gun control?

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

The way I see it there are two different issues here.

1. Gun Control

2. Stopping Violence in the US

They are related, but only to an extent. I don't think gun control has a positive impact on levels of violence in the United States. The issue of gun control is one of the right to bear arms, but more importantly and one that people seem to forget is the right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The right to life means the right to defend yourself against murder.

Stopping violence is a separate issue. Gun control is not the answer, education and law enforcement is. If anything, it is my belief that while the right to carry concealed weapons may not directly lower rates of violence, it does provide people an opportunity to lessen their risk of being a victim. On a large scale the numbers may not reflect this but it gives people the choice on a personal level, which is what this nation is all about... supposedly.

Mixing the two issues will only lead to misunderstanding and arguments. Unfortunately a good chunk of the country is naive enough to think that they are one in the same and that more gun control is the answer to violence.

 

[JonMR2turbo 10+ year member]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1818353/posts

2002 Virginia School Shooting (flashback: only 2 killed before armed citizen acts)

Richmond Times Dispatch ^ | January 18, 2002 | Rex Bowman

Posted on 04/16/2007 2:55:14 PM PDT by Beelzebubba

"I was sick, I was sick. I need help."

That was the terse explanation Peter Odighizuwa offered yesterday when reporters outside the courthouse asked him why he shot and killed three people at the Appalachian School of Law on Wednesday. Three others were wounded.

Inside Buchanan County General District Court, Odighizuwa was less vocal. He hid his face and said nothing as a court clerk read the charges against him: three counts of capital murder, three counts of attempted capital murder and six counts of using a firearm in commission of a felony.

Odighizuwa, who was wrestled to the ground by fellow students, one of whom aimed his own revolver at Odighizuwa, could face the death penalty if convicted.

The shooting rampage, which claimed the life of the law school's dean, has rocked the town of Grundy, which until Wednesday had been known mostly for its high school's championship wrestling squad. Now, the entire town is grieving on national television over what everyone can describe only as an act of senseless violence.

"The Oklahoma City bombing, the World Trade Center, Columbine - at the time they seemed like worlds away," the Rev. Stan Parris said yesterday during a memorial service for the three dead. "This time the tragedy has struck home, a remote, tiny town, a place protected by mountains and family values."

"Those who were killed were some of our finest people," Buchanan Supervisor Ed Bunn said. "It's on everybody's mind."

The man accused of the killings, 43-year-old Odighizuwa, is being held without bail. Yesterday, General District Judge Patrick Johnson appointed Radford attorney James C. Turk Jr. to represent the Nigerian-born Odighizuwa.

Odighizuwa protested briefly, saying he wanted area lawyer James Carmody to represent him. Carmody had represented Odighizuwa in August when he was charged with assault and battery against his wife.

But Carmody is not on Virginia's short list of lawyers qualified to represent capital defendants, so Johnson appointed Turk.

In his only courtroom outburst, Odighizuwa complained loudly that he is not getting proper medical attention.

"I was supposed to see my doctor," he said, his voice rising. "He was supposed to help me out. I need my medication."

Bailiffs then led Odighizuwa from the courtroom. He wore shackles on his feet and handcuffs on his wrists. He hid his face behind the green court documents that stated the crimes he is accused of committing.

Those killed in Wednesday's shooting rampage were the school's dean, L. Anthony Sutin, 42, of Grundy; associate professor Thomas F. Blackwell, 41, of Grundy; and student Angela Denise Dales, 33, of Vansant. The wounded are Rebecca Claire Brown, 38, of Roanoke; Martha Madeline Short, 37, of Grundy; and Stacey Beans, 22, of Berea, Ky.

State police and school authorities allege that Odighizuwa, upset about being dismissed from school for poor grades, shot and killed Sutin and Blackwell in their upstairs offices, using a Jennings .380 semiautomatic pistol he had concealed beneath his trench coat. He then allegedly went downstairs and fatally shot Dales and wounded the three other students.

Police said they do not know how many shots were fired, but by the time fellow students tackled Odighizuwa, the two magazine clips he had with him were empty. Each magazine could hold eight rounds.

One of the students who subdued Odighizuwa was Tracy Bridges, a 25-year-old sheriff's deputy from Buncombe County, N.C., who is studying to become a lawyer.

