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Yeah, that's why you have nothing to discuss when the actual topic comes up? I'm sure you're going to be just as precise and relavent here too.

I'd be less oncerned with the news media than the retards like Quentin Tarantino and his ilk who glamorize the cruel and macabre. The people who need it never learn from the news but everyone just has to see the latest gorefest to see who outdoes the last guy.
If anything fuels the imagination of these retards are the movies and media that glamorizes senseless violence.

   

Three fallacies I have heard on the shows that pass for news as of late:

1) If EVERYONE had access to guns on campus grounds then this would have been nipped in the bud.

2) The campus should have been on a LOCKDOWN as soon as they hear about the 1st shootings.

3) Had the current gun laws been enforced this tragic situation could have been averted.



I can only imagine what impact the first point would have on the University insurance rates across the nation. It would effectively bankrupt them overnight. Then there is the reality of creating more harm due to random incompetence. Even the most highly trained are not immune. Then there is the chance that with impulse you could have someone go postal and as they have a gun already and don't have the time to cool off...

The lock down issue is a knee jerk talking point. There is no central communication on a campus except maybe facebook. Is there a need? Sure, but to then extend that argument of communication to crowd control over thousands within minutes to an area that has people randomly going to and from day and night is like asking the Titanic to stop on a dime. It's just not feasible within the time frame presented.

Lastly, the only law that was broken (besides murder) was concealment. He bought the gun legally and there were no checks or wait period. It was harder for him to get a drivers license or a green card. The laws are virtually non-existent. I know that when your on the road driving as fast as you can just because you can would get a lot of people killed and there has been a lot of mass killings with guns. Not saying accidents can be avoided outright all the time but there has to be some reasonable restraint. We have speeding limits on a highway for good reason.

   

Yes,

But what's wrong with that? We would put him out on his own of course (he'd be a high-level threat to our boys) and just see how many he kills before someone drives a car bomb into him.

   

It will help alright.. help people get more desensitized and future gunmans going; "Ah! Chains! Never thought of that."

   

I thought it was a bang on analysis. Soldiers coming home on leave or when, or rather IF, the war ends you will probably see a large increase of violence. Soldiers developing traumas or psychic illnes, from what they have experienced in war, migth go out "in a blaze", as this young man did, to end their suffering. I'm not saying they will all become savage killers but soldiers become desensitized from war and some become cruel and even savage as a means to distance themself further from the suffering.
Some will end their lifes quietly while others won't. Thats the harch reality of war.

   

USA is a great country, where our kids are safe, where life is good.

Canada is like a big loft right on top of a really great party. (Robin Williams)

Some party, I think I'll check in that big loft and take a nap you idiot.

I love Canada.

   

You missed the point. He won't get anyone with people shooting back.

   

Except that, in and of itself, is a fallacy. People do not "snap", use a [insert object here] and go on a rampage before they 'cool off'. The people who do on rampages are those who lack the psychological faculties *to* cool off. Thousands upon thousands of inimate relationships end *horribly* every day. Thousands of people find out their partner was cheating every day. Thousands of people cry for days on end after leaving their significant others, but only a miniscule, microscopic fraction of these situations end in any sort of violence.

It takes a huge amount of provocation to get the average person to commit any sort of violence and the breakup of a relationship, even a long term intimate relationship is just not enough. The vast majority of people are cool enough so that it just doesn't happen.

The people who do commit violence during/after a breakup are those people who cannot take a step back and cool off. It's not the [insert object here] that magically turns well adjusted people into maniacal killers. These mass killers were disturbed to begin with and denying *everyone* [insert object here] because an abnormal person might use it is unreasonable.

There are better ways to decrease the likelihood (*nothing* will ever stop the most determined) of these events.

1) Identification. Find those who are disturbed and get them help.

In the US, just like all their health services, mental health services are abysmal. They just suck. Those who need therapy or counseling cannot get it until they do something extreme. So what happens? They get people doing extreme things. Sometimes those things involve guns. Bad situation.

In Canada, however, there is a *multitude* of mental health services available. There's free therapy available from the government if you need it. There are private organizations all over who also provide. No-cost counseling is available from both the college and university where I live. The people who need counseling get it *before* they do something extreme and as a result, fewer extreme things happen in Canada.

2) Certification. Want to buy a gun? You must be *this* sane to get on the ride.

Why do you think there has *never*, *ever* been a crime committed in the US with a legal privately owned automatic firearm? Why? It's because there are very strict criteria for who can own automatics. You can be denied owning them for having too many *speeding tickets*. That's one thing the US got *right* with its gun legislation. Their laws ensure that the likelihood of someone committing a crime with a legal automatic is so incredibly unlikely that it just hasn't happened.

Why do you think murders with legally owned firearms in Canada only account for a very small fraction of all homicides? It's because we've always had a screening program for firearms owners. It used to be called an FAC, now it's called a PAL. If you want to legally get a gun in Canada you have to a) take a course, b) pass a written test, c) pass a practical exam, d) submit to a criminal background check and e) (if you've been diagnosed with a mental illness) submit to your psych profile being examined. All of this X2 if you want a handgun.

