Willravel

I don't fly planes either, but I have no qualms requiring pilots to get proper training before flying over my house.

I'm not asking to be the instructor, just that people be properly trained before someone gives them a weapon that can so easily kill.

Hain

//claps//

dksuddeth

why should we?

training like your average police officer is given?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Hain

1 - It's going to happen eventually, whether we like it or not.
2 - Given what was said earlier, I hope firearms licenses require more than that.

Willravel

So as to avoid the NUMEROUS gun related accidental deaths every year. Or do you like that this right that you so valiantly defend kills so many innocent people accidentally?
No one here is talking about the police but you. I have absolutely no clue why they would be the bar, and I'm not sure what they have to do with anything.

http://www.frontsight.com/
These programs are very successful and I would imagine that requiring someone to take a basic firearms safety and training program before issuing them such dangerous weapons would be more than prudent, it would be downright responsible.

dksuddeth

what other rules and regulations should be made because people refuse to be responsible for their actions? There are only two reasons why people want training classes and licensing requirements for people to have guns.
1. They don't like/carry guns themselves so they want to make it as difficult as possible for everyone else to carry them
2. they want some sort of 'feel good' insurance policy in the head to help them make it through the day thinking 'if someone is carrying a gun, they at least know how to use it.

nothing more, nothing less.

I'm not the only person here talking about them, but it's been said numerous times that 'common folk' don't have the training to effectively use guns, like cops or the military do. So if that's the common belief, why shouldn't they be the bar?

requiring classes and licenses to exercise a right, kinda defeats the purpose of it being a right, don't ya think? Not only that, but I believe there is a supreme court case that said no state can charge a license fee or tax for the exercise of a right that is federally protected.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

dc_dux

It will be interesting to see the USSC ruling on the DC gun ban. The author of the Appeals Court decision that ruled it unconstitutional also wrote in the decision:
No right is absolute.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

abaya

Don't you guys ever get tired of the gun control debate?... seriously. Don't make me insert another abaya_suddeth photo in here to lighten things up!! (DK, I don't know if you saw the first one in Playground, but it was a hit).
Just a sidenote about this boys vs. girls thing... Ustwo, you'd have been hard-pressed to find more of a tomboy than I was, as a kid. I tore dolls apart or used them as chemistry-set experiments when anyone was thoughtless enough to give them to me as a gift. My toys of choice were my dad's real hammer and nails, a drill if my dad would let me get to it (I loved power tools), and trees and blocks of wood. I loved playing with bows and arrows, pretend swords, etc... but just never was attracted to the idea of guns, for whatever reason. When my dad gave me the BB gun for target practice, I just remember feeling awkward and bored... not fearful or abhoring the weapon, but just disinterested. I don't know what that says, but I just wanted to throw it in there since I wasn't your typical "girl," and I don't think attitudes towards weapons are always necessarily gender-based.
So, as I said, it took me a long time to develop a more negative attitude towards weapons. I wouldn't say it was in my "nature" to abhor them, but since I was so disinterested, it didn't take much observation of people and their guns around me (e.g. my crazy wanna-be militia relatives) to shift my feelings towards the negative end of the spectrum. And now, I really just do not like them. I love the idea of being able to defend myself, and when I took a self-defense course, I was very much into the various ways that I could harm someone... whatever it took, I would do it. But not with a gun, I know that.

Hope we can get this thread of the very unenlightening merry-go-round that it's currently on...

__________________
And think not you can direct the course of Love;
for Love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
--Khalil Gibran

dksuddeth

In the example of silbermans decision, licensing doesn't appear to be brought up. Would that be because of Murdock v. commonwealth of PA??

No, I hadn't, but now you've got me intrigued.

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

dc_dux

I agree on licensing. My point was that but the Appeals Court ruled that 2nd amendment right is not absolute and that "reasonable restrictions" would not violate that right.

Enough said. We shall see this spring when the USSC rules on the case.

__________________
"The perfect is the enemy of the good."
~ Voltaire

abaya

Just look for the photos in the threads below... there is a world outside of gun control debates, my friend!!
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...=abaya_suddeth
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...=abaya_suddeth

__________________
And think not you can direct the course of Love;
for Love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
--Khalil Gibran

dksuddeth

oh god, those rock

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

There are two general ways to respond to crime problems: prevention and reaction. Prevention is about removing the opportunity to commit a crime. Reaction is about punishment and deterrence via punishment. Either way the problem is addressing and stopping crime. The problem with reaction is that the crime has already occurred, and someone has already been victimized. Things like "give em guns and if they commit crime, then punish the shit out of them" are perfect examples of reactive measures to crime. They may prevent crime by deterrence, but they're mainly punishment and don't protect the victims. My way, prevention, is about preventing the victimization in the first place.

