Time to discuss gun regulation in the US?

[Spoiler]

"Those who call for gun control after incidents like this contribute nothing to the solution. Gunmen like Friday’s plan their actions, right down to wearing military garb. They could certainly procure illegal firearms or use incendiary devices to kill. I only wish the kindergarten teacher and principal in Connecticut had been armed."

-Dr. Keith Ablow, psychiatrist

[schwarzkopf]

How can you call those facts.... a man with a knife in a room full of kids can cause an equal amount of damage..

You are wrong, because without a GUN - the guy can be stopped. With a gun, only lack of ammo or lack of targets stops him.

[Shadoweye]

A tool designed specifically to take life.

A tool designed to defend is how i see it... your slant on it is just as comparable to my slant on it.....

[artemishunter1]

Don't blame the guns. Blame the guy who caused the massacre.

Without the gun, the massacre, would not happen. You can not kill 43 people with a knife before being stopped. Seriously. do not say if gun was illigal, then only criminal will get it. So, what, every single incidents like this happened, when regular people got guns, not criminals.

[Shadoweye]

You are wrong, because without a GUN - the guy can be stopped. With a gun, only lack of ammo or lack of targets stops him.

Then explain to me how gunmen with ammo are stopped all the time?

[Stede]

Maybe, but its not necessarily the source of the problem. sure, they were shot with a gun, but when was the last time any of you were in school? think of the " methods " in place to react to a situation like this, its called a lockdown, in which the most meager display of protection is put in place, it goes a little like this
> Close and lock door, which doesn't do much, because they have a gun and can probably just shoot the handle off.
> Close Blinds, again, kind of pointless, they are already inside after all
> Put all the kids in one corner of the room, the one closest to the door ( not behind the door, but if you walked in and turned left, that corner ) probably the stupidest of them all, i know there might not be another alternative, but crowding them all together isn't saving them from an automatic weapon, its making them easier targets.
> Wait.
Whoever came up with this really didn't think it through, what, is the gunman honestly stupid enough to believe more than maybe, 10 out of hundreds of class-rooms, that should be populated by thousands of students, are actually empty? Maybe instead of reconsidering gun laws, we need to reconsider our plans for emergencies such as these.
Will it reduce the gun-related deaths to 0? No, but it will probably prevent it from being 18 kids who were only 5-10 years old.
I guess what i'm trying to say is the actual layouts of schools need to be fixed, so in case of an emergency, you have somewhere to go, limiting the deaths as much as possible. But its truly unavoidable in my opinion, take into consideration, a crowded hallway in a heavily populated high school, the gunman would be lost in a crowd, and bullet penetration would lead to devastating effects.

Those are solid wood / metal fire doors per every municipal fire code in the country. And contrary to the action movies you see, you can't just shoot the handle off one of these doors. Nevermind the fact that in this situation the facts seem to strongly indicate the shooter entered the classroom / crime scene before the lockdown was in effect. Also, automatic weapons were not used in this incident.

Please get informed before rendering an opinion.

[shimerra]

How can you call those facts.... a man with a knife in a room full of kids can cause an equal amount of damage... opinions do not equal fact.

A man with a knife is most certainly not equally dangerous to a man with a gun despite them theoretically being able to cause similar amounts of damage.

Seriously I support guns rights, but I face palm every time someone tries to equate a gun and a knife in terms of killing power as if the two were some how equally dangerous.

[schwarzkopf]

So according to you there's NO CORRELATION AT ALL between the fact that countries with stricter gun laws and harder legislation regarding where and how it can be bought all have lower shooting rater than the USA? It's just a string of coincidences?

Actually - there are countries with a high gun ownership of guns that do not have the shooting level of the USA, the issue here isn't how many guns - rather how easy guns.

[Gothicshark]

Really? It is all the right wingers that make america dangerous? How about the worst area's of gun violence in the country, the inner cities in detroit, LA-places that vote democrat over 80%? Perhaps if the criminals and gang members were prosecuted effectively and not allowed to vote (As they are felons) the country would be safer.

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/homicide.htm

Mortality
All homicides

Number of deaths: 16,799
Deaths per 100,000 population: 5.5
Cause of death rank: 15

Firearm homicides

Number of deaths: 11,493
Deaths per 100,000 population: 3.7

Source: Deaths: Final Data for 2009, tables 9, 10, 11 [PDF - 2.1 MB]

http://www.heedinggodscall.org/content/pfctoolkit-10

GUN VIOLENCE in the UNITED STATES

Some Indicative Data:

Gun Ownership

The US has an estimated 283 million guns in civilian hands
Each year about 4.5 million firearms, including approximately 2 million handguns, are sold in the United States
An estimated 2 million second hand firearms are sold each year
The percentage of American households with a gun has been steadily declining (high of 54% in 1977 to 33% in 2009)
The average number of guns per owner has increased from 4.1 in 1994 to 6.9 in 2004.

Sources: Injury Prevention (2007); ATF (2000); National Opinion Research Center (2008); Pew Research Center (2009)

Gun Deaths:

More than 30,000 people are killed by firearms each year in this country

More than 30 people are shot and murdered each day

1/2 of them are between the ages of 18 and 35

1/3 of them are under the age of 20

Homicide is the second leading cause of death among 15-24 year-olds

And the primary cause of death among African Americans of that age group

Gun Homicides (average annually):

Less than 50: Japan

Less than 150: Germany, Italy, France, etc.