It's no the objects that are dangerous, or should not be available. It's the users/citizens that need to have their mental heath taken care of and be properly screened and certified.

To modify an old turn of phrase: Guns don't kill people, people do, so let's make sure our people are taken care of and doubly sure for our people with guns.

   

What about the Virginia Tech massacre?US gun laws are so outrageously relaxed that the owners of the shop where he bought the guns from did a background check on him to see if he had mental health problems.

They obviously failed in this regard as he had been admitted to a mental health unit in 2005.

   

Though not as safe as they are in Britain or Canada where we can take our kids to school in the knowledge that there is almost no chance of them being massacred by a gun-toting maniac.

   

The only true restraint is that exercised by each individual. It must be taught and encouraged from an early age. It is the kind of restraint encourage in good martial arts programs.

   

I think you'll find you are wrong:


BBC News


Virginia gunman 'had mental care'

Police interviewed the gunman at length more than a year ago

The student who shot dead at least 30 people at Virginia Tech University was admitted to a mental health unit in late 2005, police have revealed.

Cho Seung-hui was sent for evaluation after two female students made complaints against him, they said.

The complaints were made in November and December 2005, around the time Cho's English teachers raised concerns over his writing and general behaviour.

Authorities have not yet linked the 23-year old to any of those he killed.

A total of 32 people died in shootings at two locations on the Virginia Tech campus on Monday.

Two people were killed at the West Ambler Johnston Hall, a university dormitory, before Cho killed 30 others, plus himself, at the Norris Hall complex across campus some two hours later.

Police say the same gun was used at both locations but have not definitely proved that Cho was at West Ambler Johnstone at the time of the shootings there.

Twin complaints

In the aftermath of the shootings, teachers and fellow students have spoken of Cho's moods, violent writings and unpredictable behaviour.

One of his roommates, Karan Grewal, told the BBC that Cho rarely spoke to those with whom he shared a three-room apartment.

"I figured he was pretty lonely, but not that he was angry in any way or he was capable of what he did."

Two separate complaints about Cho's behaviour were lodged in late 2005, university police chief Wendell Flinchum told a news conference.

But he said the two women who made the complaints were not among Cho's shooting victims.

However, Mr Flinchum did reveal that Cho was well known both to campus authorities and local law enforcement agencies.

"I'm not saying they were threats, I'm saying they were annoying. That's the way the victims characterised them, as annoying messages," he added.

In the first instance, Cho reportedly telephoned a female student and made direct contact with her.

Police spoke to Cho after she lodged a complaint, they said.

In a similar incident a month later, in December 2005, Cho reportedly made contact with another female student through instant messaging, leading to her complaint.

He was referred to a mental health unit outside the Virginia Tech campus on 13 December for evaluation amid concerns he was feeling suicidal, police said.

Private medical records from the mental health facility remain confidential, but Cho was referred back to university authorities for counselling after his assessment and had no further contact with campus police.

Around the same time, at least two of Cho's English teachers voiced their concerns over his behaviour and the tone of his work.

Cho's writing was moody and often involved themes of violence and death that alarmed Lucinda Roy, who was at that time head of the English department at Virginia Tech.

She removed Cho from regular classes and tutored him one-on-one after a complaint from another teacher.

"He was quite a gifted student in some ways, but he seemed to be very lonely and depressed," she said.

news.bbc.co.uk
--------------------


And he was STILL able to legally buy guns.

   

It's amazing how Americans, especially the pro-guns ones, mis-read, accidentally or deliberately, the Second Amendment.

This is what the Second Amendment says:



"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

Now the Second Amendment does NOT say that ALL Americans have the right to keep and bear arms at will. What it DOES say is this (looking at it more closely) -

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

So a well-regulated MILITIA is allowed to keep and bear arms in times of national emergencies, but the Founding Fathers didn't intend, or want, every American to keep and bear arms at will, and to take weapons with them into institutions of learning.

It's interest that most pro-gun groups only site the SECOND half of the Second Amendment:"The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

They conveniently omit the first half which says a WELL-REGULATED MILITIA is allowed to keep and bear arms.

In fact, most American courts DISMISS the idea that every American has the right to keep and bear arms. They've read the Second Amendment more carefully.

   

That's my point exactaly. The system they have for what we would call restricted and non-restricted firearms has far too many holes. Blaming the object because a faulty system allowed an unqualified person got ahold of that object is not the solution.

The system of Canada and even part of the system in the US shows that the holes can be plugged intelligently. That's the solution.

   

CNN says 22 dead now.
The radio is now saying it is a suspected terrorist attack - Dept. of Homeland Security is supposed to have sent an alert to schools across the country about it.

...of course they (MSM) are. I'm surprised that they haven't reported that the gun used came from Iran. 150 died in Iraq today, many more injured. Where is the shock and horror from the leftys on that one?

   

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