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"A Tragedy... of Monumental Proportions."
There will be plenty of "rapid responses" to the gun rampage on the Virginia Tech campus, which has claimed the lives of as many as 31 students -- making it the deadliest school shooting incident in the history of the United States.
Do not doubt that the National Rifle Association is preparing its "this-had-nothing-to-do-with-guns" press release. The group has no compunctions about living up to its reputation for being beyond shame -- or education -- when it comes to peddling its spin on days when it would be better to simply remain silent. But the NRA will not be alone in responding in a self-serving manner. Many groups on all sides of issues related to guns and violence in America will be busy making their points, just as many in the media will look for one dimensional "explanations" for what the university's president, Charles Steger, has correctly described as "a tragedy... of monumental proportions."
"The university is shocked and indeed horrified," explained Steger, after it became clear that what had happened on his campus Monday was worse the carnage at Columbine High School in 1999 or at the University of Texas in 1966.
The trouble with shock and horror is that it does not often translate into contemplation, let alone serious reflection on the state of a nation in which such an incident can occur -- and, more troublingly, in which no one can suggest that the killings were unimaginable.
The first question, appropriately, is: Why did this happen?
The second question, equally appropriately, is: What should we do about it?
There is is a simple answer to Question No. 1: America is a violent country.
Unfortunately, simple answers lead to simplistic responses. If America can do nothing about its violent streak, the NRA will argue, it is silly to place limits on gun ownership. Better to arm everyone, the argument goes. Or better to allow the "concealed carry" of weapons. Or, well, you get the point -- anything to avoid taking a piece out of the profits of the corporations that manufacture and sell deadly weapons.
By the same token, the notion that banning those weapons will end the violence has become a a tougher sell. Shocking and horrible rampages occur in countries with stricter gun laws than the U.S. No, they do not happen as frequently. But they do happen.
Conversely, in some countries where gun ownership is relatively high, incidents like at Virginia Tech are far less common.
We ought to wrestle with these contradictions and complexities.
But where to begin?
Here is a modest proposal: Instead of adopting a particular line, rent Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine."
Of course, there are those who will not be able to see beyond their rage at Moore to recognize the value of this particular film.
Moore's 2OO2 film remains the best popular exploration of violence and the gun culture in America. And, despite what the film maker's critics would have you believe, it is a remarkably nuanced assessment of the zeitgeist.
Moore's purpose was to offer an explanation for why the Columbine massacre occurred and to examine the broader question of why the U.S. has higher rates of violent crimes than other developed nations.
Moore certainly does not let apologists for the gun industry off the hook. But he does not stop there. "Bowling for Columbine" explores the role that America's mad foreign policies and obscene expenditures on weapons of mass destruction might play in fostering a culture of violence. Most significantly, Moore takes a serious look at the way in which American media, with its obsessive crime coverage, creates a climate of fear in this country -- a climate that actually ends up encouraging violence.
After the movie came out, Mary Corliss wrote in Film Comment: "Moore makes the mind swim with the atrocities and poignancies on display. 'Bowling for Columbine' should be mandatory viewing."
That was true in 2OO2. It is ever more true today.
John Nichols' new book is THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT: The Founders' Cure for Royalism. Rolling Stone's Tim Dickinson hails it as a "nervy, acerbic, passionately argued history-cum-polemic [that] combines a rich examination of the parliamentary roots and past use of the 'heroic medicine' that is impeachment with a call for Democratic leaders to 'reclaim and reuse the most vital tool handed to us by the founders for the defense of our most basic liberties.'"
Copyright © 2007 The Nation
39 Comments so far
Show AllI highly recommend Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine. Does anyone know of other movies that explore the issue of gun violence in America?
Also please remember that this type of violence (and more) is happening each day in Iraq.
The people in Iraq being killed are also students, teachers, brothers, sisters, etc...
Violence is not the answer no matter what the issue is.
