America's shame. Again.

[Solomon1]

Now that is so sad but unfortunately predictable in a country with so many guns.

 

994 mass shootings in 1004 days

 

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2015/oct/02/mass-shootings-america-gun-violence?CMP=share_btn_fb

 

What the actual ****?

 

Had NO frikkin idea

[Zamo]

A three year old Chicago boy accidentally shot in the head and killed by his six year old brother.

 

Mind numbingly awful is the research by the Washington Post showing that 43 people have been shot by kids younger than three - this year alone, so far.

 

More here from the Indy - http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/toddler-dies-after-accidentally-being-shot-in-head-by-six-year-old-brother-a6698711.html

 

 

The more people shout about this and shame America publicly, the more likely it is that they'll eventually take their heads out of their backsides and act.

 

Do you know how many people there are in Delhi America? I think you need to calm down a bit.

 

If only you could be a little more consistent when it came to passing collective judgement on cultures then perhaps people would take you a little more seriously.

[RootsBooster]

In the USA I suspect they are more widely used for the killing of non human animals whilst hunting, they are made and sold in the USA for hunting and self defense. In the wrong hands just like cars they can be used to kill people.

 

I don't think revolvers like the one in the OP are meant for hunting at all.

Self defence, against what? People with guns ?

 

No, guns (not hunting rifles) are made for offence as much as they are made for defence.

 

---------- Post added 19-10-2015 at 09:53 ----------

 

Did making drugs illegal mean there were few needles, wraps of cocaine, crack pipes etc lying around and fewer irresponsible people? Would it be any less fatal if a child was shot with an illegal gun rather than a legal one?

 

You're trying to compare something that causes a chemical/physical dependence to something that doesn't.

 

---------- Post added 19-10-2015 at 09:55 ----------

 

I don't think that one person in 20,000,000 Americans knows nor yet gives a monkey's or even knows what Sheffield and particularly Halibut suggests about our gun problems. I don't own a gun, never needed one, but I believe anyone living in an area with very limited policing is entitled to have a legal firearm with regular training in its use and storage. Can we please, at some time, get off this subject and find another country to attack. I'm sure there are worse places in the world. You might need our help again, if old Putin has his way.

 

There's only two topics I can think of where some people join in and say "Please stop discussing this". One is religion, the other is America's gun culture and all the tragedies that go along with it daily.

 

Why do you and Harley wish it to be hushed up?

Edited October 19, 2015 by RootsBooster

[buck]

Doesn't change what guns are for, they are for killing.

 

---------- Post added 19-10-2015 at 00:51 ----------

 

 

By that reasoning we should never ever discuss anything that ever happens in any other country that is a democracy.

 

I hope you realize that is silly.

I won't argue with you on this point. Almost every post for or against is valid, except where it is an obvious troll. But after a while there is so much repetition that the value of the argument is diminished. Saying guns should be banished is true, but who is going to do it, and how against a population that is probably about 50/50 for and against. Your much harsher gun laws came from a 19th Century need to suppress guns because some of what America is facing was happening in Britain then. You all love those links, look it up somewhere. I don't put much trust in links myself, preferring first hand opinions, not second hand. What I say comes only from me. No links. Continue if you will, I've read enough

[sandy18]

I don't think revolvers like the one in the OP are meant for hunting at all.

Nor do I.

 

 

 

Self defence, against what? People with guns ?

People that wish to do you harm.

 

No, guns (not hunting rifles) are made for offence as much as they are made for defence.

 

310,000,000 civilian firearms in the USA and the overwhelming majority have never been used to kill a human, they are made and sold for the primary reason of self defense, hunting non human animals and target shooting. Significantly more people would be killed by guns if killing was the primary reason for their manufacture and sale.

[cassity]

When they agree with the law.

 

Well of course but you don't have to agree. Are there any laws of this land that you disagree with but comply?

 

What is it you think Americans will do if laws are introduced they disagree with?

[RootsBooster]

Nor do I.

 

 

 

 

People that wish to do you harm.

 

 

 

310,000,000 civilian firearms in the USA and the overwhelming majority have never been used to kill a human, they are made and sold for the primary reason of self defense, hunting non human animals and target shooting. Significantly more people would be killed by guns if killing was the primary reason for their manufacture and sale.

 

...then why are some called "assault" weapons?

[Sierra]

While I don't enjoy my country being criticized (again?!!! What now??? ), I have to admit that I truly do enjoy hearing all of your opinions.

 

When you're born, raised, and have lived all your life in one country, sometimes it's hard to see the forest for the trees. Guns (in the western US anyway) have always been just...around.

 

My father has (and still has) guns. I remember seeing the boys I grew up with toting BB guns and such around (when their ages were still in single digits) to shoot jackrabbits and cans off fences and such. Boys have guns, it was just a fact of life.

