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As I lollygagged around the packed convention floor at the Eastman Gun Show in Gainesville, GA amid thousands of guns and what seemed like millions of bullets, it occurred to me that I’ve never heard of a mass shooting at a gun show.
This was on Saturday afternoon, a day after 20-year-old Adam Lanza went on a shooting spree that left twenty-eight dead. Lanza first murdered his mother at home, then drove to a local elementary school and blew away 20 children and six staff members before killing himself. He reportedly used guns that were legally registered to his mother after having been denied an application to obtain a rifle himself earlier in the week due to Connecticut’s relatively strict gun laws.
Before all the blood had time to dry, pro-government zombie toady scribes were shrieking for more “gun control” and insisting that “something” must be done NOW. They trotted out the tired meme that the “gun lobby” is very powerful and has a lot of money behind it—as if the government they dutifully worship doesn’t have far more power and money than the NRA. One went so far as to proclaim that “no person in the United States Of America should own a gun, unless they’re a police officer or a soldier.” And of course, “white men” were blamed, albeit by onewhite man after the next.
After being escorted into a press conference by well-armed Secret Service members, Barack Obama’s eyes grew misty as he proclaimed it was time to “take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this.” New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg also screamed from behind his posse of armed bodyguards for more gun control. Taking time off from repeatedly authorizing billions in taxes to bomb the shit out of the Middle East, other politicians decried the USA’s “gun culture.”
The Soros shills at Think Progress, who never seemed to meet a white male they liked nor a government regulation they didn’t like, hastily cobbled together “A Timeline Of Mass Shootings In The US Since Columbine.”
As always, anyone who writes for George Soros turns out to be—oh, what’s the word?—instructive. Much can be learned merely from taking their list of spree killers and digging a little more deeply. In most cases, the following massacres occurred in so-called “gun-free zones” that gun-control advocates naively thought would help prevent gun violence rather than encourage it:
• An autopsy concluded that Columbine killer Eric Harris had the SSRI antidepressant Fluvoxamine in his bloodstream at the time of his death.
• Jeff Weise, who killed nine people and himself at a Minnesota high school in 2005, was taking increasingly high doses of Prozac at the time of his spree.
• Robert Hawkins, who killed eight people and himself at an Omaha mall in 2007, reportedly “had been on antidepressants” at the time of his shooting. He allegedly had taken antidepressants since he was six years old.
• Seung-Hui Cho, who killed 32 and wounded 23 at Virginia Tech in 2007, had been prescribed Prozac and had previously taken Paxil for a year, but he apparently had ceased taking his medication at the time of the shooting.
• Andrew Engeldinger killed five people and himself after being fired from his job in 2012. A police search of his house revealed he’d been prescribed the antidepressants Mirtazapine and Trazodone, as well as the insomnia medication Temazepam.
• Eduardo Sencion, who killed four people and himself with an assault rifle at a Utah IHOP in 2011, was a paranoid schizophrenic whose “medications were changed” during the summer prior to his attack.
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ARTICLE CONTINUES HERE.
How the hell does a “gun free zone” encourage gun violence? Because one shooting took place in one? I also like the snide way in which it’s mentioned that Adam Lanza was denied a license and had to resort to taking his mom’s guns. CAN YOU BELIEVE THESE LIBERAL PUSSIES IN CONNECTICUT? DENYING THIS GUY A GUN?? And of course an arms dealer who “doesn’t watch the news” is really a fantastic source of information on current events. And of course some mustached pro-guns everywhere all the time for everyone horseshit wouldn’t be completed without the tired and obviously revelatory “You don’t need guns to kill people” trope. No shit?! Fucking genius. But what else would you expect from a “magazine” that runs WordPress.
“How the hell does a “gun free zone” encourage gun violence? Because one shooting took place in one?”
No, Einstein, because almost EVERY mass shooting occurs in one. Apparently James Holmes, the “Batman Shooter,” was alleged to have picked that specific movie theater in Aurora because it was the only one within driving distance that was a “gun-free zone.” Colorado is a concealed-carry state. The movie theater in question was an exception.
Gun-free zones also encourage certain over-medicated pussies to spray lead in such places because they know it’s unlikely that someone will be breaking the law and therefore able to return fire.
And although correlation does not necessarily imply causation, it just so happens that these mass shootings started spiking—in SCHOOLS—right after the passage of the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. Imagine that!
And maybe some people don’t gullibly swallow major-media “news” as unbiased sources of information like you appear to do. Sucks to be you.
Sorry all this all needed explaining to you, but glad I could help! Now go watch some more of that “news”!
What I hate about this whole gun argument is that everyone’s basically admitting that Americans don’t have the freedom to feel safe in a public place unless they’re constantly armed against some random suicidal spree killer looking to go out in a blaze of glory. We should live in a country where you don’t have to be carrying a weapon to feel safe. I don’t think people should be called liberal pussies because they want a free society where we aren’t at war with out own neighbors. I don’t think that’s an excessive expectation. “Gun free zones” are wishful thinking, they don’t accomplish anything. But it’s also pointless to think we just have to put up with the fact that from now on, every month there’s going to be a mass murder-suicide.