A Tragedy of Monumental Proportions? Nope, I hardly think so. Of the ultimate for the friends and family, certainly. Those who stood, faced death and did not die will also carry that injury with them forever. This event though is more like a Hurricane, Tornado or Lightning....there are too many of us in too small a cage and some of us are armed. It is a given that these events will go on happening now and then with nothing much being able to prevent them. Weapons? That cat is out of the bag, Christians everywhere will not stand for being unable to wield instruments of death whenever they feel like it. Our society does little or no teaching about how to deal with problems other than to kill. Until that changes, hold onto your hats, folks.
Of great interest is the fact that the shooter is a South Korean national and presumably was divorced from the typical US enculturation/socilization experience. Further, not knowing the typical South Korean eqivalents makes any sort of easy analysis impossible. And having read a detailed description of the shooter's actions raises even more questions. Meanwhile, a real Holocaust continues in Iraq, and every bit as premeditated.
Personally I was creeped out by Bush's initial response to the shooting in which he defended a citizen's right to bear arms. By the afternoon the spin doctors had clearly knocked some sense into him and he changed his statement to reflect the horror and gravity of this tragedy. Usually criminals are gifted with a silver tongue. He officially goes down as the most insensitive and inarticulate president in history.
For those families and friends that lost their loved ones, it is indeed a tragedy, but let us not forget that Iraqis have had days like this every day since March 20, 2003.
There may be some connections between increasing violence in the world on many levels and on many fronts.
US national leaders who promote invasions, violence, torture, the killing of half a million innocent Iraqi civilians (including children) and similar activities don't exactly contribute to an atmosphere of peaceful problem-solving.
Food for thought on this at:
"Events at home and overseas trouble our souls: New directions provide opportunities"
PopulistAmerica.com
October 13, 2006
http://www.populistamerica.com/events_at_home_and_overseas_trouble_our_souls
The Boomtown Rats I Don't Like Monday's Lyrics
"The silicon chip inside her head
gets switched to overload
and nobody's gonna go to school today
she's gonna make them stay at home
And Daddy doesn't understand it
He always said she was good as gold
And he can see no reason
Cos there are no reasons
What reasons do you need to be shown
Chorus:
Tell me why
I don't like Mondays
I want to shoot
The whole day down"
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2trpvq
I think it might be significant that this was an English major shooting up the Engineering department. The endless repitition of the concept that a person's comercial value is their only value probably cracked the shooter.
I wonder how long it will take Lou Dobbs to start ranting about the alien menace, how did this man get a visa, who is guarding the borders, etc? My bet is he will wait a judicious one day and then look out, the hatemongering is going to go through the roof.
Yes, the shooter was a South Korean student, but in the 1990s wasn't there a international student who also went on a rampage at the University of Iowa in the physics department?
When I was an international student in the US I was shocked to see magazines for mercenaries, classmates who went hunting, and bullets for sale at the nearest gas station. It doesn't take much to understand that in a country with guns and ammo being so available that shooting rampages are going to occur.
The NRA bears a great amount of the responsibility by preventing gun control.
I've already seen threads implying that the shooter was a north korean mole. Anti-immigrant response is widespread. Insanity.
Juan Cole mentioned on PBS News Hour that this is SOP in Iraq - yet nobody seems to get all that upset - in fact, it's not even reported here! I guess it's okay to kill all those 'other' people - just like in Nazi Germany! They simply don't matter, do they?
As for 'Bowling for Columbine' - I found that movie disgusting, ignorant, and offensive. I can't imagine what anyone would see in such a screed - what a piece of ugly propaganda!
The Iraqis are fighting back because they are armed - you will never be free if you can't defend yourself. That's how European countries fell so easily to Hitler - their guns were all registered and the Nazis confiscated them. I don't think my mother ever went near a gun before the Nazi occupation - some people have to learn the hard way. My biggest worry is that we don't have big enough guns - or nearly enough ammunition. How would we defend ourselves? Half our population doesn't even know how to load a gun, let alone shoot one. That's the really scary part of all this - not that a few wackos go off kilter now and then.
