WTF Denver shootings at Batman showing

[throdgrain]

But clearly millions of "felons" do get hold of guns and don't worry about it! The 10,000 homicides a year (which apparently aren't carried out by legitimate gun owners) are being committed by someone! And since nearly a third of all Americans have a criminal record, then unless everyone else (including all the kids) all own three guns each and are secretly committing thousands of murders and blaming it on those with criminal records, then the criminals have lots of guns, and yes, commit 10,000 homicides, more than 10 times the number as the whole of the EU (which has a 60% bigger population) Sorry, but that is carnage.

Sorry, but, millions of felons holding guns and shooting each other? Really? Millions??

 

[Scouse]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_States

From the first paragraph:

Gun violence is not new in the United States, with the assassinations of President Abraham Lincoln in 1865, and of Presidents James Garfield, William McKinley, and John F. Kennedy. High profile gun violence incidents, such as the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr.

They're listing presidential assassination attempts as their highest priority examples of gun violence. The schools come later - but this is muddying the waters very much. You can hardly use assassinations of presidents as an argument for gun control - because no matter how guns are controlled (and regardless of whether they were state-sponsored assassins) - the perpetrators of these crimes would have gotten hold of a gun.

Also from the same article:

The majority of gun-related deaths in the United States are suicides,[5] with 17,352 (55.6%)

So, over half are suicide (and arguably gun is a good way to go - much better than draino or domestos), and:

12,632 (40.5%) were homicide deaths

40% murder - where guns are weapons of choice - but with murder knives, spoons, my fat throbbing member may also be a weapon of choice.

That leaves 15% "other".


So, looking at the numbers, you have to ask this question - banning guns would cut gun deaths - but would that cut deaths?

I mean, suicides that blow their heads off will just start jumping off bridges (possibly onto motorways). Murders may, arguably, lessen slightly - but those that don't may become even more grizly as alternative, less effecitve, weapons are used.

I don't know about "other"

As for:

All interpretations are up for debate, it just so happens that yours is wrong

>>>

in 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court took a position for the first time on this issue in District of Columbia v. Heller, holding that the second amendment secures an individual right to own firearms

I'm not saying I know the arguments as well as debated in the US Supreme Court - but perhaps it's not as cut-and-dried as you think, old bean

 

[soze]

Any one stuck on a train delayed for over 2 hours because some selfish fuck* jumped in front of it might like handguns to be legal reading that.

*Not trying to come down on people that feel the need to kill themselves just the people that do it in a way that fucks over so many people.

 

[Tuthmes]

Stuffs

I see you leave out the ~75.000 people that get "injured" every year, aswell as the 4k death of "other" guns. Not sure what you are doing with the other figures (for example: guns as a weapon of choice, etc), but i'm not following you there.

 

[Scouse]

I see you leave out the ~75.000 people that get "injured" every year, aswell as the 4k death of "other" guns. Not sure what you are doing with the other figures (for example: guns as a weapon of choice, etc), but i'm not following you there.

I talked about gun deaths simply because it's more important (IMO).

The 75k injuries - or 0.02% of the population of 350,000,000 - whilst very much being part of the argument aren't actually necessary to come to a satisfactory conclusion because the "weapons of choice" argument applies equally to them.


The "weapon of choice" thing is easy. Look at it this way:

1) If you're going to murder someone, you're going to murder them.

2) If you're going to kill yourself, you're going to kill yourself.

You can murder people with guns - and bricks, knives, baseball bats, plastic bags, chiuauaua-cannon etc. You can kill yourself with guns - or by jumping off cliffs, motorways, lying on railways, slitting your wrists, drinking domestos, sticking your cock in something with too-high a voltage.

If you ban guns you will reduce "gun death". But you will increase suicides and murders by other means.

I.E. You don't reduce "death" - you just change the method used.

Guns are good at killing people. That's why people choose them - but something else will do nicely instead.

In the meantime, all the law-abiding hunters and recreational shooters get their (relatively) harmless hobby stopped.


If you want to stop deaths in the US then you need to look no further than improving the balance of the economy. It is inequality of wealth that is ultimately responsible for the vast majority of murders and I daresay the suicide rate isn't helped by poverty either.

 

[Tuthmes]

I talked about gun deaths simply because it's more important (IMO).

The 75k injuries - or 0.02% of the population of 350,000,000 - whilst very much being part of the argument aren't actually necessary to come to a satisfactory conclusion because the "weapons of choice" argument applies equally to them.

Read carefully what I posted earlier. The other points have already bin discussed to death in this thread.

 

[Scouse]

The other points have already bin discussed to death in this thread.

Surely you mean shot?



