That difference is fundamental. A firearm, used properly for its intended purpose, kills someone. A car, used properly for its intended purpose, moves someone around. In fact, the only way you can kill someone with a car is if you use it improperly. The same goes for alcohol. They don't have a nonviolent purpose, and thus need to be approached from a standpoint of regulation bearing that in mind. And you know this. You know that a gun and a car are fundamentally different in a number of ways.
Also, characterizing my stance (or the stance of anyone in this thread) as being "against firearms" is disingenuous. No one is advocating a ban on guns. What we are advocating is intelligent policy that addresses the need for careful regulation of who is able to own a firearm, and what sorts of firearms they can own.
Ultimately, the problem is much much deeper than just guns and gun control.
Yes. Mental health needs to be prioritized, yesterday. Our need for a dramatic shift in how we, as a culture, approach and deal with mental health is urgent. But you're trying to sideline the gun issue. Not going to happen.
I'm not sure it's linked to a radical conservative belief.
It is, trust me. The modern American conservative movement is not the same as what is termed conservatism in Europe. It's a whole different beast, but firearm ownership is absolutely one of its traits.
Saying that "cars and alcohol aren't designed to kill, whereas guns are" and thus the supposition that firearms should be treated differently doesn't really sit well with me, and I can't really give you a concrete reason why.
You need a concrete reason.
i believe your statement is a fallicious position—straw man fallacy perhaps.
Nope, not a straw-man.
The only fallacy was yours: the false equivalency of claiming that, because guns kill people and cars can also kill people, they should be regulated similarly. That's an actual fallacy, and you should fix it in your own reasoning before you try to go after someone else's.
This is tough and it really sucks. The issue is so much more than guns. Will enacting more stringent gun control laws do anything?
Probably, yes.
It would certainly make some people feel better, but it won't fix the underlying issues that cause these types of situations.
The underlying issue makes the person unstable. It doesn't make the person automatically use a gun. Restrict access to firearms, and you increase the likelihood that events like today will play out with a much lower body count.
My condolences to the victims, their families, friends and communities.
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According to the CDC, there were 10,228 deaths due to alcohol impaired crashes in the US in 2010. They further state that 1.4 million drivers were arrested in the same year for driving under the influence of alcohol.Furthermore, the CDC states that there were 32,885 deaths in motor vehicle accidents in 2010.
Shall we adopt your stance against firearms and apply it to alcohol and/or motor vehicles?
Ultimately, the problem is much much deeper than just guns and gun control.
You may notice that you have to register your car annually to drive it, some states require annual inspections of your car, you have to have an up-to-date license which you had to pass a written test and a driving test to get. To top it off, there are cops patrolling the highways to monitor your use of a car and who will issue you a citation if they catch you using it improperly, including citing you if you are out of certain kinds of maintenance (bad lights). I'd say cars are the focus of an awful lot of regulation and oversight compared to guns...
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The death toll continues to rise, and it's already well past Columbine levels. The last year has seen a rash of violent mass shootings (this isn't even the first one this week!) and yet for some reason we still haven't given any serious attention to the issue of curbing gun violence and mass shootings. Every time someone tries to bring it up, he's immediately shut down by hordes of gun nuts with idiot-speak like, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people," or, "If everyone had a gun, people could protect themselves better!"
Yeah, 60 year-old Mrs. Henderson should be issued a firearm she doesn't know how to use so that in the event of an armed gunman with intent to kill entering her classroom, she can efficiently take him out while managing to avoid hitting any of the thirty panicked children in the process, before he has a chance to shoot her.
That's way better than restricting who is allowed to get ahold of what weapons.
You say that last line with the sarcasm it deserves, but many gun advocates would mean it literally.
Fact of the matter is we have a culture that worships the idea of personal violence as redress, our heroes all use guns, break all sorts of rules, and frequently get almost as nasty as the villains they pursue. Not to mention movies like "Falling Down". When violence becomes an acceptable method of redressing one's problems than violence will become a more common response.
I teach English in the UK and have taught To Kill a Mockingbird for several years. Two years ago a student asked why Harper Lee decided to make Atticus a crackshot with a gun so that he could win over his kids. Why not have him build a go-kart or fly kites or something? I didn't really have an answer to that but your post reminded me of the conversation.