As for the 'gun violence' in the US - that's mostly on account of economics and domestic violence - drug dealing and misogyny. Those are social/cultural problems and have nothing to do with gun possession. Canadians have as many (or more) guns per person as we do - they aren't violent. It isn't about guns - it's about a racist/supremacist/misogynist culture. That has more to do with ignorance, religion, and fear than anything else.
Gun manufacturers, tobacco companies, the weapons industry, the people who write internet porn and television scripts and video games of nonstop murder and mayhem, these guys are simply merchants. They are neither good nor evil, just growths built into the social organism and programmed to feed and survive. That is what was so satisfying about Michael Moore's movie - that it recognized that while we might be disusted by the gun trade (which merely profits from our group psychosis) we do not hold them to be the root cause of our problem. I'm glad to see that commentators are connecting the dots to Iraq. Certainly the rest of the world is doing so.
As the thousands who congregate for the World Social Forum attest, ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE. Just imagine all the amazing things people could do, if the things associated with art, culture, beauty, grace, finding common ground were instilled instead of team sports, divisons, me versus you, hierarchies of imagined superiority based on race or gender or religion or ethnicity. Jesus said you can't pour new wine into the old wineskins, and all these traditions hold mankind hostage, deadlocked into tragically redundant ideological feedback loops. And those who are poets, mystics and metaphysically oriented have been shut out of conversations, like the wise Indigenous shaman, the Grandmothers who in councils came to decisions because they valued life, and thought ahead to the impacts their present activities would have on future generations. Every people has something to teach, to bring to this incomprehensibly complex web of life. Religions tend to get fundamental and want everyone to line up and do it ONE way. They turn off the innate creativity and stymy true expression. Not everyone can handle that subjugation of the fundamental self, so we have obesity, drug addiction, gun crime, porn addicts, gamblers, those who LIVE by and through sports, those who live for $ and things, those who have to have alcohol daily, and about 30 million taking anti-depressants. The model sucks the life out of the living and those most sensitive, or unbalanced or at the fringes go off like loose canons and we pretend they are the exceptions. Wow. What must the masters think of this experiment called human life these days?
Contrary to this article and popular belief, America is not a "violent country." Sure, our leaders love killing from far and above, but most violent crimes on our streets are committed by the very desperate - the equivalent of a Muslim whose house was destroyed, family blown apart, friends arrested. Nothing left to lose.
America is a country of people who WANT to be violent but who lack the balls. On Sept. 11, a few brave men and women on one plane took action. Those on the other three planes? Scared of a box cutter. A BOX CUTTER!
Americans are used to "watching" fake "heroes" save the world from "evil" on a scale never encountered. Nearly every "action" film features gangs of well-financed WHITE MEN emptying their heavy arms on the streets in broad daylight as part of some insane scheme that couldn't possibly succeed in the "real" world. That has happened exactly once, and the cops were out-gunned, and there were no "heroes." After 10, 20, 30 years of such nonsense, it's easy to see why so many Americans see danger around every corner. And it's also easy to see why they usually do nothing in the face of grave danger - they're sure Bruce Willis will show up any moment.
When was the last time a bomb went off in your neighborhood? Do you know anyone who was robbed at gunpoint within the last six months? Has anyone on your block been a victim of a "home invasion" since they've moved in? How many children have been kidnapped in your community? Ever see 4 black SUVs skid up to a jewelry store and open fire? Any serial killers next door? (side note: there are 10x more serial killer films/tv than actual serial killers.) Wait - here's an easy one: every been in an actual fight? Better: have you ever raised your fists to defend the defenseless?
No, America is not a violent country. It just imagines - even wishes - that it is.