/gets coat

 

[DaGaffer]

Sorry, but, millions of felons holding guns and shooting each other? Really? Millions??

FFS, read what I said. If 100m Americans have a criminal record, and (according to the NRA and you) law-abiding Americans don't commit gun crime, someone is killing 10,000 people a year with guns (and injuring 50-70K more). So yes, that means statistically millions of "felons" have guns, and thousands of those millions are shooting each other with them. This isn't difficult to understand, unless you're claiming a. the gun crime stats are a lie, or b. criminals aren't getting hold of guns the easy way (via the complete lack of gun control) but via the hard way (smuggled in), which would imply the US ATF Bureau and US Customs may as well pack up and go home.

 

[DaGaffer]

I'm not saying I know the arguments as well as debated in the US Supreme Court - but perhaps it's not as cut-and-dried as you think, old bean

From you of all people, I'm surprised that you would use the words of any modern US political or judicial institution to justify anything. The Civilian handgun market alone is worth $1bn a year, which tells you all you need to know about any judge's desire to rock the boat.

 

[throdgrain]

Statistically speaking, with Gaffs special google-wand, there are millions of felons running round America with illegal guns. Paints a picture, I'll give you that

Tell you what mate, I do respect your opinions, and often agree with you, but when I post about something that I really know about, and you still post with the same kind of authority as you do everything else, it makes me doubt some of your other posts too ...

 

[old.Tohtori]

Tell you what mate, I do respect your opinions, and often agree with you, but when I post about something that I really know about, and you still post with the same kind of authority as you do everything else, it makes me doubt some of your other posts too ...

Welcome to my world

 

[Job]

You cannot possibly separate the cultural physcological effect of allowing mass gun ownership from the statistics.
Guns not only kill, they maim, intimidate and threaten.

 

[DaGaffer]

Statistically speaking, with Gaffs special google-wand, there are millions of felons running round America with illegal guns. Paints a picture, I'll give you that

Tell you what mate, I do respect your opinions, and often agree with you, but when I post about something that I really know about, and you still post with the same kind of authority as you do everything else, it makes me doubt some of your other posts too ...

OK, I'll draw you another picture. From the US DoJ stats site:

During the offense that brought them to prison, 15% of State inmates and 13% of Federal inmates carried a handgun, and about 2%, a military-style semiautomatic gun.

http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/guns.cfm

There are currently approx 2.26m prison inmates in US prisons. So, lets average 15% in state prisons and 13% in Federal to a nice round 14%. That means 316,000 people are in prison at any one time who were in possession of a gun when they got caught. They're the ones actually in prison. And you can't see how is easy it is to get from there to millions given the numbers of people in the US with a criminal record?

 

[Tom]

Look, it's simple. Millions of US citizens want guns. Gun ownership is part of their constitution. If they want guns, let them have them. If you don't like it then voice your concern, don't buy anything made in the US, don't go there, whatever. But please don't waste your time arguing statistics when the obvious answer is that Chuck Yankee likes big guns and fuck anyone who tries to take them from him.

BTW I'm with Throddy, shooting things with a gun is fun.

 

[Poag]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-18980974

Oh dear, not the right response.

 

[soze]

http://thechive.com/2012/07/25/good...ora-to-visit-victims-of-co-shooting-4-photos/

That was nice of him.

 

[DaGaffer]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-18980974

Oh dear, not the right response.

Unfortunately, it probably is.

 

[soze]

That Sons of Guns show had about this. After a shooting they had about 20 people come in and try to buy guns. He scared one of them to the point of making them cry and refused to sell them a gun until they got training. So I can imagine loads of people in Denver will go and buy guns for self defense and never try to train with the gun. Just stick it in a box until they get robbed then get themselves killed with their own gun.

 

[Poag]

I heard some American say that if people in the audience had been armed they could have stopped the guy. More likly they would have shot at someone else, who would have shot back and then it would just be everyone shooting everyone else.

More guns is not the answer. Better controls, screening and mental assessments is. As American is so gun happy private ownership will never be outlawed, tighter controls are the only answer with checkups on persons carried out infrequently afterwards.

 

[soze]

Yep unless there were military or police in the Cinema who had a gun chances are a firefight would of caused more harm than good.

 

[DaGaffer]

More guns is not the answer. Better controls, screening and mental assessments is. As American is so gun happy private ownership will never be outlawed, tighter controls are the only answer with checkups on persons carried out infrequently afterwards.

Of course it is. But that's not going to happen. So everyone buys more guns. A conspiracy theorist could have a field day with this one...

 

[Scouse]

Yep unless there were military or police in the Cinema who had a gun chances are a firefight would of caused more harm than good.

I disagree with that. It would have been pretty obvious who was shooting.