I think at this point, a wholesale change in culture and values in this country just isn’t ever going to happen. If there were ever a real push by the federal government to restrict gun ownership, even with an overwhelming public opinion in favor of it, there would be such a huge backlash. I honestly believe trying to change the gun culture in the US would bring the anarchists and anti-government domestic terrorists (ala McVeigh) out of the woodwork and create a decade of violence within America. Countries that have stricter gun laws have less gun murders, as a matter of fact, but we can’t start over – America is too far down the path it’s already on for a real sea change. The funny thing is, the 2nd amendment clearly refers to a “well regulated militia” as a precursor to the right to bear arms – and I think the key word is “regulated”. If we were strict originalists about the 2nd amendment, there would be a requirement to be a part of an organization that was regulated by the federal gov’t in order to own a gun. It seems it’s harder to get a driver’s license than a gun these days, and I think it should be at least as hard.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I only used the word “pussies” to describe the shooters. Apparently “Max Power”—I’m sure that’s his real name, cuz, y’know, he’s NOT A PUSSY—took my article personally and felt he was being called a pussy. That’s obviously his hangup.
He was responding to a passage in my article where all I did was note that Connecticut’s strict gun laws didn’t prevent the shooting from happening. The whole “pussy” thing was in his head. Let’s hope the doctors are able medicate the problem out of him.
Regarding what was meant by a “well-regulated militia,” here’s what the OGs of the Constitution reputedly said about gun rights. Capitalization added for emphasis:
A free people ought not only be armed and disciplined but they should have sufficient arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, WHICH SHOULD INCLUDE THEIR OWN GOVERNMENT….Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. …To ensure peace, security, and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. The very atmosphere of firearms everywhere restrains evil interference—they deserve a place of honor with all that’s good.
—George Washington
The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able may have a gun.
—Patrick Henry
The Constitution shall NEVER be construed…to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms….The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.
—Alexander Hamilton
Americans have the right and advantage of being armed—UNLIKE THE CITIZENS OF OTHER COUNTRIES, WHOSE GOVERNMENTS ARE AFRAID TO TRUST PEOPLE WITH ARMS….A WELL-REGULATED MILITIA, COMPOSED OF THE BODY OF THE PEOPLE, is the best and most natural defense of a free country….
—James Madison
No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms….Laws that forbid the carrying of arms…disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes….Anyone who surrenders his arms because of a cry for public safety does not deserve freedom….THE STRONGEST REASON FOR THE PEOPLE TO RETAIN THE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS IS, AS A LAST RESORT, TO PROTECT THEMSELVES AGAINST TYRANNY IN GOVERNMENT….
—Thomas Jefferson
I hadn’t intended to use the word “pussy” in my comment as a direct response to the use of that word in your original post, sorry if that was the implication.
It appears a few of those “founding fathers” quotes you listed might be bogus (Washington and Jefferson, in particular). Please see this link for more info:
http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/general/BogusFounderQuotes.htm
Not to mention the media parades these shooters and pin them up as some kind of super villains. Thus giving them the attention they sorely sought out. Giving the next anxiety ridden loser another role model and example to which he’ll finally “get the respect he deserves.” The news has to report obviously, but they can choose to highlight the victims and heroes in each situation, but then again, villains sell.
Militia’s regulated by the federal government? Do you even know what a militia is garsh? I also like how Max completely misses the point about Connecticut’s gun laws denying him a gun. It shows you even with strict regulation, these types will still get a hold of guns. This time, from his parent. Even if all guns are banned, the black market explodes and we’re looking at Mexico.
If only there were a pill to stop mass murderers! That would do it!
@Garsh…
Thanks for the link. That’s why I said “reputedly.” Will be checking and cross-checking the origins of the quotes and report my findings later.
Still looking for an original source of the Jefferson quote that’s in all caps. For now, this one seems to be corroborated:
“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms…disarm only those who are neither inclined or determined to commit crimes. Such laws only make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assassins; they serve to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.” (1764 Letter and speech from T. Jefferson quoting with approval an essay by Cesare Beccari)
As a Canadian, I will refrain from making the usual, “we Canadians don’t have these issues because we have more sane gun control.” Instead, I’d like to speculate that the reason the US is so divided on this and so many other issues–or rather is so divided but cannot come to some sort of resolution–is that the US Federal Government has way too much power. Canadian provinces are practically their own countries compared to US states in many ways. The states of the USA should have more power so that blue staters and red staters need not constantly engage in futile arguments tying to convince one another of their obviously superior position. They can arrive at their own conclusions in their own territories and stay out of the business of others.