Yes, I agree with John Freeman and Steve Hammons. Well said. Honorable Bush is not exactly an example of a peaceful, diplomatically inclined, man. One hundred fifty-one people were sentenced to death while he was governor of Texas. To that achievement, we may now add all the killing he has been presiding over since the Fall of 2001. Nor are the neoconservatives who hold important positions in his administration men and women of peace. Violence is etched in their genes.
" Does anyone know of other movies that explore the issue of gun violence in America?"
Nathan, I recommend the movie Elephant, by Gus Van Sant. It is a work of fiction but it is very haunting.
Frank I agree with you here when you say "America is a country of people who WANT to be violent but who lack the balls". I oppose the argument that we fail in stopping young people who feel alienated from going into schools and killing loads of people. I think it is amazing the number of people who DON'T go into a school with an AK and reek havoc. What we should be doing is making sure that when someone is not reached - and we will always have people who feel alienated and have no support system to help them - that we do not make their only option a huge stockpile of easy to obtain, rapid fire projectile weaponry.
Frank, speaking of balls, your sexism is appalling. America is a VERY violent country to women. What's the latest statistic, how many women are raped every hour? How many wives beaten? How many children abused? How much VERBAL abuse or hate speech (includes listening to idiots like Rush Limbaugh), how much vicarious violence in aggressive sports, in road rage (which kills 40,000 a year, some of that, arguably is inclement weather-related), how much self-abuse as alcoholism, drug addiction, suicide, etc. US has one of the highest murder rates in the world and that's with 2.2 million incarcerated (arguably many for non-violent drug related offenses).
On violence as a prevalent ethos in the United States and on its relationship to other aspects of the life and ways of this nation, let us listen to the words of one of the United States' military's higher ups, Major Ralph Peters, a member of the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the author of such novels as "Twilight of Heroes," and, most relevantly on this occasion, a professional of violence. All the passages cited below are drawn from his paper "Constant Conflict," published in "Parameters" (Summer 1997), pp. 4-14.
"We have entered an age of constant conflict. [...] Those of us who can sort, digest, synthesize, and apply relevant knowledge soar, professionally, financially, politically, militarily, and socially. We, the winners, are a minority.
For the world masses, devastated by information, they cannot manage or effectively interpret, life is 'nasty, brutish . . . and short-circuited.' [...] We are entering a new American century, in which we will become still wealthier, culturally more lethal, and increasingly powerful. We will excite hatreds without precedent. [...]
He who warns of the "clash of civilizations" is incontestably right... .[...] More men and women will enjoy health and prosperity than ever before, yet more will live in poverty or tumult, if only because of the ferocity of demographics. There will be more democracy--that deft liberal form of imperialism--and greater popular refusal of democracy. One of the defining bifurcations of the future will be the conflict between information masters and information victims. [...]
Contemporary American culture is the most powerful in history, and the most destructive of competitor cultures. [...]
Our cultural empire has the addicted--men and women everywhere--clamoring for more. And they pay for the privilege of their disillusionment.
[...]
The films most despised by the intellectual elite--those that feature extreme violence and to-the-victors-the-spoils sex--are our most popular cultural weapon... . They feature a hero, a villain, a woman to be defended or won--and violence and sex. Complain until doomsday; it sells. The enduring popularity abroad of the shopworn Rambo series tells us far more about humanity than does a library full of scholarly analysis. [...]
We use technology to expand our wealth, power, and opportunities. The rest get high on pop culture. If religion is the opium of the people, video is their crack cocaine. [...]
As more and more human beings are overwhelmed by information, or dispossessed by the effects of information-based technologies, there will be more violence. [...] The have-nots will hate and strive to attack the haves. And we in the United States will continue to be perceived as the ultimate haves. States will struggle for advantage or revenge as their societies boil. Beyond traditional crime, terrorism will be the most common form of violence, but transnational criminality, civil strife, secessions, border conflicts, and conventional wars will continue to plague the world, albeit with the 'lesser' conflicts statistically dominant. In defense of its interests, its citizens, its allies, or its clients, the United States will be required to intervene in some of these contests. We will win militarily whenever we have the guts for it.