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The only fallacy was yours: the false equivalency of claiming that, because guns kill people and cars can also kill people, they should be regulated similarly. That's an actual fallacy, and you should fix it in your own reasoning before you try to go after someone else's.
Actually, to be fair, I wasn't using alcohol/cars to say that we should regulate guns like alcohol/cars; rather I was trying to point out the fact that you quoted some statistics as justification for your position. I found statistics that were just as appalling but that we don't see the same vitriolic reaction like we do with firearms.
The underlying issue makes the person unstable. It doesn't make the person automatically use a gun. Restrict access to firearms, and you increase the likelihood that events like today will play out with a much lower body count.
By the same logic: Restrict access to alcohol, and you increase the likelihood that automobile accidents involving alcohol will play out with a much lower body count.
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The underlying issue makes the person unstable. It doesn't make the person automatically use a gun. Restrict access to firearms, and you increase the likelihood that events like today will play out with a much lower body count.
By the same logic: Restrict access to alcohol, and you increase the likelihood that automobile accidents involving alcohol will play out with a much lower body count.
Actually, that doesn't make any sense.
Restricting alcohol availability might reduce the number of incidents but would not affect their lethality.
I teach English in the UK and have taught To Kill a Mockingbird for several years. Two years ago a student asked why Harper Lee decided to make Atticus a crackshot with a gun so that he could win over his kids. Why not have him build a go-kart or fly kites or something? I didn't really have an answer to that but your post reminded me of the conversation.
To answer just this question it was to juxtapose how a calm peaceful man can also be capable of violence under the correct circumstances. It also represents his willingness to protect his family from the madness of the town folks racism that's been turned on him for his representation. I'm just saying lets not turn even To Kill A Mockingbird into some sort of endorsement of gun culture.
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The underlying issue makes the person unstable. It doesn't make the person automatically use a gun. Restrict access to firearms, and you increase the likelihood that events like today will play out with a much lower body count.
By the same logic: Restrict access to alcohol, and you increase the likelihood that automobile accidents involving alcohol will play out with a much lower body count.Actually, that doesn't make any sense.
Restricting alcohol availability might reduce the number of incidents but would not affect their lethality.
That doesn't make sense either. If you remove the incident, you remove the lethality.
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The cynic in me can't help but wonder how long before the media starts blaming this on video games, RPGs, popular music, and/or something else they can vilify in lieu of actually addressing the problems that lead up to horrible events like this. Given that the perpetrator was in his early 20s, my guess is that it won't be long. Mike Huckabee is already saying that this is a result of Americans removing the Judeo-Christian god from the public arena, despite the fact that that's demonstrably untrue.
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Are you saying that guns are as prevalent as cars and alcohol? Or that car accidents involving alcohol are as deadly as shootings? Or are you suggesting that people who suffer psychotic breaks decide to get liquored up and attempt to kill a bunch of people? Because it's my understanding that none of those things are true.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say.
According to this link, there were 250,272,812 registered highway vehicles (cars, pickups, motorcycles, buses, and I think it also includes semi-trucks) in 2010.
According to this CNN article (which has a link to the source they used), there were 310,000,000 non-military firearms in the US in 2009. With the quick search I did, I could find reliable numbers for 2010, but I think it's safe to say it is still comparable.
So, with these numbers, I'd say that guns are more prevelant than cars.
Scott Betts quoted that there were 30,782 deaths attributed to firearms in 2010. I quoted that there were 32,885 deaths attributed to vehicles in 2010.
The statistics show that vehicles are more dangerous than firearms, but vehicles don't get the vitriolic reaction that firearms do.
EDIT: quote and url tagd
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The cynic in me can't help but wonder how long before the media starts blaming this on video games, RPGs, popular music, and/or something else they can vilify in lieu of actually addressing the problems that lead up to horrible events like this. Given that the perpetrator was in his early 20s, my guess is that it won't be long. Mike Huckabee is already saying that this is a result of Americans removing the Judeo-Christian god from the public arena, despite the fact that that's demonstrably untrue.
