Shooting in Connecticut

[nicks67ca]

And now an evacuation at the same church St Rose. I was just there this morning. Sounds like some sort of threat.
ugh

[GregWeld]

My last post is - as my others have been - posted to be "thought provoking" -- not argumentative -- just stuff to think about.


How many of you own these killing games for the video play stations? How many of you have bought them for your kids...

Do you think that making a game out of killing people / monsters / other army's is a good value to have?

I have NONE of these at my house. Every time I see an Ad for these - I shake my head in a WTF kind of way. What are we teaching kids with these "games"?

If it's the weapons etc that do all these crazy atrocities... We should have a mass murder like this every single day. Why? Think about all the "ex" and current, Navy Seals... Marines... Army Special Ops guys etc that our government has trained year after year. These are some of the most lethal human beings on the planet - maybe in the universe... Personally I'd feel the safest on a bus full of them... over a bus with normal people and one "street urchin"... I can't remember ever reading about one of them committing something as heinous as this. Nothing would stop them if they wanted to do mayhem. What stops them is, they are SANE. The "street urchin"? I'm not so sure about him.

There is a current instance of this on trial now - where the guy shot up an entire village in Afghanistan.. The guy has to be insane. BTW -- there were dozens(?) of other troops around this guy with weapons and training etc... but it didn't stop him. Just saying - there was plenty of "deterrents" around. It just didn't help.

[realcoray]

Originally Posted by GregWeld

I'm taking the stance by the way -- not because I'm in complete disagreement... I'm just trying to point out that you can't defend from every thing that happens in life.

Indeed, but don't you think that it's a lot easier to kill 20+ people with a rapid fire high capacity gun versus a knife? Show me a knife attack anywhere in the ballpark of one of these school shootings.

Bombings are completely different in that to achieve the same effect would require a tremendous amount of work and planning, including things that could tip the police off in advance.

I see guns being valid for two reasons, hunting and self defense. I don't think you need an uzi or something for either, and I think you don't need 19+ round clips for either.

[GregWeld]

Originally Posted by nicks67ca

And now an evacuation at the same church St Rose. I was just there this morning. Sounds like some sort of threat.
ugh

So sorry Nick! That's the last kind of thing you all need now!


This kind of stuff just kills your spirit. I think because of the sense of helplessness we all have. We all want to be able to fix the world.. and somehow we can't.

[Vegas69]

Originally Posted by GregWeld

If I have "intent" -- the first guy that gets taken by surprise is the guy with a gun. There's so many doors in a school - they're large places - they're "porous" with windows (usually low) etc. They're porous with people coming and going at all hours. I worked playground duty for 5 or 6 years at our kids elementary school. The traffic in and out was constant - and from multiple doors. Look at Columbine... that was a GROUP of students! That wasn't a random insane adult from outside. That was planned... So to me - if they knew there was armed resistance - that would have just been incorporated into the plan - a simple distraction at one end of the school - draw the officer into a trap... and now we would have just added to the death count and added another weapon and ammo and armor to be used at the scene.

I agree but the criminals in these cases are not highly trained Navy seals. They are sick kids. The positives of having a trained officer/solidier outweigh the negatives. This particular wacko committed suicide once he knew armed police were on the scene. He prayed on the innocent because he was a coward.

[GregWeld]

Originally Posted by realcoray

Indeed, but don't you think that it's a lot easier to kill 20+ people with a rapid fire high capacity gun versus a knife? Show me a knife attack anywhere in the ballpark of one of these school shootings.

Bombings are completely different in that to achieve the same effect would require a tremendous amount of work and planning, including things that could tip the police off in advance.

I see guns being valid for two reasons, hunting and self defense. I don't think you need an uzi or something for either, and I think you don't need 19+ round clips for either.

You could make a (several!) pipe bomb by getting on the internet -- going to the hardware store - one stop at Cabella's... and be at an event within an hour or two of deciding to do something like that. NOTHING would stop you (anyone). No law. No amount of law enforcement. The only hope would be that you'd mess up and blow yourself up before you could commit such a thing.

I'm not being a "gun" advocate... Not at all. In fact -- I'm not arguing GUNS at all -- I'm arguing what can be done about this kind of thing. I'm just saying that while we like to be reactionary and "do something".... I don't think there is anything anyone can do to stop this kind of stuff. In fact - I would say there is absolutely ZERO you can do.

I love the fact that you can ONLY carry on 3 ounces of 'liquid' boarding a plane. Really? So the planes that were used in 9/11 had 4 guys each on them - that's 12 ounces of 'liquid' if each got on with one 3 oz bottle... These people are crazy they don't care if they die. If they need 6 guys they'll round up 6 guys.


BTW --- I think that schools would need TWO -- officers minimum and three or 4 at larger schools. I'm not against that at all. But ONE.... one is not protection from anything. There might need to be one per entrance door. Then you'd have a fighting chance at prevention... but then I feel the "intentional person" would just move to a different venue.

[Vegas69]

It's been brought to my attention that High Schools here do have multiple armed officers. That makes it even easier to implement into elementaries and middle schools. I agree, one isn't enough. It should be based on the school size.

The truth is, most of thse variables are not going to change. The news isn't going to quit reporting negativiely, parents will continue to let there kids play war games, people won't lock up their guns, criminals will always find a way to obtain a gun. I do think education and systems could help diminish these variables over time.

Putting systems in place to protect our elementary/middle school kids is a no brainer.

[ironworks]

Originally Posted by realcoray

Show me a knife attack anywhere in the ballpark of one of these school shootings.

There were 22 kids killed in China on the same day with a knife.

[GregWeld]

Here ---- Read this --- it helps restore your faith in humanity.....



http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/momen...umanity-this-y

[GregWeld]

Originally Posted by ironworks

There were 22 kids killed in China on the same day with a knife.

Incorrect -- there were 23 INJURED not killed.


That is what RealCoray is arguing - is that it is the type of weapon used that made the killings so easy. I agree with him 100%. The point I'm discussing is what to do about it. My point is that laws don't protect anyone. They just give us a prosecution tool... AFTER the fact.

Todd wants protection at schools. I agree - nothing to argue there... whether it's a deterrent or not is how we implement it... one guard at a huge school isn't really much of a deterrent IMHO.... Again -- my discussion about that is -- would it just move the assailant to a different location? Say he wants to attack kids - would you just go to Toys R Us? A kids movie showing? The Santa area at the mall? A soccer game? So what can we realistically protect people from - and where?


Everyone agrees that this is an incredibly horrendous crime. Unimaginable really! It makes you sick with grief. What to do about it is another discussion entirely.