Can America be fixed?

[johnny]

Okay, you guys win.
I won't fight it anymore.

You are nowhere near as honest a discussant as you make out. I’ve been clear that my focus is more handguns but you want to keep making out that “we”, like there’s some kind of team that all thinks the same, are totally focused on longarms and death rates.

You choose the argument that suits your biases just like everyone else does.

 

[Zaf]

Removed by user

 

[pink poodle]

Maybe its time to focus this thread on whats really fucking the USA: removing net neutrality and high fructose corn syrup.

Damn right. And rap music. And video games. If we could stop all these things violence would cease. Except suicide. For that we would need to stop rock music as well.

 

[Binaural]

Maybe its time to focus this thread on whats really fucking the USA: removing net neutrality and high fructose corn syrup.

Are we about to talk about obesity in America! Sure we are! This is a pretty great article, but the main points are that inactivity, terrible food choices, and the fact that fewer and fewer have to physically work hard at work anymore. There are some parts of the country (i.e. boulder, Colorado) that are relatively slim and wouldn't look out of place in Australia, but the suburbs in the cities are awash with blubber.

 

[LPG]

Also, killing with a firearm doesn't depersonalise the experience, and I'd challenge it being "cleaner"; gunshot wounds are as messy an affair as blunt force traumas and deep lacerations.

My point was the act of doing it is cleaner and quicker with a gun. Once it's done they are both messy but there is more space and effort between starting the assault and having killed someone with other methods. In this time you give people to rethink or scale back the force they use. Hit something a few times and people can calm down and think more rationally. A gun in my point of view makes taking someones life too easy. Of course some people are going to do it but the extra effort is a deterrent or at least time for people to reconsider.

 

[Dales Cannon]

Can you suggest a benefit of a gun?

Allows you to conveniently use chemical energy from pretty much any remote location taking minimal set up time to damage stuff that otherwise wouldn't be damaged.

 

[Nambra]

Because the status quo is not working, not acceptable and I've not seen a superior solution suggested.

That is why the hell I think an element of limiting access is relevant, particularly regarding the topic at hand: mass school shootings.

I'm not sure why there needs to be a body of statistical evidence to support this as part of any eventual solution.

I have to give you credit Zaf, you're done well given your minority standpoint in this thread and supported your assertions with empirical data and factual information. I'm glad we've not been debating ebikes.

I just can't see how clinical analysis can consider the wider effect of a changing of attitude or "social maturity" that comes from legislation. We've moved on from slavery, sexism, racism and all the horrible legacies of generations past, have enacted laws to reinforce these new social norms, and continue to discuss, review and mature as a society. That's not to say the laws are absolute in preventing incidences of slavery or racism or sexual violence, but they were enacted to reflect the changing attitudes of society - that shit isn't acceptable anymore. It is sensible that we should similarly ruminate over guns too.

For a nation like the US to have the NRA, with a claimed membership representing only 1.5% of the population and with disproportionate political influence in Washington, suggests that the US doesn't want to embrace social reforms when it comes to guns. Which is odd, as the US is progressive on many other social agendas - cannabis laws, equality for women and so on. This probably speaks more about the American political system, the influence of money and corruption of power, than the gun debate.

 

[scblack]

Are we about to talk about obesity in America! Sure we are! This is a pretty great article, but the main points are that inactivity, terrible food choices, and the fact that fewer and fewer have to physically work hard at work anymore. There are some parts of the country (i.e. boulder, Colorado) that are relatively slim and wouldn't look out of place in Australia, but the suburbs in the cities are awash with blubber.

I have no reference, but articles I have read in the very recent past tell us that Australians are comfortably as obese as Americans.

Coming from the lovely suburb of Plumpton (specifically Plumpton Marketplace shops) near my workplace, there is a LOT of very fat people in Sydney.

 

[johnny]

Apologies for lumping you together. It's hard when you have thirty respondents and little time, the argument starts to try and address multiple points at once; which can lead to the perception I've not understood, or I'm not clearly answering your individual points.

I identified this issue early on with Binaural and tried to continue from there. Again, apologies for any broadness or scattered answering that seeked to address multiple points at the cost of a more focused discussion. It's a difficult discipline to try and maintain when so many separate issues are constantly raised, and one I have not excelled at in this discussion even having identified the possibility.

Yeah, I reckon that’s fair enough too.

 

[Nambra]

I have no reference, but articles I have read in the very recent past tell us that Australians are comfortably as obese as Americans.

Coming from the lovely suburb of Plumpton (specifically Plumpton Marketplace shops) near my workplace, there is a LOT of very fat people in Sydney.

Let's get back on topic... It's easier to shoot a fat person with a long arm.

 

[pink poodle]

Let's get back on topic... It's easier to shoot a fat person with a long arm.

Are there any stats to support that assertion? In theory they should make an easier target. But are they a more effective e target? Or does the blubber allow for more ineffective target zones? Then the weapon choice comes in. Maybe the job is easier at close range, more a point and shoot scenario than having to line it up and make the hit from a range. This would require a skill element that is perhaps not as common and increases with range. Maybe something like an Uzi up close or a shot gun would be the better choice.

