Bloody hell that’s nearly as quick as a double barrel shotgun.

Why anyone feels the need to own one of them to keep in their home is incredible.

Very heartbreaking video no visual violence but be warned it’s audibly and emotional upsetting.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/embed/p05z1442/43173753

Watch and then try to defend guns being so free to own you ****.

It is I’ll informed, you are portraying 300m people as gun toting morons.

Which clearly is an ignorant viewpoint, yours only it seems.

The UK has a completely different attitude to gun possession and a culture that supports such. The US on the other hand has taken the right to arm themselves, that’s thier constitutional right. But there aren’t 300m of them with guns, and even less a tiny %age willing to use them to kill people.

Its cultural, unless you understand the difference you will always come from a “they’re all morons and I’m better than you” attitude. I don’t know you but by what you are saying I’d suggest immersing yourself in the cultural aspect of a different society then come back informed.

Its all based on a false premise and a false reading of the constitution tho.

Given the wailing that any attempt and gun control causes and the ridiculous suggestions like arming all teachers then the inference that the gun nuts are incapable of critical thought is not farfetched

That bump stock video is insane. However, even without the bump stock: Who the hell needs a semi-automatic rifle, with a 40-round clip? That whole type of gun should be abolished immediately. If they want access to them, then limit them to licensed ranges and specialists.

The other point is that 40c for a bullet is far too cheap: They should make them $5/round, or something like that.

But there aren’t 300m of them with guns

IIRC the last time I looked at this, the ratio of guns to people is about 1:1, but gun ownership is about 50%.  Of that 50% it’s not an even distribution; those who own more than one gun are likely to own several, and a small percentage own very many.

Its cultural, unless you understand the difference you will always come from a “they’re all morons and I’m better than you” attitude.

True but it also sums upuus foreign policy around the globe

The whole bump stock thing is just a convenient scrap to throw- they’re not linked significantly to other mass shootings, because all they do is speed up the rate of fire by about 50%, at the expense of a lot of accuracy. There’s 2 reasons they suddenly got talked about after Vegas- the first is basically novelty, the other is that the gun lobby is happy to talk about banning them because they’re not important.

Banning them won’t prevent a single shooting, at best it’ll make a minority of them a bit less severe but it could go the other way. An AR or similar fires as fast as you pull the trigger, which for anyone who’s invested a little time in practice, is pretty fast. But actually, you pull the trigger as fast as you can aim, and most of the time that’s a lot slower. The only time a bump stock is useful to a shooter if is they’re firing into a packed crowd, ideally from above.

It’s just a diversion, and the only reason the gun lobby is relatively happy to talk about it, is because it doesn’t matter in the slightest to them. And if it doesn’t instantly placate all gun control advocates- which of course it shouldn’t- then they’ll roll out “thin end of the wedge”

I agree with all the distain and frustration at the US Gun Law situation, like most I like living without Guns being in a place where I live, or reside.

We are very lucky in that respect living here, we rarely see incidents occurring like those in the US.. But, for arguments sake here..

What would your reaction be if the UK population could own a Gun and then an incident like this occurred at a local school where your kids attended.. Frustration? Anger? Retaliation? Political persuasion to get the Law changed ? or perhaps nothing..

It’s worth considering what actions you would impart, if such a situation were to happen here.

bikebouy wrote:

It’s worth considering what actions you would impart, if such a situation were to happen here.

Is it supposed to be a hard question? I’d be calling for changes to the law to limit access to guns, because that’s clearly the only thing which will help. Why? What would you do?

The reason they apparently find it difficult in the US isn’t just down to cultural difference – it’s that the cultural difference results in a sense of entitlement for the gun toting morons* and/or a failure of logical reasoning (either they’re failing to understand that their “right” to own guns is resulting in a loss of right of life for other people, or they don’t care).

*clearly only those toting guns are gun toting morons – realistically not even everybody who owns a gun is a gun toting moron, but they make up a significant and vocal proportion of them.

https://twitter.com/Tennesseine/status/967164213583056897

The armchair tough guys who picture themselves side-shooting their way through a hail of bullets to save the day remind me of that sage observation by, of all people, Mike Tyson.

