You don't have to have been in a job to know roughly what it's about, you know!

Another sweeping generalisation

ok LHS can you answer the following questions

What does a fireman do – do they really need breathing apparatus and hoses to do their job?

What does a butcher do – do they really need to own a variety of sharp knifes to do their job
or have you just got no idea about what these people do or what tools they require?

It really aint rocket science is it

I seem to have missed something as I haven't seen many comments in the media asking for tighter gun controls. Most people seem to be sensibly waiting for more than rumours about yesterday's events.

Equally, I can't comment on whether tighter gun laws would make a difference and don't think that's a topic for today. I'm more thinking about how I would feel if a friend or family member had been one of the victims, not what affect this could have on a hobby of mine, FFS!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk/10222161.stm

So your opinion would be that a farmer has:

No need to kill vermin on his land?
No need to kill wild or domestic animals attacking livestock?
No need to kill a lame animal when injured or dieing?

EDIT: To be honest I personally would add in the right to protect themselves and their family if living in a remote area but i know that is a point of contention here so will keep that one separate.

Junky – I think you'll find that, as discussed, for someone to establish good cause for a firearm, they have had to convince the police, (who act on home office guidelines which lay down suitable calibres for foxing) that it is necessary.

as such, I'd argue that your statement that "it is a BS reason" is unsupportable, since the police, the government, and the law, since the House of lords judgement in R (countryside alliance vs HM attorney General) specifically states that "Foxes are a pest and the fox population has to be culled (Court of Appeal judgment, para 23)"

So, you're wrong not only in fact, but in government policy, police application and wrong in law!

Government policy, creates law which is enacted by the courts and the police, they are not seperate reasons just one. And why asume that government policy is right, I frequently don't think it is, and would never use it as a fact to support a question of what is right and wrong.

No, in the case of firearms – the law is set down by parliament, and in addition to that the home-office (government) distribute circulars giving guidance to police forces on how to apply the law – guidelines not rules, it is for each chief constable to interpret the law in his own manner.

In addition to this there is case law, which is definitive proof of the correct interpretation of the law.

throughout this, all are in agreement that killing foxes is a justifiable reason for owning a rifle.

so, either everyone in officialdom is wrong, or Junkys right!

calling me junky is as pointless as me calling you ratty. Do you feel like stopping or do we stay in the playground? That aside very good answer you are a super skilled googler. Clearly the fact farmers get guns means amazingly that my statement of BS reason has no legal weight at all thanks for clarifying that.

LHS sorry I seemed to have missed you answers to my questions about jobs all I can see is some more questions for me

We have gone way OT now so I shall leave it.
I am not anti-guns per se my only point is that it is easier to do an act like what occured yesterday if you have access to guns than if you do not have access to guns. Whether that fact alone makes it legitimate to further control the access to guns or not is the real debate IMHO.

I'm not bothered about being called ratty – in fact several people on here do it, what's your problem?

As it happens, since I've been through the application process recently and have shot more than a few foxes in the past, its all fairly fresh in my mind! yes, the fact that farmers are permitted guns means that the weight of opinion is against your statement that its a BS reason.

I'd agree on your last paragraph – however as said before, I think that the problem is down to carefully controlling who gets access to guns, not how "easy" it is.

We have gone way OT now so I shall leave i

Agreed, the butchers and firefighters thing was a little OT.

I have guns. I am sane. However, there is no legislation which would control me if I flipped one day for some reason.

IMO, gun owners are usually more controlled about life. For example, if I were to get a criminal record, they'd take my lovely guns away and I wouldn't be able to dine on self-shot pheasant. That would be a bad thing. So, I behave myself.

Our gun legislation works. As others have, no doubt,said – Guns don't kill people….

>Guns don't kill people….

Well they do don't they 🙂

There was a guy In Frankland who attacked a few people with a sword in Thornton Heath, in a church.

I never heard the part about banning swords.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/540387.stm

If your'e gonna do it, you'll do it.

If your'e gonna do it, you'll do it.

