20 elementary school children plus 6 adults shot dead by a guy with a gun

Kids do have the right to live, as does everyone. Those rights are protected, which is why there are laws against murder, assault, etc. Quite using emotional statements to defend your position on guns. It doesn't make you look any more reasonable to tell me that because I believe in gun rights I also agree that children should die.

The gun isn't killing children, it is the crazed maniacs that love to get public attention with their brutal acts. Taking guns away from millions of people isn't going to stop someone from acting out on their desires to kill.

Let me ask you, who do people call when their lives are in danger?

 

Maybe this is just cultural differences, we dont have guns in the UK and we dont have the level of gun crime which there is in America. I cant see any arguement for the carrying of guns which would make me change my mind.
People call the police when they are in danger and yes the American police carry guns, I dont see the relevance of this question.

 

You don't have gun crime because you don't have guns. Your violent crime rate is double what it is here in the US though. It is statistically impossible to determine the exact amount because each country defines violent crime differently, but based on the data one can still conclude violent crime is more of a problem in the UK vs the US.

People carry guns for personal protection. We have the right to defend ourselves with lethal force if necessary. People defend their homes from robbers and rapists. Can you not see why someone would want to have a gun to protect themselves? Seems silly to me to believe otherwise. Since you like to bring emotions and guilt into your arguments I will do the same. Head over to YouTube and search for 911 calls with old women in their homes that are being broken into. In one video I heard the woman scream to the police dispatcher as she was dragged away and brutally murdered. You can find other videos of 911 calls where the person has a gun. They are crying to the police, yelling at the intruder to stay away. But when the intruder gains entry and threatens their life, they shoot and justice is served. The innocent people don't die, and another scumbag is not living to terrorize anyone else. What you do when you take guns away is make people more vulnerable to violent crimes.

 

I'm with you. Where I come from, it is generally believed that all Mexicans are lazy, but I don't agree with that view. Any Mexicans reading this should have no reason to take offense at any of that, right?

Talk about a non-sequitur. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, so you have no need to carry a gun? It makes no sense at all. The weather seems warm, so I am buying a cat. I like midget porn, so I have no need of a drivers license. Jesus. Its just nutty.

Another non-sequitur. The legality of guns has nothing to do with the need to own one, except maybe for the fact that only criminals have guns which actually gives you more of a need to own one. Maybe you need to own one so that, when the Germans are thinking about invading your pathetic island, you won't have call an American to come save you while you cower in your basement. Maybe you need to own one because you are a professional marksman, or a contract killer working for Obama's government, tasked with killing people without a trial who he deems in need of killing.

1) I don't write for a living. 2) My errors usually do not have a glaring red line informing me of their existence staring me in the face before I hit post, as yours do.

 

Are you being sarcastic or mocking the situation?

How does someone drive to a school and "accidentally" kill people?

Law abiding citizens laying down their guns does not stop criminals!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

No I am not mocking the situation, it happens (albeit rarely), Kids get hold of a gun and take it to school, sometimes they have grievances and sometimes it's not deliberate. The Columbine Massacre was kids killing kids and there has been a case where a younger kid has found a gun and taken it to school, the teacher got shot by accident. The kid had no intention of shooting the teacher. Mostly it is deliberate but not always.
Sadly todays society is one where vengeance is the norm, an eye for an eye and all that rubbish. What most people don't realise is that violence breeds violence, an eye for an eye and the world end up blind. When kids are getting hold of these weapons and using them against each other than surely there needs to be measures put into place to stop it. The current laws clearly are not working so isn't it time for a change?
Law abiding citizens with guns do not stop criminals. This is clear as there are still criminals in America. So what then is the answer? More Laws to control who owns a gun? Psychological profiling to try to weed out the psycho's and stop them getting their hands on a gun? Or just leave things as they are? After all what is in place now is obviously doing the job just fine.

 

The fact is guns will never be banned here in the US. It is a right guaranteed by the highest authority in the country, the constitution. If somehow the federal ever government tried to, you would see civil war. A society is not truly free unless they have guns. We learned our lesson in England and the founding fathers made sure the US government would never have ultimate power over its citizens. So your solution of simply banning guns is not reality and will never happen. It is not an option.

The problems with school shootings are not guns. Please tell me how banning guns solves the severe mental problems suffered by these shooters. And the attention gets put on the ones that actually kill people. Hundreds more school shootings are prevented thanks to teachers and parents and tips from fellow students. The mental problem is still there after you take away guns. No one needs a gun to kill people. Using household materials one could create a bomb they learn off the internet to inflict more damage than a single gun ever could. The tools of death are all around us. Instead of striping all americans of their rights because of a few, solve the real underlying problem.

If you let people drive cars they will crash and kill themselves eventually. If you let people skydive, someone will die in the process. If you are allowed to eat fast food, smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol, eventually health problems will kill people. What it boils down to is individual freedom and responsibility. The chance to make good decisions and bad decisions. Your logic is that the government should take away peoples freedom to prevent them from harming themselves. But go down that road and you will never see an end. There is always something you could ban because everything kills people. You have to give freedom to people and hold them accountable for their own lives.

 

Yes, but you have one of the highest violent crime rates in Europe. And so many people in the U.K. have been killed by kitchen knives that your government is now trying to make long kitchen knives illegal.

Any police officer will tell you, a murderer will find a way to commit murder.

If you look at the school shootings, there is a common pattern - there were plenty of warning signs that these kids were going to blow and no adult did anything about it. Any police officer will tell you, a murderer will find a way to commit murder. If you look at the record, the kids that couldn't get guns built bombs. How do you build a bomb, you say? Ask Google.

The answer is simple: A child must have greater access to mental treatment than they do to weapons.

