Yeah I was going to come in here and post about the irony of 32 people dying in America media coverage and sympathy vs. another 200 or so people dying in Bagdahd, and the irony of Bush speaking at VT and talking about how senseless violence is, but…well I just did it I guess.
i read his plays. yuck. that kid was…i don’t know.
i went to school with a kid who was very disturbed and antisocial. he once actually snuck up behind me and pushed me off the top rafter in gym class. after graduation, the next i heard of him, he broke into Oakland University (the local college around here) and was trying to steal money from tampon machines. he then proceeded to take a dump in the middle of the hallway and a janitor caught him. he beat the janitor within an inch of his life with a pair of bolt-cutters. he’s in prison now.
^he’s not in prison.
People like you who honestly think tighter gun control is the be all end all answer are severely out of touch. I just had to do a big debate on this topic, and although I am not an gun owner or proponent of gun ownership personally, I have learned there are a multitude of other factors involved. Simply enacting tighter controls will not stop tragedies like this. What we really need is better systems of detection and help in the short term, and ultimately a social change of attitude and education to and about guns in the long term.
I understand why people are calling for stricter laws, but where were you a week ago? You are letting your heart speak for your mind.
That being said, god bless the students and families of Virginia Tech, they are in my thoughts.
EDIT: On Iraq: I agree, its incredible the lack of response towards this. Have we really been numbed that much?
wuppl, you’re severely out of touch with the fact that guns serve one purpose only: killing. You clearly missed that point in your debate. The only way to prevent senseless killing like this is to make it difficult for people to obtain and own guns and ammunition. Case closed.
Ok, I’ve been thinking about this and everybody should go watch “Bowling for Columbine” again. Anyway, Cho is no different than president bush really, Bush knowingly sends bombs and troops to kill people knowing full well that innocent people are going to die, that’s just as crazy as Cho, also, I’ve seen pictures of the victims of VT, but, how many victims of the wars do we see? almost none. If the president is killing innocent people is it any wonder that some of the citizens of our country will do the same? We as a nation spend more money on killing and preparing to kill than any other nation, it only makes sense that the citizens of said country would do the same. hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
My prayers to ALL the victims.
The problem is they don’t only serve for the purpose of killing nowadays. Millions are used for legit sporting purposes, and completely legal defense of the household. I don’t know where you live, but gun culture is a huge part of society in a large portion of this country, and you can’t deny or change that. It took me a while to realize this being from a small liberal suburb of Philly, but its a valuable thing to know.
Thus, because gun culture is a huge part of our national society, it becomes a societal problem that we must fix (which I said before)
If you want to get into a debate about, I’m more than willing; all I’m saying is that your arguments reek of emotional instability a lack of long term thought out processes.
P.S. I am completely for the ban of automatic weapons of any kind as well as armor piercing bullets, which can serve to create no good in the hands of a civilian.
well, that settles it! wuppl has the answers! he’s emotionally stable and has a long term thought out process! he has wisdom!
Can I pose a hypothetical question to your point?
Suppose, at the outset of the attack this week, after it became evident Cho was killing people in the science building, one of the teachers had the presence of mind, determination, and courage to ask ten of his strongest students to rush Cho as he entered the classroom. He told them that some if not most of them would die or be wounded, but that it would be the only way to stop him.
Having convinced this group to execute his plan, they did step into the face of danger, as Cho began firing wildly as they attacked him. He killed four of his attackers, wounded two, but also killed three more of the remaining students in the class who were huddled in a corner with the teacher.
But, the four attacking students did subdue Cho, and as a result, stopped him from killing the twenty other people he managed to kill before his rampage stopped. Do you blame the teacher for the deaths of the seven that died in his classroom as a result of his plan? Or are the lives of the soldiers and the innocents worth the lives of the twenty that were saved?
Evil exists, in and off itself because of physiologic, psychologic, emotional, cultural and religious defects of the human condition. As the number of our populations grow, so do the numbers of the lunatic fringe, and consequently the number of incidents like VT, the Middle East, 911, Columbine, Oklahoma City, London, Madrid, the West Bank, Lebanon, Darfur, and on and on and on.
