Millions of kids fear being killed at school. It's time for adults to say: enough.

[sharedvalues]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/millions-of-kids-fear-being-killed-at-school-its-time-for-adults-to-say-enough/2018/12/27/faa0cf62-0a06-11e9-88e3-989a3e456820_story.html



Anyone who buys guns or ammo is sending money to the NRA through gun company profits. And the NRA uses that money to lobby to allow American kids to get killed so gun companies can make more money.

If you buy guns, stop.
If you buy ammo, stop.
If you belong to the NRA, quit.

If you argue for anything besides restrictive gun control now, future generations will look on you as we now look on the Americans who fought against the civil rights movement.

We must confront gun violence in this country. To do that, we need fewer guns.

[gejohnston]

1. thanks media,

never mind that their odds of being shot is one in 614 million. Winning the Powerball is one in 279 million. On average per year, more kids die of brain injury or broken neck playing football.

[gejohnston]

3. My kids are adults,

What lowering gun regulations affected this? None. A number of failed policies, and the media contagion effect. After a school shooting in Germany, the media focus created a copy cat. Santa Fe TX was a copy cat, and a fan boy of, Columbine.
Why wasn't it a problem when there were no gun laws? When it was acceptable to make your own gun in high school shop class?
Don't put this at my feet. Look at the POS "sheriff" who knew that his deputies were total cowards and then the narcissistic incompetent had the balls to blame me on CNN? Fuck that. Never mind that officials swept several felonies committed by Cruz under the rug to make the county look crime free. Never mind that the "sheriff" nor the cowards who cowered in their armor will still collect their six figure pensions and retire because the courts have ruled that the police do not have any legal obligation to protect or aid anyone not in their custody.

Shall we discuss the countries with very strict gun laws but still have armed security, just like every synagogue in Europe? If the Pittsburgh shooter showed up in, say, Denmark or France, he would be faced with armed security armed with automatic weapons. Why? It happens there. If it is a Jewish school in Sweden, there are metal detectors, guards with submachine guns, etc. Why? It isn't because of their lax gun laws isn't it?

When I was a kid, we had fire drills, that's it. My state has no gun control laws to speak of, and the Gun Control Act was passed with I was in second grade.
Please spare me the bullshit.

Oh, and two thirds of school homicides are stabbings and beatings. Ever notice that the media and activists only seem to give a shit when it is mostly affluent white kids?

[sharedvalues]

5. This is all a load of distraction.

We need to focus on a simple principle, borne out by data and research:

Fewer guns means fewer people killed.



Its also useful to focus on:
Gun companies want more guns so they can make more money.


Similar circumstances as:
Asbestos
Tobacco
Leaded gasoline.


We are killing people so companies can make more money.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

6. Agreed; comparing guns to asbestos... is a distraction n/t

[sharedvalues]

9. Same profit motive--corporations wanting to sell deadly stuff to make money.

Asbestos and guns both kill people.
Asbestos and guns were/are lobbied for by corporations to make money.
Asbestos and guns both had paid corporate scientists trying to deny scientific truth.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

12. re: "...corporations wanting to sell deadly stuff to make money."

I don't think that corps aiming to lose money have much future. As to deadly stuff, that's not hard to find. I think medical mistakes are still much deadlier than firearms.

[sharedvalues]

13. Cool, you support asbestos AND guns!

I appreciate your servitude to your corporate overlords

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

25. Cool, you can make stuff up

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

57. re: profit motive

You mean like alcohol, right?

[gejohnston]

8. still not a valid argument

Actually, no such data exists and the "research" that claim this is done by non-scientists not trained in the scientific method and never appears in peer review publications in the relevant field. Ever wonder why they are published by internal house organs without peer review, anything done by Hemenway, or Dentistry Today?
https://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2004/12/17/naspanel

[sharedvalues]

10. Republicans stopped govt from funding research

Because the Republican vote depends on gun identity politics.
So Republicans stopped research on guns.

