School shooting in CT, 18 kids 8 adults dead.

[Tiberius]

After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn't do it. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military.

[Something completely different]

I posted my opinion on this subject before in the "Offensive weapons in the UK" thread. And I am to tired to find and requote all the stastics.


http://atheistforums.org/thread-15812-po...#pid366665

[Autumnlicious]

We completely agree. I do think it should be a pain in the ass to get a gun, just not impossible. Perhaps forcing gun owners to have the people they live with screened as well? Random gun safety inspections from local law enforcement? There are many ways to make guns safer without eliminating their availability. I don't think it will stop people from killing each other en masse, but it would make sense anyway.

I never lobbied to ban guns. I lobby for increased gun control across the board.

In the US, a person can go across state lines from a restrictive gun control state to one with significantly lessened restrictions, acquire firearms (often without the onus of increased tracking and licensing of the restrictive state) and bring them into the original restrictive states.

We need federal gun control legislation to be increased, with penalties and licenses enforced, as opposed to the hodge-podge solution.

I don't demand individual specifics, only that there be a consistency to gun laws across the nation.

"Free firearm" for purchases, though, probably should be banned -- after all, what pressing need is being served for self-defense or legitimate hunting?

It makes you wonder why we as a nation demand the right to have the ability to kill to the point that you can go to a Walmart or local crabshack and get weapons?

It reeks of a societal addiction to death.

[The Grand Nudger]

Well, I don;t know that it;s an issue of a pressing need either for hunting or for self defense that's leveraged when you hear folks railing against licensing. Just that people feel highly uncomfortable being on some governments lists......

A strange aversion on the one hand (since they're already on a ton of lists) but an understandable one on the other...since you don't want to be on the "wrong" list.

[Annik]

We completely agree. I do think it should be a pain in the ass to get a gun, just not impossible. Perhaps forcing gun owners to have the people they live with screened as well? Random gun safety inspections from local law enforcement? There are many ways to make guns safer without eliminating their availability. I don't think it will stop people from killing each other en masse, but it would make sense anyway.

This is very much in my line of thinking as well. Maybe someone needs a permit before they can even go through the process of buying a weapon (which would include a written test and firearms safety class) and it needs to be renewed. Maybe even a mandatory psych evaluation (to help weed out those who are undiagnosed). However, with these changes (that will have their own problems to be worked out) there needs to be more change in our government regarding promoting good mental health and caring for those who don't have good mental health in a way that is stigma-free and cheap.

[Creed of Heresy]

Well this nation was basically founded with the founding fathers saying "Here, you're all allowed to have guns; if we fuck up, feel free to take us out." A societal addiction? Possibly. A bad one? Not especially, but it's not a good one, either...

[The Grand Nudger]

The random gun safety thing is probably a no-go. You think that giving law enforcement "reason" to randomly search your anything-for-anything is a good idea?

"Hello law abiding citizen, I'm here to rummage through your house - stand aside"

[Autumnlicious]

In this thread:
Taking singular questionable policy suggestions and using that as a reason to disregard regulation instead of confronting the questionable policy, denying it and replacing it with more reasonable suggestions.

Very American.

[Shell B]

Where?

[Something completely different]

Breaking news. How many events like this have to happen before gun control is taken seriously?

In Germany we have some of the stricktest gun controls on the entire European continent and maybe even in the world.

There were 3 highschool massacre here in the past 10 years.

Most murders happen out of sudden impulse of agression in a tense situation. So one might argue that the domestic homocide rate might go down with stricter gun control.

But certainly not with highschool and other massacres.

We had a attempted highschool massacre here 3 years ago where a student ran through the schoolhalls slashing arround with a sword.

A person determined to commit a murder, will find ways to do so.

The advacation of responsibility, is far more importent than the regulation, in this case.