 

There were the inevitable incidents such as the irate neighbors with neat holes or cracks in their kitchen or car windows and my friend's little sister who was grazed by a ricochet and has no memory of it because she was an infant at the time, sat on her mother's lap.

 

Every year, we hear the same public service announcements by the police cautioning people not to shoot guns in the air on New Year's Eve because the bullets have to come down somewhere.

 

My husband had a couple guns that I never paid much attention to until our first child was born, and then at my hysterical insistence he kept both in a locked box in the garage with the bullets kept in another locked box high on a shelf in our closet. He refused to part with them and this was (in my mind) a reasonable compromise.

 

Part of me wonders what it would be like to live in a place where I don't immediately respond to a stranger's rude behavior with rudeness of my own, because now my first thought is, "what if they have a gun?" The second thought is being polite. People have been shot for the craziest things. For their shoes.

 

Anyway, please carry on because I am interested in what you all have to say on this matter.

Edited October 19, 2015 by Sierra

[cassity]

I won't argue with you on this point. Almost every post for or against is valid, except where it is an obvious troll. But after a while there is so much repetition that the value of the argument is diminished. Saying guns should be banished is true, but who is going to do it, and how against a population that is probably about 50/50 for and against. Your much harsher gun laws came from a 19th Century need to suppress guns because some of what America is facing was happening in Britain then. You all love those links, look it up somewhere. I don't put much trust in links myself, preferring first hand opinions, not second hand. What I say comes only from me. No links. Continue if you will, I've read enough

 

 

The same sort of people who championed the abolishment of slavery, the same sort who fought for human rights, the same sort who fought to end inequality..people with backbone, people with vision...not small fry thinkers who pass the 'buck' with..."Who is going to do it".

 

For starters, strip the NRA of it's political leverage and lobbying....yeah! I said it.

[RootsBooster]

I won't argue with you on this point. Almost every post for or against is valid, except where it is an obvious troll. But after a while there is so much repetition that the value of the argument is diminished. Saying guns should be banished is true, but who is going to do it, and how against a population that is probably about 50/50 for and against. Your much harsher gun laws came from a 19th Century need to suppress guns because some of what America is facing was happening in Britain then. You all love those links, look it up somewhere. I don't put much trust in links myself, preferring first hand opinions, not second hand. What I say comes only from me. No links. Continue if you will, I've read enough

 

Could you state one of these 'valid' arguments against tighter gun control?

I honestly don't think I've ever heard one that can't easily be countered and dismissed as flawed.

 

---------- Post added 20-10-2015 at 00:14 ----------

 

For the people who keep saying 'Gun restrictions would have no effect!'

...it seemed to work okay with lawn darts in the US

Anyway, please carry on because I am interested in what you all have to say on this matter.

 

I find this interesting...

 

In April 1987 seven-year-old Michelle Snow was killed in Riverside, California by a stray lawn dart that was thrown by her brother’s playmate. These darts were part of a children’s game in the 70’s and 80’s involving large, weighted darts with sharp metal tips, designed to pierce a horizontal target on the ground.

 

Michelle’s father immediately began a campaign to ban the darts, arguing that anything less than a full-scale ban would be insufficient—after all, even if you were to ban lawn darts in your own home, nothing can stop a neighbor’s child from throwing one over the fence. The campaign led to an all-out ban in the US and Canada. To this day, it is illegal to assemble a lawn dart in either of the two countries. The problem wasn’t just that lawn darts were dangerous, it was that they were dangerous AND they were being marketed to children as a game, despite being responsible for 6,100 emergency room visits over a span of eight years. So when parents observed that these unnecessarily dangerous toys were injuring and killing their children, they did what any sensible parent would do: they complained until the government listened.

 

Now examine how differently our society treats guns in a similar context: On April 20th, 2013, a five-year-old Kentucky boy shot and killed his two-year-old sister with a gun that had been specifically manufactured for child use. The gun was called “My First Rifle”, a .22 caliber gun which marketed itself as “especially for youth shooters.” Instead of massive public backlash, the National Rifle Association (NRA) instead, days after the event, held its Annual Meeting where it explicitly marketed firearms and firearm paraphernalia to kids, including NRA bibs for children, ‘Youth Model’ firearms, and NRA publications focused on ‘Youth Shooters.’

 

Where was the outcry over the blatant militarization of children by one of the most powerful political lobbies in the United States? Where was the parental campaigns demanding that children not be subject to the propagandization of firearms? Where are the restrictions, the regulations, the bans? The NRA’s response, instead, sent a different message: “You’ll have to take my gun from my child’s cold, dead hands.”

Edited October 19, 2015 by RootsBooster