That’s all we need to know: guns are dangerous and the gun (child shooting) lobby is afraid of the research.

For those who are interested in good faith debate, the facts on gun research being stopped by Republicans are here:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100210272859

I’m sure a pro-gunner (pro-child death-er) will try to deny the facts about gun research above, but those of us who traffic in facts know the truth.

[gejohnston]

14. not true either,

the Dicky Amendment bans advocacy. Research has been and is still being done, your side doesn't like the results. Never blindly believe what some ideologue tells you.
https://www.nij.gov/topics/crime/gun-violence/Pages/welcome.aspx
This junk study is the main reason why.
https://guncite.com/gun_control_gcdgaga.html

[sharedvalues]

15. You're wrong. DU has discussed this at length

And you refuse to accept facts.
That’s your problem, not DU’s.
The facts are well explained in my link.

Have an excellent evening!

[gejohnston]

17. That's nice,

I read the actual law first hand.
https://www.congress.gov/115/bills/hr4573/BILLS-115hr4573ih.pdf

[sharedvalues]

19. Wrong. Read link above. Fewer guns, fewer dead kids.

Happy New year!

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

26. I've heard about some...

...cults and "churches" that make folks repeat stuff over and over and over and over...
I don't think that exercise makes it true. The member your exchanging with seems to working from "read-only memory". Changes are not permitted.

[gejohnston]

18. don't have any,

Why are there more shootings now in the UK than 50 years ago? There are almost no legal guns in Mexico and Brazil. There was a time when there no guns or shootings, yet London was worse than Detroit and Baltimore.
Show me a single country that has more guns, less restrictive gun laws than us. Then show me their murder rates.

[sharedvalues]

20. Read the link above. Fewer guns, fewer deaths.

It’s not our job to explain to you the facts.

Or read this link.

This is the truthful, thoughtful, real media. If you dont believe them, that’s on you, and you’re helping get American kids killed by spreading disinformation.

https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/2016/2/29/11120184/gun-control-study-international-evidence

[Straw Man]

22. From your link ...

The authors are careful to note that their findings do not conclusively prove that gun restrictions reduce gun deaths.

[sharedvalues]

23. Yup. You don't understand how the scientific method works.

That’s ok.
I’ll quote for you

First, and most importantly, that gun violence declined after countries pass a raft of gun laws at the same time: "The simultaneous implementation of laws targeting multiple firearms restrictions is associated with reductions in firearm deaths," the study finds.

You’re thin-slicing the effect of just a single law, and also misunderstanding how scientists define “proof “

[Straw Man]

24. Do tell.

You’re thin-slicing the effect of just a single law, and also misunderstanding how scientists define “proof “

What "single law" is that? The statement I quoted was in reference to their conclusions after they "systematically reviewed the evidence from around the world on gun laws and gun violence, looking to see if the best studies come to similar conclusions."

I understand what "conclusive proof" means, and I understand that they, by their own admission, did not achieve it.

[sharedvalues]

29. Read the article

Re single laws and effect on violence.

Summary: My quote says that multiple gun control laws, when passed near in time, CLEARLY reduce gun deaths.

[Straw Man]

39. C'mon now. I read the article.

Your conclusions go well beyond the claims of the researchers themselves. How many disclaimers do you want? Here's another:

In our conversation, Santaella-Tenorio was insistent that he and his colleagues have not "proven" that gun laws reduce violence. The data, he says, is simply too complicated, and the analyses too primitive, to come to such a hard conclusion.

[sharedvalues]

30. Good work. Canada is another good example

Canada has very restrictive gun laws. The laws restrict use and carrying, not ownership. So there are a lot of guns in Canada locked away, but few guns on the streets, and very few handguns and semi autos on the streets.

Voila: gun crime in Canada is very low.

This is all very obvious to people like you who argue in good faith.

Fewer guns, fewer deaths.

