FSTDT Forums
Community => Society and History => Topic started by: Askold on June 12, 2016, 09:45:23 am
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2016/06/12/shooting-orlando-club/85785254/
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/12/us/orlando-nightclub-shooting/
Approximately 20 people are dead inside Pulse, a gay nightclub, Orlando Police Chief John Mina said Sunday morning, just hours after a shooter opened fire in the club. At least 42 people have been transported for medical treatment, he said.
Police have shot and killed the gunman, Mina told reporters.
"It's appears he was organized and well-prepared," the chief said, adding that the shooter had an assault-type weapon, a handgun and "some type of (other) device on him."
At least nine officers were involved in the shootout, Mina said. Several coroner vans were seen traveling toward the nightclub.
The shooting began around 2 a.m., and an officer who was working at the club responded, Mina said. The officer engaged in a shootout outside the club, after which the gunman ran into the club.
"That turned into a hostage situation," Mina said.
Horrible act of violence. There are also suspicions that this may have been a terrorist attack but we may have to wait a while before the police are ready to reveal more.
EDIT: Updates http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/12/florida-gay-nightclub-shooting-injuries-reported-at-pulse-orland/
50 dead this is now officially the worst mass shooting in the US history. The shooter was called Omar Mateen and he had a history of being suspected of terrorism and known to have hated gay people.
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So is the NRA going to go around saying that we shouldn’t ban guns because if gay people and other minorities all had guns then hate crimes wouldn’t happened? Or does that only apply to straight white men?
Anyway I'm going to say what I say every time there's a mass shooting. We shouldn’t bring up information about the killer. A great deal of research has gone into the psychology of mass shooters and the conclusion is they are narcissistic little turds who commit the shootings because they want to receive mass attention and are inspired by watching other mass shooters get wall to wall media coverage. heres a great article on the topic http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303309504579181702252120052
When faced with mass shootings and terrorist attacks, always remember: Don’t Feed The Trolls.
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This is horrifying. I've already seen people referring to the club as "the devil's workshop" due to the nature of it, and it's infuriating.
I will say I'm impressed by the helmet that took a bullet for that police officer. A life saved, at least.
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The only "plus" to this is that because it was a gay club we won't be seeing any reaction from neo-Nazis.
And I bet they're thanking God it wasn't one of their ilk who did it.
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Ugh. This is terrible. 50 people killed just for being LGBT.
I'm going to make a really cynical (but sadly true) prediction: Donald Trump is going to exploit this tragedy in an attempt to get LGBT people on his side (with his "Ban Muslims!" platform and all).
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Ugh. This is terrible. 50 people killed just for being LGBT.
I'm going to make a really cynical (but sadly true) prediction: Donald Trump is going to exploit this tragedy in an attempt to get LGBT people on his side (with his "Ban Muslims!" platform and all).
(http://puu.sh/pqdLV/e61ec5fac4.png)
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Tough = killing all muslims and their families.
Vigilant = banning all muslims from entering the country.
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
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Promille?
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Right, they call that something else in English. I meant "permille (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per_mille)".
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Not sure who I'm angrier at. Trump for being a walking peice of human garbage or the Lt. Gov of Texas who tweeted "you reap what you sow" about this.
Ironbite-I think.....*flips a coin* Bernie Sanders? The fuck magical coin of decision making?
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
I'm sure you care about the deceased and their families past making a pointless jab.
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
I'm sure you care about the deceased and their families past making a pointless jab.
This thread managed all of two responses before it reverted to the script of "herp-a-derp irrelevant stuff about neonazis and donald trump". Not a...whole lot of sympathy for the victims in the posts above mine.
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
I'm sure you care about the deceased and their families past making a pointless jab.
This thread managed all of two responses before it reverted to the script of "herp-a-derp irrelevant stuff about neonazis and donald trump". Not a...whole lot of sympathy for the victims in the posts above mine.
As it turns out, people exist outside the context of this thread. I know enough about most of the people posting here that I don't have cause to doubt what they feel about this. That this is a tragedy is, to most of us, an obvious background fact that doesn't need stating, so understandably the conversation can move to other aspects.
You, on the other hand... I don't know how you feel about the LGBT community. Maybe you're gay. Maybe you have several trans friends. Or maybe you don't. Like I said, I don't know you.
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
I'm sure you care about the deceased and their families past making a pointless jab.
This thread managed all of two responses before it reverted to the script of "herp-a-derp irrelevant stuff about neonazis and donald trump". Not a...whole lot of sympathy for the victims in the posts above mine.
As it turns out, people exist outside the context of this thread. I know enough about most of the people posting here that I don't have cause to doubt what they feel about this. That this is a tragedy is, to most of us, an obvious background fact that doesn't need stating, so understandably the conversation can move to other aspects.
You, on the other hand... I don't know how you feel about the LGBT community. Maybe you're gay. Maybe you have several trans friends. Or maybe you don't. Like I said, I don't know you.
Well I certainly respect them enough not to throw them under the bus by launching into a slavish defence of a religion that teaches they should all be put to death.
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Lay off the pope would you. The current one is pretty mellow about the who gay thing.
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Yeah, stop. I have several Islamic friends and they are some of the nicest people I know. Islam didn't kill those people, bigotry did. And now you're simply trying to turn that bigotry that the queer community endured this morning and redirect it at a group of people over their religion. Seriously, you've said enough things for me to classify you as a wanker and not review my decision, but using the worst mass shooting in American history--which didn't even happen a day ago and victimized people like me--is disgusting.
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Well I certainly respect them enough not to throw them under the bus by launching into a slavish defence of a religion that teaches they should all be put to death.
But not enough to pass the chance to use them as political props, apparently.
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There are about a billion Muslims in the world. You can't tar all of them with the same brush.
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Not like that will stop them.
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And according to r/AskReddit, discussion is being censored on r/news:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/4nqnrm/breaking_news_orlando_nightclub_massshooting/ (https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/4nqnrm/breaking_news_orlando_nightclub_massshooting/)
Don't they realize that'll only make things worse?
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As it turns out, it's possible to be in shock and pain over a hideous slaughter of LGBT people and be angry that it's being used as fuel for the dehumanization of another group. I know it's a shocking concept to someone who treats the suffering of others as his own wankbait, but then again, I assume a lot of things would be.
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Called it. 30 seconds into hearing about last it. Called it. Wake up this morning, see the news and boom, confirmed
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Called it. 30 seconds into hearing about last it. Called it. Wake up this morning, see the news and boom, confirmed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3My4MHr51c
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This is awful.
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Okay wow, Dan Patrick can go fuck himself with a cactus. Just uhg.
But lets be fair to Conty and Hof. Last year when a white guy shot a bunch of black people in Charleston they both agreed that all white people were to blame for that. Wait what's that? They didn't? Oh, I guess they're just giant hypocrites then.
