US - 27 shot & killed on Christmas Day

[TooCurious]

Wow, 6.7 suicides per 100k. 2/3 of gun deaths are people killing THEMSELVES. So lets not talk gun control, lets talk mental health and how we as a society have made it more difficult to raise boys into men.

 

[STANDREID]

justifiable homicides and suicides are included in the gun deaths. So lets stop pretending that gun deaths are the big bad wolf because they aren't. The reason this is a topic is because there is an election coming up and it is a political gold mine for Democrats to squeeze votes from the low information voters.

They don't give a care about drugs and traffic deaths because it doesn't fit their adgenda to take away our civil rights.

 

[Tawny]

We already have more than a little bit of gun control, what we don't have is more gun education. Your post is a very circuitous way of saying that all that disagree with you are responsible for the deaths of children. Case by case you can make an argument that something else led to the death of all 27 besides guns.

What gun control do we have?

Background checks for handguns.
Felons and those have stayed in mental health institutions are not allowed to buy guns at licensed gun retailers.

Other than that, it's fair game. You can buy and sell guns on the street with no repercussions (unless you're a felon who is caught buying a gun). You can open carry in plenty of states, castle doctrine extends to your car in a few, and concealed carry just requires another background check.

The answer lies somewhere in the middle. We DO need to train people on the use of firearms but if you were to propose mandatory training before purchasing or owning a firearm, people would flip out. If you required a firearm registration database, people would flip out. How do we track who has been trained properly to use the weapons they own if we don't now who owns what weapons?

And THEN you have the machoism I mentioned earlier, but if you bring up feminism people flip out. Even though feminism is also beneficial to those tragic numbers of men who kill themselves because machoism tells them never to show emotion past the age of 8.

I find it interesting and fascinating that we would rather require sterilization of people we deem unworthy of parenthood than restricting those people's access to weapons designed to kill. It's a creepy notion, IMO.

 

[Archangel7]

No secret where the problem is. Police know. It's as easy for the public to know as looking at the FBI UCR stats on who commits the crimes, with what instrument, even the total crimes in the US.

One can even look a gun homicides alone, without the clutter of suicides, justifiable homicides, etc.

You can even see where the problem is geographically and by population size. Last data I saw clearly indicated the problem was centered in population areas with 250K or larger.

Canada has about 15 of those, USA has about 126 population areas that size.

But wait, there's more.....You can't really honestly and truthfully compare countries and I believe there still is still a disclaimer addressing such on the FBI UCR web.

Why? It has to do with how countries report. The crimes in the UK for example are counted only after conviction along with some public voluntary crime surveys/questionnaires. The US doesn't do that. Crimes are counted at the origin regardless of judicial adjudication.

So we all know who does the crime by age, race, sex, what population areas geographically(250K and larger)and one can even narrow it down more, but you have to look......

Now the question is, if the collective we(cops, you if you look, anyone, everyone)knows who, what, where, etc. why don't we use that data to clear the crime in those specific areas?

But alas we know the answer to that too.......and because of that it's somewhat easier just to punish the law abiding citizens and their 2nd Amendment Rights.

 

[Archangel7]

What gun control do we have?

Background checks for handguns.
Felons and those have stayed in mental health institutions are not allowed to buy guns at licensed gun retailers.

<snip>

I find it interesting and fascinating that we would rather require sterilization of people we deem unworthy of parenthood than restricting those people's access to weapons designed to kill. It's a creepy notion, IMO.

snipped by me for brevity.......
How do you propose restricting access to all "weapons designed to kill" in a free and democratic society? People kill themselves in jail. Not much more restricted than that.

One one hand, for example in Canada, you have huge upheaval of right to die proponents that advocate for suicide if someone wants to commit it, yet scream about suicide deaths in Canada with a gun.

Yep. I find a lot of creepy notions.

Funny thing about freedom, it really isn't free. It has a cost associated with it whether one is fighting for it in a war and causing death or dying or watching the ones that just can't live in it reasonably without causing death or dying.

 

[Tawny]

snipped by me for brevity.......
How do you propose restricting access to all "weapons designed to kill" in a free and democratic society? People kill themselves in jail. Not much more restricted than that.

One one hand, for example in Canada, you have huge upheaval of right to die proponents that advocate for suicide if someone wants to commit it, yet scream about suicide deaths in Canada with a gun.

Yep. I find a lot of creepy notions.

Funny thing about freedom, it really isn't free. It has a cost associated with it whether one is fighting for it in a war and causing death or dying or watching the ones that just can't live in it reasonably without causing death or dying.

If people are going to kill themselves they are going to find a way (without proper treatment). I'm not debating that. Make access more difficult to guns and it's more of a challenge as to how they do it, though. That said, they usually only use one shot anyway.

