Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting

[DuckAvenger]

 

[TC]

I also find it laughable that people are still trying to ban so called "assault weapons" which are just hunting rifles with pistol grips and synthetic stocks most of the time, as well as, higher capacity magazines. Last time I checked, most homicides were committed with hand guns and something like 4 rounds were used on average.

 

[NecroJoe]

I also find it laughable that people are still trying to ban so called "assault weapons" which are just hunting rifles with pistol grips and synthetic stocks most of the time, as well as, higher capacity magazines. Last time I checked, most homicides were committed with hand guns and something like 4 rounds were used on average.

Well, if this one thing reported was true, each victim in this case was shot twice with a high-capacity rifle.

Just this morning in SoCal, a mall went on lockdown when someone shot 50 shots in the parking lot. My gues is that this wasn't 12 reloads of a revolver.

There was federaban that expired a few years back, but many ststes implemented their own. CT was not one of those, I don't believe.

 

[LeVeL]

I also find it laughable that people are still trying to ban so called "assault weapons" which are just hunting rifles with pistol grips and synthetic stocks most of the time, as well as, higher capacity magazines. Last time I checked, most homicides were committed with hand guns and something like 4 rounds were used on average.

Anything that looks like a machine gun is a machine gun, right? :lol:

 

[ScarFace88]

Well, if this one thing reported was true, each victim in this case was shot twice with a high-capacity rifle.

Just this morning in SoCal, a mall went on lockdown when someone shot 50 shots in the parking lot. My gues is that this wasn't 12 reloads of a revolver.

There was federaban that expired a few years back, but many ststes implemented their own. CT was not one of those, I don't believe.

Ca has banned magazines with a capacity above 10 rounds, so that was likely something that wasn't legally possessed.

 

[NecroJoe]

Anything that looks like a machine gun is a machine gun an AK-47, right? :lol:

...FTFY, per the media.

 

[ScarFace88]

...FTFY, per the media.

 

[argatoga]

So what if I do and come to the conclusion, that we in Europe have made progress since then? That we came to realize, that owning weapons isn't doing you any good but only produces more dead people?

It's symptomatic, that you completely ignored the rest of what I wrote. It's like you shutting out the negative parts and I find it amazing, because I know you are an intelligent, educated and sane person.

Yet like many others, your views about firearms seem to be completely insane and self-destructive. I really have trouble getting that in my head.

Maybe you really have to be grown up outside of the USA to realize, how unbelievably ridiculous that sounds to foreign ears.

I agree, though, that the USA have entered a downward spiral of violence, where the only solution to protect yourself from people with guns, is having your own gun. That's why there are 200,000,000 guns in private ownership in the USA. In words: Two hundred million. And that is only the official number. I'm sure the number of unknown, illegally owned weapons is even higher. Does anybody seriously believe it takes 200 million weapons for Americans to be able to defend themselves against their own government?

That number alone is also making complete nonsense of any already existing regulation or restriction people usually refer to, when more gun control is discussed (again).

By the logic of the weapons industry - that only arming yourself protects you from other armed people - the next logical step would be: "Well, let's give guns to school children, so they can defend themselves against an amok runner". Ridiculous.

And no, I don't think that banning firearms from private property is the solution to everything. Besides, I would really like to see the result of policemen trying to take away firearms from rednecks...

But there is one undeniable truth: An amok run is much more difficult, when you only have a knife or a baseball bat.

And I tell you another truth: More guns don't mean more safety. More guns only lead to more people being shot. In fact, each year much more people are being shot inside the USA, than US soldiers are being shot abroad in countries like Afghanistan or Iraq.

Which means, it's probably not more dangerous to serve in the army abroad, than living as a school teacher in an American suburb...

I had to sign papers for my new apartment so didn't have time to address the rest of your response. Now I have the time:

Would you provide evidence of this downward spiral of gun related violence you speak of? I don't see statistics showing that the 0.01% of Americans killed a year by firearms is increasing.

I would also like to know what your solution is to when a government turns into one which no longer protects its peoples' natural rights.

 

[NecroJoe]

My favorite "sollution" (besides putting "god" back into the pledge, even thoiugh the deadliest mass murders happened before God was put into it): "If the teachers were armed, this would have ended quickly."

Fact: the more guns there are around, the more likely you will be involved in accidents wth said guns. That is a fact about EVERYTHING. The more sips of water you take, the more likely you are to choke and drown on it. The more you drive, the more likely you wil be in a car acident.

Now...i simply can't imagine that any rational person actually thinks it's a good idea to bring guns into schools for the purpose of self-defense. I just can't...you are more likely to die in a plane crash than die in a school shooting. However, I can't help but imagine that accidental shootings would skyrocket, simply because of the math.

Just looking at it from a statistical standpoint, if, say, there are 2 accidental deaths per 100,000 guns...7.2 mllioon teachers. That's potential for 144 accidental deaths per year...mostly in areas with high concentration of children.

Let's NOT bring guns into the schools, and fix the problems, rather than trying to declare "war" on gun violence.

