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Va. Tech: People Kill People -- With Guns
On Sunday, the National Rifle Association wrapped up its 136th annual convention in St. Louis. Sixty-thousand attended. NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre fired up the crowd, telling them, "Today, there is not one firearm owner whose freedom is secure."
On Monday, one of those owners shot more than fifty students, staff and teachers at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. Thirty-two of them died, the worst such massacre in American history. So much for their freedom.
At that same St. Louis meeting -- amidst sessions on African big game hunting, "methods of concealed carry," and quick draw competitions -- Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action, chillingly warned of an event remarkably like Monday's shootings. Warned, not because of the bloodshed or the anguish it would bring the bereaved families, but because such an incident would give gun control advocates "a green light to do it all," by which he meant, he said, "gun bans, gun registration, gun owner licensing, gun rationing, taxes and fees."
Cox callously declared that for those in favor of stricter gun laws such a tragedy would be "the Hail Mary of their playbook." Hours after his remarks, innocent victims lay dying, shot down by a maniac with a pair of handguns.
Frankly, I wish Cox were right about at least some of what he propagandizes as the vast power of the gun control lobby. How many times do mass killings such as what happened in Blacksburg, Virginia, have to occur before we get it through our thick, wired for the Stone Age skulls? For that matter, how many times do people have to write a column like this one decrying the insanity of gun violence in America?
And how many times do we have to put up with NRA bullies and loudmouths screaming about the right to bear arms? You can have your guns for hunting and collecting and skeet, trap and target practice. Hell, you can have a permit for a gun to protect your business or home, even though it's 22 times more likely to kill a member of your family than an intruder. But the rest?
Let's face it, the reality is that NRA officials have a much broader agenda than most of their four million members probably realize. At its root is opposition to government regulation of any kind. They mention the United Nations as an alien force almost as often as those black helicopter loons in Idaho. Former UN Ambassador John Bolton was even one of their convention's guest speakers, inveighing against the perfidy of international arms trafficking treaties.
Maybe here in New York City we're more hyper on the issue. Thirty years ago I had a handgun pointed at me during a robbery on a Manhattan cross street. It got my attention. And don't start with me, suggesting that if I'd had a gun I could have fought back. More likely, I'd be dead.
Friends have had similar close calls. And a month ago, just a few blocks from my apartment, two unarmed auxiliary policemen were gunned down by a lunatic not unlike Monday's campus killer.
As for Virginia, well, to modify their tourist slogan, the state is indeed for lovers -- of firearms. "Having a gun is not a liability in this state for a politician," George Mason University politics professor Mark Rozell explained to the Washington Post last month. This was after an aide to the state's new junior senator, Democrat James Webb, was arrested with a loaded handgun and ammunition, entering a US Senate office building. He said the gun belonged to Webb.
The senator is "clearly committed to the Second Amendment and has a gun close by when he is in Virginia," Virginia Commonwealth University political scientist Robert Holsworth told the Post. Senator Webb, a former Marine marksman, proudly showed off his carry permit during last year's election campaign and received an NRA approval grade of "A."
The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence gives Virginia a grade of C- on legislation preventing gun violence (New York State gets a B+, Mississippi an F). Virginia has no law requiring gun registration, although a permit is needed to carry a concealed weapon. If you buy firearms from a licensed dealer in Virginia, you have to pass a criminal background check, but there is no such rule for buying weapons from unlicensed dealers at gun shows, a loophole both congressional and state legislation aim to close (the bills are vehemently opposed by the NRA).
The Virginia Tech killings will be blamed on a variety of things, just as Columbine was. Regardless of the true motive, some will suggest that the shootings were an aberrant incident timed to mark the anniversary of Columbine, Waco, Oklahoma City -- even the 1775 Battle of Lexington and Concord and Hitler's birthday -- all of which took place at this time of the month. Or that if this young murderer is, as the Chicago Sun-Times was reporting Monday night, a Chinese national on a student visa and not an American, it somehow doesn't count.
