Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I don't want to sound disrespectful so please don't take this the wrong way but I almost find it funny when something like the recent shooting happens and then everyone sits around with furrowed brows stroking their chins asking "Why did this happen?". The reason it happened is because guns are so readily available in the US. Yes, shootings happen elsewhere in the world too but the rate in America is enormous because of the Second Amentment, the right to bear arms. By making firearms so easily available, even with permits, is just asking for them to land in the wrong hands. You only have to look at a few cases of well-documented violence from around the world to know this:
- Seung-Hui Cho, the Virginia Tech shooter, purchased both his guns legally. 32 dead.
- Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the Columbine shooters, acquired their firearms through straw purchases however they were originally puchased legally. 13 dead.
- Robert Steinhäuser, perpetrator of the Erfurt massacre, purchased his guns legally. 15 dead.
- Charles Whitman, University of Texas at Austin shooter, purchased his rifle legally. 15 dead.
- Pekka-Eric Auvinen, Jokela school shooter, purchased his handgun legally. 8 dead.
These are just a few of the school/college shooting incidents from around the world which have taken place with legally purchased, licensed weapons. If the United States wants to see a decline in gun crime then it must first start confiscating firearms, not handing out more. To decrease the number of shootings you must prevent people from obtaining the firearm in the first place. Allowing people to just waltz onto school grounds armed to the teeth like some sort of desert Rambo is nothing more than an irresponsible recipe for disaster. If the law is passed then in a few months time everyone is going to be standing around asking "Now why did that student kill all his classmates at his school in Arizona?". To stop the killing you must remove the weapons, not add more of them. I myself am a high school student and although the idea of someone storming through the building shooting everyone is scary, the chances of it happening are tiny. I would be a lot more concerned at the prospect that everyone I am passing in the hallway might have a glock stuffed down the back of their waistband.
Yes and the MSM doesn't mention the approximately 2 MILLION instances a year that lawful gun owners stop a crime,sometimes by the mere presence of a firearm. These shootings are an aberration performed by a few unbalanced people. There are millions of gun owners that never do harm with their guns and many times stop harm from being done. But you want these people disarmed? That is just wrong and ignorant.
Every state that has inacted shall issue laws has seen a drastic drop in violent crime. Yes, more guns equals less crime. It's a fact proven by the 40 states that have these laws.
In a nation, the size of the United States, with a population approaching 400 million people, how would you suggest the above be done?
Deicide which classes of firearm are to be confiscated first and then send out notices to owners of those weapons announcing that they must be turned in by a certain date. I trust permit holders are kept on record.
Location: The Raider Nation._ Our band kicks brass
1,853 posts, read 9,684,654 times
Reputation: 2341
Charles Whitman---- Happened August 1966. Laws were completely different. Anybody could buy a gun through the mail. Whitman had previously showed signs of being crazy.
Pekka-Eric Auvinen----- Wasn't in this Country doesn't count for anything here. I don't know, nor care about laws in Finland.
Robert Steinhäuser----Again, not in this Country. Kind of strange though, Germany has some of the toughest gun laws in existence. Why didn't the precious laws stop him. Another one that showed early signs of being crazy.
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold----- Under age. Could not have legally purchased them on their own. The girl that helped them broke many laws. All of them also showed signs of being crazy. Again, you used a lousy example.
Seung-Hui Cho----- Broke the law by lying on his application. Can't be counted as a legal purchase. He was a nut from the beginning. He should not have slipped through the cracks.
Three of your examples are from highly restrictive Countries. One is from over 40 years ago, and the other two were not legal purchases. So where does that leave your theory?
All of them have something in common. They were all crazy. They were all bent on killing people, and they all went after unarmed victims. You just made a pretty good case for why we should have concealed carry by non crazies on campus. The crazies don't care about the law. How hard is that to understand?
Seung-Hui Cho----- Broke the law by lying on his application. Can't be counted as a legal purchase. He was a nut from the beginning. He should not have slipped through the cracks.
Easier said than done. If you think his 'slipping through the cracks' is the reason for what happened, you should spend more time fighting the mental health laws in this country and not the gun laws. Despite the fact that he had a mental illness, confidentiality laws really leave many hands tied.
As a mental health professional myself, I fully understand why he got to where he did. Sad but true.
I put the ownness on the parents to some extent, they knew the severity of his problems, yet shipped him off to college to live on his own with no support? Not smart, if you ask me. I attribute that somewhat to cultural differences and perhaps the lack of understanding on their part due to language barriers-which to that I say, you are in American, LEARN THE LANGUAGE, so you can understand when professionals tell you that your son is crazy and needs help!
Three of your examples are from highly restrictive Countries. One is from over 40 years ago, and the other two were not legal purchases. So where does that leave your theory?
If three of those were from highly restrictive countries then imagine what could happen in somewhere like America when gun ownership is practically encouraged?
The Charles Whitman example was relevant because, although laws may have been different then, he purchased a gun legally and went and shot a load of people. This is no different from many recent cases.
