School Shootings...

[Patrick5087]

QUOTE American was founded on war, pilgrims vs native americans, the colonial british government etc. Some famous guy said 'American constitution emerged from the mist of gunpowder.' Now that would certainly explain why the founding father's made it so in the constitution to allow people to carry firearms and their love of guns.

Well the British had how many wars? Against the French/Spanish Against the Scottish?

Besides that, advocating more gun control doesn't help. I can tell you why, smuggling, If I want a minigun I can get on smuggled. Sure I have to pay a little extra but that wont stop me from getting it. There are way too many ways to get goods into this country.

there have been 46, over 40 years. There has also been 7 over 30 years in Canada. And 14 throughout the rest of the world those are the "known" ones.***

The problem is that people are getting out of control and have no way to vent there anger. USA is a big country. The UK is pretty small. Also the UK has and still has problems with the IRA right? The whole northern Ireland thing? So while yes USA are a bunch of bastards so where its parents

so really we learned from our parents

here is the real problem, no one really knows who the person next to them are. They could be a murder or they could be a saint. its just no one really takes time to get to know people. Really its just no one cares about eachother. I know I know hippie talk. But thats the way it is.



*** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooti...table_Shootings

 

[monsta666]

Seems more like a dig at Britain than a comment about school shootings, but a bit of banter never harmed anyone? Right?

QUOTE (Patrick5087 @ Apr 08 2008, 04:27 AM)Well the British had how many wars? Against the French/Spanish Against the Scottish?

How long is a piece of string? It also depends what you define as a war. If it is full out attacks to take over the country then there hasn't been that many. Things that spring to mind are the battle of Hastings in 1066; the 100 years war between 1337-1457; Spanish Armada in 1588/89 and more "recently" the battle of Trafalgar square in 1805, so it is not exactly very recent. Those are the big ones but considering two of those battles occurred before America existed (at least to the old world) it is not that bad. Will the Spanish ever learn that attacking the British navy is futile?

It should be noted that most of these "wars" were in fact single battles. So it is a bit debatable whether you can class them as actual wars. As for Scotland... England had two wars with them with the last ending in 1357. Imagine that? Scotland and England in peace with each other for over 650 years?! I can hardly believe it myself!

Guess that is what football and hooligans are for!

QUOTE there have been 46, over 40 years. There has also been 7 over 30 years in Canada. And 14 throughout the rest of the world those are the "known" ones.***

Don't know what to make of this. Perhaps it is a joke, I don't come across these jokes too often. I commend you for your good wit!

QUOTE The problem is that people are getting out of control and have no way to vent there anger. USA is a big country. The UK is pretty small.

Despite UK being a small island we manage to cram 60 million people in it.* That population is not that insignificant... In any case it possible to make balanced statistics that cater for differences in population i.e gun deaths per 100,000 people. Check out my statistics on page 1 for more information.


QUOTE Also the UK has and still has problems with the IRA right? The whole northern Ireland thing? So while yes USA are a bunch of bastards so where its parents

so really we learned from our parents.

Yes they do or perhaps did is a better word. The Irish Republican Army (IRA) are not as strong as they used to be. In any case the IRA is seen as a terrorist organisation at least to England, Republic of Ireland and America. I suppose you could say the IRA are freedom fighters who are fighting for the freedom of Northern Ireland from English rule. However after the bombing in 1998 (and various other attacks) it is difficult NOT to call them terrorists. If you can convince yourself the IRA are not terrorists then you can convince yourself Al-Qaeda are not terrorists. I guess it all boils down to different perspectives.

QUOTE here is the real problem, no one really knows who the person next to them are. They could be a murder or they could be a saint. its just no one really takes time to get to know people. Really its just no one cares about each other. I know I know hippie talk. But that's the way it is.

It's the heart of the problem. How do you identify these people? Impossible in my opinion so it best to introduce measure that ensure people do not carry guns into school. Do you achieve this through social change or by extra security measures? These shootings will happen again if no action is taken despite what the laws state. That is why it is so important to make sure people follow these laws.

 

[snorky2k]

I used to live in a small state (Iowa, USA) that is a little over half the size of the UK. We had almost three million people and about two thirds of those lived in large towns. There are many places where an entire square mile only has one farm house. I don't doubt that the UK has sixty million people. But, even though I live near Chicago now, I have difficulty imagining how such a small island can support so many people.

