So none? Unless you count him shooting himself in a closed poly.
Another school shooting in the US
- Thread starter .Griff.
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So none? Unless you count him shooting himself in a closed poly.
That's how tenuous your argument has become, differentiating between a massacre on the streets vs inside a school.
lolkwerk indeed.
Soldato
Semi autos are, I'd guess, used mainly for offensive purposes. For example, the British army use a semi auto SA80 (Although it also has an automatic mode). Many, many organisations use semi autos for purely offensive purposes. Nobody uses bolt action for offence, they're pretty much limited to sniping and hunting.
The advantage of restricting semi auto/auto sales is that the gunmen would have to spend more time reloading, meaning a few more people may escape with their lives.
Try explaining that to this woman.
Approx. 1:30. But worth watching the whole thing.
The question was how many school shootings were there after dunblane? The same number as before dunblane, ZERO. It was an isolated incident, doesn't get any more isolated than one occurrence. The Hungerford killer purposefully skipped over shooting little kids, so isn't relevant to school shootings. It's an extremely rare and different kind of psycho that wants to shoot little kids.
The SA80 has a semi auto mode because it's impossible to shoot accurately in full auto, which was my point! It still has a full auto mode though for when you want to indiscriminately ASSAULT something.
Which organisations use semi-autos? Hostage rescue? Police? People who have to account for every single bullet?
Not sure of your point? I think you're trying to be obtuse and argumentative, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt...
Shooting people is of course at times justified. War happens. Shooting baddies, or aliens is a game lots of little boys play. Does this make mass murderers? No...
Rape is never justified...
As for the NRA's suggestion playing violent video games makes people desensitised to shooting people in real life, maybe picking up real hand guns and/or real rifles in real life, and shooting targets shaped just like real people is even more applicable to this argument?! Kettle, black!
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Soldato
Let's play a little mind game. Consider the following questions and try and give fair and reasonable answers.
1) Imagine the US with zero guns. Give a likelihood for a school shooting.
2) Imagine the US with just a thousand guns. Give a likelihood for a school shooting.
3) Imagine the US with just ten thousand guns. Give a likelihood for a school shooting.
4) Imagine the US with a hundred million guns. Give a likelihood for a school shooting.
I'd suggest your figures would rise from 1-4.
The more guns, the more likely a nutter, rapist, druggy, angry kid, angry husband, angry mother, suicidal girl etc, is to have one available...
Now, personally I'm not sure how one would even try to reduce the number of guns in the US could even take place. For one, there's seemingly just not the will to even try. And that's absolutely fine! Just as long as everyone realises that's the case, and they are willing to pay that price for that freedom. But to try and hide behind the lie that more guns and gun freedom is not related to more deaths, is shameful.
And if we liken it to speed limits. If we halved all speed limits in the country, road fatalities would drop! However, we've decided the current speed restrictions are a fair speed to death relationship/cost!
In the US, they just need to absolutely understand their right to continue with their current love affair with the fire arm has the cost of X thousand deaths a year. Are they happy with that?
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Soldato
To add to this, I've been on an electronic shooting range using real rifles (not bullets though) to shoot at humanoid objects running about on a screen. It is certainly desensitising, but only when you're doing it to other fake things, so not applicable to real life at all IMO.
That isn't a fantasy though, it's training for something that happens every day in real life - self-defense shootings. It doesn't fetishise and trivialize the act of shooting people in to a violent fantasy like video games do. No wonder half of the people in this thread don't seem to trust themselves around guns. It's like people who watch the most disgusting kinds of porn everyday and then finally get to meet a real women one day. They wouldn't know what to do with themselves, and would have a very warped outlook. And there would be a very small minority of psychos who would just rape her.
Notice how there isn't a video game called "Concealed Carry Shooter"? It would be too boring to sell any copies.
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don't often require an assault rifle to fire a burst of automatic fire in a military context
SOPs frequently vary and I'm not by any means up to date on whatever the latest school of thought is coming out of Brecon but clearing a bunker used to involve half a mag of rounds fired as an automatic burst
three round bursts can be fired from top cover in a moving vehicle - you can't necessarily use the sights properly if traveling at speed over rough terrain anyway so it can be more of an instinctive shoot watching the splash of rounds hitting the sand near the enemy...
Though most of the time, in either a deliberate attack or reacting to effective enemy fire you fire aimed shots... in theory rapid fire being approx 1 every 2 seconds deliberate fire being one every 6 seconds...
Generous tax rebates for every gun decomissoned, plus the availability of non-lethal firearms for those concerned with defending their property. (Also helps keep the gun industry in business).
Gun control in the UK had no statistical effect on gun crime, it was a pointless media led reaction.
http://dvc.org.uk/dunblane/ssaagreenwood.html
The UK isn't America, it's ridiculous to compare the cultures.