Polling indicates that although a majority of Americans favor stricter gun control, they tend to blame such senseless massacres more on a poor family upbringing and the dark influence of popular culture than a lack of sensible gun laws. There's some truth to that, of course. The argument also will be made that regardless of the law, a lunatic or criminal can get hold of a gun.
Yet take a look at a study released last fall by Johns Hopkins' Center for Gun Policy and Research. In 1999, a gun store in the Milwaukee area was found to be the leading seller of guns in America that later turned up in the hands of criminals. The shop cleaned up its act, observed the laws and there was a 44 percent decrease in new guns going to local bad guys. According to Daniel Webster, the study's lead author, "Increased scrutiny of the few gun dealers linked to the most crime guns has the potential to significantly reduce the supply of new guns to criminals in many other US cities." (According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, one percent of licensed dealers are responsible for more than half the guns recovered from criminals.)
We have some 200 million, privately owned firearms in America, 65 million of which are handguns, the primary purpose of which is to threaten, hurt and kill people. Every year, there are 30,000 gun deaths and 300,000 gun-related assaults in this country. All of this violence costs America an estimated $100 billion a year. Toys are regulated with greater care and safety concerns.
Over the next days and weeks and months, there will be much wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth and rending of garments but what will be done? If the past is any guide, the majority who favor stricter control will in all likelihood be shouted down by the vitriol, and the electoral and lobbying money power, of the well-armed few. Oh well, we all too probably will say. Until the next time. And the time after that. Unless we make a noise. Now.
Sadly, perhaps the person with the sanest, existential perspective on all this was Jamal Albarghouti, the Virginia Tech grad student who shot the cell phone video that has been seen on all the networks. What was he going to do next, an anchorwoman asked him. "Get on with my life. What else can I do?" he replied.
"Of course," he added, by way of an explanation, "I'm from the Middle East."
Michael Winship is a Writers Guild of America Award winner and former writer with Bill Moyers.
Copyright 2007 Messenger Post Newspapers
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31 Comments so far
Show AllAssuming that handguns are made illegal, why would a War on Handguns be any more successful than the War on Drugs?
People do NOT kill people with guns. People kill people with BULLETS!!
A little investigation will reveal that there are millions of guns loose in the US and collecting them all is a technical impossibility. Guns are durable and can last a hundred years if kept dry and oiled. Bullets, or cartrige ammunition rather are a completely different matter. The explosives in ammunition degrade over time and eventually become unreliable and useless. If the Virginia shooter had had to repeatedly clear duds from his guns we would have more live students today.
I propose that we give up on gun control and engage in an immediate program of strict ammunition control. Ammunition is made by a handful of factories in the US and it should be easy to restrict or ban it's sale.
Keep your guns; I want all the bullets.
Interesting idea Pangolin. However, suppose all US ammo producers are put out of business. Might we just see bullets mixed in with all the coke and dope that crosses our borders? Again, I ask if the War on Drugs is such a failure (and it is), why would the War on Ammo be any more successful? We'd have a whole new class of people to put in prisons (the ammo dealers).
indeed...this is typical of the lazy mind...it's MUCH too hard to tackle the underlying social problems that cause the DESIRE to kill (barring the few truly mentally deficient murderers) which is the only precondition to these horrendous acts...guns, knives, home-made explosives (should we ban fertilizer in Oklahoma City?)...all can be used in the hands of determined sociopaths to cause widespread damage...lots of money in gun smuggling...and what types of people would be the ones buying them?
Floyd R Turbo, American, (Johnny Carson) made the observation that guns dont kill people, bullets do.
Chris Rock thought the solution for gun violence was making every bullet cost $5000.
"I would blow your f**king head off, if I could afford it."
The European experience demonstrates that when push comes to shove far more people are interested in altering their mental states than in maintaining a firearms stash.
Due to the fact that ammunition production requires both a machine shop and an explosives lab makes effective production of ammunition for casual use unlikely.
Pot, opiates and coke all come from plant matter of which the first 2 grow readily in most warm regions. Easily grown and processed wherever dirt, sunlight and water are available.
