Newtown School Shootings

[Major Robert Dump]

If we allowed our children to legally carry guns things like this would not happen.

Gun control works really well in Chicago. If we could model the entire nation as we do Chicago, the minority underclass should wipe itself out in 3-7 years, using all those guns they are not legally allowed to possess. This would make whitey happy, and we could finally have White Flight Part 2: The Reclamation go into effect

[Major Robert Dump]

BUT AT LEAST THEM GAYS CAIN'T GET MARRIED!!! *charges rifle*

[Major Robert Dump]

AND HERE I THOUGHT THE ONLY THING THAT COULD HARM KIDS IN SCHOOL WERE LIBERAL TEACHERS AND LACK OF PRAYER *charges assault rifle*

[Husar]

If we allowed our children to legally carry guns things like this would not happen.

Yes, absolutely, because they wouldn't be nervous or confused at all and statistics show that a country with more guns, like America, is a safer place.

Gun control works really well in Chicago. If we could model the entire nation as we do Chicago, the minority underclass should wipe itself out in 3-7 years, using all those guns they are not legally allowed to possess. This would make whitey happy, and we could finally have White Flight Part 2: The Reclamation go into effect

Absolutely correct again because a single city with gun control surrounded by a whole country with hardly any gun control and gun fares, gun shops and tons of illegal weapons floating around is really the best example of why gun control on a nation-wide level would never work.

I didn't want to enter the gun debate as America will never change anything about that and happily pay the price of more gun deaths, which is okay with me as long as you don't expect me to be shocked, but please spare me with completely nonsensical "examples".
If you want to make a valid comparison, take a country that actually has effective gun control, has had it for more than ten years and isn't flooded with guns due to the lax policies all around and from the past, i.e. an area that simply has effective gun control and not the lame US regional version.

[Major Robert Dump]

Yes, absolutely, because they wouldn't be nervous or confused at all and statistics show that a country with more guns, like America, is a safer place.



Absolutely correct again because a single city with gun control surrounded by a whole country with hardly any gun control and gun fares, gun shops and tons of illegal weapons floating around is really the best example of why gun control on a nation-wide level would never work.

I didn't want to enter the gun debate as America will never change anything about that and happily pay the price of more gun deaths, which is okay with me as long as you don't expect me to be shocked, but please spare me with completely nonsensical "examples".
If you want to make a valid comparison, take a country that actually has effective gun control, has had it for more than ten years and isn't flooded with guns due to the lax policies all around and from the past, i.e. an area that simply has effective gun control and not the lame US regional version.

I think your sarcasm detector may be miscalibrated, bra. You may want to take it in and have it looked at, is the little red light on? I hear Wal Mart is running a special, but you guys don't get superior stores like Wal Mart because you hate guns, freedom, and hence, low prices.

[Husar]

I think your sarcasm detector may be miscalibrated, bra. You may want to take it in and have it looked at, is the little red light on? I hear Wal Mart is running a special, but you guys don't get superior stores like Wal Mart because you hate guns, freedom, and hence, low prices.

Ok, when I went to have a shower I wondered whether I would regret breaking my rule of not posting in the morning before I'm fully awake.
I can see the sarcasm in the first part but given that Chicago actually has gun control and lots of crime, how is the second part sarcasm? Or is it sarcasm in the sense that you also think of it as a bad example? My apologies if I horribly misunderstood, I still love you anyway.

[Catiline]

States should pass a law allowing concealed carry in formerly no carry zones. It should be sort of like the Air Marshall system; with a few weeks of training, school staff are allowed to bring small firearms to class, concealed, IWB, with a heavy police grade trigger, a. Level 3 holster and they should be asked not to discuss the fact with anyone.

You'll never be able to stop rampages, but you must be able to reduce death toll. Like it or not, kids are sheep and cannot defend themselves. When faced with these situations, they need responsible adults to protect them more reliably than this

You want to live in a country where primary school teachers carry weapons in class?

I keep seeing this suggested as a solution today, and it's the most pathetic and moronic thing i think I've ever read.

[HopAlongBunny]

Of course its moronic. Deterrence relies on display hence a 0.50 cal. machine gun on the desk and an assault rifle in hand. Truly, it would send a message...