The Robert Steinhäuser example is relevant because it proves that even in a country where gun laws are extremely tough things can and do occasionally go bad. All that this says is that if gun laws are relaxed then it leaves the door open for this kind of thing to happen even more.
Eric and Dylan may have been underage but the guns were purchased legally by an adult. My point here is that even if a weapon is purchased legally it can still very easily fall into the wrong hands.
If Seung-Hui Cho lied on his application then why wasn't this found out before he was allowed to purchase his weapons? If the current system is so ineffective that someone can tell a flagrant lie on their application and still have it granted then relaxing gun laws further is hardly the way you want to be going.
As for them all being crazy, yes they were and that is very much part of my point. Guns can get into the hands of crazy people in countries where it's difficult for a sane person to get hold of one. In a country like the US where gun laws are eased even further then it will be even less difficult for the crazies to get hold of them.
Location: The Raider Nation._ Our band kicks brass
1,853 posts, read 9,684,654 times
Reputation: 2341
Quote:
Originally Posted by boycew02
If three of those were from highly restrictive countries then imagine what could happen in somewhere like America when gun ownership is practically encouraged?
You cited several examples of what you called legal gun purchases. I broke them down. The one and only example of a legal gun purchase in this Country was over 40 years ago. Why was it legal? Because gun laws were almost nonexistant back then. Why is it still famous? Because it was an extreme rarity to happen back in that time. It was why so many laws were enacted in 1968.
It is because of those laws that we have so many crazies going after unarmed victims today. That is the whole point of argument. Many of us refuse to be unarmed victims of crazies. If you want to be a victim in your Country, that is your business. You won't find me trying to influence laws in Britain.
Deicide which classes of firearm are to be confiscated first and then send out notices to owners of those weapons announcing that they must be turned in by a certain date. I trust permit holders are kept on record.
A) Not every weapon or owner has a "permit" as there is no requirement
You cited several examples of what you called legal gun purchases. I broke them down. The one and only example of a legal gun purchase in this Country was over 40 years ago.
No it wasn't, Eric and Dylan's guns were purchased legally by an adult. My point regarding that was that although they were purchased legally they still found their way into the wrong hands. The more guns you have floating around the system the greater the risk of one getting into the hands of a crazy person who thinks it perfectly normal to go out and start blasting at innocent civilians.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South Range Family
If you want to be a victim in your Country, that is your business.
Actually the chances of getting shot in Britain are substantially lower than in the US. For every 100,000 people in the United States 2.97 of them will find themselves the victim of a firearm homicide. Here in Britain the rate is 0.12. The reason? We have much tighter firearm laws here. It's all very well saying that you arm yourself because the crazies are armed too but if the US had tighter firearm laws then there wouldn't be as many guns in circulation for them to get their hands on.
Also what's to say that (supposedly) good people don't go bad? Just because someone doesn't have a criminal record and can pass a background check doesn't mean that they're a model citizen by any stretch. The University of Sydney carried out a study regarding 65 high profile multiple-victim shootings in the US over the past 40 years and found that 62% the handgun and 71% of the long gun shootings were committed with legally acquired firearms.
To prove my point further, after research the International Crime and Justice Institute were able to draw up the table below detailing how the homicide and suicide rate of a country is directly linked to the percentage of households that own firearms.
Do you have any idea what you are even talking about? You already live in a Country where it is your civic duty to protect yourself.
Yes I do.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South Range Family
How would following laws that already exist lead to lawlessness? You go off on a strange tangent by mentioning two hate groups that never even consider what is legal or illegal. The rest of what you said was so incoherent, I don't have a clue what you were trying to get across.
Person's like these legally get arms see the point. KKK isn't spell out on their foreheads okay. Sadly I am short in time to expand on the wordings you consider incoherent.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South Range Family
When these laws were made, compromises were also made. To make the antis feel better about themselves, they put limitations on certain areas of carry. As was predicted, those areas have now become victim zones. That's why there are so many school shootings in the news.
Outrageously, deadly compromises you imply.
Quote:
Originally Posted by South Range Family
As an Ohio resident, I have both Ohio and Pennsylvania carry permits. I have gone through training and background checks for both States, and they have deemed me honest and responsible enough to carry a weapon. Why do you think that as soon as I walk on to a campus, I would turn into a babbling idiot that would all of a sudden start to shoot the place up? A college campus is no different than a mall, or movie theater. Many law abiding citizens already carry weapons in those places. We just don't go around shooting everyone in sight. It's time to eliminate the victim zones. Compromise is no longer an option.
No I understand why you strongly stand for what you believe in. REMEMBER Not everone is like you or I. There are very few responsible ones.Speaking as an arms carrier.
Stop Generalizing based on personal intelligent but unfortunately a very small sample size. Widen the sample size and you would be shock with the outcome based on your stand.
Last edited by npumcrisz; 02-17-2008 at 03:47 PM..
Reason: statement added
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
