7 Dead In Santa Monica, CA College Shooting

[filkertom]

Horrible. When the hell is this going to end?

This entry was originally posted at http://filkertom.dreamwidth.org/1624595.html. You may comment there or here, although LJ tends to have a livelier conversation at this time.

Comments

[ravenclaw_eric]

It'll stop, or at least become vanishingly rare, after we lock up the crazies. I predict that in future times, our habit of allowing schizophrenics to wander the streets untreated will be regarded with the sort of horror we reserve for things like witch burnings.

[bayushisan]

I'm not sure if involuntary commitment is a good thing. I know that people need to get treatment, and I do believe that they should, but giving the government the power to commit someone to a mental institution could lead to that power being abused. In fact it WILL lead it to being abused because it always does. I honestly don't know what to do, but taking away a person's right to self determination seems like a bad idea.

[juglore]

During the eighties the good ole USA decided it was more important to save money than to treat mental illness. All the asylums were closed or defunded. Across America mental patients were dumped on the streets. And now we get to reap the whirlwind.

The government doesn't want to confine anyone for their safety or anyone else's safety. The government would have to pay for it. Until America decides that taxes and services are a good idea invest in body armor.

[ebartley]

The deinstitutionalization started decades before the eighties -- all the way back into the fifties in some states. It picked up steam as it went along (e.g. it started by making it more difficult to institutionalize people who clearly needed the help but didn't want it; flushing out current patients was a later stage.) Timing varied a lot state by state, since the majority of this was state bureaucracies and state courts.

[ravenclaw_eric]

Spoken like someone with no first-hand experience with mentally-ill people. If they need a choice, the choice should be between the asylum (which, be it noted, means "place of refuge") and the National Razor. Having suffered as much as I have at the hands of mentally ill people, my patience and kindness have long since been exhausted.

[bayushisan]

No first hand experience? Huh. See that would be funny if it wasn't for the fact that I happen to be one of the mentally ill. I suffer from major depressive, panic disorder, anxiety disorder, bi-polar and I've been told that I also have borderline personality disorder. The vast majority of the mentally ill never hurt anyone and don't deserve to be institutionalized because they have an illness. Why is it ok to quarantine them and not, say, AIDS victims?

For the record I oppose giving any government the power to institutionalize people. Its a power that, as history shows again and again, is abused. The mentally ill have the same rights as you whether you like it or not.

[gardnerhill]

That won't keep the Law-Abiding Responsible Gun Owners(tm) from losing their kids, friends and family because their definition of "gun safety" is keeping Daddy's pistol loaded, and on a divan where a 3-year-old can get it.

[ravenclaw_eric]

And just how frequently does this happen? I keep a weather eye on the news, and I can't remember the last case like this. Insofar as this happens, it's so far down in statistical noise as to be meaningless. You're likelier to be devoured by a shark than to have this happen.

[alverant]

"And just how frequently does this happen?"
Practically daily. Seems like every day there's an "accidental" shooting in this country.

ETA maybe you missed the story about how an Army vet was killed by his 4 year old son or how a brother killed his sister with an AK-47 who thought was it was safe or the parents who left a loaded gun around the house and simply told their toddler son "not to touch it" (you can guess what happened next).

[redaxe]

Over at the Daily Kos, KagroX has been tracking weekly gun death reports for 20 weeks now (published on Saturdays). Here's the latest edition, with 45 separate incidents, including "three gun-cleaning accidents, four home invasion shootings, six target practice accidents (including one in which the victim was shot at a toddler's birthday party over a mile away), four people showing off new guns who accidentally shot themselves or the people they were showing off to, three who bought guns for family or self-protection and ended up shooting themselves and/or family members with them instead, and two cops and two soldiers involved in accidents." The hashtag is #gunFail if you want to track it on Twitter.

Gun accidents are far from uncommon, even among people who are or supposedly are trained in safety procedures, far less the kids who get their hands on them.

[alverant]

Thanks.

Consider Texas where there's a 19% illiteracy rate among adults. So they can't even read the safety procedures, much less follow them. Then you have those that refuse to read it because they are Manly Men and Manly Men don't bother with instructions. I wish people would accept the fact that being a "responsible gun owner" has more to do with being lucky than proper behavior.

ETA if it were up to me, there would be no "accidents". Gun owners would be 100% responsible for their weapons. If someone is shot, the owner is guilty of "assault with attempt to kill" and if they die, it's "murder". There would be no accidents. Maybe that would help drive the point home.

[redaxe]

I don't know that I'd go quite that far. After all, there are some behaviors that are FAR more responsible than others. Keeping weapons locked up and unloaded (and perhaps even with safety locks on the triggers) is far less likely for them to be involved in accidental shootings than if they're lying around in desk drawers and the like.

I'm an advocate of the auto-owner-parallel requirements for firearms. I want all firearms owners to have to pass written and range tests for understanding and competency, respectively. I would require liability insurance on all weapons and ammo, and if an owner could demonstrate that their weapons were stolen from a situation secured to a reasonable extent -- say, a locked gun safe -- then I'd be inclined not to press criminal charges against the owner. Conversely, loaded guns in bedside drawers would be felony-level "harboring a deadly menace" or the equivalent.

[alverant]

If it can be proven that the owners took reasonable measures to prevent "accidents" and theft, then I could let it slide. The problem is how does one prove that and how it works with "innocent until proven guilty"?

[redaxe]

The first thing that needs to happen (in places where it hasn't yet) is mandating standards for firearms storage in residences. Gun safes and trigger locks should be a minimum. [Aside: I know I'm precluding all the mavericks who think they're a-gonna shoot them a home invader or three. The frequency of those situations vs. accidental shootings makes that far less important to me.]

The easy case is the absence of a safe or indications of a trigger lock (do they leave markings on the weapon where they contact it?). Much more difficult is when the safe has been forced. After all, we have to take the word of the owner that s/e didn't do it, right?

That's one reason to mandate insurance. It can't return life or health, but it can compensate victims and, if appropriate, beggar the careless or criminal owners of firearms.