Intriguing question, I agree. I am talking from a Dutch perspective, mind. Canadian law enforcers have already termed this horrific crime a ‘one-of-a-kind’ one and assured the population that the punishment will be extremely severe, no matter the state the perpetrator might have been in.
For me it is a grizzly kind of adding-up exercise, or: weighing the pros and ons. Yes, if one passenger would have had a permitted handgun he could probably have saved the victim’s life. On the other hand, there’s no way of denying that the right to bear arms (i.e.: a pistol or revolver) brings its own grave dangers with it, think of the tragedies that happened at U.S. high schools in recent years. They surely are linked to that right to bear arms.
So: I don’t really see a great advantage in widespread carrying of guns, because many people can go off the deep end by one of life’s many possible tragedies, and then go on a killing spree.
But at the same time I know that the American and European perspective on such matters differ hugely. So I’m open to comment and criticism.
Police identify accused in bus attack
Gabrielle Giroday and Ian Hitchen, Winnipeg Free Press and Brandon Sun
Published: Friday, August 01, 2008
BRANDON, Man. - A 40-year-old man has been charged with second-degree murder in connection with a gruesome stabbing and decapitation aboard a Greyhound bus in Manitoba Wednesday.
RCMP said Friday that Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton, has been arrested and charged with second-degree murder and is scheduled to appear in court in Portage la Prairie, Man., Friday at 10 a.m. local time.
Nice try troll, but it won't fly. All school shootings are done in no gun zones, they are also(except for the college shooting)done by teens who stoled the weapons they used. If we truly had the right to keep and bear arms the school shootings wouldn't have happened as one of the teachers would have been armed and would have taken the shooters out before they did too much damage.
When I was in school we used to bring our deer rifles to school and go hunting after class, no one ever got shot any where on any schools in the US at that time. Your statement is just a fine example of liberal thinking and, as I said, it won't fly.
They are linked to the fact that the perpetrators "bore arms", whether they should have or not. Criminals will get guns whether they are illegal or not, so their crimes aren't really related to that right.
It's the law-abiding who are affected by laws. They are the ones who are disarmed by anti-gun laws. It's because of those laws that there are more victims for the criminals to attack and kill without fear of an effective defense.
Had there been more armed citizens, each of those school shooting tragedies could have ended much more quickly, with fewer victims.
Imagine if some of the teachers in those schools were qualified and allowed to carry a concealed weapon. Can you see how the outcome could have been so much better? When only the police have effective defense against a gunman, then he knows he has lots of time to claim numerous lives before anyone will be able to stop him.
So: I don’t really see a great advantage in widespread carrying of guns, because many people can go off the deep end by one of life’s many possible tragedies, and then go on a killing spree.
Exactly. That's precisely why there is an advantage to more widespread carrying of guns!
The bad guys will get their weapons in spite of the law, and more guns in the hands of the good guys mean it's more likely the bad guys will be stopped more quickly, or that they won't even attempt their crimes because of the higher likelihood of being shot in the process.
In the USA, at least, the areas with the strongest anti-gun laws are mostly the ones with the highest gun-related crime. Those laws don't stop the criminals.
The vast majority of those who carry a concealed weapon are law abiding citizens who are not going to go on a rampage just because they are armed. Does the widespread driving of cars make people go on killing sprees with their cars? I carry concealed to protect myself and my loved ones.
In other cases, the "gun free school zones" led to massacres.
Criminals will find something to kill with...gun, knife, bat...and if people flee, they will kill many more.
In this country, if the citizens were allowed to freely exercise their constitutional rights, you would see a lot less massacres happen, and when they did, they would be a lot less severe.
I place the blame on the terrible massacres right on the heads and hides of liberal politicians and liberal citizens who vote them in, who have disarmed the peace loving public and left them at the mercy of these cretans.
where people are well armed, there is less crime, less massacres, and more dead and wounded criminals as opposed to dead and wounded honest citizens.