[I hope that did not sound like "Brit" bashing. I am just shocked how many people are living there. I'll have to look up Taiwan and Hong Kong. Those must be even denser populations than the Brits have. Is there a signifacant shock crime issue in either of those and are they similar?]

 

[franzoir]

Blah, i think people missed the point, if you want to use population to justify why you have more pyschos then a smaller country, i dont see it as an excuse sorry.

Rather then blaming your population size with the "Oh well, we are such a large country, that we are bound to have a few pyschos", for me that doesnt cut it. Don't indulge yourself in excuses like this shouldn't, you be looking at society and how you can improve it to avoids these scenarios.

From my point of view, i think the solutions that i offered are pretty fair.
1.Tougher gun control. Why do you need it? So that society is aware that guns are bad. Sounds silly? well not really, you would be suprise how just making something illegal would deterr people. Yes, even with tougher control laws, you could get a gun off the black market, but that is like saying a murderer shouldnt be prosecuted because there are more killers out there that will be kill.

2.Education. Educate kids that violence is not the way is not the way to solve your problem, nor that it is the american way to shoot now, question later. (And if that is the American way, change it)

Before anyone tells me this wont work, well tell me your solution because as far as i can see it this is all the federal/state government can do to reduce gun crime. And if you still disagree with me, what can it hurt to try out these solutions, it not like what im proposing is radical or extreme and will have HUGE rammifications for the US, except for the bible bashing south who loves the bible and the gun (surely thats a contradiction) and org like NRA.

Lmao, you never know who is is a pyscho? Thats true... why even i have visions of going on a shooting rampage (joke). Well yea just about anyone could be a psychopath, but quite frankly so what... you can't really spot these people in a crowd with 100% accuracy. Even if you could, what would you do, phone the police and say " i think my next door neighbour is a psychopath," where is the evidence? The best solution is to improve society, why because we are shaped our family friends and society. Rousseau once said " good society creates good people, bad society creates bad people" or something like that, although simplistic, its the truth. If you are churning out people in society that are willing to pick up a gun and kill their fellow classmates, surely, just maybe something is wrong with society and not the population size or other bs excuses.

FINALLY, if everyone thinks that its futile to do anything because there will always be pyschos out there, well i think your scum but aside from me, society can never be perfect but does that mean we should stop trying? (Your answer says alot about the type of person you are)

 

[Patrick5087]

Well, you also have the problem with violence in the home. I mean really there are no numbers as to how many parents hit there kids still in America. I would say that I was one of the lucky ones where my parents didn't hit me to punish me. They just 'brow beat me' used words and logic to get me to think a different way.

Also I think the way schools have gone overboard with school fighting. I mean I can understand if it is with weapons but with fists they shouldn't automaticly be expelled. But what do you want from a state filled with hippies.


QUOTE Don't know what to make of this. Perhaps it is a joke, I don't come across these jokes too often. I commend you for your good wit!

no joke, those are actual stats on how many school shootings there have been, to be about the fact that there really haven't been that many school shootings in history. I have some wits, and I wouldn't kid about that sort of thing.

The whole brit knocking or any other country that i happen to say something against will always be on a kidding nature.

I agree that there needs to be more measures taken to prevent such acts, its just we have a serious problems with "CEOs" They are even in the public education system. They take half the money and the rest goes to the schools. So schools have to cut corners just to get supplies for there normal operation. Yea Americas education problem has problems I wont even try to compare our public school systems with anyone. All I can be proud of is the more private institution's, like th colleges and such

 

[FlareDragon2004]

It would be better to stop bullying from the beginning. Little kids, though innocent as so, are blunt, and hurt more so than when older. I have no idea how this would be done, but I think this is a large chunk of the problem. The other part would have to be psychological disorders.

I mean, no offence, if someone has shown to be mentally unstable once before, why the hell not force help if they don't want it? Careless leads to many problems in the world, and this is one of them.

 

[Hiroyuki]

Re. population, I think population density is more likely to lead to shootings than simple population total. When people live shoulder to shoulder and don't have enough space then stress levels will surely rise. However school shootings and gun deaths generally don't seem related to density. If you look at these figures in a blog post of mine you'll see the UK had 8 times the population density of the US, whilst Japan is 11 times! But neither country is noted for such events.

Gun availability must make a difference. When people snap, they will lash out with whatever comes to hand - fists, knives, guns - but some of those are more damaging than others.

