Erin Moriarty made this ridiculous statement in her piece during CBS' 48 Hours: Anatomy of a Rampage...
"...it’s not just the gun that can turn a shooter into a mass killer. It's also the size of the magazine or clip that contains the ammunition."
That's right, the size of the magazine is what turns a 'shooter' into a 'Mass-Killer'! That's bogus rhetoric!
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BTW, I never said I wasn't for "gun control." I said I am a gun owner, and I do believe that armed, and knowledgable and trained citizens are an asset, not a liability. But none of that says anything about my views on gun control -- other than that I am a personal fan of the Second Amendment.
A high capacity clip makes a gun more convenient for the shooter. It doesn't add to the safety. And that's what guns are for right "personal" protection.
We have a problem with believing in violence-as-a-solution in our country moreso than a gun problem.
Having said that, I think we all likely agree that there should be SOME limitations on the weaponry that should be available in general, it's just a matter of where we draw that line.
I'm also with Ben, in that, I, for one, would not feel a BIT safer if I knew every other person out there was packin' heat.
I do not argue that there should be no limitations or regulations regarding gun ownership, only that the 2nd Amendment should not be abridged out of irrational fear. If everyone in my town owned a gun... it it was mandated... the crime rate involving handguns would not initially go down. But I do believe that over time criminals would be less likely to break into ANY house or attempt to rob banks and convenience stores.
I don't understand how BenT can assume that people would be more scared by a gun than a knife or club. What people fear is 'Pain' and 'Death' and all the other inconveniences in between. If Americans were only allowed to own knives and the 2nd Amendment guaranteed the right to keep and bear knives (not guns) this debate would be about 'knife control' and I'd be advocating our right as Americans to carry and conceal knives for self-protection.
The average martial artist cannot disarm a gunman from ten feet away... the AVERAGE martial artist. Why would we assume that a skill that requires far far far more training than the handling of guns be better suited to keep the peace and protect oneself from a marauding gunman?
While I believe BenT's arguments are well-meant, I also believe they're not practical. Nor do they address the need and right of each individual to protect themselves. His foodcourt scenario is... laughable. I know the difference between a balloon popping and a gunshot. As, I suspect, many many others do as well.
Knives and clubs are not the efficient, purposely designed instruments of death, that guns are. I hope even gun ownership advocates have a respect for such machines.
If you were being mugged by a man holding a knife, would you be inspired to self defense if you had your own knife? People who carry firearms have this unfounded belief that they can react faster than someone who enters a situation already mentally prepared for violence against another human being.
Forgive me if I don't bow to your superior grasp of human nature. Your arguments are more personal-invention couched to support your personal beliefs on on this issue. The rest of us are arguing from the same couch... some of us from personal experience in handling guns, so don't assume that simply because you've labelled yourself 'the fact based' that you somehow have a more rational and reasoned opinion here. Your arguments have lacked facts... plenty of anecdotes... but sparse on facts.
And I agree with ER on this-- you can't possibly know how any one of us would react to a Virginia Tech situation. All you have is anecdote and personal opinion, which according you, amounts for very little when it comes from me and others who disagree with you... on any issue.
No... I'm quite certain it was loaded. January 1983, a bunch of redneck yahoos in Washington County, FL blocked the trail me and a bunch of other Frat brothers were driving-- we were on our way out after partying. They were looking for my blue Bug because they knew I was friends with one James Bell who had a running 'near-deadly' feud with one of their redneck yahoo brothers. While trying to get out, the car door was pushed shut so that the top of the door pinned my neck to the body of the car... I was effectively immobilized... and my keys were immediately stripped from the ignition.
I had half a dozen drunken rednecks, some of whom were high as a kite, and there was one evil looking dude with a shotgun pointed right in my face. Was it loaded? I believe so, but did it matter? I was scared, they knew it... but they had missed my friend by three or four cars...
Obviously, they eventually let me go. So yes, I have had a gun pointed at me.
In the gun safety class I took in middle school, we were clay pigeon shooting, when a student turned around with the loaded gun toward the rest of the class. The entire class cringed back, tensing ready to be shot. I thought my heart had stopped. Two students wet themselves. The teacher got control of the situation, but I have never forgotten that instant of pure fear. About 10 minutes later, I got the shakes so bad I couldn't hold a pen for the rest of the day.