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Okay wow, Dan Patrick can go fuck himself with a cactus. Just uhg.
But lets be fair to Conty and Hof. Last year when a white guy shot a bunch of black people in Charleston they both agreed that all white people were to blame for that. Wait what's that? They didn't? Oh, I guess they're just giant hypocrites then.
Actually i blamed yanks and the kkk. My exact words wore "gun toting stormfront spastics"
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Okay wow, Dan Patrick can go fuck himself with a cactus. Just uhg.
But lets be fair to Conty and Hof. Last year when a white guy shot a bunch of black people in Charleston they both agreed that all white people were to blame for that. Wait what's that? They didn't? Oh, I guess they're just giant hypocrites then.
Actually i blamed yanks and the kkk. My exact words wore "gun toting stormfront spastics"
So, in a headline about mass shootings, you guess and called that there was a "gun-toting" individual involved.
Excuse me while I go drink lead water and eat lead paint chips until I'm stupid enough to forget your Islamophobia and believe this.
ETA: ah, I believed Deimos was trying to save face by saying he meant something else in his first post. Nevertheless, we should all continue to point and laugh at the bigot.
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Well maybe I misread you Hof. So you are taking the stance that a small extremist group is to blame that doesn't represent Muslims as a whole. Or alternately that you do think the KKK represents white people as a whole?
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I could go on and on about seperate groupings and that crap. But in the charleston case. For me, he represented two things depending on which field of view i was in. White nationalists, amd americans as a whole
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I could go on and on about seperate groupings and that crap. But in the charleston case. For me, he represented two things depending on which field of view i was in. White nationalists, amd americans as a whole
We get it: you're an edgelord. You hold inflammatory views, you can go on, but when asked any basic questions you won't, then you'll wait a week or two (or sooner if a bad person who is Muslim does something bad and you can post tasteless things), only to post again. Oh Em Gee, your so edgy, keep trollin', trollin', trollin', trollin', WHAT!
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Get over it. You leftist cucks cant even handle the fact that we are at war. But im sure youll keep going," its just a minority, stop being an edgelord" when youre crawling on a theatre floor when theyre executing people in front of you
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9gN2hdybFY
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cucks? C'mon mate aren't you from Geelong? We don't have that fetish here.
Besides if we were genuinely at war with Islam there are over 300 thousand muslims in Australia. You'd know about it. Do you shit your pants when they guy making your kebab yells out the back to bring more hummus?
There are a couple of million of them in the US, as citizens. What are you going to do about it? Intern them?
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Do you shit your pants when they guy making your kebab yells out the back to bring more hummus?
I'll bet he does.
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Get over it. You leftist cucks cant even handle the fact that we are at war. But im sure youll keep going," its just a minority, stop being an edgelord" when youre crawling on a theatre floor when theyre executing people in front of you
/me points at Deimos
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxpDa-c-4Mc)
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Get over it. You leftist cucks cant even handle the fact that we are at war. But im sure youll keep going," its just a minority, stop being an edgelord" when youre crawling on a theatre floor when theyre executing people in front of you
You mean, we're all white guys who like to fap to black guys fucking their wives?
"Cuck".
Back in your xenophobic little box Diemos. 50 people fucking died, try to display some basic human decency willya?
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Oh FFS, r/news! (http://imgur.com/a/l3EZj)
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Okay wow, Dan Patrick can go fuck himself with a cactus. Just uhg.
But lets be fair to Conty and Hof. Last year when a white guy shot a bunch of black people in Charleston they both agreed that all white people were to blame for that. Wait what's that? They didn't? Oh, I guess they're just giant hypocrites then.
At the same time, the people who'll happily bash the everloving fuck out of Christianity itself whenever we hear about a Christian mass murderer, or kiddy fiddling priests or the like will also leap to the defence of Islam whenever a Muslim does the same thing. It's not something only conservatives do, but rather a result of ultra-polarising American style "I hate what the other sides likes and vice versa purely on principle" politics.
Personally, I'd love if it we could just treat Islam like the superstitious, objectively harmful to society bullshit that's based on nothing more than blind faith for the sake of blind faith that it is without a bunch of well meaning idiots conflating criticism of a religion with calling for discrimination against an ethnic group, and racist idiots cheering you on for the same reason.
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Oh FFS, r/news! (http://imgur.com/a/l3EZj)
This, this is how some people react to a tragedy? Oh FFS!
Also yes, almost all religion is based on bloodthirsty iron age bullshit excepting a few modern ones based on airheaded new age bullshit. Who fucking cares?
In LA a guy was arrested going to a pride rally in the last day with a carload full of guns and he wasn't a Muslim. Just a reminder that some wankers do this because they can't get their pecker wet so it's not primarily about religion.
Maybe we can put our political footballs down and just agree this is a sad, fucked up thing?
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So now all the right wingers are gonna pretend like they're the ones who really care about gays.
Already seeing the blowback from that.
Ironbite-hehehe...blowback.
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To be honest, I think that atheists blaming all of Christianity for the actions of any random bad thing a Christian has done are morons too. Christianity and Islam are huge religions with a wide variety of different interpretations. This entire religion is evil because one person did a bad thing is bigotry, plain and simple.
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To be honest, I think that atheists blaming all of Christianity for the actions of any random bad thing a Christian has done are morons too. Christianity and Islam are huge religions with a wide variety of different interpretations. This entire religion is evil because one person did a bad thing is bigotry, plain and simple.
It's also self indulgent wankery. "If only all of the people in the world were as clever, rational and educated as I am and gave up this religion silliness..."
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Also yes, almost all religion is based on bloodthirsty iron age bullshit excepting a few modern ones based on airheaded new age bullshit. Who fucking cares?
In LA a guy was arrested going to a pride rally in the last day with a carload full of guns and he wasn't a Muslim. Just a reminder that some wankers do this because they can't get their pecker wet so it's not primarily about religion.
Religion isn't the only reason people do terrible things to each other, but I think we can also agree that it's not completely blameless either, yes? At the very least, it's a very powerful source of justification for people who're already that way inclined, or it can influence those who're on the fence. Basically, superstitious bullshit is not benign by any stretch of the imagination. Hence why I fucking hate seeing well meaning idiots defending it purely for the sake of politics.
Maybe we can put our political footballs down and just agree this is a sad, fucked up thing?
I can most certainly get behind this.
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Seen on another forum:
I have strong feelings on the gun issue, but this is not a day nor a place to discuss them.
Of course, the problem is that shootings are so frequent that by the time it's the day to discuss the gun issue with respect to one shooting, another's already occurred and it's no longer the day to discuss the gun issue.
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To be honest, I think that atheists blaming all of Christianity for the actions of any random bad thing a Christian has done are morons too. Christianity and Islam are huge religions with a wide variety of different interpretations. This entire religion is evil because one person did a bad thing is bigotry, plain and simple.