I'll illustrate each of our philosophies using the travesty in the OP as an example.
DK's world: A gunman who was easily able to get a hold of guns despite the fact he may have had warning signs as to mental illness opens fire in a school. Several armed students return fire. The gunman is killed, and one of the students who pulled a gun to respond is killed, and another injured. Before the armed students returned fire, the madman was still able to kill a half a dozen students and injure an additional sixteen.

Willravel's world: A potential gunman applies for a gun license, but is turned down due to a history of emotional problems. He attempts to get a gun illegally, but fails. No one is injured and no one dies.
You act like "right" has one definition. It doesn't.

abaya

hehe. Good to know we agree on something, eh? Thanks to Crompsin in the first place for coming up with such an insane combination...

/back to The Usual Gun Control Debating Thread...

__________________
And think not you can direct the course of Love;
for Love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
--Khalil Gibran

dksuddeth

why is it that in your world, everything turns out peachy keen, yet in my world, the only thing that changed is another student died? bias? I think so. Especially considering the other possibilities, like a student with a gun stopping said gunman before 6 died or 16 were injured.....or wanna be gunman gets even more pissed because he can't find a gun so he straps on 10 pounds of homemade dynamite? It's all conjecture. The only difference is my scenario creates the possibility of defense in the face of failure while yours is hoping for success and no plans for failure.

how many do you think there are?

__________________
"no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything. You cannot conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

Willravel

The point: Prevention vs. reaction. And... Go!
Obviously there are more than one.

Infinite_Loser

Ah... The obligatory gun control argument.

It's always nice to note that people kill people. It'd be just as easy to mow plow into a large crowd of people with a car as it would to be to open fire on a group of people (Actually, it'd be easier).

__________________
I believe in equality; Everyone is equally inferior to me.

Hain

Thank you for numerating your points. Saves me the trouble.
1 - I still would not mind to take a class to own a gun.
2 - Yeah, so? What happened to better safe than sorry?


That was before you and others unwittingly popped my bubble universe that cops had actual engagement training.



Maybe this was all ready tackled by the linguistic artists. If not, I will sleep on this one.


@ Willravel:

While your way seems squeaky clean, dksuddeth is right, and ties back to my concerns in the OP. If it were not for guns, the killer would make or buy explosives. Guns are only tools. Just like bombs. Just like screwdrivers.

StanT

But a whole lot harder to be selective about your target or get past 4-5 victims (human speed bumps and all).

Note that the NIU shooter, the VA Tech shooter, and the CO Springs shooter all obtained their guns legally. Heaven forbid we make sanity a requirement for legal gun ownership (like it is for a driver's license).

Willravel

Not really. When you look in places that have a lot less guns you don't see school bombings. It's still shootings.

Hain

Correlation does not equate causality. Again we are ignoring the sociocultural aspects as to why today's American generation is going to hell, steering with its own hands.

Willravel

Correlation is more than a lack of any evidence whatsoever.

Hain

samcol

I'm going to threadjack back to motive

Does anyone else think that maybe anti-depressants are actually the problem? In almost every case of these mass shootings and attempted mass shootings or weird stabbing 75 times or the mother drowning her kids and what not, it seems the person was on anti-depressants then abrubtly stops taking them.

After reading about these drugs in my opinion they are extremely over prescribed. Plus the whole system seems to reward doctors and the people taking these pills (like the happy pill commercials on tv). These drugs should really only be given to the extremely mentally ill schizophrenic or manic depressive type people. Even on the labels now they say things like 'increases suicidal tendencies.'

The doctors should be telling people to get more sunshine and exercise and eating correctly rather than prescribing these pills.

My understanding some people taking them start to have diminishing returns and have to up the dose to get the good feeling. Then some decide to stop taking them for one reason or another. Wouldn't that cause a day after exstasy type depression, except for weeks instead of a couple days. I guess that might cause someone to flip out on society.

I admit I don't know a lot about anti-depressants, it's just a thought.

__________________
It's time for the president to hand over his nobel peace prize.

Hain

No, I am glad that someone brings this back to sociocultural reasons this day's American generation is burning out. I have always felt that medication is over prescribed, whether it is for depression of ADHD. From what I have seen, people don't need it to function. Yes I have seen those that really really should stay on their medication... but I have seen parents that just a quick fix so they don't have to deal with their kid.



@ Willravel:
You had to see that one coming.

surferlove007

That is what my dad told me...when you take a shooting class isn't the main objective to shoot in the midsection? Or am I wrong?
Thanks for confirming Cromp.

MSD

It won't matter because DC isn't a state and therefore the decision won't result in the incorporation of the Second Amendment.
The core problem is that mental illness is a taboo in our society and people aren't free to discuss it. People see it as being the problem or fault of those who suffer from it rather than having sympathy, they avoid it and are afraid of it, and those who are mentally ill become outcasts as a result.