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I have had guns nearly all my life. I got my first one when I was 14 yrs old. I'm 60 now. I have never even threatened a human with a gun. But I will use one to defend my famly, property, or myself against some lunatic who I have never even offended in anyway that is trying to do harm to me or the people I care for. It is my right as a human being to be prepared to defend myself if need be even if it ain't PC correct to stand up to an aggressor. If all guns are banned you can bet the scum of the earth who want to shoot innocent people will still find a way to acquire guns.
Nothing 12
I disagree that most people who hunt graduate to bigger better things.
Only people with sick minds do that.
Real hunters hunt for the sport and to put food on the table. We wouldn't be here if our forefathers weren't hunters. Some people who lived through the depression back in the 1930's had to hunt to keep from starving to death. My parents were in that group.
You can say we don't have to hunt now to survive. You are right. Someone else is killing the meat we eat. Does a slaughter house employee go out and graduate to bigger, better things?
Maybe there have been instances where that happened. Was it the fault of the job or the mindset of the person.
There are violent people who get pleasure from hurting or killing other people not because of what they do but because they have some problem that keeps them from being rational and thinking like most ordinary people think.
Innocent people get murdered everyday by sicko's who have never hunted in their life.
I just read the first 8 pages of commentary on this thread, then stopped in disgust. No one seems to have read the key part of the news story:
"Hawkins had suffered from behavioral problems as early as 14, when he became a ward of the state after his parents could no longer afford to pay for treatment in a residential rehab center."
The kid stole the AK-47 from his "estranged stepfather." He left a note to other members of his extended family saying that he felt himself to be a burden on everyone in his family his whole life because he had been in long-term mental health treatment. He shot up the mall as the angry prelude to taking his own life, so that "now I'll be famous."
All the gun lovers on this forum don't get it. If a person wants to commit grandiose suicide, as happened in this case at the hand of a mentally unstable teenager, nothing's going to prevent it if that person has a powerful firearm. There's no protection. Even if someone in the mall was carrying their own weapon, they might shoot back, making things possibly worse, but would also be at a disadvantage unless also packing a comparable assault weapon, while possibly also striking passersby, then perhaps finally killing the perp, which is what the perp wanted all along. Back to the Wild West days of public lawlessness. This mindless escalation of "overkill" assault-type weapons in the unregulated hands of the general public, who cannot be trusted to secure those weapons from unauthorized use, has got to stop. Everyone who agrees with me must notify his/her Congressional representatives that this situation is simply no longer acceptable. The U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled several times in the past that Congress and/or the States DO have the Constitutional authority to regulate and even prohibit the ownership among the public of these types of weapons.
The root cause of this incident was the suicidal intent in the perp. (Availability of an assault weapon turned a possibly private suicide into a grandiose, gun fantasy-driven slaughter and media event.) The root cause of the incident is addressed only by therapy and mental health treatment. Of course in this case the original course of treatment under supervision of his own family had been terminated because those treatments were no long affordable by the family.
The AK-47 and ammunition that were used were obviously not sufficiently secured in the "estranged stepfather's" home. Depending on whether any criminal act was committed by the teenage to "liberate" the weapon from that home (maybe the weapon wasn't, in fact, secured at all in that home), every impacted victim of this event might have the right to sue that gun owner for damages, subject to any Nebraska law that might mandate proper security of guns (and especially assault-type weapons) in homes. Going forward, that gun owner might also lose all availability of privately provided homeowner's insurance after this incident. What company will insure his residence, if he continues to own and store firearms, after this incident? I also think that all state-level insurance regulatory agencies should be directed by law to mandate that insurance companies in the homeowners business must have policyholders declare in writing whether any firearms are stored in the home and in what manner they are secured. (Can I elicit a collective "Duh!" on that?)
Finally, it should be increasingly clear to all members of the public that if criminals find out that firearms are present and stored in your home, it is just a matter of time before an attempt will be made to steal them. The fact that so many of these "overkill" assault-type weapons are now in the hands of the general public, more or less unsecured, is steadily decreasing the safety and security of all of us.
Last edited by ParkTwain; 12-07-2007 at 05:10 AM..
Park Twain
I totaly agree with you that assualt type weapons should be banned. Exept for military and law enforcement.
I also agree that this young man who shot the people in the mall had a mental problem and didn't get the help he obviously needed years ago. I guess it is hard to understand what goes on in some peoples minds to make them feel so insecure and worthless to the point that they feel they need to do something so repulsive just to be remembered. That is a mental sickness that can't be cured with an aspirin or any other medicine we take for granted to help the physical problems we all have from time to time. It is a shame the young man didn't get the long term professional help he needed. Like any physically ill person I don't think the mentally ill just go out and try to get sick on purpose either.
I don't agree with a total ban on guns.
For some it is just a hobby. For some it is a way that they feel they can try to protect themselves. Especially for the elderly.
I believe responsible hunters should be allowed to hunt. Americans have been doing that forever.
But the assault type weapons have to be controlled somehow. I'm not smart enough to figure out how to do that. I think that even if they are banned in this country, a person who really wanted one could probably get it on the black market from another country.
I guess it is just the world we live in. There might not be a real concrete solution.
My heart goes out to those that were lost and their families.
I just read the first 8 pages of commentary on this thread, then stopped in disgust. No one seems to have read the key part of the news story:
"Hawkins had suffered from behavioral problems as early as 14, when he became a ward of the state after his parents could no longer afford to pay for treatment in a residential rehab center."
