Current Affairs The " another shooting in America " thread

[mezzrow]

Now I'm by no means an expert, but I have spent my academic career studying psychology of crime, so I feel I have a better than average view of the reality of crime. The underlying problem for us in the United States is not guns. That's a symptom of a problem, but to claim that homicides will go down to levels in Britain or Australia if they'd only get banned just isn't true. The underlying problem in the United States is a culture that reveres criminals. This might seem like a strange statement to make, given that the US has the highest incarceration rate in the world, but it's the truth. The fact is, even non-firearm homicides are higher in the US than most other western countries. We rank if not #1 at least top ten in virtually every single criminal act someone can commit. On average, a homicide occurs every 30 min, a forced rape every 10, and a robbery/burglary every minute. Our media is dominated by criminals. The most popular modern shows we have broadcast have criminal protagonists (Breaking Bad, Sopranos, etc). Even our police procedurals star detectives who "play by their own rules" or "take the law into their own hands". We have cultural icons like Jesse James (one of the more prolific mass killers in US history). Hell, recently in my hometown a kid was arrested after breaking into more than thirty different houses, most of them more than once. There was zero outrage, most people claimed he was just a boy being a boy. We've seen recently that more and more mass shooters in the US have been experimenting with explosives. Even the Orlando shooter is alleged to have had them. If you treat the symptom of guns, the disease will continue through explosives, or arson, or any of a number of other ways to incapacitate people (9/11 was through the use of airplanes after all, and no one seems to remember the Oklahoma City bombing). The true cure for the disease of violence in the US is to work hard to eliminate the culture we've built up saying that crime is acceptable. In New York, when things like littering and hopping turnstiles for subways were cracked down upon, homicides decreased. We need to take the broken window philosophy to the entire country in order to truly decrease our violent crime. Just discussing guns and claiming that's good enough isnt coming close to the actual problems involved.

By far the best post on this thread. Hammer, meet nail.

 

[mezzrow]

Is it your view that there will never be a day when it is not the "right" of a US citizen to own a firearm?

Yes, that is my view. When you find it in your heart to accept that, we can begin to talk honestly on the subject.

 

[jhramone]

Hollywood and the computer games industry are doing you no favours.........

You're telling me! It's tough to get people fired up about changing every aspect of their culture. It isn't as sexy as campaigning for an easy, fix-all solution, because it's going to take generations of work. The good thing is, though, that people are starting to really talk about issues of violence. You and I can have a friendly conversation online about it, and hopefully more people will as well.

 

[LinekersLegs]

That is true, murders by guns would decrease, the problem is that the overal homicide rate most likely wouldn't. While mass shootings make for sensationalistic news, they represent a minuscule fraction of the actual homicides committed in the US. The VAST majority of homicides occur between romantic partners or close associates, and are the result of increasing hostility. Murder is a crime of opportunity, so if the person has a gun readily available when their spouse makes them mad, certainly they'll use that. The problem is, take the gun away, they're still pissed off and a week later they might have a hammer in their hand when they're angry enough to kill. That's why, while handguns are the number one choice of murder weapon, number two is blunt objects, not rifles. It's my opinion that to truly decrease the murder rate you have to address a culture where physical violence is seen as an acceptable solution to problems. There are far too many ways to kill someone to ban the tools, you need to attack the motivations behind the killings. I just worry that not enough people will see this and be shocked when crime rates remain the same after spending a decade trying to overturn all of the Supreme Court precedence surrounding guns.

According to this link by @mezzrow to data by the FBI the preferred choice after firearms to murder someone is a knife rather than a blunt object
https://www.quandl.com/data/FBI/WEAPONS11-US-Murders-by-Weapon-Type
5662 Hangdgun murders, Firearms type not stated 1959, knives 1567, blunt object 435 shotguns 262

I fully agree that we need to address the culture/motivations behind the killings and for me that would also embrace mental health policies. However a gun is specifically designed to cause maximum damage and, unlike knives/blunt objects, you can do it at a distance rather than having to be close to your victim. Being faced with someone bent on murder would be awful even if they are unarmed but I'd fancy my chances more to either a) escape from the attacker or b) recover from my wounds if a gun wasn't involved.

Guns with clips of 30 bullets make it particularly difficult to either run away or tackle an opponent without getting hurt, if the Orlando killer had been armed with a machette and a hammer do you honestly believe the death toll would have been the same?