 

I guess we might have to agree to disagree on this one,
@Corwin, I agree that the kids need the help from professionals, maybe you should do something about that, make some noises at the right people. That might help solve the problem some what but I don't think it will go away entirely while the guns are still avilable.
More regulations might help to prevent these unstable people getting their hands on guns.
I hate to take a pessimistic view, but I am not convinced it will work.
But on a positive note at least Obama is recognising the situation, unlike in the past when certain musicians were blamed instead of what is actually at fault.

 

What about parents that actually care?

 

The problem is, Obama's proposals will do nothing to cut down on gun violence. What Obama wants to do is limit magazine sizes to 10 rounds, ban certain types of weapons based on cosmetic features, and create a national registration system for guns. The problem is, and even the vice president himself admitted, these policies won't do anything to effect gun violence or prevent another sandy hook. We had a similar ban from 1994-2004 which banned "assault rifles" and columbine happened during that time. Kids will find whatever they have available, and that was proven at columbine. The reason they are trying to get these small steps passed is because their end goal is a ban on all firearms, similar to what the UK has. But like I said before, it won't happen. So they have to chip away little by little until they take away all guns. That is why you see the public mobilizing and getting active in support of gun rights. In my opinion the laws are already too strict as it is. You either have guns in your country or you don't. Gun laws and regulations are useless in a society that has so many weapons. Criminals will steal and sell them on the black market if they can't buy them legally. The thing that makes me sick is that these politicians try to cloak their actual intentions by introducing very small bans and regulations. They will continue to pile them on until its impossible to own a gun. By that time the pubic won't really notice the complete dismantling of the 2nd amendment.

 

So the answer must be to remove all laws and restrictions on guns? Of course thats the answer, then when everybody who has mental health issues has shot a bunch of kids then killed thenselves there wont be a problem will there? and everybody can live happily ever after cant they.

 

Did I say that? Did I say that would reduce gun violence? No I didn't. You misunderstood my point. But even if those laws and restrictions didn't exist, I am willing to bet gun violence wouldn't go up much. The mental patient can already get guns, even with current laws, so that wouldn't make it any easier for them to shoot a bunch of kids. Parents are responsible for their kids behavior. Current laws don't stop parents from being dumb and not securing the weapons they have in their house. The parents are responsible for making sure their kids don't shoot up the school, not the government. Gang bangers in the inner city (which is most gun violence in this country) don't get guns legally anyway. They steal them or buy them off the black market.

My point was that you either have guns or you don't. If you have guns, none of these stupid laws have a dramatic effect on criminals and their desire to kill people with guns. If you ban guns altogether and somehow rid all of them from the country, you lose the vital power of the government. To reduce gun violence we should be focusing on mental health, personal responsibility, and taking guns away from criminals, not law abiding citizens.

The problem with socialism is that you believe the government can solve all your problems. You believe the individual is too stupid, too careless, and too dangerous to have any responsibility.

 

http://smartgunlaws.org/new-data-on...t-weapon-ban-worked-to-reduce-crime1994-2004/

Shows that the proposed laws do in fact work.

 

A few problems with that source:

1. It is liberal leaning, completely baised
2. The stats it provides are not relevant. Data from the US government states that only 2% of gun crimes every year are committed with any kind of rifle, not just assault rifles. With such low usage in crimes to begin with, the maximum decrease in gun crime could only be around 2%.
3. The law only banned cosmetic features. For example, a rifle that was banned could be quickly modified by the manufacturer to conform to the new law. And it would still be the exact same gun, minus a pistol grip or some other purely cosmetic feature that did nothing to increase how lethal the rifle was.

Now, let me point you do the actual study by the National Institute of Justice on the short term impacts of the ban: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/173405.pdf

A few direct quotes that are important:

But the most important part of the entire study:

That last part is important, and reveals the laws failure, because the aim of this ban was to get rid of rifles that could kill lots of people at one time. This statement, in an official study by the government, shows that the law failed to do what it intended.

And by the way, in case you didn't notice the map on the link you posted, Sandy Hook is in Connecticut, a state that already had a ban on assault weapons. Imagine that!

 

So what then is the answer? how are you going to protect your gun collection?
What do you propose to stop the kids getting hold of guns and killing?

 

I have zero intention of debating someone from the UK who let his own government turn him into an unarmed subject, and he now wants us to join him in that status. Their crown was trying to disarm the subjects here in the 1700s, so we kicked the Brits out. That ended the conversation. Permanently.

 

I don't have to do anything because kids are not getting my guns and killing people. It is the parents responsibility to teach their kids gun safety if they choose to have guns, and also to secure them so that the children can not have access to them without permission. It's a simple solution really. If you have children, keep your guns secure (common sense). Keep up with their lives in school. All school shooters display signs of trouble that go ignored by parents and teachers. It's the mental issue that ends up killing other children, not the fact that they have access to guns. Millions of kids have access go guns and don't go killing their classmates. And there are also kids that don't have access to guns that end up killing their classmates.

 

If you really feel that you don't need to do anything because kids aren't getting your guns then that is a very selfish and narrow-minded view. To protect your collection why not run a series of blogs to educate the ignorant? the 'Im all right Jack' attitude will get you nowhere when the gun laws are passed.
Unfortunately common sense is rare these days (you probably have more chance of finding rocking horse shit) and as such the responsibility lies at the feet of those who are able to implement common sense on behalf of those who have none, it's just unfortunate that those who are responsible for their actions have to be treated the same way.
I still think that guns are not a necessity

 

FYI:1 'He' is a SHE
2 She would not want to own a gun anyway.
3 People were unarmed LONG BEFORE I was even born.
4 The fact that you did join the debate by making that post in the first place kinda makes you a hypocrite, dont you think?

Just my opinion