Yet another US shooting

[Leith Green]

8 hours ago, djchapsticks said:

Gets to the point where honestly, you become desensitised to something as fucking abhorrent as murdered children.

America as a nation, as a culture have made their stance clear. A few dozen mass shootings a year, including primary and nursery aged children, is a price more than worth paying to avoid serious gun reforms. Even a conversation about it is a massive no-no.

Good people with guns stop bad people with guns they will tell you. But they don't. Bad people with guns clearly breach the divide far, far too often. 

Frankly its their own fault - they could change it any time they want but continue to elect politicians who trumpet their "gun freedoms".

Some stats that a civilised country wouldnt accept - 

• In 2020 guns overtook car accidents as the leading cause of death in children and teens.
• This was the 128th mass shooting event in 2023 (one where at least four people are wounded or killed).
• This was the 89th incident of gun violence at schools or nurseries in 2023. The graph below shows the numbers and the trend suggests that 2023 will be a(nother) record breaker.

[Theroadlesstravelled]

2 hours ago, Boo Khaki said:

It's difficult to discern who precisely you are attempting to mock here, since much of the aforementioned backtracking and straw-clutching involves GC's who have previously been adamant that they can 'always tell' desperately concocting excuses to explain why this time they were so 'confused'. Seems that the GC's are happy to 'misgender' people not only as a deliberate act of spite, but also when it's a convenient but patently horseshit excuse for jumping to prejudiced conclusions and exposing themselves for the the hateful arseholes they are.

 

It is silly that the likes of the New York Times and CNN go to great lengths to apologise for not being respectful and mistakingly deadnaming and misgendering a murderous psychopath. 

 

[Richey Edwards]

How many of these tragic shootings need to happen before they realise that letting people have firearms is a terrible idea?

Do they really value the freedom to own firearms over the lives of children?

[djchapsticks]

1 hour ago, Leith Green said:

Frankly its their own fault - they could change it any time they want but continue to elect politicians who trumpet their "gun freedoms".

Some stats that a civilised country wouldnt accept - 

• In 2020 guns overtook car accidents as the leading cause of death in children and teens.
• This was the 128th mass shooting event in 2023 (one where at least four people are wounded or killed).
• This was the 89th incident of gun violence at schools or nurseries in 2023. The graph below shows the numbers and the trend suggests that 2023 will be a(nother) record breaker.

There is a massive factor that no-one will seem to actually say aloud either - schools, particularly middle and high schools in the US are absolutely rampant with bullies, tormentors and aggressors. This has always gone on and with the added factor of phones, the internet and social media, kids simply can't go or stay home to avoid it any longer. I don't think the fact there's been a constant upward trend since 2011 (the real advent of smartphones) after decades of low stagnation is purely coincidental.

I see videos popping up on my twitter or YT feed now and then of some 13-17 year old kid picking on another kid in class, sometimes even picking on teachers  and it kicking off into a fight that the aggressor will normally win as they've preyed on someone obviously weaker than them. All around are children giggling and filming to make sure that as soon as the stop button is hit, it's immortalised online forever.

The comments on these posts are typically full of people sympathising about how horrifically the kids in the videos are being treated and yet no-one seems to be willing or able to connect the dots that in many, many cases, these are the exact profile of person who one day will decide enough's enough and come in with fucking guns and shoot up dozens of innocent people.  I understand that it is a LOT more nuanced than this...not every bullied child will come in and shoot up a school but I'd wager that a massive high percentage of school shooters are a perfect storm of mental disorder and tormented by others as a result of it.

[djchapsticks]

20 minutes ago, Richey Edwards said:

How many of these tragic shootings need to happen before they realise that letting people have firearms is a terrible idea?

Do they really value the freedom to own firearms over the lives of children?

Yes. That is the most unequivocal of all yesses. They do.

This is not even a freedom though - it's a fucking falsehood. On January 6th 2021 the very reason the right to bear arms was introduced, was severely tested. The right to bear arms is essentially to allow the people to rise against a tyrannical Government, so in the face of what they deemed a 'tyrannical Government', they descended on Capitol Hill, armed to the teeth and were both condemned and absolutely bitch-slapped for doing so. They could take up their arms against the US Army/Govt all they like. No matter how many of them there are, they'd be churned down into a red paste within seconds.