[ICantSpellDawg]

Not all teachers should carry, just some. The principle, assistant principle, some others, maybe randomized so they can't be individually targeted as easily. There would be a courses similar to the auxiliary air marshalls course. We do it on flights. People should be able to carry concealed, children should be protected and with special training there should be responsible people available to make sure that these rampages go from 25 to 10. More rapidly than waiting for police to get there to pick up the bodies. It would slow most shooters down and instead of easily running room to room them may be forced to take cover while kids flee and police arrive

[Major Robert Dump]

Ok, when I went to have a shower I wondered whether I would regret breaking my rule of not posting in the morning before I'm fully awake.
I can see the sarcasm in the first part but given that Chicago actually has gun control and lots of crime, how is the second part sarcasm? Or is it sarcasm in the sense that you also think of it as a bad example? My apologies if I horribly misunderstood, I still love you anyway.

Its sarcasm because its both measurable and not measurable. Yes, it has strict gun control. No, its not working. Yes, it is surrounded by states where guns are legal, so acquiring guns is still rather easy. All in all it is a perfect example both for and against gun control.... If guns were prohibited tomorrow, how would said guns be removed from the street? Well, I would imagine that the gun registry would be scrubbed and people would be forced to hand over their legal guns..... okay, great, so thats a fraction of the guns.... what about all the cartel members, the gangs, organized crime, career criminals, hillbilly militias, how would we get thier guns? The same way we get them now, when they get arrested and the guns get confiscated, which hasnt reduced the illegal guns significantly (yes, yes, supply i know). Those people wont be turning their guns in for a Kmart gift card. Making ownership a life sentence will have a negligible effect just like it does for other life sentence crimes.

Gun prohibition is a circular argument. People would be all for it, if there werent so many illegal guns.

[PanzerJaeger]

As I've said before, it would be a terrible shame if Americans allowed fear and ignorance to convince them that restricting rights that millions of their fellow citizens enjoy would somehow prevent the statistically insignificant actions of madmen. This is a mental health issue, and any legislation that results from it should be focused on that.

[Idaho]

You want to live in a country where primary school teachers carry weapons in class?

I keep seeing this suggested as a solution today, and it's the most pathetic and moronic thing i think I've ever read.

Those yankees love it! They love shooting guns. Not only is it fun, but it defends them against the US government and the King of England. So anything that prevents gun ownership is crazy and will never work.

[Catiline]

Not all teachers should carry, just some. The principle, assistant principle, some others, maybe randomized so they can't be individually targeted as easily. There would be a courses similar to the auxiliary air marshalls course. We do it on flights. People should be able to carry concealed, children should be protected and with special training there should be responsible people available to make sure that these rampages go from 25 to 10. More rapidly than waiting for police to get there to pick up the bodies. It would slow most shooters down and instead of easily running room to room them may be forced to take cover while kids flee and police arrive

Absurd. No one that does this sort of thing is going to be deterred by Miss Miggins with a concealed weapon, though you can guarantee eventually someone will pinch it off her and go postal on the kids, and a decrease from 25 to 10 isn't a real improvement, its window dressing. The only thing that will help is a fundamental reduction in the number of serviceable weapons, which is achievable over time if society wills it, and making access to mental healthcare easier than access to hand gunsand assault rifles.

But hey, drape yourself in your fabricated interpretation of the 2nd, and pretend that each time this happens it's worth it for freedom and your right to have Rambo fantasies that these weapons that are fantastically good at killing kids could otherthrow the government when they get a just a little bit more tyrannical.

[Major Robert Dump]

The teachers with guns argument isn't even worth having, especially when it moves away from the random odd teacher with a concealed weapon to some organized, trained in-school militia like flight marshalls. Give me a break. This isn't a video game. The librarian, the gym coach and the cafeteria supervisor tactically moving as a strike team... yeah. As if teachers don't have enough on their plate already, and as if most teachers would be a match for a couple of teenage thugs who decide to overpower them and take their gun.

If schools need to be more secure, then add more security guards and cops, with modified ROE, and be careful not to encourage police brutality while also allowing those security/cops to act accordingly against serious threats. Oh, and make sure they are well trained and not overweight, gaping vaginas like the cop who fled the columbine shooting because he was "outgunned." A trained cop with his service pistol should be more than enough match for a couple of nerdy dorks who don't even know how to handle a weapon.

