First Gun Confiscation Killing...

[Littlejoe]

They definitely are more deadly - the number of casualties in 2017 exceeded the whole of the 2000s - but according to the FBI they're becoming more frequent too.* I noticed the first article doesn't include the last two years.

The chart in the second does show an increase in frequency as well as effect, but the use of the same axis for both plots de-emphasises it. I think that's a scaling effect. It looks like casualties have increased by a factor of 3-5 while incidents have doubled. Certainly the four years with most incidents are all in the last decade - 2017, 2016, 2015 and 2012. The increase also seems to outpace population growth. I'd look more but my eyes are getting squiffy from trying to read the graph.

do you think there should be a law that requires every person in the US to get a flu shot? After all, the deaths from Flu related illness, DWARFS death by mass shootings. In fact, flu related deaths (approx. 12,000) as estimated by the CDC, these rival, if not surpass gun homicides or suicides (or both if the high of 56,000 is correct)

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/disease/2015-16.htm

[JimL]

do you think there should be a law that requires every person in the US to get a flu shot? After all, the deaths from Flu related illness, DWARFS death by mass shootings. In fact, flu related deaths (approx. 12,000) as estimated by the CDC, these rival, if not surpass gun homicides or suicides (or both if the high of 56,000 is correct)

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/disease/2015-16.htm

Apples and oranges, littlejoe.

[Littlejoe]

Apples and oranges, littlejoe.

No it's not. How is that so? Flu is passed from person to person so someone with the flu is potentially lethal as the CDC stats bear out.

[Jedidiah]

If he was sane and capable of rational judgement, worthy of keeping his gun, he would still be alive.

Jim

This is still after the fact and does not serve in any way as a defense of a plain wrong action.

[JimL]

This is still after the fact and does not serve in any way as a defense of a plain wrong action.

What was the wrong action? You guys don't seem to know what you want. If the police showed up at the Parkland Florida shooters house, do you think they should have taken his gun from him because of something he may have said, a threat, or shouldn they have just suggested that he get psychological help?

[Jedidiah]

What was the wrong action? You guys don't seem to know what you want. If the police showed up at the Parkland Florida shooters house, do you think they should have taken his gun from him because of something he may have said, a threat, or shouldn they have just suggested that he get psychological help?

They should have used established due process, not gone in like gestapos.

[oxmixmudd]

This is still after the fact and does not serve in any way as a defense of a plain wrong action.

Apparently this is the law. They had legal cause to go to his house and take his guns. Now people that don't like that law can challenge it in the courts, and may have a case. But the fact remains, a normal person of sound mind in this circumstance would not be dead. And a good argument could be made that whoever reported him did indeed have just cause, as demonstrated by the behavior that got him shot.

And you've refused to address the other issues. Do you really believe he would have behaved differently if they were there to collect him for a psych eval?

I'm not sure how it will play out in the courts. It would be better to have a licensing infrastructure as it is with a driver's license. But because the constitution guarantees the right to bear arms, what to do to take a gun away from a mentally unstable person gets complicated. And it's going to be a while before it gets figured out.

But the rate at which gun violence is escalating, and the rate at which mass shootings are escalating, it has to change. To be honest, I'm not sure what the right to bear arms can actually accomplish in these times. At the time of the constitution, it meant any invading force could expect real resistance from the population at large. What real resistance can a gun offer to a tank, or a fighter jet or attack helicopter? And we can't let joe civilian have arms that could truly resist such an invading force. And more and more as a nation, we simply aren't capable of sanely dealing with guns, let alone the sorts of weapons that would actually be a threat to an invading force.

The gun violence in America is bad. Especially when compared to other similarly advanced nations. I'm not going to post stats. If you care, you'll google it. If you don't care, you'll just say the sources are biased. But the statistics are just raw data. And they tell a story. That the abundance, proximity to, and lack of reasonable controls on guns make America one of the worst nations in the world as it relates to gun violence and deaths. Especially as compared to other wealthy, high functioning nations.

There must be changes in how we deal with the issue of guns.

