Gun Freedom? Well, I guess we'll just keep opening up the ground and putting dead bodies in it

[Corn]

Xerox already answered your question Thom. Oh, and he did it without shouting insults either.

 

[Soybomb]

<< mproper storage and respect is to blame in this situation, not the gun >>



Exactly. What problem do you people have with a &quot;qualified&quot; citizen owning a properly stored gun. If someone breaks into my house at night and I put a couple slugs in him are you going to be crying because he is dead? There will always be accidents with everything, guns included, but the positives often outweight the negatives.

 

[vi edit]

If I'm not mistaken, there are already laws on the California books stating that guns must be locked up and unnaccesible to children/minors.

If I am correct in this assumption, then kid obtaining the gun was breaking a crime. The father and owner of the gun should assume some responsiblity of this as well.

Yes it is tragic. But, it really is no different than an underage highschool student getting drunk, driving a car, and then killing a family of 4 in a car wreck.

 

[Wingznut]

I won't own a gun. Not because I'm against them, or anything like that. But the reason is obvious...

Just pay attention to the news. Look at the ratio of when a gun is actually used for self protection vs that gun being used for murder. It's extremely rare that a gun is used in self defense. Especially when compared to when an innocent person gets killed.

 

[BDawg]

The NRA also doesn't want things such as trigger locks to be manditory. I suppose they also don't favor prosecution of parents who's guns are used for murder by their kids because they weren't locked up.

Lock up the guns? Sure my kid can take them and kill others, but the king of England will sure be scared to break in the house!!!

 

[FettsBabe]

Guns don't kill people...people kill people. Whether it be with a baseball bat, knife, rope, or whatever else is handy. I hardy think the NRA should send a representative to the funeral to explain why the kids died. Why not send dr.s to funerals, nurses, drivers of vehicles, knife companies, Heck...lets send the ocean too.

When does the BLAME stop and PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY begin???

 

[ratkil]

Hey, I bought a trigger lock this weekend, pretty proud of myself......um.....anyway....carry on.......

 

[Jmman]

The analogies in this thread are not very logical. What makes a gun dangerous is the fact that it makes killing easy. If you use a knife you have to cut and hack and stab multiple times with a struggling victim in order to kill. With a gun you can easily kill a person at a distance without any effort at all....getting your hands bloody with tissue and brain matter is a far more difficult proposition....

 

[BDawg]

If guns don't kill people, and people would still kill without guns (w/ bat, club, shillelagh, etc), then why do countries with similar culture and media (Britain, Canada, etc) have such a lower homocide and gun related homicide level?

 

[vi edit]

<< If guns don't kill people, and people would still kill without guns (w/ bat, club, shillelagh, etc), then why do countries with similar culture and media (Britain, Canada, etc) have such a lower homocide and gun related homicide level? >>



It's not that simple. Cultures and values have to taken into consideration here. It's sad to say, but our culture is based upon immediate gratification, more so than many other cultures.

 

[Viper GTS]

I suppose they also don't favor prosecution of parents who's guns are used for murder by their kids because they weren't locked up.

While I'm adamantly opposed to the legal requirement of trigger locks, I AM all for the prosecution of parents who are irresponsible with the weapons they have.

For the record, I've lived my entire life in a home where guns were readily accessible. Two rifles, a 12-guage, &amp; recently a .38 revolver. The ammo for all those weapons is also readily accessible. It was never questioned that if we so much as touched those weapons we would be punished severely, &amp; the thought never crossed our minds to use them. My mother grew up in a similar situation - Her dad was a cop, &amp; had guns in the house. Readily accessible, yes. But well enforced that they were NOT to be touched. My brother (14) now has his first true firearm - A single shot break action target rifle. While the possibility is there for an accident, it is unlikely. He is fully educated in proper firearm safety, &amp; has a hunting license.

What am I rambling about? With proper education &amp; discipline, things like this wouldn't happen.

Viper GTS

 

[vi edit]

<< What am I rambling about? With proper education &amp; discipline, things like this wouldn't happen. >>



Not quite. Taking out your fathers gun and playing William Tell with a friend is no where in the same category as a kid taking a weapon into school and popping 15 classmates.

