In Response To The Shooting Today in Colorado

...I donated $20 to Gun Owners of America.

Yeah...I'm an asshole.

No, you'd be an asshole if you donated to the NRA. The antis aren't giving anyone a break to mourn, why should we? It's all such knee jerk reaction, and utter bullshit to boot. I understand the anger but banning weapons isn't the answer, it's like banning sports cars because cars kill people and sports cars kill more. If you can be trusted with a weapon, you can be trusted with any weapon. Plain and simple. if you can't you can't. regulate the people who can have them and their actions with them, not the item itself.

This will be a rough one to defend. He bought all the guns legally, parts of them were illegal under the old AWB, he bought 6000 rounds of ammunition online. I'm not saying I agree with them, but the antis have a very strong case to make on this one.

Progurt wrote:This will be a rough one to defend. He bought all the guns legally, parts of them were illegal under the old AWB, he bought 6000 rounds of ammunition online. I'm not saying I agree with them, but the antis have a very strong case to make on this one.

No they don't, again, like jared lee laughner and the Tuscon shooting the suspect showed signs of mental illness beforehand. This is just another clear case of the failure of both our mental healthcare system and enforcement of the laws already on the books.

That's a valid argument to make, I'm just saying that trying to look at it from a neutral perspective, they have a very strong case for at least two things, a return of the AWB, and restrictions on buying ammunition online.

Police chief: Suspect bought over 6,000 rounds of ammunition through Internet

Authorities in the Colorado movie theater massacre found an AR-15 rifle drum magazine Friday capable of carrying 100 rounds, and the police chief said thousands of rounds of ammunition for various weapons had been bought online in the weeks prior to the shooting.

Police took suspect James Holmes, 24, into custody Friday after they say he set off two devices and sprayed the theater with bullets from an AR-15, a 12-gauge shotgun and at least one of two .40-caliber handguns police have recovered. Investigators are confident that Holmes acted alone, police said.

Aurora, Colorado, Police Chief Dan Oates said Friday night that Holmes had purchased four guns at "local metro gun shops," and bought over 6,000 rounds of ammunition through online transactions.

gendoikari87 wrote:No they don't, again, like jared lee laughner and the Tuscon shooting the suspect showed signs of mental illness beforehand. This is just another clear case of the failure of both our mental healthcare system and enforcement of the laws already on the books.

Bingo!!

The right-wingers are going to claim that this tragedy could have been prevented if more citizens had been legally armed in the theater. The only problem here is the guy was wearing kevlar. Most common carry calibers wouldn't have stopped a kevlar vest.

The liberals are going to claim that it's too easy to get guns. That's also bullshit for many reasons everyone on this forum is familiar with. The real issue is our lousy corporate healthcare system and that asshole Reagan who began the whole deinstitutionalization movement in the 80s. Lots of mentally ill folks were thrown out of hospitals under the lie (inspired by hacks like Thomas Szaz) that "there is no such thing as mental illness." We're reaping the bitter fruit of that policy.

The question, then, will become whether or not he showed any outward sign of mental illness before this happened. If not, then our argument won't work very well either.

I used to work at a call center called Teleperformance. A number of my coworkers also used to work there. One of the training managers who had worked with some of my friends and coworkers, but who came there after the time I worked there, later moved out to Colorado. On Thursday night, he died when he was shot three times shielding his girlfriend with his body. The bullets that killed him were fired semiautomatic from an AR-15 originally designed for the military, using a 90 round drum that had previously been illegal to sell under the AWB. Now, even if our argument is the correct one, how can I as a decent human being make that argument to people who now have a dead friend and colleague?

Events and actions like this have consequences. Especially in a democratic society. Will the majority of people accept our argument that we need better health screening, that this attack would have been deadly no matter what weapon the killer used, or will they also demand some measure of restrictions? And if the majority does want restrictions, how will the people on the right-wing see that? Particularly the ones claiming this was a transparently obvious "false flag" attack orchestrated by the Obama administration with the intent of intimidating the people into surrendering firearms rights?

Things are going to happen as a result of the killings in Colorado, things that we aren't going to like.