The kid stole the AK-47 from his "estranged stepfather." He left a note to other members of his extended family saying that he felt himself to be a burden on everyone in his family his whole life because he had been in long-term mental health treatment. He shot up the mall as the angry prelude to taking his own life, so that "now I'll be famous."
All the gun lovers on this forum don't get it. If a person wants to commit grandiose suicide, as happened in this case at the hand of a mentally unstable teenager, nothing's going to prevent it if that person has a powerful firearm. There's no protection. Even if someone in the mall was carrying their own weapon, they might shoot back, making things possibly worse, but would also be at a disadvantage unless also packing a comparable assault weapon, while possibly also striking passersby, then perhaps finally killing the perp, which is what the perp wanted all along. Back to the Wild West days of public lawlessness. This mindless escalation of "overkill" assault-type weapons in the unregulated hands of the general public, who cannot be trusted to secure those weapons from unauthorized use, has got to stop. Everyone who agrees with me must notify his/her Congressional representatives that this situation is simply no longer acceptable. The U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled several times in the past that Congress and/or the States DO have the Constitutional authority to regulate and even prohibit the ownership among the public of these types of weapons.
The root cause of this incident was the suicidal intent in the perp. (Availability of an assault weapon turned a possibly private suicide into a grandiose, gun fantasy-driven slaughter and media event.) The root cause of the incident is addressed only by therapy and mental health treatment. Of course in this case the original course of treatment under supervision of his own family had been terminated because those treatments were no long affordable by the family.
The AK-47 and ammunition that were used were obviously not sufficiently secured in the "estranged stepfather's" home. Depending on whether any criminal act was committed by the teenage to "liberate" the weapon from that home (maybe the weapon wasn't, in fact, secured at all in that home), every impacted victim of this event might have the right to sue that gun owner for damages, subject to any Nebraska law that might mandate proper security of guns (and especially assault-type weapons) in homes. Going forward, that gun owner might also lose all availability of privately provided homeowner's insurance after this incident. What company will insure his residence, if he continues to own and store firearms, after this incident? I also think that all state-level insurance regulatory agencies should be directed by law to mandate that insurance companies in the homeowners business must have policyholders declare in writing whether any firearms are stored in the home and in what manner they are secured. (Can I elicit a collective "Duh!" on that?)
Finally, it should be increasingly clear to all members of the public that if criminals find out that firearms are present and stored in your home, it is just a matter of time before an attempt will be made to steal them. The fact that so many of these "overkill" assault-type weapons are now in the hands of the general public, more or less unsecured, is steadily decreasing the safety and security of all of us.
After reading a single line of this, can you say sanctimonious?
Forget that this child was disturbed and had severe personal mental health issues, forget that he stole the gun, forget that the system and his family failed him and lets all focus on a legally owned gun.
If he ended up in a high speed chase and ran over a school yard full of children would all of you be calling for the banning of cars or a new law that would make cars only do 35 mph? After all if it saves the life of one innocent child, isn't it worth it.
What if the guy had been an Arab looking guy screaming verses from the Koran?
Man... we would go to red alert across the nation and be onboard to bomb Iran again.
But because it is just another disturbed inidividual... home grown... that goes to buy a McMuffin and assult rifle then goes to massacre people, this will blow over in another week or two. Happens at least a few times a year.
Maybe we should'nt sell assault rifles like candy. The only other logical leap is to train kids from kindergarden to use assualt rifles and practice during recess so they will be ready to defend themselves from psychos at any time. I am not sure that is the best thing for our society.
Can't people just hunt and defend their homes with pistols and rifles?
If a ban was made on assault rifles, I do not buy that all these kids with psychological issues could still figure a way to get their hand on one without alerting authorities.
Maybe we should'nt sell assault rifles like candy. The only other logical leap is to train kids from kindergarden to use assualt rifles and practice during recess so they will be ready to defend themselves from psychos at any time. I am not sure that is the best thing for our society.
Bily4, I understand the argument from both sides reasonably well, but for me personally it is more than just guns. It is this incessant desire to want to legislate behavior as though this is going to be the cure all. It worked so well during prohibition and in the war on drugs, as well as countless other examples.
It is always the extreme case that is focused upon in which legislation is created completely ignoring one side of the argument.
I have difficulty understanding the lefts position when they will point out every flaw in government, and there are many, yet they will turn around and want this same very flawed government to tell them how to think, how to live, how to act and how to behave, as though this is the fix? It is rather baffling.
Bily4, I understand the argument from both sides reasonably well, but for me personally it is more than just guns. It is this incessant desire to want to legislate behavior as though this is going to be the cure all. It worked so well during prohibition and in the war on drugs, as well as countless other examples.
It is always the extreme case that is focused upon in which legislation is created completely ignoring one side of the argument.
I have difficulty understanding the lefts position when they will point out every flaw in government, and there are many, yet they will turn around and want this same very flawed government to tell them how to think, how to live, how to act and how to behave, as though this is the fix? It is rather baffling.
Fair enough. Still, obviously if you take the "limited government" argument to the extreme you have anarchy, Mad Max time... which is not too good either. Government exists for a purpose, or my thinking is the Founding Fathers would not have bothered. I don't see how trying to prevent disturbed individuals from getting assualt rifles puts us on a slippery slope.
Your argument could be flipped around with the right that want no part of anything that might actually improve or stabilize society domestically (remember Rudy Ridge!!), but have not a thing to say when they sign up for bankrolling and invading other countries. No problem with "limited government" there.
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