27 Dead, Most Are Children, at an Elementary School in the U.S.

Zebonka12 wrote:But I'll bet this prick would've had a harder time blowing those kids away if his nutjob survivalist mother didn't have that semi-automatic lying around. Which -is- the part that can be looked at, and should be. No matter how many idiots bleat about the rights they think they have.

YEAH, this is the part that bothers me....why in god's name did that woman have an assault weapon among her (reportedly) 4 gun collection?!?

Something tells me either she had issues herself, or there was a threat that simply hasn't been told to us the general public, that prompted such a bunch of purchases!

inu-liger wrote:

   
YEAH, this is the part that bothers me....why in god's name did that woman have an assault weapon among her (reportedly) 4 gun collection?!?

Something tells me either she had issues herself, or there was a threat that simply hasn't been told to us the general public, that prompted such a bunch of purchases!

Godzilla? Aliens? Communist hordes? Armour plated bears? Tell me what possible threat there might be that would require any civilian to own an assault rifle ...

The time to discuss gun control is every moment that gun control is not discussed. Unfortunately, gun control alone is not going to do it. We also need to make sure there is help for families with a member suffering from a mental illness.

There are parents afraid of their own kids - like the mother in this latest nightmare (though how she could have been aware of her son's unstable personality AND still own/collect weapons is something I'll never understand).

These parents struggle on their own, and are either offered medications that often make their children yet more unstable, or they're offered the advice to have their children arrested so there's a "paper trail". They're told that paper trail will get them the help they need, when what it really means is these young people will wind up in jail - which, I think we can all agree, isn't 'help'.

I have no idea what kind of 'real' help they need, I just know that ignoring those suffering from these mental/emotional issues is not going to keep us safe regardless of (much-needed) new or enforced gun laws.

I read this post the other day, and I found it both enlightening and disturbing. Maybe it will be of interest to you, too. It's written by the mother of an emotionally unstable son who will soon grow too strong for her to control:

http://anarchistsoccermom.blogspot.com/2012/12/thinking-unthinkable.html

I only skimmed that story and wow, it was powerful.

My thoughts, exactly. I hope, this time, there will be enough public pressure for a sustained and meaningful conversation about gun control, and about proper care and treatment for the mentally ill.

I wrote a long post filling in some holes of what I was trying to say in my last post because I was frustrated that Zebonka so misinterpreted what my thoughts were ( also I admit I am not such a good writer) but the cell tower reception is off and on for me (tall trees here and weak signal). So I lost it all. I lose a lot of my posts. I try to write briefly or concisely but then I tend to go into summary or conclusion mode prior to fully explaining ideas.

Anyway I will move on to other ideas. That was an interesting link Magical. Also distressing to read. Written in a calm style but she is probably suffering so much anguish.

I was really shocked to read this blog by the mother of a mentally instable child. I cannot believe there is no medical help for her in a civilized country like the USA. I also think that gun control is not the only answer, I believe that the society must try to become less violent as a whole. Even if I will be blamed to be anti-American again I must point out that the USA seems to have a bigger tendency to solve problems with violence than other countries. War is often the first means of choice instead of being the last resort and according to statistics considerably less children in the USA are getting a non-violent education than in most other Western countries. To me it seems that the public discourse does not do any justice to the real underlying problems, it is dominated by stupid fire arm lobby arguments ("there would have been less victims if the teachers had been armed") and even more grotesque statements by political commentators like Huckabee who blamed the gays and the lack of God's presence in schools.

We have a similar- although less deadly - ongoing argument in Germany: speed limit on highways. I think we are the only country in the world who has no general speed limit for highways and it is always a matter of "freedom". Apparently, it would be against the most basic human rights to force "free citizens" to slow down and lessen the risk for other people on our high-traffic motor highways. It is the same slave owner argument as the American arm lobby uses. It must be a God-given right to own slaves, own fire arms, speed up like crazy. Just like the twisted American fire arm lobby the German car lobby will tell you that the lack of speed limit will make the traffic safer and the car industry better and if the speed limit comes we will have more dead people on the roads. You just cannot win an argument like this with normal logic.

"Zebonka so misinterpreted what my thoughts were"

I don't think it's that, entirely, although I might've possibly missed the spirit of what you intended to say - who knows.

I only meant to point out that an all too human thought process in these situations (and one that I readily admit to having had myself in the past) is that 'it will never be 100% safe' enters into our heads when trying to contemplate a way forward. It gets to a point where that's an irrelevancy, and the way it gets brought up in these discussions is upsetting to me because it helps no one.

So if I sounded dissatisfied, it's more with the situation in general and the way that we approach it - not with your post in particular.

I don't think that the "not 100 percent final result" would in any way prevent moving forward. That would be similar to a patient confusing what a doctor is telling them and thinking he is advising against surgery when he is actually not (i.e., risk factors with certain operations) or a parent telling a child about flying in an airplane. It is only realistic to consider the final result in any endeavor but the lack of perfection should not lead to a lack of trying or of attempting to make progress. I may have unwittingly used a "talking point" that anyone would associate with an NRA type argument and it was probably not a necessary thing to say. It is maybe similar to a person taking Brian May's hand and gently saying to him, "Brian, honey, I need to tell you that even if humans stop killing animals, it will not solve the problem of violence against animals 100 percent. If a whale really wants to eat a seal, there isn't much we can do about it." Ha. Anyway fault is mine for not considering very well my posts.