Less than 200: Canada

More than 10,000: USA

Source: IANSA (International Action Network on Small Arms of the United Nations)

Injuries and Deaths from Guns

Everytime a gun injures or kills in self-defense, one is used:

11 times for a completed or attempted suicide
7 times in a criminal assault or homicide
4 times in an unintentional shooting death or injury

Source: Journal of Trauma, injury, Infection and Critical Care (1998)

Per Capita Annual Gun Death Rate (per 100,000 population):

Highest: Louisiana (19.04, 45.6% households contain guns)

#25: Pennsylvania (10.90)

Lowest: CT, NY, New Jersey (4.99), RI, MA, Hawaii (2.20)

National: (10.32)

Source: Centers for Disease Control

Costs of Gun Violence

Gun violence impacts society in many ways: medical costs, costs of the criminal justice system, security precautions such as metal detectors, and reductions in the quality of life because of fear of gun violence.
U.S. lifetime medical costs for gunshot injuries total an estimated $2.3 billion
U.S. taxpayers pay for almost half ($1.1 billion or 49%) of lifetime medical costs for gunshot injuries

Guns Recovered from Crime

Only 1% of gun dealer account for almost 60% of crime guns recovered by police and later traced
In one year, at least 30,000 guns were “lost” out of gun dealers inventories
Guns with a short “time to crime” are disproportionately represented among crime guns. Guns manufactured and sold 3 years or less, prior to recopvery by police in crime make up 34 % of recovered and traced crime guns, but only 14% of the US gun stock.
Guns sold as paert of a multiple sale at a gun dealer were up to 64% more likely to be used in a crime than guns not part of such sales.
“No background check” sales account for an estimated 40% of gun sales in the U.S.

Sources: ATF (2000); Brady Center; National Institute of Justice (1993, 2007); Police Foundation (1997)

[artemishunter1]

"Those who call for gun control after incidents like this contribute nothing to the solution. Gunmen like Friday’s plan their actions, right down to wearing military garb. They could certainly procure illegal firearms or use incendiary devices to kill. I only wish the kindergarten teacher and principal in Connecticut had been armed."

-Dr. Keith Ablow, psychiatrist

Offcourse, the same excuse gets thrown every time. Bull shit, every firearm will be illigal. They could easily be idenfied in roads before this happens.

[kittysox]

If we would have put politics aside and had serious gun discussion ages ago 20 kindergarteners would still be alive. It's been said over and over that you can not determine the people who will do these type of things, however you can control gun laws. Things are so far out of hand here now.

[Deleted]

the media's definition of an "assault rifle" is so back asswards, and even rich agrees that they are completely wrong on that all the time, and he seems to despise the fact that we can buy guns here (Not saying he is wrong, the laws need to be enforced)

You cannot go buy a full auto gun without a permit, even at a gun show.

Agree with you 100%, most people would not know an Assault rifle if they were hit in the face with it. They just see "Black scary machine gun", you can buy full auto weapons, but you need a licence from the ATF, they would also cost you at $10,000 for something that is not completely shite.

I Dont despise the fact you can buy guns (I own a few myself), I despise the cavalier attitude towards storage and safety in the USA.

[Nilinor]

You are wrong, because without a GUN - the guy can be stopped. With a gun, only lack of ammo or lack of targets stops him.

JUST for you, because you think a knife guy can be stopped so easily..
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...se-school.html

edit! adding more

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osaka_school_massacre
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akihabara_massacre
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/au...knife-massacre

[ptwonline]

You still did not answer my question. Do you blame a hammer for crushing someones skull in an assault?

A hammer is not really a casualty multiplier the way a gun can be. Not a valid comparison.

[Kissme]

Bowling For Columbine is a great documentary about exactly this, I recommend watching it for some useful/interesting insight on this issue

It was probably his best film.

The idea that the culture needs to change more than the laws is a very strong argument.

[Sky High]

people need to learn the difference between outright banning all guns and not allowing people to carry around assault rifles. THERE IS A MIDDLE FUCKING GROUND PEOPLE. and i love how people bring up the constitution, at the time when it was written it took you up to a minute to shoot ONE ROUND AND RELOAD ANOTHER. now we live in a world where you can fire off 100+ rounds under 30 seconds. to say the average everyday American should be able to tot around guns meant nor for self defense but out right slaughtering waves of people is horrifying to say the least. we need to rethink our position on firearms in this country, to ban them is like people have said akin to probation and would only open up a black market to it. but to say that i should by all accounts walk into a gun show and buy an AK47 with little or no hassle is about the same god damn thing.

[Deleted]

Gun owners got blood on their hands from 28 children.

[Deleted]

Lol... its already HARDER to get a gun than it is a drivers license... Point of fact... i hate to wait 72 hours to purchase where i live, and it takes me about 20 mins to get a license to drive a 2k lb vehicle and mow over a bunch of pedestrians in the street...

Takes most people a minimum of 20 lessons in the UK and most of Europe to get a driving licence.

[artemishunter1]

Those are solid wood / metal fire doors per every municipal fire code in the country. And contrary to the action movies you see, you can't just shoot the handle off one of these doors. Nevermind the fact that in this situation the facts seem to strongly indicate the shooter entered the classroom / crime scene before the lockdown was in effect. Also, automatic weapons were not used in this incident.

Please get informed before rendering an opinion.

A semi automatic was used, civilian version.

[schwarzkopf]

Then explain to me how gunmen with ammo are stopped all the time?

Talking about crazies here, not criminals, snipers, assassins ... talking about CRAZIES.