Mass shooting at Oregon college: 15+ dead...

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Perhaps restricting access to the "Gunz" to folks like Mercer on the basis of his diagnosis might have saved lives....did you see this
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/201 ... arvard-nra

That's the one danger of looking at mental disorders, as it's easy for people to use blanket legislation that punishes the majority. There's no evidence showing that he couldn't have killed 10 people via other means.

As for that link, I've done my own unbiased study in regards to firearm ownership and murder; there's pretty much zero difference (in fact, the countries with less ownership had a higher murder rate overall, though it wasn't a difference worth noting); you need not take my word for it, though--it's easy to do. Many studies end up cherry picking things (which is why you have studies using the same data showing different results). For example, one of the the gunz in the house = more likely to be murdered, studies, used high crime areas with people most likely to be involved in criminal activities (half the people used in the study had prior arrests).

Sadly, you have to do it yourself nowadays when it's over emotive subjects.

Oregon law ALREADY bans the mentally ill from buying guns, but he still bought them legally. There already are background checks for FFL firearms sales (a brand new gun purchased at a federally licensed new gun dealer) and people like Seung Cho and Elliot Rodger and this guy STILL get guns. And they're not getting them from the Russian Mob or Mexican cartels or even the guy on the street corner, but legally. Short of taking away everybody's guns, which again would result in a bloodbath, I don't know what else could be done.

Sigh…..
I just buzzed though and picked a few to respond to for now.

Meaning what?


News to me and I’ve been to lots of gun shows. Which ones have you been to where state and federal laws do not apply?


Even if there was a problem what could effectively be done about it?
Hint: Passing gun laws that don’t work, then passing more when those don’t work isn’t effectively doing anything.

When you do that you open the door for anyone with any kind of mental handicap to get f****d around for whatever reason. We call it discrimination.

Officially diagnosed, or just "according to mom"?

Far to early to conclude he was an aspie but it is a realistic possibility. He was in a special needs school that accepted aspie studentshttp://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-oregon-college-gunman-torrance-20151001-story.html. You do not get admitted without some sort of official diagnosis. Besides the usual loner, odd, virgin descriptions there has been reports of what might be described as special interests.

There seems to be a pattern that mass shooters have serious mental defects. The system has once again failed to prevent a tragedy from happening. Early warning signs were ignored again and another tragedy has happened again. It is easier to blame the individual lone wolf attacker and nothing changes. Inadequate mental health systems have failed to prevent another tragedy.

A LOT less.

Chenpeng Village Primary School stabbing. 23 children injured. No fatalities.

Same day as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. 20 children killed. No survivors.

Gun regulations makes it more difficult, and it has extremely good results in other countries.

There are rumblings about not letting ASD folks being able to legally buy guns now, since the last three "I'm dying, and taking as many mofos with me"- Lanza, Mercer, amd the loner dude in Cali were all on the spectrum.

In my state, felons with certain crimes and people who had a involuntary psychiatric hospitalizations can't purchase weaponsm Since Autism (the current party line by the powers that be) say is a developmental disorder along the lines of Downs Syndrome, and I doubt many people with DS are buying Uzis, why are we letting someone with a developmental disability buy guns? Their brains are hard wired differently, how can they be trusted?

I've read a boat load of that nonsense on FB and Twitter.

For the argument about well why not all mentally people be banned? Supposedly, you can treat a mental illness and it gets better. There are no treatments for ASD that will shift you to "normal". This is the double edge sword for my husband. His work couldn't fire him for ASD as he is a protected class, but with no therapies that will make him "normal", the business put him on permanent disability.

It will be interesting to see how gun lobby and the gun banningfolks spins this event.

Of course, with money I can go to Detroit and buy whatever fire arm I want illegally, but the above three shooter's guns were all legally purchased.

*delete*

The validation code loops that makes it extremely hard to post on my S5, this is the best I can do. It won't let me delete the post.

The U.S. isn't 'other countries'. Contrary to what Obama says, we are an exceptional people. I don't think that the Crazy Euros are going to complain much the next time we save them that we have a large number of responsible people who have experience with firearms. Until then, however, we'll have to listen to their criticism I suppose. Same holds true for the liberals in this country.

Dear Campin Cat,

Excellent post.......I had only heard of Charles Whitman, among your examples.

I rather do think that Brenda Spencer 'started this' or 'opened the floodgates' or 'Gave

them ideas', though......a disgruntled/embittered young person with some connection

to the school, who seems to have fantasized/contemplated/planned the attack for some

time......what do you think?

In a number of cases, the perpetrator had been severely bullied, as in Columbine.....

Or FELT mistreated.

I've read that the shooter dropped out of training for the Army, but became obsessed with mass shootings. If someone in a future shooting gets a body count in the triple digits, then the government will know that more should be done to prevent more shootings.

I did say my last post.. that comparisons are difficult if not impossible... read this..

p.s. this is an interesting article re the difficulty of making comparisons in countries crime rates.
http://blog.skepticallibertarian.com/20 ... an-the-us/

You make an interesting point here;I did not know, that as you say that this is an unusually violent period, Do you think this violent period will lead to a less violent period or will it get worse & worse??
You could argue lots of things contribute but the common and inescapable factor still remains... guns, not only that the type of guns available.

Could I ask (genuinely) has gun ownership in the US increased or decreased? in say the last 30 years?
Does anyone know?

I was interested in comparative gun homicide rates after a couple f thee interesting comments so I looked up the wiki page.
USA has (2013 stats) 3.56 homicides per 100,000 and is rated 15th in the world behind Honduras (64 per 100K) other larger countries like South Africa, Brazil and Mexico.

So 15th worst gun homicide out of 190 countries

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... death_rate

I agree, this is the real concern... ie, what actually can be done? Is there any hope to improve this or is it too late and it will continue to get worse.
(I agree with the poster earlier (pezar I think) that `drug related` crime issues are a significant contributor to (bad) gun use)