And the China situation is interesting to me because of an experiment I read about long ago involving mice or rats learning a maze faster after mice/rats learned it in another location ... so it was just a strange feeling (or whatever a good word would be ... surreal ... eh) for me to read about the guy in China ... Almost a simultaneous decision to commit a very similar act of violence. Most likely coincidence and mental illness similarity but with what physics research is up to these days (not that I can easily understand that stuff) there may be a lot that is still unknown about how information or ideas travel. And the 1927 story was just to illustrate that violent images or games are not necessary in order for a person to get the idea to blow up a lot of school kids. Just interesting in the context of this particular latest crime.

I think the last part of the above-mentioned blog is some of the most profound truth I have ever seen:


I don’t believe my son belongs in jail. The chaotic environment exacerbates Michael’s sensitivity to sensory stimuli and doesn’t deal with the underlying pathology. But it seems like the United States is using prison as the solution of choice for mentally ill people. According to Human Rights Watch, the number of mentally ill inmates in U.S. prisons quadrupled from 2000 to 2006, and it continues to rise—in fact, the rate of inmate mental illness is five times greater (56 percent) than in the non-incarcerated population. (http://www.hrw.org/news/2006/09/05/us-number-mentally-ill-prisons-quadrupled)

With state-run treatment centers and hospitals shuttered, prison is now the last resort for the mentally ill—Rikers Island, the LA County Jail, and Cook County Jail in Illinois housed the nation’s largest treatment centers in 2011 (http://www.npr.org/2011/09/04/140167676/nations-jails-struggle-with-mentally-ill-prisoners)

No one wants to send a 13-year old genius who loves Harry Potter and his snuggle animal collection to jail. But our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system, does not provide us with other options. 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.”

magicalfreddiemercury wrote:

My thoughts, exactly. I hope, this time, there will be enough public pressure for a sustained and meaningful conversation about gun control, and about proper care and treatment for the mentally ill.

Half of the country is talking about it, and most of the world is talking about it. But the half of the country NOT talking about it are the ones standing in the way.

How do we include the gun-toting NRA lifers into the debate in a meaningful way? How do we show them that the lives of children are worth more than the feeling of dogmatically obeying constitutional amendments?

This really is up to us. The politicians are a reflection of the people. If the people engage in the debate and demand change, then it will happen. This is what the civil rights movement was all about.

YourValentine wrote:
I was really shocked to read this blog by the mother of a mentally instable child. I cannot believe there is no medical help for her in a civilized country like the USA.

Civilized? Half the country believes there should be no universal health care, and these same people believe to the death (pun intended) that everyone should have a gun. They are also pro war and "pro life" at the same time. This does not sound like a civilized country to me.

Even if I will be blamed to be anti-American again I must point out that the USA seems to have a bigger tendency to solve problems with violence than other countries.

The only people who will call you anti-American for pointing out facts is... Americans.

Just like the twisted American fire arm lobby the German car lobby will tell you that the lack of speed limit will make the traffic safer and the car industry better and if the speed limit comes we will have more dead people on the roads. You just cannot win an argument like this with normal logic.

But the difference is - Germany doesn't have a traffic death rate that is higher than the rest of the civilized world combined. It has, in fact, one of the lowest rates of traffic fatalities in the world.

http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/cause-of-death/road-traffic-accidents/by-country

http://www.thelocal.de/national/20090709-20477.html

So they may have a point. Germany's roads may not be perfect, but they are amongst the safest in the world.

We can't say the same for the schools in America.

Restriction tends to lead to rebelling. I would argue Germany's roads are (comparatively) safe because people don't feel the need to be above the law. This is the same reason why there is very little drinking and driving in Germany - the drinking age is so low, so there is no need to get pissed as a teenager and drink and drive later in life as a form of rebelling against authority. The world generally looks up to Germany as an example on these matters.

Ouch, TheRealWizard, that's harsh. I'm assuming you're intelligent enough to know that generalizations like that are very rarely true.

Anyway, the "jokes" about people shooting up Elementary Schools started a few days ago. Pathetic.

waunakonor wrote:

Ouch, TheRealWizard, that's harsh. I'm assuming you're intelligent enough to know that generalizations like that are very rarely true.

I'm listening ... feel free to debunk.

In the meantime, I recall nearly half the country voting Republican last time around, and just about every time..

I want to add another thought to the discussion. I think that there is general agreement in many countries that the administration (police, army) should have the monopoly on violence and citizens should resolve their problems peacefully. I think this general agreement does not exist in the USA to the same extend, maybe it does not exist at all. In the USA people think they have to resolve their own problems, period. There is not so much trust in the government as in European countries, for example. The idea that a school headmaster should be be armed at any given moment and she should shoot and kill an intruder is so grotesque that I do not know how to respond to that. In other countries people think about less guns in the wake of such a tragedy and not more guns.