It's also self indulgent wankery. "If only all of the people in the world were as clever, rational and educated as I am and gave up this religion silliness..."
Yeah I think that's why the New Atheist movement ended up having so many misogynists and xenophobes. Big chunks of the movement just spent all their time patting themselves on the back for rejecting one kind of irrational thinking that they lost sight of the fact they can still be irrational in other ways, and then get angry when this is pointed out.
For what it's worth, the shooters father has said he doesn't believe the shooting wasn't religiously motivated http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/orlando-shooting-religion_us_575d76d5e4b0e39a28add69f
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I have no problem with anyone calling Islam superstitious bullshit or criticizing any of its interpretations. Depending on the context this criticism can be loaded with xenophobia but the criticism itself is not only acceptable but also welcome.
I do however dislike blaming a whole heterogenic religion or a group of cultures based on the actions of a small minority. Ignoring the social and political factors when it comes to terrorism is harmful since it's easier to influence them directly than the religious factor. Since all these factors are intertwined influencing the other aspects of the situation would eventually ripple to the religion, too.
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I have no problem with anyone calling Islam superstitious bullshit or criticizing any of its interpretations. Depending on the context this criticism can be loaded with xenophobia but the criticism itself is not only acceptable but also welcome.
I do however dislike blaming a whole heterogenic religion or a group of cultures based on the actions of a small minority. Ignoring the social and political factors when it comes to terrorism is harmful since it's easier to influence them directly than the religious factor. Since all these factors are intertwined influencing the other aspects of the situation would eventually ripple to the religion, too.
This sums up my opinion. All religion is superstitious drivel, but people have a right to believe what they want, and they shouldn't be discriminated or persecuted for their faith. But more so to the point, this selective notion that Islam is some how responsible for all of the evil of its followers, coupled with different treatment of other faiths, is blatant discrimination and islamophobia. One would think that people would learn the error of their ways after the way this nation treated Islam following 9/11... Alas, 'Murica.
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I'd just like to point out that one of the last major genocides was committed ON Muslims BY Christians. So much for trying to say Muslims are "worse". The previous statements on religion (particularly Queen's) sum up my opinion. Religion is, at best, useless, but it is not my place nor my right to tell people what they can or cannot believe.
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To be honest the shooting has got me more interested in the "conversion therapy" bullshit.
How so?
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Actually seen in another thread on this topic as someone's "last two cents" on the issue:
http://www.infowars.com/10-reasons-why-gun-control-wont-work/
I don't think I need to quote from the article for you all to have a good idea of what'll be in there, since it's from Info Wars.
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It has been pointed out that the Wounded knee massacre had 150 victims so it beat this one by 200% and there have been other similarly sized or even bigger massacres in USA as well...
As for the"not the time to talk about gun laws" argument... Last year there were more than 365 mass shootings in USA so is there is some universal waiting period after each one before you can talk about gun control then there will never be time for it in USA.
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It has been pointed out that the Wounded knee massacre had 150 victims so it beat this one by 200% and there have been other similarly sized or even bigger massacres in USA as well...
As for the"not the time to talk about gun laws" argument... Last year there were more than 365 mass shootings in USA so is there is some universal waiting period after each one before you can talk about gun control then there will never be time for it in USA.
No, the point is that we're never supposed to talk about sensible gun regulations. Ever. We can talk about mental health (even though this was about discrimination and homophobia and not mental health), but we can never talk about gun regulations. It's the first rule of the NRA.
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It has been pointed out that the Wounded knee massacre had 150 victims so it beat this one by 200% and there have been other similarly sized or even bigger massacres in USA as well...
As for the"not the time to talk about gun laws" argument... Last year there were more than 365 mass shootings in USA so is there is some universal waiting period after each one before you can talk about gun control then there will never be time for it in USA.
No, the point is that we're never supposed to talk about sensible gun regulations. Ever. We can talk about mental health (even though this was about discrimination and homophobia and not mental health), but we can never talk about gun regulations. It's the first rule of the NRA.
Mental health is an easy scapegoat to pin it on because no policymaker anywhere is going to be able to stop mental health problems from existing, particularly in America where any attempt to comprehensively deal with any major health problems will instantly be shut down because soshulusms.
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And the fact is most mass shooters aren't mentally ill, at least in a legal sense. They are likely to have Narcissistic personality disorder or Sociopathy, but those are regarded as different things. Better programs to help mentally ill people are a good idea, but those personality disorders are believed to be untreatable so it probably wouldn't have much impact on mass shootings. Taking the guns from our warm live hands, that would.
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People who are "mentally ill" in the sense that the.public understands it-i.e. unwell enough to need hospitalization are more lukely to be victims of violence than perpetrators of violence.
The reasons behind mass shootings are in a sense tragically simple. You need someone with the right level of rage and hate and the means to enact a massacre. That's it.
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"when will we start excluding an entire religion from our nation because a promille of a promille of a promille of them have committed terrorist acts in the West"
Fuck this clown.
I'm sure the families of the deceased will be very heartened to know that "Not all..."™
I'm sure you care about the deceased and their families past making a pointless jab.
This thread managed all of two responses before it reverted to the script of "herp-a-derp irrelevant stuff about neonazis and donald trump". Not a...whole lot of sympathy for the victims in the posts above mine.
As it turns out, people exist outside the context of this thread. I know enough about most of the people posting here that I don't have cause to doubt what they feel about this. That this is a tragedy is, to most of us, an obvious background fact that doesn't need stating, so understandably the conversation can move to other aspects.
You, on the other hand... I don't know how you feel about the LGBT community. Maybe you're gay. Maybe you have several trans friends. Or maybe you don't. Like I said, I don't know you.
Well I certainly respect them enough not to throw them under the bus by launching into a slavish defence of a religion that teaches they should all be put to death.
Well
1. http://biblehub.com/leviticus/20-13.htm
2. The reason we're talking about the long term impact is because it's pointless to discuss how this is bad. So instead of just saying "This is bad and makes me sad" (it is and does) we talk about the broader and more significant cultural and political impact of the event.
3. You yourself are appose doing to gay marriage and think it will lead to pedophilia, so I have trouble thinking you seriously care about gay people.
Edit: TBH responding was a bad idea.
1. Yes. Christianity is just as backward (more on this later)
2. No, you just don't want to address the fact that the murderer is from a group you (meaning progressives) consistently cuddle up to and use all manner of deflection and fallacious nonsense to absolve them when one of their number does something heinous.
3. Bollocks. I actually support same-sex marriage, if you're referencing what I think you're referencing, it was a wider point about progressive activism.
On the christian thing...imagine this same action but let's change the flavour of the Abrhamism and say it was done by a christian (let's say Brian Fischer, just for the sake of imagery). He's a hateful fuckwit and viciously homophobic due to the teachings of his religion.
