Okay. When?

[paft.livejournal.com]

Here is what we know.

A gunman walked into an elementary school this morning and opened fire.

We're getting conflicting reports about the death toll. Twenty-seven dead, 18 of them children. Twenty dead, 10 of them children. Twenty-six dead...

The president has released a statement. He says "Now is not the time" to have a conversation about our gun laws.

Okay.

When? How long is the interval after a mass shooting when we can have this talk?

I ask because, looking over the past year, it's hard to find a really broad window in between mass shootings where the gun people would deem it "appropriate" to have this discussion.

Last February, there was the shooting in the school cafeteria (3 dead), and the shooting at a health spa (5 dead.)
In April, there was the Oikos University shooting here in the Bay Area (7 dead)
In May, a guy opened fire in a Seattle Cafe (5 dead)
In July, we had the Aurora Theater shootings (12 dead)
In August, the gunman at the Sikh temple (6 dead)
In September, a workplace shooting at Accent Signage (5 dead)
Just a few days ago, there was that shooting at the mall in Oregon (3 dead)

So I'd really like to get a high sign from the gun people about when we can have this very serious talk. Preferably, I guess, it would be at some point when memorials were not being planned and relatives of the dead not struggling to cope in the wake of yet another mass shooting.

When would that be in this country?

*

Comments

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I'm sure the gun people would like to have this serioius talk, too, so that we might finally get a handle on these violent video games and movies and porn, and maybe start bringing prayer back into the schools and Christ in Christmas and Jesus back in this country's life.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Well turnabout is fair play after all ;)

[zebra24.livejournal.com]

1. I would say that PUBLIC security measures aren't sufficient and can't be: police is ALWAYS late.

2. We must allow individuals (i.e. teachers) to have a guns to defend themselves and our kids.

3. Parents must be given a choice - about security rules in the schools.

That's not a question for Obama or some officials, beside school principal.
Principal and parents must be responsible for defense of kids, give them a choice to be better defended with a guns.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you're advocating a country in more or less permanent paramilitary lockdown, with armed guards stalking the halls of our schools.

Doesn't sound like a free country to me.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

When? How long is the interval after a mass shooting when we can have this talk?

We've had this talk. Many, many times.

It's not guns that are the problem, it's people.

This happened in China today (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-20723910). Knives. 22 children injured with knives.

It's not the weapons that are the problem.

I'm frankly tired of the conversation. We know it's not guns that are the problem. We know this. So why do we continue pretending that, hey, maybe it is?

We do need to have a talk about how we've attached a stigma to mental health treatment. The access is there, but people don't want to take advantage when they clearly need it. Even things like getting treatment for simple depression holds a significant stigma.

Let's deal with problems we can solve as opposed to pointing our fingers at tools.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

Weapons may hardly be the whole problem, but the reasonable regulation of weapons has to be part of any real solution. Imagine how much more effective that attack in China would have been if the assailant had an automatic rifle like our boy, and you see how successful our guy is. Having weapons of mayhem freely available is not helpful.

[korean-guy-01.livejournal.com]

We can have that talk when the 2nd Amendment is repealed.

[paft.livejournal.com]

But until then, no serious discussion about the availability of guns in this country is "appropriate?" Seriously?

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

I don't know when.

All I want to know right now is how I am not going to be sobbing when we light our Channukah candles tonight and how many times I will probably sneak into my children's bedroom tonight to watch them sleep.

If we ever DO have "the conversation" perhaps we need to make a heavy proportion of it focused on compassion and an attempt to understand what is it that makes the infinitesimal fraction of people who possess a firearm cause these events of mass terror. Perhaps we should make certain that we talk about why some among us have such reservoirs of rage or despair that they believe annihilating themselves and others is the answer. Maybe we should begin the conversation with sincere and mutual pledges to not descend into our partisan finger pointing and to listen to what data says regardless of whether it agrees with our original assumptions.

But I'm not holding my breath.

[jerseycajun.livejournal.com]

Is this too long to recommend as a DQ?

