OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE

[filkertom]

Breaking news this morning: Five dead in Illinois shooting.

ENOUGH!

Enough with the goddamn guns.

Enough enough enough.

I haven't even had my fucking Egg McMuffin yet, and a half-dozen people have been shot.

Y'know what, gun-rights-über-alles folks? You're correct. Guns don't kill people. PEOPLE WITH GUNS KILL PEOPLE. A lot more easily

Comments

[admnaismith]

Aw, c'mon, if guns hadn't been available, he would have just stabbed them all with a plastic spork. And it would have been the same thing.

Because anti-gun laws will not stop ALL gun crime, there's no point in even trying. That's why conservative Republicans want to get rid of all criminal laws, police and prisons. Because why bother?

Remember when...

[rev_bob]

...the GOP was the "law and order" party?

No lie. They used to win elections based on getting rid of crime; that's where the Drug War came from.

My, how the worm has turned...

Re: Remember when...

[admnaismith]

The worm turns on a dime.

Republicans are the "law and order" party (donk-donk!) when they are in power.

When Republicans are the minority party, the government is a bunch of jackbooted thugs with a secret plan to take over America, and all laws are abominations against individual liberty and religious freedom.

Someday there will be another Republican Administration, and in an instant it will once again be considered treason to criticize the President.

[starcat_jewel]

I keep wondering -- how many deaths will it take to make the gun-worshipers say "enough"? And the answer is, there is no such number. No matter how many people die, their "right" to have as many guns as they want is more important.

And if everybody had guns, right down to the kids in the elementary schools, all of the deaths would stop. Because more guns mean less crime -- John Lott says so! (Ever wonder why he's the only name they ever cite? It's because no one else has been able to replicate his results.) If I wanted to live in a goddamn war zone, I'd move to fucking Somalia.

[dragonmakr]

I shudder to think it, but it seems like the only thing that will get the folks who believe more guns are the answer to think again will be a mass killing that includes gun carrying "honest citizens" (my apologies, I couldn't think of a better term). To have a few folks who are armed involved, and there ends up being more killing.

This is not something I want, nor even something I can articulate properly... But geez.

[starcat_jewel]

That won't do it either, because there will always, always be some way for them to twist it around so that those "honest citizens trying to help" did the wrong thing that they should have known not to do. And that the gun-worshiper writing about it, who wasn't there and has no idea what went down, would have not done if HE had been there.

It's a mythology, and nothing will shake it because it's not about reason or reality.

[gardnerhill]

The "No True Scotsman" fallacy. Everyone with a gun is a Law-Abydin' Reesponsibull Gun Owner who'd be a victim of fascism if required to register the gun or only buy after the same waiting period they demand of women wanting abortions - but the moment he mows down a playground or massacres his girlfriend and her family with his steel dildo suddenly he's A Lone Nutball Who Has Nothing To Do With Us Reesponsibull Law-Abydin' Gun Owners, Don't Take My Binky Away Waaaaaahhhh!!!!

[ebartley]

A poorly-publicized mass shooting (2 deaths, clearly intended to be more) last year in the Clackamas Town Center (Colorado) did in fact have the murderer confronted with a man with a valid concealed carry permit. The man carrying drew but didn't shoot, explaining afterwards that he saw someone behind the shooter and was worried about missing the shooter and hitting them. Shortly afterwards, the murderer shot himself in the head.

[bayushisan]

Stories like this just enforce my personal distaste for guns. I was raised around rifles, as my father used to hunt, and I was always taught to have respect for them. I fired one once at summer camp, and didn't feel one way or the other toward them at the time. Now? Honestly I don't know. I've been a second amendment supporter for years, and still am to some extent, but I just don't know how you go about stopping these kinds of incidents.

I'd like to think that if we taught people to love one another that it would eventually sink in to most people.

[kelbob]

Illinois is already one of the most restrictive states for gun ownership.
So if gun control is the answer why hasn't it worked in Illinois?

[filkertom]

That's a very good question. Unfortunately, it's not likely to be answered anytime soon. As alverant noted above, there has been a whole lot of potential government research on guns, gun violence, gun control, etc., etc., etc., that has simply been shut down legislatively because of hard lobbying and hard cash by the NRA. Here, go wild.

[sveethot]

There was a nutjob who went batshit crazy at a local college. With a knife. 14 stabbed. No fatalities.

[alverant]

The laws in Illinois don't matter when you could drive for a few hours to a state with less restrictive laws to get your ordinance. Straw purchases are a source of income to gangs. What is needed is a consistent national policy with the same law applying equally to all states, no more or fewer restrictions. That would make going elsewhere useless