+1

This, thankfully, is a rare occurance and to be able to predict, legislate, and protect against this kind of pre-meditated hatred is nigh on impossible.

"Guns don't kill people…."

You're right, we need to ban wappers. Eh, rappers.

>IMO, gun owners are usually more controlled about life.<

Oh really – on what basis have you made that assessment?

>Guns don't kill people…. <

'Course not, that's not their primary function at all.

Heard it all now…

banning would not stop this sort of evil act, i like moston here i could if i wanted to, get a weapon and rounds for it , for about 300 squid, education and maybe more renewales to the current licenes, an auwfull shitty mess R.I.P those concerned.

esselgruntfuttock – Member

There was a guy In Frankland who attacked a few people with a sword in Thornton Heath, in a church.

I never heard the part about banning swords.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/540387.stm

If your'e gonna do it, you'll do it.

If you're gonna do it, you'll do it ? 😕

Well no………….he didn't "do it" …………he didn't manage to kill anyone.

And that's the point. He wasn't successful with his intended massacre because he only had a sword.

I'm sure that if he had managed to get his hands on a gun, he would have been far more successful with his obvious mission to kill people.

If Derrick Bird had only had a samurai sword like the fella in Thornton Heath, then he wouldn't have carried out the massacre and this discussion would not be occurring now.

What was the geezer doing in Frankland btw ? I thought he was declared insane.

>I'm sure that if he had managed to get his hands on a gun, he would have been far more successful with his obvious mission to kill people. <

That's surely the point. IIRC correctly it was subsequently discovered that Hamilton ( Dunblane) had a range of major personality issues – and I'll lay odds this guy was in the same boat. Far too easy to obtain a gun licence imo

esselgruntfuttock – Member

"There was a guy In Frankland who attacked a few people with a sword in Thornton Heath, in a church.

I never heard the part about banning swords."

You're clearly a sleeper agent for the other side of the argument "Look, people go on killing sprees even if they can't get guns, the only difference is, nobody dies."

I'll say it again, name me a single mass killer in the UK on the scale of Bird, Ryan or Hamilton that has used anything other than a gun?

That's a fair point convert. And with the exception of Shipman (who is no doubt Britain's most prolific, UK soil based mass murderer), you're right, guns made it easy for those people to kill a lot of people in a very short time.

1. Cars kill more than guns. Some dimwit above said car deaths were accidents.

I think I must be the person you are defining as a dimwit.

Try this thought experiment: (assuming you can think)

I leave the house. I take my car. I go to ASDA.

I leave the house. I take my gun. I go to ASDA.

Which of the above sentences precedes an account of a deliberate killing?

Can I simplify it for you (you dimwit)

More people in the UK are killed by cars than by guns.

More people in the Uk are intentionally killed by guns than by cars

Do you get it? You dimwit!

I honestly don't think you can do a comparison between gun crime and car accidents. Gun crime is pre-meditated, you don't purposefully get into a car to kill somone (well not usually! 🙁 )

Gun legislation in the UK already goes an awfully long way to ensure that you are vetted by multiple responsibilities before having a license, and reviewed periodically. Out of the thousands of gun owners in the UK, 1 or 2 cases over the last years have turned out like this recent shooting in Cumbria. And lets not kid ourselves here, these are pre-meditated mass murders by someone who is clearly unhinged. This isn't a single shooting or stabbing because of for example finding your wife/husband cheating on you.

When a switch flicks like this in someones head, they will carry out their plans, and get hold of the tools to do this whether legal or not.

Gun legislation, like knife and banned dog breeds goes a long way to ensure that irresponsible people can't easily acquire these things and if they think about doing so they have the legal consequences to consider. It will never be able to stop it completly and certainly in this recent case, It will never, or could ever legislate against 1 or 2 unhinged mass murderers and to think it could is deluded.

No need to kill vermin on his land?
No need to kill wild or domestic animals attacking livestock?
No need to kill a lame animal when injured or dieing?

No need no, I know a number of farmers who dont have guns, injured or dieing animals are dealt with by the local hunt.