A few cops/security in every school should do the trick. Cost too much, you say? Well, there's the price of our freedoms. Turns us into a police state, you say? Well, there's the cost of our freedoms. Wallow in it and enjoy it.

For the record, him having an assualt rifle in this case is laregly irrelevant IMO. It's not like he took on the SWAT Team. Kids that age freeze, the dont run, and he shot each multiple times. He could have caused just as much carnage with a pistol and a few magazines

Theres an interesting story coming from portland, a guy with a concealed weapon had the mall shooter in his sights but did not have a clear shot due to civilians cowering nearby. He is claiming the shooter saw him there pointing a gun at him, then shot himself..... I saw this on a blog, gonna wait and see if someone legit picks it up

[Major Robert Dump]

I should also point out that many of the armchair cops and taciticians who think arming teachers is golden are the same people who think teachers are lazy, overpaid, incompetent union monkeys. They don't trust those liberal teachers to teach their kids, but by god lets give em guns. Funny

[Papewaio]

Is it normal in the US to be vetted before entering school grounds or is it an exception to the rule? I thought it was limited to problem inner city schools and definitely not the norm particularly for primary schools.

[quadalpha]

And this really sums it all up doesn't it? You don't understand, but continue to comment and make judgement anyway?




I don't know where you live, but obviously not in the US. It was taxation without representation that riled up the elites. They felt they were proper British citizens (aristocrats even) and deserved to be treated as such. That's why you saw motions such as the Olive Branch Petition to prevent all out war in the first place. No one wanted war, they only wanted a democratic voice and were happy to pay taxes as long as they could redress their concerns.

No, what I don't understand is why people delude themselves into thinking they need guns, and none of you have so far answered. The real reason seem to be quite well known. I quote:

And now it has happened again, bang, like clockwork, one might say: Twenty dead children—babies, really—in a kindergarten in a prosperous town in Connecticut. And a mother screaming. And twenty families told that their grade-schooler had died. After the Aurora killings, I did a few debates with advocates for the child-killing lobby—sorry, the gun lobby—and, without exception and with a mad vehemence, they told the same old lies: it doesn’t happen here more often than elsewhere (yes, it does); more people are protected by guns than killed by them (no, they aren’t—that’s a flat-out fabrication); guns don’t kill people, people do; and all the other perverted lies that people who can only be called knowing accessories to murder continue to repeat, people who are in their own way every bit as twisted and crazy as the killers whom they defend. (That they are often the same people who pretend outrage at the loss of a single embryo only makes the craziness still crazier.)
So let’s state the plain facts one more time, so that they can’t be mistaken: Gun massacres have happened many times in many countries, and in every other country, gun laws have been tightened to reflect the tragedy and the tragic knowledge of its citizens afterward. In every other country, gun massacres have subsequently become rare. In America alone, gun massacres, most often of children, happen with hideous regularity, and they happen with hideous regularity because guns are hideously and regularly available.
The people who fight and lobby and legislate to make guns regularly available are complicit in the murder of those children. They have made a clear moral choice: that the comfort and emotional reassurance they take from the possession of guns, placed in the balance even against the routine murder of innocent children, is of supreme value. Whatever satisfaction gun owners take from their guns—we know for certain that there is no prudential value in them—is more important than children’s lives. Give them credit: life is making moral choices, and that’s a moral choice, clearly made.


Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blog...#ixzz2FFZiJQ9X

The mental health angle is being used as a smokescreen (which is not the same as saying it is illegitimate). I'm sure some people who use it do it knowingly to divert attention from gun control, but I suspect many are actually self-deluded enough to believe it.

Also, I do live in the US. And while 'taxation without representation' is a very convenient slogan, it does not make any sense when you stop and think about it. When did people gain the god-giving right to representation if they are being taxed? What is so outrageous about taxation without representation? The reason why the declaration of independence says that it is 'self-evident ...' is because they could not find any legal basis for revolution. You can make decent arguments for the fairness of representation if there is taxation, but none of you ever get that far.

