Yet another school massacre in the USA.

Just heard this tragic news on the radio, about an Amish school shooting.

http://www.metro.co.uk/home/article.html?in_article_id=20470&in_page_id=1&ct=5

What a tragedy. What drives someone to such a foul deed?

RIP girls, Bazza

 

http://www.startribune.com/484/story/715822.html
Here is more of the story. It is so sad, yet so disturbing.
He has 3 young children of his own attending another school.

 

I've been following this story on the news.
Shocking. Horrific. Terrible.
How anyone could do something
like that to little children.
I don't know what this world is
coming to.


Maggie

 

Paradise, PA.
What an irony.
Apparently a revenge attack on something that happened 20 years ago. Bazza

 

That made him 12 when "it" happened. Why did he let the boys go and keep the girls?
Just wonder what triggered him off today?
I guess we may never know

 

Another school shooting happened in Las Vegas today. Things are getting worse in the world. Anymore you'll have to walk outside with a gun just to stay alive.

 

It's too bad and totally tragic.

We had a gun incident in one of our own school programs last week. Thankfully the gun was never fired, but it certainly shook everyone up.

 

A cowardly and mindlessly selfish act, of senseless proportions!
How anyone could inflict this upon innocent children is totally beyond my scope of thought....
Im stunned and in disbelief as i sit here!

How do we protect our children from these random acts of savagery?

 

In the primary school my boys went to in England they introduce security cameras and doors which locked to people from the outside, but could be open as normal from the inside, in case of fire etc. It stopped people entering the building, short of smashing a window.

Sadly there is no such things as 100% security today. However, there are precautions and deterents that can be taken. Kinda like a car alarms. If you have one, they are more likely to move on to the one next door that doesn't.

 

Hey Tim the "Friggin Empire" has been collapsing for over two decades, glad you noticed, the time lines are almost identical to your Rome of yesteryear. "Rome played well the Goth's pillaged and killed". Then came the dark ages were most of mankinds accomplishments in science, education, literature, and medicine almost vanished..............And who said history doesn't repeat itself shudder

 

People have been doing exactly that at times in Northern Ireland for years.......I gues the question is, how much are you prepared to do to know your kids are safe?

 

According to the news this morning
two more of the little girls
have passed away.
This is just horrible and so sad.

Maggie

 

I think its people walking around with guns that causes the problems in the first place.

 

Not really. It depends on who is holding the gun. We can't deny everybody weapons or the innocent couldn't defend themselves as easily. With the good comes the bad.

 

Agreed. I walked around all day on Saturday carrying a high-powered rifle. Didn't shoot a single thing! Gonna probably do the same again this Saturday....

Carrying a gun doesn't cause death. People firing them in the wrong direction does.

 

Hmm Can't say that circular logic is much of an argument.

Just a quick fact:

In 1999 in the UK there were 0.12 gun-related deaths per 100,000 population - a total of 210 deaths.

In the same year in the US there were 4.08 gun related deaths per 100,000 population - total of 28,874 deaths

The point being the fewer the number of guns the fewer the number of gun-related deaths.

 

Guns is one bit of the problem, easy access, and carelessness, increase risk. But.. correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Canada have more weapons per capita than the US ?

It is different types of weapons though, probably not as much "fun", as they are more tools, like what Lev is carrying around.

 

I see there are less GUN RELATED deaths but there are a lot of deaths. If people stopped getting rights to arms they would find other ways to kill people (probably a lot more sick ways) People commit crimes no matter what they have access to and stopping legal arms would not slow that proccess down much. I take pride in my freedom to bear arms. And if I ever see some freak wanting to shoot up a school I will kill him with my gun and spare innocent children's lives. Same with my family if my home is invaded. My .50 desert eagle or 20 guage shotgun will get the job done. Something I would do though... LOCK MY GUNS UP. It's the carelessness of parents that allow kids access to weapons.

 

I was in total agreement with you...until your last sentence.