We can do it with laws. We could theoretically do it with a constitutional amendment. People are really getting fed up with being told there is nothing that can be done. With seeing people like yourself try to justify crazies having guns by constantly fighting any and all attempts to keep mass shooting from happening before the fact. If you want to maintain the capacity to easily obtain guns in this country, the wisest thing to do would be to go along with and encourage sensible gun laws and legislation. The perception that crazy people in the NRA and right wing conservatives who care more about being able to brag about their gun collection than whether or not school children are safe will drive the nation as a whole to a hostile attitude to those same people and to the idea it makes sense for there to be few if any real restrictions on gun ownership. If it keeps on like it is now, drastic changes in the right to bear arms are in our future. It would be hard. But if people keep getting slaughtered by idiots with guns, and sensible laws and attempts to take away guns from crazy people keep getting shutdown by people like yourself and the NRA, It will happen.

When the generation now in school who sees school shooting after school shooting and lives with the constant gnawing fear that it could happen at their school watch the old guard keep ignoring these sorts of events, turning their backs on the same kids that experienced the shooting to keep their election campaign $$$ flowing from organizations like the NRA, they will in fact vote against that same status quo.



Jim

[Roy]

do you think there should be a law that requires every person in the US to get a flu shot? After all, the deaths from Flu related illness, DWARFS death by mass shootings. In fact, flu related deaths (approx. 12,000) as estimated by the CDC, these rival, if not surpass gun homicides or suicides (or both if the high of 56,000 is correct)

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/disease/2015-16.htm

No.

This has nothing to do with whether mass shootings are becoming more common.

[Roy]

Having declined to say what stats you meant, you are now arguing that I don't know what stats you meant. Apparently you think this is an effective technique.

Was I talking about total public events and outings vs odds of a mass shooter?

Let's check:

BTW, according to the stats mass shootings are really not more common now than they have been in the past decades. The media gives them more attention now than they did than to get eyeballs on the TV.

Nothing there about total public event numbers, nor about odds.

[oxmixmudd]

No it's not. How is that so? Flu is passed from person to person so someone with the flu is potentially lethal as the CDC stats bear out.

This flu is not typically lethal. Most of us get the flu, and most of us survive. A crazy man with a gun is mostly lethal. You would be more in line if you picked a disease with a higher lethality, like ebola. But unlike guns, ebola is rare. But once it shows up somewhere the rights go on hold till the out break is contained. To not act in such a case is in fact negligence.

What we have is in the last few years an order of magnitude more mass shootings. We have an outbreak of a sickness that when it strikes has a very high mortality rate. And since it is growibg, and spreading, we must act to contain it.

Jim

[Littlejoe]

This flu is not typically lethal. Most of us get the flu, and most of us survive. A crazy man with a gun is mostly lethal. You would be more in line if you picked a disease with a higher lethality, like ebola. But unlike guns, ebola is rare. But once it shows up somewhere the rights go on hold till the out break is contained. To not act in such a case is in fact negligence.

What we have is in the last few years an order of magnitude more mass shootings. We have an outbreak of a sickness that when it strikes has a very high mortality rate. And since it is growibg, and spreading, we must act to contain it.

Jim

First of all, I would like you to back up that assertion that "Most of us get the Flu". I don't think that's true. According to WebMD the odds of getting the Flu are 5% - 20%.

Second of all, the CDC disagree's with you. Did you check the link? If 12,000 to 56,000 people die from Flu and Flu related illnesses, then you are much more likely to die (by a huge magnitude) from the Flu than a mass shooting.

[Littlejoe]

No.

This has nothing to do with whether mass shootings are becoming more common.

Whether mass shootings are becoming more common isn't the topic of this thread either but here we are...

My point, that you want to hand wave away, again is that, death by Flu is much more common than death by mass shooting...yet you have no fear of the Flu? Do not want to impose mandatory flu shots, but you DO want mandatory gun regulation. You aren't being consistent IMHO.

[JimL]

Whether mass shootings are becoming more common isn't the topic of this thread either but here we are...

My point, that you want to hand wave away, again is that, death by Flu is much more common than death by mass shooting...yet you have no fear of the Flu? Do not want to impose mandatory flu shots, but you DO want mandatory gun regulation. You aren't being consistent IMHO.

We don't get to choose if we are shot to death by a mad man or not. Apples and oranges.

[Sparko]

We don't get to choose if we are shot to death by a mad man or not. Apples and oranges.

And you do get to choose if you catch the flu?

[lilpixieofterror]

Having declined to say wh... blah blah blah, rant rant rant..

Whatever Roy, we both know you have zero interest in discussing these things as you are in expressing your LPOTOCD. Get help.