It has already been brought up. I think Dr. Kieth Adlow (I think that was his name) mentioned the prevalence of video games in society, or something like that.
The cynic in me can't help but wonder how long before the media starts blaming this on video games, RPGs, popular music, and/or something else they can vilify in lieu of actually addressing the problems that lead up to horrible events like this. Given that the perpetrator was in his early 20s, my guess is that it won't be long. Mike Huckabee is already saying that this is a result of Americans removing the Judeo-Christian god from the public arena, despite the fact that that's demonstrably untrue.
Link to Huckabee saying it. Lots of cries about not politicizing it, but it seems some parts of "the right" are already doing so.
today i dont care about politics or gun control or the hundreds of other things that keep dividing us as a people..today i care about the children and the faimlys..i pray for all of them..god help us all
Actually, to be fair, I wasn't using alcohol/cars to say that we should regulate guns like alcohol/cars; rather I was trying to point out the fact that you quoted some statistics as justification for your position. I found statistics that were just as appalling but that we don't see the same vitriolic reaction like we do with firearms.The only fallacy was yours: the false equivalency of claiming that, because guns kill people and cars can also kill people, they should be regulated similarly. That's an actual fallacy, and you should fix it in your own reasoning before you try to go after someone else's.
And I explained why.
Do you not accept those explanations? If not, why not? If so, why have you not acknowledged that?
HangarFlying, do you need me to explain in greater detail exactly why there is a difference between 30,000 firearms deaths and 30,000 motor vehicle deaths? I will, but only if you really need me to. I don't think you do. I think you're perfectly capable of figuring out for yourself why there is a difference, if you give it some thought. You don't even need to figure out all the differences. Just a few of them would be enough.
By the same logic: Restrict access to alcohol, and you increase the likelihood that automobile accidents involving alcohol will play out with a much lower body count.
Good. Let's restrict access to alcohol to only those without a record of drunk driving. You're on board with this, right? What about the rest of the country?
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I just don't understand how anyone can set out to hurt children.
I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say.
According to this link, there were 250,272,812 registered highway vehicles (cars, pickups, motorcycles, buses, and I think it also includes semi-trucks) in 2010.
According to this CNN article (which has a link to the source they used), there were 310,000,000 non-military firearms in the US in 2009. With the quick search I did, I could find reliable numbers for 2010, but I think it's safe to say it is still comparable.
I think he's trying to say that absolute numbers of firearms vs. vehicles is meaningless because I think people probably drive their car just a little more often and for lengthier periods than they fire a gun.
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I think he's trying to say that absolute numbers of firearms vs. vehicles is meaningless because I think people probably drive their car just a little more often and for lengthier periods than they fire a gun.I'm not exactly sure what you're trying to say.
According to this link, there were 250,272,812 registered highway vehicles (cars, pickups, motorcycles, buses, and I think it also includes semi-trucks) in 2010.
According to this CNN article (which has a link to the source they used), there were 310,000,000 non-military firearms in the US in 2009. With the quick search I did, I could find reliable numbers for 2010, but I think it's safe to say it is still comparable.
I don't think the absolute numbers are meaningless.
Furthermore, by what metric do you measure firearm usage? The amount of time actually spent squeezing the trigger? The amount of time the firearm is in your possession? Measuring vehicle usage is a bit more clear: how much time is actually spent driving.
Aviation accident statistics are measured in 100,000 hours flown. I'm sure vehicle statistics are measured in so many miles driven. I'm not sure what type of metric is used for firearms fatalities other than absolute numbers.
Does it really though? How many times a day does a regular person need to make use of a car? And how many times a day does a regular person need to use a gun? Surely the first number is many times larger than the second number. Just looking at the raw numbers is pretty misleading without considering how common the events themselves are.
I have gone, so far, 11,748 days (a mere 100% of my life) without needing a gun for anything at all. As I am neither in law enforcement nor the military, I think I fit the "regular person" profile pretty well.
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Scott, drop it and move your political view to another thread. This thread is about expressing our sorrow and sending our best wishes to the people hurt.
The more I hear about this event the more I think that first automatic weapons should be banned, I don't see any reason why a civilian could possess such a weapon and I'd like someone thinking the opposite to explain it to me.