There will be no peace. At any given moment for the rest of our lifetimes, there will be multiple conflicts in mutating forms around the globe. Violent conflict will dominate the headlines, but cultural and economic struggles will be steadier and ultimately more decisive. The de facto role of the US armed forces will be to keep the world safe for our economy and open to our cultural assault. To those ends, we will do a fair amount of killing.
We are building an information-based military to do that killing. [...]
The informational dexterity of our average middle-class kid is terrifying to anyone born before 1970. Our computer kids function at a level foreign elites barely manage, and this has as much to do with television commercials, CD-ROMs, and grotesque video games as it does with the classroom. We are outgrowing our 19th-century model education system as surely as we have outgrown the manned bomber. In the meantime, our children are undergoing a process of Darwinian selection in coping with the information deluge that is drowning many of their parents. These kids are going to make mean techno-warriors. [...]
Hollywood is "preparing the battlefield," and burgers precede bullets. The flag follows trade. [...] the image of US power and the US military around the world is not only a deterrent, but a psychological warfare tool that is constantly at work in the minds of real or potential opponents. [...] Everybody is afraid of us. They really believe we can do all the stuff in the movies. If the Trojans "saw" Athena guiding the Greeks in battle, then the Iraqis saw Luke Skywalker precede McCaffrey's tanks. Our unconscious alliance of culture with killing power is a combat multiplier no government, including our own, could design or afford. We are magic. And we're going to keep it that way. [...]
The advent of this new information age has opened a fresh chapter in the human struggle for, and with, freedom. It will be a bloody chapter, with plenty of computer-smashing and head-bashing. [...]
The next century will indeed be American, but it will also be troubled. We will find ourselves in constant conflict, much of it violent."
You may read the entirety of this barbaric gem at http://carlislewww.army.mil/usawc/parameters/97summer/peters.htm.
If this is a tragedy of monumental proportions, then what is this?
Tuesday: 104 Iraqis, 3 GIs; 51 Iraqis Wounded
Updated at 7:02 p.m. EDT, April, 17, 2007
Although there were less attacks today, at least 104 Iraqis were killed or found dead and another 51 wounded in violence. Security forces reported killing 25 suspects during operations in Suwayra. Also, three U.S. servicemembers were reported killed, and British base in Basra also came under attack; one British soldier was wounded.
America, what a lame excuse for a country.
Misanthrope (a fine name, incidentally), I second your intervention.
You want to study gun violence join the Marines.
You want peace study HR 808 for the creation of a Department of Peace. Don't get caught up in making the passing of this legislation as the main end to your means. Look for where you already act as an agent for peace within the legislation and then network with people acting in other divisions of the Department of Peace. If the government ulimately comes to us fine, but until then live and lead from the glory of the vision of peace. Martin went to the mountain top and saw the glory of the other side of humanity, so can you.
Peace Be With You and All.
Meanwhile, a real Holocaust continues in Iraq, and every bit as premeditated.
Karlof,
Can I suggest you don't use the Holocaust.
Frankly, I am sick and tired of American so called progressives who don't have and problem with destroying their colleagues lives; with spending their miserable days kissing dirty, smelly a-ses of the rich and powerful; with people dying in the street without health care etc.; and with using the greatest? (one of the greatest? tragedies) when they feel like.
No decency, no scrupple, no compassion. Pure evil.
The 33 student massacre at Virginia Tech is tragic. However, we must not allow it to be a diversion of our focus and concerns for the Iraq war, where we have been losing that many brave veterans every two weeks for over four years--not to mention those maimed for life and the hundreds of innocent Iraqis that die each week from this war.
yes
But I still don't understand this gun love (beyond me), as I don't understand lack of trains and lack of health care, the "rich are rich because they deserve" mentality and several other things.
