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Florida School Shooting

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  • Originally posted by Dimbulb View Post
    Perhaps have the class talk about the laws in other Western countries that don't have those shootings?
    Maybe use Australia as a case study: after banning guns, rates of gun violence decreased, but the rate of violent crime overall remained steady as those intent on doing harm simply used other tools like knives, cars, and arson. Or how about London, England which is experiencing an epidemic of acid and knife attacks?

    Or is that not the kind of open and honest discussion you had in mind?
    Some may call me foolish, and some may call me odd
    But I'd rather be a fool in the eyes of man
    Than a fool in the eyes of God


    From "Fools Gold" by Petra

    Comment


    • Resources for Talking and Teaching About the School Shooting in Florida

      Comment


      • Originally posted by Tassmoron View Post
        That's simply wrong. “From 1997 through May 2016 (after gun law reforms), no fatal mass shootings occurred in Australia.” Also “people didn’t find other ways to kill or to die by suicide — rates of homicide and suicide fell overall also.”

        https://www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...hey-do-n597091
        Classic liberal bait-and-switch. They only look at gun violence, not violent crime rates in general.

        Curiously, the United States saw a similar decrease in gun violence despite an increase in gun sales at the same time Australia was banning them.

        http://thefederalist.com/2015/09/03/...n-ban-conceit/

        According to your own government's statistics, homicides have decreased, but assault and sexual assault have sharply increased, and robbery is essentially a flat line.

        https://aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi359

        Although I'm curious what they mean by "homicide" since some countries keep there apparent rates down by narrowly defining the term so as not to count all homicides.
        Some may call me foolish, and some may call me odd
        But I'd rather be a fool in the eyes of man
        Than a fool in the eyes of God


        From "Fools Gold" by Petra

        Comment


        • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
          That's simply wrong. “From 1997 through May 2016 (after gun law reforms), no fatal mass shootings occurred in Australia.” Also “people didn’t find other ways to kill or to die by suicide — rates of homicide and suicide fell overall also.”

          https://www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...hey-do-n597091
          At this point let's point out that here in the U.S. the number of firearms in private hands has gone up sharply since the election of Bill Clinton in 1992 while simultaneously the amount of gun related violence has dropped dramatically.


          Please explain this phenomena if the availability of firearms is what causes gun-related violence.

          I'm always still in trouble again

          "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
          "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
          "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

          Comment


          • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
            At this point let's point out that here in the U.S. the number of firearms in private hands has gone up sharply since the election of Bill Clinton in 1992 while simultaneously the amount of gun related violence has dropped dramatically.

            [ATTACH=CONFIG]26521[/ATTACH]

            Please explain this phenomena if the availability of firearms is what causes gun-related violence.
            The New York Times offered an opinion on the graph suggesting that correlation does not equal causation, but I doubt it's enough to change many minds on the subject,

            Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/03/us/politics/las-vegas-shooting-gun-claims-fact-check.html

            A widely shared chart showing that more guns mean fewer gun murders gives a misleading impression.

            In response to calls for more gun control and fewer guns, some have pointed to a chart published by the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank in Washington, to argue that more guns don’t necessarily translate to more gun homicides.

            The point that more permissive gun laws did not lead to a huge spike in gun violence has merits, said Adam Winkler, a Second Amendment expert at the University of California, Los Angeles. But the chart itself, he said, “is a bunch of hokey.”

            The chart’s data on the spike in the number of firearms and the decline in the homicides by firearms are accurate. But there is no proof that these two trends are connected. Crime, whether or not committed with guns, has generally declined over the past two decades. Experts aren’t entirely sure why but do say the drop was influenced by a host of economic, racial and demographic factors.

            “Not a single criminal justice researcher out there looks at the gun homicide rate solely as a function of the number of private firearms,” said Mr. Winkler.

            A few other statistics quickly puncture the chart’s suggested conclusion.

            The number of firearms in the United States has steadily increased over the past two decades. It rose to 310 million in 2009, up from 259 million in 2000 and 192 million in 1994.

            Gun homicides, meanwhile, fell dramatically from a 1993 peak of a rate of 7.02 per 100,000 people; by 1999, it was at 3.82 per 100,000 people. But the homicide rate has remained steady since then, suggesting the correlation between the number of guns and number of gun killings does not hold past the turn of the millennium.

            At the same time, the number of mass shootings has also spiked dramatically.