It’s so freaking easy to simplify these complex situations to one or two black and white issues because that’s what the current news media does in order to grab your attention while they sell you more gas guzzling automobiles. Bush is not a strong president by any means, but equating what he’s attempting to do in the Middle East with a maniac like Cho isn’t something I can’t sign up to. Sorry. You’re going to have to fill in a lot of the missing threads in your thought processes before I can agree with this point.
And using Michael Moore as a reference isn’t going to win me over either. As much as I agree with most of his premises about gun control, his arguments are lost by his factual inaccuracies and his avoidance of any intelligent debate on these subjects with people of substance. He’s an entertainer, as full of shit as Rush Limbaugh on the right, who makes a ton of money trumping up stories that people want to believe as truth because it fits in with their own unintelligent view of the world, a world that is truly much more complex than most of us have time to grasp.
Look man, I’m not saying I have all the right answers. I am saying that your acute minded opinion is not necessarily the right one.
To tell you the truth, I was a little confused by your post initially, but I think I see where you’re coming from.
I can’t see the rationale for guns even for sport, and especially for game hunting. That being said, I have to concur that just because it’s my opinion, doesn’t mean that the counter-opinion isn’t also valid in some ways, and the protection and understanding of those positions is actually the most liberally open-minded line of reasoning we can have.
It’s not really until we can educate ourselves better to the pointlessness of shooting things that we will really overcome this problem. That being said, it bothers me more that if the general population was mostly “unarmed” as it were, then the only guns that remained would be in the hands of the governmental agencies, and THAT is what really scares me.
It goes back to that “price of freedom” argument again. Sure, as a culture, we are in more danger from the Chos of the world because guns are accessible. But with more governmental control and regulation in all aspects of our lives, only the government will have guns and we will generally lose more and more “freedoms” in order to secure our own “safety”. I still haven’t decided whether I’m willing to live in that cage yet.
…it’s just like abortion, or the war on drugs, or prohibition…
You can’t outlaw any of those things b/c the only thing that’s going to do is force people to obtain them illegally and then that would REALLY be unsafe.
We should have the right to bear arms. There is always goign to be some knuckleheads out there that want to go all buck wild and shoot up people - it’s the sad truth about human nature. But just because there are hundreds of thousands of people each year killed by drunk drivers, you don’t see us outlawing alcohol, do you?
The bottom line is that it’s a slippery slope. You make legislation like that and you set a precendent for all types of other rulings that take away our civil liberties.
To follow up with what Fone wrote, attacking me personally is one way to guarantee that you’ll never get me to see your point of view. What you should have wrote was something along the lines of this: “marley, I can see where you’re coming from, but have you considered better detection and education about guns?” and go into your reasoning from there.
come now fone. the government has a 400 billion dollar military expenditure. do you really think that you and your gloc are going to stop an authoritarian clampdown? that’s why we have term limits, regular elections, and checks and balances my man.
The United States LOVES its guns.
Look at these figures from our military spending.
We spend more on guns & bombs then every other country COMBINED!
They ain’t EVER going away.
It’s pathetic.
And our leaders and media do nothing but feed this fire with fear.
Look at how many times they keep playing this VT stuff OVER and OVER. Nothing like a little fear to keep you in line.
The United States is in NO danger of being attacked.
Incidents like this are so random and not common, but I bet you THOUSANDS of guns will be bought this next month by people who think they need one to protect themselves.
And I bet its safe to say that over 3/4’s of those will be used on family or friends.
The MAJORITY of gun attacks are carried out by someone the victim knows.
Just like rape.
I’m more scared of my family members & friends with guns then by some imaginary person that the news and our leaders say is gonna get me. :
Military spending in 2005 ($ Billions, and percent of total)
Country Dollars (billions) % of total Rank
Source: U.S. Military Spending vs. the World, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, February 5, 2007
United States: 420.7 - 43% - 1
OVER 400 BILLION!
43% of the entire worlds military spending.
Good god.