“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth”

interesting experiment

Interesting link to an article and site from that if you want to see how the gun toting morons “think”:

http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/02/foghorn/debunking-the-myth-that-no-one-wants-to-take-your-guns/

http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/

This seems a good summary of what they’re worried about:

My worst fear: a large scale attack on a school — or schools — will lead to the complete degradation if not attempted elimination of our natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms.

(as opposed to being worried about lots of kids being killed 🙄 )

  aracer

bikebouy wrote:

It’s worth considering what actions you would impart, if such a situation were to happen here.

Is it supposed to be a hard question? I’d be calling for changes to the law to limit access to guns, because that’s clearly the only thing which will help. Why? What would you do?

Perhaps no one in America has thought of that. Obviously they are all gun toting sister loving morons who can’t/won’t change despite themselves but if someone cultured and educated properly, ie a British person were to email one of their political representatives they might be able to achieve something?

🙄

You have to wonder why they didn’t achieve a restriction on firearms similar to Britain and Australia during their 8 year enlightenment, or Obama administration as it’s also known.

“You have to wonder why they didn’t achieve a restriction on firearms similar to Britain and Australia during their 8 year enlightenment, or Obama administration as it’s also known.”

Probably because the Democrats didn’t control both houses for large parts of Obama’s presidency, the controls previously introduced under Clinton had also been allowed to expire.

America is supposedly a democracy, albeit a flawed one. Compromise might eventually win out – the pro-gun lobby admitting that the second amendment doesn’t mean that semi-automatic firearms with changeable magazines are a constitutional right and the anti-gun lobby admitting that allowing the ownership of revolvers and bolt-action rifles might satisfy those who genuinely have need of firearms.

<div>”Klunk:</div>
<div></div>
<div>Interesting experiment”</div>
<div></div>
It’s interesting but it’s also pretty meaningless since it doesn’t recreate the most important bit- everyone there was prepared for it.

It’s interesting but it’s also pretty meaningless since it doesn’t recreate the most important bit- everyone there was prepared for it.

well it suggests the best defence against a bad guy with a gun is not a good guy with a gun but a good pair of running shoes.

What would your reaction be if the UK population could own a Gun

You do know they can own a gun?

and then an incident like this occurred at a local school where your kids attended…

Another strange question.   I take it you are too young to remember Dunblane?

But there aren’t 300m of them with guns

IIRC the last time I looked at this, the ratio of guns to people is about 1:1, but gun ownership is about 50%.

Actually it’s more like 1:4 adults own a gun, with 1:3 households owning a gun.  That makes it all the harder for people outside the US (and many inside the US) to understand why the rules never get tightened. Even many gun owners are not fundamentally opposed to better regulation.  Only about 5 million people are paid up members of the NRA (by my estimate that is <1:10 gun owners).

Although its wrong to treat the whole of the US as though it is one homegenious country in terms of either politics or (gun) culture.  All the more surprising then that minority interests, even large ones, manage to prevent change for so long.

It’s interesting but it’s also pretty meaningless since it doesn’t recreate the most important bit- everyone there was prepared for it.

Prepared, armed but all but 1 died.

Yup, but look at the lessons people are taking away:

“If I’m in a movie theater and someone pulls a gun, what am I going to do? I know now I’m not gonna just fall on my kids and protect them. I need to advance on the threat.”

You do know they can own a gun?

We cannot own guns in the sense they meant which is the right americans have to own guns up to and including semi automatic assault weapons. I dont know why you chose to miss the point.

Another strange question.   I take it you are too young to remember Dunblane?

Another strange reply which misses the point. I remember it and I remember what the response was regarding already limited gun access and I remember all the school shootings here since * [ none] and I remember that after Hungerford we  banned assault weapons, pump action shotguns etc *

*Correlation does not imply causality but our approach to this sort of thing has been considerably more successful than allowing largely unfettered access to guns.

