Another School Shooting

[Okeefenokee]

What is the nuance from the pro gun control side? I've seen suggestions like longer waiting periods, more background checks, mental health screenings, additional ammo taxes and smaller magazine sizes, which are all debatable, but I have to ask would any of those nuanced solutions have stopped any of the shootings we've seen?

Australia seems to have good results from gun control legislation put in place in the 90s.

https://www.theatlantic.com/internation ... ol/541710/

DID AUSTRALIA’S BAN ON GUNS LOWER VIOLENT CRIME RATES AND LOWER SUICIDE RATES?

Yes, as with the gun-happy United States, the murder rate is down in Australia. It’s dropped 31 percent from a rate of 1.6 per 100,000 people in 1994 to 1.1 per 100,000 in 2012.But it’s the only serious crime that saw a consistent decline post-ban.

In fact, according to the Australian government’s own statistics, a number of serious crimes peaked in the years after the ban. Manslaughter, sexual assault, kidnapping, armed robbery, and unarmed robbery all saw peaks in the years following the ban, and most remain near or above pre-ban rates. The effects of the 1996 ban on violent crime are, frankly, unimpressive at best.

It’s even less impressive when again compared to America’s decrease in violent crime over the same period. According to data from the U.S. Justice Department, violent crime fell nearly 72 percent between 1993 and 2011. Again, this happened as guns were being manufactured and purchased at an ever-increasing rate.
https://winteryknight.com/2017/10/06/di ... e-rates-2/

[Okeefenokee]

The Australian Gun Ban Conceit

The Australian gun ban’s effect on suicide in the country isn’t any better. While Vox repeats the Harvard study’s claim that firearm-related suicides are down 57 percent in the aftermath of the ban, Lifeline Australia reports that overall suicides are at a ten-year high. The Australian suicide prevention organization claims suicide is the leading cause of death for Australians 15 to 44 years old. So, while Australians kill themselves with firearms less often, it seems they don’t actually take their own lives any less often than before the ban.

http://thefederalist.com/2015/09/03/the ... n-conceit/

[TheReal_ND]

Australia ironically probably would have managed to lower violent crime if they didn't import so many South Asians.

[ooky]

Aside from the hypocrisy of these people wanting to ban things they don't personally own or care about, while defending much more dangerous cultural practices they do partake in, another form of hypocrisy really pisses me off: alienation.

Again, sorry for the hopping in and out - I am least busy on Fridays but still have to do a lot of work so can't sit on for extended periods. But I find this comment really interesting (the rest of the post where you put all blame on "leftists" for the complete breakdown of society because we don't like racism, sexism, homophobia etc less so). It essentially echoes a series of comments by Michael Ian Black (copied from a twitter thread):

Michael Ian Black
‏
Verified account

@michaelianblack
Feb 14
"Deeper even than the gun problem is this: boys are broken.

Until we fix men, we need to fix the gun problem.

The last 50 years redefined womanhood: women were taught they can be anything. No commensurate movement for men who are still generally locked into the same rigid, outdated model of masculinity and it’s killing us.

If you want to hurt a man, the first thing you do is attack his masculinity. Men don’t have the language to understand masculinity as anything other than some version of a caveman because no language exists.

The language of masculinity is hopelessly entwined with sexuality, and the language of sexuality in hopelessly entwined with power, agency, and self-worth.

So men (and boys before that) don’t have language for modes of expression that don’t readily conform to traditional standards. To step outside those norms is to take a risk most of us are afraid to take. As a result, a lot of guys spend their lives terrified." (<<And I, ooky would argue, alienated from others).

"We’re terrified of being viewed as something other than men. We know ourselves to be men, but don’t know how to be our whole selves. A lot of us (me included) either shut off or experience deep shame or rage. Or all three. Again: men are terrified.

Even talking about this topic invites ridicule because it’s so scary for most men (and women). Men are adrift and nobody is talking about it and nobody’s doing anything about it and it’s killing us."