 

[jhramone]

According to this link by @mezzrow to data by the FBI the preferred choice after firearms to murder someone is a knife rather than a blunt object
https://www.quandl.com/data/FBI/WEAPONS11-US-Murders-by-Weapon-Type
5662 Hangdgun murders, Firearms type not stated 1959, knives 1567, blunt object 435 shotguns 262

I fully agree that we need to address the culture/motivations behind the killings and for me that would also embrace mental health policies. However a gun is specifically designed to cause maximum damage and, unlike knives/blunt objects, you can do it at a distance rather than having to be close to your victim. Being faced with someone bent on murder would be awful even if they are unarmed but I'd fancy my chances more to either a) escape from the attacker or b) recover from my wounds if a gun wasn't involved.

Guns with clips of 30 bullets make it particularly difficult to either run away or tackle an opponent without getting hurt, if the Orlando killer had been armed with a machette and a hammer do you honestly believe the death toll would have been the same?

Ah, that's right. I apologize, it's early in the morning here so I was going off memory, not looking things up, and I got the two confused. Even still, my point still stands. I agree that mental health reform is a substantial issue that needs to be addressed. I honestly believe, without guns, the Orlando shooter would've emulated Timothy McVeigh and used explosives. Don't forget, the Oklahoma City bombing killed 168 people and no firearms were used. To discount knives, hammers, vehicles, arson, poison, strangulation, or bare fists is silly. All of those can be just as lethal as a handgun. When the person most likely to kill you, statistically speaking, is someone you live with, distance doesn't matter, what matters is that the person thinks homicide is an acceptable solution to a problem. How many TV shows have the main character murder to solve their problems? How many American folk heroes are the same way? That's the real threat. A culture that promotes murder.

 

[SerenityNigh]

Messing with a Texan and his guns is only slightly more acceptable than molesting his kids.

In many cases, it's much safer to assault the kids

 

[SerenityNigh]

Hollywood and the computer games industry are doing you no favours.........

See, that makes perfect sense and I'd normally agree with you, but I've also seen this:

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...-no-link-between-video-games-and-gun-murders/

To be fair, this ignores non-gun murders and so we can't rigorously test the link between overall violent crime and video game consumption, but I think we can conclude without much deliberation that access to guns is a greater influence in gun-related deaths than violent video games, etc.

 

[LinekersLegs]

Ah, that's right. I apologize, it's early in the morning here so I was going off memory, not looking things up, and I got the two confused. Even still, my point still stands. I agree that mental health reform is a substantial issue that needs to be addressed. I honestly believe, without guns, the Orlando shooter would've emulated Timothy McVeigh and used explosives. Don't forget, the Oklahoma City bombing killed 168 people and no firearms were used. To discount knives, hammers, vehicles, arson, poison, strangulation, or bare fists is silly. All of those can be just as lethal as a handgun. When the person most likely to kill you, statistically speaking, is someone you live with, distance doesn't matter, what matters is that the person thinks homicide is an acceptable solution to a problem. How many TV shows have the main character murder to solve their problems? How many American folk heroes are the same way? That's the real threat. A culture that promotes murder.

He could well have tried to emulate McVeigh but a) the raw materials are far harder to obtain b) require both time and expertise to build resulting in far greater chance of discovery prior to the event. Obviously that doesn't rule it out, the Boston bombers unfortunately managed it, but very much doubt there would be a one for one replacement in succesful mass attacks.

As I say I don't disagree that culture is very important in reducing the number of attacks (both mass attacks and the more common crime/domestic ones) but I do strongly disagree that once a person has decided to murder another that other methods are equally as lethal as guns - they can kill but just not at the same effectiveness.

 

[SerenityNigh]

By far the best post on this thread. Hammer, meet nail.

Hammer meet action?

*I'll get me coat

 

[jhramone]

He could well have tried to emulate McVeigh but a) the raw materials are far harder to obtain b) require both time and expertise to build resulting in far greater chance of discovery prior to the event. Obviously that doesn't rule it out, the Boston bombers unfortunately managed it, but very much doubt there would be a one for one replacement in succesful mass attacks.

