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ananda
(28,864 posts)Thanks for posting, Will Pitt.
longship
(40,416 posts)ErikJ
(6,335 posts)South Carolina GOP'er wants teachers to have machine guns.
A state senator running against Lindsey Graham says that teachers should be allowed to carry machine guns in the classroom.
Oh my gosh, finally! Someone who makes Lindsey Graham look good.
South Carolina state Sen. Lee Bright (R), who is challenging Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) in the GOP primary, said on Friday that school teachers should be able to carry machine guns to protect students from gun violence.
http://crooksandliars.com/2014/01/and-while-we-re-topic-underpaid-teachers
Arkansas Granny
(31,517 posts)
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Dawgs
(14,755 posts)
joanbarnes
(1,722 posts)
JoeyT
(6,785 posts)I think we're more or less already there. Ten or twenty years ago each one would've been reported on breathlessly for weeks or months. Most of the news shows would've drug anything they could pass off as an expert in front of their cameras to be interviewed endlessly, no matter how stupid they were. As long as they didn't drool enough to short out their mic and burn down the station, they'd let them prattle endlessly about how Dungeons and Dragons and black nail polish cause school shootings.
Now? It barely makes a ripple.
I'm not sure if it's because news has become so bogged down with trivial horseshit that there isn't room for anything of substance, or because we've seen so many that they don't cover it because it's become "Dog bites man". Probably a bit of both.
The top stories on several non-political news aggregator sites don't mention any of them. They do inform me Justin Beiber got a DUI, that kids are snorting Smarties again, and something or another about Johhny Depp and two women I've never heard of. You know. Important stuff.
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)Unless it is epic enough to meet the national news expectations of the moderators, they will lock any school shooting threads in LBN as too common "local news".
Kablooie
(18,634 posts)People tend to adapt to just about anything and then accept it as the norm.
In rare instances revolutions break out but only after years and years of accepting intolerable circumstances.
Unless the right wing comes to their senses and demands change I don't think anything will but I don't think the right wing today have any senses left to come to.
It's mystifying how so much of our lives seems to be controlled by what the insane right believe.
lapislzi
(5,762 posts)for the preservation of their interpretation of the Second Amendment.
The change the right wing wants regarding firearms is fewer regulations and more guns in the hands of more people. I thought that's been clear for awhile now. The wealthy and well-armed write the gun laws, such as they are, and they seem to be all right with this state of affairs.
AlinPA
(15,071 posts)such shootings are an acceptable price to pay for their interpretation of the 2nd amendment. (You worded that well).
tavalon
(27,985 posts)What is wrong with America that we can find this okay at all? During my stint as an ER nurse, I saw first hand the horror of what happens when people use guns on people. I would never own a gun, nor would I ever point a gun at a human. It's beyond my understanding how people can do this. And I'll admit, the fact that this horror is being visited on children makes my blood boil all the more.
abelenkpe
(9,933 posts)AAO
(3,300 posts)WilliamPitt
(58,179 posts)Construction equipment backfired.
Funny how a tractor fart can set a whole campus to running.
Can't imagine why.
ileus
(15,396 posts)friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)It has to start somewhere.
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)You're going to need the support of those who don't already agree with you,
and the acquiesence of the very people your claque has been actively demonizing for the past
couple of decades or so.
In short: It ain't gonna happen in your lifetime or mine.
tiny elvis
(979 posts)the obliquely implied army backing your brassiness is a proxy for sadistic death mongers
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)http://www.biblebelievers.com/billy_sunday_booze.html
"We have no interest in that; just take your disciples and leave, for you are hurting our business."That is the attitude of the liquor traffic toward the Church, and State, and Government, and the preacher that has the backbone to fight the most damnable, corrupt institution that ever wriggled out of hell and fastened itself on the public.
I am a temperance Republican down to my toes. Who is the man that fights the whisky business in the South? It is the Democrats! They have driven the business from Kansas, they have driven it from Georgia, and Maine and Mississippi and North Carolina and North Dakota and Oklahoma and Tennessee and West Virginia. And they have driven it out of 1,756 counties. And it is the rock-ribbed Democratic South that is fighting the saloon. They started this fight that is sweeping like fire over the "United States. You might as well try and dam Niagara Falls with toothpicks as to stop the reform wave sweeping our land. The Democratic party of Florida has put a temperance plank in its platform and the Republican party of every state would nail that plank in their platform if they thought it would carry the election. It is simply a matter of decency and manhood, irrespective of politics. It is prosperity against poverty, sobriety against drunkenness, honesty against thieving, heaven against hell. Don't you want to see men sober? Brutal, staggering men transformed into respectable citizens? "No," said a saloonkeeper, "to hell with men. We are interested in our business, we have no interest in humanity."