What I'm concerned with is how easy it is to use a rapid fire weapon with high capacity magazines in places with lots of people. Since most of those crimes are committed by people who are legally allowed to purchase those weapons (as the law allows now), there is no other way to prevent those crimes than restricting access to weapons designed for quickly killing large numbers of living creatures.

Welp, guess we'll just throw our hands up and hope it isn't our babies in their classroom next.

Explain to me why, even in a "free, democratic society", we NEED high capacity rapid fire weapons?

 

[SweetT]

Combined the population of those countries is about 120 million. So about one-third the population of the US. To put it in perspective. We have 3 x the population, and 365 x more gun homicide.



Good job. When you can’t win an argument with logic, change the subject.:thumb:



And how do the criminals get those illegal weapons? Because of our weak gun laws. So lets weaken our gun laws even more and make it easier for criminals to them. Maybe then we can get the numbers more up to your expectations. Go Merica.

The problem is Criminals don't follow the laws, so increasing, tightening laws doesn't affect them in any way. Gang bangers/****s etc get their weapons illegally, off the street, buying from other criminals/stolen guns etc. They know they wont pass the gun checks that are in place. Even if you outlaw guns ****s/street criminals will continue to have them because they don't care about laws...that is the real problem.

 

[SweetT]

The dead included the parents of a young child who were shot during a robbery in Columbus, Ohio; a Texas grandfather, whose 73-year-old wife says she shot him for “continuous marital issues and infidelities;” a young couple killed in their vehicle in the early morning hours near Augusta, Maine; and the owner of a barbershop in Alabama who was known as "a strong voice against crime" in the community, according to local news reports.



Notice that these killings were committed by local gang bangers and armed robbers. The same exact people that LEOs are trying to eradicate. And yet thousands of people are marching in protest against the cops and calling them a 'threat' to their people. Has anyone protested against the gang banging killers?

OK! this one maybe deserved it...I know thats not right of me but JEEBUS dude!

 

[Tawny]

The problem is Criminals don't follow the laws, so increasing, tightening laws doesn't affect them in any way. Gang bangers/****s etc get their weapons illegally, off the street, buying from other criminals/stolen guns etc. They know they wont pass the gun checks that are in place. Even if you outlaw guns ****s/street criminals will continue to have them because they don't care about laws...that is the real problem.

They can easily buy them from random people selling them on the internet. They don't need to go to shady alleyway gun dealers with trunks full of stolen weapons.

 

[bluesneakers]

If people are going to kill themselves they are going to find a way (without proper treatment). I'm not debating that. Make access more difficult to guns and it's more of a challenge as to how they do it, though. That said, they usually only use one shot anyway.

What I'm concerned with is how easy it is to use a rapid fire weapon with high capacity magazines in places with lots of people. Since most of those crimes are committed by people who are legally allowed to purchase those weapons (as the law allows now), there is no other way to prevent those crimes than restricting access to weapons designed for quickly killing large numbers of living creatures.

Welp, guess we'll just throw our hands up and hope it isn't our babies in their classroom next.

Explain to me why, even in a "free, democratic society", we NEED high capacity rapid fire weapons?

I've posted this before but I think it's an important enough issue to keep sharing. Guns are a problem wrt suicide because they are accessible and lethal. So if a person acts on impulse with a gun he or she is more likely to complete suicide.


Guns in the Home and Risk of a Violent Death in the Home: Findings from a National Study

(American Journal of Epidemiology)

The risk of dying from a suicide in the home was greater for males in homes with guns than for males without guns in the home (adjusted odds ratio = 10.4, 95% confidence interval: 5.8, 18.9). Persons with guns in the home were also more likely to have died from suicide committed with a firearm than from one committed by using a different method (adjusted odds ratio = 31.1, 95% confidence interval: 19.5, 49.6).

Guns & Suicide: The Hidden Toll
(Harvard School of Public Health)

The scientific study of suicide has partly been an effort to erase myths. Perhaps the biggest fallacy is that suicides are typically long-planned deeds. While this can be true&#8212;people who attempt suicide often face a cascade of problems&#8212;empirical evidence suggests that they act in a moment of brief but heightened vulnerability.

[snip]

Though guns are not the most common method by which people attempt suicide, they are the most lethal. About 85 percent of suicide attempts with a firearm end in death. (Drug overdose, the most widely used method in suicide attempts, is fatal in less than 3 percent of cases.) Moreover, guns are an irreversible solution to what is often a passing crisis.
...
The episodic nature of suicidal feelings is also borne out in the aftermath: 9 out of 10 people who attempt suicide and survive do not go on to die by suicide later.