[spin]

4. Guns can be used for evil purposes or for good purposes. ...

Both my mother and my daughter successfully used a handgun to deter an attack by a much larger male. In both cases no one was shot and both attackers ran away when they realized their victim was armed. In my opinion legitimate self defense is an example of a firearm being put to good use.

I do agree our gun laws could be improved to better insure that only honest, sane and responsible adults can legally purchase firearms. I oppose banning and confiscating firearms legally owned by qualified individuals as has been suggested by some. My opinion is of course influenced by the fact that if my mother didn’t have a handgun that night when she was attacked, I might not be here to make this post.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

7. A gun is a simple tool

It's available to the person holding it for good or evil uses.
It isn't magic; it won't pull its own trigger; it won't cause evil on its own.
If you ascribe any of those powers to a gun, you're a simple tool.

[sharedvalues]

11. True. Guns can and are used to kill children.

That’s why the nation’s youth is rising up against the gun lobby.

That’s why patriotic Americans should rise up against the gun lobby: which aims to sell more guns so Republican gun CEOs can make more money.

[spin]

31. My daughter had recently graduated from high school ...

when she stopped the intruder breaking into our home by pointing a large caliber revolver at him.

The revolver might have saved her life as she was 5 ft 2 and weighed at the most 100 pounds.

[guillaumeb]

28. Please read reply #1

Yes, there are a relatively few instances where gun owners defend them selves, but people who live in houses where guns are kept also die at higher rates from gun violence.

Where is the balance?

[spin]

32. Research on the number of times firearms are used for legitimate self defense is ...

Last edited Sun Dec 30, 2018, 01:53 AM - Edit history (1)

hard to find. However there was a 2013 study that got little mention.

Apr 30, 2018, 08:00am
That Time The CDC Asked About Defensive Gun Uses
Paul Hsieh Contributor

Last month, I discussed the need for more robust and intellectually balanced research into gun use in the United States. In particular, I proposed that “Any Study Of ‘Gun Violence’ Should Include How Guns Save Lives.”

In particular, a 2013 study ordered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and conducted by The National Academies’ Institute of Medicine and National Research Council reported that, “Defensive use of guns by crime victims is a common occurrence”:

Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million, in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/paulhsieh/2018/04/30/that-time-the-cdc-asked-about-defensive-gun-uses/#3cc03cb5299a

[gejohnston]

35. actually not true,

but people who live in houses where guns are kept also die at higher rates from gun violence.

That study was actually debunked. It was done by ER doc named Author Kellerman that took millions from the CDC that produced a work that he refused to share the raw data and methods for peer review for five years. When he did, it contained too many statistical flaws. That is where you get the 43 times more likely. It went though several revisions.

Latest revision has renting and smoking pot are higher risk factors.
https://guncite.com/gun-control-kellermann-3times.html

It also has to be noted our "gun violence", is not evenly spread. For example, in 2014 54 percent of our 3007 counties had no homicides. Two percent of the counties had 52 percent all of the US's homicides. When you look at the 50 most violent cities in the world, two or three are in the US. Usually Baltimore, Detroit, East St Louis. While, Michigan and Missouri has had universal background checks since the 1920s, the other 48 are far stricter. What they have in common are poor infrastructure, abject poverty, drug gangs, and political corruption.

Relative to what? What is relatively rare that someone is killed in self defense, but it is important to remember there is a high probability of surviving a handgun wound and that most of the time the threat is neutralized with no shot fired. According to several criminology studies, as reviewed by the CDC, it isn't that unusual.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

38. Dr. Arthur Kellerman, stated:

"If you’ve got to resist, you’re chances of being hurt are less the more lethal your weapon. If that were my wife, would I want her to have a .38 Special in her hand? Yeah." (Health Magazine, March/April 1994)

[guillaumeb]

27. But with those odds, that undercuts the reason many give for owning guns.

Perhaps there are other reasons that are more important to gun owners?