– Brosef Stalin
The People’s Republic of Canuckistan
I think the country is divided because half of them go by “common sense” and what their gut says while the other half checks the data first. More guns = less crime. Legalization = less drug abuse. More school tax $ does not equal better education. Going with your gut does not allow for counterintuitive truths.
And let’s not forget the shooting that took place at fort hood in 2009, which conspicuously happened when all of the generals ordered the colonels to wash the guns of the privates, leaving a lone gunman as the only armed person on site.
Also, all cops were having their revolvers cleaned by judges during the Detroit police station shooting in 2011.
But in all seriousness, How is an Ohio mall and an IHOP a gun free zone? Nebraska has no registration or licencing of handguns and citizens are permitted to carry them in public as of Jan 1st 2007. The mall shooting occurred on Dec 5th 2007. Utah also permits the carrying of firearms in public spaces.
As for high schools and hormonal teenagers on medication you seem to be making a case exactly why access has to be further regulated to keep unstable people from weilding such immediately destructive power.
The mentality I see coming from people who are against gun regulation is something like ‘we gotta keep the guns to keep the govt away from what’s mine’. Like the govt doesn’t have a million more guns and resources at their disposal to crush you if you and your handgun become a problem. Gun control isn’t about govt putting its boot on your throat, that boot is firmly planted, gun control is about not giving such deadly power to nut jobs who have a murder/death wish.
@”But in all seriousness, How is an Ohio mall and an IHOP a gun free zone?”
In all seriousness, did your eyes gloss over the word “almost”?
In case it did, here’s what I wrote:
“almost EVERY mass shooting occurs in one.”
It was in response to someone who alleged that only “one” happened in a gun-free zone.
re: Fort Hood…your comment seems to imply that if more of the soldiers had been armed at the time of the shooting, the massacre might not have been as bad. No?
And the whole “the government could crush you anyway” line is a little defeatist for my tastes. The American Revolution never would have happened with that attitude.
Well looks like two of your examples aren’t gun free zones and the military base and police stations are quite the opposite. So I guess we have 2 non gun free zones, 2 gun presence assured zones, and 4 gun free zones, hardly close to “almost EVERY’, capital letters or not.
Oh, sweet, starry-eyed, naive, wet-behind-the-ears “Billy.” So it’s more examples you want? OK, then…
Feb. 2, 1996
Moses Lake, Wash. Two students and one teacher killed, one other wounded when 14-year-old Barry Loukaitis opened fire on his algebra class.
Feb. 19, 1997
Bethel, Alaska … Principal and one student killed, two others wounded by Evan Ramsey, 16.
March 1997
Oct. 1, 1997
Pearl, Miss. … Two students killed and seven wounded by Luke Woodham, 16, who was also accused of killing his mother. He and his friends were said to be outcasts who worshiped Satan.
Dec. 1, 1997
West Paducah, Ky. … Three students killed, five wounded by Michael Carneal, 14, as they participated in a prayer circle at Heath High School.
March 24, 1998
Jonesboro, Ark. … Four students and one teacher killed, ten others wounded outside as Westside Middle School emptied during a false fire alarm. Mitchell Johnson, 13, and Andrew Golden, 11, shot at their classmates and teachers from the woods.
April 24, 1998
Edinboro, Pa. … One teacher, John Gillette, killed, two students wounded at a dance at James W. Parker Middle School. Andrew Wurst, 14, was charged.
May 19, 1998
Fayetteville, Tenn. … One student killed in the parking lot at Lincoln County High School three days before he was to graduate. The victim was dating the ex-girlfriend of his killer, 18-year-old honor student Jacob Davis.
May 21, 1998
Springfield, Ore. … Two students killed, 22 others wounded in the cafeteria at Thurston High School by 15-year-old Kip Kinkel. Kinkel had been arrested and released a day earlier for bringing a gun to school. His parents were later found dead at home.
May 20, 1999
Conyers, Ga. … Six students injured at Heritage High School by Thomas Solomon, 15, who was reportedly depressed after breaking up with his girlfriend.
Nov. 19, 1999
Deming, N.M. … Victor Cordova Jr., 12, shot and killed Araceli Tena, 13, in the lobby of Deming Middle School.
Dec. 6, 1999
Fort Gibson, Okla. … Four students wounded as Seth Trickey, 13, opened fire with a 9mm semiautomatic handgun at Fort Gibson Middle School.
Feb. 29, 2000
Mount Morris Township, Mich. … Six-year-old Kayla Rolland shot dead at Buell Elementary School near Flint, Mich. The assailant was identified as a six-year-old boy with a .32-caliber handgun.
March 10, 2000
Savannah, Ga. … Two students killed by Darrell Ingram, 19, while leaving a dance sponsored by Beach High School.
May 26, 2000
Lake Worth, Fla. … One teacher, Barry Grunow, shot and killed at Lake Worth Middle School by Nate Brazill, 13, with .25-caliber semiautomatic pistol on the last day of classes.