I don't know what the answer is. Gendo's right about the lack of concern about mental health in this country. But considering the stigma attached to people with mental health problems in this country, I don't see any advances in improving mental healthcare coming anytime soon.
As far as the usual Right Wing response- arm more people- this has worked on occaision but the danger of hitting bystanders probably prevents a lot of gun carrying people from firing.
That and the fact that your first instinct in a shooting situation is to get the fuck outta there.

And the fact that he was wearing a Kevlar vest.

I don't call this neutral:
(link deleted, WTF!!!!)

The New Yorker published an online editorial, One More Massacre by Adam Gopnik. Check it out when you have a chance.

Gopnik falls back on the same repetitive arguments that he himself complaints about.

Xela

Xela wrote:I don't call this neutral:
(link deleted, WTF!!!!)

The New Yorker published an online editorial, One More Massacre by Adam Gopnik. Check it out when you have a chance.

Gopnik falls back on the same repetitive arguments that he himself complaints about.

Xela

Apparently something coded in the forum automatically removed your link. It was not, as far as I know, intentional, and I'm working to get that fixed.

Edit: Looks like something was preventing *users* with less than a week of membership from posting messages. I... think... I fixed it.

The antis are clamoring hysterically about " assault weapons" and stereotypes about CCW holders- even though a CCW holder was involved in anyway.
The same old shit about not knowing wtf you are talking about- the weapon was first described as an AK ( of course ) by the press, then there's a crowd of upper class soccer moms describing the AR- 15 as a weapon " designed solely for the purpose of killing people" ( oh, the horror! ), dumbass liberal bloggers calling magazines " clips" ( " clips" just has a nice Hollywood ring to it, doncha know ), etc, etc, etc.
This is what drives me crazy about liberal democrats- they attack the symptom and not the disease. Until you address the class divide in this country, with all of its attendant evils of bigotry, poverty, and lack of opprotunity, there will always be violence, on a massive scale, in our society.
The democrats, being hopelessly compromised by their alligiance to big business, will never come close to resolving the inequality in our society.

I've also been annoyed by the right wing nuts claiming that a few CCW holders in the theater would have resolved the whole thing. There are some shootings where that might be true. For this one, the guy was wearing Kevlar and the theater was full of tear gas and he had the only gas mask. Yeah... no.

Progurt wrote:I've also been annoyed by the right wing nuts claiming that a few CCW holders in the theater would have resolved the whole thing. There are some shootings where that might be true. For this one, the guy was wearing Kevlar and the theater was full of tear gas and he had the only gas mask. Yeah... no.

Typical American approach to the problem. Pick a pre-programmed response and stick to it without compromise, no matter how dumb it is.

I have to agree with some. I think one of the motives of this were to highlight how futile it is to stop this. He had bombs so the "well if he didn't have guns this wouldn't have happened" argument is moot. The more guns/ccw crowd are foiled by the tear gas, kevlar and a crowded theater. and he seemed fairly normal before hand so the mental health argument, while the best, might even fall through for this incident.

Progurt wrote:

Xela wrote:I don't call this neutral:
(link deleted, WTF!!!!)

The New Yorker published an online editorial, One More Massacre by Adam Gopnik. Check it out when you have a chance.

Gopnik falls back on the same repetitive arguments that he himself complaints about.

Xela

Apparently something coded in the forum automatically removed your link. It was not, as far as I know, intentional, and I'm working to get that fixed.

Edit: Looks like something was preventing *users* with less than a week of membership from posting messages. I... think... I fixed it.

Thanks Progurt. Link: Gopnik

The comment at the top of the page when I read it was a really good one:

My thought is that evil will find a weapon to unleash its fury. In the Aurora case, two main weapons of mass destruction were in play: guns and bombs. Some of the bombs were made with materials commonly available. So, if we outlaw guns, do we later ask ourselves why criminals caught with guns are not following the laws? What criminals follow laws? Do we outlaw bomb making material? Sorry, no more fertilizer for your garden since we do not know if you really have a garden. Unfortunately, bad things happen to good people by various means. Do we really have the means to deter all possible avenues in which evil may be unleashed? We all want to be problem solvers, prevent evil and when evil occurs, find a rationalization and dream up preventive measures. While I applaud this spirit and do not advocate giving up in despair, evil lurks in the minds of seemingly sane and insane people. Let's figure out how to have a society dominated by more of the former and less of the latter.