It also goes to what several experts are saying - some minority of mass shooters are truly mentally ill, as in they are delusional with irrational obsessions. But many are not actually "crazy", just psychopathic - they do not feel empathy and they are ok with hurting and killing things, sometimes for fun or because they like it. That's not really the same as mental illness, at least as we commonly mean it, for one thing because they do not feel this state lessens their quality of life, they still understands what society considers right and wrong, they know who they are and where they are, in other words, are not coo-coo. But more than anything, the thing most associated with mass shooters are anger issues and extremism.

Fla. shooting suspect had a history of explosive anger, depression, killing animals

[ooky]

Alcohol kills at around 10,000 Americans every year just in DUI crashes.

When are we going to ban alcohol?

I don't drink alcohol, so fuck it. It's easy for me to point to the fact that tens of thousands of Americans are dying every year from this poisonous substance that nobody needs outside of controlled scenarios. You don't need alcohol just to eat your meal at a restaurant. You can get by with iced tea or soda. I have decided this for you because I don't drink and it doesn't affect me to one bit to ban your alcohol.

Think of the children.

Who is suggesting we ban alcohol? But we do regulate it carefully, and you can buy an AR-15 style weapon years before you can legally drink.

Also we do regulate guns far more than alcohol. Stop lying.

Well, I'd say that makes sense to me since a single bullet shot from a single gun can be much more dangerous than a single drink. And while I agree alcohol can be dangerous if misused, it's pretty hard for a person to walk into a crowd or school and kill 10s of people quickly with alcohol against their will. But it is true what I said that legal age to buy a gun is earlier by years than legal age to buy a drink.

Are you arguing for more regulation of alcohol?

[Okeefenokee]

Aside from the hypocrisy of these people wanting to ban things they don't personally own or care about, while defending much more dangerous cultural practices they do partake in, another form of hypocrisy really pisses me off: alienation.

Again, sorry for the hopping in and out - I am least busy on Fridays but still have to do a lot of work so can't sit on for extended periods. But I find this comment really interesting (the rest of the post where you put all blame on "leftists" for the complete breakdown of society because we don't like racism, sexism, homophobia etc less so). It essentially echoes a series of comments by Michael Ian Black (copied from a twitter thread):

Michael Ian Black
‏
Verified account

@michaelianblack
Feb 14
"Deeper even than the gun problem is this: boys are broken.

Until we fix men, we need to fix the gun problem.

The last 50 years redefined womanhood: women were taught they can be anything. No commensurate movement for men who are still generally locked into the same rigid, outdated model of masculinity and it’s killing us.

If you want to hurt a man, the first thing you do is attack his masculinity. Men don’t have the language to understand masculinity as anything other than some version of a caveman because no language exists.

The language of masculinity is hopelessly entwined with sexuality, and the language of sexuality in hopelessly entwined with power, agency, and self-worth.

So men (and boys before that) don’t have language for modes of expression that don’t readily conform to traditional standards. To step outside those norms is to take a risk most of us are afraid to take. As a result, a lot of guys spend their lives terrified." (<<And I, ooky would argue, alienated from others).

"We’re terrified of being viewed as something other than men. We know ourselves to be men, but don’t know how to be our whole selves. A lot of us (me included) either shut off or experience deep shame or rage. Or all three. Again: men are terrified.

Even talking about this topic invites ridicule because it’s so scary for most men (and women). Men are adrift and nobody is talking about it and nobody’s doing anything about it and it’s killing us."

It also goes to what several experts are saying - some minority of mass shooters are truly mentally ill, as in they are delusional with irrational obsessions. But many are not actually "crazy", just psychopathic - they do not feel empathy and they are ok with hurting and killing things, sometimes for fun or because they like it. That's not really the same as mental illness, at least as we commonly mean it, for one thing because they do not feel this state lessens their quality of life, they still understands what society considers right and wrong, they know who they are and where they are, in other words, are not coo-coo. But more than anything, the thing most associated with mass shooters are anger issues and extremism.

Fla. shooting suspect had a history of explosive anger, depression, killing animals

Rebuttal,

https://youtu.be/Tg-q38DfxpA?t=2580

[ooky]

Alcohol insurance as well. Put these people on special lists.

How many more innocent, beautiful people need to die so these people can enjoy their murder-sauce at dinner???