Two different psychologies isn’t it

vesus

As discussed, much of this is alien to us…. but just look at flight 93 (“lets roll”)

Northwind wrote:

It’s interesting but it’s also pretty meaningless since it doesn’t recreate the most important bit- everyone there was prepared for it.

Well it establishes a baseline of the best possible outcome.

Yup, but look at the lessons people gun toting morons are taking away:

poly wrote:

Although its wrong to treat the whole of the US as though it is one homegenious country in terms of either politics or (gun) culture.  All the more surprising then that minority interests, even large ones, manage to prevent change for so long.

Only if you’re confused about how “democracy” works in the US.

I remember it and I remember what the response was regarding already limited gun access

You mean we didn’t let suspected paedophiles who had been the subject of numerous police complaints keep guns?

This is what a Police officer wrote about Hamilton five full years before Dunblane, and that the firearms department decided not to act upon:

“I am firmly of the opinion that Hamilton is an unsavoury character and unstable personality.

It emerged from enquiries that he, during the course of the first week of camp, seemed to become increasingly stressed and had difficulty in managing the group. It was during one such moment that he became extremely angry and assaulted one of the boys. This particular child was in fact assaulted three times by Hamilton during the first few days of the holiday and was eventually removed by his parents.

Furthermore, allegations were made, albeit uncorroborated, by one of the children that Hamilton induced the child to pose in various compromising positions, scantily clad in extremely ill-fitting swimming trunks, for photographs. To date these photographs have not been recovered but neither I nor the officer who interviewed the child have any reason to disbelieve that the allegations are in fact wholly true.

Convincing corroborated evidence was uncovered which confirms that two boxes containing approximately 36 slides each have not been recovered by the police despite Mr Hamilton’s claims that he handed over all of the photographs taken. Mr Hamilton has been reported to the Procurator Fiscal in this regard for obstructing the police.

The foregoing report, in part, conveys some of the concerns which I harbour about this man. I firmly believe that he has an extremely unhealthy interest in young boys which to a degree appears to have been controlled to date. It was his ploy, whenever challenged, to engage in ‘smoke screen’ tactics which divert attention from the focal issue and this is the purpose for the profusion of correspondence to MPs, Procurators Fiscal, the Chief Constable and the like. I would contend that Mr Hamilton will be a risk to children whenever he has access to them and that he appears to me to be an unsuitable person to possess a firearm certificate in view of the number of occasions he has come to the adverse attention of the police and his apparent instability.

The Procurator Fiscal at Stirling has not yet decided on whether or not he will proceed with the case against Hamilton but at the moment it appears in all likelihood that he will not.

I respectfully request that serious consideration is given to withdrawing this man’s firearm certificate as a precautionary measure as it is my opinion that he is a scheming, devious and deceitful individual who is not to be trusted”.

Dunblane was an entirely preventable disaster, every alarm bell and red flag had already been raised, it was sheer police incompetence or meddling that led to no action being taken.

I do wonder if a large number of people have watched so many US action movies that they genuinely believe that one person can take on a much larger force or armed assailants and “take them out” without being killed? (as regularly depicted in numerous films)

I’d suggest that the (now pretty much forgotten) lesson of Vietnam, where around 50,000 of the best trained and armed troops in the world returned home in body bags, despite fighting a poorly trained and poorly armed aggressor, suggests quite the opposite.

it was sheer police incompetence or meddling that led to no action being taken.

Presumably, nincompoopfan doesn’t see the result of applying this observation to armed American policemen and the like, in the light of exactly these type of responders being so ineffective during the latest child-slaughtering festival…

<span style=”font-size: 0.8rem;”>Presumably, nincompoopfan doesn’t see the result of applying this observation to armed American policemen and the like, in the light of exactly these type of responders being so ineffective during the latest child-slaughtering festival…</span>

Yay, personal abuse FTW.

