Virginia Tech Shootings

[Sabresque]

"The White House said President Bush was 'horrified' by the massacre, but reiterated Bush's support for the right to bear arms. Bush later offered prayers for the victims."

I read that and wanted to puke my guts out.

[OROD]

Originally Posted by Sabresque

"The White House said President Bush was 'horrified' by the massacre, but reiterated Bush's support for the right to bear arms. Bush later offered prayers for the victims."

I read that and wanted to puke my guts out.

People also use knives, baseball bats, cars, airplanes, and many other things to kill others. Where's your self-righteous indignation at the right to bear those items?

.

[D.O.A.R.]

Originally Posted by Sabresque

"The White House said President Bush was 'horrified' by the massacre, but reiterated Bush's support for the right to bear arms. Bush later offered prayers for the victims."

I read that and wanted to puke my guts out.

I suspect you have similar reaction to all the President's speeches.

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!


From the website of the Virginia Tech Fencing Club:

Originally Posted by Virginia Tech Fencing

16 April 2007
Update
As many of you know, a gunman shot and killed over thirty Tech students on campus today. So far I do not know of any Tech fencers that were involved. Many of our classmates were not so lucky. Feel free to drop fenceweb@vt.edu a line saying you are all right. Our hearts and minds are with the victims and their families.

URL: http://www.fencing.org.vt.edu/index.html


My heartfelt condolences to all victims.

Peter Gustafsson

[Inquartata]

Well, THAT turned political real fast.

[campb1pr]

Thank you Peter for your relevant posting. As an alum of Virginia Tech and the VTFC, my thoughts were first of the club members, and it was selfish to feel relief that our small community was not directly affected, as so many have been and will be. But, since this is a fencing board, I was gladdened to see the support of this thread and your post, redirecting us back to acknowledging the victims and supporting our own community of fencers, as well as the larger community.

Thank you.

[erooMynohtnA]

Should the President have reaffirmed his position on gun control while addressing the Virginia Tech shooting?

Will/should there be firearm restrictions at a local or national level because of this?

Is the university to blame? Are the local police to blame? Is anyone to blame? Are many agencies to blame?

Is there an underlying cause that can be controlled to prevent this type of event from occurring again? Less violent video games, firearm restrictions, increased security, restriction of visas, mandatory military service, contingency plans at all educational levels?

I'm trying to think of everything to keep the arguments in this thread and out of the other.

[erooMynohtnA]

Originally Posted by Sabresque

"The White House said President Bush was 'horrified' by the massacre, but reiterated Bush's support for the right to bear arms. Bush later offered prayers for the victims."

I read that and wanted to puke my guts out.

Originally Posted by OROD

People also use knives, baseball bats, cars, airplanes, and many other things to kill others. Where's your self-righteous indignation at the right to bear those items?

.

Originally Posted by D.O.A.R.

I suspect you have similar reaction to all the President's speeches.

Please, guys, take it to the politics forum. I set up a thread for it. I hope we can all agree this thread isn't the place for political dispute.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

Should the President have reaffirmed his position on gun control while addressing the Virginia Tech shooting?

And should all of these people also have immediately resorted to reaffirming their positions on the matter?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070417/...ech_world_view

At least for Bush it's a domestic matter.

I especially like Mr. McNulty's remark.

"Some good", he says. "Some good"!

[D'Art]

For once Tony Blair actually seemed genuine in his statement, but that is neither here nor there.

I have my own opinions on guns, knives, swords and weapons in general, but really, if someone is determined to commit an atrocity, they will find a way of doing it. Legislation just stops those who have innocent reasons for having (usually derivatives of) weapons, like the British shooters mentioned in the article Inq. linked to.

My sympathies go out to those affected.

[noodle]

1) no
2) no
3) no, no, no, no
4) no, no

[occasionalfencer]

Originally Posted by D'Art

.

I have my own opinions on guns, knives, swords and weapons in general, but really, if someone is determined to commit an atrocity, they will find a way of doing it.

This is said so often that it is easy to think that it is true. There is no verification of this, other than the fact that people keep on saying it. If someone is determined to commit an atrocity, and they have no access to weapons which easily and quickly kill lots of people, they might cause some trouble but clearly not as much. Or, they might just give up because it turns out to be too much trouble. We don't know.

If someone wants to commit atrocities with a knife, in the same amount of time they might kill a couple of people, but not 30. If they don't even have a knife, but just their bare hands, they could again cause trouble, but less. The point of guns is that they kill quickly and easily. They are doing exactly what they are designed to do in a case like this. That means that with the same effort other weapons would do less.

[Inquartata]

The worst civil mass murders in history have been committed with fires and explosives.

Will we ban matches?

[Slim]

Originally Posted by Inquartata

The worst civil mass murders in history have been committed with fires and explosives.

Will we ban matches?

Easy now. Let's not give them any ideas.

[Slim]

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

SNIP.....

Is anyone to blame?

Absolutely. The knucklehead who did the shooting.

Consider this. Had the university not had a prohibition on LEGAL firearm possession on campus, and had a student or faculity member with a LEGAL license to carry been on campus while carrying, it's conceivable that the numbers of dead and wounded would be smaller than they are. There are many documented cases where priviate citizens with LEGAL permits to carry have intervenied and reduced the number of lives lost in situations such as this.

