Va. Tech Shooting

[glo-unit]

I must agree with Chance here. Can both the Pro and Anti gun nuts just let things be for a while. Also there is only one person to blame, one sick fuck who caused this, no matter how much you try to blame each other politically it won't change anything.

 

[brettea79]

Having a cesspool of guns won't work either.

Hell, why isn't Canada as gun violent as we are?

Canada, a country of about 31 million people show estimates of 7 million owned guns. Some experts place that number as high as 25 million.

In India teachers carry guns and such instances are unheard of.

 

[Marvels]

The gunman used pistols, not assault rifles. Must have had a hell of a trigger finger to get off all those shots.

I hope they don't go and uncover the lunatic's motive/aspiration/whatthefuck. I just want him to be remembered as the sick fuck who kills kids and currently burns in every hell there is, and not as some misunderstood homeboy who deserves sympathy.

 

[Lostlover]

Canada, a country of about 31 million people show estimates of 7 million owned guns. Some experts place that number as high as 25 million.

In India teachers carry guns and such instances are unheard of.

I'd imagine teachers would be smarter than the average citizen. Smarter and more patient than the average citizen.

What's your point about Canada and India?

 

[~Danyebat~]

What T-Rexx said.

 

[Lostlover]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,477686,00.html

Fucking Charlton Heston. His old ass (not ageist) can call for looser gun controls and he isn't the one being gun downed.

If he would have had a gun at Virginia Tech, he still would have crapped in his Depends if he saw that gunman.

 

[Kulindahr]

So...party at Wayne LaPierre's place tonight?

If LaPierre had been there, it would have stopped at 4 or 5 dead.

 

[Kulindahr]

Just what Virginia needs, the lunatic fringe with firearms on campus.

What needs to happen is a complete ban on all assault rifles and mandatory psychological testing for every one carrying a concealed wpn or who owns or purchases a firearm. The mentally unstable, alcoholics and drug users have no business owning a firearm.

69, I love it when you accuse people of things they didn't say -- you're so GOOD at it!

There already is a complete ban on assault rifle, and has been for decades -- don't believe the lies; look at what's on the books.

If YOU want mandatory psychological testing (unconstitutional, BTW), YOU pay for it. That's called taking responsibility for yourself.

We still operate under "innocent until proven guilty" -- you're assuming the opposite.

And that's beside the fact that in many, even most, of these public shootings, there was no indication at all of any imbalance, etc., until the day it happened.

 

[Kulindahr]

So, as I understand it, the gun lobby position is that if the 10,000 students on campus were all packing, the campus would be safer?

That's the American position -- exactly what the Founding Fathers wanted: that we should all take responsibility for ourselves.

But it's also true: the responsibility for these deaths can be laid at the feet of the lawmakers who refused to allow the students to exercise their constitutional right. The legislature wanted them all to be victims -- and now 32 of them are. Directing anger at the people who have made the most efforts for firearms safety and the greatest push to have criminals punished -- not others! -- for their criminal actions is insulting to the survivors.

Everyone is asking what can be done to prevent this from happening again. Honest experts have conceded over and over that there has yet to be a gun "control" law passed or proposed which could have prevented any of the shootings we've seen -- but OTOH a good number of people have died because they trusted the politicians who vote for such useless laws, and so had no way to fight back.

 

[~Danyebat~]

http://www.theconservativevoice.com/article/24362.html

# # #

This is something that I, as someone living in a country with very strict weapon laws, will not ever understand.

Ho-hum...

~D~

 

[Kulindahr]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,477686,00.html

Fucking Charlton Heston. His old ass (not ageist) can call for looser gun controls and he isn't the one being gun downed.

If he would have had a gun at Virginia Tech, he still would have crapped in his Depends if he saw that gunman.

The stuff in that article is right from the bottom of the much barrel.

Let's do a thought experiment here:

Let's say a police officer had happened to be there, and had stopped the guy with four well-placed rounds. We'd be cheering him as a hero.

Let's say it was an off-duty policeman -- we'd still be cheering him as a hero.

Make it a retired policeman -- still, I think, a hero.

Make it a professor --
He'd be a half-hero: hero for stopping the slimeball, but probably arrested for illegal possession of a firearm.

But in all of those cases, the parents and friends of those victims would be thankful and grateful that it was stopped.
And the instrument which would have made that gratitude possible, which would have stopped that violence, would have been a handgun. In other words, it would have been a very good thing that someone had been there with a handgun.

So the solution to the problem is simple: make sure that there are people around with handguns. Make sure that future wacko murderers are faced with that blessed deterrent wherever they go. Because it doesn't make one tiny bit of difference what hand holds the gun: the bullets still remove the threat.