"We went to get to class after 1 o'clock, and [student] Ted Besen and other students and I were in the classroom when we heard the first three shots," Bridges said yesterday. "It sounded kind of muffled, and a few seconds later we heard the next round of shots, and a scream.

"Me and Ted and [student] Rob Sievers went out to look. A professor ran up the stairs and said, 'Peter [Odighizuwa] has got a gun and he's shooting.' I ran back and told the class to get out. They went out the back way," Bridges said.

"We went down, too, and Peter was in the front yard. I stopped at my vehicle and got a handgun, a revolver. Ted went toward Peter, and I aimed my gun at him, and Peter tossed his gun down.

"Ted approached Peter, and Peter hit Ted in the jaw. Ted pushed him back and we all jumped on," Bridges said.

 

[iceteebone 5,000+ posts]

I am with mattf on this one.
What you are failing to realize is that part of carrying a gun responsibly is making sure you are the only one that has access to it. If you leave the gun somewhere where someone else, like your roommate, can get it, then you are being irresponsible with the gun. Just like giving it to the roommate would be irresponsible. Edit: Also just like shooting someone with it is irresponsible, and illegal (I believe there are laws that make it a crime to have a gun where people can access it, not 100% about that though)

Now the roommate could always break open your safe with some tools, or ambush you while you had the weapon out. But that has nothing to do with being roommates, that is a criminal committing a crime and it could happen regardless of the circumstances of ownership.

Also, there is no difference between a knife and a gun for the argument you are trying to make. Yeah, it may be easier for you to stop someone with a baseball bat if you are bigger than them. Maybe it is easy for me to stop people with a gun because I'm a 7th degree black belt. Just because you are more willing to confront someone with another weapon doesn't mean that someone using that weapon for violence is not as bad as using a gun.

Anyway, I agree with you for the most part about gun control. I have never really thought about the issue of firearms being allowed on campus, but now that I am thinking about it I do think it should be legal. If I choose to carry a gun to protect myself from crazy people where I live (pretending it is a campus), I don't want that right taken away from me because of where I live.

you can control what goes on in your home but not in your dorm. what if you get drunk and pass out? now don't bring up responsibility because i know lots of people who would carry guns on campus party.

 

[chucku 10+ year member]

http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/commentary/wb/80510. Check this one out.

 

[JonMR2turbo 10+ year member]

Laws are words on paper. Words on paper are not going to stop people from doing what they want. Laws against murder did not stop this guy from killing people. He also broke the law when he bought his gun, when he brought it onto campus, and when he discharged it.

Prohibition of anything does not work. It was proven with alcohol and is very obvious today with drugs. Make guns illegal and only criminals will have them, because they are criminals, and breaking the law is what they do.

Look at the stats and yes the USA does have alot of crime compared to other countries. But do other countries have the amount gangs that we do? Or the huge amount of racial diversity? No. What the stats don't tell you is that most of the crimes committed with guns were committed by criminals who obtained their guns illegally.

Legal gun owners are not criminals. Here is an example that proves this:'

"221,443 concealed carry licenses were issued in Florida between October of 1987 and April of 1994. During that time, Florida recorded 18 crimes committed by licensees with firearms." (third link)

That means that over the span of SEVEN YEARS, .008% of the people who had a CCW license in Florida committed a crime. That is a practically non-existant number.

Here are some things to read

http://www.ncpa.org/pub/st/st176/

http://johnrlott.tripod.com/postsbyday/RTCResearch.html

http://www.justfacts.com/gun_control.htm

Along with Penn and Teller's episode of Bullshit about gun control

http://www.washingtonceasefire.com/content/view/47/45/

Moral of the story: human nature is never going to change. Murder did not start with the invention of the gun, it started when one cavenman cracked another caveman over the head with a boulder. People are not going to stop killing each other no matter how many guns, knives, clubs, bats, or fists you ban. Therefore, any person with half a brain can see the necessity for law abiding folks to be able to carry guns to protect ourselves from nutcases who do kill others (and of course to protect ourselves against a tryannical govt but that's a whole other post).

 

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

you can control what goes on in your home but not in your dorm. what if you get drunk and pass out? now don't bring up responsibility because i know lots of people who would carry guns on campus party.

