Sauce: i hate it here
Yes, it’s horrible the gun situation in the US.
But knowing how to stop someone bleeding to death can be useful in other dystopian situations as well. Like industrial accidents from bad management and OSHA/child-labor violations. Or non-gun injuries from abusive adults.
Or just stupid stuff that kids and/or adults do to maim themselves, like avocado knife injuries.
Don’t knock the first aid training.
Do go after the guns.
Like industrial accidents from bad management and OSHA/child-labor violations.
Yes, which certainly we’d expect a kindergartener to encounter. /s
If you have a situation in your country where you’re regularly expecting kindergartners to perform first aid, you’ve failed them before you’ve even kicked off the lesson.
Rather than me copypasting a link, you Google
“Child labor slaughterhouses”
and pick a news source that works for you. (Because NYT works for me but might give you a paywall, whereas CNN pops up a bunch of irritating ads for me, for instance.)
The problem is the slaughterhouses hiring children, not that the children working there can’t moonlight as EMTs. 🤦
It was actually cleaning companies that worked after hour and used children in cleaning slaughterhouses. Which is of course terrible and dangerous. (Slightly less traumatic than actually killing the animals but still inexcusable.)
I’m not recommending it. It was what I was referring to as dystopian.
But even in my childish '60s childhood there was a bicycle accident where knowing something to do about stopping bleeding would have helped both the other kid and me.
Having been in life-or-death medical situations since then, it’s a lot less mentally traumatic if you know something you can do and focus on trying to do it right, instead of trying to figure out from scratch what if anything you could do.
Dude we’re discussing kindergartners.
A kindergartener having to even be in high trauma situations in the first place is a societal failing, and one that probably shouldn’t be papered over by giving them first aid training but instead be handled by addressing the reasons why you’re putting so many kindergarteners in traumatic situations in the first place.
Edit: I can see the case for this type of training in young adulthood, but kindergartners? GTFOH
They are regulated, but there’s a lot of breakdowns in the system. People passing background checks who shouldn’t, prior offenders passing background checks because local cops didn’t report them to the feds, etc. The DC Navy Yard shooter years back literally had fired a weapon into his neighbor’s apartment before and still passed a background check to buy the weapons he committed the shooting with. I also think if you’re a parent and you leave your weapon accessible by your children, and they go shoot up their school, you should be held at least partially liable. As somebody who is former military, the civilian population gets away with a hell of a lot with regards to firearms. No federally mandated training standards, concealed carry licenses are haphazard and go state by state, and not all states recognize other states’ permits, no federally mandated storage requirements, etc. When I was in the military, if I wanted to go target practice on base with my personal weapons I had to register them with the provost marshal on base, keep the weapons and ammo separate in locked boxes out of my reach while driving to the range, etc. And if one weapon went missing the entire base was locked down; gates closed and nobody in or out until it was located. Civilians get by with way too much.
I think a lot of our problem is loose or missing standards at the federal level, which leaves each individual state to kind of make things up as they go along and not communicate properly with feds when things go wrong.
This is where Finland and Sweden excel. Because they have mandatory military service, everyone with a gun has been trained in all aspects of it’s use/care. Finland is one of the top 10 countries with the most firearms per civilian, and yet their rate of firearm deaths is minuscule in comparison to the U.S..
At this rate though, I don’t see how any meaningful gun regulation can be passed. The nra stopped universal background checks from being passed after Sandy Hook. I lost faith in republicans since then. They’re bad faith actors, that when faced with the prisoners dilemma, choose suicide.
This is where Finland and Sweden excel. Because they have mandatory military service, everyone with a gun has been trained in all aspects of it’s use/care.
Article I Section 8 parts 15 and 16 empower Congress to require such training every member of the militia, and they have indicated that the militia is comprised of every able bodied male citizen, aged 17 to 45. (10 USC 246)
Congress can require training on safe handling. They can require training on the laws governing use of force in self defense and defense of others. They don’t need to mandate additional military or militia service to achieve this.
Pakistan did this thing where they banned rifles (and basically anything not a handgun) without extensive permits for all new gun sales. Then they offered to buy all the guns, which a ton of people traded in for some cash, which greatly reduced the amount of firearms owned by the public.
It would work great here except there’s a 0% chance the government would want to use money to solve a problem.
Hey, that’s not true. If the problem is that billionaires’ bank accounts aren’t full enough, the government will absolutely run truckloads of freshly-minted bills as fast as they can.