            © Copyright Original Source

            Comment


            • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              See for example:



              America, the only Western country with this problem on this scale, can't possibly do anything to fix it. There are no solutions anywhere else in the Western world. That's why it happens in America and not other Western countries.
              It does happen in other countries Starlight. Entire villages being destroyed in Africa and the Middle East using guns and poison gas. People being run down in the streets in France. Suicide bombings in Israel.

              When someone wants to kill a lot of people, they will find a way to do it, no matter where they are, or what weapons they have access to.

              Comment


              • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                You anti-abortionists are crazy.

                Gun violence is very different to abortion issues, because with regard to abortion one side believes the objects being killed aren't really "people" in the full sense and are OK with it happening. Whereas in the case of mass slaughters, both sides agree that the schools kids or adults being slaughtered are indeed people who shouldn't be killed and whom killing is not okay.

                I'm quite happy to own the moral responsibility of the fetuses killed by the abortion laws I support - it's a policy that I support and it has consequences and so through my support I'm partially responsible for those consequences. I'm okay with it because I don't think the killing of fetuses is deeply immoral, and therefore am fine with accepting and acknowledging my sliver of responsibility for an act that I'm not committing myself but am willfully enabling others to commit. But for some reason you cowards run from the moral responsibility of the people killed by the laws and culture that you willfully enact and propagate and support. Unlike me and abortion, you don't generally think it's okay when people are slaughtered by guns (unless it's police or military doing the slaughtering, and then you usually seem to be fine with it!!!), and your response is to refuse to acknowledge your own moral culpability and responsibility for supporting and enabling the culture and laws that led to those murders. It's pathetic. You're not merely murderers for your role in supporting the laws and culture that repeatedly enable these acts, you're cowards who run from your own moral responsibility.
                Have you compared the numbers?

                US Deaths by mass shooting (total from 2013 - 2018, 6 years) = 1,875

                Abortions just in 2014 = 926,200

                The Nazi's didn't think the Jews were "people" either so I guess that made it OK according to your logic.
                Last edited by Sparko; 02-16-2018, 08:42 AM.

                Comment


                • Originally posted by guacamole View Post
                  That's part of what I'm trying to get at. The laws, as written, probably wouldn't have saved lives in this case.



                  How could the FBI have confiscated a legally purchased gun from an owner who hadn't yet committed a felony? Would a therapist have really committed him against his will for posting things on the internet that trolls post all the time?

                  I'm not buyin' it.

                  fwiw,
                  guacamole
                  Well the FBI could have interviewed the students and teachers who knew the kid and found out how troubled he was and then tried to get the family he was staying with to commit him, or maybe even have gotten a court order. Reading what others have said about this kid, he was a ticking time bomb. It wasn't one of those, "he was a nice quiet kid and nobody expected this to happen" type of situation, it was a, "This kid is nuts and something needs to be done" type of situation.

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                    The New York Times offered an opinion on the graph suggesting that correlation does not equal causation, but I doubt it's enough to change many minds on the subject,

                    Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/03/us/politics/las-vegas-shooting-gun-claims-fact-check.html

                    A widely shared chart showing that more guns mean fewer gun murders gives a misleading impression.

                    In response to calls for more gun control and fewer guns, some have pointed to a chart published by the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank in Washington, to argue that more guns don’t necessarily translate to more gun homicides.

                    The point that more permissive gun laws did not lead to a huge spike in gun violence has merits, said Adam Winkler, a Second Amendment expert at the University of California, Los Angeles. But the chart itself, he said, “is a bunch of hokey.”

                    The chart’s data on the spike in the number of firearms and the decline in the homicides by firearms are accurate. But there is no proof that these two trends are connected. Crime, whether or not committed with guns, has generally declined over the past two decades. Experts aren’t entirely sure why but do say the drop was influenced by a host of economic, racial and demographic factors.

                    “Not a single criminal justice researcher out there looks at the gun homicide rate solely as a function of the number of private firearms,” said Mr. Winkler.

                    A few other statistics quickly puncture the chart’s suggested conclusion.

                    The number of firearms in the United States has steadily increased over the past two decades. It rose to 310 million in 2009, up from 259 million in 2000 and 192 million in 1994.

                    Gun homicides, meanwhile, fell dramatically from a 1993 peak of a rate of 7.02 per 100,000 people; by 1999, it was at 3.82 per 100,000 people. But the homicide rate has remained steady since then, suggesting the correlation between the number of guns and number of gun killings does not hold past the turn of the millennium.

                    At the same time, the number of mass shootings has also spiked dramatically.