[gejohnston]

34. It undercuts the need for cops,

because mission creep makes the cop the enforcer. You can argue that it undercuts the need for requiring staff to carry, but has nothing to do with gun ownership in general.

[krispos42]

36. Oh, this crap again.

More proof that propaganda works, I guess.

It's simply amazing how the NRA is at once all-powerful and also on the ropes and on the brink of dissolving. It's also amazing how there is absolutely no discussion about the merits of gun-control laws anymore. Like conspiracy theorist believers, there is a self-contained, fact-and-reason-proof bubble around the most ardent of gun-control proponents that works like this:

Anything a pro-gun-control group proposed is the very definition of "reasonable". It's reasonable because Americans can still own a firearm, even if it's a single muzzle-loading rifle that takes $10,000 and 10 years to get.

If you disagree, you're a Russian troll or trollbot, a gun nut, a gun fanatic, a paid NRA stooge, and/or a terrorist and little kids getting shot in school shootings is what you beat off to in the shower every morning.

This Group used to be fairly busy, with robust discussions about the pros and cons of various aspects and proposals of gun control.

Now the divide has gotten so great it's generally not a topic that is able to be discussed. The sides has simply decided that their position is right, anything challenging it is wrong, and that absolves them from the sin of having to think anymore. For example, the control side has now enshrined into their agenda that things they term "assault weapons" must be banned, and dismiss any analysis or discussion. The debate has never gone away because the definition of "assault weapon" is and always has been arbitrary and mutable, but pointing that out equals "NRA shrill" or whatever. So, it's simply been absorbed into the system of beliefs and no longer subject to scrutiny or debate.

So what can you do?

But here is, once again, my biggest worry: the pro-control side sees the violence problem in America as a hardware problem. This makes them do unhelpful things that a) don't help violence, b) do mobilize pro-gun voters, c) spend political capital on these things, and d) ignore the root causes of violence.

The rich and powerful don't want us to look at things, like drug legalization or the school-to-prison pipeline or privatized prisons or wealth inequality or gerrymandering or election fraud, that actually help to cause high rates of violence. Blaming the hardware means you don't have to look at the system, and not changing the system is exactly what they want!

Look how low their taxes are! Look how many lobbyists they can hire! Look how much influence they have! Look how much the Koch brothers have given to various causes over the decades to shift the politics to the right in this country!

Dammit, every week I listen to the Best of the Left podcast (among others) and I hear experts and panelists discussing the core structural issues with this country, and I want so badly to change them, to fix them. But there's this albatross hanging around the neck of the Democratic party and it's shaped like the 1993 Assault-Weapons Ban, and it keeps dragging us down!

300 lousy votes in Florida shifted from Shrub to Gore, we have President Gore. A few tens of thousands of votes in like 3 states shift sides in 2016, we have President Clinton instead of Twitler.



And now I'm getting the feeling that once again, this is going to somehow be Priority 1. Not investigations leading up to impeachment and removal from office. Not working on sane tax policy or the school-lunch program or empowering the EPA or renewing the Violence Against Woman Act... this issue again!

It's goddamn tiring. It's the illusion of progress, the comforting fantasy of "making a difference". And it doesn't help an iota.




And to shift gears slightly, maybe tens of millions of parents and teachers and school administrators need to stop telling tens of millions of school kids that TODAY COULD BE THE DAY YOU ARE MURDERED IN SCHOOL. That might help with the "millions of kids are terrified" problem. After all, they do fire drills, right? But do parents and such give the kids such dire warnings that millions of kids are terrified of burning to death in school?

No, they don't?

Hmmm... almost like they're trying to accomplish a political goal.

Look, have 2 drills: an evacuation drill and a security drill. One is to get everybody out of the building as quickly as possible in a safe and orderly fashion, and another is to keep everybody in the building and to prevent people from moving into or around the building.

Since there are various reasons that each drill could be used (gas leak, chem lab mishap, earthquake damage, tornado, nearby SWAT raid, riot) then just call them that: evac drill and lockdown drill.

