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The US "Gun Culture"
Tweet Topic Started: Apr 17 2007, 12:54 PM (855 Views)
Denovissimus Apr 17 2007, 12:54 PM Post #1
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Around the world, some decry U.S. ‘gun culture’

Australia’s Howard holds his country’s tough laws as the answer

In Sydney, Australian Prime Minister John Howard said Tuesday the attack showed that America’s “gun culture” was a negative force in society, holding up tough gun laws in his own country as the answer.

In London, Buckingham Palace issued a statement on Monday saying: “The Queen was shocked and saddened to hear of the news of the shooting in Virginia.”

Queen Elizabeth II and her husband, Prince Philip, are scheduled to visit Virginia May 3-4.

‘We took action’
Howard introduced strict gun ownership laws after the shooting massacre of 35 people in the southern island state of Tasmania in 1996.

“We had a terrible incident at Port Arthur, but it is the case that 11 years ago we took action to limit the availability of guns,” said Howard, who extended his sympathies to the families of the victims who were killed at the hands of what he described as “a crazed gunman.”

“We showed a national resolve that the gun culture that is such a negative in the United States would never become a negative in our country.”

In 1996 a gunman with a semi-automatic rifle killed 35 people at Port Arthur in Australia’s worst modern-day shooting massacre.

The horror of that massacre prompted Howard to confront Australia’s gun lobby and imposed laws banning almost all types of semi-automatic weapons.

The government spent A$300 million ($250 million) buying more than 600,000 weapons from farmers, hunters and other members of the public before the new laws took affect.

But Howard told reporters: “You can never guarantee these things won’t happen again in our country.”

More than 30,000 people die from gunshot wounds in the United States every year and there are more guns in private hands than in any other country. But a powerful gun lobby and support for gun ownership rights have largely thwarted attempts to tighten controls.

Australia’s small Greens party called on Tuesday for a further review of the nation’s gun control laws, saying the latest U.S. shooting involved a multiple-shot pistol and there were an estimated 250,000 handguns in Australia.

“We really need to go back and look at the laws in Australia which permit handguns to be available, and that includes handguns with up to 10 bullets in the magazine,” Greens Senator Bob Brown told reporters.

“We Greens are saying let’s remove the potential, as far as we can, for a repeat massacre by somebody wielding a multiple-shot handgun,” he said.

‘They have got to change the law’
In India, which has some 80,000 students in the U.S. Commentators called for greater protection and stricter gun laws.

“It’s not a question of an Indian professor getting killed in the firing. This is related to the American gun laws,” said K. Subrahmanyam, a former member of India’s National Security Council.

“We can’t do anything about it. It is something which has happened in the United States. They have got to change the law.”
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Denovissimus Apr 17 2007, 12:57 PM Post #2
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I find it as no coincidence that both Australia and Britain are Big Brother states...because they have disarmed the populace.

I maintain our right to bear arms, despite this horrible tragedy.

What say you?
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Julesy Apr 17 2007, 01:33 PM Post #3
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Im on the fence because idiots and low lifes take advantage or the right.
I dont own a gun and I dont really see why I would need to.

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Denovissimus Apr 17 2007, 02:52 PM Post #4
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This is a great commentary:

Ban People — They Kill

Paul Craig Roberts
V Dare
Tuesday April 17, 2007

The tragic murders of Virginia Tech students, apparently by an insane person, will prompt new attempts to ban private ownership of guns. Once guns are banned, crime will explode. Households and vulnerable members of society will lose the ability to defend, which will invite more intrusions and attacks. Knife crimes will rise as they have in Great Britain.

Gun prohibition will create a new industry for criminals—gun running and black market sales. Police will conduct stings by posing as black market gun dealers and entrap innocent citizens driven by fear and threat to secure means of personal protection.

A large industry of family businesses dedicated to meeting the needs of shooters, who would never shoot at anything but a paper or clay target, will be wiped out. Gun clubs will close their doors. Collectors of valuable Winchesters and Colts, beautiful pieces of Americana, will have to give them up or be at risk of prison sentences.

Gun banners might be surprised at the number of Americans who provide parts and repairs for firearms that have been out of production for 70 or 80 years. Other businesses provide components from which dedicated hobbyists fashion ammunition that is no longer commercially produced.