There is no limit on the number of these tragedies - in fact they will view the reasonable and proportionate response to the increasing number of incidents as 'more guns'.

Edited March 28, 2023 by djchapsticks

[Venti]

On 23/03/2023 at 19:04, Florentine_Pogen said:

Funnily enough there's a library level in GoldenEye 007.

[hk blues]

1 hour ago, Richey Edwards said:

How many of these tragic shootings need to happen before they realise that letting people have firearms is a terrible idea?

Do they really value the freedom to own firearms over the lives of children?

I'd imagine we are long, long past the stage where the penny will drop so it won't really matter how many more such events happen.  

As for the 2nd question - they obviously do value their freedom over the lives of children.  Maybe not over their own children though, but the numbers who have had to experience that tragedy is not large enough to make any significant impact on the general population's conscience.

Where I am currently, guns are allowed but I have only ever been 'exposed' to someone using one and that was at a birthday party as a kind of salute to celebrate - it made me most uncomfortable I'll admit.  You just don't see folk here with one (save security guards etc) and certainly we don't have the kind of shootings seen in the USA. I am on an ex-pat forum where the majority of members are American and almost to a man they have major hard-ons for guns to the extent that gun chat (and Trump chat as well) is banned. It's a common question for new posters who enquire about life in the Philippines to ask about gun ownership and such - the retort from the forum mods is usually along the lines of keep that shit in the US where it belongs (foreigners can't own guns here anyway). In short, letting people have firearms in itself isn't a problem, the problem seems to be letting Americans have them. 

 

[ArabGaz]

 

[Benjamin_Nevis]

1 hour ago, Richey Edwards said:

How many of these tragic shootings need to happen before they realise that letting people have firearms is a terrible idea?

Do they really value the freedom to own firearms over the lives of children?

Basically until a high profile pro-Gun Republican politician or a high profile NRA official sees their kids murdered at school. 

[Richey Edwards]

7 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I'd imagine we are long, long past the stage where the penny will drop so it won't really matter how many more such events happen.  

As for the 2nd question - they obviously do value their freedom over the lives of children.  Maybe not over their own children though, but the numbers who have had to experience that tragedy is not large enough to make any significant impact on the general population's conscience.

Where I am currently, guns are allowed but I have only ever been 'exposed' to someone using one and that was at a birthday party as a kind of salute to celebrate - it made me most uncomfortable I'll admit.  You just don't see folk here with one (save security guards etc) and certainly we don't have the kind of shootings seen in the USA. I am on an ex-pat forum where the majority of members are American and almost to a man they have major hard-ons for guns to the extent that gun chat (and Trump chat as well) is banned. It's a common question for new posters who enquire about life in the Philippines to ask about gun ownership and such - the retort from the forum mods is usually along the lines of keep that shit in the US where it belongs (foreigners can't own guns here anyway). In short, letting people have firearms in itself isn't a problem, the problem seems to be letting Americans have them. 

 

I don't understand the hard-on that a lot of people have for guns at all. They're not fun gadgets or toys. They're deadly weapons. Why would anyone want one?

If someone wanted to own a weapon - regardless of the legality of weapons in their specific location - I would be highly suspicious of their reasons for wanting one.

[hk blues]

2 minutes ago, Benjamin_Nevis said:

Basically until a high profile pro-Gun Republican politician or a high profile NRA official sees their kids murdered at school. 

 

9 minutes ago, hk blues said:

Maybe not over their own children though.

Yep. 

[Shipa]

13 minutes ago, hk blues said:

I'd imagine we are long, long past the stage where the penny will drop so it won't really matter how many more such events happen.  

As for the 2nd question - they obviously do value their freedom over the lives of children.  Maybe not over their own children though, but the numbers who have had to experience that tragedy is not large enough to make any significant impact on the general population's conscience.

Where I am currently, guns are allowed but I have only ever been 'exposed' to someone using one and that was at a birthday party as a kind of salute to celebrate - it made me most uncomfortable I'll admit.  You just don't see folk here with one (save security guards etc) and certainly we don't have the kind of shootings seen in the USA. I am on an ex-pat forum where the majority of members are American and almost to a man they have major hard-ons for guns to the extent that gun chat (and Trump chat as well) is banned. It's a common question for new posters who enquire about life in the Philippines to ask about gun ownership and such - the retort from the forum mods is usually along the lines of keep that shit in the US where it belongs (foreigners can't own guns here anyway). In short, letting people have firearms in itself isn't a problem, the problem seems to be letting Americans have them. 

