32 people were murdered today... Any thoughts? Gun control? Campus security, etc.?
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32 people were murdered today... Any thoughts? Gun control? Campus security, etc.?
Gun control.Quote:
Originally Posted by charlestonian
This may not be a solution: criminals will get guns, one way or another but law-abiding citizens will not have protection!Quote:
Originally Posted by gRomoZeka
Since I happen to a person sitting here in a Wi-fi coffee shop with a semi-auto under my coat you can be assured that I don't think that "gun control" would be a very good or effective answer this this dilemma.
Israel has the same sort of problem as we saw today and her answer to random shootings and suicide bombers has been more security, usually provided by the private sector. I would say that the USA will have to do the same thing.
There was no need for 32 people to have gotten killed. For example: If someone were to come in to my coffee shop here, randomly shooting, unless I was one of the first to be shot, I can guarantee that there would be an abrupt ending to that guys' shooting spree. I take care of my own safety and inadvertently of those around me. Why don't others?
I think that solution is good enough when the gun control is in full force. I feel pretty safe without any gun and don't need one, since I'm sure on 99,5% that any minor thug I may encounter doesn't have it either. And I know that in my ordinary citizen life I'll probably never get into the situation when the big thugs who DO have guns would be interested in killing me.
When every asshole has a gun a number of unintentional or stupid murders happens like a teenager killing the kid from the next door for being "cheeky". Cause it's so damn easy to kill a person without other thought when all you need to do is to pull the trigger. With gun control the worst thing a depressed looney clerk can do is to punch the boss, when these crasies have guns they cause massacre. Whats good in that "protection from criminals" when you can catch a bullet at your offfice?
People often say that it's a matter of freedom, but I don't see what's owing guns has to do with freedom, if you're not talking about freedom to kill easily.
Gun Control???? We already have "gun control" in America. No matter what laws you pass; or "control" of guns, people will still kill each other. If I remember correctly, none of the terrorists on Sept 11, 2001 had any guns with them. The people killing each other with road side bombs in Iraq or Afganastan are not using guns. Timmothy McVay didn't shoot anybody in Oklahoma. The events that happened today are terrible. Very very sad; but don't even begin to think that "gun control" will stop anyone the next time....
I have several guns at home, and ADT security service. I feel safe at home but I feel less safe in public places. I carry a gun in my car but it is difficult to get to it when you are not in the car.
It's not gun control when almost anyone can buy a military gun flashing their drive license. And nobody says gun control will stops crimes and killings for good. But it will definetely stop the wave of crasy shootings like the one in Virginia Tech.Quote:
Originally Posted by Haksaw
At least it works perfectly for me. I've never seen a real gun in my life (exept those that police and soldiers have), or been threatened with one, or heard a gunshot for that matter. What's wrong with that? You may say I can be threatened with knife. Right, by I run pretty fast, he-he, and for sure I have better chances to outrun the knife, than a bullet.
OMG, probably I'll never go to USA after hearing that. It looks like you, guys, obsessed. What if some redneck mistake me for the threat to his life or just doesn't like my face and shoot me on the spot? It's scary. :lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by charlestonian
We have right to bear arms, it is guaranteed by the Constitution. For self defense. But, it is not OK to go on a shooting spree, like that guy at Virginia Tech did!Quote:
Originally Posted by gRomoZeka
How stupid. :(
Guns are to ban, people are to brainwash (that guns are bad). I can't see other way to stop these m-f-ing slaughterers.
You have nothing to fear from rednecks. They are the least of the problems.Quote:
Originally Posted by gRomoZeka
That is the whole problem. The right to bear arms is written in the Constitution, therefore it's almost impossible to provide any guns control policy in the USA. Really, I don't know which is better - to feel as unprotected as we are in Russia where it is almost impossible for ordinary citizen to obtain the gun licence, oh yeah, you can purchase some smooth-bore guns for hunt, but you'll have to wait 5 years to purchase a rifle after that. Pistols are practically unavailable for people, but a wide choice of non-lethal self-defence devices (electroshockers, pepper gas sprays, etc) is available. You can buy guns for keeping in at home for self defence, but you can't take them with you outside.Quote:
Originally Posted by charlestonian
In such a situation, only criminals have guns. There's so much police in cities that you feel relatively safe but I think that it's hard to live without any arms in rural areas. There's a proverb "Тяжело в деревне без нагана" (It's hard to live in a village without a revolver) :)
But I don't think that such a freedom of bearing arms like in USA provides safety people need. Many simply don't know how to handle firearms properly. And there's always a chance for accidents like in Virginia.