Would you all hop into this thread with niceties like "only a tiny fraction of christians are homicidal maniacs", "surely not ALL christians are like that", "he's not a true scotsman christian anyway", "this has nothing to do with religion" etc etc?
Of course fucking not. So just because this lunatic is from the beards and suicide vests end of the Abrahamic spectrum, you've decided you need to stick up for others who share his ideology.
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And the vultures come out to feed on the carcass of the latest massacre.
And no, you weren't innocently making a point about progressives with your musings about gay marriage. You were blowing peeedooo into your little dog whistle with all your might.
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Would you all hop into this thread with niceties like "only a tiny fraction of christians are homicidal maniacs", "surely not ALL christians are like that", "he's not a true scotsman christian anyway", "this has nothing to do with religion" etc etc?
If there were claims about the acts being descriptive of the whole christianity then yes, yes, no and no.
The last two claims annoy me when they are directed at a Muslim terrorist. The first due to the obvious fallacy and the second due to religion being only part of the equation but not absent from it.
Edit: When used by other Muslims I think the True Scotsman fallacy stops being a fallacy. They might well hold a definition of a Muslim that does exclude committing such acts and due to the interpretative nature of religions they are justified in holding that opinion. In fact, I think it's a welcome mentality when it comes to the discussion within the Muslim communities.
The claim "nothing to do with religion" is luckily mostly present in the strawmans such as yours. I still gringe on those rare occasions when someone uses it seriously.
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Edit: When used by other Muslims I think the True Scotsman fallacy stops being a fallacy. They might well hold a definition of a Muslim that does exclude committing such acts and due to the interpretative nature of religions they are justified in holding that opinion. In fact, I think it's a welcome mentality when it comes to the discussion within the Muslim communities.
But by that logic, other Muslims with a much more violent interpretation are just as justified, so the No True Scotsman is still just as fallacious.
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My wife is going to Orlando this week. She originally cancelled after hearing about the shooting, but friends she talked to online convinced her to go anyway. Still, she's nervous, and I'm sure I will be for her as well. That's especially considering that she is bi and she makes absolutely zero secret of her support for LGBT rights, going out of her way for others.
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Edit: When used by other Muslims I think the True Scotsman fallacy stops being a fallacy. They might well hold a definition of a Muslim that does exclude committing such acts and due to the interpretative nature of religions they are justified in holding that opinion. In fact, I think it's a welcome mentality when it comes to the discussion within the Muslim communities.
But by that logic, other Muslims with a much more violent interpretation are just as justified, so the No True Scotsman is still just as fallacious.
It depends on one's perspective. From the perspective of a religious person they can have a theological definition of what that religion requires and what moves you outside the religion. They would probably claim it's objective but it's based on very subjective interpretations. The kind of logic that requires objective definitions doesn't really work in this murky swamp of subjectivity.
A person on the outside should stick with a more objective view. So, yeah. I suppose a better way of putting it is that within a religion the fallacy doesn't matter.
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We've already got the "get over it, you don't get to mourn a tragedy done to your people because it was just peeeeeeeeople who got killed" crowd coming out of the woodwork.
It doesn't matter what the motivation is whether it's racial or whatever. Murder is murder. People get killed every day. Just because they were a bunch of LGBT people doesn't make their lives any more or less precious than anyone else. Stop reveling in some sense of victimization. Instead of bitching on tumblr how terrible this event was we should learn and solidly grasp that theses towel headed sons of bitches are never going to treat non Muslims with respect. Fuck these sand monkeys.
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Im skeptical about the ability to effectively legislate away mass shootings. There's so many guns it would take decades to make a difference.
I'm with this guy: too hard, why bother. If we had taken that role in the 1980's regarding drunk driving, imagine how much money we would've saved on the failed efforts to decrease it. Wait.
And the fact is most mass shooters aren't mentally ill, at least in a legal sense. They are likely to have Narcissistic personality disorder or Sociopathy, but those are regarded as different things. Better programs to help mentally ill people are a good idea, but those personality disorders are believed to be untreatable so it probably wouldn't have much impact on mass shootings. Taking the guns from our warm live hands, that would.
Mental illness is also a good topic to shift the focus to because it's almost tautological. We just saw a person shoot up a bunch of random people, killing and injuring a dozen or so in the process. Most people think "I would never do that, there must be something wrong with him for killing all those people." And then, next thing you know, they instantly jump to saying the shooter had a mental illness, regardless of whether that is the case. But, fact is mental illness is just a scapegoat that plays to our sympathies (those poor mentally ill, we must help them) and our fears (they'll shoot me next, we must do something). Completely disregard the fact that the mentally ill are more likely to be victims of gun violent instead of perpetrators. All it really boils down to is "take the guns of people with mental illness, not my guns," and we've seen this from the NRA for ages, as they've been blaming "haters, and gangbangers, and knockout gamers" for gun violence. Yeah, such a description is totally not a vague insinuation for taking guns from black people.
I also wonder about mental illness, if the country were to take the NRA serious, whether transiness would be on there.
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Perhaps you could make a comparison between trying to ban alcohol and trying to ban guns? Neither of those things is easy to achieve.
We still have people who demand that drunk driving should still be legal but they are a minority and similarly tougher gun control laws could be seen as perfectly acceptable pretty soon as long as you can make the people understand why such things are necessary and how you are not actually losing your "God given" rights just because you need to pass a background check to buy an assault rifle.
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Drunk driving is an action, not an object.
No, the point is that sensible policies implemented over time can help curb a social ill. If we all took the position you advocate "too many gerns why bother" nothing would have been done about the drunk driving epidemic in the 70's and 80's. But since you want to focus on a nuance that makes no difference without expounding on your reasoning (your M.O.), maybe we should liken it to car registration, as there are 253 million cars in America, mirroring very closely the number of guns (270-300 million). The vast majority of those cars are registered at the state level and able to be monitored by the government if a need arises. But fact is, we don't regulate guns in any meaningful sense, and because of that--coupled with the fact that we do monitor explosives, ricin, and planes--terrorists are now using mass shootings as their method of operation. And this is an instance where no gun control (short of assault weapons bans and gun registries) could have done anything, because he wasn't mentally ill, he would've waited however long necessary, and he wanted to do this.
Nobody is advocating going into houses and taking everyone's guns. What I am saying is that every fucking day or so, we have another mass shooting. Every fucking day or so, we say "never again." And every fucking day or so, we collectively decide "eh, too hard, better to just let people die." And I get it, you're thinking "queen, that's harsh and I don't want people to die,"but it isn't, because our inaction amounts to just that: deciding it's better to let people die. And what I am saying, everything else being a build up to this, is that some common sense policies implemented over time can help curb this social ill of seeing a mass-shooting every fucking day or so.
