Seriously thoughtful The three mass shootings this month - are they related to the recession?

[pshrynk]

I don't own a gun, because, quite frankly, it's an expensive hobby and I'd rather spend money on electronic gizmos. I just want to make the point, again, that guns are more apt to cause death because the factors involved with the kinetics of guns leads to more spots on the body being more vulnerable than with knives, etc.

The crime rates in the US are due to sociological factors, amongst them acces to guns. Also included are the multicultural make up of a very large nation, crowding in cities, economic factors, and the "cowboy" mentality that pervades society, to mention just a few.

There are not any real upswings in rampage murders in economically hard times. They are just reported more fervently and blamed on the economy at that point. As has been pointed out, the guy in NYC was tipping over the edge to rampage murder for years. Too many factors to track to give it a sound bite explanation.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I think there may be a few more massacres in the news lately, but that is no reason to condemn our whole nation, Harry. I think if you consider the size and population of the US, you would see that we are not a nation of criminals and victims. Tens of millions of us live our entire lives happily without being involved in violence of any sort.

I'm honestly not condemning anyone, DixieGal - except, of course, the people who carry out these dreadful crimes. Just saying that I believe that there is a correlation between the high number of these tragic "mass murders" and the easy availability of firearms. That appears (to me, at least) to be a pretty self-evident thing.

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I'm honestly not condemning anyone, DixieGal - except, of course, the people who carry out these dreadful crimes. Just saying that I believe that there is a correlation between the high number of these tragic "mass murders" and the easy availability of firearms. That appears (to me, at least) to be a pretty self-evident thing.

But what about our US vs Europ personal crime ratio? Those examples were of attempted crimes without guns. Anyone with less moxie would have been victims. But no one with a gun has ever threatened us in our homeland.

[HarryT]

Rome is infamous for pickpockets. It's a purely local phenomenon within the city, which one doesn't find anywhere else in Italy. Like you, I always carry all my valuables in a security wallet around my neck when I go there. To do otherwise is just asking for trouble. Tour guides generally give very strong warnings to tourists there to "watch out". Generally speaking, though, I've found that cities are cities, no matter where in the world one is. One has to be "street smart". The people who generally run into trouble are tourists who leave their common sense at home and openly walk around with wallets sticking out their back pockets, and expensive cameras slung around their necks.

[Alexander Turcic]

Although Germany has a mandatory gun storage law, two weeks ago, there was what is now called the Winnenden massacre: 17-year-old shot 15 people dead, and then himself. The Time writes:

Europeans might once have viewed massacres at educational institutions as a uniquely American scourge, but they no longer have that luxury: Friday found Germany still mourning the 16 victims of Wednesday's carnage in Winnenden, while Scotland marked the 13th anniversary of Europe's first mass school shooting, the bloodbath at Dunblane in which 16 grade-school students and their teacher were mowed down by a lone gunman. Clearly, Europe has a problem to which there's no simple solution.

[HarryT]

It's perhaps worth noting that it was the public outrage at the Dunblane killings which led to the effective banning of handguns in the UK. People were so appalled by it that there was mass petitioning of Parliament which led to an Act of Parliament banning gun ownership within a few months. An example of the fact that public opinion can change the law. See here for more details.

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Please don't "invent" what you think I am saying, especially when it is totally wrong, as it is here. Of course this man was to blame for his actions. All that I am saying is that it is highly improbable that he would have been able to kill 13 people had he not had access to guns, but was forced to use, say, a knife. Guns are not "responsible" for crime, people are; but guns can certainly make the consequences of crime a lot more horrific than they would otherwise have been.

Not true, Harry. As mentioned below, many mass murderers have killed more than just 13 people at a go using something other than a gun. You assume that the only weapon available to him would have been a knife. Big assumption.

Now, how many people have been killed in mass murders by bombs, just in the UK and Europe? More than 13 at a pop in several instances?? Are you all certain you have adequate controls in place for those weapons?? Where was all that public outrage after the 7/7 bombings? Did you all ban the possession of the items used for making those bombs??

Be honest now ..... did you?? And, please don't give me that crap about how if it's politically motivated it's not mass murder.

You do realize, don't you, that if you don't mind killing yourself in the blast, it only takes about a half an hour to build a pretty damn effective bomb? It's also much cheaper than a gun.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Violence is an inevitable result of: People having disagreements; feeling that they are either not being treated equally by others, or are superior to others; and being of a different constitution for every unique individual, making for an incredibly wide potential of responses to any situation.

For every person who goes over the top, grabs a weapon and massacres others, there is someone faced with exactly the same problems, who straightens their shoulders and fixes those problems to everybody's advantage. How many of the latter's stories do we hear of? Relatively few. But we hear about the massacres far too often.

About the only thing that keeps me from completely panicking about things like this is: Given the almost 7 billion people on this planet, and therefore the potential for so many to go over the edge, the fact that we hear so few of these incidents compared to how many of us there are, assures me that the overriding majority of humans on this planet are not like that.

But stress is stress... people are people... and in most cases, simply having a decent outlet, someone to talk to, or a place to turn to for help, would have kept quite a lot of these incidents from happening.

As complex (and potentially dangerous) as society has become, we as a society need to concentrate on providing appropriate relief valves for these stress-points, as well as better ways of identifying people who cannot handle their stress alone, and ways of engaging them to relieve that stress before it is too late. With all the effort we put into developing the latest cellphone or coolest SUV, we are falling down on the job of taking care of each other.

[HarryT]

I'm honestly not sure what point you're trying to make here, Ricky. Are you denying that someone who owns a gun and wakes up one morning feeling pissed off with the world is liable to do more damage to innocent people than someone who does not have a gun? Very few such people have either the desire or the expertise to construct bombs, I suspect, and most people who plant bombs do indeed do so to make a political "statement".