Fund mental health institutions and make it easier to involuntarily commit people before they buy weapons and go on rampages?
Case after case, you see more red flags than a May Day Parade, but none of it legally actionable or reportable on a background check.
Examples:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uvalde_school_shooting
“Ramos’ social media acquaintances said he openly abused and killed animals such as cats and would livestream the abuse on Yubo.[132] Other social media acquaintances said that he would also livestream himself on Yubo threatening to kidnap and rape girls who used the app, as well as threatening to commit a school shooting.[131] Ramos’ account was reported to Yubo, but no action was taken.[131][133]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkland_high_school_shooting
“The Florida Department of Children and Families investigated him in September 2016 for Snapchat posts in which he cut both his arms and said he planned to buy a gun. At this time, a school resource officer suggested[92] he undergo an involuntary psychiatric examination under the provisions of the Baker Act. Two guidance counselors agreed, but a mental institution did not.[93] State investigators reported he had depression, autism, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, psychologist Frederick M. Kravitz later testified that Cruz was never diagnosed with autism.[94] In their assessment, they concluded he was “at low risk of harming himself or others”.[95] He had previously received mental health treatment, but had not received treatment in the year leading up to the shooting.[96]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting
"In a 2013 interview, Peter Lanza (Adam’s father) said he suspected his son might have also had undiagnosed schizophrenia in addition to his other conditions. Lanza said that family members might have missed signs of the onset of schizophrenia and psychotic behavior during his son’s adolescence because they mistakenly attributed his odd behavior and increasing isolation to Asperger syndrome.[155][162][169][170][171] Because of concerns that published accounts of Lanza’s autism could result in a backlash against others with the condition, autism advocates campaigned to clarify that autism is a brain-related developmental disorder rather than a mental illness.[172] The violence Lanza demonstrated in the shooting is generally not seen in the autistic population[173] and none of the psychiatrists he saw detected troubling signs of violence in his disposition.[155]
Lanza appears to have had no contact with mental health providers after 2006. The report from the Office of the Child Advocate stated: “In the course of Lanza’s entire life, minimal mental health evaluation and treatment (in relation to his apparent need) was obtained. Of the couple of providers that saw him, only one—the Yale Child Study Center—seemed to appreciate the gravity of (his) presentation, his need for extensive mental health and special education supports, and the critical need for medication to ease his obsessive-compulsive symptoms.”[165]"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Buffalo_shooting
"In June 2021, Gendron had been investigated for threatening other students at his high school by the police in Broome County.[20][60][66] A teacher had asked him about his plans after the school year, to which Gendron responded, “I want to murder and commit suicide.”[67] He was referred to a hospital for mental health evaluation and counseling but was released after being held for a day and a half.[20][66][68]
Gendron told police that he was merely joking; however, Gendron later wrote online that this was actually a well-executed bluff.[65][69] He was not charged in connection with the incident since, according to investigators, he had not made a specific enough threat to warrant further action.[66][69] The New York State Police did not seek an order from a state court to remove guns from Gendron’s possession.[69][70] The mental health evaluation was not an involuntary commitment, which would have prohibited him from buying guns under federal law.[69]"
Sure; maybe it’s also a mental health problem, but it’s definitely 100% a gun problem.
Then I ask this: School shootings simply never happened when I was a kid in the 70’s and 80’s. We had far less regulation*. Any asshole could buy a gun, get it delivered to their doorstep, and they were cheap. Yes, even AR-15s.
This shit all started with Columbine. Want to suicide and go out the most horrific way possible? Shoot up a school!
So no, it’s not the guns. Nothing has really changed on that front. So what happened?
* One exception: Conceal carry laws were nothing like today, far more restrictive. I’m leaving that out because criminals and mass murderers hardly give a shit about carrying illegally. Would that stop you if you were intent on murder? Also, at the same time, the laws around transporting guns generally became more restrictive.
Yeah, it’s a social problem. Recognize that mass shooters are almost exclusively white males. The book Angry White Men by Michael Kimmel does a great job of profiling the person who does this sort of thing and why. There’s a lot that goes into it. Economics, masculinity, school culture, etc.
Weren’t the 70s and 80s the peak of violent crime in the US? Including armed violent crime?
Violent crime has pretty consistently dropped for the past century in the US with a small blip in the 90s often attributed to the prevalence of leaded gasoline and the higher propensity for violence that people exposed to it often had.