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Much as I hate the old bastard, prime minister John Howard did reduce gun suicides and homicides overall since he introduced gun control measures in 1996 to make the things harder to get. Yes I know that Australia and the US are radically different societies, the point is-making guns harder to get in one case did reduce gun crime overall. It worked!
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To quote from another forum:
I wonder how many [mass shootings] Australia's had since the Port Arthur massacre.
None
I have counted them twice
None
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I never argued for or against gun control, I simply doubted that it's possible to implement effectively at this point.
Okay, then my first post summarizing your point as "too hard, why bother" was correct.
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https://twitter.com/igorvolsky?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
This guy retweeted politicians' statements on this tragedy with how much money they'd taken from the NRA.
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Also, I never said we shouldn't try.
Okay, so we should implement common sense gun polices that over time may reduce gun violence?
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Gotta admit. I'm so glad I don't have a Facebook right now, for two reasons:
1. I know my family has Trump supporters in it, and you know the kind, and I wouldn't be able to resist reacting to their idiotic remarks.
2. I'd have to restrain myself from making the joke "A muslim killed 50 gay people over the weekend, and Republicans nationwide found themselves at a loss of who to root for." And I don't know if I have that strength of will.
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...So many different groups are using this massacre as political ammo.
Even the Brexit folks are doing it now and that one actually surprised me.
(http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/cpsprodpb/0998/production/_89965420_leave.eutweet.jpg)
Also conspiracy theorists are crawling out from under their rocks. The first theories I saw was that most of the victims had been shot by the police because... I dunno.
The other gunman who was arrested while going to a Pride parade is also getting attention from conspiracy theorists. As it turned out that he was a bisexual man who is in a relationship with another man (and presumably was not planning to shoot at anyone. He was just into guns and brought his guns and Tannerite with him as he was about to join the parade) so now there are claims that Orlando was a false-flag attack.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rR9IaXH1M0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9UFyNy-rw4
Australian comedian Jim Jefferies on guns.
There is one argument and one argument alone for having a gun, and this is the argument: "Fuck off. I like guns!" It's not the best argument, but it's all you've got. And there's nothing wrong with it. There's nothing wrong with saying I like something, don't take it away from me. But don't give me this other bullshit.
EDIT:
Meanwhile, Samantha Bee, as is her wont, nailed it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t88X1pYQu-I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGHWghMfbEU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2kJa4rlK2c
(With an assist from Pat Kiernan.)
EDIT #2:
Let's keep in mind how the manufacturer has advertised the gun used in this and so many other massacres:
(http://ammoland.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/bushmaster-man-card-banner.jpg)
EDIT #3, because hey here's more terrifying things about the AR-15:
http://gawker.com/the-ar-15-was-built-for-slaughter-in-war-zones-1781891338
Here's how the Army described the AR-15:
(https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--fcHt57LE--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/fzwk3k80z3aciqfnfshk.png)
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Something awful (http://www.somethingawful.com/news/gun-solve-problems/) were brilliant.
Got a PROBLEM? You should try...THE GUN!
Co-workers not giving you the RESPECT YOU DESERVE?
Little lady MOUTHING OFF at home?
Is the man on the TV making FUN OF YOU, SPECIFICALLY??
Have we got a solution for you!
Introducing...THE GUN!
THE GUN is the perfect product to solve ANY PROBLEM!
Just grab the handle, fill it with your FAVORITE ammunition, then point and spray your problems AWAY!
THE GUN can be used to tackle all kindsa TOUGH situations:
Wal-Mart won't let you return an AIR MATTRESS
The tip was INCLUDED but you don't feel it SHOULD BE
SOME BITCH doesn't like you back even though you were NICE to her
Another guy wore the same DILBERT T-SHIRT as you did today
PENIS issues
Disney is refusing to release the UNALTERED cut of Star Wars: A New Hope
Parking Tickets, AM I RIGHT?
A COOL DOG is telling you to GET YOUR KILL ON
Denny's stops serving SOUP after ELEVEN PM
PENIS issues
Your IPHONE BATTERY LIFE is really UNPREDICTABLE
You didn't win tickets to 99.9 KROK'S SUMMER BLAST
You saw reportage of A MASS SHOOTING and said, "Eh, I can top that."
PENIS issues
Men are trying to LOVE EACH OTHER in a PRIVATE SPACE and an OLD BOOK told you that was NO BUENO
Your neighbor won't sell you his GUN
AND MORE!
Just look at this SATISFIED CUSTOMER:
OH YEAH, A GUN IS A METAL PENIS THAT BLONDES WILL JERK OFF UNTIL BULLETS SPRAY EVERYWHERE!
So what are you waiting for? Take control of YOUR life! Order your THE GUN today at one of THESE fine stores:
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EDIT #3, because hey here's more terrifying things about the AR-15:
http://gawker.com/the-ar-15-was-built-for-slaughter-in-war-zones-1781891338
Here's how the Army described the AR-15:
(https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--fcHt57LE--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/fzwk3k80z3aciqfnfshk.png)
So, gun is designed to kill people in wars. In other news, grass is green, wet dogs smell bad and man love is hot.
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EDIT #3, because hey here's more terrifying things about the AR-15:
http://gawker.com/the-ar-15-was-built-for-slaughter-in-war-zones-1781891338
Here's how the Army described the AR-15:
(https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--fcHt57LE--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/fzwk3k80z3aciqfnfshk.png)
So, gun is designed to kill people in wars. In other news, grass is green, wet dogs smell bad and man love is hot.
It's great at that, the NRA however claims it's also great for hunting and home defense. Maybe if you like your duck pre-minced or you're not overly conerned about who's on the other side of any internal walls you may have.
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EDIT #3, because hey here's more terrifying things about the AR-15:
http://gawker.com/the-ar-15-was-built-for-slaughter-in-war-zones-1781891338
Here's how the Army described the AR-15:
(https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--fcHt57LE--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/fzwk3k80z3aciqfnfshk.png)
So, gun is designed to kill people in wars. In other news, grass is green, wet dogs smell bad and man love is hot.
It's not that, it's that a gun that can destroy someone's head with a single shot is actively marketed to civilians and the manufacturer claims it's suitable for civilians and that buying it will give you your "man card" back.
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Okay a point I want to make. Something I've been running across is people saying the shooter was a self hating gay man. Some of his former classmates and his ex wife claim he was gay, he used to frequent gay clubs and used gay dating apps. So that means he wasn't a real homophobe, he was a self hating gay guy, that's why he did it.
This is bullshit.
The shitfuck may or may not have been gay, but he didn't go on a killing spree out of self hate. We already know the basics of what drives mass shooters psychology: they are narcissists with a massive sense of entitlement and turn every little thing into attack on themselves until they see the entire world as being out to get them. Sometimes this comes in the form of an extremist ideology that gives broader more specific aspects to this, other times it’s apolitical. Then they start planning a spectacular act of revenge against the world that will get them the attention and power they think they deserve. That was almost certainly what motivated this guy. Whether or not he was gay is just trivia.