After all is said that can be said upon the liquor traffic, its influence is degrading upon the individual, the family, politics and business, and upon everything that you touch in this old world. For the time has long gone by when there is any ground for arguments as to its ill effects. All are agreed on that point. There is just one prime reason why the saloon has not been knocked into hell, and that is the false statement that "the saloons are needed to help lighten the taxes." The saloon business has never paid, and it has cost fifty times more than the revenue derived from it.
oneshooter
(8,614 posts)
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Let me shortcut to the point where you usually bail..
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4373438
If there's no individual right, then why did various states put statements like these in their respective state constitutions?
PA, 1790 - "The right of the citizens to bear arms in defence of themselves and the State shall not be questioned."
VT 1770 - "That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State.."
KY 1792 - "That the right of the citizens to bear arms in defence of themselves and the State, shall not be questioned."
OH 1802 - "That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State.."
PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)I did not leave my principles behind..
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)Wanted to do it in this thread, but.. Lost track of what post I was in =) Other one is kicked..
X_Digger
(18,585 posts).. why did states include 'each citizen' and 'themselves'?
Your little red herring doesn't address the question asked.
PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)People make mistakes in logic. Those states got it wrong.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)You argue there was no individual right, and the only proof you offer is your opinion that 'they got it wrong'?!?
You might want to add something substantive.
PowerToThePeople
(9,610 posts)It appears that I do not have the background on how to properly to address the individual State Constitutions at this time.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)Is granting the rights of smaller entities (city, counties etc.) to have an armed police force to defend 'themselves' (plural).
The second amendment grants the right to 'the people' and not to 'each person'.
Even then it starts with the explanation that the people 'need' the right so they can form a militia.
Doesn't have shit to do with an individual right. If the second amendment were meant to grant a person 'a right' - they would have granted it to a 'person' or the 'accused' (see fifth and sixth amendments) as they did in other places. It gives the right to 'the people' (plural just like the tenth) because a 'well-regulated militia' is so important for a free state. It's really pretty straight-forward reading.
I've had this discussion many times and it typically ends up with some response like "they put a comma in there, that makes it a personal right". It's not an individual right - it is granted to 'the people'. Is the tenth amendment a personal right? Of course not, that's just silly.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Please catch up on other replies in this subthread, I'd prefer not to repeat everything I've said in this thread for your benefit.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)Looked like you were just haranguing the other dude/dudette. Since he/she was weary of your persistent nagging - I thought I'd address your specific question.
Just look for the little 's' at the end of the words where you claim that they're granting an individual right (s denotes plural) and you will notice that in none of the instances that you used as examples 'granted' (insert whatever word you want to replace granted with) an individual right.
Go ahead and read the fifth and sixth amendments where they clearly 'grant' (again put whatever word you want in there to replace grant with) individual rights - then (and this is important) actually read the second amendment where it starts off by pointing out the importance of a WELL-REGULATED militia (how is an individual well-regulated?), and we are done.
It's not an individual right at all.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)You can replace one word for another to your heart's desire, but if you miss the actual concept we're discussing, it's patently useless.
Regarding your interpretation of 'the people' - you need to read US v. Verdugo-Urquidez:
Hell, try Justice Stevens in Heller-
When Madison proposed this amendment to the constitution, would you similarly assert that he was establishing a "collective" right?
Or the PA state constitution- "That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state..."
Was that similarly "collective"?
Utter balderdash.
Regarding the militia clause- If I said, "I'm out of soda, I'm going to the store." -- Would you assume that stores only sell soda, or that I was only going to buy one item? The militia clause is the reason that the right is protected. It in no way limits the right to that purpose, no more than the contents of my shopping list limits what the store sells or I might buy.
This gets back to your misapprehension about 'granting' rights. If the right pre-dates the constitution (it does, see US v Cruikshank), then how can a protection for one purpose limit it? It does not follow.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)It's a minuscule distinction at best. The primary concept is whether the bill of rights 'protects' an individual's right to keep and bear arms.
