Even the gunman's father of the latest college massacre decries the ease of access for guns.
"The father of the gunman who killed nine people at a community college here called on the nation to change its gun laws on Saturday, saying the massacre “would not have happened” if his son had not been able to buy so many handguns and rifles."
“How was he able to compile that kind of arsenal?” the father, Ian Mercer, said in an interview with CNN at his home in Tarzana, Calif. He said he had no idea that his son owned more than a dozen firearms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/us/death-of-gunman-in-oregon-college-shootings-is-ruled-suicide.html
You have to feel for the man. It's a terrible thing for your own son to turn out this way. And he's from England where they don't have many guns-even the police don't.
But the NRA and the GOP have decided to maximize the number of guns in society. And after the latest mass shooting-we have had 294 so far this year in 279 days-we get lectures on mental illness and even calls for more guns.
If everyone on campus has a gun this won't happen.
"Across the country, there’s so much concern for college students’ emotional safety that some schools add “trigger warnings” to novels and other texts. But in Texas, there’s so little concern for college students’ physical safety that concealed firearms will be permitted in classrooms at public universities like the state flagship here."
"This wasn’t the doing or desire of administrators and faculty at the University of Texas — most of whom, it seems, are horrified — but of conservative Texas lawmakers on a tireless mission to loosen gun restrictions whenever, however and wherever they can."
"To be or not to be armed in Shakespeare class? Your choice!"
"Guns in dorms? Just the ticket for a good night’s sleep!"
"Scores of students and faculty members gathered in the shadow of that tower around midday Thursday to protest the new law. Immediately afterward, when they returned to their computers or checked their smartphones, they learned of the latest massacre, on an Oregon campus, where a gunman killed nine people."
"The father of the gunman who killed nine people at a community college here called on the nation to change its gun laws on Saturday, saying the massacre “would not have happened” if his son had not been able to buy so many handguns and rifles."
“How was he able to compile that kind of arsenal?” the father, Ian Mercer, said in an interview with CNN at his home in Tarzana, Calif. He said he had no idea that his son owned more than a dozen firearms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/us/death-of-gunman-in-oregon-college-shootings-is-ruled-suicide.html
You have to feel for the man. It's a terrible thing for your own son to turn out this way. And he's from England where they don't have many guns-even the police don't.
But the NRA and the GOP have decided to maximize the number of guns in society. And after the latest mass shooting-we have had 294 so far this year in 279 days-we get lectures on mental illness and even calls for more guns.
If everyone on campus has a gun this won't happen.
"Across the country, there’s so much concern for college students’ emotional safety that some schools add “trigger warnings” to novels and other texts. But in Texas, there’s so little concern for college students’ physical safety that concealed firearms will be permitted in classrooms at public universities like the state flagship here."
"This wasn’t the doing or desire of administrators and faculty at the University of Texas — most of whom, it seems, are horrified — but of conservative Texas lawmakers on a tireless mission to loosen gun restrictions whenever, however and wherever they can."
"To be or not to be armed in Shakespeare class? Your choice!"
"Guns in dorms? Just the ticket for a good night’s sleep!"
"It gets better, by which I mean more surreal: The law, which was passed four months ago, will take effect on Aug. 1, 2016. That’s 50 years to the day since one of the first and most infamous mass shootings at an American school, the beginning of a bloody tape loop. It happened right here, at the University of Texas at Austin, where an engineering student climbed to the top of the iconic tower in the center of campus and, for an agonizing hour and a half, sprayed the surrounding area with bullets, killing 14 people and injuring more than 30."
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-guns-campuses-and-madness.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=opinion-c-col-right-region®ion=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region
I mean is this really the society that we want? I can feel safe in the grocery store only if I'm packing heat? Maybe a shooter decides not to shoot up the store because he figures the shoppers and cashiers have guns?
I mean is this really the society that we want? I can feel safe in the grocery store only if I'm packing heat? Maybe a shooter decides not to shoot up the store because he figures the shoppers and cashiers have guns?
Yet this is the bizzaro reductio absurdem tread mill were on. More guns not less.
Yet again conservatives pointed out that the killer was taken out by a gun. Right by a Police Officer with a gun, not someone off the street.
It's one ting for the police to carry guns with them, but do we want a society where everyone carries a gun with them just in case they get in an argument with someone else who carries?