You couldn't hold a pen the entire day because a weapon was panned in your general directions? Yes, I was afraid, but I wasn't cringing in fear, and I wasn't a nervous wreck after the incident. I was angry, and wanted to do the same and more to the a-holes who put that gun in my face. But even if I did have access to a weapon, and knew where to find the jerks, I had enough sense to know I was merely angry... that pointing a gun would have only escalated the violence... the same kind of violence that got my friends throat cut.
The picture I'm getting from your comments is one of "Projection": you're projecting your own fears and insecurities into your arguments. In short, you're arguing from a position of irrationality. As are most proponents of strict gun-control.
I'm sure gun ownership has some Best Practices standards, right?
So, what of Ben's question about a situation like this: There've been shots, people are running past saying "Some dude is shooting and killing people!" Three different responsible and well-trained citizens with guns here this and emerge into the hallway of the building where the shootings have supposedly occurred.
They see another dude with a handgun (or two other dudes).
What do Best Gun Practices dictate?
Do they demand that the other put down their gun? Do they ask "Are you the guy's that's been killing people?" Do they just fire for a kill shot? (I DO know enough to know that gun training doesn't counsel to try for "winging" the dangerous person).
Enlighten us. This is not a sarcastic question, but an honest inquiry: What would best practices dictate?
Also to consider is the other gunman/men's appearance. Someone on a rampage will not be dressed and accoutered like a "typical" 'on-his-way-to-class' student. Someone on a rampage is dressed for the part. And judging by the pictures that have been on the news all afternoon and evening, Cho was certainly dressed to kill.
Someone who owns and carries a concealed weapon, legally, overwhelmingly has had some training. Naturally, as BenT has pointed out, law enforcement and SWAT are far better trained, but that doesn't mean a licensed gun owner with a license to carry concealed should be denied the ability to defend themselves... even in a gun-free zone. Especially in light of how long it often takes for law-enforcement to arrive.
Since the mid-seventies when Israel allowed instructors and parent-aides to carry loaded weapons on Israeli campuses, attacks on those campuses ceased... CEASED.
Rampaging gunmen seek out soft targets. If there are no guns at the mall, the schools, restaurants, day care centers... that's where the psychopaths will strike. Remember Beslan?
16 people were killed in a German public school in April of 2002... a gun-free zone. 14 regional legislators at Zug, Switzerland were killed in September of 2001... a gun-free zone. 8 city councilmen in a Paris suburb were killed in March of 2002... a gun-free zone. To reiterate, they were all gun-free zones.
There are risks in arming the populace... or rather, allowing the populace to arm itself, but no one here can honestly say that lives would not have been saved if Virginia Tech were not a gun-free zone, and one or more instructors and/or students had been carrying weapons.
A vice-principal in Pearl Mississippi ran a half mile to his car which was parked off campus to retrieve his pistol because the school was a gun-free zone... he HAD to park off campus. This vice-principal sprinted a half mile to and a half mile back to convince the teenage shooter, at gun-point, to lay down his weapon. The vice-principal... was he a hero? or a law-breaker? What school board in their right mind would have reprimanded him?
Clearly, history and commonsense prove that gun-free zones are dangerous.
1. Citing gun violence statistics from other countries is not very applicable to a debate about US gun policy for several reasons. One is that most other developed nations have much stricter gun laws than the US, so any mass murder would almost by definition be in a gun-free zone. They also have much lower rates of gun ownership. You're comparing apples to an orange.
2. Taking your historical example of Pearl, MS. It appears this principal abandoned his students for at least the amount of time it took him to leave campus and return with his bang-stick.
If he had fired and struck another student he'd have been no hero at all. When he left the campus, how did he know that all he needed was a gun to close the situation?
If the aggressor had not lain down his weapon, but had instead fired, who do you think was more prepared to kill the other? A teen with a gun who had already killed his mother and seven classmates, or an adult who had just finished running a flat-out mile facing a teenager?