Marksmanship is an Olympic sport. A large number of marksmanship events are hosted all over the country, with the national championships at Camp Perry being the best known. I have been a member of gun clubs for decades, and no member has ever shot anyone, accidentally or intentionally. For an older person, marksmanship is one of the few outdoor convivial pursuits, and the challenge of mind- eye-hand coordination and windage calculation is rewarding.

Guns have been around for a long time, but these crazy shootings are a new development that point to a failure of culture to produce people with a sense of responsibility and self-control. When I was a kid, a youngster could walk into a local hardware store and buy a gun. There were no restrictions. If a kid was so young that he couldn’t see over the counter, the store owner might call a parent for approval. We all had guns, and we never shot ourselves or anyone else.

One of my grandmothers thought nothing of me and my friends playing with the World War II weapons my uncle had brought back. My other grandmother never batted an eye when I collected my grandfather’s shotgun from behind the door and went off to match wits with the crows that raided the pecan trees or the poisonous cottonmouth snakes that could be found along the creek that ran through the farm.

My grandmother never worried about me until I got a horse, a more dangerous object in her view than a gun.

We also all had knives, which we carried in our pockets to school every day. We never stabbed anyone and very seldom cut our own fingers.

We often had fights, more often wrestling each other to the ground than fist fights. No one ever thought of pulling a knife or a gun on his antagonist. Parents and teachers did not exactly approve of fights, but they considered them natural. We were not arrested, handcuffed and finger-printed for being in a fight.

Except for war films, movie violence was rare. I still remember the shock we all experienced when the hero in a cowboy movie actually shot and killed the outlaw. Until that film, the hero would shoot the gun out of the outlaw’s hand, knock him out with a punch to the jaw, and deliver him rope bound to the sheriff.

I began my teaching career at Virginia Tech when the institution still had its Cadets. Students marched in uniforms with powerful military weapons that as far as I can remember still had firing pins. No one ever loaded a rifle and shot someone. Indeed, as a high school and Georgia Tech student, we had to take R.O.T.C. We knew how to field strip a M1 30-06 rifle and could have procured surplus army ammunition with ease, but no one was ever irresponsible enough to load one of the weapons. When we had marksmanship practice, it was at a firing range.

The change is in the behavior of people, not the presence of guns. Banning guns does not address the cause of gratuitous violence. We need to find the cause of the sickness in our society that produces people who deal with their problems by murdering others.

England has discovered the truth of the NRA’s motto — “When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.” The gun ban has only disarmed the honest citizens. Drugs are banned, but they are available almost everywhere, as was alcohol during Prohibition. If a deranged person can’t obtain a black market gun, he will make a bomb.

Indeed, the Iraq war has greatly stimulated interest in, and knowledge of, bomb-making. The longer the senseless occupation of Iraq continues, the more likely that Americans, like residents of Baghdad, will awaken each day to the news of 100 dead and 100 injured.

Gun rights are constitutionally protected, because the Founding Fathers did not trust even the limited and constrained government that they created. To infringe this constitutional right makes it easier to infringe others. Certainly the Bush administration has shown no reluctance to infringe such foundations of our political and legal existence as habeas corpus and the requirement that warrants be obtained before privacy is invaded.

If we lose the Constitution, we have lost our country.

Responsibility goes with accountability. Government, like people, becomes less responsible as accountability declines. Indeed, it is impossible to have irresponsible people and responsible government as the government is staffed by people.

In my day parents and teachers had authority. Today teachers have no authority, which is why they have to call the police to control the kids. Child Protective Service has stripped parents of authority. Children are taught at school to call CPS if they are spanked by parents. Apparently, teachers cannot recognize the decline of their own authority in the decline of parental authority.

I remember when a misbehaving kid picked up by the police was turned over to his parents. Today, the kids are taken to jail.

Humans are fallible and will fail in their responsibilities to others and do bad things. However, today they fail more often than in the past. The cause is not guns.

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Julesy Apr 17 2007, 03:02 PM Post #5
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I heard the gun the guy used was 8 bullets in two seconds. :faint
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la anaconda de chocolatee Apr 17 2007, 03:49 PM Post #6
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I think the gun laws need to be stricter. I have been for that for a long time. I think semi auto rifles and the type of gun that this guy had should not be available at all for private ownership. Some guns defiantely need to be banned.