Sept. 26, 2000
New Orleans, La. … Two students wounded with the same gun during a fight at Woodson Middle School.
Jan. 17, 2001
Baltimore, Md. … One student shot and killed in front of Lake Clifton Eastern High School.
March 5, 2001
Santee, Calif. … Two killed and 13 wounded by Charles Andrew Williams, 15, firing from a bathroom at Santana High School.
March 7, 2001
Williamsport, Pa. … Elizabeth Catherine Bush, 14, wounded student Kimberly Marchese in the cafeteria of Bishop Neumann High School; she was depressed and frequently teased.
March 22, 2001
Granite Hills, Calif. … One teacher and three students wounded by Jason Hoffman, 18, at Granite Hills High School. A policeman shot and wounded Hoffman.
March 30, 2001
Gary, Ind. … One student killed by Donald R. Burt, Jr., a 17-year-old student who had been expelled from Lew Wallace High School.
Nov. 12, 2001
Caro, Mich. … Chris Buschbacher, 17, took two hostages at the Caro Learning Center before killing himself.
Jan. 15, 2002
New York, N.Y. … A teenager wounded two students at Martin Luther King Jr. High School.
October 28, 2002
Tucson, Ariz. … Robert S. Flores Jr., 41, a student at the nursing school at the University of Arizona, shot and killed three female professors and then himself.
April 14, 2003
New Orleans, La. … One 15-year-old killed, and three students wounded at John McDonogh High School by gunfire from four teenagers (none were students at the school). The motive was gang-related.
April 24, 2003
Red Lion, Pa. … James Sheets, 14, killed principal Eugene Segro of Red Lion Area Junior High School before killing himself.
Sept. 24, 2003
Cold Spring, Minn. … Two students are killed at Rocori High School by John Jason McLaughlin, 15.
Nov. 8, 2005
Jacksboro, Tenn. … One 15-year-old shot and killed an assistant principal at Campbell County High School and seriously wounded two other administrators.
Aug. 24, 2006
Essex, Vt. … Christopher Williams, 27, looking for his ex-girlfriend at Essex Elementary School, shot two teachers, killing one and wounding another. Before going to the school, he had killed the ex-girlfriend’s mother.
Sept. 26, 2006
Bailey, Colo. … Adult male held six students hostage at Platte Canyon High School and then shot and killed Emily Keyes, 16, and himself.
Sept. 29, 2006
Cazenovia, Wis. … A 15-year-old student shot and killed Weston School principal John Klang.
Oct. 3, 2006
Nickel Mines, Pa. … 32-year-old Carl Charles Roberts IV entered the one-room West Nickel Mines Amish School and shot 10 schoolgirls, ranging in age from 6 to 13 years old, and then himself. Five of the girls and Roberts died.
Jan. 3, 2007
Tacoma, Wash. … Douglas Chanthabouly, 18, shot fellow student Samnang Kok, 17, in the hallway of Henry Foss High School.
Sept. 21, 2007
Dover, Del. … A Delaware State University Freshman, Loyer D. Brandon, shot and wounded two other Freshman students on the University campus. Brandon is being charged with attempted murder, assault, reckless engagement, as well as a gun charge.
Oct. 10, 2007
Cleveland, Ohio … A 14-year-old student at a Cleveland high school, Asa H. Coon, shot and injured two students and two teachers before he shot and killed himself. The victims’ injuries were not life-threatening.
Serious question. It’s estimated that there are roughly as many guns in America as there are Americans. It’s unsure how many are legally registered. America has WAY more guns per capita than anywhere else on Earth. No argument there. But even if all gun sales were to stop tomorrow, how would such massacres be prevented in the future? Would most of you be cool with leaving the current number of guns in circulation alone, or would you actually favor door-to-door searches by authorities?
Ugh, OK ill do a bit of the same:
July 2012 batman shootings Colorado.
May 2012 5 killed in Seattle cafe
Oct 2011 8 killed in hair salon in California.
July 2011 7 killed in street rampage inMichigan.
April 2009 13 killed at immigration centre,with armed guards on duty.
Feb 2008 six killed in public meeting in Missouri.
It goes on, public spaces where citizens can carry handguns. Shootings happen all the same. gun free zones have no impact one way or the other. Restricting access to weapons would.
Do the Federal Government need to take greater control over the national health care system? So everyone is getting access to adequate and equal health care, including for psychiatric illnesses?
Billy-san: I’ve stated it earlier on the thread, but I guess you require corroboration. Although Colorado is a concealed-carry state, the Cinemark theaters in Colorado have ‘FIREARMS PROHIBITED’ signs…here…some pictures!
http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2012/07/no-guns-policy-at-cinemark-theaters.html
But yes, agreed—”gun-free” has no impact, at least when it comes to deterring shooters. But there are incidents where concealed carry has stopped shootings from going further. For example, one actually happened earlier this year in Aurora, CO, home of the “Batman” shooting:
“Police said two vehicles ended up in the church parking lot after some sort of argument between the drivers. Police said one vehicle was chasing the other. The man who was being chased got out of his vehicle and entered the church and told people to take cover. A woman came out of the church to see what was happening in the parking lot and got shot.
