Another mass shooting in the U.S

If you've got a chance. tune in now to the Pat Kenny Radio show, or google RTE's P.K.S. podcasts later today, There's a chat between Pat, a yank and Tom Clonen about the US love of weapons. One gent is mentioned as having an M60 machine gun along with rifles and hndguns, plus his granpa's gun.

AdamD wrote: »

Its just as likely that the gunman takes out the principal and continues killing people

Of course.

This is just typical of the mind numbingly dumb "solutions" that pro guns fools keep parroting and it never ceases to be foolish.

As if a nutter wouldn't factor in a possibly armed teacher.

What will stop these types of massacres, or at least reduce them, is making it harder for nut-cases to get hold of weapons.

That's it.

America needs to wake up to it's embarrassing problem and handle it in an adult fashion. Otherwise, these type of events will continue to happen, probably with more regularity. Jesus, it's only been six months since Holmes shot up a cinema.

Whether weekend Rambo's want to admit it or not, easy access to weapons IS a factor and step one should be making it more difficult for mentally unstable people to get their hands on them.

Anything else is just talking bollocks.

old hippy wrote: »

One hopes but Obama will be thwarted at every turn by the NRA and its followers.

I just heard a clip on the radio and he seemed to be suggesting a change. The gun lobbies are ridiculous. Have they been rallying yet?

Amerdicans are mad, at times like this u can understand the terrorists a bit.

old hippy wrote: »

I imagine they started rallies the moment the first shots rang out.

Some of the more extreme groups have made statements, but they're usually on the far side of ludicrous anyway. The NRA hadn't made a single statement last I looked, something about respect and the funerals not being over yet. Of course, if they'd made a statement they'd be bloodthirsty baby murderers and if they don't make a statment, everyone says they're cowards and are hiding away because they know they're baby murderers.


I wonder if anyone ever twigs that that level of acrimony plays a huge role in preventing proper debate and ensuring that any one of these tragedies is immediately - usually before all the families have been notified - turned into a screaming match between the rabidly pro-ban on one side and the equally rabid anti-ban on the other side, while everyone who isn't in either extreme just shuts up because to have any opinion that's not on either extreme exposes you to the full ire of both extremes. Doesn't matter if it's online or on air, the pattern is the same.

Hell, look at this thread. We're IRISH. We have no say and no vote in US domestic policy, and most of the people posting here - no offence meant - don't know very much about the technical aspects of what they want banned (and no, they do not "know enough to be getting on with"). But despite this, we have 20 pages or more of vitriol, of people saying "obviously, the US must do this immediately" and so forth... but not a whole lot of actual informed commentary.

Mind you, this thread's not the worst I've seen from Irish sites - it's even worse elsewhere; somehow the argument moves from shock and grief over the tragedy to pro-ban/anti-ban (within a dozen posts, sadly - we're getting way too practiced at this) to suddenly getting America and Ireland confused and the next thing you know I'm reading this on thejournal.ie, said by an Irish person about other Irish people in response to a tragedy in the US:

Peter Richardson wrote:

Responsible gun owners are merely those who have not yet killed another human being.

Now you can say that that's just trolling...
...but if we're trolling (and putting up with trolling) on threads about a tragedy that saw twenty children shot dead by a mentally disturbed kid who'd just killed his own mother... what the hell does that say about us and whatever weight we think our opinions ought to have in any discussion on this?

Tony EH wrote: »

What would you rather? People just saying "ah feck, who cares. it's America...what can be done? blah balh"

I'd rather the next 20 kids weren't killed.

I'd rather people hugged their own kids, then sat down and tried to figure out what happened, why it happened and how to prevent it without resorting to demonising the other parents sitting down with them as though they wanted children to die. (I mean, seriously - does anyone actually think that the average ordinary member of the NRA wants to see kids dead?)

I wouldn't mind not being told I wanted to see dead kids myself, or that I'm one bad hair day away from shooting up a school myself, but that's just for me rather than a more general thing.

And I suppose if some of the more extreme posters could remember that this is Ireland and we have different laws and different social norms and different crime patterns here, that'd be nice, but again, that's more specific to this country than to the debate in the US.

But right now, especially if you go take a look on the US discussion sites (and "discussion" is currently a polite white lie at best), there's only one shouting match going on and its pro-ban -v- anti-ban. Despite there being no ban on the table. Despite a ban being politically awkward, legally very difficult if not impossible, and socially unacceptable for a lot of the population there.

You stand up and say "well, perhaps some regulatory changes should be investigated, but we should also look into the mental healthcare issues this raises and perhaps also we should be looking into other aspects of this case" and you might as well turn off your internet now to save your own mental health, because both sides will turn on you like a honey badger in a bad mood. The pro-ban side will cite your openness to discussion of regulation as being a blatent and underhanded attempt to avoid a ban; the anti-ban side will call you a traitor to the constitution. And both sides will ignore the mental healthcare and other issues completely (they may pay a line's lipservice to acknowledging them as remotely secondary issues, maybe, but not worth looking into because BAN ALL GUNS NOW YOU MURDERING PRO-GUN SCUM/YOU COMPLETELY NAIVE IDIOT YOU CAN'T TEAR UP THE CONSTITUTION LIKE THAT.... well, you get the idea. It's like discussing abortion legislation in Ireland following the X case with someone from Youth Defence.

Biggins wrote: »

No. Very unlikely that anything substantial will happen.
More window-dressing probably.
Why?
One clue for the reason for little change will come, is in my signature.

Custard!