 

That seems to be a big part of the problem. While having guns involved massively increases the body count, they are part of the symptoms, rather than the cause.

In the UK we don't have mass stabbings occurring on a daily basis. There seems to be something else at a cultural or societal level in the US which is leading to these levels of attacks happening in the first place.

[hk blues]

2 minutes ago, Richey Edwards said:

I don't understand the hard-on that a lot of people have for guns at all. They're not fun gadgets or toys. They're deadly weapons. Why would anyone want one?

If someone wanted to own a weapon - regardless of the legality of weapons in their specific location - I would be highly suspicious of their reasons for wanting one.

I guess we don't get it as we're not American and don't understand the psyche around it - at least that's what they usually say when I ask about it. 

As I said in my post, I was uncomfortable around the gun and by uncomfortable I mean frightened to some extent.  This wasn't a pistol or a revolver, it was a f***-off real gun.  It was just kept under the bed as well!  I cannot imagine living in a country where that was the norm.

[Sherrif John Bunnell]

[coprolite]

13 hours ago, Theroadlesstravelled said:

Americans don’t care about tragedy.

It's only Steps they ignore. Bee Gees version went to number one

[Sergeant Wilson]

52 minutes ago, Richey Edwards said:

I don't understand the hard-on that a lot of people have for guns at all. They're not fun gadgets or toys. They're deadly weapons. Why would anyone want one?

If someone wanted to own a weapon - regardless of the legality of weapons in their specific location - I would be highly suspicious of their reasons for wanting one.

I don't know about that, given the popularity of computer games involving shooting people. I get that it's a different level and killing people is usually a bad thing. I think lots of people would like a "shot" of a gun. There's even tourist attractions that let you play with machine guns etc.

[Fullerene]

4 hours ago, djchapsticks said:

Yes. That is the most unequivocal of all yesses. They do.

This is not even a freedom though - it's a fucking falsehood. On January 6th 2021 the very reason the right to bear arms was introduced, was severely tested. The right to bear arms is essentially to allow the people to rise against a tyrannical Government, so in the face of what they deemed a 'tyrannical Government', they descended on Capitol Hill, armed to the teeth and were both condemned and absolutely bitch-slapped for doing so. They could take up their arms against the US Army/Govt all they like. No matter how many of them there are, they'd be churned down into a red paste within seconds.

There is no limit on the number of these tragedies - in fact they will view the reasonable and proportionate response to the increasing number of incidents as 'more guns'.

The second amendment is not about a freedom to own a gun.  It is about a responsibility to own a gun in order to protect the new republic from enemy forces and protect each state for every other state.  The USA started off without an army, navy or air force and relied on a state militia of all its citizens for protection.

[coprolite]

The US constitution was written by people and could be changed by people if it wasn't for idiots. 

Yeeha! 

[Guest]

5 hours ago, Richey Edwards said:

I don't understand the hard-on that a lot of people have for guns at all. They're not fun gadgets or toys. They're deadly weapons. Why would anyone want one?

Because it was marketed to them by the plutocrats who run their society. Already wealthy men saw an opportunity to become even wealthier, to open a new market. Selling guns to random fuckers. Sell them in Wallmart. Tell Americans they need guns. Americans will oblige because they're a thoroughly obedient people, even forced as children to recite a pledge of allegiance/obedience. Implant in their their mind a mythical notion of "freedom" then use that association to sell them all the crap you can. Guns = freedom. Even though guns have the sole purpose of enacting violence and violence is the ultimate tyranny.

As Fullerene pointed out above, this philosophical argument using their constitution is a (relatively) recent development. From the 1950s, weapons companies began lobbying to get rid of the laws standing between them and profit. One trick they used was to reimagine the meaning of the second ammendment.

[ICTChris]

It can be difficult to accurately tell but the percentage of US households that own firearms has reduced significantly since the 1970s and 80s. Far more people than regularly used firearms for hunting as well. Not sure if many people had automatic rifles in those days.