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Not even the staunchest NRA supporter goes hunting with an AK-47. The gun laws in this country are insane.
I have long tried to get into the conservative shoes. Maybe they mean small government. Maybe then mean the state should stay out of your face.
But those who quote the second amendment are no different from those who quote the Bible to justify homophobia, or back in the days justified apartheid, or slavery, it was all in the Bible.
Maybe you needed guns when you first came to this country in the 1700s. But those were lame pre-rifles, they shot deer and, yes, people. But the right to bear machine guns?
If the right to bear arms is so sacrosanct, guns need to be regulated like cars are regulated. I mean, why don't people cruise around on interstate highways in tanks? They perhaps have a right to drive. The right to mobility.
This is really about the money.
I do not want to make light of what happened in Connecticut, but for me gun control is about what the American gun industry is doing to the rest of the world. America exports guns that kill people. American guns start civil wars.
The right to bear arms is about money. Follow the money. That is blood money.
'I Am Adam Lanza's Mother': A Mom's Perspective On The Mental Illness Conversation In America
Not even the staunchest NRA supporter goes hunting with an AK-47. The gun laws in this country are insane.
I have long tried to get into the conservative shoes. Maybe they mean small government. Maybe then mean the state should stay out of your face.
But those who quote the second amendment are no different from those who quote the Bible to justify homophobia, or back in the days justified apartheid, or slavery, it was all in the Bible.
Maybe you needed guns when you first came to this country in the 1700s. But those were lame pre-rifles, they shot deer and, yes, people. But the right to bear machine guns?
If the right to bear arms is so sacrosanct, guns need to be regulated like cars are regulated. I mean, why don't people cruise around on interstate highways in tanks? They perhaps have a right to drive. The right to mobility.
This is really about the money.
I do not want to make light of what happened in Connecticut, but for me gun control is about what the American gun industry is doing to the rest of the world. America exports guns that kill people. American guns start civil wars.
The right to bear arms is about money. Follow the money. That is blood money.
it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness..... I live with a son who is mentally ill. I love my son. But he terrifies me. ..... A few weeks ago, Michael pulled a knife and threatened to kill me and then himself after I asked him to return his overdue library books. His 7 and 9 year old siblings knew the safety plan -- they ran to the car and locked the doors before I even asked them to. I managed to get the knife from Michael, then methodically collected all the sharp objects in the house into a single Tupperware container that now travels with me. Through it all, he continued to scream insults at me and threaten to kill or hurt me...... We still don’t know what’s wrong with Michael. .... At the start of seventh grade, Michael was accepted to an accelerated program for highly gifted math and science students. His IQ is off the charts. When he’s in a good mood, he will gladly bend your ear on subjects ranging from Greek mythology to the differences between Einsteinian and Newtonian physics to Doctor Who. He’s in a good mood most of the time. But when he’s not, watch out. And it’s impossible to predict what will set him off. ..... it seems like the United States is using prison as the solution of choice for mentally ill people. ...... our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system ..... Then another tortured soul shoots up a fast food restaurant. A mall. A kindergarten classroom. And we wring our hands and say, “Something must be done.”What Does It Mean That Adam Lanza Might Not Have Been Able to Feel Pain?