My personal opinion is that the right mix would be to decriminalize drug use and further criminalize possesion of unregistered ammunition. That mix in the Netherlands yiels a remarkably reduced murder rate.
one problem...we're talking about america...
The Gun culture is exactly that, America is known for it's liberty with guns, the idea that everyone in American is armed is a common one, given the number of guns held within the population is doesn't seem possible that you will be able to eradicate them, and given the current climate should you? With Blackwater et al, the cessation of your individual liberties and terrifying government unfortunately you may soon need them.
Perhaps an anthropological approach is needed here. Homo sapiens evolved the first hundred thousand+ years for the most part in small tightly-knitted communities in which violent psychotic or sociopathic individuals, etc. were probably well-known to the community, and probably there was strong pressure against it. Surviving against the elements, lean times, etc. required group cooperation -- not simply for getting a bonus at work: but raw survival.
Our modern culture, highly mobile and fostering huge cities, promotes more estrangement than a sense of community. And this goes straight to the top, to leadership itself. Our very way of life promotes sociopathic tendencies, in part because the self-determined responsibility of communities has been dumbed-down, supplanted, and claimed by the (always distant & somewhat abstract) State.
And consider someone like "Jack the Ripper" -- serial killers ply their psychosis with or without firearms. America, for instance, is just making that transition from a largely agrarian society even just 2-3 generations ago, to a more metropolitan one. Our government system is both primitive and corrupt, our society also has not had a chance to catch up with the rural depopulation that's been going on with the rise of the factory farm, demise of the family farm, etc. I've roadtripped thousands of miles across the US and can't begin to describe the number of near-future ghost towns I've seen.
Inany case, large segments of America simply no longer trust its own government, for that reason the gun control people won't get much traction beyond authoritarian ivory towers. Clearly, we need to focus on our communities, neighborhoods, and ask ourselves whether we have a broader break-down or lack of sustainability in our very way of life.
I am impressed to see that so many people here are not foolish enough to think that simple gun control is the solution here. Most posts here see the problem as far deeper and systemic.
I do not own and have never used a gun for self-defense, hunting, or even target practice. Murder (a much better word than "kill" in the VA Tech situation)will always be a problem no matter what sort of laws are made to outlaw the instrumentalities used to commit it.
Having just watched memorial service at VA Tech all I can say is that there are more important issues to attend to right now than dewbating gun, ammunition, or other controls. Maybe later but not now.
(22 times more likely to kill a member of your family than an intruder.)
That's totally false, the actual facts say different.
(The argument also will be made that regardless of the law, a lunatic or criminal can get hold of a gun.)
That is true it's happening even in Japan.
(According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, one percent of licensed dealers are responsible for more than half the guns recovered from criminals.)
Bust and jail them then.
(65 million of which are handguns, the primary purpose of which is to threaten, hurt and kill people.)
BS, I love shooting handguns at the target range, most handgun owners do.
Gun control will do nothing to stop violence which has already been proven. You will not find any valid scientific research which will prove otherwise. What can you do to stop violence like that which happened at Virginia Tech? There's nothing you or the government can do. The government can pass laws till we're all locked up behind bars and it still won't be able to protect you.
People like this author is nothing but fear mongers that wish to control other people's lives. Do not let people like him use fear to get control of you. That's how the fascist are starting to control this country.
Any way prohibition is the direct cause of most of the violent crime in this country. Not the crime committed at Virginia Tech just violent crime in general.
A vast majority of the firearms owners are decent people. Why should they be penalized because of one person? The areas where there is less gun control actually have lower crime rates than the areas with higher gun control.
I agree with Pangolin, and suggest the Chris Rock method of gun control. Just make the bullets $5000 each, and everyone will need to have a *really* good reason to want to kill someone with a gun.
Doesn't make sense -- reloading ammunition in an old practice.
Why is it that nobody is talking about the type of pistols used? Surely they were machine pistols....that is why he could shoot 50 people so quickly......why would anybody want to buy a machine pistol unless they were contemplating mass murder?