Remember the vice-principal didn't become a hero until Luke Woodham surrendered peacefully. Up to that point it was all on the knees of the gods. As the situation would be in any instance where a civilian confronts an armed assailant.
Okay, so the real gunman isn't in the hallway at the moment, but two citizens are, and they're pointing guns at each other yelling, "Stand down."
When both refuse, then what does the responsible gun owner do? Or do they both refuse?
You make a good point about appearance - in this Cho incident, I think Cho would have stood out. But that doesn't help in our hallway confrontation between two armed citizens.
What's best practices next step?
I know it's hard...but try.
A person who was licensed would be required to know rules of engagement.
A person who was packing would most likely have brains enough to enter the hallway cautiously. If the shooter was shooting, that person would know where the shooter was located. So would any other armed individuals responding to the potential rampage. A reasonable person would demand the shooter stand down. If that shooter does not respond...or turns his/her weapon on the armed citizen...GAME ON!
Two or three armed citizens would reduce the odds of a Va. Tech type shooting. The body-count would be drastically reduced.
Now...still in reality...let's examine what happened at Norris Hall.
The crazy sumbuck walks into a classroom of 20 students killing the instructor first then methodically begins shooting the surprised students. One or two...or three individuals out of that 20 are familiar enough with their own weapons and the rules of engagement and have practiced responding to just such a scenario. A few are killed in the classroom befor the one, two, or three individuals eliminate the threat and lower their weapons.
Cho doesn't go back into the halway...he doesn't go to any other classrooms...he doesn't kill 32 innocent people.
If Cho had known there were very possibly two or three individuals in that classroom who were legally in possession of firearms...and had been trained and tested on the ROE...and were probably well-familiarized with their weapons, he would NEVER have entered Norris Hall armed on Monday morning.
That's the real world, pal.
"When both refuse, then what does the responsible gun owner do? Or do they both refuse?"
Well...I would imagine that if this were taking place that there would be no-one being shot...is that a fair assessment? If there WERE people being shot...in another romm...another hallway, both responsive armed citizens would be alerted to the fact and move toward the sound of the gunfire.
Is that a fair assessment?
I would submit is is much more viable than your own scenario.
No, it's not, but then we're not discussing US gun policy. We're discussing whether or not armed students and/or instructors could have saved lives. We're discussing the over-all safety of gun-free zones. And the fact is gun-free zones do not provide complete safety from gun gon-toting killers. Gun-free zones do not protect anyone from armed gunmen. They only make those caught within them easier to kill.
Don't change the subject BenT. You went in this direction and argued for stricter gun-control and firmly argued that civilians are incapable of shooting straight and more likely to hurt themselves, family members or beloved pets. Well! Cho was an untrained (by law-enforcement and SWAT standards) gun-owner, more likely to hurt himself (which he finally did), family members, and beloved pets... AND A WHOLE LOT OF CLASSMATES! He shot straight enough to kill 32 people, and yet your desired policy would have restricted even further these students/teachers/fish in a barrel's ability to defend themselves... to shoot back in self-defense. Many states give that right to homeowners... the right to use deadly force to save their lives and property... yet according you and others we must not give this right to students and instructors, of ANY age, legal or otherwise. Instead, we must restrict them further.
That's the question I'm asking. Who here has gone through firearms training and can answer this authoritatively?
Or do they not cover such situations in firearms training?
If not, then, what would we expect an armed citizen to do when confronted with another armed citizen?
I'm honestly asking this question. As one not instinctively in support of gun bans, but who has a great deal of concern with having a bunch of armed yahoos running around, I'm the kind of guy you need to convince we won't have hysterical shootouts in situations like this.
The pertinent rules that I've read (from the NRA and other sources) include:
1. Keep your firearm unloaded until you are ready to use it, and
2. Positively identify your target and the threat it poses before firing at it.
So, I'm thinking that what this would mean for our two citizens in the hallway is that neither would shoot until they were shot at or the other was shooting at someone. That SOMEHOW, the other armed person would have to be positively identified as a threat before shooting.
And that would be AFTER loading your weapon.
Are those accurate readings of those rules or have y'all had any training to know?
No wonder Dan had to look it up...