I offer the following as a different perspective on WHY things like this are happening:
An extraordinary, enlightened teacher named Maitreya, who will soon appear before the entire world and speak on TV, has offered his insight on reasons for such seemingly random murders. His predictions and teachings have consistently pointed to the underlying reasons why mankind is suffering, and He offers new solutions to such problems. In fact, His guidance brings great hope to a world in need of drastic change.
Aside from powerful energies now streaming into the planet(which can "tip" psychologically imbalanced people into violent actions), we are also smothering our society with greed, commercialism, and neglect of people's basic needs - both physical and psychological needs. According to Maitreya, it is complacency which contributes to the severe imbalance and consequent destructive actions:
"People whose balance in mind, spirit and body is fragile can be tipped over the edge by the disturbance of atomic patterns. Motiveless murders are the result. One of the primary causes of our spiritual crisis, Maitreya teaches, is complacency — the root of all evil in the world.
Wherever there is complacency, he [Maitreya] says, there is the seed of corruption, chaos, confusion and ultimate destruction. Complacency is not outside us, but inside, a mentality that can be summed up as: I'm all right, Jack."
http://www.Share-International.org
Oh no
Actually, I am afraid it is a dangerous BS (yes I am not familiar with his teaching). I am familiar, however, with history and human nature. I am afraid that people like Ma.. divert attention from real need to create societies where imperfect human beings can live without killing each other.
It has become clear to me today that in addition to there being too many guns, there are too many people in authority who don't read. I abhor guns. While those of us opposed to guns slog away trying to persuade people to this position, we can take such interim measures as reading the analytical reports that were produced at least after Columbine and after Taber, Alberta, and learning from them. If Canada can have an organization such as the Canadian Centre for Threat Assessment and Trauma Response whose staff travel the country training school boards about how to prevent these kinds of violent incidents from happening, surely this kind of service ought to be available in the U.S. and elsewhere.
Instead of continuing to repeat the same errors over and over again, why not find effective ways to reduce killings such as at VT. Effective training of administrators and staff of educational institutions would be a good beginning.
A mind as damaged and fragile as the mind of this latest shooter absorbs cruelty and negativity like a sponge. Let's look past the gun issue for a moment. Our culture is so steeped in rage and the thrill of the kill and lust for revenge that I am suprised that more of us are not raving lunatics who look at human beings and see shooting targets; a parade of plastic ducks at a county fair shooting gallery. We get it from the President on down - the horrible example to young people on how to get power in this world - kill people - using guns or bombs or whatever you have to.
The deaths of the innocent in Virginia and Iraq is enough cause to make us all weep - if we have any feelings left. It would take a extraordinarily strong person to resist the urge to accept and internalize this American climate of violence, and this unhappy shooter was not strong.
We had better stop all this - those of us who still hold onto their sanity - and somehow turn all this around and make peace with each other. Time is running out, folks. Our souls - not just our physical bodies - are on the line.
America and probably most of Europe and Asia suffers from its own brand of sickness. It's a sick society, where the slightest hiccup in your plight toward perfection and ultimate satisfaction might throw you into a desperate despair. How do we know that the English Major (Patient?) wasn't just distraught because his latest essay wasn't good enough, or that he might not be William Shakespeare? That doesn't cause people to go berserk? No? How about Japanese students who hang themselves for not passing exams? Or people who sideswipe and kill motorists for blocking them out of the passing lane?
We as a people are fixated on the perfect path through life, but there are none. If we could just learn that it's quite acceptable to sit under the kumquat tree and feel the breeze -- not to win the Nobel or Oscar, get the Ph.D. or M.D., or be Tom Cruz.
I've had the opportunity to go to a place outside the sickness. At least for me, while I'm there, I'm immune to it. It may not work for you, and your place may not work for me. When I return I can feel the tension return, right in the airport. It's on people's faces, in the rigidity of their gate. It's the sickness of our society, and until we get rid of it the Iraq's and Virginia Tech's will continue to stalk us.