So, are you suggesting, if we introduced 150 million guns into this country, with the kind of freedom to own them as we see the states, gun related deaths would stay the same? Because I'm certain they would rise...
And the idea of angry teenagers, drug addicts, muggers, rapists, mindless chav, depressed individuals etc etc, having easier access to guns, doesn't bother you?
I'm happy if I never own a gun if it means the above have a harder time accessing one. We're lucky we live in a society where it has valued the risk to human life greater than peoples liberty to own devices who primary function is to kill.
I feel the same way. The USA has gone beyond any kind of considerable ban, though.
"From their cold, dead hands."
Strawman,
where am I suggesting giving the UK a right to bear?
And I think it's 300 million guns in America?
If you'd read the link it concluded that statistically our gun ban changed nothing, and I've already pointed out that a second gun ban in the US would make matters worse - which it has and it hasn't even been printed yet!
If this was an easy fix (OMG Banzor all teh evil guns !!!??!!!) then this would have been done already. Americans value personal freedom over whatever happens to the other guy.
kids get killed = must buy guns before they ban them. To then ban or restrict guns just reinforces the idea that the Government isn't doing what they want and that they were really being pretty darn smart to buy even more.
I don't see the gain in preaching to a culture that is not my own, the Taliban kill aid workers and 12 year old girls, they are moronic idiots to a "man", suggesting they do otherwise is pointless.
Many societies have been overrun by their governments because they were disarmed so they obviously see a historical point in their constitution, equally armed populations have rarely been controlled like say Afghanistan. This is their choice of culture, it is pretty much irreversible and naive to suggest "doing it another way" is ever going to be viable.
Whatever solution is found, it won't involve removing guns from the populace.
Who's to say of course if we had not taken the action we did, that other similar events might not have taken place? Society decided the risk was too great to legislation was passed. To me it makes utter sense. More guns in circulation means more chance of them being mis-used. Hence my analogy, which of course you carefully side stepped.
Possibly. But I think it's clear that the quantity of guns in the US, and their ease of access, plays some role in their large number of gun related deaths each year, and horrible events as debated in this thread.
What bemuses me is the lengths people go to ignore this - EG: The NRA pointing the finger of blame recently at games and films. Why not include rock'n'roll too
Until they come to terms that in some way their selfish behaviour - and yes it is selfsh - comes at some expense, then little progress will be made. And I really do not choose the term 'selfish' lightly, as you'll hear people talking about 'their rights' etc, which of course come at a huge expense to other peoples rights.
Like yourself, I have no idea how America can address gun realted deaths, but I know turning a blind eye to their love affair with a killing machine, does not help. And I am truly greatful I live in a country that does not have the same issues.
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Because there was already a downward tend in gun crime and that trend continued without a blip, without a blip in either direction strongly implies it was meaningless and that other uncounted factors contribute more strongly.
No it didn't, society didn't vote on anything. The tabloids made an ignorant fuss to boost circulation and vote hungry career politicians jumped on the gravy train - this is how everything is done in the UK.
addressed earlier I think? Your analogy is an oversimplification of the problem. It supposes that the mentally disturbed are not capable of aquiring weapons when sub literate criminals have no such problems.
Easy access is part of the problem, it just doesn't define the problem and shouldn't be seen as the sole issue.
Guns are supposed to be held in a gun safe and under control of the owner, it's the lack of personal responsibility that is part if the problem.
Every other country has had a long period of history to form its culture, the US didn't really have that and its constitution was decided in reaction to a short period of history, essentially building in state mistrust into their culture. The government could lessen this by stop interfering in people's lives so much and expect some personally responsibility instead. State control inherently seek to expand and justify itself, this should be curbed.
Secondly parts of their population are morally corrupt to one degree or another - when disasters strike there is always looting, this doesn't happen in say Japan. They need to fix this. Even bankers steal with impunity, so nobody respects anything.
Personally I think the NRA guy is roughly on the right track when he points the finger at celebrity culture, not that anyone is ever going to agree with him.
Their culture glamourises death and creates a superficial attitude towards everything, including the lives of others. When you dumb something down, this is always what you end up with.
The Swiss prove that an ordered society is capable of owning weapons but America isn't like that, they have rights with no responsibility. Yes you can try and take all their toys away but that isn't going to fix anything because they will just lobby to get them back. You can threaten a child with the same thing, but nothing will improve until you can get them to behave.
It's worth thinking about what our own culture would be like if the Daily Mail and celebrity worship just ceased to exist.
Soldato
People do not take a huge amount of bullets they drop like a wet mattress.
Trying to be pedantic about definitions of defensive and offensive weapons is ultimately pointless as they are the same. Defense and offense relates to tactics and doctrines.