[gejohnston]

37. What astounds me,

but first


What astounds me is when I drag out my list (GINI Index, food deserts, infrastructure, schools without heat, drug war etc that creates the gangs, etc) based on what I gleaned from criminologists and evolutionary psychologists. Depending on the the listener or reader, I'm either "far right" or a Marxist.
I'm not sure if this is a part of culture war or just a moral panic.

[krispos42]

40. It's focusing on the hardware

While hardware focus can help alleviate some forms of violence, by the time it comes time for hardware to be an issue there are already a number of factors in play, sometimes since before birth (lead poisoning, for example).

It's like treating motor-vehicle deaths strictly as a problem of how much horsepower a car has, or how many cars there are.

Yes, limiting horsepower or reducing the number of cars might have some effect if everything else holds steady, but it's not going to address seatbelt use, car safety design, distracted driving, DUI, road rage, highway maintenance issues, weather, etc.


And, thank you.

[sharedvalues]

43. No, I'd say you're just wrong.

You're wrong.

Because reducing guns via gun control means fewer people get killed. Period.
(Look at Canada. A lot like America. Strong gun laws. Many fewer shootings.)

So let's focus on that. Reduce guns. Pass strong gun laws. Save kids from getting killed. It's pretty simple.

[gejohnston]

44. ad hoc logical fallacy

and the same was true when their gun laws were about the same (until 1977, machine guns were restricted less than handguns, while we were the reverse).
Also, our cultures are not the same. Canada is UK and France light and culturally little like us. When it comes to GINI Index, race relations, etc. We are actually closer to Mexico than Canada.

[sharedvalues]

45. Non-sequitur fallacy. Truth: Fewer guns, fewer dead kids

Non sequitur: The Gini coefficient has nothing to do with this thread, except to the extent that wealth concentration means that GOP billionaires want to use the NRA’s gun identity politics to get votes for billionaire tax cuts.

You’re just throwing up unrelated chaff.

I know it’s painful to hear, but:

You’re wrong. Kids get killed in American schools because we have too many guns. Period.

I’m going to keep saying it because this is the core truth. Your efforts to distract are not working.

[gejohnston]

46. Wealth inequality

there is almost perfect correlation between violent crime and wealth inequality. That is true even down to the county and zip code level and has been well established criminologists and evolutionary psychologists. That is also why part of a city will be very safe while ten blocks over will be an urban Mad Max.

Identity politics is the domain of the far left and far right.

The consensus among criminologists is that there is no correlation between guns and crime. Any other view is denying science. Also, if we have more guns than anyone else, how come our murder rate isn't even in the top 100? Norway, Iceland, Canada, and Switzerland all have high gun ownership rates. It's easier to legally own a gun in any of those countries than in NYC or New Jersey, and we all know how safe Camden and Newark is. If you count the illegal guns, according to InterPol estimates, France has more guns than people.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4447485/

[sharedvalues]

48. False: let's focus on Canada

Canada has lots of guns, but they are HEAVILY controlled.

That’s why so few people get shot in Canada.

Canada doesn’t have an NRA that uses guns to make money for CEOs, and Canada doesn’t have a Republican Party that uses gun identity politics to get votes for billionaires.

The truth: if you buy guns or ammo, you’re helping get American kids killed.

[gejohnston]

49. wrong about everything as usual

Canada has mass murders, same as us per capita. The first school shooting was in Canada,
Canada doesn't have the gang problem we have. They even let 12 year olds to buy ammo.
Every country has an NRA, and the Conservatives do use guns occasionally to get votes. Funny thing about Canada, their crime rate rises and falls at the same rate that ours does.

Mexico has even stricter laws, as does Costa Rica and South Africa. Their murder rates astronomical compared to ours.

[sharedvalues]

54. False. The truth--Canada: few handguns on streets, few deaths.

It’s quite simple.
Gun control works. Canada is an example.

