[kyp275]

Originally Posted by Mentar

However, making sure that you can't get a firearm with ease would be an important cornerstone. At least this is what most other western civilizations are successfully doing.

What you seem to fail to grasp is that achieving this would be quite literally impossible in the US. Not only are there massively more firearms in circulation in the US, you're also looking at a population that will not support a ban.

Deaths by firearm per capita in the US is over 8 times higher than e.g. Western Europe's average, while the same can not remotely be said for number of violent crimes per capita.

Guns tends to be the more effective tool of choice when one wants to kill another, naturally it would be used more often, but that hardly means that said killer would forgo the killing if guns were not available, and the lack of the same disparity in violent crimes shows that.

empirical statistical data shows many correlations which may not be scientific proof

Not much else needs to be said here.

I guess that if the next guy running Amok would do it in a supermarket or movie theater, this would be a resounding success, then?

I find your attempt at strawman to be disappointing. What does protecting school have to do with supermarket or movie theater? are you saying we shouldn't protect school UNLESS we can also protect everywhere else?

Or they could simply kill the armed officer first.

Or the trained police officers takes the shooter down? or suppress him long enough to mitigate potential damage? Do you realize that in these cases of mass shooting, the shooter tends to surrender or kill themselves as soon as armed opposition presents itself?

Which isn't all that unrealistic if the other great idea from gun nuts came to pass and the kids should be taught to rush the gunman (yes, that has indeed been proposed as "manly").

Please stop being ignorant. Should elementary school kids rush the shooter? no, because they would be ineffective, but high school or college? definitely, assuming denying entrance to the shooter is not possible.

This has nothing to do with being manly or not, it's simply the best tactic for survival. If you can't stop the shooter from gaining access to your location, and you don't make any organized effort to stop the shooter, then the only alternative is sit there and wait for your turn to be executed.

Seriously, what are you suggesting here, that people should just give up and sit there and die?

No, not really. Especially the American south can absolutely lay a valid claim on these qualities, too. Particularly the ignorant bit isn't even in contention.

actually, I was parodying you stereotyping and generalizing millions and millions of people, I'm glad you made my points for me though.

You are aware that children are generally shielded from certain topics that they are too young for to deal with? Like pornography and violence? I can assure you that security personnel with firearms is not exactly part of a recommended environment for children.

This, more than anything else, clearly demonstrate you're solidly in the "guns are inherently evil" crowd, where merely the sight of them would spread fear and corruption to all. Were children emotionally scarred because they went out shooting with their parents, something tons of people used to do, and many continues to this day? If so, they obviously didn't get your memo.

Originally Posted by Solace

At what point do you go from protecting citizens to imprisoning them?

I know where you're coming from, but again, I think stretching that from a couple officers in a school is just too much of the slippery slope fallacy. I'm simply being pragmatic here. When insurgents started intensifying their IED attacks along a supply route in Iraq, we had to come up with ways to counter their effort. But even though we have other efforts underway, we still stepped up our IED sweeping missions.

The issue being discussed is far too limited. We're trying to solve the problem of cultural violence using the structure of the culture that generated it in the first place...You cannot solve problems using the same thinking that created the problems in the first place.

Personally, I don't see this as a solvable problem as long as human nature don't change. You can magick away every single piece of firearm on the planet tomorrow, it would not stop people from finding other ways to kill each other, it's one of the thing we humans do best.