Assasination attempt in AZ is not about guns
 

Consider a classroom full of eight year olds.

As the school year progresses, there is an increasing number of attacks wherein an angry studenl stabs another student, or the teacher, with a pencil.

Some angry parents demand that pencils be banned, while others angrily defend the right of their kids to use pencils in a responsible manner - and to defend themselves from those few kids who use them to commit acts of violence.

Then there are the small number of parents who see that the problem is not pencils; curing the growing proclivity of their kids toward violence is the problem.

The fact that the instrument of choice to commit violent acts happens to be a pencil is irrelevant.

How is the above scenario not analogous to what happened in Tucson?

we did ban carbon lead pencils...

and here, it's spoons. spoons scoop out flesh..and piss off parents.

Yeah, and the country was founded with the concept that everyone can own a pencil if they want; which is fine.

But there are lots of organizations who feel that "we don't need pencils when pens work just as well."

And there are "Pencil Rights" groups, and associations of "pencil drawing enthusiasts" who support the innate right of every person to own a pencil, and use it to draw, or do algebra.

Professional artists complain that only they should be allowed to carry pencils, lest some amateurs mess up and accidentally stab someone.

Then there's people who also argue that "since everyone types anyway, we don't really need pens and pencils at all."

Don't even get me started on the "eraser lobby."

I posted something about this in PARF.

I wish we could make some progress on keeping guns out of the hands of lunatics. I'm a gun owner, and what I fear is that something much, much worse is going to happen, and it will spark a massive popular movement against guns.

There needs to be some mechanism in place at the state level that puts individuals gun ownership rights on hold if they are a psych risk. Would it be incredibly messy to try and come up with a law that can pass constitutional muster? Yes. Theres got be something we can do.

The point of my post is, guns & gun laws aren't the issue. What causes people to increasingly resort to violence in our culture, whether they use guns or some other weapon is the issue.

Creating or abolishing gun laws doesn't cure violent behavior - any more than putting a bandaid on a cancer cures the cancer.

I believe we ought to be trying as hard to find the causes and cure for the violent behavior in our culture as we are for cancer.

To immediately respond to a tragedy such as Tuscon with pro and con arguments about gun control is pointless and futile - guns aren't the problem.

...he said, his brow furrowed, while wringing his hands.

I feel the same way; there's as immediate a need for what you say as there is for finding a cure for our culture's growing propensity to express anger in terms of violence, even if the expression is only verbal; because there will always be crazies among us and words have consequences, which for some crazies is a stimulus take actions.

We've been a pretty violent species for a few thousand years (there have certainly been much more violent times to live in than our current times).

E.g.

Famous political figure murdered, 44 B.C.

http://www.photosfan.com/images/juli...asination1.jpg

Another, 1865.

http://americancivilwar.com/north/ab...s/00405300.gif

Not sure we're going to find the solution in our short lifetime, probably not ever. It's part of the human condition.

I wish is was as simple as putting a stop to this type of senseless violence & thrill killing.. But, remember when some nut was putting poison in Tylenol bottles??
Chicago Tylenol murders - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As also stated, what is to stop some nutt from driving through a crowd of people??
I'm pretty sure that everyone posting here has common house hold stuff that when mixed would make a lethal bomb, all sold at any corner market..

So, as DARISC & HardDrive stated, if not a gun, something else. How do we stop it?? I don't know, parents tend to be blind towards bad things their kids may do, teachers, already over burdened may or may not notice, but if they do, the kid may just be moved out of the class and on to another, without the kid getting any help..
So I don't think there is any way to stop it.:(

If one of the purported reasons for the 2nd amendment is "protection from tyranny," which gives us such pithy quotes as "...liberty is a well-armed lamb" and "soap box, ballot box, ammo box" then it would seem that incidents such as these are expected. That line of reasoning would imply it's not a matter of "if" but simply "when" and "whom."

Another POV regarding gun laws, this from Yahoo News:

Could tighter gun laws have saved lives in Tucson? - Yahoo! News

30 round clip for a Glock? Wooaahh.

Sherwood

If pencils are banned only crooks will have pencils.

Good point. When stuff like this happens, I always wonder about the people around them. If this guy is a wacked out as the press is saying, why didn't the parents do something? Why didn't his community college call the police?

Per capita, I think Switzerland is at the top. They don't have anywhere near the murder rate of the USA. Attitude I guess.

Not sure anyone is advocating banning guns. Tighter control would be welcome (i.e. better enforcement, etc.). AZ also seems to have recently liberalized their knife regs. citing a low frequency of knife-related crimes/incidents.

Arizona law standardizes knife regulations

Is anyone in favor of selling guns at the local drug store or Pep Boys?

Sherwood

I live in a country with fairly strict gun control, and a significantly lower violent crime rate than the US, no matter how you look at it. Still, I truly don't believe that gun control is the answer. I'm sure it might make a small dent in the murder stats (i.e. get rid of those killings that might not have happened if there weren't a gun handy) but I doubt that's much more than 5 or 10%, if that.

I really think the US is a more violent society than most other first-world countries. I think it's entrenched in your culture and reinforced by popular media. Until you deal with that issue, which is a very difficult one to deal with, everything else is just band-aid solutions.

This^^^^


How many hours of Call of Duty had this nut job played? I've got plenty of friends that think they are commandos prepared for the apocalypse from all the games they've played....

Funny (not really) schools & other groups have banned Dodgeball & other contact type sports calling them violent, then the kids go home & play all types of violent video games:rolleyes: At least when playing DB other other contact sports, we felt the consequences when you got beamed, and you knew it hurt, but with video games, there is none on that.. I feel when you know how something feels, if it is painful, you are less likely to do it to others.. Remember, as kids were were told not to touch something hot, but until you burned yourself, you didn't really know how much it would hurt..

Ironic thing is that the Swiss are well armed (or so I am under the impression).

You're absolutely right. Our country was born in violence and codified the tools of violence in our founding document. We are always going to be killing each other with guns.

I don't think there's a way to prevent such random violence. There are a lot of potentially violent psychotics who don't resort to this behavior, and then there are unassuming types who one day shoot up a mall, school, political rally, etc. It's very difficult to know who's capable of what. However...I heard this guy "may" have been involved with a white supremicist forum or website. A good start would be to limit these types of sites. Freedom of speech isn't unlimited, you cannot joke about bombs on airplanes or tell people you are going to assassinate the president, for example.