[gejohnston]

55. ad hoc fallacy

one third of their murders are shootings, and they don't have the gang and wealth inequality problems that comes with crumbling infrastructure and political corruption. They also don't have the population. Mexico, South Africa, and Brazil have almost no legal guns. Venezuela have no legal guns outside of Murdro's death squads. They wish they had our murder rates.

Actually, they have their share of illegal guns. Canada's crime rate was one quarter of ours when they had no gun laws at all, and was even when we were at our worst 20 years ago.

Still no valid argument. Ad hoc logical fallacy while knowing nothing about crime statistics or gun laws.

[sharedvalues]

61. Non sequitur fallacy. Fewer guns, fewer deaths.

Your whole three paragraphs are non sequiturs.
Key point: if we had fewer guns on the streets, we’d have fewer deaths.
Kids are getting killed because gun corps want to make more money.

[gejohnston]

64. and you don't know

non sequitur is. I simply pointed out the flaws in your "logic", I did not offer any conclusion at all.
https://www.thefreedictionary.com/non+sequitur

[sharedvalues]

66. I'm sorry you're unaware of the definition of "non sequitur"

See e.g. the second defn you linked, or just translate from the Latin.

[gejohnston]

67. I simply pointed out a

objective fact that can be verified by simply looking it up. I did not offer any premise nor draw any conclusion.
UK had no "meaningful" gun control laws until the 1930s, and they had lower crime rates. Knife crime outnumbered gun crime at the time. That is simply a historical fact. Outside of rich people dressed in tweeds, guns were never really part of British culture.
Italy, and most of Continental Europe, and large drops in violent crime rates happened in the mid 19th century, preceding any gun control laws. Italy instituted its first modern gun laws in 1931 when Mussolini felt his popularity waning. Not a non sequitur, simply a historical fact, no more and no less.
Look up Mexico's and Brazil's gun laws, and look at their murder rates. Simply verifiable facts, no more and no less.

[sharedvalues]

68. "Non sequitur": point that is irrelevant

Relevant point:
If you buy guns or ammo, you’re helping gun corps advocate for kids getting killed. You’re complicit.

[Straw Man]

69. Nobody is advocating for kids getting killed.

That's the real non sequitur in this thread.

[yagotme]

60. The truth: Mexico:few guns on street (legally), many deaths.

How's that gun control argument work again??

Mexico has 1 gun shop. ONE. Governmentally controlled, to boot. Nearly impossible to get carry permit. Murder rate above ours.

[oneshooter]

41. What evidence and/or proof do you have to back up this claim?

"Millions of kids fear being killed at school." Please let us see it, so we will know that you are not blowing smoke.

[sharedvalues]

42. I suggest reading the article I linked.

cheers!

[friendly_iconoclast]

71. IOW, "I like this editorial, therefore it is accurate and you should simply accept my word for it"

[ManiacJoe]

47. Proper secured storage is a good thing.

And it would prevent so many of the problems we repeatedly see in the news.

[friendly_iconoclast]

50. Mere moral panic mongering, the likes of which we've seen before:

Last edited Thu Jan 3, 2019, 12:54 AM - Edit history (1)

Panic mongering is a vital part modern-day gun control advocacy:

https://upload.democraticunderground.com/1172193622

Once again, the VPC hopes you are both easily frightened and poor at math

The Violence Policy Center has cranked up its evergreen moral panic
"Concealed Carry Killers"- and the gullible and doctrinaire fall for it:

https://www.google.com/search?q=%22concealed+carry+killers%22&sitesearch=democraticunderground.com

http://www.democraticunderground.com/126210658

Concealed Carry Tragedies Include Workplace Shooting, Six-Year-Old Unintentionally Killing Father.