First, I wish to offer my condolences to all those affected by this tragedy. Secondly, just to answer your question: automatic weapons pretty much are banned already. (technically untrue, but after passing your background check, you must pass another one thru the atf, get your sheriff, D.A., or state police captain to sign off on it, pay $200 dollars, and then wait 6 months.) So not technically banned, but pretty darn close. As to why, feel free to start yet another thread on this if you wish or just search the OTD forum about it.
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Scott, drop it and move your political view to another thread.
No.
Again, you don't need to participate in the discussion if you don't want to. But it needs to happen. If you don't think so, I don't care. There are twenty children who might have been alive right now if we'd gotten our act together as a country and addressed this years ago, instead of cowing to the people who say, "Don't politicize this!" or "You haven't waited the appropriate amount of time!"
I'm sick of waiting. You should be, too.
This thread is about expressing our sorrow and sending our best wishes to the people hurt.
If you want to send your best wishes to the people hurt, do it. I mean, actually do it. Figure out a way to be there for them. Coming to an online messageboard for a fantasy roleplaying system to post about how awful you feel is not sending your best wishes.
I feel awful about what happened. The difference is, when something terrible happens I'm of the mindset that we shouldn't relax and wait for it to happen again.
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I have gone, so far, 11,748 days (a mere 100% of my life) without needing a gun for anything at all. As I am neither in law enforcement nor the military, I think I fit the "regular person" profile pretty well.
Does it really though? How many times a day does a regular person need to make use of a car? And how many times a day does a regular person need to use a gun? Surely the first number is many times larger than the second number. Just looking at the raw numbers is pretty misleading without considering how common the events themselves are.
I own five* and I think I fit the "regular person" profile pretty well, too!
* my current firearms are all historic in nature, though I do wish to purchase an AK and an AR at some point in the future.
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Scott, drop it and move your political view to another thread. This thread is about expressing our sorrow and sending our best wishes to the people hurt.
Nah, I think he's been pretty cool in this discussion. It's an emotional topic, for sure, but I think it's been pretty good considering how big the issue is.
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If you are not a member of "a regulated militia", then I don't see how you should be allowed to have a gun. That amendment has been twisted beyond recognition and people need to start acknowledging that.
The state of mental health care in the USA is terrible. People need to start acknowledging that.
There's a whole lot less child massacres in countries with stricter gun control. Those numbers don't lie.
Scott's point is valid, and I think it's time to stop letting the gun control folks be the grief police. Some people grieve by trying to fix the problem.
That's how Batman handles it, and maybe we should all be a little bit more Batman about this.
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I find it "interesting" (from both a psychological and sociological point of view) that we see these tragedies happen again and again, yet nothing really seems to change, while on the other hand 4 people (who knew they were working in a potentially volatile area of the world) are killed in an embassy across the globe and everyone is in uproar, congressional hearings are held and politicians are willing to stake their careers on the issue.
20+ killed, most of them kindergarten kids, and people are apparently still unwilling to take a look at (and do something about!) the sociological, mental and physical aspects of why this happened.
The right (it's really a privilege, not a right) to own instruments of death (and that's all a gun is - whether for hunting or killing people) apparently trumps the rights of other people to live in safety from said instruments of death.
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If you are not a member of "a regulated militia", then I don't see how you should be allowed to have a gun. That amendment has been twisted beyond recognition and people need to start acknowledging that.
The state of mental health care in the USA is terrible. People need to start acknowledging that.
There's a whole lot less child massacres in countries with stricter gun control. Those numbers don't lie.
Scott's point is valid, and I think it's time to stop letting the gun control folks be the grief police. Some people grieve by trying to fix the problem.
That's how Batman handles it, and maybe we should all be a little bit more Batman about this.
Ironically, Norway has some of the strictest gun laws and also had the bloodiest massacre than any event in the US that I'm aware of.
I find it "interesting" (from both a psychological and sociological point of view) that we see these tragedies happen again and again, yet nothing really seems to change, while on the other hand 4 people (who knew they were working in a potentially volatile area of the world) are killed in an embassy across the globe and everyone is in uproar, congressional hearings are held and politicians are willing to stake their careers on the issue.
