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Michael Penn
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 12719
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 12:25pm | IP Logged | 1
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The rhetoric, metaphors, imagery spewed by gun nuts is beyond repellent, viz.:
The Second Amendment is a safeguard against racial genocide?
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David Plunkert
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 July 2012
Posts: 536
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 1:03pm | IP Logged | 2
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Yeah, of course. All these dead children should not be considered a "huge event". Just collateral damage. Not enough to take away the big phallic symbols.
iiii
Well, I think all of those dead kids should be more than enough but it so far hasn't made the leaders and people of the country call for the repeal or severe limiting of the 2nd amendment.
Sad to say....I think the folks who support the NRA and gun rights look at the terrible events of Newtown and see it as a way to expand guns on the street. That seems to be the direction the dialogue is going.
President Obama said he would support common sense control measures that work with the 2nd amendment. Even that has made the NRA and gun advocates dig in to not only resist change but to call for an expansion of armed guards at schools and in public places.
For what its worth.... I don't support guns or the NRA and certainly don't view dead kids as collateral damage. I support gun control though I think its been a losing battle.
I don't think I deserve what I'm perceiving as your ire because something you and I both support seems like an impossible long shot to me.
You agreed with me on another thread a few months back that significant gun control had already lost in the US.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133339
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 1:53pm | IP Logged | 3
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The rhetoric, metaphors, imagery spewed by gun nuts is beyond repellent…•• Most repellent is the gun nuts' insisting on an all-or-nothing approach. If there is no UNIVERSAL solution -- ie, one in which nobody ever gets killed, by anybody, in any way, anywhere -- then they should be allowed to continue their metaphorical masturbation. (When you jerk off with an AK-47, you REALLY jerk off, man!!) This is the thinking that gets them trotting out automobiles and baseball bats as proven killers. Because these people are idiots.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133339
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 1:55pm | IP Logged | 4
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You agreed with me on another thread a few months back that significant gun control had already lost in the US.•• Expressing my despair for the future of this country is not the same as "agreeing" with you.
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DW Zomberg
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 June 2012
Posts: 444
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 2:12pm | IP Logged | 5
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It's funny that the same folks who tell us to SUPPORT THE TROOPS are the same folks who believe those very troops will crush us all under their collective authoritarian boot if we're not armed to the teeth.
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David Plunkert
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 July 2012
Posts: 536
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 3:48pm | IP Logged | 6
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Expressing my despair for the future of this country is not the same as "agreeing" with you.
iii From where I sit you insinuated that I consider dead kids as collateral damage because I don't think the 2nd amendment will be repealed. I think that's harsh.
I support gun control, have three kids in public schools and dislike the NRA and their tactics. Frankly put, my stakes in this are high.
If I struck the wrong tone at some point it was unintentional.
Edited by David Plunkert on 17 January 2013 at 6:15pm
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Michael Casselman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 14 January 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 1247
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 4:48pm | IP Logged | 7
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Both sides get plenty of traction for using children as their "shields".
The other day, the NRA put out an ad mocking how the President's children have armed protection in their school. Now, I don't like when any entity or person starts using a politician's children against them for any type of 'gotcha'. I didn't care for it when they insinuated Palin was a lousy parent for having a pregnant teen daughter, I don't like it when they use the Obama girls as political 'ammo'.
I grit my teeth when people say that all this pending gun control legislation is 'for the children'. It's just as crass to say that a child's life is any more or less than an adults in this type of situation, it's crass and glib to suggest that there's some magic number of lifes that would or wouldn't be acceptable losses. It's standing on the graves of the dead, using them as a prop to 'score political points'. "Cuomo 2016" is the new running gag in (at least, my part of) New York.
Civility cannot be legislated. Sane, well-adjusted people aren't killing kids. Would abolishing all guns solve the issue? No. The arguement made would be that someone who goes out there with an intent to kill, sans guns, would simply use knives, bombs, etc. But, hey ~ that's OK, since the body counts would be lower, right? They'd be subdued quicker, right? That's all well and good, but you're still probably standing over a few corpses when you say that. Is that a better statistic?
Meanwhile, nothing said about the issue of civility.
Nothing to address 'why' someone snaps and does what they do. Why does an Army Major shoot up people on his base. Why does someone shoot up a theatre. Why does someone shoot their mom and then force their way into a school and shoot innocent children. Why a college student goes on a shooting spree across a campus.
And this isn't to dredge up the 'a guns only purpose is to kill' response. I know what the purpose of a gun is. I shot a few M-16s when I was in the service, but I don't own any, nor do I have an urge to stock up like it's the End of Days. I think the NRA is a joke, and I want reasonable measures to protect responsible gun ownership. Unfortunately, all these new laws will not save anyone. All they'll do is come up with better ways to punish the lawbreaker (assuming they don't kill themselves or go out by suicide-by-cop)
Hell, I know a few guys who legitimately love target practice, whether they do it with guns or with bows. Trap shooting, range practice, competition folks, none of whom I'd consider a 'gun nut'. They're simply the guys who'd rather have real recoil/sight/windage considerations instead of shooting via videogame. Limiting magazine capacity is a feel-good red herring, because if a real 'gun nut' went off the deep end, he'd just carry more magazines and better prepared for weapon jams. Some of this initial legislation is looking at cosmetic features of a gun instead of functionality.