Bold: But if they use a gun odds are they won't get the chance to survive and not die later.


I'm sure this will be picked apart and dismissed...

 

[wendybtn]

What gun control do we have?

Background checks for handguns.
Felons and those have stayed in mental health institutions are not allowed to buy guns at licensed gun retailers.

Other than that, it's fair game. You can buy and sell guns on the street with no repercussions (unless you're a felon who is caught buying a gun). You can open carry in plenty of states, castle doctrine extends to your car in a few, and concealed carry just requires another background check.

The answer lies somewhere in the middle. We DO need to train people on the use of firearms but if you were to propose mandatory training before purchasing or owning a firearm, people would flip out. If you required a firearm registration database, people would flip out. How do we track who has been trained properly to use the weapons they own if we don't now who owns what weapons?

And THEN you have the machoism I mentioned earlier, but if you bring up feminism people flip out. Even though feminism is also beneficial to those tragic numbers of men who kill themselves because machoism tells them never to show emotion past the age of 8.

I find it interesting and fascinating that we would rather require sterilization of people we deem unworthy of parenthood than restricting those people's access to weapons designed to kill. It's a creepy notion, IMO.

Since medical records are protected by HIPPA laws and most people won't mention it, how do they check admitting or discharge diagnosis from any hospital stay? It is just another illusion gov't presents to make libs feel better and a box to check for whoever fills out the form.

 

[bluesneakers]

It's interesting how so many people equate any gun control with banning or taking away or "outlawing" guns. Not selling guns to people on the terrorist watch list, for instance, is interpreted as repealing the second amendment. Talking about gun deaths leads to "Liberals want to take all the guns" or "Why don't liberals care about ___ deaths?" (It's possible to care about more than one thing.)

So extreme and such an easy way to not discuss an important issue.

JMO

 

[Tawny]

It's interesting how so many people equate any gun control with banning or taking away or "outlawing" guns. Not selling guns to people on the terrorist watch list, for instance, is interpreted as repealing the second amendment. Talking about gun deaths leads to "Liberals want to take all the guns" or "Why don't liberals care about ___ deaths?" (It's possible to care about more than one thing.)

So extreme and such an easy way to not discuss an important issue.

JMO

The "why don't you care about _____ deaths" is so frustrating. It's strawman and it's an attempt to distract from the topic at hand. I care about all of that, but right now, we're talking about the VERY REAL problem of too-easy access to firearms and the absurd amount of gun related deaths we have in this country. :/

 

[wendybtn]

I think part of the problem is those families that force themselves together with the rest of their crazy dysfunctional family and try to pretend to like each other just because it is a particular day on the calendar. Criminals will kill you on any day of the calendar. Kids can find guns any day, that is the dysfunctional family they were unfortunate enough to be born in. I do not know what needs to be done about gun crime but this illusion of control is silly.

 

[Archangel7]

If people are going to kill themselves they are going to find a way (without proper treatment). I'm not debating that. Make access more difficult to guns and it's more of a challenge as to how they do it, though. That said, they usually only use one shot anyway.

What I'm concerned with is how easy it is to use a rapid fire weapon with high capacity magazines in places with lots of people. Since most of those crimes are committed by people who are legally allowed to purchase those weapons (as the law allows now), there is no other way to prevent those crimes than restricting access to weapons designed for quickly killing large numbers of living creatures.

Welp, guess we'll just throw our hands up and hope it isn't our babies in their classroom next.

Explain to me why, even in a "free, democratic society", we NEED high capacity rapid fire weapons?

You're free.........In a free society there is no prerequisite based on need. You may not NEED a 562 horsepower Ferrari 458 but as a free individual you can own one.
You may not need a 12 million dollar multi acre estate but you are FREE to own one.

Where does this idea that need has any place at all in a free democratic society? You are a free citizen not a "subject" or a "comrade."

If you feel some weird guilt, just don't buy a gun, but don't pretend to be super elitist and claim other's don't NEED something based on what you deem is or isn't needed.

Now in the spirit of discussion why are you opposed to what you call high capacity firearms/magazines?

And once again, you are projecting/prejudicially profiling by inferring that an individual that owns a self loading, semi automatic firearm with "high capacity magazines" has some propensity for evil.

 

[bessie]

If a link is banned, it's banned. If the same information is available from an approved source, it can be posted.

And, as always, per TOS, questions about the rules or a removed post are to be addressed in a private message to an admin or mod.

 

[Tawny]

In the spirit of discussion: innocent people murdered in schools, churches, and theaters.

If we're so "free" why am I not allowed to buy these candies for my kid? http://www.independent.co.uk/life-s...urprise-eggs-illegal-in-the-usa-10055273.html

For their safety, right?