[rjf-snyker.livejournal.com]

My friend, former specnaz soldier, can kill people with axe, chair, shovel. My father, former train force soldier, can kill people with crowbar. I think, that mad man can use all this things for killing. Maybe prohobition this all?
Sorry for my english

[rjf-snyker.livejournal.com]

And I want to note that the attacks are effective where prohibited weapon wear

[zebra24.livejournal.com]

You - can't really put public security to higher level, it is very costly and still not effective enough.

First you have to control school perimeter - 10 feet opaque fence is just a 30-second delay for prepared offender.
Not much time to prepare defense against suicidal gunmen.
You have to have a security guard to be able to prepare to stop gunmen in that time if you don't it is a waste of money.

Second you have to have armed checkpoints on each entry with enough scanner (like in airports) and a security personnel backup, since security on entrance will die first.

Ok you did it, but what will happens then??
Then you will end-up shooting in crowd just before that checkpoint, or in school buses, or in any crowded place at all.

But definitely: it is not actually possible to increase security by disarming citizens.
Stolen or crafted weapon is too easy to obtain you can't stop crime this way, you can increase death toll by forbidding effective and armed self defense..

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

I must have missed the reigns of terror and anarchy gripping the EU countries.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

OK, my question here is a simple one: why do we need to have these discussions only after shootings, as opposed to between them? The issue of gun laws discussions popping up in these contexts, in the aftermath of this kind of shooting, is actually politicizing deaths. Why? Because nobody discusses these things in terms of the issues they expose: the profound, utter, reckless, incompetent disregard for enforcing gun laws at the heart of the professional wannabe revolutionary mindset. Instead of discussing this, people hold up murdered individuals to make points against laws, as though doing so changes the manners of their deaths or the legal failures that bring them about. It's not to me the discussion, it's how it's phrased. Sure, call that talking about talking as I'm sure you will, but pointing out that gunmen shoot people is a horrible thing. Unless the people that do so point out the recurring issue that links all these shootings, namely the ease with which deranged lunatics gain access to guns to start shooting people again and again despite all the claims from gun advocates that this is not an exception, then there's a problem there.

It is technically true that people kill people, not guns, but the question at the heart of all this, namely why these homicidal madmen gain access to guns again and again gets drowned in parading dead bodies on cameras to proclaim outrage that can neither restore the dead or heal the living. Instead focusing on the endless exposures of defects in access to guns and the willful blindness and gross, cruel, malevolent, squalid moral cowardice on the part of all the wannabe Charles Bronsons who agitate for people owning their own private Tsar Bombas that permits this to happen again and again would be a wiser approach. This, to me, is not. Sometimes how a point is phrased does matter.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Because without blood to dance in or bodies to point too the gun control advocates don't have an argument.

[texasskier.livejournal.com]

Thank you for very good post.

Let me say my opinion.(I suppose I can be banned, because even here nobody likes to speak seriously):
I was born in Russia, in country, which has very dramatic history and very tense present situation. Nobody can say, that it is civilized country.
But comparing with Russia these cases with repeatedly mass shootings and with NO real reaction of american society drive me to say:
This is a savage country, which is stuck in 19th century.
Every weekend when I driving across Texas I see advertisements: Gunshow! Gunshow! Gunshow!
Almost every small city has its own Gunshow. Every district of Houston has its Gunshow! People with rifles go in streets! Every evening news - shooting, shooting, shooting....
Are you preparing for war? Or are you children, who still wants to play war?
Why are Americans so selfish? Why don't you see the experience of other countries, which can live without "guns for everybody"?

[zebra24.livejournal.com]

Why you a so selfish?
Why you don't want to look at rate of crime in Russia and in USA?
I am from Russia as well and I know what I am talking about.

*Why don't you see the experience of other countries, which can live without "guns for everybody"? *
Guns are saving thousands of innocent lives in USA each year while in Russia they aren't.
Remember Beslan and Nord-Ost?
How many lives was lost just because nobody was able to give an armed response in time?
Death toll will be much higher in case of "no guns" and any sound statistics study can easily prove that point.

This is directly affecting Russia and high crime and homicide rate is because of selfishness of people like you.
This notion that "no guns=safety=no crimes" is against any reasonable study on subject.

