school shootings

[Legacy Account]

Shootings would be much less frequent if people didn\'t have guns!

Now I know you could go on a machete wielding rampage (and we have a knife problem here in the UK...), but it takes an altogether different person to physically hack/stab someone to death and the chances of that person managing to kill several people is much less than if they were wielding a gun.

Guns are way too easy. Squeeze the trigger from a distance - you are removed from what you\'re doing to a certain extent.

Ban guns!!

 

[MPJ]

Being picked-on or teased does not create psychopathic killers, it\'s only an excuse. Lots of kids are picked on in school but only a select few grab a gun and go to town on his classmates, these select few already \'had it in them\' and it would have come out in one way or another. They were probablly picked on because others could sense this oddness even if they wern\'t sure what it was.

The common cop-out of \'society is to blame\' is garbage. While I have no great love for our modern society I can\'t stand there and say \'you know, if we as society did this or that then there wouldn\'t be bad people in the world\' because that\'s just foolish. There have always been bad people in the world as long as there have been people, there\'s just a heck of a lot more of them now than ever before.

That society stuff being said I suppose I do blame a small part of the state of the world today on the fact that very few children seem to be raised by their parents anymore. With two parents working children are raising themselves and/or are being raised by schools/TV/strangers and are not learning proper values, values that otherwise may have restrained psychotic behaviour somewhat or at least redirected it.

The term \'justice\' is laughable for most violent crimes as it can never be truely acheaved, even capital punishment doesn\'t necessairly bring justice on behalf of the victim (though I still believe we should be utilizing it far more often and for far more crimes).

Cutting this short cause I just got a call and have to run...

PS: Proud parent part - My boy in his first month of public school won \'Student of the Month\', did the award thing yesterday.

 

[GreenOne]

Ban guns
Ban schools

Ban guns in school !

 

[supervike]

Originally posted by Spacemunkie

Ban guns!!

Ban murder!!


Oh, that is already banned. Funny, it didn\'t seem to stop it.

 

[Legacy Account]

You see, this is the shite that people always come out with:

\"Banning guns won\'t stop people killing each other.\"

No it won\'t. But it takes a lot more work to kill people without automatic weapons.

Funny, but the biggest multiple murders (that weren\'t terrorist related...) committed over here involved guns: Dunblaine and Hungerford.

 

[supervike]

I\'m not disagreeing with you\'re post at all....just trying to point out the irony in it.

Criminals will break the laws.

Passing more laws does not stop crime.

 

[DrEvilmonki]

@beowulfthehunter. Have you actually though tabout what you just posted? On the one hand you say the new way of inclussion and pushing at risk kids is the problem and then you say that school violence is decreasing!

If these new methods are causing the problems then you would expect more violence not less.

I would suggest that while difficult that not abandoning children might not be a sensible solution.

 

[airhead]

Originally posted by Spacemunkieit takes a lot more work to kill people without automatic weapons.

None of these shootings involved automatic weapons.

Originally posted by GreenOne
Ban guns
Ban schools

Ban guns in school !

They have. Thus, no guns in school means an idiot can go in there and it is a free fire zone. All the law abiding citizens are unarmed - nobody to shoot back at you.

 

[Shawn R. L.]

There is about 20,000 (literally) laws regulating firearms. I think by this point it might be getting sort of clear that laws arent the awnser. Moral/spiritual decay - now there\'s something that needs change and NO, laws wont help that either.

 

[Legacy Account]

A gun is much more \'automatic\' than a knife or a club! There may be laws in place over there, but everyone still has a gun. If they didn\'t, they wouldn\'t be able to use \'em!

If you honestly believe that kids should go to school armed, then that says everything about gun culture in your country as far as I\'m concerned....

 

[Mr.S.Marbo]

Originally posted by Shawn R. L.
There is about 20,000 (literally) laws regulating firearms. I think by this point it might be getting sort of clear that laws arent the awnser.

You can pass gun controls as much as you like and make as many laws as you like to try and restrict their use, but it\'s not really going to work very well if you still have \"legal\" guns avaliable in a country. You can ban those with a criminal record from getting them, you can try and vet those with psychological illness so they don\'t get guns. You can ban people carrying concealed weapons and you can ban high powered weapons. To me none of these will make much of difference at all. You can pass as many laws as you like but in my opinion they don\'t have a great effect unless you pretty much stop the vast majority of the population having guns (such as the UK).