One of my favorite books is Evil by Roy Baumeister, an excellent book on the psychology of violence. One of his main points is that the commonplace idea that violence is caused by low self esteem is disproven. There is one kind of pathologically violent person, the fragile narcissist. Someone who craves power and dominance but who's giant egos are easily damaged and lash out at anything that could possibly scratch it.
(http://www.downvids.net/video/bestimages/img-trump-violence-intimidation-and-racism-664.jpg)
(unrelated picture of Donald Trump)
Self hate causes violence to the self.
Self Love causes violence to others. At least excessive amounts do.
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The other thing to note is that it's clear he was something of a wannabe. What I mean by that is that he had, in the past claimed allegiance to both ISIS and Al-Qaida, who are at war with each other. He felt weak, and he lashed put at others and turned to fundamentalist religion as a way of feeling better about himself. He was no Jihadist, just an angry, hateful nut with a chip on his shoulder and a death wish.
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And here we have a religious leader praising the massacre and demanding that the rest of the lgbt folks in Florida would also be murdered.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/mass-shooting-orlando-gay-club-pulse-fierce-controversy-over-pastors-remarks-about-orlando-attack/
Disgusting.
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The other thing to note is that it's clear he was something of a wannabe. What I mean by that is that he had, in the past claimed allegiance to both ISIS and Al-Qaida, who are at war with each other. He felt weak, and he lashed put at others and turned to fundamentalist religion as a way of feeling better about himself. He was no Jihadist, just an angry, hateful nut with a chip on his shoulder and a death wish.
Does it matter?
I don't personally give a shit what these shitheels claim as motivation. Elliot Rodger couldn't get his dick wet, Wade Michael Page used to play in unlistenable Nazi hatecore bands, James Holmes was a sad little git who wanted to be The Joker. The ideology and fixations of these tumors who would normally be entirely unremarkable are frankly boring. What matters is that innocent people died because of their idiotic temper tantrums, and they shouldn't have.
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I think it's a mistake to look for the one and only thing that gets these people go on a murder spree. To truly understand what makes them tick you need to look at the situation as a whole. They need to have experiences that in combination of their personality make them such bitter assholes and act as an ultimate motivation for their actions. Someone with a different personality wouldn't commit such acts but someone with similar personality but different experiences would not either.
If this particular shooter was gay or bisexual and had a fundamentalist, homophobic upbringing it must have left its mark on his psychology. Since he went on his spree in a gay club and claimed religious motivation it seems obvious this conflict had something to do with it.
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The other thing to note is that it's clear he was something of a wannabe. What I mean by that is that he had, in the past claimed allegiance to both ISIS and Al-Qaida, who are at war with each other. He felt weak, and he lashed put at others and turned to fundamentalist religion as a way of feeling better about himself. He was no Jihadist, just an angry, hateful nut with a chip on his shoulder and a death wish.
Does it matter?
I don't personally give a shit what these shitheels claim as motivation. Elliot Rodger couldn't get his dick wet, Wade Michael Page used to play in unlistenable Nazi hatecore bands, James Holmes was a sad little git who wanted to be The Joker. The ideology and fixations of these tumors who would normally be entirely unremarkable are frankly boring. What matters is that innocent people died because of their idiotic temper tantrums, and they shouldn't have.
I'll take it a step further: I don't care why these individuals are bonkers, I care that the NRA has opposed so many simple steps that might have stopped each of these shootings. The NRA opposes background checks (https://www.nraila.org/issues/background-checksnics/). The NRA opposes banning sales of guns to people on the terrorist watchlist/no fly list (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2-000-terror-suspects-bought-guns-legally-report-article-1.2437868). The NRA opposes banning gun sales to domestic abusers (http://csgv.org/blog/2014/nra-toes-line-domestic-violence/) (not surprising since many of its leaders made pro-rape/misogynistic statements in the past). The NRA opposes bans on gun-ownership for criminals and violent felons (http://thehill.com/homenews/house/287711-nra-rejects-house-bill-to-disarm-gun-owning-criminals). Because of the NRA, the CDC isn't even allowed to investigate data into gun violence in an effort to deter it (http://www.businessinsider.com/cdc-nra-kills-gun-violence-research-2013-1). In fact, because of the NRA, gun laws are so weak that known straw purchasers and criminals can purchase guns and law enforcement can't do shit (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-j-spitzer/fast-and-furious-gun-walking_b_1636079.html) (directly leading to the Fast and Furious bullshit a few years back).
There are always going to be bad people or mentally ill people who do bad things. Always. But, do we really need to make it so easy for them?
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Every country has crazy people. America gives them guns.
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Every country has crazy people. America gives them guns.
How the NRA interprets the US constitution.
the right of the people-inclusive-domestic abusers, gangbangers, serial killers, terrorists, paranoid obsessives, haters and general misanthropes who make public their avowed intention to make the targets of their rage suffer and die keep and bear arms any arms they goddamned want because they won't sell themselves, shall not be infringed-no matter how many innocents are shot to death by assholes with grudges and high-capacity semi auto death machines, STFU and pray like you're supposed to.
Sound about right?
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/war-veteran-imran-yousef-saves-dozens-during-orlando-nightclub-shooting-omar-mateen/
That guy is a hero, unlike this (http://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/on-fox-and-friends-geraldo-rivera-says-orlando-victims-didnt-fight-for-their-lives/) guy here.
Geraldo Rivera said that the victims didn't fight for their lives, from the comfort and safety of a Fox studio. Then he found some victims and tried to get them to cry harder on camera because ratings (http://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/geraldo-grotesquely-exploits-orlando-victims-family-while-cameraman-records-their-tearful-grief/comments/).
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https://livestream.com/accounts/300260/events/4963928/player?hide_external_links=true&autoPlay=false&enableInfoAndActivity=false
So this is happening. Chris Murphy is on his 12th hour of filibustering for something to be done about gun violence.
EDIT: Into its 13th hour. And it's officially the 9th longest filibuster in Senate history.
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https://livestream.com/accounts/300260/events/4963928/player?hide_external_links=true&autoPlay=false&enableInfoAndActivity=false
So this is happening. Chris Murphy is on his 12th hour of filibustering for something to be done about gun violence.
EDIT: Into its 13th hour. And it's officially the 9th longest filibuster in Senate history.
Additionally, there are 37 Senators joining him. Noteworthy, there are even two republicans in the fold, which is one more Republican than voted against banning those on the no fly list from purchasing guns. One of whom is Ben Sasse, who earned some notoriety for remaining in the #NeverTrump camp.