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.
Honest John
"Why is it that nobody is talking about the type of pistols used?"
I just can't - I am clueless.
:)
Why is the debate so easily turning into an either/or one ? Nobody's saying the measures to solve the underlying issues are not needed - for sure they are. There's no 100% solution anyhow, and these emotions will surface in many people at various points in time with various degrees of strength.
But say its just a temporary situation - the extreme anger or frustration or whatever (however irrational it may seem to us, to the person's mind it has reasons and is justified) - and if you're in that person's shoes, you'll pick the nearest stone and throw it at something. The feeling of power a gun provides might manifest itself as a possible "this is how i get back" outlet. Making guns easily accessible probably pushes a lot of borderline cases, or those that could be solved eventually, over the line too easily.
The blackmarket exists, but by definition its smaller, and the cops *can* go after it. Also, usage would never be quite as widespread off the blackmarket as it is off unquestioned purchases.
Why is that most of the rest of the civilised world accepts gun control as reasonable and appropriate but America doesn't?
After reading this article and the comments I had to look it up. Last year in England and Wales, even though guns are banned, they still had 50 gunshot deaths. Proof that gun control does not work. I find it impossible not to point out, after Bush asked the 16 year old opera singer from Wales, "What state is Wales in?", that those are both, in fact, countries.
You can't stop someone who is homicidal. And a gun isn't the only way to kill. Case in point the Happyland social club fire in The Bronx ,NY. Julio Gonzalez, 37 years old, a Cuban refugee set the club on fire on March 25, 1990 killed 87 people in the worst mass murder in New York state history. His weapon was about dollar's worth of unleaded gasoline, and a match.
All these claims that gun control does not lead to less deaths from guns is just so much hogwash.
Consider the following study:
http://www.guncite.com/cnngunde.html
and actual statistics:
"The study used 1994 statistics supplied by the 36 countries. Of the 88,649 gun deaths reported by all the countries, the United States accounted for 45 percent, said Etienne Krug, a CDC researcher and co-author of the article.
Japan, where very few people own guns, averages 124 gun-related attacks a year, and less than 1 percent end in death. Police often raid the homes of those suspected of having weapons.
The study found that gun-related deaths were five to six times higher in the Americas than in Europe or Australia and New Zealand and 95 times higher than in Asia.
Here are gun-related deaths per 100,000 people in the world's 36 richest countries in 1994: United States 14.24; Brazil 12.95; Mexico 12.69; Estonia 12.26; Argentina 8.93; Northern Ireland 6.63; Finland 6.46; Switzerland 5.31; France 5.15; Canada 4.31; Norway 3.82; Austria 3.70; Portugal 3.20; Israel 2.91; Belgium 2.90; Australia 2.65; Slovenia 2.60; Italy 2.44; New Zealand 2.38; Denmark 2.09; Sweden 1.92; Kuwait 1.84; Greece 1.29; Germany 1.24; Hungary 1.11; Republic of Ireland 0.97; Spain 0.78; Netherlands 0.70; Scotland 0.54; England and Wales 0.41; Taiwan 0.37; Singapore 0.21; Mauritius 0.19; Hong Kong 0.14; South Korea 0.12; Japan 0.05. "
The numbers speak for themselves...
Most people interested in politics don't seem to agree with me... BUT I THINK that guns, gays and abortion are issues for the idiot masses.
The laws should stay the same, only because we don't have time to worry about such trivial issues. When the earth becomes completely uninhabitable for human beings, will gun laws matter anymore?
marctileston April 18th, 2007 4:06 am
"After reading this article and the comments I had to look it up. Last year in England and Wales, even though guns are banned, they still had 50 gunshot deaths. Proof that gun control does not work."
First of all, England and Wales have NOT banned guns. Second, the US (with approximately 5 times the population) saw something like 12,500 gun-related homicides in the same year. How do YOU account for the disparity in rates of gun crime?