I'm also a parent, so I have 'skin in the game' to care about the concept of "what if that had happened at my child's school?'... but I want to know what it is that drives a wedge between someone who wouldn't think to harm a fly ~ and what to look for so that my child isn't the next fruitcake with a gun, a katana, a pipe bomb, an IED or whatever else someone who has lost touch with the concept of civility will use to kill others.
There's a reason that we as a society cry and howl and slam our fists on podiums saying 'No more!'.... and then we move on and forget about it until the next time we have a reason to cry, howl, etc. Because civility in general is in the crapper. The NRA will say it's not their fault. Mental health professionals will say "f*cked if we know {shrug}.!". The video game manufactures will claim complete innocence. Not one of them will secede any ground to say that they need to take a better look at their products, services or advocacy measures and say 'maybe we should take a look at what we're saying/doing". It'll always be the other guy's fault. The NRA points the finger at videogame manufacturers, who in turn pointed to mental health, who in turn pointed it back at the NRA.
Instead of any measure of civility, we get the circle jerk that we've come to deserve.
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Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 5:24pm | IP Logged | 8
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if people don't trust their government that much, then they need to go ahead and forcefully take it over and replace it with another one.
��
The truly pathetic part of this is that there are gun nuts who believe that they really could do that, if push came to shove. Or, at the very least, they could defend themselves against the Armed Forces of this nation.
Talk about mentally unhinged!
***
SER: We need a Supreme Court ruling clarifying that the 2nd amendment is not in place to help "overthrow" a tyrannical government.
There's historical precedent: The Southern states believed the U.S. government was "tyrannical" and seceded. This led to war, blood-shed, and the South *lost*.
And there's also basic reality: The 2nd amendment can't be in place to help "overthrow" the government because all it would do would ensure carnage and death... and it would never work. Organizing against the government would get you labeled a terrorist organization (again, due to laws that most gun-rights activists propose because they foolishly believe they only apply to Muslims). And it would take the government about 8 minutes to freeze your assets, put you on the no fly list, and eliminate your credit history. Good luck fighting the U.S. military with no resources.
We have in place a means for "peaceful" overthrow of the government -- every four years for the president and more frequently for the House. That's far preferable and saner than random people deciding to take up arms against the government. And, as I've said, if Southern blacks in the 1950s and 1960s effected change through the system that was in place, then I think future generations can as well.
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Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 5:29pm | IP Logged | 9
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DAVID: I support gun control, have three kids in public schools and dislike the NRA and their tactics. Frankly put, my stakes in this are high.
SER: I don't doubt that, David, but just 50 years ago, black Americans probably looked at a landscape just as bleak and a battle that was just as uphill. And progress was made. Put in context, it would have been illegal for my father to have married my mother-in-law 40 years ago. Could they have imagined that it would not have been a big deal for their children to wind up doing so?
If Sandy Hook can change what we think is possible, then it is a tragedy that is not just a statistic. It is a tragedy that set the stage for changing the world. I want to imagine our kids 20 or 30 years from now being as appalled by the gun culture of today as we are of the racial culture of our parents' generation.
If the guys on the other side don't want things to change and we don't believe things will change, well, nothing will change. But I've embraced their fear in a way. They are terrified of their guns being taken away. Well, I want to give them something to be afraid of.
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David Plunkert
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 July 2012
Posts: 536
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 6:37pm | IP Logged | 10
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SER: I don't doubt that, David, but just 50 years ago, black Americans probably looked at a landscape just as bleak and a battle that was just as uphill. And progress was made. Put in context, it would have been illegal for my father to have married my mother-in-law 40 years ago. Could they have imagined that it would not have been a big deal for their children to wind up doing so?
iii
Agreed Stephen... I should not have said "never." It took many years after the Emancipation Proclamation and a Civil War to get to the point of interracial marriage but the point was reached. Sandy Hook may indeed be a tipping point and the tipping point should have happened long ago.... hence my negativity.
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Shaun Barry
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 December 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 6907
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 7:06pm | IP Logged | 11
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I'm convinced with each passing day that the NRA should be qualified as a cult. They idolize guns, guns, guns above all else. Human beings second. A distant second.
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Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
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| Posted: 17 January 2013 at 8:24pm | IP Logged | 12
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SHAUN:
I'm convinced with each passing day that the NRA should be qualified as a cult. They idolize guns, guns, guns above all else.
SER:
One thing that frustrates me is that the media generally presents a moderate on gun control as a "counterpoint" to an NRA spokesperson. I don't watch a lot of cable news but have they ever put on someone like JB who supports repealing the 2nd amendment?
Currently, the debate is not Anti-Prohibition and Prohibition. The debate is between Responsible Drinking and Pro-Alcoholism.
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Topic Closed)