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https://livestream.com/accounts/300260/events/4963928/player?hide_external_links=true&autoPlay=false&enableInfoAndActivity=false
So this is happening. Chris Murphy is on his 12th hour of filibustering for something to be done about gun violence.
EDIT: Into its 13th hour. And it's officially the 9th longest filibuster in Senate history.
Additionally, there are 37 Senators joining him. Noteworthy, there are even two republicans in the fold, which is one more Republican than voted against banning those on the no fly list from purchasing guns. One of whom is Ben Sasse, who earned some notoriety for remaining in the #NeverTrump camp.
Well, Sasse doesn't come for reelection until 2020, so he can afford to do things like this for now.
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(https://38.media.tumblr.com/c26b20d3523d58572c00a59fabfc6650/tumblr_mtzmeqC16Z1qcga5ro1_500.gif)
Come on elected representatives DO YOUR JOB!
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...I still think that filibuster is a stupid concept but I agree on their cause at least. (just wish that jamming a crowbar into the machinery of democracy wasn't the only way to achieve this.)
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Well, had they not filibustered, then the floor debate would have continued to be business as usual with absolutely zero time spent to actually deal with the issue. Now, all the Republicans have agreed to is to take a vote, which means likely nothing will result from the filibuster, but this does demonstrate how completely apathetic towards the literally 10s of thousands of deaths from guns every year the Republicans are that the Democrats had to force them to do absolutely nothing for 15 hours to get them to agree to something as simple as a goddamn vote on a hot issue.
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I just goes to show how fucked up the republican party is. Republican voters want at least some regulation of guns, heck most NRA members do. Yet the republicans don't even bother to listen to their own voters.
EDIT
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTYvBKszorY
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Republicans listen to their voters. Their voters vote with their pocketbooks.
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I just goes to show how fucked up the republican party is. Republican voters want at least some regulation of guns, heck most NRA members do. Yet the republicans don't even bother to listen to their own voters.
EDIT
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTYvBKszorY
The voters aren't paying them as much as the NRA.
Nor are its members.
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NRA stopped representing gun owners years ago. They are lobbyists for gun manufacturers and regardless of what the majority of their members want they will cling to the extremist point of view simply because that is what the gunmakers in USA want.
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The problem I see is that all the gun control laws in the world won't change a damn thing until American culture grows the fuck up and stops thinking that violence is the way to deal with problems. Not automatically demonizing someone who thinks differently than you do would be a good start as would teaching that there doesn't have to be a winner and a loser in every-damn-thing.
To use the drinking and driving example, we didn't ban alcohol to solve the problem. We made the consequences for doing it worse and we went to great lengths to make it uncool and unnecessary and not just turn a blind eye to it. We had to shift the cultural paradigm, and we're still only in the middle of doing it.
This guy was born and raised in America. He's American made. Period. To think he started hating fags and grabbed a gun just because someone from the country his parents came from (or whatever the excuse of the day is) told him to is delusional. Somebody whispered in his ear. It agreed with what his American upbringing had already taught him. That's why 50 people are dead.
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The problem I see is that all the gun control laws in the world won't change a damn thing until American culture grows the fuck up and stops thinking that violence is the way to deal with problems. Not automatically demonizing someone who thinks differently than you do would be a good start as would teaching that there doesn't have to be a winner and a loser in every-damn-thing.
To use the drinking and driving example, we didn't ban alcohol to solve the problem. We made the consequences for doing it worse and we went to great lengths to make it uncool and unnecessary and not just turn a blind eye to it. We had to shift the cultural paradigm, and we're still only in the middle of doing it.
This guy was born and raised in America. He's American made. Period. To think he started hating fags and grabbed a gun just because someone from the country his parents came from (or whatever the excuse of the day is) told him to is delusional. Somebody whispered in his ear. It agreed with what his American upbringing had already taught him. That's why 50 people are dead.
I disagree with your notion of a cultural paradigm shift. People didn't automatically stop drinking and driving, and indeed people still do so today. What happened was people started going to prison for drinking and driving, seeing massive hikes in their car insurance, held liable for murders they committed, and in some instances banned from driving for life. Sure, we hear those numbers that 50% of all highway fatalities are caused by alcohol, and that impacts us, but the government was also using a pretty big stick to beat people who did not learn to comply with the law, which shifted our collective thinking in both a socially conscious way and an "I don't want to be caught breaking the law" way.
What is more, the government was free to collect highway data to learn how to reduce highway fatalities (both involving alcohol and not). Because of that, the government decided that 0.08 was a good limit, they created Dram Shop liability, they re-worked the way that highways were designed, and reduced speed limits. All of these simple solutions saved lives and the only really "control" on alcohol was that the age was raised from 18 to 21. But yet, we can't even gather data on gern violence in this country because the NRA has effectively shut down government and academic research into the area, so that the NRA's research (or foreign/intergovernmental organizations) are all that remain. Basic research into this area would go a long way into making minor policies that could keep bad people from having gerns that wouldn't affect Joe Six-Pack who goes hunting with his boy on Saturday. Having the data might show that 5% of shootings are done by domestic partners with a history of abuse (simple answer, ban domestic abusers from owning gerns) or 10% of shootings are done by people with a history of violent crimes (simple answer, ban those who commit violent crimes from owning gerns), or most mass shootings occur within a week after the lone wolf buys a gern (simple answer, longer wait periods), or from those purchased on the black market (simple answer, registry and background checks, as well as harsher straw purchaser laws). There is also keeping those off the terrorist watchlist from buying gerns (and since the government monitors ricin, planes, and explosives, mass shootings are the new M.O. of terrorists, definitely domestic and most likely foreign). None of these would affect a person's right to buy and own a firearm (unless you fall into one of these categories, or you really believe these people should be armed), but all would have a real effect on REDUCING gern violence. That's the key point, it's not about stopping gern violence altogether, but if we can cut it in half, that is a huge net win because that means 15,000 people are alive who otherwise wouldn't be (and the Australia case study is informative in this area, after it's absolute gern ban, it saw a precipitous decline in violence overall, indicating that these people committing gern crimes not move onto other weapons like knives and cars). And of course, there is the ever-persisting issue of gerns and suicide (which studies show is curbed drastically with waiting periods).
Finally, a big reason that our culture is so "yay gerns" is the NRA. They have convinced us that every democratic politician is out to steal yer gerns in an effort to whip up votes for Republicans, whipping people into a frenzy and thinking that they're gonna be like Han Solo and Luke Skywalker and use said gerns to overthrow the tyrannical government. Gern manufacturers have repeated exploited a toxic masculinity (almost a thin-skinned and fragile masculinity) in advertisements to sell gerns ("your man card has been renewed"). Some ads even equate gerns to toys like barbie dolls in which you "must buy all the accessories." Or the trope surrounding open/concealed carry, that you're somehow gonna shoot the bad-guy before he shoots you, as though you are John Wayne in the wild, wild west. The reason our culture is so backwards on gerns is because the NRA and gern manufacturers created these advertisements that push their views of gerns that play into people's fantasies while we have no sensible policy against which to push back. People can be as reckless or stupid as they want with gerns, and unless they break a crime that is facially neutral towards gerns, they probably will not be arrested.