If it indeed 'protects' that right as you insist. Then places that have restrictive gun laws would have been challenged at the Supreme Court and those laws would be unenforceable. Those laws would not be allowed to stand because the people who live in those areas have an individual right to keep and bear arms that is 'protected' by the bill of rights. Which we know is not the case because the laws exist.
We do not have an individual right to keep and bear arms. If you're trying to convince me that the existence of these laws restricting gun ownership and possession are unconstitutional and you believe that you are going to convince me (or anyone for that matter) with silly analogies about going to the store to buy pop - I wouldn't hold out much hope for that.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts).. from being enforced? Of course not. Time / place / manner restrictions on speech have been upheld, in spite of the first protecting an individual's right to speech.
Where did you get that silly idea?
Blanks
(4,835 posts)There are laws limiting free speech (and other protected rights) when it comes to public safety.
What was your point?
X_Digger
(18,585 posts).. on the constitutionality of restrictions on the right, as you asserted in post #88.
Being an individual right doesn't suddenly make all restrictions on the right unconstitutional.
LOL! That's a new one on me, and I thought I'd heard everything.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)LOL indeed. Since you've made my point. I guess we are done here.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)When you find someone who claims that any right is unrestricted, you be sure to chime in.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)X_Digger
(18,585 posts)clffrdjk
(905 posts)Here are some google terms you should start with to expand your knowledge.
Illinois ccw
Illinois pays NRA
States without ccw
DC handgun ban
CreekDog
(46,192 posts)You've been repeating the same arguments here on guns for as long as we've both been here!
If you're so tired of repeating the arguments, then stop making them! 
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Are you one of those misinformed who thinks that the bill of right grants rights, too, CreekDog?
Shall I repeat them once again and watch you splutter and hand-wave, without actually addressing the argument.. again?
*shaking my head*
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)LanternWaste
(37,748 posts)"More likely, you realized the futility of your dream.."
As did abolitionists in the early 19th century, or MP William Wilberforce in the mid-18th century.
(Insert distinction without a difference here)
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)And so should anyone who has at least a passing knowledege of history
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)While over the last two decades government has become more and more oppressive, not a single shot has been fired against it. Voting rights have been reduced. Reproductive rights, free speech rights, privacy/search and seizure, and others have been severely curtailed, and none of the 300 million guns in the country have done a single thing to protect us. As an aside, your home arsenal isn't going to help if the drone strikes start. So cut the bullshit. Please.
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)And if FSM forbid, things did get 'that bad', a determined enough populace can
fight to a draw an army no matter the differential in material supply. The US, et al, has absolute
air superiority and the most advanced weapons in Afghanistan- yet it is the Taliban
that will still be there when all that remains of ISAF will be the scrap metal the Afghanis
scavenge...
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)And he was correct. But things that are at one time inconceivable sometimes end up happening eventually.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)Not that there is "no right to bear and keep arms". The problem is that the 2nd Amendment does grant the right to keep and bear arms. I would be in favor of the 2nd Amendment being repealed, along with the various state constitutional rights to bear arms. (And yes, I realize that this is not an easy thing to do, even when school shootings are taking place, on average, every second school day).
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)It protects pre-existing rights.
If you repealed the second amendment, the right to keep and bear arms would go from being one explicitly protected at a federal level to a right protected explicitly at the state level, and implicitly by the ninth amendment.
That is one of the core tenets of the enlightenment- that governments are instituted among men to protect rights. (Sound familiar?)
From US v Cruikshank:
Read the preamble to the Bill of Rights:
Restrictive clauses against whom? Abuse of whose powers?
The bill of rights is a 'the government shall not' document, not a 'the people can' document.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)would a state not be able to enact gun control laws within its borders (assuming that the state constitution was amended if necessary) without these laws being struck down as unconstitutional?
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)As the right to bear arms would be seen as a (then) unenumerated right, just like the right to medical privacy. And the long legislative history of the right would be presented as evidence that the right exists and should be protected.
That's one reason some of the founders were hesitant to even pass the Bill of Rights- they were afraid that future generations would read it as an exhaustive list of rights. Others argued that no government would impede on citizens' rights because the constitution limits the government's power. (Naive? You betcha. We see how well *that* attitude fared, eh?)
