As we watch the number of mass shootings in the US constantly increasing, I keep wondering where this goes. I was listening to a person present for the shooting in Highland Park today. The entire town is still under a shelter in place order because they haven't even seen the shooter. She was clearly traumatized as she witnessed some horrible events. For the first time I am starting to wonder if this is the birth pang of the end of public events. As the number of weapons continues to skyrocket, and as the shooters become more and more brazen, there must be a line where people will say "ENOUGH!" They aren't going to put their lives and the lives of the families at risk. And the notion of public gatherings and celebrations will slowly die. For now at least, there seems to be no way to make soft targets safe. I am reminded of the movie Brazil [great movie!], which satirically prophesied terrorism run amok. People casually sit and drink their coffee while bombs explode and gunfire erupts all around them.
The Summer before COVID arrived in the states (2019) I was driving home and stopped at a garage sale. As I was walking toward the driveway, one of the women pointed at my Jeep. I turned to see a LOT of smoke coming from under the hood. I ran back to get my wallet and phone and ran as fast as I could right before it burst into flames. I called 911 and asked the woman if I could use her water hose. She told me that she didn't have one. BS. Have you ever met a homeowner that doesn't have a water hose? An officer arrived before the fire department and asked the woman for some water. He had to yell it at her a couple of times. She went to the house and brought back a bucket of water (with about 1/2 gallon of water in it). He grabbed it and approached my Jeep to put the fire out. Directly across the street is a Mexican restaurant. At least 10-15 people came outside and were taking photos and videos with their cameras. Not one of them offered assistance or even said anything. They acted like they were watching a movie or something. By the time the Fire Department arrived, the fire burned straight through the dashboard and front seats. That was a lucky break because I had some supplies in the back that would have made the fire worse (ie. oil, washer fluid, etc.). This is exactly why I say the 2Ars are full of excrement. People will not even pick up a phone to call 911 in an emergency. The few here and there that might have "saved" the day are the exception, not the rule. I couldn't get a water hose in an emergency. There is no way in hell any of those people (outside the police officer) would have done anything with a gun if my life was in danger.
Something else to consider is that the number of dead isn't the number affected. For each person that dies, you might have a dozen family members directly affected. There might also be between a hundred and a thousand who are traumatized depending on the venue and the success of the shooter. And their immediate family and friends are affected as well. So when we see 100 dead, what that really means is more like 10,000 or even 50,000 people who have had their lives changed forever. In order to get sense of the magnitude of some events, I was looking up the 2017 mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Country Music Festival, in Las Vegas. But I quickly noted that since the shooting, no more events have been held. So there is a great example of how the extremist interpretation of the 2nd Amendment is ending public gatherings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Route_91_Harvest
"mass shootings", at they're defined at this time, are mostly due gang violence. The defunding of police departments and the kid gloves approach to criminals by prosecutors is allowing more criminals and criminals who are more dangerous to be on the street. The COVID release of convicts also attributed to the level violence we're seeing, as well Until we take criminals off the street, this will persist. It's time for folks to wake up.
The result of the 2nd Amendment False premise. A shooting can only be "the result" of the 2nd is a law that would have prevented a shooting was overturned on 2A grounds.
It reminds me of what life might have been like to live in Ireland during 'the troubles'. Nobody knew if the next bomb was going to target a subway station, or busy walkway, or a church and anyone might look like suspicious if they paused a couple of minutes and set down a package or a briefcase or a baby carriage.
I heard people actually discussing this today. They said they are having second thoughts now about taking their kids out to any public events. "It just isn't worth the risk" they said. Great way to protect our freedom!!! People are so free they are becoming afraid to leave their homes.
I don’t know that people are going to stop going to parades etc. Many die each Independence Day from fireworks but people keep buying them and lighting them up. I think firework deaths are up 25% over the last few years. We are far more likely to die driving to the parade but we do it. I think well adjusted folk that understand statistics and risk aren’t considering foregoing public activities.