The problem with America is that from the very inception, it is a nation founded on commercial interest on the one hand, and popular demagoguery on the other. The perversity is how the phoney ideals of the revolution have been enshrined in the national consciousness as the ultimate good of humanity. The need to indoctrinate the masses in the legitimacy and goodness of the revolution has led to such wonderful things as American exceptionalism and the worship of founding texts like the declaration of independence and the constitution. The former is thankfully coming under increased scrutiny, but the latter still dominates political discourse. It is typical that political discourse on gun control is based on how to interpret the second amendment rather than the good of the nation, that no rational thought examines what is a 'constitutional right' and if something should be a right.

It might be debated whether such textual literalism is fueled by the fundamentalist Christian right, or whether the contradiction at the heart of the idea of America is particularly amenable to fundamentalism (I suspect the latter, personally). The situation is in no way improving with even greater access to the political process by the wealth of corporations (Citizens United, another decision based on constitutional technicalities) and the general fostering of ignorance as a political position (mostly the Tea Party, but also the vapid Occupy movements).

[Hooahguy]

Is it normal in the US to be vetted before entering school grounds or is it an exception to the rule? I thought it was limited to problem inner city schools and definitely not the norm particularly for primary schools.

I was actually just discussing this with some of my friends yesterday.

I went to a private school so we didnt have any security checks, but in my elementary/middle school we had a secure fence (not chain-link: a real fence that you can get over), and special doors that you needed to be paged in. And there were a few security guards. But that was because it was a Jewish school and we have gotten threats before so it pays to be prudent. For high school it was even less. No security guards and no fence.

But my friends who went to public schools? Nothing whatsoever. Not even a clear backpack that Ive seen some of the kids who go to the inner-city schools have to wear.

[ICantSpellDawg]

I should also point out that many of the armchair cops and taciticians who think arming teachers is golden are the same people who think teachers are lazy, overpaid, incompetent union monkeys. They don't trust those liberal teachers to teach their kids, but by god lets give em guns. Funny

Maybe they could earn their keep. Maybe we could pay ex-cop pensioners 10-20k per year to be armed and on premises. I'm all for useless hillbillies with guns, so it stands to reason that some teachers should have them, with the proper training.

Or we could go the way of eliminating a right to own semi-automatic firearms, which is most of them. What is Switzerland's Homicide rate per 100k with an overwhelming population armed with auto and semi automatic weapons? .7 - lower than the UK. Finland? How about Russia with their overbearing gun control? 14 - almost 3 times as high as the U.S. Counter-intuitive. My points about certain armed staff are not absurd, nor are they poorly reasoned. You can poison the well, suggesting that those opposed to the current structure or incentives in our educational system are inconsistent - but what's inconsistent in first saying person A provides sub-optimal service for payment and then later addressing the need to bestow additional responsibilities on person A? I'm in favor of arming individuals on the regular and arguing those in responsible positions over defenseless children when they cant arm themselves. I'm ok with regulation and mandated safety courses. In fact, I would push for more firearms education even in New York. I'd also discourage those parents with adolescent or teenage children from even owning firearms or keeping them on the premises, unless they were kept secret in a heavy duty safe.


Unrelated - I went to Catholic grammar school mostly and at both public and private elementary schools attended, all doors were locked and intercom systems used to allow entrance during the school day. This was more to reduce kidnapping than a baby-shoot as almost all conceivable measures would likely proof useless against armed assailants should the will exist to enter. Most schools use Windows, but those have been known to serve as weak entryways - i know, it stretches the imagination a bit to consider, but it's true.

[Hooahguy]

No, what I don't understand is why people delude themselves into thinking they need guns, and none of you have so far answered. The real reason seem to be quite well known. I quote:

Oh look, once again you fail to realize that there are so many more factors going into crime related to guns than just 'OMG GUNS R BAD" rants that I see people just like you always spouting. Look at Switzerland. High gun ownership, yet low gun crime.#Why is that?

If you did a shred of research (which you clearly have not done) you would realize that banning guns wont do much in this country due to demographics and cultural attitudes.

The mental health angle is being used as a smokescreen (which is not the same as saying it is illegitimate). I'm sure some people who use it do it knowingly to divert attention from gun control, but I suspect many are actually self-deluded enough to believe it.