You are missing the point on firearms and the US Constitution. The constitutional protection of the "right endowed by our Creator" is also to protect the citizens duty to keep our government from overstepping their place in case they become "tyrannical".
We are authorised to overthrow our own government. This is the way that America was set up by the first government here. They formed their country through revolution and recognised that future generations may have to do the same thing again. So, they wrote the 2nd Amendment into the Constitution to ensure that the citizens would still have guns in order to accomplish the task, just as they did.
There is no other country who has recongnised this right of the people. The US Constitution is remarkable in this.
You can not compare our gun problems with anywhere else.
Apparently the killer was here on a Student Visa issued in Shanghai, China. Police think that he planned the operation well before and that he called in two bomb threats several days ago in order to see how the cops would respond. He chained the doors closed in the building from the inside so that students could not escape and cops could not get in.
Well, I don't think that even armed people really can overthrow the government anymore. In military terms it's an impossibility. So is there really any need for 2nd Amendment nowadays? The Americans simply can't overthrow the government by military force any more (moreover, CIA, NSA, FBI and other good guys will do anything they can to prevent it right at the beginning), so maybe it would be better for all if the Americans waived the rights for having guns?Quote:
Originally Posted by DDT
It's hard for me believe that gun control would be effective in a situation like this. First of all, what do you mean by gun control? Is it some sort of regulation that forbids persons under a particular age to buy guns or what? I personally think that campus security is potentially more useful than gun control (meaning rules regulating the circulation of weapons). Would that bloodbath have happened if there had been a proper security system with metal detectors and everything? I understand that it is barely possible to provide for any sort of emergency whatever security system is exercised but it's not that hard to attempt to forewarn at least some portion of possible accidents.
I reckon there is no society in today's world which can guarantee that each member of it will not go on a shooting spree if he doesn't like something. I mean that however developed a country (in terms of prosperity, social consciousness, and social development), there's still a chance that someone might decide to solve their problem though use of guns.
It will be hard if that somebody doesn't have a gun.Quote:
Originally Posted by ReDSanchous
By gun control I mean that private posession of the guns (exept hunting ones and thorughly regulated) should be banned.
And the so called higher security is a way to paranoid state, I think I'd fill extremely depressed if I had to be "metal-detected" every time I went to campus.
There's an alternative - let EVERYONE bear firearms. This way there would have been several hundred guns within the campus so the criminal would be dead within a minute after he had opened fire. There should be a law which would oblige people to take a gun when leaving home as a MUST. And children at schools should be taught how to use firearms and how to shoot them and the responsibility involved also when to shoot and when to hold fire.
Many terrorists attacks might have been prevented this way.
Just a thought.
хм, вроде это не так просто, пристрелить человека (даже если он угрожает тееб пистолетом)... по крайней мере так показывают в фильмах :o
Всысле, трудно с морально\этической точки зрения, а не с физической.
We should ban chains, which would have prevented the gunman from stopping the students' escape from the classroom. If we had a ban on all handguns, then this murderer would have brought in legal rifles (with multiple clips) to kill (remember Colombind High School?) I have never seen a gun shoot without the help of a finger. No law, whether banning guns, poison, or herion, ever has stopped a crime.
Работает закон больших чисел - в здании университета несколько сотен вооруженных людей. Пусть даже из них 10% способны открыть ответный огонь. Получается - несколько десятков (хотя, думаю, таких гораздо больше). Это в фильмах в человека выстрелить сложно. В жизни бывает гораздо проще. Да и пойдёт ли преступник на подобное преступление, зная, что одноклассники могут открыть ответный огонь?Quote:
Originally Posted by ST
В порядке бреда, конечно, но идея повсеместного обязательного вооружения может сработать. Правда возрастёт количество несчастных случаев от неосторожного обращения с оружием. Но это уже другая сторона медали.
I couldn't give a damn what laws Americans choose to live under, and what justifications they use for those laws, that's entirely their business, but I thank my lucky stars I grew up in a country whose laws allow me to say that I've never even seen a handgun, let alone held or fired one, that I have never heard of anyone I know using one, or having one used against them, ever.