 

[SweetT]

They can easily buy them from random people selling them on the internet. They don't need to go to shady alleyway gun dealers with trunks full of stolen weapons.

Your right they can do that but a lot are just on the street deals. Have you ever bought a gun off the internet?

 

[Tawny]

Your right they can do that but a lot are just on the street deals. Have you ever bought a gun off the internet?

Why would I need to?

BUT if I did, I'd just go to armslist.com and agree to the terms of service. The TOS states that you won't participate in illegal activity with your gun. OK! I PROMISE!

 

[oceanblueeyes]

They don't give a care about drugs and traffic deaths because it doesn't fit their adgenda to take away our civil rights.

It certainly seems that way. 80 people on average are killed everyday in vehicle accidents even with all the safety measures we have now. In Florida I read that drug overdose is the number one cause of death in that state now. More than vehicle accidents and more than by firearms. We are in a drug epidemic with over 25 million people addicted to prescription drugs alone. Now combine that with those who are addicted to illegal drugs and dying from overdoses and its mindboggling yet its rarely mentioned even though people are dying everyday from it.

What I have never quite understood either about those with anti-gun agendas it never seems to matter about the other thousands who are murdered each year by some other method such as bludgeoning, beaten, and stomped to death, strangled, smothered, tortured, stabbed, or poisoned. Those are methods which caused extreme pain and suffering for the victims.

The last stat I remember reading it was around 40-35 percent of homicide victims who were murdered by something other than a firearm. These thousands of victims each year are just as dead as those who were killed by firearms. Around 5 thousand plus are murdered by some other method than a firearm, iirc.

The reason it gives me pause and wondering why so many never mention these victims is those homicides showed the victims suffered a horrible agonizing death before they died.

All homicide victims, no matter the tool the murderer chose to use... are equally important. Yet I see so little ever said about those who are murdered in other horrific ways. It makes me feel, rightly or wrongly, the only reason firearm homicide victims matter to the anti-gun group is they use those cases to promote their own biased agendas against guns.

I just wish the media would be fair to both sides of this subject. The national liberal media never tells about any of the countless heroic stories where so many legally armed citizens have saved many lives including their own, their families, employees, police officers, and people they didn't even know.... who they protected from being cruelly beaten or murdered or stopped a rape from happening. I just don't understand why they never report all of those heroic stories but instead they can be found in local newspapers all across our country. We shouldn't have to hunt for those stories that happen way more times than many think they do. So it isn't like the liberal media isn't aware of them because they constantly monitor local news stories in all states so they purposefully never pick the stories up even though they happen hundreds of times a year and maybe even more.

I have respect for anyone who doesn't want a firearm. If they hate guns then so be it, I respect that too. That is their choice but they do not have a right to tell those who do want to protect themselves with a firearm, they cant do it. We have loads of gun laws on the books right now. Gun laws do not prevent crimes anymore than banning alcohol during prohibition stopped alcohol from being consumed. Or when we banned certain drugs making them illegal. In truth all it did was make alcohol and drug runners into millionaires and billionaires. And more and more we are seeing news articles about gun runners now. They are not selling to law abiding citizens. So the gun runners who easily come in because we don't have secure borders will become the new billionaires if we have more restrictive gun laws. just like the Mexican drug lords.

I would make a guess that every firearm used to do murders/attempted murder/ armed robberies/assaults/rapes/ drive-bys in the gang infested large inner cities....were obtained illegally. Or the gang member paid a straw man to purchase the weapon in order to give it to the gang banger that probably already has a felony record.

Another thing I do not understand about some who view the gun as the evil to end all evil is they seem to ignore the fact that every mass murder that happens here is done in a 'gun free zone.' That isn't a coincidence by any means. I feel instead of advertising an establishment is a gun free zone they should put up big signs saying 'Beware! this is not a gun free zone' even if they didn't really have weapons there.

Criminals are always going to be criminals doing violent acts with a firearm or they will use many other weapons available. The only ones who ever abides by the rules of law are the law abiders and they aren't the glaring problem we have in this nation. Unfortunately we have millions who are violent hell bent on breaking the law and that will not change. Taking guns away for law abiding citizens or restricting them having one only gives the criminals the advantage. They love their victims defenseless like sitting ducks. They like nothing better than tighter gun laws for law abiding citizens.

The fact is we have more legal guns purchased than ever before in our history yet overall violent crime is continuing to decline. The only areas where homicides have peaked again are in the big cities saturated with gang violence. If we could remove all of those (5 or 6) violent cities our homicide rate would fall almost to the bottom worldwide. That is where the problem lies yet it is ignored like it has been for decades and it gets more out of control everyday.

IMO