I saw on some gun right's website they were complaining about him being called a Republican, pointing to his love of the IRA as very anti-Republican. In fact the author of the piece I read refused to refer to him as "him" and instead used "it." The rightwingers have also latched onto the shooter's picking out Christians to shoot in particular. The interesting thing though is that from the description of what this lunatic said to his victims, he thought they'd all be together later that day ... I suppose in heaven. In other words religious magical thinking wasn't leading him any closer to sanity.
ReplyDeleteIt occurred to me later what comment I should have left on that website: "Nobody can deny that the shooter was a "gun enthusiast."" Lol. (c:
If I had a news show and I felt like being a bit of an ass about it, I think I'd refer to the shooter as "the Republican gun enthusiast." At the very least, with ANY of these shooters, they can truthfully be called "gun owners." But then I'm sure there are those out there right now calling him an "anti-Christian" mass killer. I shouldn't stoop to their level.
In fact, in keeping with referring to the perpetrator anonymously, perhaps the media should in general always just refer to these shooters as "the gun owner" or maybe "the rampaging gun owner." That's 100% true.
And keep in mind that I'm one too (a gun owner) and my "arsenal" is about the same size as this loon's was. However, it's very difficult for me to share any sense of political affiliation with my fellow "gun enthusiasts" though. In fact, I'm kind of a lack luster enthusiast these days... having not been up to the range more than once in the past two or three years... and then only to let a coworker and his wife try out a few guns (I didn't even fire one myself... I was too cheap to pay the range fee for myself, ha!).
There is at least one good thing about the "more guns = more safety" insanity every time something like this happens... at *least* it means the people promoting this concept haven't gone as far down the delusional rabbit hole as someone like radio host and conspiracy nut Alex Jones, whom I'm sure is saying this is yet another "false flag" attack by the government to discredit gun owners.
ReplyDeleteAt the very least if you're saying we need more guns to protect against this kind of thing it means you probably don't buy into the Jones false flag delusion. You at least have enough clarity to know that this IS an actual problem.
Sometimes I like to imagine a technological fix to this in the future. Assume we don't do anything about gun laws, but at some point it's economical to outfit just about all public places with devices that can detect when a deranged lunatic is about to go on a gun rampage, and neutralize him before he can start. Not necessarily kill him, just neutralize him. That'll be the point at which guns have become utterly obsolete as a weapon.
That would be an interesting situation, because the true gun nuts say they need their guns to remove tyrants, but if their weapon is so useless that every kindergarten class has a device to neutralize their toys, then that argument will be out the window. But then again, if that were actually the case, then we wouldn't have a gun problem.
Well, I guess we'll just have to let the bodies of the innocent pile up until that day arrives... I hate to say it, but the next lunatic gun owner with a grudge is probably already reading and rereading all about this latest rampage... building courage for his or her own soon to be rampage.
What really galls me are the people who say that this kind of thing never happened when we had prayer in school. Don't let anybody tell you that Mike, because the worse school massacre in US history happened in the 1920s... when prayer in school was going strong:
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
Thanks for arming against that read herring about prayer in school. LOL.
ReplyDeleteThose trying to make this about Christians ignore he also hated blacks and the government.
The Sheriff in the county this happened was actually a Sandy Hook Truther.
Maybe the only good news is that more and more people are absolutely frustrated.
You as a gun owner certainly sound so.
It's just absurd to keep doing the same thing we always do-rap about mental illness. or even say we should buy more guns and then the same thing happens again.
The idea that as a society we can only be safe if we're all packing is dystopian in the extreme
"The idea that as a society we can only be safe if we're all packing is dystopian in the extreme"
DeleteBut it plays into the 8-year old male's fantasy of cowboys and secret agents and and (these days) "call of duty." How dare you even THINK about threatening to take that fantasy away!!!
That's what's so upsetting about the delusional... it's their fantasy world they're protecting. I think this Krugman piece (on energy) fits right into that:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/05/opinion/paul-krugman-enemies-of-the-sun.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fpaul-krugman&action=click&contentCollection=opinion®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection&_r=0
He's suspects that today's GOP doesn't want to hear about wind and solar for no other reason than it reminds them of the fantasy world of climate denial they live in. And here's where religion comes into play (in my view)... the whole idea that we're supposed to respect people's fantasy worlds is front and center. Lefties who adopt this view mean EVERYONE else's traditional fantasy worlds (though they be mutually exclusive). Righties of course mean just our "traditional" fantasy worlds (which of course they think they are the proprietors of)... including the fantasy that it's traditional (when in fact half the fantasy changes as rapidly as right wing entertainers find new topics to outrage their audience about).