It will never, or could ever legislate against 1 or 2 unhinged mass murderers and to think it could is deluded

well if these 1 or 2 [it is 3 now] had not had legally held guns we would not be having this chat the real question is whether someones need [if it really is a need] for a gun is sufficient for us to take this risk

When a switch flicks like this in someones head, they will carry out their plans, and get hold of the tools to do this whether legal or not

The last three in this country had legally owned guns and you cannot name a masacre where an illegally owned gun was used. You also ignore the example above where someone went on the rampage with a samurai sword and managed to kill no one – suggesting not everyone can get a gun at a moments notice just after they have "flipped" except for those who legally own them.
LHS sorry you got lost when I mentioned buthchers and firemen but the point was that you can know peoples jobs even if you do not do the job yourself[farmer for example] neither complicated nor controversial I would have thought. You have heard of Careers advisors havent you?

Blimey, this still going!

LHS, you seem a pretty reasonable guy and our views are pretty close I think, the difference being that I would like to see the guns restricted to those who need them for professional need, rather than recreational desire – i.e. just shifting the reason for owning a little. I'm not a ban all guns from private ownership believer, just curb ownership more than it is today.

I still think you are missing a massive point here though that you are choosing not to address.

When a switch flicks like this in someones head, they will carry out their plans, and get hold of the tools to do this whether legal or not.

The fact still remains that the last 3 "switch flickers" who effectively carried out their killings were all legal licence holders. Non of them had to scratch around for weapons, they owned them – legally. It could of course be sheer coinsidence; the only 3 switch flickers in the country in the last 25 years have all "totally by chance" had guns in their houses.

Let's do the maths……..

1/2 a million firearms owners in a country of 60 million.

So the chance of a single switch flicker being part of that subset – 1 in 120.

Chance of all 3 consecutive switch flickers being firearms owners = 1 in 120*120*120 or a 1 in 1.7 million chance.

You seem like an intelligent chap – you simply can't believe this can you? I would suggest it is far more likely that there have been numerous more switch flickers over the years and it is just those with easy access to weapons that have been able to effectively carry out the act.

convert, I see your point, and don't agree nor disagree, it depends on what your view point is and mine obviously is different.

From my personal point of view I think that anyone who makes a conscious decision to go and shoot multiple people in the face with a shotgun can't be put into the bracket of gun owner or not. Yes, i agree that the 3 you refer to all were gun owners, and if you knew what these people were capable of in advance then you would never grant them a license. If they couldn't legally own a gun would this stop them from acquiring one to carry out a pre-meditated attack like this, i don't think so.

Junkyard I won't respond to you as you just seem to be up for an argument all the time, not sure why, but its boring, calm down.

I think samuri's point in this thread is a valid one, I was saying something similar at work yesterday. Yes most deaths on the road are not intentional (tho there was that guy recently in the news ran down a cyclists after an argument, in coventry was it?. Anyone know where the stats for intentional car deaths are?) However plenty of them are not blameless, lots of careless and dangerous driving. Any other cause of death clocking up the mortality figures RTAs do would be legislated against forthwith. Cars are seemingly a special case and don't fall under the same rules….unfortunatley.

OK, fair enough we have different views – that's fine. I'll pick you up on one final point though –

Yes, i agree that the 3 you refer to all were gun owners

I have not picked these 3 out of thin air to effectively make my point. I have used these 3 as they are the only 3 in living memory in Britain. It is all we have to judge this problem on. There is not a single case in Britain I am aware of (or you are aware of either it seems) where someone has carried out an atrocity like this who has had to go looking for their weapon before committing the crime so I think it is a big assumption to believe that this is likely whilst the evidence that (a tiny minority fortunately) of those with access are more likely to do the same exists in black and white.

Of course that means that only 50 people have been killed in a country of 60 million in 25 years by mass acts like this with the present gun controls in place – an average of 2 a year. The judgment call as to if this is enough personal damage and sacrafice to "inconvenience" the massed majority of sensible and safe gun owners is one for someone further up the food chain than I.

I think I'll leave it that as I need to do some work! Have a good day all.