Police said an off-duty officer was at a service and went outside and shot the man who shot the woman.”
(Source: http://denver.cbslocal.com/2012/04/22/2-shot-outside-aurora-church/#.T5WjZzkp8hQ.facebook)
More…
“New Life Church in Colorado Springs in December 2007. In that assault, the church’s minister had given Jeanne Assam permission to carry her concealed handgun. The gunman killed two people in the parking lot — but when he entered the church, Assam fired 10 shots, severely wounding him. At that point, the gunman committed suicide. imilar stories are available from across the country. They include shootings at schools that were stopped before police arrived in such places as Pearl, Miss., and Edinboro, Pa., and at colleges like the Appalachian Law School in Virginia. Or attacks in busy downtowns such as Memphis; at a mall in Salt Lake City, or at an apartment building in Oklahoma.”
And more…
“In the Pearl, Miss., shooting, an assistant principal retrieved his gun from his office and used it to physically immobilize the shooter before he caused additional harm.
“In Edinboro, Penn., which left one teacher dead, “a shotgun pointed at the offender while he was reloading his gun prevented additional harm. The police did not arrive for another ten minutes” after the assailant was apprehended by school staff.
(Source: http://www.wnd.com/1999/04/1788/#DUAyWCPkP7Ez8u5B.99)
“As always, anyone who writes for George Soros turns out to be—oh, what’s the word?—instructive. Much can be learned merely from taking their list of spree killers and digging a little more deeply. In most cases, the following massacres occurred in so-called “gun-free zones” that gun-control advocates naively thought would help prevent gun violence rather than encourage it”
Then
‘But yes, agreed—”gun-free” has no impact, at least when it comes to deterring shooters.’
So which is it, encourage or no impact?
There are no contradictions in those statements. It doesn’t deter them; it encourages them.
See, “Billy,” that’s the difference between you and me: I don’t make retarded inferences such as this…
“How is an Ohio mall and an IHOP a gun free zone?”
…but you do.
Here, take your ass. I’m handing it to you.
I shot a gun for the first time a couple of years back. It was fun.
So then how do you claim it encourages? As many shootings happen in non gun free zones, not to mention that the main example of your gun free zones are populated with juveniles on medication which biases the impact of whether the zone is gun free or not. Your arguments are all based in conjecture, which I wouldn’t do but I guess you would because you just did.
It encourages shooters because they assume no one will be armed there. Duh!!!!! You don’t see ‘em walking into gun shows and blasting people.
“As many shootings happen in non gun free zones”
Did you pull that statement out of the ass I just handed you? Evidence, please. So far I’ve listed nearly 40 that occurred in gun-free zones, and you’ve listed fewer than ten that haven’t.
And where’s your evidence that the people who commit crimes in non-gun-free zones aren’t on medication?
Keep ‘em comin’, champ!
I’m not going to keep them coming.
James Holmes, Seung-Hui Cho, Jard Loughner and the Columbine shooters all purchased semi-automatic guns with the intention of killing a lot of people. Were you to either ban these guns, or require rigorous psychological evaluation and a substantially longer waiting period prior to gun ownership, those tragedies would have been substantially less likely to happen. In Australia for, in 1996, for example, a mass shooting prompted the banning of semi-automatic rifles and pump action shotguns, in addition to a massive national buyback of guns; since then there’s been 1 mass killing carried out by arson, and none due to guns.
There needs to at least be more effort put into psychologically evaluating potential gun owners. Loughner in particular had been completely disconnected from reality for months if not years prior to his purchasing a gun; it’s insane there is no mechanism in place to prevent a bona fide crazy person from obtaining deadly weaponry.
The alternative option, of significantly lowering the threshold for institutionalizing people, is an extremely dangerous slippery slope. It’s especially surprising that virulently anti-PC conservatives seem to be championing the method over stricter gun control, as the “racists, misogynists,” etc of society would surely be targeted if we really went down this road. Then there’s the other alternative option of arming EVERYONE in america and training all citizens to be on guard to defend themselves against these kinds of attacks at a moments notice–an unprecedented, absurdly grotesque state of affairs that I can’t believe anyone could take seriously. Insisting that everyone should be armed and trained in how to defend themselves, just because you happen to enjoy playing GI joe, surely flies smack in the face of the spirit of liberty that you are claiming to defend.