It's a senseless loss of life. The man was disturbed and would have carried out his plans in some capacity be it with a gun or machete... Perhaps with fewer casualties but it would have happened nevertheless. Only the NUMBER of deaths is greater, the tragedy remains the same. Gun control is no more than yet another cop-out for where a country, culture and world failed an entire generation. This is no time for partisan politics and "I told you so" lobbyist attitudes. But the bickering continues with little change or hope for my peers. The problem is at the heart of human society and blame lies in each and every one of us. So to my parents: Thanks for leaving me this fucked up planet! :)
Lpenek,
You made a good point. I do think that this country (and maybe Japan) are affected more than others, because this society is much more ruthless (there is more too loose –including life – no health care), much more competitive, much more insecure. The kids are terrorized from prenatal care into believing that if they don't spend every moment pushing, self-promoting etc. they won't succeed in life, i.e. they won't become rich, powerful and famous.
Lpenek,
I always ask a question: "Where are the religious leaders? How can a Christian, for example, know whether or not he/she is successful?" The question is rhetorical; I know well that most of the so called religious leaders spend their days kissing dirty, smelly a-es of the filthy rich.
Thank You ArmyBrat . . .
Here are some words I remember from John Lott and mixed in my own. Let the conversations begin . . .
What do you do when the police can't protect you?
Time and time again we have been faced with the fact that "Gun Free Zones" do not work. Here we have another school invaded. Last month in Utah we had a Shopping Mall invaded. Before that the University of Washington . . . do you really need me to list them all?
Gun-free zones may be well-intentioned, but good intentions are not enough. It is an understandable desire to ban guns; after all, if you ban guns from an area, people can't get shot, right? But time after time when these public shootings occur, they disproportionately take place in gun-free zones.
It is the law-abiding good citizens who would only use a gun for protection who obey these bans. Violating a gun-free zone at a place such as a public university may mean expulsion or firing and arrest, these are real penalties for law-abiding citizens. But for someone intent on killing others, adding on these penalties for violating a gun-free zone means little, if still alive, this person faces life in prison.
Unfortunately, instead of gun-free zones ensuring safety for victims, these laws only makes things safer for attackers.
The recent University of Chicago study that examined all the multiple-victim public shootings in the United States from 1977 to 1999 found that when states passed right-to-carry laws, these attacks fell by 60 percent. Deaths and injuries from multiple-victim public shootings fell on average by 78 percent.
Attacks still occurred, they overwhelmingly happened in the special places within right-to-carry states where concealed handguns were banned. This latest event is again a good example of this. Kansas with its newly passed Right-To-Carry law has seen a remarkable decline in crime.
There is absolutely no evidence that there are any more accidental gun deaths that occur from right-to-carry laws. Permit holders also tend to be extremely law-abiding. Consider what is required in order to get a Right-To-Carry Permit. FBI background check, state law enforcement background check, training and gun handling requirements, legal law classes and a list of requirements that only attracts law abiding citizens.
Not only did the gun-free zones fail here, but there is an even simpler point to make. It is the physically weakest, women and the elderly, who benefit the most from having a gun to protect themselves. The U.S. Department of Justice's National Crime Victimization Survey has shown for decades that resistance with a gun is by far the safest course of action when one is confronted by a criminal.
Good intentions don't necessarily make good rules. What counts is whether the rules ultimately save lives. Unfortunately, too many rules primarily disarm law-abiding citizens, not criminals.
armybrat-
"The Iraqis are fighting back because they are armed - you will never be free if you can't defend yourself."
So we are comparing US of A, with Iraq - The Land of Freedoms with a country which has been in turmoil since it was put together. I also want to know whom you're defending against in the US? The closest countries that may attack us are Canada and Mexico. Other than that there is this terrorist threat but Bush has apparently taken care of by installing his colormeter on CNN and Fox. So apart from conducting a coup against your own government, I do not see whom you're defending your freedoms against. Stop this charade - the argument does not make sense. You are living in 2007 not 1807 and the law of the land isn't "might is right!"