As someone else said though, even in the US these events are really fairly rare and trying to do too much about them can be counter productive. Especially when people may have gone on the rampage because they were bullied or persecuted, the answer is surely to address those problems rather than for the state and schools to join in and also persecute the very same groups of people because they fear they may go on the rampage, which surely just makes it more likely.

I used to know an american girl who didn't fit in, and liked wearing a trenchcoat. She was actually a very nice and intelligent girl, but being intelligent she was pretty contemptuous of the idiots she had to rub shoulders with at school. After the "trenchcoat mafia" shootings, she actually started to fear for her life, not on account of her fellow students but because of the school itself, which started having armed guards patrolling the school, and everytime they walked past she worried that they might shoot her because of her appearence.

When you look at the idiocy of the kneejerk reactions of many schools, such as having pupils arrested for writing "scary" essays or using maps of their schools to make Quake levels or whatever, it's truly a wonder that there isn't a school shooting every month as one person after another is pushed over the edge by institutionalised persecution resulting from previous incidents.

 

[Dalriada]

QUOTE Re. population, I think population density is more likely to lead to shootings than simple population total. When people live shoulder to shoulder and don't have enough space then stress levels will surely rise. However school shootings and gun deaths generally don't seem related to density. If you look at these figures in a blog post of mine you'll see the UK had 8 times the population density of the US, whilst Japan is 11 times! But neither country is noted for such events.

National population density means nothing, since it only means there's some highly populous areas and some desert areas.

However, it's true that the density of most areas in the USA is far lower that in Europe or worst, Japan (for various reasons). I'm not sure it can be related to school shootings.

 

[monsta666]

QUOTE (Dalriada @ Jul 01 2008, 11:44 PM)National population density means nothing, since it only means there's some highly populous areas and some desert areas.

However, it's true that the density of most areas in the USA is far lower that in Europe or worst, Japan (for various reasons). I'm not sure it can be related to school shootings.
I think what Hiroyuki is referring to is urban areas. Urban areas (which have higher rates of gun crime) have a higher population density than small towns. I haven't got the figures on hand but I can generally say (with reasonable confidence) that cities such as London, Manchester, Liverpool have higher rates of gun crime than say Cambridge, Norwich or even Newcastle. I'm sure similar things can be said of other countries.

Then again there can be other factors at work here (more poverty, substandard education etc).

 

[snorky2k]

Yes. Crime does seem to be more intense in the urban areas. While Des Moines Iowa has a higher crime rate than most Chicago Illinois suburbs, with its quarter million people it looks just like a Chicago suburb. Violence seems to follow the likelyhood of robbery. There is a better chance of stealing something valuable in the cities and not getting caught. In the smaller towns, everyone notices the stranger and the long term criminals have already been caught. However, that is changing lately.

The larger communities also have more people living below poverty level. When I was a kid living in a small community in northern Iowa, the town where I went to high school had 4,500 people. In the last fifteen years, a large number of egg farms were built and the population had an influx of 6,000 mexican immigrants mostly being payed below minimum wage. High school children could no longer get part time jobs and more than one time an entire class was arrested for drug charges. Houses selling for $80,000 are going unsold and have lost a quarter of their value in the last year and are still falling. Children who already have language problems are not being addressed because the school funding is still at the level for the size the community was at the last census almost ten years ago. Health care is difficult to obtain because a majority of the immigrants are undocumented and the employers are not providing healthcare. An undocumented worker is lucky to get a third of the pay of a documented worker and risks being deported if they try to get out of the almost slave like conditions. It is difficult for kids to have a good attitude when their parents are being treated poorly.

In situations like these the employers are immune from prosecution because the eggs are used for medical vaccine purposes not food and the employers are politically influential in the US and Europe.

 

[CASSHERNxLYUZE]

QUOTE (dchaosblade @ Feb 15 2008, 03:22 PM) I offer this question to you: What can be done to prevent these atrocious events from occurring? CAN anything be done?
Yes, there is.

Until we stop forcing everyone to fit into some mould, and just start respecting one another as individuals, this sort of thing (among others) will continue to happen.

It may not seem much, but think about it. It is this culture of control and conformity that leads to labelling, discrimination, and abuse. I'm sure that what these shooters only really wanted was to be themselves and not be at the losing end of things for it, but we all know how even a simple thing like that is just too much to ask for from society. Eventually, they got tired of the way things are and just decided to do something about it.

Anyway, here's a recommended reading for those who are really interested in the subject:
www.social-anxiety.com/area-angry-loners.html