"If that boy would've burned himself, he would not have known it or felt it physically" ..... congenital insensitivity to pain, a rare neuropathic disorder that makes people unable to register painful stimuli. .... autism spectrum disorders can sometimes correspond with a reduced sensitivity to pain. ..... People with congenital insensitivity mainly experience problems with self-inflicted injuries, but they also sometimes struggle with emotional regulation. ..... a Georgia teenager who can't feel pain. Thirteen-year-old Ashlyn Blocker had been given "a range of psychological tests to determine if she could feel emotional pain and empathy" by her doctor. "He found her to be a bright and friendly child"It Is Incredible How Much Guns Have Advanced Since The Creation Of The Second Amendment
Understanding where they came from goes a long way to understanding that they're not going away any time soon...... As soon as gunpowder was poured down a metal tube and lit to fire a bullet, the challenge became speeding the process along...... In the history of weapons, the M1 Carbine is the father of what all of we now call "assault weapons." It is also something the writers of the U.S. constitution probably never imaginedA Land Without Guns: How Japan Has Virtually Eliminated Shooting Deaths
America's gun control laws are the loosest in the developed world and its rate of gun-related homicide is the highest. Of the world's 23 "rich" countries, the U.S. gun-related murder rate is almost 20 times that of the other 22. With almost one privately owned firearm per person, America's ownership rate is the highest in the world; tribal-conflict-torn Yemen is ranked second, with a rate about half of America's. ...... the country at the other end of the spectrum .... In 2008, the U.S. had over 12 thousand firearm-related homicides. All of Japan experienced only 11, fewer than were killed at the Aurora shooting alone. And that was a big year: 2006 saw an astounding two, and when that number jumped to 22 in 2007, it became a national scandal. By comparison, also in 2008, 587 Americans were killed just by guns that had discharged accidentally. ........ Even the country's infamous, mafia-like Yakuza tend to forgo guns ..... Japanese tourists who fire off a few rounds at the Royal Hawaiian Shooting Club would be breaking three separate laws back in Japan -- one for holding a handgun, one for possessing unlicensed bullets, and another violation for firing them -- the first of which alone is punishable by one to ten years in jail. ......... Japan is unusual in that potential gun owners must affirmatively prove their mental fitness ...... U.S. gun law has its roots in resistance to British gun restrictions, whereas some academic literature links the Japanese law to the national campaign to forcibly disarm the samurai, which may partially explain why the 1958 mentions firearms and swords side-by-side. ....... Tunisia, which had the lowest firearm ownership rate in the world (one gun per thousand citizens, compared to America's 890) when its people toppled a brutal, 24-year dictatorship and sparked the Arab Spring.The Freedom of an Armed Society
an armed society — especially as we prosecute it at the moment in this country — is the opposite of a civil society..... gun sales have steadily risen over the past few years, and spiked with each of Obama’s election victories. ..... the N.R.A. strives for a day when the open carry of powerful weapons might be normal, a fixture even, of any visit to the coffee shop or grocery store — or classroom. ....... A favorite gun rights saying is “an armed society is a polite society.” If we allow ever more people to be armed, at any time, in any place, this will provide a powerful deterrent to potential criminals. Or if more citizens were armed — like principals and teachers in the classroom, for example — they could halt senseless shootings ahead of time, or at least early on, and save society a lot of heartache and bloodshed. ...... gun rights advocates famously maintain that individual gun ownership, even of high caliber weapons, is the defining mark of our freedom as such, and the ultimate guarantee of our enduring liberty. Deeper reflection on their argument exposes basic fallacies. ........ speech dominates and distinguishes the polis, the highest form of human association ..... “violence is mute.” ..... Violence — and the threat of it — is a pre-political manner of communication and control, characteristic of undemocratic organizations and hierarchical relationships. ...... Guns do communicate, after all, but in a way that is contrary to free speech aspirations: for, guns chasten speech. ...... An armed society is polite, by their thinking ...... The suggestion is that guns liberally interspersed throughout society would cause us all to walk gingerly — not make any sudden, unexpected moves — and watch what we say, how we act, whom we might offend. ...... The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld our right to experiment in offensive language and ideas, and in some cases, offensive action and speech. Such experimentation is inherent to our freedom as such. But guns by their nature do not mix with this experiment — they don’t mix with taking offense. They are combustible ingredients in assembly and speech. ....... Such is the effect of guns on speech — and assembly. Like it or not, they transform the bearer, and end the conversation in some fundamental way. They announce that the conversation is not completely unbounded, unfettered and free; there is or can be a limit to negotiation and debate ....... The very power and possibility of free speech and assembly rests on their non-violence. The power of the Occupy Wall Street movement, as well as the Arab Spring