And that's what handguns are for -- they make the playing field level. Handguns make it possible for a little lady in a wheelchair to stop three larger guys who have tipped her over and are kicking her and screaming "Die!", for a 14-y.o. to see policemen pinned down by someone in a house across the street to come to the aid of the cops, for a leader of a youth group to drive off a knife-wielding pervert who masses three times his own, for a father of four to stop the intruder who has announced he is coming upstairs to kill the family....
More handguns in the hands of citizens does not increase violence -- that's been proven over and again in state after state. What it does is drastically reduce the rate of crimes against people -- and while the crime against property (when no one is around) tends to rise, I'll take that over crimes against people any moment of any day.

Using this tragedy to call for more restrictions on what could have saved many if not most of those lives is hypocrisy at its lowest. We all know that if there had been someone there with a firearm, who knew how to use it, the death toll would have been lower -- policeman, Marine, private detective... or professor, or student. Let's ditch the ventures into la-la land.

 

[Kulindahr]

http://www.theconservativevoice.com/article/24362.html

# # #

This is something that I, as someone living in a country with very strict weapon laws, will not ever understand.

Ho-hum...

~D~

Pratt, as usual, is calmly reasonable, though he did get one thing wrong -- one school shooting was stopped not by anyone with a gun, but by two wrestlers who worked together.

But <retch> why did there have to be a <gag> pic of Ann <barf> Coulter <heave> there?

News items I've been hearing have been parceling out blame to campus security, local police, anyone they can think of who should have "prevented" this. That's understandable; grief and/or horror strike out in anger. What I'd like to hear, and haven't heard a peep of, would be about the perpetrator -- something like this:

Let his body be removed;
let it be cast away, never to be found.
Let no tomb, no grave, no marker show he ever was;
let his heritage be oblivion.
Let there be no fame in murder,
no name in slaughter:
let his name be stricken,
forgotten,
remembered no more.

 

[69Strat]

69, I love it when you accuse people of things they didn't say -- you're so GOOD at it!

Accusations about the lunatic fringe being armed on campus? You bet!

There already is a complete ban on assault rifle, and has been for decades -- don't believe the lies; look at what's on the books.

My understanding is that the Assault Weapons Ban expired in September of 2004, as part of the law's sunset provision.

If YOU want mandatory psychological testing (unconstitutional, BTW)

Your individual rights do not override the interests of society in maintaining law and order for the safety of the community.

And that's beside the fact that in many, even most, of these public shootings, there was no indication at all of any imbalance, etc., until the day it happened.

Well adjusted mbrs of society don't go on a shooting rampage, unless there's already an underlying issue of imbalance. Being mentally unstable is not a Constitutional right to own nor possess a firearm.

 

[LATNMUSCL]

I have relatives from and living in Blacksburg so this horrific tragedy hit home extremely hard. Though I am relieved that none of them were physically injured by this incident, we share the grief and outrage in empathy and sympathy with all the families and friends that had loved ones; lost, injured , or endangered.

I'm not a card carrying member of the NRA but as an American I uphold this right, because I believe this: Messed up people do messed up things, with or without guns.

That's just the way of the world, isn't it? You just don't know WHO is messed up!

 

[Kulindahr]

Accusations about the lunatic fringe being armed on campus? You bet!

Like I said, attacking things no one has said.

My understanding is that the Assault Weapons Ban expired in September of 2004, as part of the law's sunset provision.

That law was a lie, and if you believe that lie you've got a serious problem, and in fact I begin to doubt you ever had any military experience at all.
It didn't ban a single assault weapon. Assault weapons were banned decades ago. What it banned was weapons that made certain members of Congress uncomfortable, and by the admission of some of its own sponsors, the whole point was to make the first step toward a total gun ban.

Your individual rights do not override the interests of society in maintaining law and order for the safety of the community.

Yes, they do -- that was the whole point of America: individual rights come first. The "interest of society in maintaining law and order for the safety of the community" is a fudge-phrase for totalitarians -- the concept the Soviets used to override everything their constitution said, and require regimentation at all level.
Have you read the Constitution? "... shall make no law....", " ... shall not be violated....", "... shall not ....", and the most powerful phrase of all, "... shall not be infringed." Those protections of individual rights are absolute.

Well adjusted mbrs of society don't go on a shooting rampage, unless there's already an underlying issue of imbalance. Being mentally unstable is not a Constitutional right to own nor possess a firearm.