Irresponsibility is irresponsibility whether it happens at home or on campus. Violence, a break in, and theft of a weapon can also happen at home or on campus. If the argument is that whoever obtains a gun legally is deemed responsible enough to carry one, which is what I assume you have been saying all along, then there can be no distinction between a campus, an apartment, or a house.

If you say that they should not be allowed on campus because people are not responsible on campus, then you are also saying that the people on campus are not responsible, meaning they would not be able to carry a gun no matter where they were, which makes the whole argument null.

 

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

Great post JonMR2turbo ^^

Thanks for those links, I've been arguing with someone on another forum and he keeps saying that those assertions are meaningless without facts to back them up, even though it is common sense that we have learned through the history of prohibition in this country.

 

[iceteebone 5,000+ posts]

Irresponsibility is irresponsibility whether it happens at home or on campus. Violence, a break in, and theft of a weapon can also happen at home or on campus. If the argument is that whoever obtains a gun legally is deemed responsible enough to carry one, which is what I assume you have been saying all along, then there can be no distinction between a campus, an apartment, or a house.
If you say that they should not be allowed on campus because people are not responsible on campus, then you are also saying that the people on campus are not responsible, meaning they would not be able to carry a gun no matter where they were, which makes the whole argument null.

i know the people in my house. i don't know the people in my dorm

 

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

i know the people in my house. i don't know the people in my dorm

So you are saying that a given person could get a gun if you had it in your dorm but not if you had it in your house?

That just doesn't make any sense.

If you want to argue that it is more likely, then I will agree with you, partially. Then again, it follows that if you live in a dorm you should take more safety precautions with your firearm then if you live in a house. Just like if you go somewhere crowded in public with your firearm, you will take more precautions then if you took it out onto your 40 acre ranch.

 

[iceteebone 5,000+ posts]

So you are saying that a given person could get a gun if you had it in your dorm but not if you had it in your house?
That just doesn't make any sense.

If you want to argue that it is more likely, then I will agree with you, partially. Then again, it follows that if you live in a dorm you should take more safety precautions with your firearm then if you live in a house. Just like if you go somewhere crowded in public with your firearm, you will take more precautions then if you took it out onto your 40 acre ranch.

idk my roomate at a dorm. they could throw me in the same dorm as cho. at my home, i know my family and who lives there.

 

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

idk my roomate at a dorm. they could throw me in the same dorm as cho. at my home, i know my family and who lives there.

Ok, are you just going to keep repeating the same thing and not even respond to my arguments?

If so, I am done arguing with you, even though we have almost the same ideas about gun control in the first place...

 

[iceteebone 5,000+ posts]

Ok, are you just going to keep repeating the same thing and not even respond to my arguments?
If so, I am done arguing with you, even though we have almost the same ideas about gun control in the first place...

i thought i was responding to your arguments but i guess not

 

[Buffalohed 10+ year member]

i thought i was responding to your arguments but i guess not

Um, you said basically the exact same thing three times:

you can control what goes on in your home but not in your dorm. what if you get drunk and pass out? now don't bring up responsibility because i know lots of people who would carry guns on campus party.

i know the people in my house. i don't know the people in my dorm

idk my roomate at a dorm. they could throw me in the same dorm as cho. at my home, i know my family and who lives there.

Did you even read my comments? I explained pretty thoroughly why that is not a valid argument. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/eyebrow.gif.fe2c18d8720fe8c7eaed347b21ea05a5.gif

 

[PollyCranopolis 10+ year member]

The right to private gun ownership has saved thousands of lives. Period. Perhaps if there was not a gun ban on this campus, a student or teacher may have been able to take this crazy guy out before he killed 30+ people. The criminals will get thier hands on guns if they are legal, or illegal, either way. I'll continue to carry to protect myself and my family.

 

[iceteebone 5,000+ posts]

The right to private gun ownership has saved thousands of lives. Period. Perhaps if there was not a gun ban on this campus, a student or teacher may have been able to take this crazy guy out before he killed 30+ people. The criminals will get thier hands on guns if they are legal, or illegal, either way. I'll continue to carry to protect myself and my family.

there was a 2 hour gap between shootings. the police and campus security should've taken care of it then