Their families are at more risk driving to and from events than from a possible shooting at an event.
Gun control is not from a position of concern for human life. You even reference "soft targets" in your post, so you know the preferred target for killers. Gun laws provide killers with more of these soft targets. On the topic of banning firearms, how far would you go? Do armored car guards get to keep their guns?
I remember people like that when I lived in New York, where I was born and raised. Same sort of folks in California. I'm so glad I don't live in those places anymore. There are lots of places in the USA where folks still love to help you out and will go way out of their way to do so.
Lefties want to ban legal gun ownership because they hate the way many gun advocates vote. Gun advocates want to eliminate violent crime.
How you were able to whine about gun advocates based on this incident is really a gut buster. And it is the left that wants to outsource all duties and responsibilities to the government. You don't want people to be able to defend themselves
Just got through reading a book by famed correspondant Peter Baass about Bosnia. The atrocities committed on an almost unarmed population in Bosnia are too horrific to describe here. And this was in the Europe that is touted by liberals posting here as civilized. History suggests over and over that an unarmed people can and will be subjected to terrible things by others including their own government. And yet the left, the same left that has killed many millions around the world, pushes removing the right to own a gun in the US. So yes,, when the left touts removing guns from civilian ownership here we go again. Murders by the left far exceed those by Hitler. Yet we constantly hear about Hitler. How come the left never talks about these guys. Stalin - 20 million murders. Mao (the liberal hero) - 60 million murders
Truth. there are three main instigating beliefs for the left's hostility towards self defense (at least against violent criminals). 1) the mindset that lethal force is something only the government can be trusted with. The left often wants to remove all responsibilities-and rights-from the citizenry-be it saving for old age (Social security schemes) to self defense. 2) the attitude that violent criminals are not really evil scum bags but rather victims of an "unjust" economic system and "racist" criminal justice process and self defense is improper since the violent criminal cannot help his actions that would cause honest people to shoot his sorry ass. 3) the abject cultural loathing towards self defense/firearms advocates. This is the most recent of the three pillars of the anti self defense crowd. It started when the Democrats: desperate to stave off the effective attacks by Nixon and others in the 1960s, that the Democrats were soft on crime, Adopted gun control to pretend the democrats were actually trying to reduce violence. When gun owners and the soon to be more political NRA objected to this nonsense and started mobilizing voters against the supporters of the gun control schemes, the left started pushing laws designed to harass gun rights advocates/ Additionally, the cultural loathing directed towards the gun rights/Self defense advocates accentuated.
1) REVISED They want the state to have a monopoly on force, and it doesn't have anything to do with trust.
We h. sapiens are wired to handle small numbers very well. We can instantly identify two objects, or three, or four, or five of them. Somewhere around eight, though, things start to get fuzzy. We're hard-pressed to quickly differentiate between, say, 11 and 12 objects. By 20, it's hopeless. It's not surprising, then, that folks might have difficulty visualizing, say, 45,222 objects. 45,222 was not picked at random. It's the number of people who died of gun-related injuries in the United States of America in the year 2020 according to Pew Research*. In an attempt to make this number something we could easily relate to, I did a little number crunching. I ended up with this result. Consider each gun-related death in 2020 represented by a standard size coffin. Now place those coffins end to end along a stretch of express highway. If one were to drive past the entire length of the coffins at 60 miles per hour, it would take one hour. One entire hour. 60 miles an hour. 45,222 coffins. Regards, stay safe 'n well 'n un-shot. * Ref: Gun deaths in the U.S.: 10 key questions answered | Pew Research Center
Did I mention that the number one cause of death for children in the US, is now guns? https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2201761
When the Only solution that's acceptable is scrapping the Constitution it probably isn't going to be solved. I further ask who are the people that or denying every solution but gun control what is their motivation other than the aforementioned.
I looked it up, its for ages 1-19 so it includes gang & drug activity. Calling it "children" is to sensationalize it and is a misrepresentation. If you look at the breakdown, suicide is whats driving the increase.