The guns used in these killings bring no benefit to civilian society beyond mindless entertainment for enthusiasts. Yeah its fucking fun to shoot a gun, but I bet it’s also fun to fly a fighter jet, or for a less extreme example, drive a forumla 1 racing car. These things are prohibited from public use for sound reasons that no one disputes. I hate Obama as much as the next guy, but when he said “what choice to we have,” he was right.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_wit_fir-crime-murders-with-firearms
#4 with a…bullet. we got the Philippines shook
you know, the militia thing makes lots of sense in 1793 terms where infantry makes all the difference in a war with european powers who have toeholds on the continent, not so much in 2012 with drone-based air superiority. or chemical weapons. or tanks. or guns that don’t need a ram rod to be fired repeatedly.
Wow, I never expected to agree with Goad on any issue…
Laws don’t work on criminals – see Chicago, DC, NYC and Detroit’s harsh gun laws and subsequent increases in gun related deaths and violence, based upon 20-30 years of statistics.
Anders Breivek killed kids too, quite a few – managed to take out 77 people total in a country where his weapons were completely illegal for everyone.
Crazy killer people use guns or knives or needles or poison or bombs to kill other people and have done so long before “gun control” existed, no amount of restrictive legislation will have the desired effect upon people who are committed to murdering other people.
When a civilian stops a mass shooting, the average death toll is 2.3.
When a cop stops a mass shooter, or the shooter kills themselves, the average death toll is 14.3.
http://silverunderground.com/2012/07/auditing-shooting-rampage-statistics/
You do the math, liberal insane people.
And please tell me how making it harder for the victims to defend themselves keeps them safer.
Please use examples, not the magical thinking in your head.
exactly, if those kids were armed none of this would have happened. proper firearm training should begin in kindergarten.
I owned my first gun at age five. Present for passing kindergarten. I agree with Jim Goad on this issue of gun laws. The only people advocating more gun laws are exactly the same people who absolutely nothing about guns except for what they get through the propaganda media.
For what it’s worth, it appears that Congress recently let funds for school security lapse…
http://newsninja2012.com/wth-before-connecticut-tragedy-obama-administration-quietly-let-school-security-funds-lapse/#axzz2FPkUmbGo
I’ll ask the question again, though: There are an estimated 300 million or so guns currently circulating in the USA. Even with a complete ban on all future sales, how do you prevent these kinds of mass shootings without going door-to-door and searching houses a la the Gestapo or Stasi?
Jim, I like you’re articles. Mostly, they make me laugh, but sometimes they get me worked up, good or bad, and that’s great! Keep it up.
I’ve been thinking about this question you posed. What about this:
-Immediately ban the sale of assault weapons.
-For the following year institute a buy back program (I think someone mentioned this in the comments already). Something like $500 for a handgun, $1000 for assault rifles. They’ll be destroyed or whatever can be recycled will be recycled (This would also provide some nice stimulus, like when George W. Bush sent everyone in the country a check)
-During that same year, everyone will have to register their firearm/s and demonstrate competence in handling and safely storing firearms. They’ll get a license. As I was told repeatedly while learning how to drive “it’s a privilege, not a right.”
-There will be laws about safe-storage.
-After the year if you are caught with a gun without a license, you’ll get a nice fine. If you have a license, but the gun is unregistered, you’ll get a fine and the gun will be confiscated. Lots of permutations with this point.
-If a gun of yours is stolen and found you’ll be fined based on the safe-storage laws. If the stolen gun is used in a crime you may be held financially liable. I’m sure there would be insurance sold for this. Again, there are lots of variations here.
This won’t altogether stop murders, mass-murders, etc. However, I do think it would be better than the status quo. What do you think?
“As I was told repeatedly while learning how to drive “it’s a privilege, not a right.””
Kudos to Mr Goad for calling out the pill-pushers. I’m deeply conflicted on 2nd Amendment issues, but I think it’s interesting that nobody is questioning one of your main points: that there seems to be a correlation between big-pharma anti-depressants and mass murder. Maybe it’s just a kind of bias — some of the people who are fucked up enough to need meds are going to be the ones fucked up enough to shoot up a school. Give some scientists a grant and lets find out.
It is insane to me for a sanctimonious politician to support a ban on guns when their security teams use firearms to protect their bloated, fascist asses. That ILL-logic alone compels me to say fuck off. Don’t get me started on the domestic terrorist turned “professor”, Bill Ayers, calling the police when Fox News knocked on his door. Pieces of shit of the highest order!
does anyone work anymore?
When did Jim Goad start writing for Naturalnews.com? Yeah, some sick people who do very bad things are on meds. They are usually on meds because they are fucked up to begin with. Millions of people take antidepressants etc. and have been helped. Maybe the Vtech shooter could have gotten his shit sorted earlier if his mom hadn’t taken him for a fucking exorcism. I don’t blame ‘big pharma’ any more than i blame the NRA.
“I’ll ask the question again, though: There are an estimated 300 million or so guns currently circulating in the USA. Even with a complete ban on all future sales, how do you prevent these kinds of mass shootings without going door-to-door and searching houses a la the Gestapo or Stasi?”