 

[flamin'trek]

Let's get back on topic... It's easier to shoot a fat person with a long arm.

Just one long arm? there aren't going to be many of them around is there. Maybe some fat people have two long arms, but shooting them just because they've got a little extra weight and long arms doesn't really seem fair.

 

[slowmick]

Are we about to talk about obesity in America! Sure we are! This is a pretty great article, but the main points are that inactivity, terrible food choices, and the fact that fewer and fewer have to physically work hard at work anymore. There are some parts of the country (i.e. boulder, Colorado) that are relatively slim and wouldn't look out of place in Australia, but the suburbs in the cities are awash with blubber.

Sad to say but easily the fittest/healthiest looking, happy and most alert people I came across in a 5 week lap of the USA were the staff at the Gun Store in Las Vegas. Both male and female staff. Sure they all had a side arm and a knife on their belts but they very much "present" in their jobs. i guess you need to bring your A game when you are helping tourists play with machine guns...

 

[Zaf]

Removed by user

 

[Oddjob]

Sad to say but easily the fittest/healthiest looking, happy and most alert people I came across in a 5 week lap of the USA were the staff at the Gun Store in Las Vegas. Both male and female staff. Sure they all had a side arm and a knife on their belts but they very much "present" in their jobs. i guess you need to bring your A game when you are helping tourists play with machine guns...

Was it Battlefield Vegas? Those staff are all veterans is my understanding.

Sent from my SM-G900I using Tapatalk

 

[Tubbsy]

An analysis of the Australian statistics relating to local mass-shootings.

http://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2...fore-after-australia-s-1996-national-firearms

Their conclusion is that the the law changes in '96 have had the effect of preventing mass shootings.

 

[Skydome]

An analysis of the Australian statistics relating to local mass-shootings.

http://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2...fore-after-australia-s-1996-national-firearms

Their conclusion is that the the law changes in '96 have had the effect of preventing mass shootings.

And N.Z didn't implement the same shit we did and according wiki only 3 mass shootings since 1997.

Also that article is peddling fake news, there have been mass shootings since 96 but that article seems to be trying to say there hasn't been any, so that article can be ignored.

 

[johnny]

And N.Z didn't implement the same shit we did and according wiki only 3 mass shootings since 1997.

Also that article is peddling fake news, there have been mass shootings since 96 but that article seems to be trying to say there hasn't been any, so that article can be ignored.

Hang on a minute, you're a bit over the top there, Donny, calling fake news and attacking the source and not the argument...., which is a characteristic from many in the gun debate on both sides, for some reason.

They define mass shootings as 5 deaths and over, not including the killer. By that measure I think they're correct. It's the measure that seems a little high.

I think mass shootings are a difficult thing to define. Some one walking into a shopping centre and killing 4 people whilst wounding 15 seems very different than some one shooting their family of 4 whilst they sleep and then offing them self. The former seems much more difficult to achieve without a weapon that can be used at a distance and at a rapid rate (as well as creating smoke, loud noises and increasing confusion and fear, etc.)The latter could be achieved with a rock out of the garden and the gun has a very minor (maybe non-existant) role to play in the killing. One is indiscriminate killing with few if any fixed targets where the killer is assumed to be looking to maximise casualties. The other is very targeted and is limited only to those specifically intended to be targeted.

With that very loose and hugely inadequate guide I reckon you could say that the Monash incident was a mass shooting.

Again, mass shootings are a little bit of a distraction as gun crime in general should be the focus. But, in saying that, mass shootings have a much greater impact on society than normal gun crime. It is akin to terrorism; you are highly unlikely to to be the victim of a terror attack in France. However the impact of the attacks on concerts, trains, restaurants, workplaces, etc. that France has experienced is far greater than the percentages of the population killed. Mass attacks in public places are an attack on the society, not the actual targets, and that is how they are felt. When your community is attacked you feel the impact even if you were not there. Because there are threats of further attacks, there are ramifications for social cohesion and you begin to question if you will be safe if you go to the same or similar places that were attacked.

The impact of mass shootings are greater than just the amount of people shot and to measure them in statistics only is to miss a lot of the outcomes of these events.

Terrorism as a tactic works for the same reasons that mass shootings are greater than the sum of their casualties.

 

[Skydome]

There is no official definition as to what constitutes a mass shooting.

That article defines mass shooting as 5 dead excluding shooter, so they are playing politics with this one to get the desired outcome that THEY wanted.

Some people define mass shooting as more than 3 people getting shot with no requirements for fatalities.

Until we have a solid and agreed upon definition of what constitutes a mass shooting it is pointless to do studies as depending on the definition getting used for said study each study will come up with a different conclusion.

So yeah, that study is pointless and to further note you are more likely to die from medical malpractice than firearms, so i'd rather AMA and etc sort that issue out before getting on their high horse.

 

[pink poodle]

Congratulations @Skydome you have passed. This was all just an elaborate ruse to ensure you weren't an anti-gravity fascist trying to sneak in...you've earned a trip to the gun store!