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I'm honestly not sure what point you're trying to make here, Ricky. Are you denying that someone who owns a gun and wakes up one morning feeling pissed off with the world is liable to do more damage to innocent people than someone who does not have a gun? Very few such people have either the desire or the expertise to construct bombs, I suspect, and most people who plant bombs do indeed to so to make a political "statement".

Anyone with the desire to kill as many people as possible will choose whatever weapon they think will get the job done.

It takes no expertise whatsoever to make a bomb. Please do try to get your head around that. None. No expertise. A pipe, some nails, and some very easy to access chemicals.

Several of the boys who have carried out school shootings here in the US also built and brought bombs along with them.

My point is, if you want to kill a lot of people, and you don't have a gun, you can still (very easily) kill a lot of people.

I remember a case here in the US where a guy woke up one day really pissed at the world, blocked the exits to a building and torched the place. He didn't have access to a gun ..... big whoopie. He still killed a lot of people. Or maybe they never died because he didn't have access to a gun??

People are creative, Harry. Especially people who want to kill people. Most especially people who really want to kill a lot of people. That's my point.

[pshrynk]

Well, I think that the case can certainly be made for the idea that in the US, the disaffected rampage murderers will use a gun or guns to carry out their rampage and in Europe that person is more likely to use a bomb. The fact that the disaffected gather themselves to marginalized political groups there and to the NRA here is part of the equation.

Note to NRA members -- I used your organization as a whipping boy only because using the Weather Underground would have been anachronistic and besides, they were disaffected, marginalized nut jobs back when guns were much more restricted and therefore used bombs. The NRA does a lot of good stuff, just like the ACLU. Part of a living, free society.

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Well, I think that the case can certainly be made for the idea that in the US, the disaffected rampage murderers will use a gun or guns to carry out their rampage and in Europe that person is more likely to use a bomb. The fact that the disaffected gather themselves to marginalized political groups there and to the NRA here is part of the equation.

Note to NRA members -- I used your organization as a whipping boy only because using the Weather Underground would have been anachronistic and besides, they were disaffected, marginalized nut jobs back when guns were much more restricted and therefore used bombs. The NRA does a lot of good stuff, just like the ACLU. Part of a living, free society.

Bombs are becoming much more common over hear, psyhrynk. They are less expensive, and any disaffected six year old can build one.

People have been deluded by the notion that a bomb has to be some complex device with a timer that counts down in some dramatic way, and has all sorts of wires .... bullcrap.

Your basic explosive device can be made from a large plastic pop bottle and a bunch of brads or carpet tacks. Kids put them together all the time, because they like to see stuff "blow up."

If those kids become disaffected adults who blame others for their problems ... watch out.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

Bombs are becoming much more common over hear, psyhrynk. They are less expensive, and any disaffected six year old can build one.

People have been deluded by the notion that a bomb has to be some complex device with a timer that counts down in some dramatic way, and has all sorts of wires .... bullcrap.

Your basic explosive device can be made from a large plastic pop bottle and a bunch of brads or carpet tacks. Kids put them together all the time, because they like to see stuff "blow up."

If those kids become disaffected adults who blame others for their problems ... watch out.

Well, my point is that the availability of materials informs the method of violence. Kids who like to blow things up either go on to be gun collectors or med students, in my experience. The availability of guns here tends to push violence that direction. The lack of avilability else tends to push violence in the direction of political statement using large explosions.

[Xenophon]

Many common household implements in the US have higher death-tolls than firearms. These include:

• Automobiles (including trucks, busses, etc.)
• Five-gallon plastic buckets.
• The ever-popular "blunt instrument."

The US has more homicides that do not involve firearms than homicide by fire-arm. Even more oddly, when you consider killings involving legally owned weapons the numbers get quite small indeed. Most homicide by firearm involves violent criminal A killing violent criminal B -- a problem that has existed since long before the beginning of recorded history. They just didn't use guns back when Ug killed Og over the best part of the deer. You might not realize these things if all you see is news coverage, because the cases that don't fit that profile are the ones that get most of the news.

Should any of you choose to check up on these assertions, be very careful when reading papers on the subject. Nearly all writers conflate different kinds of problems (whether deliberately or not) and so produce exceedingly confusing statistics (as in "lies, damned lies, and"). For example, the CDC* reports on deaths of children involving fire-arms -- and you have to look really carefully to discover that their definition of "children" includes people below the age of 25(!)*, includes deaths of criminals in shootouts with police, includes deaths of policemen (who happened to be younger than 25), etc. And writings from other places (on both sides of the issue) are nearly as confusing!

If you read the literature, you must read very carefully indeed!

Xenophon

*I single out the CDC because that particular bogosity is easy to explain. Others are nearly as bad, but more subtly so. Further, I may well have mis-remembered the number 25 -- it might really be 21, or 20, or 22, or... but it was definitely older than 18.

[RickyMaveety]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Well, my point is that the availability of materials informs the method of violence. Kids who like to blow things up either go on to be gun collectors or med students, in my experience. The availability of guns here tends to push violence that direction. The lack of avilability else tends to push violence in the direction of political statement using large explosions.

I disagree that the lack of availability changes the motive. Lack of availability of one weapon just pushes people to choose different weapons. The choice of weapon does not make something a "political statement." It also doesn't make mass murder something other than mass murder.

I love it when people call mass murder a "political statement." A "political statement" is when I stopped voting Republican and told people about my choice. If I had decided to kill a few other Republicans to shut them up .... that would have been murder, not a statement.