wasn't expecting to get involved as i don't do much here in this forum, but i agree. posted the tweet here because of local flavor. not so much windex/arugaua/cornbread/oxyclean flavor. all of which are intended to kill apparently.
I agree with you. I will only add that I don't believe most people realize how easy it is to get a firearm legally or illegally. The number of firearms floating around is staggering. If someone wants one, they will get one.
There is nothing about the 2nd Amendment that restricts registration and restrictions on the type of arms that can be owned. If the 2nd were absolute individuals then should be allowed to own Stinger missiles. Anyway this is the type of ridiculous strawmen that are thrown out. Many countries have far greater restrictions on guns than the US and are not authoritarian states like the PRC. Again you are reading the 2nd Amendment as an absolute when already there are restrictions on gun ownership for convicted felons. There is nothing about it that could restrict gun ownership to those mentally ill who may represent a danger to wider society. I agree this is huge cultural problem. The reason why we don't have sensible gun laws and registration isn't because of the 2nd Amendment it is because of a gun culture that values and prizes guns to the point that accepts mass shootings.
Except that we see in many other industrialized countries where limiting legal access to guns there are far far fewer mass shooting incidents like this. Let me ask you this though this about prohibition arguments. Do you think we should legalize all drugs including heroine and PCP? Since obviously people are still obtaining and using those even though they are already illegal. This is the type of argument that puts the perfect against the good. I agree that more restrictions won't completely stop mass shootings just as banning heroin doesn't stop heroine overdoses. That said it certainly makes it more difficult to get heroine.
It's no surprise that Houser got his gun legally. This is what boggles my mind and to be blunt shows how f^(ked up our culture is. As even this thread alone shows that we cannot even agree that those with a history of violent mental illness should not be allowed to have guns.
How many mass shootings have there been in Switzerland (where every adult male is a member of the military reserve and is required to maintain an assault rifle in the home)? Do their guns not count for some reason? Why is their murder rate 1/4 that of Australia where guns were banned? For that matter, why is there no solid data that Australia's rather draconian firearm restrictions resulted in a substantial decrease in homicides and violent crime? Could it be that gun ownership is not strongly correlated with criminality and that there are other factors at play in the US that influence the statistics? Yes. It is less difficult and expensive to get heroine than oxycontin. This has resulted in people that have gotten hooked on oxycontin to transition to heroin to feed their habit. It turns out that doctors and pharmacists are a lot less likely to feed people's addictions than drug dealers.
If you just want to cite gun ownership consider that Iraq is one of the most heavily armed places in the world. Saddam Hussein just prior to the US invasion handed out Kalishnikov's to every single family. I doubt you would consider Iraq a very safe place. I think you would agree that Switzerland's population and diversity makeup is much different than Australia and for that matter much more different than the US. While Australia's population is much smaller than the US' it's much more similar in terms of culture and ethnic diversity to the US but in Australia you don't see nearly the same amount of mass shootings that you see in the US. So yes I agree there are other factors but if you look at similar countries with similar cultures there is a clear difference in the amount of mass shootings with one of the main factors being it more difficult to get guns. I am curious to see your sources. Further are you factoring in issues of purity and strength in regard to heroin versus oxycontin and also the availability of oxycontin, as a legal albeit controlled substance? From a quick glance that I'm seeing according to recent stats there are more people who have abused prescription painkillers than have abused heroin. (12 million to 9.2 million http://oxywatchdog.com/category/surveys-statistics/ http://www.drugfreeworld.org/drugfacts/heroin/international-statistics.html Which would drive up demand and prices. Also how do you know that heroin is easier to get than Oxycontin? This isn't to impugn your character but I am curious what sort of research are you basing this off of. I personally know how to obtain oxycontin, tell my doctor I'm suffering from chronic pain, but don't know off the top of my head how I would go about obtaining heroin. Anyway you are partly making my case. Oxycontin is a controlled substances with gate keepers like doctors and pharmacists. While there are many that abuse it as you note those gate keepers most likely are dampening down the actual numbers. What many are resisting is the idea that there should be more controls on the access to guns by people like Houser who have a history of mental illness.
It would be a fair comparison if people collected Oxycontin as a hobby or used Oxycontin as home defense or really didnt need a reason to posses it in the first place. Oxycontin is used for one thing only. Its why it can be controlled. And even then its not controlled very well. If responsible law abiding people could get Oxycontin w/out needing a reason, we would have a much much bigger problem. We dont have an amendment specifically protecting Oxycontin. We are rounding back to the previous conversation. The gun culture in America is out of control. I am for stricter regulations, not to prevent mass shootings, but to prevent accidental deaths. With the amount of guns out on the street, more regulation is not going to prevent these people from getting them. This has been proven with every new shooting.
Same ol same ol. How many mass killings more do we need before gun control. Eventually people will revoit against the gun lobby.
I don't just want to cite gun ownership. That was the point. There are other factors that control how safe a place is, and gun ownership has little to do with it. I would also hazard a guess that there were not many mass shootings in Iraq during Hussein's rule there (not counting the military killing other Iraqis). There are three major language groups in Switzerland (Italian, German, French). In terms of skin color it is less diverse, but surely skin color is irrelevant to criminality. Right? Australia had far fewer homicides and mass shootings than the US before instituting their firearms restrictions. Were the other factors more important then, but the firearms restrictions more important after they were implemented? Why did restricting firearms not have a clear and easily traceable effect if the restriction of firearms reduces violence? Is America more similar to Australia than Australia before the firearm restrictions is to Australia after the firearm restrictions? Here is a mention from the NIH (see the sidebar). There have been a number of articles that I have read, but I have no inclination to track down more. Why would I need to do any of that? People are failing to feed their habits with oxy and turning to heroin. It says so in the link I provided. Whatever the relative purity or availability, it is happening. That is really neither here nor there. Maybe people would prefer to take a relatively safe drug in pill form that they can get mostly legally from an unscrupulous doctor. Some also buy oxy on the street at outrageous prices, again likely because it is safer and in pill form. Besides primary sources (i.e. addicts saying that they can get heroin more easily than oxy)? I am not aware of any academic studies. I would imagine it varies from person to person. As a criminal defense attorney I deal with a lot of drug dealers and few doctors. A doctor would do the opposite. A competent and scrupulous doctor is not going to prescribe you oxy at abuse levels, you have to find a pill mill, and hope it doesn't get shut down. The gatekeepers force people to black markets where they get the same things or worse. There is no indication that the CSA reduces the rates of abuse of controlled substances, and there is every indication that prohibition fails to stop people from getting the prohibited substances and has the nasty side effects of enriching the black marketeers and increasing violence.
Need strict gun laws so no one gets wounded like in this case: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/07/2...oxnews/national+(Internal+-+US+Latest+-+Text) That 62 year old is in the hospital because of a gun, when are people going to understand..
Not criminality but it is strongly correlated with gun deaths. Also, guns aren't banned in Australia - just restricted in term of access.
