Database of Mentally Ill + Armed Volunteers In Every School=

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Dil, what's your standard deviation there? I wouldn't necessarily call a nearly 22% increase insignificant.

Still, it does sound as though:

- a correlation between poverty & homicide seems to be more important anyway.
- this is all just correlation, and doesn't necessarily imply reducing gun ownership in what might already simply be a violent culture (e.g., the US) will help.

(Oh yeah, I don't actually take sides on this issue, but I still say equating guns with knives is absurd...)

The NRA leadership screwed the pooch with that response. LaPierre came off like a crackpot.

Standard deviations are (I didn't select the countries at random though; I just selected the top 24 in regards to income, which is often used to determine "developed"):

Top 12 firearms owned murder rate yearly: 1
Bottom 12 firearms owned murder rate yearly: 0.7

Quite uniform and accurate (if you take out the US from the former, they're closer; the US can be considered an outlier from the other 23).

I generally say that it has no effect there due to such a large difference in firearms ownership between the two groups in comparison to the increase in murders. It has an effect, of course (the two numbers compared), albeit of no consequence to everyone living in said countries in a realistic setting.

Shrox, are you 100% certain you take no part in the industries that drive the violence in this country?

Personally, I have fired a semiautomatic weapon just for fun at a bunch of tin cans. I have played LA Noire for hours, a graphically violent game made by the same people as Grand Theft Auto. Last month, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing Skyfall at my local theater.

If certain types of entertainment disappeared tomorrow, I have no doubt that I would find different and creative ways to fill my time and my quality of life would not be impacted. I'm not saying I want that or I am advocating for it, but I am saying that I would be open to a discussion.

I don't understand how anyone can kill innocent strangers simply because they have the means to do so. It is beyond me and it frightens me. It is terrifying that those simple things that I have participated in could cause someone who is unstable to commit such atrocities. But we have to be forthcoming and honest about our own involvement in the problem and willing to make changes if we want to see an improvement in the situation.

I worked in video games. I don't now, I work in educational augmented reality.

If just one out of 10,000 are adversely affected be exposure to violent media, would you want that 1 in 10,000 to be in your family?

So you think 1 out of every 10,000 people would be inspired to commit mass murder purely by watching a certain movie or playing a certain game.

And that nothing else would trigger that latent homicidal tendency within them. Not Shakespeare, or a rainy day, or an argument with their parents, or a grumbled comment from a grocery store clerk, or getting cut off in traffic. Nothing except a video game.

Do you have any data to back up that position?

Register the Mentally Ill.

No, I asked a hypothetical question. I did not say what I "think".

Okay, then apply my response to the hypothetical.

Sounds like the War of All against All.

ruveyn

Thank you for articulating what I've been trying to say for a while now. Naturally, the NRA will point blame at everything but itself & its own extremism. With specific regard to LaPierre's speech, it's comforting to see it so roundly condemned, among the media & among politicians. The arrogance of this group is truly breathtaking. I'd like to think this represents some watershed moment, some paradigm shift, but I'm not deluding myself on this one.

It's important to note among those gun-supporting politicians who seem to be reconsidering their position, almost none of them are Republicans. Mostly they are circling the wagons. And I'll be blunt about this: THERE WILL BE NO LEGISLATION PASSED with respect to gun control, not even any measures as modest as banning high-capacity magazines & assault weapons or limiting purchases to one a month or closing the gun show loophole on background checks. NONE. Period. End of debate. The NRA has drawn its line, & elected officials cross it at their peril. Nothing will be done, & if the Democrats really try to push this, they will get routed in the next election, & then the crazies will have their hands on all the levers of power in Washington. Politics is the art of the possible, & gun control isn't just a heavy lift, it's outside of the range of the possible. These gun massacres are just something that we Americans must learn to live with.

But in the wake of a tragedy of this scale, the urge to do something won't soon subside. Since we can't do anything about guns, we'll create a registry of autistic people & the mentally ill. We'll arm teachers & school administrators. We'll put more police officers everywhere, whatever the expense. More guns. More security. More checkpoints. In my opinion, these a much bigger threat to civil liberty than gun control ever has been.

Last edited by Billybones on 23 Dec 2012, 1:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Didn't Romney say something similar? Look how well it worked for him...

The tide is turning against guns.

I dislike the idea of a register. Has the sex offenders register ended sex offences? No! But a mental register creates stigma and a barrier to treatment

Poor idea. You just dont need the guns.

I agree. Gun control is a poor idea. You just don't need the mentally ill.

So what is the suggestion there. Culling?

History has proven that crossing the NRA is bad for your election. When the NRA was double-crossed in 1968 with the gun control act, the democrats lost big, then again in the '94 mid-terms. Al Gore might have won in 2000 if he didn't include gun control in his platform, and John Kerry might have stood a chance too in '04. In some states and some districts, democrats that support gun control stand about as much chance of winning as a white neocon running in Jesse Jackson Jr.'s former district!

Having loose gun laws does not require a police state. People who are willing and trained to carry loaded weapons in public can fill most of that role without increasing the need for more cops beyond restoring the police presence lost due to budget cuts. The advantage of such a system is no Stanford Prison Project-like sense of superiority over the population since a citizen with a gun carries no title, gets no honors short of something extreme happening, does not become made to feel privileged, and does not deal with he worst aspects of society every day, and thus will not become contemptive. They are your average "Tom, Dick, and Harry", trained and licensed to carry a gun; peaceable citizens; not out to be John Wayne, who want to be able to defend themselves if needed, and good Samaritans if they happen upon such a case and the law allows for it.