That car the drunk used to kill children with has to be registered and insured. Your analogy still sucks.

No it doesn't. It can break those laws as easily as driving drunk. You are not preventing anything.

The thing is, a really determined bad character can break however many rules or laws they put their mind to. Rules and laws of ANY kind on their own don't stop that. But the more barriers you put in front of something, the less people end up doing it. For example, I've seen in my lifetime that cracking down on seatbelts and mandatory seatbelt laws have led nearly 100% of people to wear them nearly 100% of the time, when in the 80s, a lot of people didn't wear them a lot of the time, even though it's super easy to just put on a seatbelt. Heck, it's also super easy to fasten the seatbelt behind you so you don't have to listen to that annoying chime if you don't want to wear it, but most people still don't do that - some of them the same people I know used to rarely wear seatbelts. Are there people out there who still don't wear seatbelts? I'm sure there are. But they are much, much, much fewer in number.

Montegriffo is pointing out that it makes no sense that something as inherently dangerous as guns should be the subject of this much heartburn about regulation of ANY kind, given that we don't have that same reaction to regulating so many other things that can be dangerous, or affect others negatively.

From where I'm sitting, I certainly don't want to prevent reasonable, law abiding citizens from owning guns. But I'm ok denying people bump stocks. There are people who as whole classes introduce too much danger into the equation, and I think to preserve others' rights around them shouldn't be able to legally buy or own guns, for example those with confirmed histories of domestic abuse. Will any law or regulation stop all the bad people who would use a gun the wrong way from using it in that wrong way? NO, that's not how the world works. But the goal should not be perfection and complete cessation of anything at this scale. The goal to be to reduce the deaths and improve the situation.

[Okeefenokee]

For example, I've seen in my lifetime that cracking down on seatbelts and mandatory seatbelt laws have led nearly 100% of people to wear them nearly 100% of the time, when in the 80s, a lot of people didn't wear them a lot of the time, even though it's super easy to just put on a seatbelt. Heck, it's also super easy to fasten the seatbelt behind you so you don't have to listen to that annoying chime if you don't want to wear it, but most people still don't do that - some of them the same people I know used to rarely wear seatbelts. Are there people out there who still don't wear seatbelts? I'm sure there are. But they are much, much, much fewer in number.

That's one helluva jump there, ooky.

The summer games are two years away.

[clubgop]

Who is suggesting we ban alcohol? But we do regulate it carefully, and you can buy an AR-15 style weapon years before you can legally drink.

Also we do regulate guns far more than alcohol. Stop lying.

Well, I'd say that makes sense to me since a single bullet shot from a single gun can be much more dangerous than a single drink. And while I agree alcohol can be dangerous if misused, it's pretty hard for a person to walk into a crowd or school and kill 10s of people quickly with alcohol against their will. But it is true what I said that legal age to buy a gun is earlier by years than legal age to buy a drink.

Are you arguing for more regulation of alcohol?

Molotov Cocktail, easy. I don't need a background check to buy a 40. So you can take that sass and shove it. Stop lying.

[ooky]

Rebuttal,

https://youtu.be/Tg-q38DfxpA?t=2580

Thanks a ton for queueing me to the pertinent portion of the recording, that was great.

Of course I don't agree with his take that the problem is that men should go back to strictly defining themselves as "sheepdogs", though I agree part of what leads to the issue is that if men feel they are not needed as sheepdogs they don't know what else to be. But he says MIB is trying to make men into "feminized versions of what you wish they were", and I don't see that at all. A protector and creator simply aren't inherently male characteristics. They are human ones. There are other human characteristics as well that men should be allowed to feel and participate in without being ridiculed and attacked for being non masculine, is the point. The fear of being ridiculed for not being masculine "enough" leads to insecure and unhappy men pushing other, more angry or violent or aggressive versions of masculinity, and or to attack what they define as femininity (either by hating women in general or hating or demeaning "feminine" characteristics), or to attack other men when they don't conform to their own narrow view of what is allowed to be masculine.

But I definitely appreciate this because it is rational discourse. We don't all always have to agree, we just have to be able to discuss without immediately screaming the entire other side are evil troll people.