LadyEllen
Posts: 10931
Joined: 6/30/2006
From: Stourport-England
Status: offline
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First of all, my own condolences on what happened. It was widely reported in the UK and I'm sure the reactions from here will be as varied as the reactions over there. Two students from my area were at the university at the time, so we have had first hand accounts of the terror and tragedy, and direct impact of that.
Handguns, rifles and shotguns with capacity for more than three rounds were banned here in the UK over a decade ago. It is now very difficult indeed to legally obtain even a shotgun permit, and this weapon must be secured in a steel box when not in use. We can still obtain air weapons to maximum legal power (a .22 at max legal power can kill, if used properly), and there are scores of books around, as well as redundant engineers who can make such a weapon very deadly by increasing its power, or even reactivate a deactivated handgun.
Yet -
a) our gun crime - mainly handguns - has soared in the past ten years, guns now being a fashion accessory and tool of gang behaviour,
b) I can obtain a semi automatic pistol and ammunition for a few hundred pounds (cheaper than before the ban) within a day or so. Within a few days and at a little higher price, I can obtain a fully automatic sub machine gun and ammunition,
c) if I wanted to murder one or a bunch of people in our witness crowded island, a gun would be my last choice even if I had one,
d) if I wanted to commit suicide with a gun, I could just as well put on a burkha and take my kids' toy gun onto the underground in London, where I'd be shot by police within a half hour.
I believe what we will come to see in these latest shootings in Virginia, and in the previous similar incidents, is a situation none other than those which resulted in the ban here in the UK - the failure of the system which administers the granting of permits. We had two key incidents here, both of which were awful, and both of which could not have occurred in the way they did had the system been administered properly. Both of the men who committed the incidents here, were known to be seriously psychologically ill, meaning that their permits should never have been granted, yet they were.
Now, I'm pretty convinced that had our two culprits here been picked up on and refused permits, then in those days at least, when no black market for guns existed, they would likely never have obtained guns, but probably would have still embarked on some sort of spree with an alternative weapon. Indeed, we had another case at around the time when another seriously psychologically ill man killed and maimed a class of infants with a machete - which is a horticultural tool whose sale can hardly be banned.
What this means, is that it is not the weapons used which are bad, but that the people who use them to kill others are in whatever way, psychologically damaged. What we see here then, is a failure of the psychological/psychiatric systems which ought to be in place to prevent such incidents, either by providing cures to those afflicted such that they have no urge to kill or by incarcerating them in such a way that they are incapable of acting out their urges. Yes, this denies them their freedom, but we cannot deal in absolutes here for one dangerous person, when the right of so many others to life is potentially put at risk thereby.
There is no point in banning guns, since they will always be around and only the law abiding would obey such a law. There is little prospect of removing the guns from US society that exist as of now, since there are just too many, and most importantly it is a right in the constitution. But, the US could do what I feel we ought to have done in the UK a decade or so ago, and that is to look at how these permits are granted, and the penalties for possession of a gun without a permit.
E
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In a test against the leading brand, 9 out of 10 participants couldnt tell the difference. Dumbasses.
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RE: Gun Control And Tragedy - 
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