Please read this article. You will notice, as Im sure you have, that the other Western Nations where shootings are not a regular occurrence, their health care is better than what we have here. Look at the Oklahoma City bombing. No guns involved, yet 168 people died, including 19 children.

Also, I do live in the US. And while 'taxation without representation' is a very convenient slogan, it does not make any sense when you stop and think about it. When did people gain the god-giving right to representation if they are being taxed? What is so outrageous about taxation without representation? The reason why the declaration of independence says that it is 'self-evident ...' is because they could not find any legal basis for revolution. You can make decent arguments for the fairness of representation if there is taxation, but none of you ever get that far.

What are you smoking? And more importantly, is it legal? Because if it is, you gotta tell me where I can get some.

[ICantSpellDawg]

What are you smoking? And more importantly, is it legal? Because if it is, you gotta tell me where I can get some.

I think he is trolling. Either than or the post is an opaquely constructed ironic argument meant to convey the opposite agenda.

[Papewaio]

Well I live in Sydney's west. I'm what they call a Westy. It's considered the less desirable and more dangerous part of Sydney. A city of some four million inhabitants.

I can walk my year one kid straight into the center of school. There is a little fence around it to stop children's sports balls rolling out from the grounds. No vetting process, parents just wander in with their kids, the younger ones clutching their hands and the older ones it you are lucky giving you a kiss on the cheek and then running to line up.

My kids safe, I don't have to go through an ID check and I can go home and not worry about the safety of my kid.

A five year old kindergarten boy got run over on his way to school. It was in the papers and news for days afterwards, that's the level of tragedy here that makes multi night headline news on paper and tv.

[Hooahguy]

Well I live in Sydney's west. I'm what they call a Westy. It's considered the less desirable and more dangerous part of Sydney. A city of some four million inhabitants.

I can walk my year one kid straight into the center of school. There is a little fence around it to stop children's sports balls rolling out from the grounds. No vetting process, parents just wander in with their kids, the younger ones clutching their hands and the older ones it you are lucky giving you a kiss on the cheek and then running to line up.

My kids safe, I don't have to go through an ID check and I can go home and not worry about the safety of my kid.

A five year old kindergarten boy got run over on his way to school. It was in the papers and news for days afterwards, that's the level of tragedy here that makes multi night headline news on paper and tv.

But Australia also has a much better health care system which perhaps is able to catch would-be killers and commit them before they do anything terrible. Im not very knowledgeable about Australia's mental health care system so I cant really comment to the fullest, but I can only assume that with the better health care system that there are other positive results from it.

[rvg]

Australia also has 22 million people vs our 300+ mil.
It's pointless to draw parallels between the two countries.

[Montmorency]

It's not pointless, by any means. Though a sentiment like, "Here is Australia. Why can't Amerikkka be more like it?" isn't very useful, the questions for analysis it raises can lead to workable solutions. Just because Australia is a different country does not mean we can take nothing from its policies or circumstances. Differences invite circumspection and qualification, not disregard.

Certainly, though the military situations the US found itself in when invading Iraq and Afghanistan would share little in common with an American entanglement against China, the Chinese military studies these situations very carefully for any lessons it could glean.

[Papewaio]

Australia also has 22 million people vs our 300+ mil.
It's pointless to draw parallels between the two countries.

Ratios.
Per Capita.
Compare similar number of states, with similar ethnic mix and background.
Meta studies.
Many ways to compare and contrast data from different sized number sets.

Canada, Australia and US are different but similar enough that you can learn from each other and cherry pick the best of solutions.

As I stated earlier its your country, your rules, your outcomes. USA leads the way in so many areas it is an amazing icon. It's size doesn't always work for it and its social inertia can be counter productive.

Forgive me if I have different preferences. I do not as a Kiwi expect everyone to be an Ozzie. That's like asking a Canuck to want everyone to be a Yank. I like the variations, I'm just personally happier to give up urban gun ownership for increased safety in Australia. In New Zealand with far more rural based people and plenty of pests to hunt, gun ownership is a far more positive thing as they are tools and generally taught as such. So horses for courses.

[Major Robert Dump]

DAWG: nothing you laid out makes organized arming of teachers any less absurd. And the fact that you think they can "earn their keep" by being armed is even more absurd. Throw as much analyticals as you want, I will continue to live in the real world. I wold be perfectly willing to entertain the notion of allowing CC holders to carry at school, but never the idea of arming teachers as a rule.