School shootings still weren’t a big/common thing back then tho so I fail to see your point.
The point is that an all time peak in violent crime and violent gun crime would indicate you’re not disproving gun crime you’re just hiding it in dark numbers that you’re hoping we won’t think matter.
Also that peak is statistically referred to as happening between the 70s and 90s, specifically quadrupling vs rates prior in the 60s and 50s, before declining afterwards, so you were kinda right.
Sorry what context were we talking about? Oh yeah, school shootings. Also that’s still the point; it being a clear relationship. I don’t understand what your point is. You posed a whataboutism. They’re two different arguments.
If you want to talk about gun crime and reform broadly we can. First, in the case of things like mental health checks, how do we decide what makes someone fit to get a firearm? How do we decide who gets to make that decision? How are we going to regulate firearm sales? How do we make it possible for private sales to exist while enforcing background checks and without causing undue burden. Btw you know you already need to get a backhround check to get a firearm except in a few circumstances, right?The American pseudo-left is often frothing at the mouth for reform on this issue and has poorly formed (if any) ideas about what should actually go into place. It doesn’t help that most people are controlled by fear mongering more effectively than facts, especially those that don’t know much about guns.
Another pr9blem people have with gun control regulation is that it allows an authoritarian government to more easily defeat the populace. In every modern war, guerrillas, especially in urban areas, have the upper hand against modern militaries due to the need to project soft power and retain international support. If you think it’s never gonna happen here then you clearly haven’t been paying attention and if you’re gonna be one of those people that goes “bubut the military had bombs and jets” don’t even bother replying as you clearly haven’t been paying attention modern history and the successes across the world of resistance movements.
And it’s all great to say that the 20,000 people a year that die from guns (mostly suicide followed by active gang members engaged in gang violence, both activities prone to causing deaths regardless of accessibility to guns, but likely reduced) are a price that’s worth it to pay but there’s no realistic way that you’re disarming the American populace, only preventing new sales. This means that there will still be a huge amount of guns available for criminals, and as we’ve seen with drugs, banning something that people desire just causes a crime-ridden black market. Not to mention the immeasurable good that they could do against a tyrannical government.
On top of that, you can literally 3d print firearms now. It at least used to take some knowhow but now any scmuck can get into it with just a little bit of searching and a very minor investment. In that way, the cat’s out of the bag, and if the US gun market fails to supply criminals, especially organized crime, we know exactly what they’re going to do.
The key is building up social services in impoverished areas and removing the factors that push people towards crime. Improving our mental health infrastructure and social safety nets such that we have a violent crime rate that resembles other developed nations. Reducing the needless/baseless criminalization and overpolicing of poor and minority communities to reduce the trauma of communities growing up without fathers. Getting a handle on race relations, even between different poc groups, such that gangs become an unnecessary method of association. Not just zeroing in on the scary but useful tool that is the firearm, especially as it is the only true equalizer in society. “God created man but Samuel Colt made them equal”.
Not to mention how they allow women especially to stand up to violence they would otherwise have no chance against. Don’t give me the pepper spray and stun gun bs btw, I pity the person that thinks that will stop a large, angry man. If you’re truly interested in nonlethal means of self defense however, I believe the foaming/gel bear sprays would definitely stop an attacker, but they tend to be quite large and annoying to carry. Also, if you think armed self defense is unnecessary it’s only because you’ve never been in a situation where you wanted or tried to defend yourself but couldn’t. I don’t carry a weapon, but I’ve experienced things that make me feel like maybe I should’ve been and things would’ve gone differently.
Sorry for the long flow of consciousness style comment and I apologize if I attacked you at all I can sometimes get heated abt this subject.
School shootings are a miniscule issue though by the statistics. The problem is that we spectalize them with the 24 hour news cycle because it makes people angry and upset. This spectacle is also exactly the reward these murderers are seeking out. If the news was required to spend a proportionate amount of time on different subjects by how much they negatively impact your health on average (let’s say by how much they reduce the life expectancy of the average person), we should be banning cigarettes, alcohol, and added sugars long before guns. Why are we so focused on the guns? Why aren’t we focusing on reducing our ridiculous overweight and obesity rates? Because school shootings make you sad, like the WWF panda or the aspca commercial. Don’t get me wrong, they get me sad too, but our deeply damaged society is to blame, not guns.
In general yes but this discussion is a out mass shootings.