First of all, guns are hardly the only instrument people use to kill. Cars, bathtubs, and baseball bats, along with knives, are quite effective. Pushing people in front of oncoming trains works well, any carbon monoxide-producing machine works well, and on an on. Second, the vast majority of people who commit violent crimes have a prior history of committing violent crimes and have been put back on the street anyway. A fully armed citzenry can ensure that they don't get to come back yet again, by making sure their next attack is interrupted by their prompt death.
The best way to reduce violent crime is to reduce the population of violent criminals, and make it plain to anyone contemplating becoming a violent criminal that the result of pursuing this course will be premature death -- not imprisonment for a term coupled with the farce of "rehabilitation", or the "death penalty" delivered decades after the crime, with the decades being spent in prison getting hot meals, heat and air conditioning, television, medical care, and "counseling". What we do not need is law-abiding citizens being taxed to pay the cost of housing violent criminals in comfortable prisons.
With the limited information available about this particular case, it sounds like the perp is schizophrenic, and if so, he should have been locked up in a secure mental institution years ago. Same with the mass murderer "student" at Virginia Tech, who had been exhibiting signs of severe mental illness since early childhood, was not doing anything remotely related to "studying" at the university, and yet was allowed to live in a dorm and wander around society freely, using credit cards and bearing an ID that identified him as a "student".
If that's true, explain why the most gun-rights friendly jurisdictions in the US are also the ones with lower crime rates? And why when these massacres take place even in geographical areas friendly to guns, is it always in a school, church or other area where the shooter expects others to be unarmed? Why are the English even now moving to control the sale of knives if guns are so inherently dangerous in the hands of ordinary citizens?
Canada's murder rate, especially with firearms, is very low compared to the US. Toronto, a city of nearly 5 million, has a murder rate of 1.9 per 100,000. Compare that to Atlanta (34.5), Boston (5.5) New York City (9.1), Vancouver (2.8) and Washington, DC (45.5). The overall crime rate in general is an average of 48 incidents per 100,000 people, compared to Cincinnati (326), Los Angeles (283), New York City (225) and even Vancouver (239).
What does that tell us? It's really too complicated to look at just one cause. But the fact that Canadians do not have ready access to guns certainly plays a large part.
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/st/st176/
You will find it very interesting --- I fine it all very interesting, but I like #6 and #7 best.
Myth No. 6: Criminals mainly have guns in order to commit crimes.
The number one reason criminals acquire handguns is not to commit crimes but, like noncriminals, to protect themselves.52 Criminals keenly feel the need for self-protection because they associate with other criminals and are likely to be victims as well as victimizers. As Figure II shows:
• In a survey of imprisoned felons, 58 percent said protection was a very important reason for getting a handgun and 26 percent said it was a somewhat important reason.
• Only 28 percent cited use in crime as very important and 20 percent said it was somewhat important.
Myth No. 7: Killings and other violent crimes were prevalent in the Old West because guns were so plentiful.
There was violence along the frontiers, but most of it was related to clashes with Indians, bandits or foreign nations.
There was not a great deal of "ordinary" crime. From 1870 to 1885, the era of the Wild West when "everybody wore a gun," arrest rates per 100 residents were much lower in the West than in eastern cities.53 Moreover, "the Western frontier was a far more civilized, more peaceful, and safer place than American society is today."54 Contrary to the impression left by movies and Western novels, crime and homicides were rare. For example:55
• In 1880, wide-open towns like Virginia City, Nev., Leadville, Colo., and Dallas had no homicides.
• By comparison, Cincinnati had 17 homicides that year.
• From 1870 to 1885, the five Kansas railheads of Abilene, Caldwell, Dodge City, Ellsworth and Wichita had a total of 45 homicides, or an average of three per year - a lower homicide rate than New York City, Baltimore and Boston. • Sixteen of the 45 homicides were committed by duly authorized peace officers, and only two towns " Ellsworth in 1873 and Dodge City in 1876 "never had as many as five killings in any one year.57 "There was not much ordinary crime in the Old West, primarily because almost everybody was armed."