If the cinemagoers had been armed, he'd have been shot. Probably before he killed many more. Yes, there may have been some collateral (most likely) - but probably less death.


Yes, less guns = less gun death (as said before, not necessarily less death tho). However, if I'm under fire from a loony with an automatic weapon I want the ability to shoot back. Otherwise I'd be a sitting duck - and FUCK THAT

 

[soze]

I disagree with that. It would have been pretty obvious who was shooting.

If the cinemagoers had been armed, he'd have been shot. Probably before he killed many more. Yes, there may have been some collateral (most likely) - but probably less death.


Yes, less guns = less gun death (as said before, not necessarily less death tho). However, if I'm under fire from a loony with an automatic weapon I want the ability to shoot back. Otherwise I'd be a sitting duck - and FUCK THAT

Look at how many hours it takes people like Swat to learn to shot and shot properly. You get some random with a gun and they will be hiding behind a chair and just holding the gun up and firing blind more than likely. Plus hitting a target with a hand gun at range is not easy so should a civilian manage to kill that guy in full body armor with a handgun using legal bullets while panicking it would of been a miracle. More likely is innocent civilians get killed.

*I believe in gun control not a ban. But I do not believe that civilians with guns would reduce death in this kind of circumstance.

 

[Poag]

I disagree with that. It would have been pretty obvious who was shooting.

If the cinemagoers had been armed, he'd have been shot. Probably before he killed many more. Yes, there may have been some collateral (most likely) - but probably less death.


Yes, less guns = less gun death (as said before, not necessarily less death tho). However, if I'm under fire from a loony with an automatic weapon I want the ability to shoot back. Otherwise I'd be a sitting duck - and FUCK THAT

Automatic weapons are outlawed in the US in civilian hands. This guy had civilian single shot variants to the weapons used by the military/police. This does not affect how fast he could pull the trigger however, and his 100round drum mag would have gone on for a long time if it hadn't jammed, got to be thankful for the terrible design there.

I'd disagree that less people would have been hurt. Yes one person may have stood up and shot the guy, another person slower to react may have stood up, search for a gun and shot the "defender" by mistake.

Its all if buts and maybes, but in a dark cinema, smoke/gas around so its hard to see....can see it happening very easily personally.

Of course it is. But that's not going to happen. So everyone buys more guns. A conspiracy theorist could have a field day with this one...

Sorry, are you agreeing with me or disagreeing?


I think your agreeing with me so i'll go with that. Its all circular at the moment, the gun nuts take any tightening of controls as the government trying to take the guns away from them, so they lobby against it.

In the mean while the regular people feel the need to defend themselves so they buy guns, untrained and only doing so in a panic. So its just a circle of death, more guns, more death, more guns. All the while the gun groups lobby for less controls and that its not the guns fault.

I'll admit, most gun owners are probably totally sane great people, but it only takes 1 to remove 12 people from life and seriously wound dozens more.

Its one persons "right" worth 12 peoples lives?

 

[soze]

Its one persons "right" worth 12 peoples lives?

That is too simplistic and the easy argument is. Are the 12 peoples lives worth trampling the rights of 80 million (dunno the exact amount) civilians who own a gun in the US.

It is pointless anyway Americans have a hard enough time banning Automatic Weapons a total ban would probably lead to the Armed Militia protected under the constitution being formed.

 

[caLLous]

Let's not forget how much body armour he had on as well, it would've taken a good few well-placed shots to stop him (probably).

 

[throdgrain]

I disagree with that. It would have been pretty obvious who was shooting.

If the cinemagoers had been armed, he'd have been shot. Probably before he killed many more. Yes, there may have been some collateral (most likely) - but probably less death.


Yes, less guns = less gun death (as said before, not necessarily less death tho). However, if I'm under fire from a loony with an automatic weapon I want the ability to shoot back. Otherwise I'd be a sitting duck - and FUCK THAT

I fail to see how anybody can disagree with this statement

 

[throdgrain]

Let's not forget how much body armour he had on as well, it would've taken a good few well-placed shots to stop him (probably).

lolcounterstrikeexpert

For anyone who's interested, hre is a link to a bloke whos tried interesting ammo penetration stuff - http://www.theboxotruth.com/

 

[megadave]

It's true though, remember when those two guys with loads of armour had a shoot out with the police? took them hours to take them down because normal police weaponry couldn't penetrate their body armour.

 

[soze]

As most soldiers say they first time you are under fire you shit yourself. So Target shooters who carries a gun are not about to stand up in the proper position and return effective fire. They are going to hide and do some spray and pray. Not to mention the first time someone sees you firing they might think you are a second shooter and you get someone else start shooting you.