Shock and grief as families face aftermath of US school shooting

FranckApr 17th, 2007 - 23:13:05

TO JEN
It is too bad that there is not a site for intelligent discourse. The web, as it sits, is open to, and has been over run with the mindless drivel of non-thinkers. The garbage you read here come from the type of people that Cheney loves. Wave the flag and they'll come running. Straight into the pits of hell. God Bless America. No one else does. If you find a site that screens out mental midgets, please, please let me know.

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To FranckApr 17th, 2007 - 23:25:38

I'll be more than happy to as soon as I find one!!!!

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@'Franck'Apr 17th, 2007 - 23:26:12

' Wave the flag and they'll come running. Straight into the pits of hell. God Bless America. No one else does'

So much for 'intelligent discourse'... Nice bumper sticker mentality 'Franck'.

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saraApr 17th, 2007 - 23:37:16

I'm concerned now... Maybe there will be racial problems between Asians and Americans now... It's scary don't you think? I don't think it should matter if the shooter was Asian or not. Don't you think it's useless information to release that? What does the media what us to think?!

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LouisApr 18th, 2007 - 00:05:10

To the Belgian fellow:

Belgian firearms laws as recently are not all that more stringent than many jurisdictions in the US. I do not know offhand if Onkelinx got her reforms passed, but as of 2005 there were more than half a million registered firearms in Belgium of which about 5% of which were considered 'Military' firearms. In a country that is mostly urban and has a pop of about 10 Mill thats quite a few. That does not include the 2 million legitimate unregistered firearms that the Belgian government believes are in circulation. Weapons that are considerably more (and I struggle to find the right word here) dangerous / effective / appropriate in a school shooting situation were (in 2005) available unregistered to anyone with ID.

The firearms used in September in Quebec and yesterday in Virginia are legally available in Belgium and most of the rest of the EU. This shooting could have easily have happened in Belgium; at the very least Belgian law would have had no effect.

Now, I am not nessesarily saying that a complete ban on firearms is nessesarily a bad thing or that it would not reduce the overall homicide rate. As a 'solution' however it completely ignores the actual situation. The number of firearms already in circulation down in the US is staggering and a complete ban on importation and manufacture would not really alter the supply significantly. Americans as a whole beleive that defence of self and property is a valid use of deadly force and that preparing for that possibility is a legitimate action. Confiscation is unpalatable by more than just the gun nuts and would be a huge and expendsive undertaking. There is a tremendous area of the US where firearm ownership is a legitimate and ocassionally nessesary part of living in rural areas. Confiscation of property without compensation and prohibition of firearms also has (for good or for ill) some SERIOUS legal difficulties in the US. The portions of the US Constitution that garuntee those 'rights' do not have a legal mechanism to permit change. Top that off with the fact that the largest numbers of casualties in a single school rampage in the US were not with firearms at all. Explosives and fire were used before firearms (Bath Massacre, 18 May 1927).

US firearms laws are not perfect but reactionary 'fixes' of the sort suggested here are not viable solutions and certainly have a questionable ratio of benefit vs. cost.

The reasons for America's issues with violence and firearm violence are as complicated as they are serious. While wealthy, America has some serious issues with inequity, class and race struggle, education, health care, lack of retirement security, cost of living vs wages, lack of affordable housing, official corruption, substance abuse and a relatively recent legacy of frontier law. These are all things that are known to be issues with crime.

Now, I find the mass facination that Americans have with firearms and violence to be just as disturbing as the next guy and frankly am not that keen on the idea of an inalienable right to arms. Nonetheless, I find not a lot of credibility in many of the hasty fixes proposed.

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CocoApr 18th, 2007 - 01:37:22

After having expressed my opinion on this site, I was pleased to read that a lot of people share my disgust for weapons. As it turns out, I am from the same country as Toni (Belgium) but live currently in the US. I am a little bit disturbed that LOUIS, who is throwing numbers and stats in the mix as if he is an expert in Belgian firearms, fails to mention his source(s). I am not an expert myself, but I never saw a place in Belgium where you could walk in and buy a gun. We will never know if the VirTech drama would have taken place if stricter gun control would of have been in place. There is, however, a quantum leap between getting a gun from a store and getting one from an illegal circuit.

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SamsApr 18th, 2007 - 02:37:40

Jen,
I am sorry dear but unfortunately folks here are not the intelligent breed you are looking for. Just a bumch of idiots here...

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SP4: Stay out of who's country???Apr 18th, 2007 - 03:18:50

The fact is a foreign national came to America and killed our citizens.

Tonny, the problem is your friends won't stay out of OUR country!

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RebelApr 19th, 2007 - 17:06:15

If there were not people being rude to other people and stop picking on them then people would not freak out and go on a killing spree.

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