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Sad that one maniac gets world-wide attention for his murder spree.

RIP victims. RIH maniac shooter and those who took away the freedom to defend ones self.
 
This is an interesting article from 2003 about the same topic. The UK has a lower murder rate than the US so this kind of thing is kind of a blip but, in general, the UK's violent crime rate is much higher than the US. That is, crimes such as armed robbery, burglaries while the owners are at home and so on are way up in the UK.

The Telegraph published an article about the UK being the violent crime capital of Europe.

However, I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that gun control is the problem. Many countries have gun control (Canada, Germany, the Netherlands) who report significantly lower rates of violent crime. The article cites that the UK has not adequately addressed the root causes of crime (and those are typically poverty, unemployment, lack of opportunity, etc.)

However, it would be dumb to underestimate the mitigating effect of legalized protection. Even if intergroup and intragroup violence isn't necessarily effected, at least burglaries and muggings would see a drop.
 
However, I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that gun control is the problem. Many countries have gun control (Canada, Germany, the Netherlands) who report significantly lower rates of violent crime. The article cites that the UK has not adequately addressed the root causes of crime (and those are typically poverty, unemployment, lack of opportunity, etc.)

I don't know about the Netherlands, but Canada and Germany don't have anywhere near the level of gun control that the UK has...
 
<broken link removed>


Looks like gun control really works, eh? 12 dead, 25 wounded.

Seems like he used a shotgun for most, if not all of it.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
conversely....the argument is made that it would have been worse had gun
control not been implemented, not that it would have been eliminated
 
"British Gun Control doesn't Work" read the headlines.
The truth is, no "Gun Control" does what it's sold for.
It's simply the control of the people by the government.
 
I don't know about the Netherlands, but Canada and Germany don't have anywhere near the level of gun control that the UK has...

Canada actually has a pretty weird gun law, or very weird self protection law. You are not allowed to own anything for the purpose of self-protection.

Your firearms need to be locked, everywhere, except when at a sports shooting range. A firearm cannot be used for self-protection. You cannot buy a baseball bat for the purpose of self-protection. But if it so happens that you have the baseball bat with you and you are in a situation where you have to defend yourself, then you could legally use that bat. But then again, only in proportion to the threat - that is, if the attacker has a smaller bat, you can't use your bigger bat.

One famous incident many years ago was with an old man who was attacked in his home and he had to use a kitchen knife. The old man wounded the intruder. The court ruled against the old man because the intruder was not armed with a knife but with some metal club. The population was in uproar.
 
The Virginia Tech massacre was a school shooting that took place on Monday, April 16, 2007 on the campus of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. In two separate attacks, approximately two hours apart, the perpetrator, Seung-Hui Cho, killed 32 people and wounded many others[1] before committing suicide.

A nut is a nut, in the UK in the US.
 
they'd be calling for structer controls on cabs if he had plowed into a group of people crossing the street, or sitting in a restaurant?

Oh wait, it's what he used to do the killing, not the user's fault. The gun caused him to kill people.
 
The idea that this sad episode proves that gun control "doesn't work" is nonsense. What it proves is that no system of gun control will guarantee a complete absense of gun violence. The UK has a much more stringent set of gun control laws than we do and much less gun violence per capita. Make of that what you want.

Frankly, I'm not so interested in whether gun control would "work." I'm not going to be swayed in my views of gun control by what the statistics show about the efficacy of gun control in curbing gun violence. We Americans have a special culture with firearms that other countries don't share or have discarded. For Americans, it's woven into our constitution and history and is not dependent upon empirical statistics from our own country, let alone that of another country.
 
The idea that this sad episode proves that gun control "doesn't work" is nonsense. What it proves is that no system of gun control will guarantee a complete absense of gun violence. The UK has a much more stringent set of gun control laws than we do and much less gun violence per capita. Make of that what you want.

Frankly, I'm not so interested in whether gun control would "work." I'm not going to be swayed in my views of gun control by what the statistics show about the efficacy of gun control in curbing gun violence. We Americans have a special culture with firearms that other countries don't share or have discarded. For Americans, it's woven into our constitution and history and is not dependent upon empirical statistics from our own country, let alone that of another country.

The Virginia Tech massacre was a school shooting that took place on Monday, April 16, 2007 on the campus of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. In two separate attacks, approximately two hours apart, the perpetrator, Seung-Hui Cho, killed 32 people and wounded many others[1] before committing suicide.

A nut is a nut, in the UK in the US.

The reference to "gun control" in these instances serves to show that both shooters probably felt they could kill with impunity as people around them were not likely to have the ability to intervene. In the VT case it was due to campus policies on student carry and in the UK it was national law that allowed this feeling to exist. The idea that someone could be in a position to stop the "killing spree" because strict gun control has not been implemented or they are not in the safety of a "gun free" zone MIGHT have given them a moment of pause. As is always said, criminals do not follow laws or rules, so to put restrictions on law abiding citizens in an effort to reduce crime is what is nonsense.

What I make of their laws and their effect on the level of violence is more likely due to better enforcement of existing laws, which is where our country comes up WAY short. It is time this country gets tough on criminals who break the laws we have, not implement more laws.
 
Originally Posted by waltermitty
conversely....the argument is made that it would have been worse had gun
control not been implemented, not that it would have been eliminated


How so?

That is some liberal thinking right there.
________________________________________________________

If the shooter had had access to selective fire weaponry, high explosive weapons, or RPGs, might not the damage have been worse? UK gun control may have prevented a much more serious calamity. That's not an argument in favor of UK gun laws for the US. But they were lucky all this guy had was a shotgun. Coulda been a lot worse.
 
I hate to see this board brought down to the level that they make a cheap political point over a massacre. When at the same time, I'd be willing to bet 80&#37; of you would criticize the brady campaign when they look at a massacre and cry for more gun control.

It's just shameful.
 

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