The fact that guns are available is the problem not who gets them. It\'s like cars. The use of cars is highly regulated by law (speed limits, drink driving laws, highway code, tests, insurance, MOT etc, etc), but because we have cars people will always die as a result of them. Guns are a dangerous consumer product, there is nothing else I can think of that people buy as a civilian that is designed to kill someone in an instant with ease. You would not accept say a toaster that was as deadly as a gun so why do we accept a gun?

The answer to me is simple. If we did not have guns there would be far less gun violence, and less injury and death. It\'s the fact that guns are around that is the problem (not that the laws controlling them are not good enough) and there is only one law that can fix that and that\'s a law that bans firearms outright.

You might say well cars are dangerous too do you suggest we ban them too? I would say I think we need to use more public transport and yes we should use less cars. Shame in the UK our train service is shockingly bad eh.

 

[petey]

Americans that think carrying guns is good are idiots. There I said it.

 

[supervike]

Again, many of you are under the assumption that Americans are all strapped and have gun racks in their pickups.

Possibly JUST possibly mind you, there is more to Americans than what you are told by your press.

Guns are legal here, but its not the wild west. I don\'t own a single gun, but I enjoy the right to own one if I please. I am a law abiding, tax paying FREE citizen.

Cigarettes are still legal, yet kill more people every year than guns do.

Why do you all want a government that looks after your every need and solves all your problems?

 

[DrEvilmonki]

I can\'t accept the ban guns arguement. Other than Japan can anyone tell me where it is illegal to own a gun?

I do however view the idea that it is a right to own a gun (and a big arse gun + I will have 20 of them thank you) likely to cause problems.
It will permeate a culture, not every citizen, but a critical mass in which gun prevalence in itself can cause problems.

Now it is my understanding that you do not need a license to own a gun in most states and that veting is fairly minimal. It just makes getting hold of a gun way to easy IMO.

There are plenty of people in New Zealand who own guns but in order to legaly obtain one you need to go through a licensing process which includes education, police checks and affidavits from people you know who will vouch for your character (and these people get checked up on to).
There are strict conditions on how you can store your firearms.
Handguns are virtualy unheard of since you need special licenses for these and no one other than collectors are likely to be given one.

We still have gun deaths, criminals still use guns to commit crimes. However the US does seem to have it worse than most (although I wouldn\'t be shifting to Mexico, Brazil or Estonia if I were you).

And finally this is an issue for the US to sort through really. My personal opinion is that I think it\'s a possibility that your beliefs around guns could be helping fuel violence in your society. Sometimes we need to look at what we hold true to see if in fact it is truth.

 

[spazzy]

Our gun problems are based primarily on criminals. I know, that sounds like an obvious thing to say, but hear me out. Our family owns many firearms. Everything that we own is legal, and everything that we own is either used for hunting or as a collectors item. Our family is involved in hunting, and if you are a meat eater of any sort you cannot blame us for that. We also believe that as hunters we also hold a great deal of responsibility in wildlife conservation. We do not trophy hunt, anytime something is shot at it is legally and with the intent of ending up in the freezer and ultimately on the table.

Because we believe that there is a great deal of responsibility involved with hunting and the use of firearms, my husband and his father teach hunter education classes. These classes are designed to teach new hunters young and old how to be safe, responsible, and respectful. In the state we live in it is mandatory for a person under the age of 18 to take this class before they may purchase a hunting license. It is my belief that this should be required for persons of any age, but that\'s a long hard road, and we\'re working on it. I know that when some people think of hunters they think of drunk rednecks acting stupid with guns, chasing a poor defenseless bambi through the brush on their 4 wheel drives, but I promise you that this is not the case with a majority of american sportsmen, though I cannot deny that there is probably that occurance from time to time. Every group will have its bad apples.

That being said, guns will be used responsibly by individuals who choose to be responsible. They will be used irresponsibly by individuals who choose to be irresponsible. As it stands now ownership of a firearm is a right, which has been taken away from a few individuals. Personally, I believe that the ownership of firearms should be a privelege that is earned. But, the bad guys will still get them. Ultimately, a firearm is a tool which will be used in the manner decided by the wielder.