I agree with zenx and thanks orbit7er for the stats. The same stats can be easily found at the criminal justice website and the european report on crime.
There is no ultimate solution for guns. My friend (who owns 7 guns) was arguing yesterday with me that gun control will not solve the problem. What he and other gun lovers fail to understand is that the point is to reduce the deaths as much as possible. If England has a homicide rate of 2 per 100K people and US has 7 per 100K people then what we need to do is think of ways of reducing this figure. Banning or regulating firearms will not eliminate homicides but one can easily assume that we can get this figure down to 4 or 3 per 100 K. Even if you reduce this number by half we can save 100s or thousands of lives. Now THAT for me is a good reason to give up this freedom (which is also debatable.)
Most conservatives who own guns own lots of guns - and they are more afraid of a fascist government than anything else. Rarely are guns used for self-defense, although that's the way I've used mine. Europe was easily subjugated by Hitler because of gun laws - the Nazis simply went door-to-door with the registration list and confiscated all guns. I know because I still have the sidearm my mother carried - after the Allied liberation - and good thing too, because the Nazis came back in December. All of us kids learned to handle firearms from a young age and were taught that the government is our worst enemy - and lo and behold, we have a fascist government now. No way I'm giving up my guns - or registering all of them. Never.
Some of the arguments need revisiting:
1. The UK is a different society. They have a different set of issues and its hardly apples to apples. That said, the lower accessibility to guns must help get past 'anger flashes' without incident.
2. "A homicidal person will use other means, if not guns/People will get them anyway". This is like saying its ok to legalize drugs, cause there are anyhow soooo many ways you can screw up your lives. Yes I agree there are other means, and some of those cannot be controlled. But guns are one the high-impact ones, and can be controlled pretty easily. Yes people will continue to get them and kill people one way or the other, but for sure the incidence will be lowered.
3. "If everyone had a gun, someone would have shot back".
- More people will just die trying to resist muggings and other petty crime.
- Not everyone will ever be comfortable enough.
- A lot of trigger happy folk (and guns do have a making one's finger feel more twitchy) will accidentally let go in the wrong situation
- What does one need policing/cops/laws for ? The Nordic region countries are largely gun free in public life, and everyone walks around freely at any point of time. The more you create a need to 'defend yourself' inside your head, the more you'll see reason to defend yourself around you - suspicion and lack of trust in the person next to you is precisely where America probably does not want to go if such behaviour is to be reduced.
We live in a society where is as easy to buy guns and semi automatic weapons of mass destruction as it is to buy butter and eggs. The only purpose of semi-automatic weapons is to kill. The sale of these weapons must be stopped.
Armybrat
"they are more afraid of a fascist government than anything else"
Well conservatives who also support corporate america and all their trickle down theories are doing enough to turn this country into a fascist government. Neo fascism is a government structure which is deeply intertwined with corporations so much that its hard to distinguish between the two. Our government is already on its way to a fascist form of government privatizing every branch including the military. Very soon our government will be a military industrial complex with companies like blackwater and their mercenaries calling the shots. Thats when you will actually need your weapons. So instead of being worried about fascist governments and fighting them with pistols try to fathom the counter the power of these corporations by promoting free societies.
"Why don't you put all that energy into promoting universal healthcare - including mental health and dentistry"
The so called "Left winged nuts" ARE infact spending their energies on those problems as well along with civil liberties, racism, global warming, education, anti-war movement and every other evil in our society. Unfortunately the right winged lunatics are stopping them at every step with their money hungry agendas by voting for douchebags like Bush and Cheney!
The main reason that you can not win a war on drugs is that there is nothing wrong with marijuana, and people know it. There is something wrong with handguns though, and we need an education program to allow people to find out just how wrong it is to allow anyone to own one. In the case of cocaine and heroine, those are both highly addictive and we have way too little education available about their effects. Until we legalize marijuana the war on drugs is hopeless, because it continues the lie that there is something wrong with it. Note that just because something is legal does not mean that everyone will use it. I for example have never tried marijuana and never will either.