Forums

Help › Forums

The Orlando Shootings

Mon, Jun 20 2016 2:55 AM (100 replies)
  • MBaggese
    15,367 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 3:57 PM

    mkrizan86:
    But as long as we're offering examples, how's this for a country, that doesn't allow firearms to anyone, but cops, army, registered hunters (hunting rifles only) or licensed body guards:

     

    Well, what about those who shoot trap/skeet/targets/etc?

     

    I think what most people who are not gun enthusiasts don't realize. is shooting is fun..similar to golf, where every time you go out to shoot, you want to do better than before.

     

    It's a fun sport...in fact all I do is target shoot now, I haven't hunted in quite a few years.

     

    Next, as been brought up before, consider how long guns have been legal to own in the United States and how many guns are in the US legally and owned by law abiding citizens.

     

    Next consider anyone with a criminal element/thought/etc...and how many of "those people" have guns.

     

    Now Have all the law abiding citizens turn in their guns...

     

    Who will posses guns now?

     

    I could go on and on about this, but I'll leave it at that.

  • mkrizan86
    1,866 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 4:25 PM

    I realise all this, Mike. I know our system wouldn't work there. That's why I was agreeintg with Jim about this being mostly a cultural thing and to each their own ;-)

  • ct690911
    7,190 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 4:40 PM

    "Now Have all the law abiding citizens turn in their guns...

     Who will possess guns now?"

    Our omniscient government decided to bring in a "long gun registry"; supposedly to put into a database, so police would know ahead of time if the house they were responding to had rifles, shotguns, etc. There was also a fee borne by the firearm owner to register his gun(s)...was mainly considered another cash grab by the gov't.

    Anyway, it became law...all the honest folk lined up..paid the fees and registered the weapons. Does anyone think the bad guys were doing this?...lol

    The registry no longer exists...go figure.

  • Jimbog1964
    8,378 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 6:06 PM

    ct690911:
    Anyway, it became law...all the honest folk lined up..paid the fees and registered the weapons. Does anyone think the bad guys were doing this?...lol

    Not going into here as enough on this thread even by my standards, but that has happened elsewhere too.  It don't solve anything on it's own but as part of a concerted push it was beneficial.  No one is so naive as to think you stop guns existing, and like I said before I go back to the UK yes I could get one if I really wanted........

    And @ Mike.  As much as we get things wrong in Aussie, and we do as nothing is ever perfect I will say two things I fully support here:

    1. Points based immigration.  It does not mean we do not also have an asylum policy, and that's something to look at again.  We are not some right wing fascist state though and overall it's a good model for anyone, IMHO.

    2. Guns

    It's not the UK (here in Aussie where I amas think said), and some guns are legal (OK some in UK too but basically so few there we will say none for this).   People here in Aussie do hunt in parts, and we have those feral pigs and even feral camels etc LOL........I would not be in line to take that away from decent people at all.  Basically guns are often allowed in a controlled way for set purposes.

    The difference in Australia is that after a series of mass shootings, culminating in the horrific 1996 Port Arthur massacre people said this is crap, and something needs to change.

    No NRA here and a government action fully supported by all our gun laws went from pretty loose to extremely tight.............No one feels they are missing out protection wise as we think that's a false sense of security if not an outright fallacy, and I think hunters are happy also.  (EDIT: Talking high level - Others read all the papers if they wish)

    More importantly no more mass shootings.............I personally think the Aussie model is one to consider and adapt from there.

    In the end it's for Americans to work it out I know.  I just see news like last weekend and feel as sick as anyone in America at the senseless loss of decent people that's all.  I say have the debate and keep the one eyed NRA reps to a sensible minimum when doing so.

  • hakman123
    2,119 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 9:11 PM

    Not being from the USA, I can only scratch my head in wonder at how many Americans truly believe that they should be allowed to own any firearm they like!

    I can understand you value the right to bear arms - but I'm sure that the founding fathers were not thinking of machine guns or assault rifles when they drafted the constitution. In those days a rifle took a couple of minutes to load, and then you got off 1 shot.

    If you stormed a crowded area with an 18th century rifle and started firing -- you'd be tackled to the ground and subdued way before you got it loaded for the 2nd shot.

    Most of the hobby shooting loved by many Americans can still be done without the need to own automatic or semi-automatic weapons.  The mass shootings have all been associated with these auto or semi-automatic weapons. So surely limiting the number of rounds per second that a shooter can fire, will dramatically reduce the ability to spray vast numbers of bullets into a crowd.

    After Sandy Hook Elementary, and now the Orlando incident (to name but 2 recent ones) -- if people still think that it is a great idea to have assault rifles in general public ownership -- then maybe there is no hope for you!

    You do agree on limits!!  I mean you can't buy a nuclear device down the local ammo shop. You can't buy land mines. I'm pretty sure you can't legally own an RPG.  So how come 'the right to bear arms' is dragged out every time somebody tries to limit the TYPE of guns you are allowed to own?  Surely the line can be drawn so that you can't legally own anything that is semi-automatic or automatic???  No??

    We did it in Australia. The government changed the ownership laws to make these weapons illegal, and then bought back any weapons that were no longer allowed.

    I talk to my American friends about it - and they say -- "Ah but then the criminals will own them illegally anyway".   Yep!  But they are lot harder to get hold of here now.   Your problem is that they are legal, and you can almost impulse buy them when you pay for your gas.  Some guy gets angry for being cut off on the freeway, or because he got sacked from work --- having an assault rifle in the car with him can somehow escalate his reaction!!!

    Here we have a few beers, argue over a nice looking girl at the bar, and have a fist fight, then make up afterwards over another beer!   

