Metaltastic
Member
- Feb 20, 2005
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TO PROTECT MY LOVED ONES!!! Sorry, generic superhero reference (and I don't even like comic books )
Heh, I see where you are going with this.
I really wanted to leave a gun "debate" out of this, but let me just make a simple point.
The kid's father owned many guns (fifteen or so) and belonged to a gun club. Fine. In Germany, from what I understand, one has to belong to a marksmanship club, hunting organization, or similar to own a firearm. German forumites, please correct me if I'm wrong.
Now, I've noticed on some of the news websites that people use this as fodder in an argument with Americans, saying that Americans are more violent and have easier access to guns, and the German way of what I described above is a better solution. This makes no sense to me.
What if the jagoff's father was a policeman and he took his gun?
What separates an American from owning a firearm for target shooting or sport (who can buy the firearm regardless of his club organization, but faces varying application processes from state to state, background checks, etc.), from a German who must belong to a club prior to owning one?
My point is, if the kid wanted to carry something like this out, and assuming his father had a firearm in the home for whatever reason, then he would find a way to do so.
ORRRR, he could simply fashion a makeshift flame thrower like we read about the wikipedia link provided earlier.
Uh oh, let's ban super soakers, gasoline, and zippo lighters now! No need for a background check on any of those.
Sorry, I just had to. Reading commentary on news reports fires me up. I should probably stop doing so and just discuss with you gents.
-Joe
exactly, thats the reason.
I know what you mean and I definitely agree upon someone willing to go on a spree will find the means to do it...
BUT, there have also been examples of having very restricted access to firearms preventing an even worse ending:
In November 2006 we had the last school-shooting here (prior to the current one) in a town called Emsdetten. The guy who did it hadn't had access to "real" firearms so he ordered some historical, non-functional weapons online and somehow put them back in fairly working shape. He's been additionally equipped with two knifes, some pipe bombs and a small caliber rifle.
Though managing to injure 5 people, he wasn't able to kill anyone but himself.
Who knows what he had been able to do if he had access to full-size modern firearms...
You just can't compare Germany to the US in that matter (gun control) because in the US you already have gazillions of firearms circulating.
And if this will finally lead to a ban on keeping weapons at home here, I could only support that.
No, no, no...we shouldn´t give bread the blame. I´m sure it was letter soup. When he ate it, the letters was moved to one certain sentence: KILL EM ALL!!!
I THOUGHT YOU WERE GONNA LEAVE IT AT THAT JOE
But after a quick glance at that Wikipedia article, it didn't seem like there was a disproportionately large amount of shootings in America - is there any evidence that proves we have way more shootings as a result of guns being legal? (and I'm not talking about gang/ghetto stuff, somehow I doubt many of those folk have legal licenses for their firearms ) As James has said, criminals will get guns regardless of the laws, so the only difference laws seem to make is how easy it is for law-abiding citizens to also get guns to defend themselves (and I don't think any of the American concealed-carry advocates on here have ever actually had to fire a single round in self-defense, though correct me if I'm wrong! And Eric, your time in the army overseas doesn't count )
I am not referring to Metallica
Who's they
???
THE GOVERNMENT?
That's one fundamental difference between you and I, but it's ok. I respect everyone's views even if I strongly disagree.
-Joe
As James has said, criminals will get guns regardless of the laws, so the only difference laws seem to make is how easy it is for law-abiding citizens to also get guns to defend themselves
No problem man! It's mainly a difference of cultural context, I believe. If I was a US-resident I wouldn't be for an all-out ban on firearms too for a multitude of reasons, because - as I said - the context is so different.
Which brings me to this:
In the US? No doubt about it. Putting an all-out ban on firearms wouldn't make them disappear.
But here (and that's what I wanted to illustrate with the example above) gun control makes it so much harder for non-law-abiding citizens to access firearms too, just because there are way less weapons in circulation.
If the father of that scumbucket would have followed the laws and stored the gun safely instead of having it laying around in the house that kid would have had virtually no chance to pick up a modern firearm and probably would have had to go down the route of the Emsdetten guy - who ultimately caused way less harm because he hadn't access to modern firearms.