 

[MacGuffin]

Would you provide evidence of this downward spiral of gun related violence you speak of? I don't see statistics showing that the 0.01% of Americans killed a year by firearms is increasing.

Well, I dunno about the total numbers increasing but there recently was a killing spree at some smalltown US school - dunno if you heard about it -, where more than 20 children were killed, which to my knowledge was a first in an ever-increasing spiral of violent amok runners.

I would also like to know what your solution is to when a government turns into one which no longer protects its peoples' natural rights.

From what I witnessed lately, it's more likely that if such a government will ever come to power, it will be elected by the American people. So I guess if there was a government, which no longer protects its peoples' natural rights, it probably wouldn't be noticed much anyway...

 

[argatoga]

Well, I dunno about the total numbers increasing but there recently was a killing spree at some smalltown US school - dunno if you heard about it -, where more than 20 children were killed, which to my knowledge was a first in an ever-increasing spiral of violent amok runners.

You've bought into the media sensationalism. This isn't common.

From what I witnessed lately, it's more likely that if such a government will ever come to power, it will be elected by the American people. So I guess if there was a government, which no longer protects its peoples' natural rights, it probably wouldn't be noticed much anyway...

So you have no solution? Or you assume it will never happen despite the whole of human history saying otherwise?

 

[Momentum57]

Well, I dunno about the total numbers increasing but there recently was a killing spree at some smalltown US school - dunno if you heard about it -, where more than 20 children were killed, which to my knowledge was a first in an ever-increasing spiral of violent amok runners.

Except it hasn't... Unless you meant downward spiral of reduced violence? According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics Violent Crime is at its lowest rate since the 70's.

Year Violent Crime Rate
1971 396
1972 401
1973 417.4
1974 461.1
1975 487.8
1976 467.8
1977 475.9
1978 497.8
1979 548.9
1980 596.6
1981 593.5
1982 570.8
1983 538.1
1984 539.9
1985 558.1
1986 620.1
1987 612.5
1988 640.6
1989 666.9
1990 729.6
1991 758.2
1992 757.7
1993 747.1
1994 713.6
1995 684.5
1996 636.6
1997 611
1998 567.6
1999 523
2000 506.5
2001 504.5
2002 494.4
2003 475.8
2004 463.2
2005 469
2006 473.6
2007 466.9
2008 457.5
2009 431.9
2010 403.6
2011 386.3

Unmotivated rampage killings has been relatively flat over the last 20 years.

 

[MadCat360]

http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/12/6/365.full

Like this?

I have been reading some other reports. Apparently this study was fast-tracked by Injury Prevention and was not subjected to appropriate peer review. Prof. Chapman is also an anti-gun campaigned, even prior to writing the paper.

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

In 2006, the lack of a measurable effect from the 1996 firearms legislation was reported in the British Journal of Criminology. Jeanine Baker (a former state president of the SSAA(SA)) and Samara McPhedran (Women in Shooting and Hunting) found no effect detectable with ARIMA statistical analysis of the data. Weatherburn described the Baker & McPhedran article as "reputable" and "well-conducted" and stated that the available data are insufficient to draw stronger conclusions. Weatherburn noted the importance of actively policing illegal firearm trafficking and argued that there was little evidence that the new laws had helped in this regard.

A study co-authored by Simon Chapman argued that reduction in firearm numbers had prevented mass shootings because in the 18 years prior to the Port Arthur massacre there were 13 mass shootings and in the decade since 1996 there have been none. The 2002 Monash University shooting of seven people, two of whom died, is ignored by Chapman because the usual definition requires four deaths. Data interpretation of trends in this study differs from other authors, while clearly being based on the same data.

Media reports gave Chapman wide publicity while failing to note his long history as an anti-gun lobbyist, which continues to this day. Since then, evidence to a Senate Inquiry showed that Chapman's research was fast-tracked for publication by the journal Injury Prevention, which bypassed the standard peer review process. The original emails between Chapman and Pless, and reviewer comments, are contained in the Senate Inquiry submission.

Despite the documentation demonstrating this breach of academic protocol, Chapman insists that the emails sent from his University of Sydney account to the then-Injury Prevention editor Barry Pless, and the disclosed reviews that highlight concerns with Chapman's paper, should be ignored. He states in a 2012 revision to this Wikipedia article: "...that 'evidence' was completely wrong because the paper was fully reviewed and Chapman has the reviews, the revision and all correspondence with the editor, Prof Barry Pless, and is amused at the purile(sic) efforts of some to insist otherwise."

Baker and McPhedran have also published a meta-study pointing out that differing authors' conclusions were based on the same data, but that interpretations diverged.

A 2008 study on the effects of the firearm buybacks by Wang-Sheng Lee and Sandy Suardi of Melbourne University's Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research studied the data and concluded, "Despite the fact that several researchers using the same data have examined the impact of the NFA on firearm deaths, a consensus does not appear to have been reached. In this paper, we re-analyze the same data on firearm deaths used in previous research, using tests for unknown structural breaks as a means to identifying impacts of the NFA. The results of these tests suggest that the NFA did not have any large effects on reducing firearm homicide or suicide rates.