So, you can’t trust the police to administer a licencing process properly, you can’t trust the police to come and help you if there is an attack and ’banning’ all guns tomorrow wouldn’t take a single one of the 300m unregistered ones already in circulation out of the hands of madmen and criminals. In effect, you’re on your own…

In the U.K. firearm, and specifically handgun, firearm murder rates rose and wider firearm offences went through the roof after the “Ban” and only dropped back after ten years – so assuming a US ban has the same impact (and reminding once again that we knew every single legal gun owner and what guns they had in order to implement that ban) what do you propose to do to protect the public in the meantime?

Maxtorque

I’d suggest that the (now pretty much forgotten) lesson of Vietnam, where around 50,000 of the best trained and armed troops in the world returned home in body bags, despite fighting a poorly trained and poorly armed aggressor, suggests quite the opposite.

I’d suggest that if you’re going to use the Vietnam war (or any historical analogy) to make your point that it’s relevant to what’s being discussed in some way. The NVA and Vietcong were generally well organised, well armed, certainly adequately armed with the latest Soviet block weaponry of the day. Despite this the Americans generally inflicted 5 times the casualties they suffered because the Vietnamese leaders believed they were engaged in an ideological war to rid Vietnam of colonialism and foreign invaders, and as such they were willing to send every man, woman and child in Vietnam to die in pursuit of that goal.

I do wonder if a large number of people have watched so many US action movies that they genuinely believe that one person can take on a much larger force or armed assailants and “take them out” without being killed? (as regularly depicted in numerous films)

I don’t think that’s really what’s being discussed in practical terms, certainly not the way you’re describing. I think America’s gun laws, or rather some state’s gun laws are crazy enough, and their culture is strange enough that you don’t have to invent arguments or points of view.

ninfan wrote:

Yay, personal abuse FTW.

Veracity

In the U.K. firearm, and specifically handgun, firearm murder rates rose and wider firearm offences went through the roof after the “Ban”and only dropped back after ten years

The 1997 handgun ban? Excluding Dunblane 67 gun homicides in 1996, 45 in 1997; 29 in 2003. 1 handgun homicide in 2001 (the earliest year I found stats for). Your argument might be slightly better if you hadn’t just made up your own stats.

If we can’t rely on police officers to take down an armed attacker how is giving a handgun to a teacher deemed a reasonable suggestion? If trump lambasts a cowardly cop, how is Mrs Wilson the 10th grade math teacher to feel when she gets her glock?

The fact that this is even being touted as any sort of sensible measure is a barometer of how deeply entrenched fire arms are in the American psyche. The only thing ninfan has said that is coherent is that a blanket overnight ban will not work.

Teachers go into the profession for the love of educating youngsters. Tackling armed assailants should be nowhere near their remit. In fact, having armed teachers at school will further normalise firearms in the eyes of youngsters which is dangerous. Kids are not daft, they will know who has a weapon, where it is stored and will probably try to laugh and joke about it. Long term for tackling problems of gun normalisation, having a weapon in the classroom is about as daft an idea as I have heard. I don’t think all Americans are stupid as not all of them are suggesting teachers should be armed.

Having firearms can be a minefield in other ways. Will teachers have to go through regular psychiatric tests? Teaching is stressful enough as it is. How do you discipline or sack the teacher that is failing at their job, but is also carrying a weapon? A disaffected and clever pupil won’t even have to source a gun outside school. The school can provide one for them.

I saw a video last night for a device called a barracuda which is a locking mechanism which effectively bars access to rooms, and can be deployed quickly by classroom teachers if required. I don’t know how effective they are in practice, however even delays of seconds in these situations can make all the difference.

Companies are turning against the NRA. This is the way to change things. It might take years. Attitudes have to be changed.In the meantime we can only realistically make school shootings less deadly.

hand gun offences spike after ownership of hand guns becomes illegal shocker

There is no short term solution to the problem of mass recurring public slaughter in the USA.

The introduction of even more guns in the hands of teachers and others will only make the situation even worse than it already is.