Getting grounded by his parents is the LAST thing on this kids mind. No repercussions in the world would have stopped this one. There were much more underlying issues than a lack of a gun saftey course.

 

[kranky]

<< . I suppose (the NRA) also (doesn't) favor prosecution of parents who's guns are used for murder by their kids because they weren't locked up. >>

I'm not an NRA member, but I have seen many times where they fully support the enforcement of gun laws on the books.

 

[Demon-Xanth]

Jmman: ok, cars. people only need a right foot to commit mass murder. They cause more deaths each year than guns (assuming at this point that inanimate objects can decide to commit murder), yet nobody in thier right mind would want to ban them.

Why are shootings more prevelent than self defence cases in the news? Simple: why report something that was prevented? Do you report a close call to your local highway patrol?

And if guns kill people, where is the jail where guns are kept until they are let out on parole? And why does the innocent person who just happened to be holding hands with the killer get put behind bars instead?

 

[Jmman]

This is a difficult issue; there are no easy answers. Countries like Japan and England do have far fewer gun deaths and their homicide rate is much lower than here. That being said, England's homicide rate was much lower than here prior to their gun ban. No simple answers, but I guess if I had my choice I would rather live in a society with no guns than a society where everyone has a gun. This is coming from someone that has several firearms, including several assault rifles......just my $.02.....

 

[MrCadaver]

Wingznut, that's completely incorrect. Did you know that when ammo manufacturers added up ammo sales as compared to crime usage, over one TRILLION shots are fired, completely legally, completely safely, for every shot fired criminally or in a dangerous manner. What do you expect, they're going to open the news with, &quot;Today several law-abiding upstanding citezens discharged their firearms today, and the bad guys are dead&quot;. The media is NOT objective. Ever noticed how, when reporting a murder, EVEN WHEN THE MURDER WEAPON WAS NOT A GUN, they paste that little image of a handgun in the corner of the screen?
I'm sure everybody remembers when the guys went into the Jewish day-care center and open fire with an UZI, right? What people don't remember is that NOBODY was killed. On the other hand, when somebody drove his Cadillac into a daycare playground, killed six children and injured 12 others (not far from the Jewish daycare center, as fate would have it), did it make the national news? Of course not. Sure, kids actually died that day, families torn apart, etc. but there weren't guns involved so it didn't make the news.

 

[Viper GTS]

With proper education &amp; discipline, things like this wouldn't happen.

Read: parents should learn how to parent. I'm not saying that a gun-safety course would stop things like this, but proper parenting almost certainly would. In all reality, the only difference between you &amp; me &amp; Kip Kinkle (the one here in OR) is the way we were raised. We're all human, we all have the same wants/needs/desires/weaknesses. The ONLY difference is the environment in which we are raised, and that is the responsibility of the PARENT.

Viper GTS

 

[Tiger]

Kalifornia is the most regulated state in the Union when it comes to owning/buying a firearm and yet this happens? Seems to me that we'd get a clue sooner or later that piling on regulation after regulation will not stop this. The only thing that will is swift and merciless punishment for the offender and registered owner. Maybe then teenaged morons like these would think twice.

Prohibition of Alcohol didn't do anything but drive the industry underground and hand it over to orginized crime. The same would happen with guns.

Far more people are killed by teenagers with cars than with guns, should we ban cars or raise the driving age to 30? If not, why not? Driving a car isn't a constitutionaly guaranteed right, it's a state sanctioned privilege.

I own three guns, none handguns but each semi-auto. Although I have no kids in the house each gun has a trigger lock and is locked in a safe. I am the only one who knows the combo. Should I be forced to give up my right to own these guns because some moron allowed his kid access to a gun?
Taking away my guns won't stop this, period.

 

[Schola]

Acording to World Library Desk refernce, the muder rates of England and the United States are very similar despite Enlgand having more stricter gun laws.

 

[glenn1]

People who would gladly jettison the Second Amendment, and think that taking guns away from citizens is a good idea, deserve to be called what they are, COWARDS. He who would willingly sacrifice the tools to protect himself and his family, will always need someone braver and better than himself in order to remain free.