You harp on this enough I begin to wonder if you've been judged mentally unstable. What the heck is your fixation with the idea?
Oh -- your last sentence is such a mangle I can't tell what you mean to talk about.


And now PLEASE back to topic, and stop using this thread for your political grandstanding. We already know you're an authoritarian, so let it lie there.

 

[brettea79]

I'd like to comment on this topic, but it seems Kulindahr is doin fine by himself. You're dominating this topic. Those of you that want stricter gun control be alittle more specific. Kulindahr's position is very precise and clear, those arguing his point are just responding w/ "gun control," "gun control." More detail please. And why the argument on banning assult rifles? Pistols were used in this case.

 

[69Strat]

That law was a lie, and if you believe that lie you've got a serious problem, and in fact I begin to doubt you ever had any military experience at all.

Frankly, I don't see the connection between the Assault Weapon Ban and my military experience. Sounds like you're losing it.

It didn't ban a single assault weapon. Assault weapons were banned decades ago. What it banned was weapons that made certain members of Congress uncomfortable, and by the admission of some of its own sponsors, the whole point was to make the first step toward a total gun ban.

No, it isn't about making certain members of Congress uncomfortable, it's about acknowledging existing law. As far as I'm concerned, the only people who should be allowed to possess an assault rifle, be it semi-auto or auto, are those working in law enforcement and serving in the military.

Yes, they do -- that was the whole point of America: individual rights come first. The "interest of society in maintaining law and order for the safety of the community" is a fudge-phrase for totalitarians -- the concept the Soviets used to override everything their constitution said, and require regimentation at all level.

Your individual right to own a firearm does not overide the interests of society to regulate the possession and ownership of firearms. Don't believe it? Then take a hard look at what federal and state law has to say on the matter.

Have you read the Constitution?

Yup.

"... shall make no law....", " ... shall not be violated....", "... shall not ....", and the most powerful phrase of all, "... shall not be infringed." Those protections of individual rights are absolute.

I'm still waiting for you to show me where the Constitution expressly provides for the mentally unstable to own firearms?

You harp on this enough I begin to wonder if you've been judged mentally unstable. What the heck is your fixation with the idea?

Interesting, because your obssession with firearms, 1700's fantasy, and paranoia of the government all point to somebody who is on the fringe.

And now PLEASE back to topic, and stop using this thread for your political grandstanding.

Sounds like a self-description.

 

[Trent0n1]

And now PLEASE back to topic, and stop using this thread for your political grandstanding.

Pot...calling kettle black! You guys disgust me. You've already cast aside the memory of those innocents who lost their lives and are shoring up your own political positions.
A little respect for 32 dead people is in order here.

 

[iman]

^Respect for dead people means that we should do what we can to prevent more of these episodes.

We do not allow individuals to own Thompson submachine guns, Browning Auto rifles or fully automatic weapons. Those weapons are banned because they are too dangerous and no one has a right to such weapons. We don't allow people to carry around TNT or plastic explosive for the same reason. No one claims that "TNT doesn't kill people, people kill people".

The country is flooded with guns because the manufacturers and their lobby make money from the sales. Gun owners need to get over the adolescent notion that owning or carrying a weapon somehow empowers them. It is just common sense that more guns mean more killings in the same way that selling TNT at Walmart would mean a lot more explosions.

 

[jackoroe]

^Respect for dead people means that we should do what we can to prevent more of these episodes.

We do not allow individuals to own Thompson submachine guns, Browning Auto rifles or fully automatic weapons. Those weapons are banned because they are too dangerous and no one has a right to such weapons. We don't allow people to carry around TNT or plastic explosive for the same reason. No one claims that "TNT doesn't kill people, people kill people".

The country is flooded with guns because the manufacturers and their lobby make money from the sales. Gun owners need to get over the adolescent notion that owning or carrying a weapon somehow empowers them. It is just common sense that more guns mean more killings in the same way that selling TNT at Walmart would mean a lot more explosions.

You are. of course, wrong as it relates to owning fully automatic weapons. Individuals are permitted to own such weapons, as long as they have the requisite tax stamp. Try reading the Federal gun laws before you comment incorrectly and look so foolish!

The right to keep and to bear arms is Constitutionally protected. Even the goofy left have conceded this to be an individual right. Witness the Federal Court decision, striking Washington DC's gun ban as Unconstitutional. More guns do NOT mean more killings, I would recomend the book "More Guns. Less Crime". It is an intelligent study that concludes that counties that allow individuals to carry firearms, experience less crime.

And yes, gun companies like to sell guns so as to make a profit. That's the way it works in a free enterprise system!