This discussion is about gun violence. Saying there weren’t a lot of school shootings back then is about as helpful to the root issue discussion as saying that cyberbullying wasn’t an issue before the 90s anyways.
Almost all comments in this chain, and indeed the immediate one you replied to mention “school shooting”.
Beyond that, schools and dangerous guns existed before 1980.
Edit even the original meme is about a school shooting
School shootings aren’t a part of gun violence?
I feel 9/11 and faux news had something to do with fetishizing guns. Fear mongering kills.
We have too many guns, all you will do is take away guns from people that are not going to do anything wrong, and then make tens of millions of law abiding people into criminals.
The only way to stop a bad kindergartner with a gun, is with a good kindergartner with a gun.
Now in fun colours!
“No way to prevent this,” says only nation where this regularly happens.
Only Onion headline I can quote off the top of my head. Never gets old (unfortunately).
Like those kindergartens.
They are getting old? I’m glad they survived!
Never gets old
A lot of Americans do actually support some gun control measures. A lot of Americans also don’t actually know how insanely hard and effectively the NRA has organized and opposed any remotely reasonable gun control measure. They basically ensure that any hearing on the subject is flooded by their members to oppose it. They just go and many sane Americans don’t.
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The ATF has no ability to have searchable records of firearm sales. To run a “trace” they need to use fucking microfilm or manually go through literal shipping containers full of receipts that are scarcely legible due to water damage. Article.
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Measure to impose some reasonable restrictions on the ability to purchase firearms for, say, known domestic abusers: no, because we just don’t fucking care.
I’m not American, but I actually support sane firearm ownership. I look at the lunacy over there and I am almost shocked. I really do think, from hearing about this as much as I do, that many Americans support sane measures. But the NRA is a huge problem. It prevents people from even being educated on this issue.
I am personally against a central firearms data base, but thats for “I dont trust someone like Trump” reasons IE I dont trust some jackboot from causing trouble. But that aside the NRA needs to be dissolved and its leadership drawn and fucken quartered. They have done infinitely more damage to gun rights as a whole than any other organization, combine that with the classism and racism of said oraganization and I can say with compelte certainty that they deserve liquidation.
Fuck the NRA the traitorous Rusky puppets that they are.
The ATF has no ability to have searchable records of firearm sales. To run a “trace” they need to use fucking microfilm or manually go through literal shipping containers full of receipts that are scarcely legible due to water damage. Article.
Can’t they just scan them? I’ll read article meanwhile.EDIT:
Keyword searches, or sorting by date or any other field, are strictly prohibited.
Th-- wh-- how?!
Right?! I know. It’s so needlessly complicated. When I first learned about this my jaw legit dropped.
I’m not even necessarily proposing a registry but this is just fucking ridiculous.
I’m going to get all kinds of negative votes for speaking up here. I’m not attempting to defend the various positions I outline below, just to explain why the gun folks see the current situation as the least bad alternative. If gun people in the US actually had their way the laws would be MUCH more permissive than they already are.
Again, I’m not attempting to defend the various positions, only to lend some context (and in the case of domestic abuse, to correct) the talking points above.
If the second amendment is explicitly designed to allow normal citizens to defend themselves against a tyrannical government, then allowing that same government to compile a registry of gun ownership makes no sense. Registration inevitably leads to confiscation, see Australia and New Zealand for recent examples.
(Note; It’s highly suspect that non-military ownership of small arms could effectively fight the US military. Years of attrition in Afghanistan might be the counterpoint here.)
The CDC was examining gun violence statistics in the past, but then ventured outside of the realm of science and into political speech. Most gun people are ok with making science based recommendations determined by facts. But they’re worried that a government entity funded for the purpose of science but controlled by unelected anti-gun bureaucrats will push policy based on politics.
(Note: Any gun policy has some base in science, the question is whether the policy controls the science, or whether science leads the way. Counterpoint: national COVID policy was marginally effective at great cost, both in lives lost and economically)
There are measures to keep “known” domestic abusers from purchasing or possessing firearms. If “known” means “convicted” or under indictment, then those folks are legally prohibited from firearm ownership or possession. This was recently confirmed by a notoriously pro-gun Supreme Court in United States v. Rahimi, by an overwhelming 8-1 majority. Even a restraining order for domestic violence is enough to prohibit purchase or possession.