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

We don't need a conversation, I agree. There's nothing to say for the other side. Just get rid of guns.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

How?

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

Stewart had some hilarious points (http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-10-2012/any-given-gun-day) to make (http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-10-2012/any-given-gun-day---bob-costas---fox-news) on the matter the other day.

[zebra24.livejournal.com]

I would say that topic must have been always discussed.
Our grief shouldn't stop our discussion of preventive measures.

Nobody in the world should be able to forbid you to discuss topics that affects YOU.

This talk is not a question about divine guarantees this is a question about people rights to defend themselves in most effective (including cost effective i.e. affordable) manner.
Even perfectly armed and prepared people can be surprised, but if you forbid him to self defend himself, you are a murder helper and that blood on your hands also.

The "liberal" lawmakers made it possible to create a "safe for murder zones" in schools and universities, restricting any effective self-defense actions for school staff.
Those people must be blamed for inability to defend those they robbed of rights for effective self defense.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

But you're not politicizing the tragedy in blaming the people who don't want school shootings to turn into gun battles between amateurs.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

Yes. Too soon. There are still bodies on the Floor.

Merry Christmas.

PS: bet you a $1 he was off his psycho meds.

[paft.livejournal.com]

So when would it be appropriate?

[papasha-mueller.livejournal.com]

N-E-V-E-R.

And sorry, I don't have another planet for you.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Why should gun control be so verboten a topic it must NEVER be discussed?

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

We've been having this talk for decades.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Not on a high end public level. This administration has not addressed the proliferation of guns in this country.

[oportet.livejournal.com]

A talk between pro-gun law and anti-gun law will make about as much progress as a talk between pro-life and pro-choice - none.

People's minds are made up, and as long as politicians care about their jobs more than any individual issue - no possibly unfavorable law change will happen.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

Not just that, but there's also no room for compromise.

I'd be willing to discuss tightening of licensing and registration requirements but I expect some concessions as well. Would gun-control advocates be willing to support national reciprocity or the reclassification of suppressors to Title-I in exchange? I doubt it.

[mutive.livejournal.com]

Look, it's all *very* simple.

What we need are *more* guns.

If all of those kinder gardeners were armed, one of them *surely* could have taken down the gunman before he took down more than one or two.

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

Playing with real guns is so much more fun than water pistols anyway. Amirite?

[cheezyfish.livejournal.com]

Is it to early to talk about stronger gun control using this tragedy as justification?

The answer is hell yes, it is well to early.

[paft.livejournal.com]

So what window of time after a tragedy do you advocate as appropriate, given that we've been having mass shootings in this country roughly ever two months this year -- and sometimes only days apart?

[brother-dour.livejournal.com]

There are three major obstacles to this question OP poses:

1. uber-Right wing Second Amendment supporters who do not trust the most vocal gun control advocates to know when to stop
2. very vocal far Left gun control advocates who probably don't know when to stop- who are willing to accept nothing short of a total disarmament of the population
3. politicians who are terrified of alienating voters.

[paft.livejournal.com]

I think a major obstacle so far has been the no-gun-control contingent's paranoid insistence on hyperbolizing the debate into all or nothing.

Most people in favor of gun control aren't advocating a wholesale ban on all guns.

[gillianinoz.livejournal.com]

From an Australian perspective (we just woke up to this news here, still trying to take this in), I feel this is more a mental health issue more than a gun control one.

We have strict gun control here, but we were never a gun culture as the US is. There is no way on earth guns can be banned in the US. Perhaps controls on semi automatic weapons and the like, but to take them away completely? Cold dead hands etc.

In the days to come no doubt we will find the shooter was mentally ill. Off his meds. We have heard it before. So then it comes down to support for the mentally ill. Did he have support? Was he a veteran? Could he afford his meds?

I am from Australia and we actually spend less per capita on mental health here than in the US. That's a prety scary statistic in a country that prides itself on taking care of all its people, fortunate and less fortunate alike. Although at least meds here are affordable for everyone. That is a huge difference.

Our last mass shooting was a mentally ill young man named Martin Bryant. That led to tight gun control here, but sadly not more help and support for the mentally ill.