I don;t think simply locking guns up is the answer. Parents need to take the responsibility to educate their kids in safe use of weapons. The reason we have so many fatal illegal gun incidents is because of lack of education into how and when to handle a weapon. Just locking them up and nothing else is like denying your kid access to the internet because their is a minority of "bad" people on it. Give your child the knowledge in how to use the internet safely and they will do just fine

 

I agree

 

Yes there are a lot of deaths - the figures I have quoted are ALL gun related. And to say that people would find other ways to kill is just foolish - up close and personal killings are rare - guns can kill fom a distance. And locking guns up - well Duh!!! not having them in the first place is even better as carelessness then can't be a factor.

 

You guys are going to have to agree to disagree before this gets personal. This is a UK/USA culture/freedom difference. I have lived them both, and have had my eyes firmly opened to both. I know where I stand

Personally, I'm more concerned with the bad or drunk driver getting mine or my kids' butt......

 

Lev,

Yes you are right - it is a UK/US difference. It is my opinion - note MY opinion that the "right to bear arms" is the most stupid of all the American constitutional rules, as it has resulted in the highest number of gun related deaths anywhere on this planet in so called peace -time.

 

...which is why you still live in the UK.......and we don't

 

Thats why you never go hunting with Dick Cheney

But on serious note, security needs to be beefed up drastically at schools, might be the only effective way to prevent school shootings.

For example, at our school:
If you come earlier than 7:35 to school, you can come through the lunchroom door without being checked.
Even if you come later than 7:35, its highly unlikely you will be searched, usually the secuirty guards dont search alot of people. Plus there are entrances where there is no security.
We have open campus lunch, and after lunch we can come in without being checked, in fact secuirty doesnt monitor the doors during lunch. So anyone can just slip in..

need I say more about my school's flaws?

 

Actually I believe Brazil has that honor.
http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/2979/53/

 

Brazil is full of criminals and gangbangers, so theres no doubt that they gonna have the highest gun death in the world, surely I would think Columbia had this place in the world. Plus poverty and other economical hardships dont really seem to help, plus the police there are crap.

 

One thing we all can agree on is that sanity is important, and we need to give our children a stable enviornment and a respectable childhood, not talking about giving in to them either. Strong parenting is key to the salvation of all nations.

 

Gun control is an interesting problem. If you allow law abiding citizens to have guns, then bad people will get them and kill people with them. If you allow law abiding citizens to have cars then bad people will drink and drive and kill people with them. Ban 'em both. Or not. I don't care, I've got my own troubles.

 

This is kind of funny Blades, because here, the strange part would be having the security guards at the schools.

@Solange. Yes there are more guns per capita in Canada, but most are long guns for hunting, not automatic weapons or hand guns. It's not likely someone will greet you at their door with a weapon, if your car breaks down in the middle of nowhere. I also understand that there is less fear among Canadians as compared to the U.S. based on interviews with citizens on both sides. That apparently has something to do with it.

 

guns are designed for one purpose, and one purpose only...KILLING!

Despite all the moral arguments for and against, and despite what side you take on the issue, the fact remains that this was the weapon that was used to take the lives away from these poor, innocent little girls.

IMHO(and i am an ex-gun owner)...they have no place in any society!

 

If you don't have a gun, how on earth can you return fire when one of the bad guys uses theirs?

 

My wings are like a shield of steel - batfink

In my perfect society, the baddies dont have guns cause they aint any!

 

The big question is, how long until the govenrment convinces us to give up more of our rights for 'security purposes'?

Anyone seen V for Vendetta? It is kinda scary really, the apralells that are seen between that movie and the US today. What really worries me is that the unthinking masses will give up all the freedoms we fought so hard for (OK, that our 'forefathers' faught so hard for back in the 1700's) just to feel 'safe'.