Apparently it is still under much contention, and not clear either way.

 

[LeVeL]

Well, I dunno about the total numbers increasing but there recently was a killing spree at some smalltown US school - dunno if you heard about it -, where more than 20 children were killed, which to my knowledge was a first in an ever-increasing spiral of violent amok runners.

I'll even graph Momentum57's numbers for you:

Yup, decreasing steadily over the last 20 years.


I've been making too many graphs at work, it's second nature now




By the way, interesting to see the 2010 breakdown of mortality causes in the United States:

Source

 

[MacGuffin]

Yes, there are probably many ways to talk it smooth.

 

[argatoga]

Yes, there are probably many ways to talk it smooth.

How about you provide actual evidence?

You have a warped view of the U.S. that has no factual backing (but plenty of evidence that says otherwise).

 

[narf]

Actually you are in a logical fallacy, you cannot make an argument about my mindset if you are not talking about a specific solution. My argument is that there is no solution that would have an ROI high enough to warrant it when it comes to firearm availability in this country.

If you want to make an argument for a SPECIFIC solution with a reasonable ROI then by all means we will listen.

I have proposed solutions in this thread already.
For example, stop the celebrity-stlye 24/7 coverage of these cases. Sure, it won't stop every madman, but it should reduce the motivation to aim for a huge event when going coockoo in the head. Investment? Zero. Return? Potentially huge.

I believe the same principle applies to the live helicopter coverage of car chases. Some get into one just to be on TV.

My favorite "sollution" (besides putting "god" back into the pledge, even thoiugh the deadliest mass murders happened before God was put into it): "If the teachers were armed, this would have ended quickly."

Fact: the more guns there are around, the more likely you will be involved in accidents wth said guns. That is a fact about EVERYTHING. The more sips of water you take, the more likely you are to choke and drown on it. The more you drive, the more likely you wil be in a car acident.

Now...i simply can't imagine that any rational person actually thinks it's a good idea to bring guns into schools for the purpose of self-defense. I just can't...you are more likely to die in a plane crash than die in a school shooting. However, I can't help but imagine that accidental shootings would skyrocket, simply because of the math.

Just looking at it from a statistical standpoint, if, say, there are 2 accidental deaths per 100,000 guns...7.2 mllioon teachers. That's potential for 144 accidental deaths per year...mostly in areas with high concentration of children.

Let's NOT bring guns into the schools, and fix the problems, rather than trying to declare "war" on gun violence.

More guns don't sound like a reasonable solution to me either.

 

[GerFix]

I have been reading some other reports. Apparently this study was fast-tracked by Injury Prevention and was not subjected to appropriate peer review. Prof. Chapman is also an anti-gun campaigned, even prior to writing the paper.

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

Apparently it is still under much contention, and not clear either way.

No it isn't. The raw statistics (leaving out any contentious interpretation) are that the firearm related death rate in Australia is now less than half what it was before the National Buy Back Scheme (NBBS). It is true to say that the death rate was falling in the 10 years before the NBBS, but to suggest that it would have continued to fall is speculation. The fall since though is fact, as is the reduction in mass shootings (4 or more fatalities) which was 11 in the 10 years before and zero in the 16 years since.

How about you provide actual evidence?

You have a warped view of the U.S. that has no factual backing (but plenty of evidence that says otherwise).

USA Violent crime rate (per 100,000) in 1960 - 160.9
USA Violent crime rate (per 100,000) in 2010 - 403.6

True it was highest in 1991 (758.2), but the death rate from violent crime in the USA is so far higher than that in the rest of the OECD (5 times the average) it is difficult to not have a warped perspective on a nation that broadcasts news of mass shootings to the world every 6 months and does nothing meaningful about it.

 

[argatoga]

No it isn't. The raw statistics (leaving out any contentious interpretation) are that the firearm related death rate in Australia is now less than half what it was before the National Buy Back Scheme (NBBS). It is true to say that the death rate was falling in the 10 years before the NBBS, but to suggest that it would have continued to fall is speculation. The fall since though is fact, as is the reduction in mass shootings (4 or more fatalities) which was 11 in the 10 years before and zero in the 16 years since.



USA Violent crime rate (per 100,000) in 1960 - 160.9
USA Violent crime rate (per 100,000) in 2010 - 403.6

True it was highest in 1991 (758.2), but the death rate from violent crime in the USA is so far higher than that in the rest of the OECD (5 times the average) it is difficult to not have a warped perspective on a nation that broadcasts news of mass shootings to the world every 6 months and does nothing meaningful about it.

Violent crimes don't all involve guns.

So your logic is that since our media over sensationalizes things we should do something about it? I prefer seeing if there is an actual problem then acting on it if it exists. Emotions corrupt opinions and allow devastating things to be passed. The Patriot Act being a good example of evil riding on emotion.

 

[NecroJoe]

"Violent crime" just means that there was the use of force.