<< &quot;Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined.&quot; >>

Patrick Henry



<< &quot;Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!&quot; >>

Patrick Henry



<< &quot;Be it remembered that the peoples who suffered by these hideous massacres, who saw their women violated and their children tortured, were actually enjoying all the benefits of 'disarmament.' Otherwise they would not have been massacred; for if the Jews in Russia and the Armenians in Turkey had been armed, and had been efficient in the use of their arms, no mob would have meddled with them.

Yet amiable but fatuous persons, with all these facts before their eyes, pass resolutions demanding universal arbitration for everything, and the disarmament of the free civilized powers and their abandonment of their armed forces; or else they write well-meaning, solemn little books, or pamphlets or editorials, and articles in magazines or newspapers, to show that it is 'an illusion' to believe that war ever pays, because it is expensive.

This is precisely like arguing that we should disband the police and devote our sole attention to persuading criminals that it is &quot;an illusion&quot; to suppose that burglary, highway robbery and white slavery are profitable. It is almost useless to attempt to argue with these well-intentioned persons, because they are suffering under an obsession and are not open to reason. They go wrong at the outset, for they lay all the emphasis on peace and none at all on righteousness. They are not all of them physically timid men; but they are usually men of soft life; and they rarely possess a high sense of honor or a keen patriotism.&quot; >>

Theodore Roosevelt,
Link

 

[Soybomb]

<< What makes a gun dangerous is the fact that it makes killing easy. If you use a knife you have to cut and hack and stab multiple times with a struggling victim in order to kill >>



I assure you in a close range situation an attacker could just as easily cut your belly wide open with a knife as shoot you with a gun, if not with an easier &quot;quieter&quot; action. A well trained knife user will be able to kill just as easily in close combat.

 

[Ulfwald]

Ok, here is a challenge I usually present to all you gun control nuts.

Place a sign in front of you place of residence the reads: THIS HOUSE HAS NO FIREARMS, WE ARE ARE TOTALLY GUN FREE

Go ahead and do that. Here is another one. Place a gun on the kitchen table and then tell it to go kill someone, scream at it, threaten to punish it if it does not do as you say. What will happen, nothing. WHY????? Because it takes a HUMAN to pick up that gun, point it at someone, and pull the trigger.

So the issue here is not gun control, it is CRIMINAL CONTROL!!!!!!

 

[BDawg]

Here is something I pulled up from the Relocation Crime Lab, a page that compares crime statistics in varoious cities.

Murders per 100,000 people

Manhattan 7

Toronto 2

That's almost a 400% increase in homocides! Manhattan was not the worst city by far!

And from the US Dept of Justice:

Linky

The murder rate in the US overall is .08 in 1000 people, while England's is .01 in 1000.

So by looking at this page, England has a higher crime rate, but a lower murder rate. Wonder why that is??? You think it's because they have so many fewer guns?

 

[Napalm381]

q]That will never happen. This is free country and I have just as much right as you to posts my thoughts even though you might to be ignorant to understand them. [/i] >>

I made no statement whatsoever about your right to post idiotic, pointless drivel. My point was that you frequently post your foolish, anti-gun ramblings, and yet somehow you have not changed a single persons opinion. Take a hint- we don't agree with you, and never will. Logic, and the Constitution, are on our side.

 

[Jmman]

I am not sure of the document you are quoting, but our murder rate is about 10 times higher according to this site....link
By the way, this site I believe is a gun advocate site, so I do not really have a reason to dispute the numbers. They are supposedly derived from a UN international study.
As far as guns making it easier to kill somebody than other items, lets put it another way, how many times do you hear something like this &quot;Today in suburban USA, little Billy was playing with a knife (substitute bat, club, chain, etc) and he accidentally killed himself(or maybe his friend). &quot; Not very often, and I think that the statistics would bear this out......
And if you really wanted to kill somebody, you can probably use a variety of items. You could probably drown somebody in a bowl of soup if you were determined enough. That being said, if you carry this argument to the extreme, why don't we all carry nuclear bombs. This would be an even better deterrent to crime, and also to any foreign nations that have some plans for us....

At the end of the day, we have more guns here in America than just about any other country. Unfortunately, we have one of the highest murder rates and number of gun deaths of any industrialized nation. That kind of defeats the argument that all of these guns are making us safer doesn't it??

Like my grandpappy used to say, &quot;If it ain't broke, don't fix it.&quot; Unfortunately, it is looking a little broken right now....