I have not picked these 3 out of thin air to effectively make my point. I have used these 3 as they are the only 3 in living memory in Britain. It is all we have to judge this problem on.

Agreed.

Raises for me 2 questions:

a) Are people who carry out these atrocities more likely to be gun owners?
b) Would these people acquire a gun whether legal or illegal?

My view point would be:

a) Probably
b) Probably

I dont think (and lets be straight here, I dont actually know – none of us do) that the three examples everyone seems to be quoting would have occurred if the individuals hadnt had immediate access to guns. The oft quoted 'switch flicking' is a bit misleading to me, as in my experience working in forensic psychiatry, the urge to carry out this kind of behaviour has generally had to have been building up for some time prior to the act itself. There are some differences in these cases regarding pre-planning and motivation – Ryan and Hamilton appeared to have killed indiscriminately, whereas Bird actually targetted people, winding down his car window and beckoning people over as if asking for directions. Whatever, my personal take on it is that in the cases of Dunblane and Hungerford, if they hadnt had immediate access to weapons, they probably wouldnt have acted on their urges, though in the case of the Cumbrian shootings, Bird would have probably found an alternative. Bottom line is, if you dont really need to own a weapon (and yes, I know, there's a massive difference between 'need' and 'want') then you shouldnt be allowed access to them. I'm very conscious that I've been sat here thinking about this thread for the past twenty or thirty minutes when really I should have been giving more thought to the victims and their families – my condolences to all those concerned.

Junkyard I won't respond to you as you just seem to be up for an argument all the time, not sure why, but its boring, calm down.

You keep saying that these people would get guns if they wanted to after loosing their mental faculties but cannot cite any examples that is why you dont answer me. As i said the evudence suggests that not everyone can get a gun at a moments notice just after they have "flipped" except for those who legally own them.

Junkyard, I refer to my previous comment about your argumentiveness.

I agreed above with convert on the fact that they were all gun owners yes and then raised 2 questions as to the type of people who commit these crimes are more likely to own a gun / or try acquire one anyway if they were illegal.

Now, no, i don't have facts to back this point of view up, however using the statistical analysis of 3 people equally isn't conclusive evidence to the contrary.

I don't think arguing over different opinions is really going to change anything is it? Lets not detract from the debate and certainly not from the fact that this is stemmed from such an horrific incident.

when a gun owner goes mental, he's more likely than most to use a gun

when a 'cage fighter' goes mental, he'll probably use his fists / feet

when a man who owns a samurai sword goes mental, he'll probably use that

it's not the acess to wapons or control of them that's the issue here, it's the unpredictability of how and when someone loses their grip on reality and rational thought. so unless we all submit to regular mind-scanning, there is no solution to this. end of debate imo?

we all submit to regular mind-scanning

Crikey, we'd ALL be in a lot of trouble then!!! 😐

I think what it all comes down to is that some people just go postal and shoot people. Its a very rare occurance and very hard to predict but it is possible to say that if they didnt have guns thye'd find it harder to kill people. Some think we should ban all guns due to this rare occurence and others think reacting to something so rare by banning guns is daft. Its the apparent lack of predictability that makes banning all guns attractive.

Not that it has that much relevance, but a few years ago I was staying with some mates in New York. I had to be reminded to tone down my usual levels of p**s taking on several occasions as people were 'packing heat'!
People can be unpredictable at the best of times, but I cant help but feel just a little bit anxious when they're carrying bloody big guns. Like I said, unless you genuinely need one, why bother?

LHS, I would like to see the guns restricted to those who need them for professional need, rather than recreational desire – i.e. just shifting the reason for owning a little. I'm not a ban all guns from private ownership believer, just curb ownership more than it is today.

I would like to see cars limited to work use only, no recreational use or as a means to get to places of recreation, all cars limited to 55mph, ped friendly crumple zones at the front, lifetime ban after any accident where undue care and attention is a contributory cause, lifetime prison sentence for causing a fatality.

this would save a huge amount of lives far more than your suggested gun controls.