The attempt by the likes if the ninny to suggest that it would improve things, is if course nonsense.  Why this is so, has been laid out very effectively elsewhere in the thread, but no doubt nin hasn’t bothered to read their lucid spelling out of the obvious, because he’s too busy trying to justify the unjustifiable with his ludicrous repetitive assertions.

The long term solutions – immediate severe background checks, a ban on all public gun ownership and the enforced confiscation of existing firearms are not going to happen. You might as well ask a terminal junkie to voluntarily give up his heroin.

The future for the USA is extremely dystopian. Despite the news of protests and boycotts, I see nothing but a continuing descent into hell for it’s citizens, ecouraged and promoted by ridiculous NRA apologists like the absurd ninfool.

Selah.

Australia and uk have shown that the imposition of gun control works, e.g. http://uk.businessinsider.com/does-gun-control-work-2018-2 The fact that it doesn’t work overnight is a poor excuse for doing nothing. Not sure if anything will prompt dramatic change in the USA you’d have thought children being slaughtered might but obviously not.

ninfan: What do you think would work in the long run?  Could stricter rules around guns (whatever the specifics)  ever stop/reduce these kinds of atrocities?

athgray wrote:

he fact that this is even being touted as any sort of sensible measure is a barometer of how deeply entrenched fire arms are in the American psyche.

The fact it’s being touted is simply an indication that nothing has changed. You’re right to some extent there, but ultimately it’s a political thing “come up with something, anything which isn’t in any way a ban on guns so they can’t complain you’re doing nothing”. I’m not sure how effective those proposing it think it will be. Remember:

My worst fear: a large scale attack on a school — or schools — will lead to the complete degradation if not attempted elimination of our natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms.

the aim of anything being proposed here isn’t to make kids in schools safer – they don’t actually care about that.

Long term for tackling problems of gun normalisation, having a weapon in the classroom is about as daft an idea as I have heard.

It’s not daft to those who think gun normalisation is a good thing.

aracer, your last point is a good one. Pretty sad though.

What do you think would work in the long run? Could stricter rules around guns (whatever the specifics) ever stop/reduce these kinds of atrocities?

I think the most effective solutions would be solving the much deeper problems in American society – healthcare, poverty, housing, drugs, fear.

see Canada/Switzerland for examples where they don’t have this pervasive problem with mass shootings (though still higher firearm homicide rates than U.K. admittedly, but with numerous other societal issues in each country that could be improved)

We also need to put things in proportion – 580,000 people hold firearm and/or shotgun certificates in the U.K, covering approx 1.8 million guns, over 3000 registered dealers.

i also think that the whole “we’ve not had a school massacre since Dunblane” thing gives a false sense of security. Black swan events tend to be rare, it’s almost impossible to draw patterns. “We’ve not had a massacre since the last one”  what do we say/do when the next one happens? We’ve certainly had a lot of people killed with guns, mainly illegal ones, and a lot killed by other means too.

we keep touting Australia as an example of where bans work… but you’ll note that Australian police all carry guns still, and it’s not long since they had a major hostage siege with a gunman either.

Bottom line is their country, their rules. If we are going to lecture Americans about unnecessary deaths why not start with road traffic deaths. Compared to the UK they have roughly5 times the population but 15 times the RTA deaths. Around 30’000 compared to under 2000 here.   20’000 lives to be saved every year by getting down to our levels.

As visitors there is far more chance of being killed on the road than by a gun.

Can you show where healthcare, poverty, housing etc have been identified as root causes rather than

“In the vast majority of cases, we have someone who feels aggrieved—a family breakdown, a wife filing for divorce or a restraining order, being fired from a job, or even the pent-up sexual frustration borne from not being good with women.

Whatever the cause, easy access to a firearm at the time the perpetrator felt most aggrieved was what tipped the situation into violence. In a significant number of incidents, the perpetrator began shooting within an hour of receiving a piece of news that they clearly couldn’t process. In a few cases, it was just minutes before the perpetrator stormed out to their car, grabbed whatever firearms were there, and began shooting. ”

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/observer.com/2016/08/these-are-the-actual-reasons-mass-shootings-occur/amp/