Why should the only standard for success be total prevention? Isn’t it progress if a ban resulted in these events happening once a year, say, as opposed to once every couple of weeks? If we limit the size of magazine you can buy, and the next shooter kills 10 instead of 26, wouldn’t the ban still have been worth it? Or do we abide the additional 16 dead so some garrulous good ‘ol boy, who is after all a lot cooler than any liberal, can keep himself mindlessly entertained?
One of the better plans I read from another site, that didn’t involve any actual gun banning:
-limit magazines to 15 rounds
-national gun buyback for all 20+ round magazines, semi-automatic, and illegally converted automatic weapons, no questions asked.
-MANDATORY TRAINING COURSE for all prospective gun owners. Insane this isn’t federal law. If you have to pass a driver’s test you sure as shit should have to pass a gun test, which should include some form of psychological evaluation.
-Make straw purchases a felony with a minimum 5-10 yr prison sentence.
“If we limit the size of magazine you can buy, and the next shooter kills 10 instead of 26, wouldn’t the ban still have been worth it? ”
With respect to this point, I’d also like to add…in the Aurora case, James Holmes went into the theater with a novelty 100 round magazine, a magazine that apparently has a tendency to jam. As it happens it did jam and less people died as a result. Surely this is a preferable outcome than if he had a more efficient magazine that killed more. If we ban magazines exceeding 15 rounds, surely it will result in more favorable outcomes, even if there are still shootings.
@pat
From the start I’ve been very wary of “antidepressants,” especially the fact that they make humans tolerate situations that they’d naturally find intolerable. It’s my belief that if you’re depressed, you seek to fix the situation that’s depressing you, not gobble some zombie pills that make it seem as if everything’s all right while cockroaches are crawling on your face. I’m very skeptical about the whole idea of “chemical depression.” At the very least, I think this shit is WAAYYY over-prescribed. It’s at the point where one in every four American adults is on some kind of psychotropic drug. And in my personal life, I’ve seen tons of people around me who’ve become immobilized and/or destroyed by them.
And I wasn’t “blaming” anyone in the article. I was merely pointing out a correlation that I think needs further investigation. Here are about 800 billion more instances of school violence involving perps on SSRIs.
You can’t blame people being medicated for the shootings you listed. It just means these people were genuinely disturbed/depressed and were under treatment prior to snapping. Usually people who are exhibiting beavior that suggests they want to hurt themselves and/or others end up on medication, so what’s the revelation here?
There is something wrong with America. Violence in the developed world has dropped dramatically over the last few hundred years. The US hasn’t followed suit to the same extent. That is all we know. Good luck with that.
Fair enough, sir. I’ve just had an assload of teh “big pharma” hooey. I think modern medicine has made our lives better for the most part. Full disclosure: I have been on a tricyclic for about 22 years and it fucking saved me. How much of this is chicken-egg has to be looked at too; these people were obviously fucked up to begin with. Maybe what they were taking was prescribe after a smaller incident, maybe they went off of it etc.
“I’m very skeptical about the whole idea of “chemical depression.” I was too, my friend. And I ain’t searchin for no hankie, but getting sane and on a safe dose helped me. You will get no argument from me about shit being over prescribed. We are a society that wants to fix everything with a pill.
btw the site you link to ain’t exactly JAMA. The first two stories mention the perps being a billion times over the legal limit, the second talks about the perp’s love of violent vidja games.
At 9:00 PM I wrote:
“And I wasn’t “blaming” anyone in the article. I was merely pointing out a correlation that I think needs further investigation.
Five minutes later, “waiwhat” writes:
“You can’t blame people being medicated for the shootings you listed.”
Let me guess—you weren’t captain of the debating team, were you?
You also wrote:
“Violence in the developed world has dropped dramatically over the last few hundred years. The US hasn’t followed suit to the same extent. That is all we know. Good luck with that.”
From October 30, 2012:
Government figures released two weeks ago said that violent crime has fallen by 65 percent since 1993….
In 1992, there were an estimated 200 million guns in the US. Now there are an estimated 300 million. But the violent-crime rate has dropped around 65 percent.
Good luck with your response!
The lag isn’t in my reading comprehension, it’s in comments being approved and posted.
Take the word “blaming” out and your correlation still seems trivial. I don’t disagree about pills and overprescribing but people fucked up enough to commit mass killings seem to be crazy first, medicated second, and often commit the murders after going off their meds.
“to the same extent”, meaning its dropped significantly lower in those other nations pal. Harvard’s Steven Pinker, in his book, The Better Angels Of Our Nature, breaks it down…The US rate of murder by gunfire is almost 20 times higher than 22 other populous, high income nations where the frequency of crime is about the same. Murders period (shootings, beatings, stabbing, etc), and its still 7 times higher than those other countries.