Washington, DC — Concealed handgun permit holders are responsible for at least 873 deaths not involving self defense since 2007, including 29 mass shootings that killed 139 people, ongoing VPC research shows. Since there is no comprehensive record keeping of fatal incidents involving concealed carry permit holders, this tally most likely represents a small fraction of the actual total.

I couldn't be arsed to look for any 2014 or 2015 screeds from them, so let's
look at one from 2013:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023118413

Research Details Hundreds of Examples of Innocent Lives Lost to “Concealed Carry Killers"


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 27, 2013
3:18 PM
CONTACT: Violence Policy Center
Avery Palmer, 202-822-8200 x104, [e-mail]

As Zimmerman Case Begins, VPC Research Details Hundreds of Examples of Innocent Lives Lost to “Concealed Carry Killers

WASHINGTON - June 27 - Washington, DC— As the trial opens this week over the deadly shooting of Trayvon Martin, research shows that similar fatal incidents are shockingly common. The Violence Policy Center has uncovered hundreds of examples of non-self defense incidents involving private citizens legally allowed to carry concealed handguns. These incidents resulted in 516 deaths — including 24 mass shootings and the killing of 14 law enforcement officers.

Doing the math, and according to the VPC, concealed carriers are responsible for 357
deaths over the last three years, or 119 a year.
Lets stipulate, for the sake of this argument, that all of those deaths were murders
even if they were not.

Now comes the part where the wheels fall off the panic mongering.

The lowest estimate I can find for the number of concealed handgun permit holders
in the US is 11.1 million- other figures cited were a high of 12.8 million but
I'll stick with the low one. Taking that number, and using the numbers given by the
VPC, we see that 119/11100000 = a murder rate of 0.93 per 100,000 permit
holders, a rate about one-fifth of the US population as a whole

Source for US murder rate:

https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/tables/table-1

https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2015/preliminary-semiannual-uniform-crime-report-januaryjune-2015/tables/table-3

Worse for the controllers, these numbers mean that those 'concealed carry killers'
kill at a lower rate than does the populations of the UK, France,
Australia (where have I heard that name recenly?), Ireland, Canada...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

http://rboatright.blogspot.com/2013/03/comparing-england-or-uk-murder-rates.html


and at par with Norway and Sweden

[friendly_iconoclast]

51. "Won't somebody *please* think of the children?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children

Logical fallacy

In their 2002 book, Art, Argument, and Advocacy: Mastering Parliamentary Debate, John Meany and Kate Shuster called the use of the phrase "Think of the children" in debate a type of logical fallacy and an appeal to emotion. According to the authors, a debater may use the phrase to emotionally sway members of the audience and avoid logical discussion. They provide an example: "I know this national missile defense plan has its detractors, but won't someone please think of the children?" Their assessment was echoed by Margie Borschke in an article for the journal Media International Australia incorporating Culture and Policy, with Borschke calling its use a rhetorical tactic.

Ethicist Jack Marshall described "Think of the children!" as a tactic used in an attempt to end discussion by invoking an unanswerable argument. According to Marshall, the strategy succeeds in preventing rational debate. He called its use an unethical manner of obfuscating debate, misdirecting empathy towards an object which may not have been the focus of the original argument. Marshall wrote that although the phrase's use may have a positive intention, it evokes irrationality when repeatedly used by both sides of a debate. He concluded that the phrase can transform the observance of regulations into an ethical quandary, cautioning society to avoid using "Think of the children!" as a final argument...

Moral panic

The Journal for Cultural Research published an article in 2010 by Debra Ferreday, which was republished in the 2011 book Hope and Feminist Theory. According to Ferreday, media use of "Won't someone think of the children!" had become common in a climate of moral panic. She suggested that the phrase was becoming so common that it could become another Godwin's law.

In a 2011 article for the journal Post Script, Andrew Scahill wrote about the power of children in rhetoric to create an untenable stance for an opposing viewpoint. According to Scahill, an individual arguing "for the children" makes it extremely difficult for an opponent to hold a "not for the children" position.