20+ killed, most of them kindergarten kids, and people are apparently still unwilling to take a look at (and do something about!) the sociological, mental and physical aspects of why this happened.
The right (it's really a privilege, not a right) to own instruments of death (and that's all a gun is - whether for hunting or killing people) apparently trumps the rights of other people to live in safety from said instruments of death.
And yet if it happens in tribal Waziristan, no one cares. Darn you Dunbar's Number! Also, the right to firearms and the right to safety from those firearms are not mutually exclusive. Anyone seeking to remove either right SHOULD be prosecuted.
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I own five* and I think I fit the "regular person" profile pretty well, too!
* my current firearms are all historic in nature, though I do wish to purchase an AK and an AR at some point in the future.
Sure, but do you use those guns as often as you use your car? Do you think that most people do?
Let me use an example. Let's say that you have two viruses which are present in the country. The first virus has infected 100,000,000 people and killed 0.000001% of them, or 100 people. The second virus has infected 100 people and killed every one of them. You can't suggest that these viruses should be looked at in the same way just because they kill the same number of people.
To be honest, I shoot mine far far less than the average shooter. I went out to the range for the first time in years last month.
I have no doubt that cars are driven more than guns are used. Though, it would be interesting to come up with a metric that compares usage of firearms. Currently, firearms deaths are given as absolute numbers. The only way to fairly compare that to vehicles is to use absolute numbers too.
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If you are not a member of "a regulated militia", then I don't see how you should be allowed to have a gun. That amendment has been twisted beyond recognition and people need to start acknowledging that.
The state of mental health care in the USA is terrible. People need to start acknowledging that.
There's a whole lot less child massacres in countries with stricter gun control. Those numbers don't lie.
Scott's point is valid, and I think it's time to stop letting the gun control folks be the grief police. Some people grieve by trying to fix the problem.
That's how Batman handles it, and maybe we should all be a little bit more Batman about this.
Ironically, Norway has some of the strictest gun laws and also had the bloodiest massacre than any event in the US that I'm aware of.
Yet as an aggregate number of people dead by gun crime, the USA is the biggest in the developed world.
What happened in Norway was an aberration, a statistical anomaly. This year alone we had the Dark Knight massacre AND this killing in the US.One of these tragedies wasn't enough to warrant any meaningful change, maybe two will be?
What happened in Norway was an aberration, a statistical anomaly. This year alone we had the Dark Knight massacre AND this killing in the US.
Believe it or not, the United States is on its eighth mass shooting of the year. And there are still two weeks left in December.
Scott, let's not go there preemptively. If people here start bringing that nonsense up, I'll help shut it down, but let's not start the argument if we can avoid it.The death toll continues to rise, and it's already well past Columbine levels. The last year has seen a rash of violent mass shootings (this isn't even the first one this week!) and yet for some reason we still haven't given any serious attention to the issue of curbing gun violence and mass shootings. Every time someone tries to bring it up, he's immediately shut down by hordes of gun nuts with idiot-speak like, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people," or, "If everyone had a gun, people could protect themselves better!"
Yeah, 60 year-old Mrs. Henderson should be issued a firearm she doesn't know how to use so that in the event of an armed gunman with intent to kill entering her classroom, she can efficiently take him out while managing to avoid hitting any of the thirty panicked children in the process, before he has a chance to shoot her.
That's way better than restricting who is allowed to get ahold of what weapons.
No one is doing it here, but it's being said right now, all over the place. Everyone with a vested interest in protecting their imagined gun rights is coming out of the woodwork. They've seen this before, and they know they have to address it head-on. They're going there preemptively.
This should be the focus of discussions regarding mass shootings - why do they happen, and how can they be prevented. We haven't had any serious gun control regulations presented on a national level for years, now, and miraculously we've had more mass shootings than just about any time I can remember. It's abundantly clear that unrestricted ownership of firearms and the associated glorification of gun ownership and gun use is doing nothing to stop mass shootings, so why do we continue to allow the gun-rights crowd to run roughshod...
The problem isn't gun laws in general, it's one specific facet of gun laws: you cannot have one if you have specific mental diagnoses, but it is illegal to check if you have these diagnoses. It's on the honor system.