                    © Copyright Original Source

                    I'm not saying that more guns means less crime (although I've seen that argument put forward), but rather if, as we are repeatedly told, the availability of firearms is the cause of gun related violence then shouldn't we have witnessed a sharp increase in gun related homicides as the number of available firearms rose so dramatically? And yes it is true that the gun-related homicide rate basically leveled off "past the turn of the millennium" but according to liberal wisdom that should not be the case as the number of firearms in public hands continued to sky-rocket.

                    Basically, if the availability of firearms is the cause of increased gun violence we should have experienced a severe increase in gun violence as the number of guns increased. But we didn't. We saw the exact opposite.

                    I'm always still in trouble again

                    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by Sparko View Post
                      Well the FBI could have interviewed the students and teachers who knew the kid and found out how troubled he was and then tried to get the family he was staying with to commit him, or maybe even have gotten a court order. Reading what others have said about this kid, he was a ticking time bomb. It wasn't one of those, "he was a nice quiet kid and nobody expected this to happen" type of situation, it was a, "This kid is nuts and something needs to be done" type of situation.
                      Do we really want the FBI to get involved any time somebody is struggling with a mental illness? This would create many more problems than it would solve.
                      "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                        For comparison the headlines in my country yesterday were about a disturbed youth who was radicalized online and spent 5 months planning a violent terrorist attack, only to give up on it the moment he started to carry it out:

                        [He] planned to ram a car into a group of people in Christchurch and then stab them... but has since told a psychologist when it began he "decided not to hurt anybody because he did not have the means to kill enough people"...

                        ..."The reason no-one was hurt was that he did not have access to knives," Lange said. But there was significant premeditation, and hostility towards non-Muslims.


                        It has been more than 20 years since we had a mass killing here (4+ people dying in a single homicide incident). We have never had an Islam-motivated terrorist attack.
                        Because you don't have large population centers, or even a large population at all, and most of who does live there are sheep farmers.

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
                          Do we really want the FBI to get involved any time somebody is struggling with a mental illness? This would create many more problems than it would solve.
                          In this particular case, the FBI WAS involved, because the kid allegedly posted 'braggings' on social media, and many seemed concerned he would do such a thing, and not the least bit surprised that he did. It appears they simply dropped the ball, or didn't push enough.
                          The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                            I'm not saying that more guns means less crime (although I've seen that argument put forward), but rather if, as we are repeatedly told, the availability of firearms is the cause of gun related violence then shouldn't we have witnessed a sharp increase in gun related homicides as the number of available firearms rose so dramatically? And yes it is true that the gun-related homicide rate basically leveled off "past the turn of the millennium" but according to liberal wisdom that should not be the case as the number of firearms in public hands continued to sky-rocket.

                            Basically, if the availability of firearms is the cause of increased gun violence we should have experienced a severe increase in gun violence as the number of guns increased. But we didn't. We saw the exact opposite.
                            I think it's possible, likely even, that the number of gun users hasn't risen so much as the number of guns that each individual has acquired. So, what we're seeing is owners who used to own one or two guns now owning three, four, or more. My gun owning co-workers all own more than one, and my boss's son (who also works here) actually owns a literal arsenal of several dozen (mostly AR-15s in different configurations). I think that matters to statistics like these. We have more guns, but the number of gun owners likely hasn't risen very high.

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
                              Do we really want the FBI to get involved any time somebody is struggling with a mental illness? This would create many more problems than it would solve.
                              But taking guns away from everyone is a valid solution?

                              I think going after the troubled people who cause the murders is a more viable solution. And in this case, the FBI would be involved because someone reported this kid for posting a comment that he was going to shoot up a school! So yeah, they should investigate that, and they would have found out that the kid was a valid threat.

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                                I think it's possible, likely even, that the number of gun users hasn't risen so much as the number of guns that each individual has acquired. So, what we're seeing is owners who used to own one or two guns now owning three, four, or more. My gun owning co-workers all own more than one, and my boss's son (who also works here) actually owns a literal arsenal of several dozen (mostly AR-15s in different configurations). I think that matters to statistics like these. We have more guns, but the number of gun owners likely hasn't risen very high.
                                Actually there has been a huge increase in the number of actual new gun buyers, with the biggest jump seen among women. Firearm training courses are jammed to capacity forcing those that offer them to increase the number of classes to accommodate these folks. While there are those who stockpile firearms IIRC the actual number of guns per person is something like 1½ meaning the vast majority only have a single gun.

                                I'm always still in trouble again

                                "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                                "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                                "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                                Comment

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