(Note: enforcement of gun confiscation from prohibited persons is spotty at best, but it’s arguable that this is a problem with policing as the laws are already on the books. The counterpoint here would be the ability in many states to conduct private party transfers without the involvement of a licenced firearms dealer or the requisite background check)
I’m not American,
Then your opinion is irrelevant.
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“BuT gUns doNt kilL PeoPle, PeoPle kilL PeoPle”
Then regulate fucking people’s access to guns! It’s not that hard.
Problem is, gun are useful.
They protect our children.
They protect our food supply.
They protect our freedom.And people have been killing each other for centuries before guns were invented. Thinking that guns are the reason for death is clearly propaganda. But you all know that. I’m just here to point out what actual reality looks like. Since none of you have ever touched grass.
Cars are useful. Cars protect children in many situations. Cars are among the things that majorly contribute to even having a food supply. Cars freedom patriotism eagles liberty-gasm!
Yet it is still possible to have cars serve those functions without giving in to the lobbies that wish to make it mandatory to get paid for shoving a car down the throat of every loony who wants one to hurt others with. Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
Usually for those inside, not outside
Because cars are well regulated to make them as safe as possible.
While this is debatable, the regulation of cars is still a useful allegory for gun regulation.
I live in the Netherlands. No one I know owns a gun. Yet I have all the things you list in abundance. Added bonus: lack of school shootings and gun violence.
Your propaganda argument is nothing but you sticking your head in the sand. That, or you are a successful troll.
But how do you deal with the horrors of all that communism?
Is it not a terrifying wasteland with less… consumer goods? I would die without my Kit Kat flavored Trix cereal.
Problem is, you find gun fun and don’t actually care about children’s lives at all. That’s all it ever really is.
I have had to say this many times lately, just because something is propaganda, doesn’t automatically make it false.
The best propaganda is the truth.
Since you clearly have no idea of how propaganda works.
This comment history is a neat little museum of bad takes.
oof, no kidding. lotta branworms in that museum.
I like when they surprise me. “Capitalism perfect, guns good, diversity bad,” builds up a sort of caricature. Then that is completely broken with the weird digression, “HTTPS is bad and imperfect, throw it all out.”
Guns don’t protect children. They’re the leading cause of death in children.
I have no idea what you’re talking about with protecting food…hunting? Not how most people get their food. Most people get food from a grocery store…where they’re increasingly likely to get shot.
If the freedom line was in reference to the military, there’s hardly a vet alive who’s done that… they’re all dead from old age. The only wars we’ve been fighting were for revenge or resources. I say that as a vet.
If you’re talking about protecting us from our government…as far as I know, nobody has even won an armed confrontation with the police or feds over freedoms. Guns made Waco worse. Guns made Ruby Ridge worse. I guess the Bundy’s protected their “right” to steal from taxpayers by grazing their cattle on public land without paying for it like they should have. That feels like a less important right than “life” to me personally.
Guns don’t protect children. They’re the leading cause of death in children.
Fucking THANK YOU!
They’re the leading cause of death in children.
Uh…WHAT? Ain’t no fucking way. *checks statistics*
…😳 what the actual fuck. Y’all doin alright down there?
Graph in article shows that until around 2019 most children died from cars.
fuckin biden making gasoline too expensive /s
It does give the impresson that grand theft auto is a realistic simulation.
Not for several decades, no.
Problem is, gun are useful.
Problem is, people are stupid.
Which is evidenced by both your shitty grammar, and tired argument.
Guns don’t kill children, I kill children
The only thing that can protect from a child killer, is a child killer killer. The solution is to have more killers. Stop trying to regulate killers.
As part of my pledge to halt or slow climate change, I support killing of any kind to reduce carbon emissions. Go get em tiger. Boil em, mash em, put em in a stew.
repeal the 2nd amendment
If gunning down little kids with lunchboxes isn’t enough to make you dial the guns town a notch, then nothing will.
Sandy Hook survivors are in high school now and some are getting into activism.
Columbine happened when I was a kid and nothing of any substance has been done since.
The mass school shootings didn’t really take off off until the mid 2000s. So we are really just seeing the generation of constant mass shootings come into adulthood.
When columbine happened it was rare for that type of shooting to happen at a school. The actual rate of school shootings was rapidly dropping by the late 90s too. It is still much lower than it was, only these mass shootings has increased. So, with it being, at the time, a rare event, and shootings in schools on a rapid decline, it just didn’t hit the way it seems to have affected gen z/alpha.