The only thing substantial that came out of your post was that "it's about a racist/supremacist/misogynist culture." The current violent scenario is a mixture of all the social evils that breed within our culture. Banning or regulating guns will not put an end to the violence but it will definitely reduce the volatility of the situation. We've had high school kids with guns, university literature nerds, snipers shooting at pedestrians, drivers shooting at cops, even the Vice President accidentally shooting a 70 year old man - the list is endless.
And before anybody says "gun-free" culture doesn't work - please look into the statistics closely. Comparing the stats on "violent crimes" in europe versus US is not a logical method of looking into the problem. If you look at homicide rates in the US and compare them to even countries where law and order is literally absent, US comes up with an alarmingly high number. In spite of all this gun supporters will still say "its not guns but people who kill!"
Spartanladkenny -
Excuse me, but I've lived in Europe - and I won't ever live there permanently - too much fear and anxiety. I don't lock my doors, my vehicles (or hide the keys), or fear for my life in the US. You can twist statistics any way you want. I know what happend there all too well. I've lived all over the US and the world - everything is relative.
As for who we are defending ourselves from - that should be obvious, as it is to most conservatives - our own government is our worst enemy, not some poor shmuck that hasn't a clue as to why MOABs are falling on his head. Maybe you should check out what happened to all those crazies in the Michigan militias - you do remember Timothy McVeigh, don't you? Ah, that's right - he didn't use a gun so he doesn't count. Well, do you know who Eric Prince is? Blackwater? Why were they in New Orleans - straight from Iraq???
As for Iraq and the US - which one has been at war longer? Which is really more violent? Who has killed more Iraqis - Saddam or Bush? Which country has slaughtered more innocent human beings since its inception - both colonies of the ghastly murderous Brits? (who now disdain gun ownership - right, after they murdered half the world's populations!) Or is it okay if a nation slaughters mercilessly, but only wrong if one person is involved? I love that kind of 'sophisticated' thinking - excuse me, but your ignorance is showing.
US corporations kill a lot more people than guns in the US ever could - but that doesn't count, does it? Afer all, they're all undermenschen, aren't they? Just like the Iraqis, Afghanis, Palestinians, Latinos, etc, etc, etc. Give me a break. They wouldn't think twice about killing us either - Nazis, neo-Nazis - same difference. But you just go ahead and trip out and pretend 'it could never happen here' - pretend that banning guns will solve any problems (except for the fascist thugs). A lot of Jews thought the Germans would never go that far either, after all they were Germans too - unfortunately, they're not here to inform you. Hope you have your own cyanide capsules ready. Some people would rather fight than meekly walk into the showers.
Karlof1
"Of great interest is the fact that the shooter is a South Korean national and presumably was divorced from the typical US enculturation/socilization experience. Further, not knowing the typical South Korean eqivalents makes any sort of easy analysis impossible. And having read a detailed description of the shooter's actions raises even more questions. Meanwhile, a real Holocaust continues in Iraq, and every bit as premeditated."
Before making a statement as ignorant as this, you should know that the kid had lived in the US since 1992. He was also 8 when he first moved here, I am sure that is plenty of time to for 'enculturation/socilization' to take place.
To the people who think arming everyone is a solution: is that really a world you want to live in? Where there is some kind of hideous mutually armed detente? Where when Suzie smiles at you in the morning you're left wondering whether she thinks that if she didn't you might have shot her? I don't know; I don't think I want to live in a world of Wyatt Earps and Doc Holidays, where I'm one of them, strutting my gun laden chest down the street. God, there's got to be a better solution than that!
lpenek
frankly, we have a bigger problem
There are 47 million of uninsured, but nobody knows now many millions have died because of lack of access to health care.
Dying from cancer in the street of New York isn't probably fun.
But, of course, there is silence, silence, and overfed liberals are blabbing about respect for KKK and white supremacists.