As much as I am not a consipracy theory person, I do watch what goes on and it is starting to scare me. If we aren't careful, we are going to end up with Bush being our High Chancellor for life. *shudder*

OK, stopping now because I try not to get overly involved in politics or religion discussions, but had to say my $.02

Calltaker

 

Probably not going to be able to get this data, but I would love to see these stats broken down further to the raw data.

How many deaths in each country was a result of self-defense against an attacker, and how many were just cold-blooded murder? I would expect to see wayyyy less self-defense in the UK, as guns are not legal, but yet a lot more self-defense in the USA, as generally they are legal. I would rather be in a country where I have the right todefend myself against the physcos, especially when in my own home......

 

The stats probably also include accidents as well as those that were intentional.

Strictly speaking, there are legal guns in the UK, e.g., gun enthusiast clubs (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/5209632.stm) among others. A lot of the control on guns in the UK stems from the killings in Hungerford in Berkshire and Dunblane in Scotland - perhaps as a kneejerk political action.

It seems that the authorities here deem that intending to kill or harm someone is criminal. The case that springs to mind here is http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/717511.stm also http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/724416.stm

I'm curious though, what is it that requires a gun on a walk each Saturday? Is this related to wild animals that may ambush you at any point?

 

Lev - this where I looked for my info http://www.gun-control-network.org/GF01.htm

 

Hehe...I have a deer and elk tag to fill. I'm hunting.

 

While any death in these shootings is a terrible tragedy, we must remember that there are over 50 million kids in school, every day, in the USA.

That is over 2 ½ times the TOTAL Australian population.

It is almost impossible to protect that many people all the time.

Just heard that 29 people have died in one State in OZ, in hospital, in one year, due to hospital mistakes, yet we can't ban hospital treatment, of course.

Guns do not kill anyone, people using guns kill people.

I believe (or have read) that all Swiss young people have to go through National service. They all have an Army issue automatic rifle at home, as part of their training, and their deaths by guns is virtually non-existent. Bazza

 

I agree....with the exception...guns don't kill people.....husbands who come home early do!

 

It seems that those army rifles are your resposibility to keep and maintain until you're old and gray. Losing your rifle is a serious offence with an extraordinary jail term attached. Nobody steals a rifle in Switzerland, because your neighbour is required by law to apprehend or shoot the burglar. Everyone in Switzerland knows this law, and there are enough well armed and well trained neighbours to enforce and maintain that law.

 

True. Plus shooting sports are THE most popular sports in Switzerland, or were at least a few years ago. But a berserk murder/suicide, or someone looking for "death by cop", wouldn't be deterred by all the firearms in all the homes. The Swiss are simply more civilized, much as I hate to say it.

I've sat out this thread, mostly because we just did this a depressingly short time ago. There are millions of school kids, and only a relatively few school shootings any given year (thank God). While they are horrific attention getters, they are extremely rare. The average school child is still much more at risk from lots of different things outside of school than from being in school.

 

We get the knee-jerk "ban/restrict guns" reaction every time an atrocity involving guns occurs. Frankly gun control has nothing to do with it.

This was, as usual, a public mental health/justice system issue. According to the news here last night, the guy was a paedophile, and was going to do a lot more than just shoot the girls, because he got the 'urges' again, and was having weird dreams, or some such b.s.

Let's get things in perspective before we start shouting for over-simplistic, push-button solutions, which aren't solutions. Guns can be used to give people a lot of pleasure, hunt for food, and defend a nation or self. Gun access by the law abiding public isn't a problem. Community/personal attitudes and sociological problems are. We have a lot stricter gun controls after the Port Arthur massacre. There has not been any reduction in gun crimes - so much for that 'solution'.


http://www.bruneitimes.com.bn/details.php?shape_ID=6687

Tightening gun laws because of a serious crime is like restricting automobiles because some people drive irresponsibly. It aint going to work.

E.g.:- Gun crimes are one the highest in South Africa and Rhodesia, not because a lot of people have guns (which they do), but for other political/social issues.