I think the one thing everyone is forgetting in this entire tragedy, with their talk of changing gun culture, is the irrepairable harm that would come to the rap industry if we enacted gun prohibition. Are you guys willing to answer for all those lost jobs? Won't someone think of the rap music?

[ICantSpellDawg]

DAWG: nothing you laid out makes organized arming of teachers any less absurd. And the fact that you think they can "earn their keep" by being armed is even more absurd. Throw as much analyticals as you want, I will continue to live in the real world. I wold be perfectly willing to entertain the notion of allowing CC holders to carry at school, but never the idea of arming teachers as a rule.

How would CC holders being allowed to carry at school and not be punished by the government have helped prevent this kind of tragedy? Other types, sure. Unless you also allowed employees who had their CCW's to carry to work at school it would be meaningless. My suggestion is not that we arm all teachers, but rather that we arm some admins or other workers who arn't in regular contact, maybe teachers if they are so inclined and it would not pose a major hazard. Not arm teachers as a rule, I havn't said that

[PanzerJaeger]

What has always fascinated me about the gun grabbers is their complete silence on alcohol. Alcohol related deaths claim the lives of millions of people each year, hundreds of thousands of them being innocent children - far more than firearms. Even infallible Australia isn't immune to the misery caused by the substance. And the typical arguments about guns are uniquely interchangeable. Consumable alcohol serves absolutely no beneficial social good. It's sole purpose is to alter people's mental state, which leads to all manner of terrible outcomes. The fact that millions consume it responsibly each year does not negate the fact that millions also die each year because of it.

And yet, in all the years that I've been reading Pap's and some of the others' posts, I've never read a word written about the social costs of alcohol. This leads me to believe that the immediate jump to ban guns, as opposed to say, trying to understand why society keeps letting mentally disturbed individuals fall through the cracks, is not out of a genuine concern for the teh childrenz. If it were, such posters would be calling for a return to Prohibition in the states and abroad. Instead, the urge to ban instead of understand reveals deep rooted fear or ignorance about guns and/or general disdain of the mindset that leads people to desire gun ownership.

[Major Robert Dump]

How would CC holders being allowed to carry at school and not be punished by the government have helped prevent this kind of tragedy? Other types, sure. Unless you also allowed employees who had their CCW's to carry to work at school it would be meaningless. My suggestion is not that we arm all teachers, but rather that we arm some admins or other workers who arn't in regular contact, maybe teachers if they are so inclined and it would not pose a major hazard. Not arm teachers as a rule, I havn't said that

It would have to be "as a rule" because otherwise there would not be enough takers. We are talking about schools, at least in this instance, as being in municipalities inside of towns inside of states, not feds in federal airports in federal skies. In order for your plan to come off, it would have to be complied to, which would raise all sorts of liability, district, county, city and state issues that no one wants to touch, especially school admins and teachers. Or we could just put more cops/security in schools as dedicated security, not an administrator trying to juggle duties and be school security. To argue that it would cost more would actually be unprovable, because I promise you that arming clerks and educators will make insurance premiums skyrocket. And if it did cost more, then so what? That's the price we have to pay for getting our cool toys.

Let me tell you where this is going to go, since politicians don't have the balls to close loopholes for fear or rustling feathers. They are going to take the path of least resistence. They are going to use the same conecept being used for ObamaCare, for Tobacco and for Lotteries: PREPARE FOR FIREARMS TO HAVE THE LIVING HELL TAXED OUT OF THEM. And that, my friends, is how we will cover the costs of added security, both physical and administrative.

@Panzer: many states (not sure about the federal level) have laws that do not allow firearms in the homes of felons or abusers. I foresee similar measures to be taken in conjunction with homes where people with mental issues are present.

What I find really funny is that the VA and DOD give names of mentally defunct veterans to the fed to prevent them from buying firearms. Not gonna debate this issue, and I would be willing to bet ole Tom Coburn takes his dog out of this fight now. But if I am not mistaken, there is no similar database kept for the casual mental health recipient, due much I am sure to patient-provider confidentiality. Much of the ATF form relies on the honor system.