Thing is, once a right is recognized, legislatively or judicially, it's damned near impossible to make it go away.
A good example is the right to travel. You'll find it nowhere in our founding documents, but it's protected.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)is to amend the constitution not only to repeal the Second Amendment but to add a new amendment that specifically grants to states the right to regulate guns within their borders as they see fit. And yes, I am fully aware of the difficulty of doing this.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Again, I think you're looking at it from an 'all rights flow from the government' perspective, which is diametrically opposite of our western idea of a representative democracy.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)The suggestion that the right to carry a gun is a universally recognized human right is just plain false, there are many democracies that either ban or strictly limit gun ownership.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)We were discussing the means by which powers and rights are allocated or recognized (respectively.)
When someone claims that the right to carry a gun is a universally recognized human right, you be sure to chime in, mkay?
Until then, keep your fingers out of my mouth- my words come out just fine without you trying to stuff new ones in there.
Besides, I don't know where your fingers have been.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)You can use you juvenile personal attacks and tell me you don't know where my fingers have been, but you falsely claimed that the right to bear arms is a pre-existing right that would still be constitutionally protected even without the second amendment. You then went on some spiel about western democracies while ignoring the fact that many western democracies have strict gun control.
Stop with the personal attacks, if you want to pretend the right to bear arms is a pre-existing right as you clearly stated in post 28 don't be surprised when someone tells you that you are wrong.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)All rights are inherent in the people. We (via the consent of the governed) grant power to the government to protect those rights. The government has limited power to infringe on those rights under specified circumstances (e.g., your person and effects can be searched without a warrant in exigent circumstances; or you can be required to get a permit to have a public assembly; or you can't blare your political message via bullhorn from the street at 3am.)
Honestly, does nobody take civics anymore, or study the enlightenment? The basis for our government's founding philosophy?
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)Civics has taught me that in a democracy we have the right to advocate for change. You can pretend that your view on guns is some sort of noble stand for "pre-existing" rights, but I think you are completely wrong. Civics taught me the law is not set in stone and just because we have bad gun laws now does not mean we have to accept those laws, we can fight to change them.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Civics includes the enlightenment philosophy that rights pre-date the institutions created to protect them.
That is the crux of this subthread, much as you seem to want to drag it into another direction.
You're free to propose whatever law you wish, just don't be surprised when it never makes it out of judicial committee on constitutional grounds.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)I don't believe the right to bear arms is a human right however, I am more of the belief that the right to life is a human right and guns deprive people of life.
I believe the second amendment violates people's human rights rather than protects them.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)The right to privacy may set a murderer free to kill again. The right to not be subject to cruel and unusual punishment may result in a child rapist's coerced confession being thrown out of court, allowing him to rape again. The right to not self-incriminate may mean that a serial killer is freed. Rights are dangerous things, but to not protect them is even more dangerous.
But there is no right to murder, so it's a bit of an apples to oranges comparison. (Otherwise, there'd be no convictions of people shooting victims.)
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)There was nothing dangerous about Europe limiting gun ownership, in fact Europe has only a tiny fraction of the gun violence we see in the US. Limits on gun ownership have not resulted in the loss of freedom for Europeans, they are still democracies and have a good quality of life.
Here in the US we pretty much have given gun nuts the right to murder, George Zimmerman's "right" to kill was given priority over Trayvon Martin's right to life. Stand Your Ground laws have allowed gunners to kill people and deprive them of every last one of their rights with the magic words "I felt threatened". Shooting a person deprives the person that was shot of their rights and that is true even if the shooter was as scared as George Zimmerman claimed to be, telling people they can't carry a gun with them everywhere they go does not violate human rights.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)We also have stronger protections of speech and religion than many EU countries.
Should we give those up, too?
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)I happen to be a strong advocate for free speech rights, in fact there is much documentation of my activism in this area. While it may be a difficult concept for you to understand, it is actually possible to believe the First Amendment was correct and the Second Amendment was wrong. I am not one of those absolutists who pretend that the Founding Fathers crafted a perfect document, nor do I think the entire document is bad. I think it is a flawed document which contains some good and some bad and we should stand up and defend the good parts and discuss how to mobilize support for fixing the bad parts.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Me? I'll take our first and second (and third and fourth and.. ) protections over another country's system, thanks.
