Yes, despite the ease with which swords kill in Game of Thrones, when using a knife IRL I believe it is difficult to avoid hitting a rib. One stab to the abdomen may not be enough to immediately put someone down, unless you are lucky, so the would-be mass murderer is likely to find themselves quickly grappling with a bunch of other people. It is also easier to run away from a knife.
Roof was a drug user…can’t legally buy gun if you use illegal drugs: https://www.atf.gov/file/61446/download
The use of guns is still more common than people driving cars into crowds. Cars are also much slower than bullets, and people at least have a chance to jump out of the way. With bullets, you’re pretty much screwed.
The overwhelming vast majority of gun crimes are committed in inner cities with illegally owned hand guns. Our laws have done next to nothing in reducing these numbers. I have lived in a rural area all of my life and do a lot of rifle hunting. I am completely comfortable with a rifle or shot gun in my hands AND I have a tremendous respect for the necessity of safety both while in the woods and especially so when secured and stored at home. The point of my comments being that I am not frightened or concerned by responsible gun ownership.
I am conflicted about hand gun ownership and the right to carry by private citizens. I do believe that people have a right to protect themselves but to me it seems creepy and over the top to be “carrying” all the time or in places of worship or other public places where being armed is just not appropriate. I do advocate much tougher standards and criteria to legally obtain guns and I also believe that there needs to a much more significant emphasis on mental health programs.
There is such a mixed bag of various things that are contributing to what we have at hand in our country. It goes with out saying that there is no easy fix. I understand the ease and efficiency of guns as a tool for violence but I am against an across the board no one can own guns solution.
Addressing the hatred and despair that so many people in our country have and the economic inequities that exist would go a long way as well. This is not a simple matter in any regard.
My heart aches for the families who lost loved ones in this horrific event in South Carolina! It is important for people to understand you can be a gun owner and be a compassionate and decent person, these things are not mutually exclusive.
Better gun control would not make it harder for evil people to do evil, but could make it harder for good people to do good. So, no. I don’t think it would have prevented this incident.
As long as our laws state (generalizing here) that one can not be legally controlled until one has actually done something, then no, gun control is not the answer.
As long as someone who shows obvious signs of mental illness can only be legally controlled after they have proven to be a danger to self or others - no gun control is no the answer. Remember the UCSB shooter whose parents tried and tried to get someone (law enforcement, mental health professionals) to intervene and stop their son BEFORE he did damage? They ran into all sorts of patients rights laws and were unable to stop what they had reason to believe was coming.
None of the other young male mass killers were poor or exhibited racial animus, so that can’t be the problem. They were all loners with grim futures, perhaps. Maybe we should require gun purchasers to bring along three witnesses who attest to being the purchaser’s friend. Then at least three other people know you have a gun. If you don’t have three friends, you can’t buy a gun.
Then there would be ‘friends for hire’ ads on Craigslist.
^True! I’m just trying to come up with anything that would change the result. People go on about nothing changed after Sandy Hook. What do those people propose that would have changed this and other incidents like this? They are not uniform.
“Better gun control would not make it harder for evil people to do evil, but could make it harder for good people to do good. So, no. I don’t think it would have prevented this incident.”
Bull hockey.
Again, other countries with much stricter gun law do not have the incident of mass murder as we do. Are their evil people somehow different then our evil people?
I heard it reported, but have no way of knowing if it is true or not, that the father went with the murderer to purchase the gun. So, it seems there is a good possibility that the father, at least, knew he had a gun.
I find it very disingenuous that people believe nothing can be done and the excuses are laughable if it wasn’t such a serious issue. I think, again, it’s because they care more about the 2nd Amendment and their rights to have their precious guns - then they do about the lives of people.
Possibly. Maybe their young male culture is different.
“Possibly. Maybe their young male culture is different.”
Or maybe those other countries don’t put guns up on some pedestal and have laws which prevent gun purchases by anyone with a pulse.
I don’t agree with your characterization of either gun attitudes in this country, or ease of accessibility to them in many/most places. If we really lived as you describe, then I would expect these incidents to occur much more frequently than they do.
Aren’t guns ridiculously easy to purchase at gun shows? Even after Sandy Hook, we couldn’t get laws requiring universal background checks for gun sales passed.
Improved gun control could start there.
More frequently?!?!? Can we get any more frequent?!?
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/mass-shootings-map
There have been 8 just since 2014.
“I don’t agree with your characterization of either gun attitudes in this country,”
Then how do you explain after Sandy Hook that not one gun bill could pass Congress? Not one! Even something as simple as universal back ground checks.
We, as a nation, are a sick bunch who revere guns over and above anything else.
One possible solution is to make guns much more expensive. Tax them a lot …tack on a surcharge that will go into a fund in each state to offset the taxpayers’ cost of police time, court time, jail time for criminals that use guns. Tax the ammo too.
The semi-automatic assault rifle used in the Sandy Hook murders can be purchased for under $1,000.
What if it cost as much as a car?
With 118 million (?) gun owners in the US, of course we could.
Tax 2nd Amendment? Florida legislature would never go along with that!
Change the legislators, change the laws.
“With 118 million (?) gun owners in the US, of course we could.”
3.8 homicides in the US per 100,000 people. That is the 3rd HIGHEST of OECD countries.
http://www.businessinsider.com/oecd-homicide-rates-chart-2015-6
Sadly, the reality is that things are unlikely to change much, if at all. Gun violence in the U.S. is appalling to other developed countries. The desire for guns isn’t understood. In most countries, the simple fact that a 21 year old got a gun as a birthday present, or that a 21 year old used birthday money to buy one, is bizarre.