With a few legendary exceptions, law enforcement officers in the Old West were rather ineffective. Still, there were few robberies, thefts or burglaries in western towns, primarily because almost everybody carried or possessed firearms and was willing to resist. "The citizens themselves, armed with various types of firearms and willing to kill to protect their persons or property, were evidently the most important deterrent to larcenous crime," said one author.58 Unlike "Gunsmoke's" Matt Dillon, the much-heralded western peace officer actually faced fewer problems than his counterpart elsewhere. The westerner, said one student of the era, "probably enjoyed greater security in both person and property than did his contemporary in the urban centers of the East."59 "It's a fairly recent idea that guns aren't a good thing," says Jon Weiner, a professor of history at the University of California. "The image of the lone man defending his homestead . . . is deeply embedded in the American psyche."60
The comment and criticism is that a free people have the right to self defense from individual predators and nutcases, and from governments gone awry. The latter is the most dangerous, as events of the 20th Century proved. See here for quantification:
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM
Protection from both types of threats requires firearms.
You are misinformed. Those shootings took place at "Gun Free School Zones." Unfortunately the "Gun Free School Zone" signs were obviously defective. Otherwise, the murderers would not have been able to bring guns into the "Gun Free School Zone."
There have been shootings in other areas, such as shopping malls. Those areas were also designated "Gun Free."
I'll leave you with two more thoughts.
First: in the U.S., the concept of government is, that it is there to serve the citizen. The citizens own the government, the government is not supposed to own, or "take care of" the people. In fact, our nations founders stated that, should a government become tyrannical, the duty of people is to take up arms against it.
Second: studies prove that an armed society is a polite society. Look at American Cities. Those with relaxed gun laws have far less crime than cities with restrictive gun laws. Every time guns have been restricted, crime has increased. Every time gun laws have been relaxed, crime has plummeted.
Thugs are afraid of getting hurt. They usually target the weak and helpless.
The myths implanted by those that fear a firearm versus see it as a social construction tool it is are just that. Yes a firearm kills as does a knife , a tire iron, a cricket bat, a lawn dart, or a sledge hammer etc.......
They are just tools.
They save many more lives than they take. I have carried a handgun in some form or manner since I was a teen. Mindset is key as I do not go armed where I wouldn’t go unarmed. I take the responsibility for myself, my family, friends and community seriously. As a retired serviceman and former sheriffs deputy I know what the police are capable of and what they do more than many of their other duties. They clean up crime scenes, they are an after the fact response unless they were on the scene and happened to get unlucky enough to be directly involved.
There is a reason they wear a uniform as well........mere presence is in 99% of the time a deterrent to criminal activity.
That has played out as well with our nations recent surge in concealed carry laws for most states. Crimes against persons have dropped as crimes against property have risen. The mere thought that granny or her granddaughter could be armed IS a deterrent. The CHL/CCW laws drove crimes against persons DOWN ! Regardless if they chose to carry a firearm or not. It serves a purpose for all . Not just the pro 2nd amendment people but the anti 2nd socialists who’s real effort is to undermine our constitution versus make the common persons lives safer.
Humans with firearms do far more good than evil. Soldiers and LEO’s don’t arm themselves to go on a killing spree no more than law abiding citizens do.
Laws are only respected by those that are hurt by them in the long run.
Criminals ‘are’ by definition and experience those that ignore the laws. Thus any law that keeps a firearm from the criminal or average citizen for self defense is taking that self defense ability from that tax paying, law abiding person.
As the criminal element totally ignores the law........gun control hurts who ?
Stay safe and be a sheepdog versus just sheep waiting for the slaughter........woof !
You wrote: “...think of the tragedies that happened at U.S. high schools in recent years. They surely are linked to that right to bear arms.”
Every single one of those murderous rampages occurred in areas defined as Gun Free Zones (more accurately known to sane individuals as “Target Rich Environments”), in which law abiding citizens are NOT allowed to carry weapons; in other words, where their right to bear aram IS infringed.
So, please explain how these “tragedies” are “linked” to the right to bear arms. It seems to me they are actually linked to the government INFRINGING on that right.