If this guy went to the school with a knife instead, stabbing takes longer than shooting not nearly as many people would have died.
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Julesy Apr 17 2007, 03:53 PM Post #7
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I agree Michele

I dont see the rational need for guns.
I think you should go through a psychological test to see if you are sane enough to carry a fire arm.

I dont even see the need for guns for hunting...

ummm you can buy meat in a grocery store.

Its all these stupid men trying to be macho and fuck up shit for others
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la anaconda de chocolatee Apr 17 2007, 03:57 PM Post #8
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yeah half of the points made that arguement had me laughing.

all the gun clubs would be closed down~ oh fucking well! Find a new hobby! Become a mason if you need some type of club

people in the gun industry would loose jobs~ a hell of a lot more people in this country have lost jobs due to all of our manufactoring of goods being outsourced to asia! boo-hoo-hoo
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Denovissimus Apr 17 2007, 03:59 PM Post #9
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We need to maintain our right to bear arms to protect up from an oppressive government!
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Julesy Apr 17 2007, 04:16 PM Post #10
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I dont see any RATIONAL need to carry a gun. Period.

There ate a ton of different ways to detour a criminal.

Like a crossbow.

:D
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Denovissimus Apr 17 2007, 04:20 PM Post #11
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To paraphrase one chick said in Death Proof, second half of Grindhouse, in her defense of carrying around a gun...want to know what happens when a criminal approaches me with a knife? The muthafucka gets shot!

Limits and bans on assault type weapons yes, but we should still maintain the right to bear basic arms...not only as a deterrent against criminals but to protect ourselves from the government! Even our forefathers recognized that, and that's why it was made the 2ND Amendment to the Constiution!
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Julesy Apr 17 2007, 04:24 PM Post #12
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I agree.

Just excessive amounts of guns is uneccessary. Totally. You can only handle one motha fucking gun at a time.PERIOD.

Unless youre some sort of octopuss guy from Dr. Who :huh
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Noname Apr 17 2007, 04:42 PM Post #13
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We should have the right to bear arms, as Jesse said. I find it rather odd that the Queen gave a statement on our country policies. She needs to look at her own country and the fact that the monarchy is costing the country millions!
I hate it how people work their own ideas in when people are scared. They take advantage of people's fear and they put in their own ideas. Banning all guns in America would go against the Constituion and thus that would go against America. We have the right to bear arms. Austraillia isn't America.
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Jane Apr 17 2007, 07:56 PM Post #14
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I'm suprised that article didn't mention Dunblane. That was when our gun laws were tightened, when someone killed 17 5 and 6 year olds in their school. We've never had the same gun culture as America, although right now gangs in poor areas are killing each other with guns or knives. I wouldn't want a gun in my house. It's certainly not common for people to have them. You own a weapon what's to stop it getting used on you?

Is it not sensible to have to have a licence to own a gun? To show you are able to use one sensibly? To prove you are of sound mind and not mentally ill? I believe over here they have to be kept in a purpose built locked cabinet, is that not better than having them where a child could get hold of it?



On the other hand if someone wants to get hold of a gun they still can if they are determined. It makes me laugh when they talk about knife amnesties when everyone has knives that can be potential weapons in their own kitchens!
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Sexy Zombie Apr 17 2007, 11:38 PM Post #15
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If some one wants to commit a mass murder they're going to do it regardless of if they own/have a gun or not. You can make homemade bombs, use knives, make a gun, using a paintball gun the right way can kill, make homemade lethal gasses... You don't need a gun to do it they're just easier and take the least amount of imagination.

I personally plan on owning some guns when Rick and I move in esspecally if he becomes a cop. I'll get all the papers and stuff and train on how to shoot and clean it. And when we have kids later they will understand how to handle a respect a gun and the guns will be kept in a safe perfurable with a number pad and finger print reader so they can't get to them without our knowledge.
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Denovissimus Apr 18 2007, 12:56 AM Post #16
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Good thinking Erin! :clap
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Noname Apr 18 2007, 11:38 AM Post #17
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^^
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Auntie Maine Apr 18 2007, 12:39 PM Post #18
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I want some guns but Jimmy won't let me.I told him I didn't want any bullets,just some pretty little derrangers to lay around for decor.
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Julesy Apr 18 2007, 01:47 PM Post #19
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lol!
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Noname Apr 18 2007, 04:03 PM Post #20
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there is a joke in there that i am not getting, isn't there?
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