protests, stemmed precisely from their non-violent nature. This power was made evident by the ferocity of government response to the Occupy movement. Occupy protestors across the country were increasingly confronted by police in military style garb and affect. ......... The non-violent nature of protest in this country ensures that it can occur. ..... nothing suits power so well as extreme individualism ..... Their pervasive, open presence would sow apprehension, suspicion, mistrust and fear, all emotions that are corrosive of community and civic cooperation. To that extent, then, guns give license to autocratic government. ..... Our gun culture promotes a fatal slide into extreme individualism. It fosters a society of atomistic individuals, isolated before power — and one another — and in the aftermath of shootings such as at Newtown, paralyzed with fear. That is not freedom, but quite its opposite. ...... assembled masses don’t require guns to exercise and secure their freedom, and wield world-changing political force. .... power does not lie in armed individuals, but in assemblyGun homicides and gun ownership listed by country
With less than 5% of the world's population, the United States is home to roughly 35–50 per cent of the world's civilian-owned guns, heavily skewing the global geography of firearms and any relative comparison ...... The US has the highest gun ownership rate in the world - an average of 88 per 100 people. That puts it first in the world for gun ownership - and even the number two country, Yemen, has significantly fewer - 54.8 per 100 people ...... But the US does not have the worst firearm murder rate - that prize belongs to Honduras, El Salvador and Jamaica. ....... Puerto Rico tops the world's table for firearms murders as a percentage of all homicides - 94.8%. It's followed by Sierra Leone in Africa and Saint Kitts and Nevis in the CaribbeanManchin Gives Boost to Gun-Restrictions Push
even strong proponents of gun rights in Congress may begin to shift in their views after the deadly shooting rampage last week in NewtownGUNS AND THE LIMITS OF SHAME
When did a majority of South African Boers realize that Apartheid was reprehensible? How about whites in the American South? When will the Japanese force their whalers to stop, finally realizing that their persistence has caused widespread international revulsion and opprobrium? When will the British realize that public drunkenness—a practice now internationally associated with them as a nation—is something to be embarrassed about? When will we Americans realize that our society is an unacceptably violent one, that this is how the rest of the world sees us, and that much of that violence is associated with guns? Will it be the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School? Where is our threshold for self-awareness? ...... The unprecedented massacre of children led, within two years, to legislation that imposed a total ban on the private ownership of handguns in the United Kingdom. Today, no one in the United Kingdom can privately own a handgun or a semiautomatic weapon....... There was not much hand wringing or heated debate over this legislation. It was discussed, and enacted, with overwhelming public support, in response to the mood of national shame and grief over the killings. ...... What will it require for a majority of Americans to realize that they have a national problem that needs to be urgently addressed? We have lost four Presidents to gunmen in our short history as a nation, and very nearly lost several more ..... Would even another, much larger school massacre bring about change? .... If someone murdered a hundred schoolchildren in a single day with guns, would a majority of Americans agree to true restrictions on them? What is our national threshold for shame?Mayor Bloomberg Telling It As It Is on Gun Control
The U.S. gun laws, bought and paid for by the N.R.A., are a disgrace to the nation, an affront to the values it claims to represent, and a travesty of the Democratic process. ...... Senator Dianne Feinstein, of California, said that once Congress resumes she would introduce a bill to ban on assault weapons. (The previous ban expired in 2004.) And Dan Malloy, the governor of Connecticut, seconded the call for such a ban ...... And if he does nothing during his second term, something like forty-eight thousand Americans will be killed with illegal guns. That is roughly the number of Americans killed in the whole of the Vietnam War....... prohibit assault weapons. We’ve got to really question whether military-style weapons with big magazines belong in the streets of America in this day and age. Nobody questions the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. But I don’t think the founding fathers had the idea that every man, woman, and child could carry an assault weapon..... nobody should underestimate the hatred, ignorance, baloney, mendacity, and borderline lunacy that would confront him if he were to follow Bloomberg’s advice and take on the gun lobby ....... There is no point trying to reason with Republican gun nuts like Gohmert, just as there is no point trying to reason with Republican anti-tax nuts about income-tax rates, or with Republican nativists about immigration.WHAT OBAMA MUST DO ABOUT GUNS
emotion is hardly all that is needed. What is needed is gun control—strict, comprehensive gun control that places the values of public safety and security before the values of deer hunting and a perverse ahistorical reading of the Second Amendment. ...... in my home town of Chicago, there’s an awful lot of violence and they’re not using AK-47s. They’re using cheap hand guns..... eleven of the worst twenty mass shootings in the past half century have taken place in the U.S.
