American Gun Laws

And I too didnt notice the date!

Dont worry Dickens I felt your reply was still worth reading.

MerylStreep

Dickens
I think you’ll find johanna has left the building.

... again!

I never look at the original posting date of topics.

Silly old me!

Dickens
I think you’ll find johanna has left the building.

johanna

Really crimson ?
Have you not wondered how you would feel wandering around Dunblane, or Hungerford or more recently visiting Norway perhaps?
I have.

Oh come on!

I've lived in Norway - a country with some of the strictest gun controls around. You only get permission to own a gun if you can officially document a use for it - and taken extensive training it its use for that purpose, usually hunting or sports.

You cannot compare that with the lax gun laws in the USA. In spite of what happened on Utøya 11 years ago.

How many times does a "Dunblane" or "Hungerford" happen in the US.

It is unusual for mass shootings to occur in either the UK or Norway.

This thread is 10 years old!

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He does now seem to fit more of the profile for this sort of thing, having tried to join a shooting club and being refused [I think rejection is mentioned a lot in these cases]. But, he seemed quite a normal sort of person when he was studying to be a Dr [?]. If only these people could be 'spotted' before they commit these crimes.

I do sigh though when the media say things like "police have yet to establish a motive". Surely these people have mental health problems of a very serious kind so it does not really make sense to talk about motives. They need to be taken to a special hospital and examined by psychiatrists.
If the psychiatrists then say - no this man is sane, he just has some very odd ideas, or was getting paid or something. Then fine, move to a trial. But they are already discussing the death sentence for the guy in the USA who looked completely out of it.
It will be interesting to see what happens in the scandinavian case where the gunman is being tried.

Just glimpsed the massacre bloke on the news. Mmmmm.
Surely even the gun lobby must now question the logic of letting just anybody buy a gun!

It's not just that Americans can carry guns ( I don't remember actually seeing any being carried on show) but the thought that they could carry a loaded machine gun in the back of their car. Is there any limit to the size of weapon that can be bought over the counter? Some of the weapons used in this last massacre seem rather scary.

Do you remember the US female politician (Gabrielle Giffords) who was shot earlier this year? On that occasion, there were many people standing nearby who had guns on them, and wanted to help. However, they did not wish to shoot at the gunman, for fear they would be taken for an accomplice as they opened fire. In the end, the gunman was tackled to the floor by 2 unarmed people, 1 male, 1 female (how incredibly brave, I just can't imagine it).

For me, this puts paid to the idea that you are safer with a gun. What's the point of having a gun if you're not going to use it in a life-threatening situation where the other guy has a gun, because you're too scared about being shot at yourself?!

I think it really comes down to trust in your fellow citizens as a community. In the presence of one crazy person, knowing that the community will do what they can - that's what all societies need, I think.

Was not the right to bear arms framed at a time when there was little, if any, organised crime prevention service in the fledgling USA? I am sure the Founding Fathers did not envisage a country where suburban housewives routinely carry guns.

Knife crime in this country is, I suggest, generally a young urban man on young urban man crime. If guns were more freely available they would be shooting each other, to more lethal effect. One can only hope that in the states there will one day be a powerful anti gun lobby that will have the weight of the pro gun lobby (which is huge) - then they would need a sympathetic president plus 2 sympathetic legislative bodies. Just maybe they might at least ban the sale of those guns that make multiple shootings so easy.
But I don't know what it would take - the level of wooden headed denial and conviction that they have it right (the founding fathers were perfect, you understand) is quite astounding.

I lived in the Sates with my American husband for 12 years and we had a nice group of friends. We and one other family were the only ones who didn't own a gun. We knew a wife who kept a gun by the side of her bed because her husband was away often. One night he came home unexpectedly and she called out to him but he didn't answer. As he opened the bedroom door she was aiming the gun at him. Luckily, she didn't shoot him. Gun ownership in US and the beautiful city of Bath are 2 of the reasons we came to live here - so glad we did. It's a much better place to bring up children.

Hard to believe it was a year ago - it still feels fairly recent to me.

Today is the first anniversary of the two attacks in Norway that killed 77 people, many of them also young and who should have had their whole lives ahead of them. Such deeds as that and the recent slaughter in America are incomprehensible.

That's the thing, isn't it. It's todays news but the families that have lost loved ones and the people that have been badly injured will still be living this for the rest of their lives. How can one person knowingly do that to other human beings. Annoyingly there was, before the film a scene [one of those things that are fashionable in film making now where they show a scene before the film actually starts properly] where someone goes into a cinema and fires bullets into the crowd. This has obviously been pulled now, but it's too late. I was going to see the Batman film [not a fan of that sort of film but it was partly filmed nearby so I wanted to se it out of interest] but not sure if I want to go now.

It is horrendous when these dramatic & tragic situations happen and they are very shocking and totally unacceptable.
Sadly and equally shocking, are the many thousands of people whose lives have been and are still being destroyed on a daily basis by repressive regimes, in wars etc but they go on so regularly they do not make the news.

crimson
In your penultimate post ( sorry ridiculous word ) you say:" Johanna ,I wish you understood how much it pains me when these terrible thing happen."

Crimson, I do, I really do.

Cast your mind back to the Munich Olympics 1972. There was a massacre. Palestinian Freedom Fighters mowed down Israeli contestants.
Two of the victims were brothers. Their parents were Holocaust Survivors, who had lost all their family,their parents , brothers ,sisters, aunts, uncles etc, etc.and met and married after the war.
So, they had nobody left, except their sons, and then they were taken as well.
For me, that must be the ultimate test of faith.
I think about them sometimes.

I think he used tear gas which is why no one would have been able to retaliate. Doesn't seem to quite fit the profile of this sort of killer.

I think I see what you meant now, johanna, but I still don't think the two situations are comparable. Crimson was talking about a country where gun-toting is legal and common - if we thought about it, most of us would feel more uncomfortable over there, especially in a potentially dangerous situation. In this country and Norway it is not legal or common so it's not at the back of your mind all the time. Of course, terrible massacres such as those which have happened could happen anywhere in the world, but they predictably occur more often where it's legal to carry firearms.

Please no, no no crimson, never would I accuse you of insensitivity.

But this guy walked into a shop and just bought enough guns and ammunition to probably wipe out a village, and no one thought anything of selling it to him. I'm not saying that everyone in America carries a gun but you wouldn't know if they were or not. I realise that knife attacks are more common in this country, the difference being that you can only kill one person at a time with a knife. You mention Hungerford and Dunblane but how many other massacres have there been in this country? And how many more would there have been without our strict gun laws? How many in America during the same timescale? One of the girls murdered at the cinema had narrowly escaped being killed in another attack in Canada just a few weeks ago. What is the saddest thing about a lot of these massacres is that the lives taken often seem to be young people with their whole lives ahead of them. johanna; I wish you understood how much it pains me when these terrible things happen; I somehow feel that you are accusing me of some sort of insensitivity.