Screw France's burqua ban, Germany's 'hate speech' laws, or other countries' gun laws.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)We also have the highest rate of gun homocides of any developed nation. Our nation does not have nearly the level of freedom we like to pretend we have, and guns do more to take away people's freedom than they do to enhance it.
There is no doubt Europe has their own set of problems and I would not adopt all of their laws, but we were not talking about burqua bans so it is a complete strawman argument to act as if that is relevant to this discussion.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Our culture is homicidally violent. If you magically waved your wand and made all last years murders with guns disappear, our homicide rate would *still* be higher than most EU countries.
It's a culture problem, not a tool problem. If you compare the murder rate of NYC to London in the 1880's, before either country had any kind of substantive gun control, you'd note that NYC's was five times that of London. Of course, the thing that nobody wants to talk about is that our murder rate (with guns or without) is half what it was just two decades ago, and it continues to fall, even as there are more guns in circulation.
Please continue waving and shouting as the situation continues to approve- if nothing else, it's good exercise.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)If our culture were really as homicidally violent as you say it is then there would not be such a significant drop in crime, if it were part of our culture to be homicidal then the crime rate would rise as our population grew and more people were raised into this homicidal culture you talk about.
Our culture as a whole is really not all that violent, the number of people who actually commit violent acts is relatively small. The problem is that relatively small number of people has "tools" as you like to call them that make it a lot easier to kill.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Depending on who you talk to, the cause for the drop is anything from Roe v Wade, to removing lead from paint and gasoline, to the crack cocaine wars, to the rise of violent video games (seriously, there's a study that correlates it.)
What, you don't think cultures can change in 20 years?
General gun availability certainly doesn't track with our homicide rate. (One goes up, the other goes down.) Nor does any particular gun law, either more restrictive or less.
No, simple solutions to complex problems are as improbable as the moon chaning composition.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)Yes I agree that cultures can change in 20 years, they change even more in 130 years yet you were using 1880's crime rates to make your point about gun violence today in the post that I responded to.
Generally speaking areas with less guns have less gun violence, you may point to exceptions like DC which has strict gun laws and high crime or Vermont which has loose gun laws and low crime, but these are the exceptions rather than the rule. Generally speaking less guns means less gun violence and numerous studies have shown this.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)I bet you imagine that if we implemented EU-generic gun control, we'd have something approaching EU-generic homicide rates.
That'd be no more true then than it was when neither NYC or London had any gun control.
Correlation does not imply causation, which seems to be what you're trying to do. 75% of inmates smoke cigarettes, therefore smoking causes crime, right? 
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)Unless you know of cigarettes being used as murder weapons in a crime your analogy makes no sense. I suppose you could argue that second hand smoke kills and therefore it is a murder weapon, in fact many people have made arguments similar to this and for that reason laws were put into place to limit second hand smoke. Those laws have been very effective.
Just as there is a correlation between cigarettes and smoking related deaths, there is also a correlation between guns and shooting deaths. I think most social scientists would agree with me that is a valid correlation to draw, when every single shooting death involves a gun I certainly don't think the correlation can be denied.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)I would have thought that was a clear analogy. Perhaps not.
Similarly, gun availability does not correlate to gun homicides, much less cause it. If that were true, we wouldn't see the precipitous drop in homicide rate (both with and without gun use) in the face of 140M+ more guns in the same time period (per FBI's NICS).
Your last para isn't a correlation, but a tautology.
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)Find me a story about someone being shot with a cigarettte and you might have a point, but until you can find me that story you can't compare a weapon that is used to commit crime with a cigarette which is generally not used as a weapon.
I don't have time for any more back and forth, go ahead and have the last word if you want I am calling it a night.
X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Do I need to explain what analogies are?
Bjorn Against
(12,041 posts)X_Digger
(18,585 posts)Correlation does not imply causation. For example, the correlation between smoking and inmates does not imply that smoking causes crime. (And you can't cure crime by banning smoking, more importantly, lol.)
In the case of firearms, there isn't even strong correlation- see our gun homicide rate and NICS checks over the same time period.
friendly_iconoclast
(15,333 posts)and the acquiesence of the very people your claque has been actively demonizing for the past
couple of decades or so.
tblue
(16,350 posts)Can't happen too soon.
