Off Topic 50+ Dead in Vegas, 200 injured

Another one of life's sad murderous bastards has struck.

 

The shooter is a 64-year old, apparently. Wtf?

 

Still won't change the attitudes to guns in America, same arguments just go round and round, what a desperately sad situation.

 

They are stark raving bonkers.

 

I read an article a couple of years ago after the kids were killed, it spoke about a mindset that is deeply ingrained in the USA that looks at this issue in a way that none of us in the rest of the developed world can understand, it's why the response is to us almost crazy, even today on social media you have some Americans saying that the answer is more guns or pointing out that people get killed with knives in the UK. What they don't seem to get is that over 30,000 Americans are killed every year with guns, around 12,000 of these are murders including mass shootings the others are suicides, the comparison for us is something like 40 people each year killed by guns including suicides, in any other developed country it's the same story.

 

The thing with their right to bear arms, I guess it was enshrined in their beliefs about 240 years ago when you could probably shoot one round every twenty seconds, not 400 a minute.

Two of my friends are off to Vegas next week, I bet they are looking forward to their trip

 

This love of guns bamboozles me. Can't understand the reason for all the gun deaths is the millions of guns owned by the population

 

Yeah I watched a video basically showing that.
Someone walks into a bank with a musket and fires one shot. In the time it took him to reload everyone had evacuated.
Guns have come a long way, surely the law should have changed along with them??

 

That’s it. Some folk in America call Islam for being outdated and archaic, whilst at the same time picking up a gun and relying on 250 year old rules as justification for using it.

 

RIP

 

You cannot convince a monkey to not eat a banana. I love the US and visit every year but a large section of the population are idiotic, uneducated, backward morons that simply refuse to change. That goes for so called educated pillars that end up running the show.

Yes, people fire guns, but how is it justifiable under a two hundred year constitution for an average Joe schmuck to get their hands on several automatic weapons in the first place? Wtf is wrong with these gun lobby morons? A gun is a weapon made to maim and kill. It is a completely ridiculous argument to suggest guns should be allowed because it 'the person pulling the trigger' and not the weapon that is the problem. Too damn right they are the ****ing problem. You buy an automatic weapon then you aren't shooting ****ing cans on your porch are you? What kind of civilized society allows these weapons to be openly available? Not just automatics either - handguns, shotguns and any other type of firearm. Are they that ****ing stupid to believe that no control is even remotely sensible?

The gun laws in the USA are an absolute disgrace. Children have been murderedin the past and they do nothing. This massacre is the latest sorry episode and yet nothing will be done. It is sickening. The constitution of the USA is ****ed up beyond belief.

 

I think I will stick to Spain, sorry Catalonia, for my holidays.

 

I tuned into some talk radio while on the way to work this morning. To hear the justification - or, more accurately, diversion tactics - of those trying to prevent changes to the gun laws was at the same time chilling and almost laughable. If there was any kind of debate on this issue you could tear the arguments to shreds - but there isn't. Both sides of the political divide listen to single, self reinforcing points of view to the point at which logic goes out of the window.

Worryingly, we seem to be going down that route in the UK as hearing what you want to hear gets more clicks and sells more papers/TV subscriptions than having your opinion challenged.

 

What possible justification can anyone have for members of the general public owning assault rifles and machine guns. I don't agree with it but I can understand the argument for hand guns for personal defence and rifles/shotguns for hunting, but mitilary grade weapons? The friends I have in The States pull their hair out over this **** because even when you have a President who wants to change the law, he can't even get the tiniest change passed through Congress.

 

They still think they're cowboys, that's the problem.

 

December 15th 2012, Sandy Hook, 20 children aged 6 and 7 years old were murdered along with 6 adults, nothing changed, you have to wonder at a society that makes no changes to the way in which it operates in response to such an abdominal act. On March 13th 1996 the Dunblane school killings happened to which two new gun laws were enacted in this country banning private ownership of handguns and imposing new restrictions on firearms, does it stop a determined killer no, but it does make it harder for them to carry out such attacks.

I have had many arguments with Americans on social media about mass killings and the same excuses are constantly put forwards, today many said new gun laws would make no difference because criminals ignore the law, what people who say this are ignoring is that it is not criminals that are doing this, these mass killings are not done by bank robbers, burglars, drug dealers or even terrorists, it is people with a grievance against society, mentally unstable or suicidal in some cases, prayers and words will not make any difference and I can't see that this horror will either, the American people allow on average 12,000 people a year to be murdered by guns, with suicides and accidents this comes to over 30,000 a year, it's the price they are happy for their fellow citizens to pay for their guns, crazy doesn't even begin to describe this.

 

really reduces the war on drugs or the war on terror to a side show

 

I am American, and I own 2 guns. One is a shotgun...it holds 5 shells, and I keep it loaded by my bed. I bought it in San Antonio, TX because even though I lived in a nice, safe neighborhood, there were still home invasions. People would come up to the door, kick it in, and steal or worse. As a military man, I was often gone from my family and I taught them how to handle the weapon safely. I felt better knowing that if someone kicked my doors in (I installed a security door) or broke a window, my family would be safe upstairs waiting for the police to arrive. I keep a small derringer in my fishing tackle box, loaded with a snake load, for when I am out in the wild with rattlesnakes and copperheads.

It is illegal to own an automatic weapon...it is still unclear how the shooter obtained them. I am heartbroken about what happened, and yes, we do need to think about what we do next. But, we need to do it logically. Creating new laws won't work if they are not enforced. Feel good laws do nothing. We need to punish those who use a gun in the commission of a crime harshly...maybe add mandatory time to the sentence. Most handgun crime is gangs and drug related...we need to figure that problem out. Not all of us gun owners are cowboys...

 

I am a Canadian. We have a surprisingly high incidence of gun ownership. We have a very low incidence of gun crime. I think this is because every person who owns a gun must obtain a hunting licence. This involves passing a gun safety test and requires the guns to be stored in a safe gun cabinet. Handguns can only be purchased by people holding a special licence, which it is not easy to obtain.

Either this or that Canadians tend to be less violent or a combination of the two has resulted in Canada having a very small fraction of the number of gun deaths as in the US. Many US citizens would regard Canadian controls on gun ownership as offensive. The incidence of gun deaths that the US suffers is the price they pay in exchange. The rest of the world regards that as a crazy bargain.

 

Is it fair to say that Canadians do not own guns with self-defence in mind like they do in the States?