    There - instead of a fist fight - one guy shoots the other, and then sprays the bar with gunfire, there is a police stand off for 6 hours, and several innocent by-standers are the latest victims of laws that most of the world look on as just plain stupid! 

    I'm sure I'll get hammered by American gun enthusiasts - but why in the world do you need to 'bear arms' with something that can get off 300+ rounds per minute ? Surely you can do whatever you want for fun, with something that needs to have the chamber emptied and reloaded manually.

     

     

  • Jimbog1964
    8,378 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 9:45 PM

    Read something in a paper which honed it for me.....History says there will be 3 more US mass shootings this year, unless something changes.......(I need to check that but reading it quick seemed to add up)

    Incomparable frequency of mass shootings or numbers generally to the rest of the developed nations, and all whilst general crime is v comparable.  No prizes for spotting the difference..............

  • Duckster789
    534 Posts
    Thu, Jun 16 2016 11:50 PM

    Jimbog1964:

    Read something in a paper which honed it for me.....History says there will be 3 more US mass shootings this year, unless something changes.......(I need to check that but reading it quick seemed to add up)

    Incomparable frequency of mass shootings or numbers generally to the rest of the developed nations, and all whilst general crime is v comparable.  No prizes for spotting the difference..............

    You are puddy in your newspapers hands. Don't believe everything you read.

  • fatdan
    3,379 Posts
    Fri, Jun 17 2016 1:00 AM

    Since '99 there have been 18 shootings like this with 8 or more killed,  in 5 of those tragedies an assault type rifle was used...there were 32 more with less than 7 people died, an assault rifle was used in 1 of them....44 of the 50 mass shootings were done with Pistols and shotguns....so the proposed government banning of assault weapon is not the solution by any means...you have to ban them ALL, or none and banning all of them will never happen here!

    Millions upon millions upon millions of Americans own guns, of the 50 mass shootings in 17 years, not even all of those were perpetrated by born and bred Americans, some were done by confused children/teens....

    Most of these mass shooters didn't even own guns, they had to purchase/steal/ or borrow them "after" they hatched their plan to commit these crimes! Now that is the fault of the process to purchase weapons not doing the job properly.....

    Where I live, there has been two killings in over 20 years, 1 was a robber from the inner city, the other was some rich kid who shot his step dad for something stupid like he bought him the wrong color Mercedes~

    Within a 10-15 minute drive of my house there might be a killing every 2-3 years...

    However  within a 25 minute drive of my house there are multiple shootings daily!

    My company is located across the river in East St. Louis IL(I will leave it up to you to google the city, but none of you would walk a block there without getting robbed or shot), we manufacture and never deal directly with the public....Myself and another person carry guns, we have 3 shotguns throughout the main office and a reputation with the locals, an 8ft fence with barb wire on top around the entire property which is an entire city block, and DOGS!!!! For 20 years we "still" had possible deadly situations at least once a year, sometimes twice a year!

    I can honestly say that if we were not armed, I would be dead, that's how bad that area is!

    I don't think you can compare England, Australia, and several other European countries to the US with over 300 million people, but I personally like what you have done there and if I could I would be all for the same here, but I can't, I for one am pro guns against my wishes!

  • Jimbog1964
    8,378 Posts
    Fri, Jun 17 2016 2:59 AM

    Fair comment.  The uncomfortable truth  is I am sure I would be the same if I was there even with my experience elsewhere so far, and that’s a problem.

    Bad thread for OCDers like me:) but this thread but it is a serious issue too.

    I have upset people over religion.  A letter to my parents comes to mind when I was say 14.  We got asked to write about faith.  Apparently that never meant researching other similar books and pointing out remarkable similarities :)

    Anyway that in mind this is only that small chestnut, guns:

    Couple of things spring to mind:

    1.  Europe

    Has a very roughly comparable population and a large land mass.  I therefore don’t think that is necessarily an insurmountable issue;

     2.  2nd Amendment

    Great language when it was written, but been out of date since the Tommy Gun and now we have drones.  It is thus overdue amendment. 

    Once up to date it won't get in the way of progress.  It can still be called the second amendment, and so no great change that way.  I think it almost got amended anyway in the 1930s, but those drongos at the NRA got involved  again.  Brings me nicely onto……

    3.   NRA

    ASAP they been sent a road map as a present.  Such map to be route 1 to a very large    adventure playground for adults in the middle of a large truck intersection.

     

     

    I would start any debates with the remit that the models are out there that say less guns  = less murders (and yes that includes successful suicides too before any one pipes up).

    It’s my stance and in all honesty with the greatest of respect I say that.  The alternative is several  mass shootings a year, and that’s just the bit that makes the news.  Way I see it pretty crap v elsewhere..Got to try by getting a real debate going if at all possible, IMHO!

  • PRIESTESS
    10,697 Posts
    Fri, Jun 17 2016 3:26 AM

    Nice post Dan. I read with a heavy heart quite intensively the Shooting within the club as i am involved with a nightclub myself. I would like  the USA to make obtaining a license like the one the gunman had in Orlando for fire arms to be much stricter!! Especially  obtaining the firearm he did. If he was only allowed to buy a pistol would he have done what he did? If he was forced to buy the assault rifle on the black market then alarm bells would have ran somewhere because Police would have informants within them parameters?

    Such a tragedy , the more i read the harder it become to finish what i was reading.

    P.S  Dan you need to move to a better part of town:) I did google  East St Louis .

    Just one more thought, why didn't the seller of that Assault Rifle inform the Police of the purchase.  That's another area the USA can look into!  Buying a weapon like that should be an automatic probe from the appropriate authorities? If they did that and find out who this guy's father was then maybe he could have been caught prior .

RSS