Not agreeing or disagreeing with you but just thinking out loud. Seems to me that we do a pretty good job of making some places relatively safe from gun violence, such as courthouses and airports/airplanes. But those are fairly small and contained areas with lots of security. It would be very expensive to have that level of security everywhere. I've actually wondered before why we don't seem to have a lot of mass shootings at big sporting events or political rallies given that the security seems less consistent - at least in my experience. I did go to a family member's high school graduation last year and they had the metal detectors out and everything. Maybe that's becoming more universal, but aren't there plastic guns at this point? As to why mass shooters may pick schools, it seems some of them have a negative experience with the school because they went there. Or maybe gunning down kids is just the softest of targets. Some of the shooters are willing to die, but others obviously make it to trial and probably didn't really want to die or chickened out when it came down to it.
OK… the firearm, and I’ll hope the shooter doesn’t have additional ammunition, especially preloaded mags. And I am assuming “high capacity” is 10 rounds or more. So you win. Now, back to my question. Your assault weapons ban has been passed and put into place. The “crazy person”, who has no prior criminal record, legally purchases a Glock 38, with 6 preloaded magazines. How are we going to keep them from shooting up a school? If they get through all 48 rounds, which doesn’t take that long even with mag exchange, and they only have a 50% strike rate, that’s 24 possible fatalities. Look, I believe these high powered rifles should be more difficult to obtain, and that could come with a more robust background check system and required training. But limiting or banning high powered rifles/pistols will not solve the problem completely. My point here is it seems that most people want to go straight to gun control but they don’t seem to want to talk about mental health, and all that entails. Its always just “gun control”.
I may be wrong, but I heard that she shot thru a door to gain access, so it wasnt a just walk right in school. She knew the school layout quite well and how to gain access.
I think this is a bit simplistic, the next level question has to be asked. What is it about our society that creates rage so profound in young people that they believe the only way to release it and show it to the world is to kill kids, which they know is the ultimate evil act?
I'm not trying to solve the problem completely - I'm trying to MITIGATE the number of children killed. I'd prefer they have to change clips than not because it makes it more difficult for them to kill so many people. Just because its POSSIBLE to create the same carnage with a glock as an AR-15 doesn't mean its just as likely.
It is sorta crazy that the most successful political assassination in recent memory was pulled off in Japan with what was basically a homemade weapon. I think maybe you might be overthinking the school part a little, while you are correct I think about having the association with school, etc. I think that has more to do with most of the shooters being very young. School is probably their only formative experience in a public type setting. Older shooters like Paddock went after an outdoor concert, so the targets might just match an age profile of the shooter. I think for the most part, shooters target their peers, whether its school, the workplace, etc.
Proper background checks, not just criminal record check, would have prevented this and many other mass shootings
The schools here in Tampa do not look like prisons. Such an ill-informed comment. No one is suffering from using common sense measures to keep children safe on each campus. No one is giving up their freedom for these common sense protections. These measures become a solution to a problem. There is no plan or solution to take away the guns of 150 million people (guesstimate). Liberals rarely have a plan to solve a problem. How would you rid the country of all guns?
The gun is a democratizer of violence. It gives a person a feeling of control and power. It allows the weak to dominate the strong (or vice versa). A child can kill the strongest of muscle men skilled in hand to hand combat, a cop can kill a family dog that is no threat at all, etc. If you are going to put a psychological profile to this type of crime, it is obviously an assertion of control or power over people they might consider having been dominating or controlling to them, the fear or weakness they felt is erased and now they are giving it back, they are in control, they are the actors and not doing the submitting. It is the same fantasy gun owners have about the gun protecting them from an overly powerful government bent on dominating them, that they can control their destiny. The phallic qualities of a gun can be overstated, but that it is a tool of control and dominance over others isn't coincidental either in why people are drawn to them to assert themselves.
Of course not, but even in other countries you don’t see nearly the level of this behavior, with any weapon, as what you see here. Just as a “for instance”, people in the US are twice as likely to feel lonely than those in Japan. Why? We have the highest rate of depression. Why? We have the highest crime rate generally among western nations, even before guns. Why? I have been a strong advocate for gun control measures (however futile it might be), but it isn’t the only underlying problem leading to this.
Those are fair questions. If we're looking at it from that angle then gun control measures, as challenging as they may be, would be more easily achievable than solving depression or loneliness.
Children require structure and stability, which means roles and rules and responsibilities ...... as well as love and proper nurturing. I suspect many of the mass shooters did not grow up in a healthy family environment. Generally, happy, healthy, well-adjusted people do not engage in mass murder.
