| bassguy252 wrote: |
| I would think the problem of gun violence would be about a culture of guns in the first place. |
Yes that is what I think is the logical answer but the response of Americans is pretty counter intuitive, to me anyway.
I was reading in the paper the other day that in light of the school shooting that there has been a vast increase in gun sales for Christmas presents and that some stores are completely sold out.
It is completely nonsensical to me as to why people think that the solution to stopping gun crime is to have more guns.
To me, using simple probability and mathematics, the more guns you have, the more likely gun crime is to occur - legal ownership or not.
I'm really not going to argue this with anyone as I'm sure there are people on this site who think otherwise, even though I do think that common sense dictates that that less guns equal less crime.
I'm sure it is easy to say that in principle but that's just my thoughts on the matter.
I'm just grateful i don't live in the USA where there are shootings seemingly every other week. Though i do think it is a good sign that Obama is trying to impose harsher restrictions. Like realistically, who goes hunting with an assault rifle?
I'm sure there will be the one person who thinks that i am trashing USA as usual. It's really not the case, it's just my feelings on the matter. Really at the end of the day I have my opinions on gun control but it's not really a high concern for me since i don't live there, and it starts to be a case of just not caring.
I mean the events are tragic enough. Any loss of life caused by the actions of some mad man are terrible but sadly it just keeps happening again and again and again and again with the USA and although people may say "oh we are doing are best", your best clearly isn't enough because these things keep happening and if they do keep happening there must be something that can be done to stop them.
Really it just starts to become a lack of sympathy. It's like imagine the situation where a guy starts a new job and makes a mistake, and it's forgiven because he's new and didn't know better. Then it happens again and it's sort of criticised but again he's still sort of new and it was an honest mistake. Then it happens again and then it's clearly just his fault, it's careless and he should have known better.
This is what this has become to me. People should have known better after the countless number of school shootings that have occurred - and i wish i could give the figure but considering the USA is the only country which has it's own wikipedia page on school shootings it can be assumed that it's a lot.
Really this is just the rambling of a foreigner but to us across the pond (of the people i have spoken to or heard speak about this issue) it's just confusion and sympathy (from most)...and the confusion is to why this keeps happening.
Like i said before the "never change USA". That is not an uncommon thing to be said about the USA from here regarding this issue. It isn't some controversial statement that i just conjured up, people do say these things - "oh USA they've had ANOTHER school shooting."
People from here anyway just say change the laws and i know that it will never happen but that is what i personally think should occur as well.
Personally i wish that they would just get rid of them altogether but that will never happen. Like i have no problem with people owning guns for hunting. People have those here. They have rifles or sometimes shotguns. They don't have handguns or assault rifles or in some cases i've seen explosive weapons. We don't give the average joe that shit. Like i would have no problem if that was it. Just hunting permits and i mean some shooting may occur with those weapons but i could at least have sympathy for those events because it isn't basically a gun free for all and you can have whatever you want. I know it isn't actually like that but that is what it seems to be like.
The other thing is that Americans from what i've seen seem to be really obsessed with their freedoms. Nowhere and i mean absolutely nowhere else in the world have i seen something like this. You find the news for any European country today - go onto BBC news or whatever and you will not see one mention of people complaining about their rights being infringed. Meanwhile in the USA all i ever seem to see is "oh my constitutional rights this, my constitutional rights are being infringed that." America is meant to be the land of the free and yet all i hear complaints about is the USA not being free.
Why i mention this is because of your 2nd amendment and the issue regarding it. I personally think that it is the highest level of retardation that it's an automatic right to own a gun and taking that at face value that means anyone can have a gun. Any crazy can. Now i know that you obviously just don't walk in and lift one and buy one but there clearly must be something wrong in the system where these crazies are allowed to have one and these shootings occur.
I don't think it should be an automatic right but that there should be a law perhaps (as an alternative to no guns at all) that reduces the type of weapons allowed and makes it extremely difficult to get one because that would reduce the problem i think.
But i have the feeling that some people in the USA think that if there were no guns at all that the country would just grind to a halt and suddenly there would be masked gunmen with illegal firearms everywhere gunning people down on the street. I think that that situation is completely laughable and that it's just fanatical to think that.
Basically to tl;dr: I think there should be no guns at all as an ideal situation. If that wouldn't happen then make it extremely difficult to get a gun, change the guns that you can own etc. I think the idea that it's your right as a citizen to own a gun is stupid because that is how these problems occur, it's a luxury - not a right! and i think the lack of motivation to really get up and change these things means that these shootings continue - and i personally am just losing sympathy because nothing seems to be getting done on this front.
Again this is just my ravings, take them as that and please do not take offence. This is just what i think and what other people i've heard say. I try to back it up with facts as the case may be. Sometimes the truth hurts but it's better than just pretending that everything is okay. The way forward is through criticism and debate, and not just sitting back and letting this shit go on. I hope i have been reasonable.
EDIT: and let me say something quickly about illegal ownership.
Yeah, there is no excuse for that. It should be cracked down upon and people i am sure are doing their best. However there clearly has to be more done to reduce this problem. Like a nation wide initiative or some shit. I don't know the exact politics of the USA but there is obviously a need.