Logical
(22,457 posts)
Auntie Bush
(17,528 posts)tiny elvis
(979 posts)lumped together by police for convenience
blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)Really
Accountable
spanone
(135,841 posts)
'when will we ever learn, when will we ever learn......'
n2doc
(47,953 posts)Shandris
(3,447 posts)...I'm not so sure that the -gun- is the problem. It's a -symptom- of the problem, certainly. But it is -not- the problem -- the problem is that so many kids are willing to murder their own classmates. Perhaps we should start trying to figure out -why-, wouldn't you think?
Because with 3D printers and ubiquitous availability of guns as it is and more on the way, you can only get rid of the ones that will be legally owned. So sure, some kids won't have such an easy time -getting- a gun (again...until 3D printing hits more of a home market), but they're still willing to murder their own classmates.
WHY?!
tiny elvis
(979 posts)why are you resigned to random humans having the power to make godlike decisions?
the cause of malaria is known and it still has no cure or vaccine and cannot be eradicated
what is its surest prophylactic?
Shandris
(3,447 posts)I refuse to believe that we, in the span of 15-20 years, went from 'this never happens' to 'every other day' and its just something we have to live with if we don't completely disarm our society because no other remedy will work.
We give random humans the power to make godlike decisions every day; we call them presidents, congressmen, judges, prison guards, and policemen. Yet fundamentally they are no different from us. That's not an effective approach vector.
And, again, even if you succeed in removing a large number of firearms for a short period of time, it relies on people not breaking the law to work -- especially in light of 3D printing.
There is no way to approach the conversation with a solution of 'disarm everyone' and be speaking -coherently- about the problems we are facing. It would be great if it did work -- no gun nut or gun lover or even gun owner here -- but it doesn't. It -can- cut down on the number of shootings, absolutely. But it's not an effective solution, and we'd better have some effective solutions in mind when the ability to print these things becomes a household ability.
Tafiti
(1,723 posts)I don't really understand why ThinkProgress would count the Wakefield and Albany incidents to make this point. Based on what I read, these are shootings that just happened to take place NEAR a school. I'm sorry, but when as a writer you use the phrase "school shooting," you are intentionally making the reader conjure a very specific image or situation, i.e., an incident akin to Columbine. They're needlessly detracting from their message by exaggerating the truth. I would even say it's a stretch to include the Delaware Valley incident, as that appears to be a bona fide accident from someone who brought a gun into the school. Granted, it shouldn't have been there in the first place, but again, that's a different scenario than a deranged shooter intentionally targeting students and teachers in a "school shooting."
Isn't 4 or 5 in the first 2 weeks of the year bad enough and STILL worth making the point? Yes! Disappointing that they had to go a bit "tabloid-y" here.
Thor_MN
(11,843 posts)
Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)Stick with the eye-rolling. If you slap your head every time a "responsible gun owner" makes a bizarre comment, you'll be loony enough to join then in a few weeks.
Tafiti
(1,723 posts)In your and Thor's rush to presume something about me (which you're wrong about), your reading comprehension skills really took a digger while you read my post. My comments weren't some veiled attempt to criticize the overall message - I was merely pointing out that ThinkProgress really took artistic license with the term "school shooting" to push an agenda - that I support!
Really be honest with yourself and pretend you stumbled across a headline about a "school shooting" and you click on the link: http://turlockcitynews.com/news/item/1628-shooting-locks-down-wakefield-school-suspect-flees
Are you sure after reading that you wouldn't have thought, oh, I was expecting....something else? Sorry, I just think labeling that event a "school shooting" is clearly a misuse of that term. If you think that conclusion is bizarre, I guess I don't know what to say.
I feel compelled to add that I've never owned a gun in my life and most likely never will. I also fully support gun control. Believe it or not, I can hold all of these opinions at once without contradiction.
Liberal_in_LA
(44,397 posts)Doctor_J
(36,392 posts)We're basically Columbia with better TV. The gun problem is a particularly grotesque manifestation of the fact that we are as of now a failed experiment in self-governance
Donald Ian Rankin
(13,598 posts)There's no "at risk of", they already are.
America will probably not be able to reduce the rate of gun deaths significantly without repealing (or violating) the 2nd amendment.
America is not going to repeal the 2nd amendment.
So all you can do is grin an bear it, basically - it's not going to get better for the forseeable future.
I wish I could be more optimistic :-s
