The lack of gun control is the only reason that these school shootings happen so often in America.
Or society is sick. Machine guns were readily available many years ago — actual machine guns, not black plastic rifles that look like something out of a movie, but are functionally the same as a hunting rifle. Where were all the mass shootings back then?
Banning scary-looking rifles won’t solve the problem. I went shooting with family and friends a few weeks back for my dad’s birthday. I can tell you that someone packing a couple semi-automatic handguns and a few magazines can do a tremendous amount of damage in a short period of time.
Background checks and mental health checks would probably help. There’s something going on out there that goes beyond availability of firearms.
There were more people incarcerated in mental institutions decades ago, which is why I think there were less shootings then.
We still put many people with mental issues in jail. In fact, I’d guess we put more mentally ill people in jail today than we did back then. It’s easier to throw them away in prison than to tackle something as complex as mental illness.
I didn’t say prison. I’m talking about mental institutions. I don’t believe in putting mentally ill people in the same facilities as sane criminals. I’m a staunch advocate of reforming our justice system.
Agreed. My point is that we still don’t deal with mental illness appropriately. Mental institutions from 40 or 50 years ago were nightmares and today’s prisons aren’t much better in terms of mental healthcare.
Also, who said anything about rifles? I don’t even know if this shooter used rifles. I want almost all guns to be nearly inaccessible.
Never happen.
It’s what needs to happen.
And then what? Ask Londoners if they feel safe with people getting stabbed every night while the police confiscate garden tools, get cuffed by their own suspects, and the mayor talks about banning fast food ads.
Guns, trucks, knives…sick, determined people will use whatever they have at their disposal. You can’t ban every potential weapon and you can’t legislate malice. Something is wrong, and it’s not guns, which have been readily available in the US forever.
I live in a relatively secure apartment building at the moment and don’t own a gun currently, but if I hadn’t moved out of my downtown condo, I’d have a gun by now. With my front door at street level, I had random drunks pound on my door late at night and try to force their way in because they had the wrong house, as well as someone who kicked in one of my first floor windows in an attempt to break in. And as a kid, someone broke into our house when only my sister and I were home; he thought my sister was there alone, so he bolted as soon as he heard me coming (with my trusty pitching wedge, no less), but he could’ve easily overpowered both of us. This shit happens and I’m not going to be left with only a golf club to clumsily defend myself in an enclosed space.
I’m buying a gun and getting training as soon as I’m back in a private residence.