Firearms are part of the culture here in the US. They are not going away. Making it more difficult and/or prohibitive for law abiding citizens to obtain them for LEGAL purposes while not enforcing the existing laws on those who decided to break them only enables the knuckleheads.

[D'Art]

As Inq. pointed out in his own special ways, there are other ways to commit atrocities, other than guns. In the British Isles, it was fairly common during the days of guerrilla warfare (or rebellions, as the history books tend to call them) to burn down buildings with the occupants locked inside. One of the few historical accuracies in the film Braveheart. How often do you hear about bombers nowadays? Almost daily over here. They cause more destruction and potentially higher loss of life than guns can. The Nazis were quite ingenious in their inventions of new types of atrocity. Where there's a will, there is unfortunately very often a way.

[scrapinpeg]

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

Should the President have reaffirmed his position on gun control while addressing the Virginia Tech shooting?

Why not? He probably bases his position in part on an understanding that things like this may happen, and wants to make sure there's no confusion that this is going to change his policy. Might as well clarify that right up front.

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

Will/should there be firearm restrictions at a local or national level because of this?

What's wrong with the ones already in existence? More restrictions on gun possession aren't likely to have much effect. There are too many guns already out there to be able to effectively limit their numbers, for one. Second, places where possession is outright illegal (such as DC) have just as many or even people getting shot than places where possession is legal, so the efficacy of such laws is questionable. Third, laws only dissuade law-abiding people -- there are laws on the books against killing people, for example, but that didn't stop this nut job from breaking that law repeatedly yesterday morning -- so people who want to get guns to commit crimes are going to get them, and the honest citizenry will be unable to protect itself. If some of those kids on campus had access to firearms, had been brought up to their safe and respectful use, and had the bravery to do so, perhaps one of them might have been able to stop this wacko.

I think guns should be lawful to own, that people should be trained in their proper and safe use, that the state should be able to license usage based on demonstrable safe use like driving cars, and that those who would sell a gun or ammunition recklessly or negligently to someone who should not own the weapon should be liable for any harm that results.

I do not think gun ownership should be per se forbidden, except to convicted violent felons, the dangerously mentally ill, and others who are proven to be violent threats to society.

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

Is the university to blame? Are the local police to blame? Is anyone to blame? Are many agencies to blame?

The guy pulling the trigger is to blame. The university had nothing to do with it. The local police tried to stop him. No agencies had anything to do with it. The blame lies solely with the guy who did the shooting, and anyone who knew or suspected what he was up to and helped him to do it. Pointing the finger anywhere else is unfair, unwise, and unjust.

Originally Posted by erooMynohtnA

Is there an underlying cause that can be controlled to prevent this type of event from occurring again? Less violent video games, firearm restrictions, increased security, restriction of visas, mandatory military service, contingency plans at all educational levels?

There is usually an underlying cause to most human actions -- we rarely act randomly. But the causes are different from person to person.

It is less than useful to look for deeper societal causes, regardless. The motives of criminals such as this are usually deeply personal, and have little to do with economic, societal or governmental factors.

If someone held a gun to my head and forced me to point to societal factors, I would say the press's wild publicity and celebretizing of these kinds of acts helps put the idea into people's heads who otherwise wouldn't have thought about it. But that's a weak cause, and I don't at all condemn the press for this.

If I may blame the victim, people in our society don't protect themselves any more. They don't know how, and don't think to do it. If they're in danger, they have no tools to take care of the situation, apart from calling the cops and hoping the cops get there in time to be useful. Hoping that someone else will rescue you is not a recipe for survival. A society where people routinely protect themselves from violence might be a society with fewer acts like this.

[Slim]

Originally Posted by scrapinpeg

SNIP....

If I may blame the victim, people in our society don't protect themselves any more. They don't know how, and don't think to do it. If they're in danger, they have no tools to take care of the situation, apart from calling the cops and hoping the cops get there in time to be useful. Hoping that someone else will rescue you is not a recipe for survival. A society where people routinely protect themselves from violence might be a society with fewer acts like this.

Great post. I'd take this a step further and say people are not allowed or encouraged to adequately protect themselves from the vermin that exist in society. Take a look at some of the insane laws on use of deadly force in cases such as home invasion. Some states require you to flee your home unless you can prove you are in immediate physical danger. Cripes, isnt having an intruder in your home enough justification to act?

[jBirch]

I think there are several issues at play here...

First, guns don't kill people. People with guns kill people. The easier it is to get firearms, the more likely they will be used.

Second, if there is one skill that humanity possesses in abundance it is finding innovative ways to kill each other. If it wasn't a gun, it would have been something else.

Third, sane rational individuals don't go about murdering innocents. However, each effect has a cause and if I were to blame anyone, it would probably be the girlfriend, the parents and probably the social contacts of the shooter. Someone noticed something and did nothing. Someone hurt this guy irreparably.

Fourth, I agree with the 'peg and Slim: why didn't anyone protect themselves? Why didn't anyone protect anyone else? When the shots were going off, why was the instinct to call the cops and hide? As a soldier, maybe I just don't understand.

Fifth, what other course of action did he have once he murdered the girl? Doesn't Virginia have the Death Penalty?

James.