I'll take the right to not even have to think about guns over the right to bear one any day of the week.
Idealistic dreams. Besides, boys have always had some strange fascination with weapons. I think it's something in their blood. In every culture in all times boys have been playing with toy weapons, be that a wooden stick to represent a sword, or a toy bows, spears, and a little later - pistols, guns, rifles, etc. And don't blame toys manufacturers they just respond to the demand.Quote:
Originally Posted by scotcher
How so? I was describing reality, as I experience it in the UK, not a wishlist of how I'd like things to be.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
Absolutely, as a kid I played with toy guns, and as a teenager I played videogames with guns in them. I've never had any experience of the real thing though, because legally and illegally they are almost completely absent from life in this country, aside from a few (and it is a few) headline-grabbing incidents each year. I certainly don't feel like I am missing out though, exactly the opposite.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
I find these words hard to believe. Literally I mean, that's why I called them 'idealistic dreams'.Quote:
Originally Posted by scotcher
I don't know what motive you think I could possibly have for lying to you, but if you choose to disbelieve me there's not really anything I can do about it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
Have you really never seen a handgun in your whole life?Quote:
Originally Posted by scotcher
Nope, not a real one. Well, certainly not in the UK. I suppose I must have seen holstered handguns at a distance when I've been abroad in countries where the cops carry them, but if I have it's never registered on my consciousness.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
Идея очень даже ничего. Но её сложно реализовать. Лечи подобное подобным...Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
Does that mean that policemen in the UK are unarmed?Quote:
Originally Posted by scotcher
Я вот думаю, было бы меньше жертв в театре на Дубровке, если бы хотя бы половина зала была вооружена?Quote:
Originally Posted by Rtyom
Хотя нет, в панике, перестреляли бы больше друг-друга. Тут нужно не только вооружить всех, но и наличие навыков обращения с оружием и этики его применения у каждого. Иначе - будет только хуже.
К слову - я за то, чтобы ношение оружия было разрешено в России. Всё-таки склоняюсь к мысли, что пусть лучше меня потом будут судить трое, чем четверо - нести.
Yes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
The vast majority of them anyway. There are armed police at airports and government buildings, though this is a very recent development. There are also armed response units dotted around the country for when they are needed, which is rarely.
You never heard Robin William's joke about what the police in Britian shout at fleeing criminals?
"Stop, or I'll shout "Stop" again!" :)
:lol:
What are they holding in their hands then?
(Strictly speaking they are military, but still - that things do look like weapons)
http://brainstorming.typepad.com/pho.../londonbg4.jpg
(or maybe they are plastic toys too. made in China :lol:)
These do look like cops:
http://msnbcmedia1.msn.com/j/msnbc/C...hmed_4a.h2.jpg
The first are not police of any description, they're soldiers, and come from any one of a dozen or so Guard regiments, which otherwise act as infantry regiments in the British Army.
An unarmed army would be a bit of a stretch :)
The second image is most likely from outside one of the potential terrorist target government buildings I mentioned earlier, probably in central London. The two mounted police won't be armed in any event.
I wish every nation on Earth had unarmed army :sigh:Quote:
Originally Posted by scotcher
That's an interesting point.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ramil
Perhaps all Iran, North Korea, Iraq, Libya et al have to do to justify their weapons programs is join the NRA :)
They are saying now that the shooter was Cho Sieng-Hui, a 23-years old Virginia Tech student from South Korea.Quote:
Originally Posted by DDT
Could this have been prevented? Check this out:
http://www.sodahead.com/poll/1483/?prom ... UAodOxcaBg
It also appears that among the student males there were no heros. They seem to have done exactly what the killer told them. Many students appear to have been told to line up along a wall and wait to be shot, which they did.
The only hero so far, is a 76 year old Jewish Professor who had lived through a German concentration camp during WWII, as a boy. The Professor blocked the doorway of the classroom with his body and told the students to escape out the window.
It is unclear at the present but it seems that none of the male students stayed to help the Professor subdue the killer. They ran and left the professor to die alone.
Somehow this doesn't surprise me as I look at today's soft bellied American youths. There was no, "watching each others' back"!
Poor man. :(