There are many suggested answers for our problems, but the problem isn\'t the firearms, it\'s the criminals or ciminals to be. When I worry about school shootings, I\'m not worried about the weapon used, I\'m worried about the person holding it. Be it a bicycle chain, a pair of scissors, a baseball bat, a gun, or even a well sharpened pencil. What truly bothers me is the individual who intends to hurt children.

 

[philologus]

Originally posted by spazzy


Phil, we are discussing private school options. As far as homeschool, I really don\'t think she would get the social interaction necessary. If you live in a larger area that has more community activities that children may be involved in, then there isn\'t a concern for that, but here we don\'t have much at all.

If you decide to go the home school route, you can look into who else home schools in your area. We have several families in our neighborhood alone who do it. There are home school groups within our county that organize athletic leagues and events for the kids to add some more \"social interaction\". In addition, our kids are heavily involved in their church activities so we have plenty of kids their age that they play with. We also organize field trips this way. The other benefit is that we know the parents and families of all the children my kids inteact with, which allows us to communicate about our kids more effectively.

 

[MarkusTay]

I\'m torn

I believe in the Constitution, and that our fore-fathers were very smart in including our \'right to bare arms\'. They also incuded our right to have a revolution if our Gov\'t no longer follows our wishes, which is great in theory and also the reason why we as Americans are allowed to own weapons. Nowhere in the Constitution does it says the weapons are to protect you from other citizens, but rather from a Gov\'t gone bad.

I say in theory, because our fore-fathers did not see the advent of tanks, missiles, and helicopter gunships. The Gov\'t we are allowed to protect ourselves from are so much better armed then us that a revolution is impossible.

That is why although I believe in our constitutional right to bare arms, I also believe it is a useless right.

An individual who purchases a handgun to protect his family should not be penalized because of the actions of others. The problem is we do not place a limit on how many guns an individual has. I am not allowed to purchase a handgun in NY without a license, but I can drive to another state and get one, which is what most criminals do. Gangs get new recruits, with no felonies, to buy dozens of guns for them. The other problem is collector\'s, like my father-in-law, who had his entire collection robbed TWICE! The first time he lost 60 some odd handguns, and 5 years later while he was still replacing them he was robbed again for about 30! The man is responsible for putting 90 firearms into the hands of criminals in my neighborhood!

This is why I am torn; because even though I do not and never will own a gun, I understand why we have the right. However, people should only be allowed to purchase one, and if you lose it or it is stolen then you should lose your right to own one. This simple line of reasoning would probably save a lot of lives.

Oh... and as far as comparing gang violence, dis-affected kids, and a lone pervert, its like comparing apples and oranges. It doesn\'t matter if it all takes place in schools, they are 3 different animals and have to be handled as such. I do not pity a pedophile, nor do I feel any remorse for a gang memeber who gets shot, but I was one of those kids that got picked on a lot so I can tell you first hand it is as much the fault of the \'victims\' as the shooters.

I remember thinking about tossing a cheerleader into a woodchipper a number of times. Thinking about it doesn\'t make you insane, DOING IT does.

 

[vincegamer]

Originally posted by airhead
[

Originally posted by GreenOne
Ban guns
Ban schools

Ban guns in school !

They have. Thus, no guns in school means an idiot can go in there and it is a free fire zone. All the law abiding citizens are unarmed - nobody to shoot back at you.

Actually, my high school had an armed police officer assigned to the school, so technically there would have been someone to shoot back.
Oh, and the year after I graduated the school installed metal detectors in all the doors so guns are not allowed and it\'s more work to get them in.

 

[vincegamer]

Originally posted by supervike
I don\'t own a single gun, but I enjoy the right to own one if I please. I am a law abiding, tax paying FREE citizen.

This one made me laugh. I have never eaten horse meat, but I used to be free to eat it. In the state of California it\'s illegal and now the US Congress has a bill to ban it that is very likely to pass.
I am not so free.

 

[vincegamer]

Sorry for multi-posts but one last thing:
Here is an article about the use of statistics and the REDUCTION in school violence that has been happening.

http://www.hoover.org/publications/ednext/3366586.html