[sharedvalues]

63. Except: kids ARE getting killed. It's a fact.

I’m sorry you don’t like the truth.
But kids are in fact getting killed.
That’s a fact, Jack.

[friendly_iconoclast]

70. You're far from the first to sanctimoniously proclaim that you're trying to 'save' children...

...from harm, merely the latest in a very long line. Harry J. Anslinger, Anita Bryant and Charles Keating are good recent historical examples:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Keating

Charles Humphrey Keating, Jr. (December 4, 1923 – March 31, 2014) was an American athlete, lawyer, real estate developer, banker, financier, and activist best known for his role in the savings and loan scandal of the late 1980s.

Keating was a champion swimmer for the University of Cincinnati in the 1940s. From the late 1950s through the 1970s, he was a noted anti-pornography activist, founding the organization Citizens for Decent Literature and serving as a member on the 1969 President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography.

In the 1980s, Keating ran American Continental Corporation and the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, and took advantage of loosened restrictions on banking investments. His enterprises began to suffer financial problems and were investigated by federal regulators. His financial contributions to, and requests for regulatory intervention from five sitting U.S. senators led to those legislators being dubbed the "Keating Five".

When Lincoln failed in 1989 it cost the federal government over $3 billion and about 23,000 customers were left with worthless bonds. In the early 1990s, Keating was convicted in both federal and state courts of many counts of fraud, racketeering and conspiracy. He served four and a half years in prison before those convictions were overturned in 1996. In 1999, he pleaded guilty to a more limited set of wire fraud and bankruptcy fraud counts, and was sentenced to the time he had already served. Keating spent his final years in low-profile real estate activities until his death in 2014.

I call it the Harold Hill approach:

[aikoaiko]

52. As a gun owner, this is not a compelling argument.

I'm not going to stop buying and using guns and ammo. Demonizing people who buy and shoot guns who also want to reduce gun violence through policy is not smart.

We have a chance to make some incremental improvements in gun laws.

A bill for universal background checks will hit Congress tomorrow. It's a good bill and has a chance to pass the Senate especially if we pair with the Hearing Protection Act.

[sharedvalues]

53. As a gun and ammo buyer, you're complicit in kid deaths

Unless your gun and ammo manufacturer doesn’t dontate to the NRA.

Also, by the way, you’re also complicit in the Russian attack on America. Because Russia used the NRA to attack america. And gun and ammo purchases also subsidize the NRA.

The plain fact is that America gun fetishism is a devastatingly destructive force in our society. Feel free to stay part of that movement. But do it with your eyes open.

[aikoaiko]

56. i remember when teachers would use that logic about buying weed.

Buy weed supports cartels and their murderous ways.

Yeah, that didn't work either.

I can still shoot guns and advocate for what I think is reasonable gun control such an expanded background check bill paired with the Hearing Protection Act bill.

[friendly_iconoclast]

59. The new Prohibitionists hate guns (on the L), and migrants (on the R)

As one can tell from both this thread (and the images and links therein), neither the bald-faced panic-mongering nor
the overweening sanctimony all these types use -and are using as we speak- has changed much in the last century or so...

[sharedvalues]

62. That's fair: if you advocate for gun control you're doing good.

But you should also be telling ammo manufacturers and the NRA to stop using your money to put or keep kid-killing gun laws on the books.

20 years ago that wasn’t really true— over the past twenty years the NRA has become owned by gun CEOs who put their profits above human lives. Before that the NRA was mostly a gun safety org, and so buying ammo did not actively help get Americans killed. In the 80s I hunted myself, and I would have supported reasonable laws about hunting rifles in exchange for controlling the handguns that kill people in cities. But we now have jumped the shark. It’s been a long sad journey.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

65. I'm interested to know...

...what should the CEOs of gun manufacturing companies do differently?

[Alea]

58. No feed for you, but bless your heart

Last edited Wed Jan 9, 2019, 01:13 PM - Edit history (1)