As I say I don't disagree that culture is very important in reducing the number of attacks (both mass attacks and the more common crime/domestic ones) but I do strongly disagree that once a person has decided to murder another that other methods are equally as lethal as guns - they can kill but just not at the same effectiveness.

I see it from a different perspective, I suppose. Recently I was doing some research on crime in South Dakota. I don't have my exact report with me, so I'm going off memory, but there were 16 homicides last year. Not all of them involved firearms, but I believe 8-9 did. In addition there were over 4,000 assaults, with something around 90 being shootings. Now you could look at that and say that without guns, 8-9 people would still be alive and 90 wouldn't be wounded. Or you could look at it and say, well firearms aren't a very effective way of killing someone if only 1/10 of gunshot victims die, guns are perfectly fine. You could look at it with the lens that, had those 90 people closed in with a knife, maybe there would have been more deaths (after all it takes skill to use a gun). I choose to look at it in a different light. A lot of those 4,000+ assaults were attempted murder, the victims just survived. That's shocking, and completely unacceptable. Arguing over whether or not one or two people would've been saved had guns not been readily available, or a handful more people would've died had a knife been used rather than guns, is ridiculous. The fact remains there were over 4,000 potential murderers in the state. Regardless of their tools, that's the real problem, and ignoring it is a catastrophe.

 

[mezzrow]

Hammer meet action?

*I'll get me coat

 

[Tubey]

By far the best post on this thread. Hammer, meet nail.

Except it's not. He's right in that there's a deeper underlying issue with crime in the USA, but simply put if guns are banned, less guns are used, therefore gun crime goes down.

To gloss over that doesn't make any sense.

If he had even given a passing mention to the possibility of tighter gun legislation to make gun ownership a privilege rather than a right, then it'd make sense. However, he didn't, so it doesn't.

 

[Tubey]

The year of the Dunblane massacre, gun homicides peaked at 84 across the UK – the most on record.

Today [after the banning of handguns], gun killings have dropped to almost a third of that. In England and Wales in 2012/13, the police recorded 30 gun homicides, 12 fewer than the previous year, and the lowest figure since the National Crime Recording Standard was introduced in 2002.


No underlying cause was tackled - simply put, handguns were banned, therefore handgun crime decreased. Not rocket science either FFS.

 

[LinekersLegs]

I see it from a different perspective, I suppose. Recently I was doing some research on crime in South Dakota. I don't have my exact report with me, so I'm going off memory, but there were 16 homicides last year. Not all of them involved firearms, but I believe 8-9 did. In addition there were over 4,000 assaults, with something around 90 being shootings. Now you could look at that and say that without guns, 8-9 people would still be alive and 90 wouldn't be wounded. Or you could look at it and say, well firearms aren't a very effective way of killing someone if only 1/10 of gunshot victims die, guns are perfectly fine. You could look at it with the lens that, had those 90 people closed in with a knife, maybe there would have been more deaths (after all it takes skill to use a gun). I choose to look at it in a different light. A lot of those 4,000+ assaults were attempted murder, the victims just survived. That's shocking, and completely unacceptable. Arguing over whether or not one or two people would've been saved had guns not been readily available, or a handful more people would've died had a knife been used rather than guns, is ridiculous. The fact remains there were over 4,000 potential murderers in the state. Regardless of their tools, that's the real problem, and ignoring it is a catastrophe.

And for me I don't see it as an either/or - you can both work to reduce the motivation and also work on reducing the effectiveness of the means if you fail at the motivation.

 

[mezzrow]

Except it's not. He's right in that there's a deeper underlying issue with crime in the USA, but simply put if guns are banned, less guns are used, therefore gun crime goes down.

To gloss over that doesn't make any sense.

If he had even given a passing mention to the possibility of tighter gun legislation to make gun ownership a privilege rather than a right, then it'd make sense. However, he didn't, so it doesn't.

Ah, semantics. Then let's talk about the differences in view between those who see their existence as defined by rights granted by nature, as opposed to being privileges granted by their ruler. That's what you're talking about.

Note that our constitution is a document that enumerates powers and grants responsibilities, but more than anything else it defines what government cannot do. Those are rights. The constitution rules the government, which governs at the will of the people. Break the document and break that will.

Understand that, and we can start to talk seriously. This is just babble. You're killing the patient to bring down the fever. You have no idea how hard the wall is that you are beating your head against here.