China: 62.5 - 6% 2
Russia: 61.9 - 6% 3
United Kingdom: 51.1 - 5% 4
Japan: 44.7 - 4% 5
France: 41.6 - 4% 6
Germany: 30.2 - 3% 7
India: 22.0 - 2% 8
Saudi Arabia: 21.3 - 2% 9
South Korea: 20.7 - 2% 10
Italy: 17.2 - 2% 11
Australia: 13.2 - 1% 12
Brazil: 13.1 - 1% 13
Canada: 10.9 - 1% 14
Turkey: 9.8 - 1% 15
Israel: 9.7 - 1% 16
Netherlands: 9.7 - 1% 17
Spain: 8.8 - 1% 18
Taiwan: 8.3 - 1% 19
Indonesia: 7.6 - 1% 20
Myanmar 6.9 - 1% 21
Ukraine 6 - 1% 22
Singapore 5.6 - 1% 23
Sweden 5.6 - 1% 24
North Korea 5.5 - 1% 25
Poland 5.2 - 1% 26
Iran 4.9 - 1% 27
Norway 4.7 - 0% 28
Greece 4.5 - 0% 29
Kuwait 4.3 - 0% 30
Colombia 3.9 - 0% 31
Switzerland 3.8 - 0% 32
Pakistan 3.7 - 0% 33
Vietnam 3.5 - 0% 34
Belgium 3.4 - 0% 35
Guns in the hands of not only the gov’t but the criminals as well who don’t have the moral fiber to know right from wrong. Case in point recently in Japan, where guns are illegal, a crime boss shot and killed the mayor of Nagasaki, point blank range. The city wouldn’t compensate damage sustained by the crime boss’ car caused by a local construction crew… so he shot the mayor.
Consider this: Guns are simply objects… like a cup. Without a user the gun is nether good or bad. Its just a hunk of metal. So why not have “people” control instead of gun control. Its the people that commit the bad acts, not the gun. A few posts back the idea of “people” control is what sellasie was proposing, banning anyone who had a stay in a mental hospital from owning a gun. Such proposals are not hitting the root of the problem. More to the point we need to be aware and vigilant in helping those that need it… like the English Prof was doing when she reported Cho’s troubling behavior. There was a breakdown somewhere and nothing was done but I think she was on the right track.
Anyway there are no quick fixes and it is impossible from stopping every tragedy that may occur.
I see your point Momma, but look how we treat people who commit Drunk-Driving offenses. If you kill someone while driving under the influence your going away for a while.
Crime by gun, not even close.
In fact, we treat drug offenses worse then both!
Maybe we if we treated crimes with guns a little harder people might think twice about using them to commit crime?
Goldfish…
Intentional gun deaths per year per 100,000:
Japan: 0.07
United States: 13.47
This is important to clarify. I wasn’t trying to attack you personally, but your argument. I had hoped that was clear, and if it wasn’t, I apologize.
H. Selassie, I’m not sure what side you are arguing, but I’m assuming with your last statistic about gun crime in japan and the US, you support greater gun control (please please tell me if I’m wrong). Everyone can and does play the statistics game, thus, here is my response:
It is possible to compare Japan and the US only if one ignores the blatants differences within out governments.
America’s high crime rate is largely in part due to our revolving door justice system. People are caught and indicted, but only a small amount actually serve time. Out of the 8.1 million serious crimes (i.e. homicides, assault, and burglary) a year, only 724,000 of these people are arrested, and further, only 150,000 actually serve time.
Japan has an extraordinarily efficient that is effective because the system infringes on rights to privacy and other things that we hold near and dear within our constitution (and rightfully so). In Japan, 99.9% of criminals caught face a legit sentence (as opposed to getting off), which some would say is awesome. But if you take into account that japan also tortures their citizens for confessions, is it still as awesome? No.
My point is, that due to our constitutionally protected rights , are state is fundamentally different from Japan, and can’t legitimately be compared.
EDIT: And to connect the dots to H’s post, the Japanese commit less murders because they are more scared of their government, for real reasons, and I can’t blame them.
True, selassie, and there is proof in that pudding… but the US is not Japan. Guns are part of our culture. If not for guns there would be no USA. I’m not praising guns but I’m am saying you can’t turn a turkey into a chicken.
I’m not going into the research but I assume Japan has less population than the US. Also what is the death rate/100,000 by other weapons? What is the suicide rate? What is the domestic violence rate? What is the drug use rate? How about death by Saron gas?
Also are you now switching your argument for that of “mental patient gun control” to “banning guns completely”?
I used to think such novel ideas were worthy but guns and the right for states to have an armed militia is built right into the very foundation of the US Constitution… not the Japanese Constitution, if there is such a thing.