Thoughts?

[mutive.livejournal.com]

I think it's a great thought.

It's pretty easy to say, "Guns bad!" or "Cold dead hands!" It's a lot *harder* to approach the problem in a way that solves the root. (Which to be fair probably isn't "guns are available". As pointed out above, you can do a lot of damage with a knife. More with a gun, to be fair, but...)

[existentme.livejournal.com]

We can and will have this talk at any time. However, no amount of talking about guns or knives or any other weapons is ever going to change the possibility and probability of these things happening - not a single whit. One does not have to be a genius to know that no amount of talk about these particular things will change the outcome. Such kinds of talk, no matter from which sides they are argued, will not change probable outcomes one little bit. The reason, again, as anyone who is reasonably bright can see, is because such conversations are starting always and only and inevitably from the back side of the issue.

If you are trying to keep water from flowing through an opening, even small children know you have to stop it at its source, on the inside of the damn, and not the outside.

This is why such conversations, which focus on such things as the weapons used, or the security of campuses, or the sizes of the enforcement teams, are worthless. The only related conversation worth having is that about conditions on the inside of the damn, which in this particular case is the culture of violence embraced by the out of our control leaders of the world.

That is to say, in sum, no truly meaningful conversation can be had about this event. Ever. All one can do is to individually become the change one wants to see and hope for the best for those who are the victims.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Nobody is claiming that restricting guns is going to completely eliminate murder.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

A few things:

1) http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-10-2012/any-given-gun-day---bob-costas---fox-news
TL;DR - Don't jump on her for timing. I know it makes you feel like it's disrespectful or 'too soon' or whatnot, and you pop a xanax while harping on about the 'proper time and place'... please, that's not even remotely close to a point. If you don't like her timing, get over it. Come back later when you feel like that's not an issue.

2) One side will say this is proof that we need less guns, another side will say this is proof we need more guns. A third side, which is the one I'm on, says this is about mental health. Do guns provide an easier outlet to be bonkers? Maybe. But, I like to look at the underlying causes to things, and in my opinion the dude being nuts came before his ownership of guns. If he didn't get one legally, he probably would've got one illegally. One discussion I'd like to have is a serious one about mental health in this country. This is the kind of discussion they had in Norway by the way.

3) Please no more strawmen my brain hurts.

[american-geist.livejournal.com]

I think we can reasonably talk about mental health AND the role that guns play in our society. I would suggest that our poor public health and the tons of overpowered weapons everywhere is probably not the best combo for a society like ours.

[lyssna.livejournal.com]

When you do have this conversation, I would recommend looking at other countries that are obviously doing much better than you in this area. In a lot of ways, this appears to be an American problem. There are free, democratic, "western" countries that have never had a school shooting. Why? And no, don't say "America is bigger", the numbers are still disproportionate.

Why are other countries better?

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

Other countries aren't "better", other countries are different. They don't have the makeup or the mindset of this country, just like the US doesn't understand or accept paying monarchies hundreds of millions of dollars to do nothing but exist.

We aren't other countries, and they aren't us. There are things to be learned from each other but we will never be exactly the same in any regard. At least as long as we have separate countries on this planet.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

A society that is seriously having a conversation about arming teachers is a broken society.

[american-geist.livejournal.com]

True that.

[foolsguinea.livejournal.com]

Hopefully never. Our objective should be to have one of these about every one to three fortnights, but just irregularly enough that it doesn't become a sadly familiar endemic problem to be solved with new police powers.

Humanity is its own form of environmental resistance. This is the natural behavioral sink, releasing frustration from overpopulation, and stripping society down to the most deserving: white Christian gun owners who practice holy Objectivist Austrian economics.

...except that all of those things--white identity, Western Civilization, Christianity, the Second Amendment, liberal democracy, Objectivism, the free market, and Austrian economics--are crap.

The real answers are anthropological, and outside our culture's traditions formed in mystical self-regard. It may be that the only thing I have said that is true is, "Humanity is its own form of environmental resistance. This is the natural behavioral sink, releasing frustration from overpopulation."

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]