I’m not one of those people afraid to walk in my neighborhood, I can’t stand fearmongering and hyperbole, but, for real, if you don’t see malice in the way too many people in the US deal with their problems and others you’re blind.
“In 1992, there were an estimated 200 million guns in the US. Now there are an estimated 300 million. But the violent-crime rate has dropped around 65 percent.”
But isn’t the early 90s right about the end of the crack epidemic, along with the significantly stricter gun control and significantly stricter policing in inner cities? Just as enthusiasts in the hinterlands were accumulating obscene quantities of firearms for their personal amusement, firearm acquisition in much of the more populous parts of the country was being cracked down upon severely.
6 of the 12 most deadly mass shootings have occurred since 2007.
Then there’s this
Murders with firearms (most recent) by country
Rank Countries Amount
# 1 South Africa: 31,918
# 2 Colombia: 21,898
# 3 Thailand: 20,032
# 4 United States: 9,369
# 5 Philippines: 7,708
# 6 Mexico: 2,606
# 7 Slovakia: 2,356
# 8 El Salvador: 1,441
# 9 Zimbabwe: 598
# 10 Peru: 442
So if violent crime has fallen 65% since ’92, I guess we’ve gone from a country committing self-genocide to a country that is merely rabidly psychotic? Sure, it is progress that is not to be denied, but we 3x as many gun deaths as fucking MEXICO. Surely we can (must) do better than this? And again, those who insist we can’t, or that the only way around this is to just start institutionalizing at whim, are doing so for the sake of people’s AMUSEMENT. It’s not like how some were remiss to forfeit their rights to privacy even it meant more vulnerability to terrorism–the argument here is that I SHOULD BE ABLE TO HAVE A FUN HAPPY TIME WITH MY GUN even it means more kids dying.
According to the BBC, there have been “47,515 drug-related killings [in Mexico] since President Felipe Calderon launched his crackdown on drug traffickers in late 2006.”
And that’s not total murders in Mexico, only ones that are “drug-related.” True, that doesn’t say how many of those have been gun-related. And I’m not sure which would be worse for an anti-gun argument—if they were gun-related, it shows Mexico’s strict anti-gun laws don’t really have an effect on criminals. If they were from machete attacks, it sort of shows that people will kill in massive numbers whether they have guns or not. It’s purely speculative, but I’d think a ton of those killings were gun-related. That list you cited may be lowballing the figures. It’s hard to tell with these sort of stats—if they’re from the country’s government, well, governments lie.
Either way, Mexico’s population is about a third of the US’s, so even with Mexico’s stricter gun laws, gun-related murder (even at the lower rate quoted in your list) is roughly the same per-capita as it is in the US.
6 of the 12 most deadly mass shootings have occurred since 2007.
In other words, roughly since Obama became president? (Not implying there’s a direct correlation there, only illustrating that you can do just about anything with statistics. And I just did something that should at least cause a tinge of discomfort among the tools of state power whose policies would allow the government to monopolize all potential for violence.) And look at your chart—the end of apartheid means South Africa has become a peaceful rainbow paradise…with the world’s highest rate of gun violence. If your list is remotely accurate, consider that South Africa has about one-sixth of America’s population, yet over 3X the number of gun-related deaths. So that’s a per-capita gun-murder rate that’s TWENTY TIMES higher than America’s. Funny how the same ones who never shut the fuck up about EVIL SICK PSYCHOTIC AMERICA don’t have the nuts to make a peep about how fucked-up South Africa is at the moment. That would be, well, um, y’see, that would be RACIST, and we can’t have that!
the argument here is that I SHOULD BE ABLE TO HAVE A FUN HAPPY TIME WITH MY GUN
Ahh, baseless imputation of motive, simultaneously unprovable and unfalsifiable. Sorry, won’t work here. Protip: You can’t read minds. None of us can. You can examine whether their statements are logical and whether their actions mesh with their statements, but none of us has a fucking clue what’s going on in the heads of others. At least that’s what they taught me in journalism school. You don’t say, “Mr. Obama doesn’t believe in Bigfoot.” You can only say, “Mr. Obama SAYS he doesn’t believe in Bigfoot,” and only if he actually said it…which I don’t think he did. I’d actually like to hear his opinions on the matter.
Looks like this debate is pretty much done, but I don’t think anybody has mentioned what I consider to be one of the most significant motivations in these mass killings: fame. Ever since Columbine it seems like it’s become a competition among young, disenfranchised males to see who can break the record for most kills. The Virginia Tech guy even mailed a video with his rantings to CBS before he started his spree. We keep falling for it and giving them their 15 minutes of fame, thereby upping the ante for the next psycho who wants everyone to know his name.
^^^ What he said.
Uruguay teen tries to copy Adam Lanza killings
sick, sick, sick
http://www.crickett.com/crickett_kidscorner.php
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLjNJI54GMM&feature=youtu.be