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By in large, I think we're in agreement actually.
A governmental big stick has to be part of a cultural shift but as experience with alcohol (and drugs to a lessor extent) shows it has to work the edges of the problem to modify the relationship society has with it rather than outright ban it or it won't work. Neither of us is actually arguing to ban guns, we're both saying sensible laws and enforcement is the right course of action. We're probably working on different time scales here since I see the DD problem as improved from when I was a teen, greatly improved from the time my parents were teens, and hopefully limited to fringe behavior by the time my grand-kids are teens. It's not something we're going to eradicate in 10 years. People are idiots and set in their ways and they pass a watered down version of that on to their kids. If we keep the pressure on eventually it waters down to insignificance.
The fact that you can't even collect data to look at the problem and that is an acceptable state of affairs for a lot of people, politicians, and the NRA is part of why I think a cultural paradigm shift is necessary. Too many people are in a state of denial to acknowledge there is a even problem, let alone think about what could be done to tackle it. Right now America lacks the critical mass to say "this is bullshit -- fix it."
I also think the NRA is only the current focal point and aggravator of a much longer standing problem which is why they managed to entrench themselves so well. Your cultural myths and heros all revolve around the common man seizing control from the savages and saving the day with a gun. The NRA has built on this and twisted it to further their political agenda. Instead of the Indians in the wild west (or the Huns & Japs or the commies) it's the government itself that's the problem. We've been hearing that line since Reagan. Regardless of how it actually got to this point the NRA is an obstacle you are going to have to overcome which is no small task with the American love of binary thinking refusing to allow for a middle ground.
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Now this is the kind of conversation that made me join the site originally.
In my opinion restricting who can get a gun legally is the best way to deal with gun problems. Laws like the ones in California where the appearance of the guns has been modified to fit the laws (google California legal assault rifle) doesn't really stop the gun manufacturers from making niche market guns for them and the magazine restrictions are also only marginally effective. If a mass shooter has to reload a bit more often it might reduce the body count a bit but for those who use the gun in a robbery, suicide or for murdering just one or few people it does not make their job any more difficult.
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An armed robber is less likely to want to kill you than a spree killer. They don't want muder one and aren't looking to make a statement. They want their meth, crack or smack and that's it. They know that whether they point a sawed off rifle or a gatling gun at you it should have the same result-you concluding that your life isn't worth your cash and credit cards.
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Now this is the kind of conversation that made me join the site originally.
In my opinion restricting who can get a gun legally is the best way to deal with gun problems. Laws like the ones in California where the appearance of the guns has been modified to fit the laws (google California legal assault rifle) doesn't really stop the gun manufacturers from making niche market guns for them and the magazine restrictions are also only marginally effective. If a mass shooter has to reload a bit more often it might reduce the body count a bit but for those who use the gun in a robbery, suicide or for murdering just one or few people it does not make their job any more difficult.
And you know, that is another thing entirely. Those gerns are disproportionately used in mass shootings. Those gerns are present in about 2% of gern crimes, but used in about 50% of mass shootings. The first question is why is that. The simple answer is that a lot of what people call "cosmetic" are actually design features to make it easier to wield in combat for the purpose of killing a lot of people quickly (remember, these gerns were designed for use on the battle field, not for hunting or self-defense). The second answer is that assault weapon bans do reduce gern violence (remember, America saw a spike in mass shooting and mass shooting deaths since 2005, when the ban expired). But, this really is a thing that agencies like the CDC should be able to look into, to assess the risk v. reward of certain regulations. Because without research, you'll just see more "cosmetic" bans.
And admittedly, one of the reasons that mass shooting deaths have increased since 2005 is clip sizes. Most hand gerns carry 10 bullets, most assault weapons carry 30. Think back to the Tuscon shooting, where Loughner used an extended clip (30) and was tackled in the split second that he reloaded. Smaller clips mean more reloads, and more reloads equal more time to stop the attacker and more time to flee. Additionally, smaller clip sizes do not impede one's ability to defend his or her home nor does it affect hunting.
And again, the smaller clip sizes is part of what I'm talking about with the problem of America. Somebody says "hey, here is a small change we can make to help the problem that won't affect your 'right' to own a gern" and in response we hear "well, it won't solve every problem, so why bother." Focusing on "oh, it won't do anything about XYZ" ignores that it will make a nice bit of difference in the case of A and B. More reloads might have reduced the casualties in Orlando, Tuscon, or Aurora by, let's be conservative, 10%. I'm sure those 7 people would enjoy being alive today, and I'm sure their families would appreciate it as well. I really don't think that Joe Schmuck's "right" to own an extended clip is more important than the lives of shooting victims, both in the present and in the future (and there will be more mass shootings because our politicians are beholden to the NRA to do jack shit about the problem).
Fuck, in a way, the status quo is perfect for gern manufacturers. We make it easy for bad people to get gerns, they shoot places up, the gern manufacturers see an uptick in sales. Against this backdrop, it is in the best interest of Bushmaster and the like to have as many mass shootings as possible because it drives up their profits. And seeing as how the NRA works for them, I'm not surprised that this is the status quo, nor am I surprised that the NRA is using state and local governments to make it even EASIER for these people to get gerns, and get gerns that can kill more people more efficiently.
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Could you please stop calling them "gerns?"
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Yes. Actual research, please. For fuck's sake.
Smaller clip and magazine sizes are IMO the most efficient and immediate way of reducing the death tolls. No grandfathering exceptions. You give your old ones to cops and get a couple of new, legal ones back or get heavily fined. You do that and the whole question of assault weapons doesn't matter. A "traditionally" shaped semi-automatic rifle would be just as efficient in a mass shooting as an assault rifle. People would probably still rather use the assault weapons since they look cool and the shooters probably like to think themselves as some kind of badasses. The question of whether to ban semi-automatic high caliber rifles altogether is something I'd like more information on, though.
On a longer term, abolish the fucking castle doctrine and stand your ground laws and any other ones that feed the gun graze. I'd also like to see the rational gun owners just abandon NRA and perhaps start a new organization that actually advances what they want instead of brainwashing them. Yes, NRA gives the members all the gun porn they want and probably has practical benefits for them thanks to the big money behind them but as long as you are a member you support their actions. Period.
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For the record: When I am talking about cosmetic differences I mean things like these:
(http://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mckjc1OHTw1r9khx4o1_1280.jpg)
Muzzle break and flash hider have a purpose which is useful in military operations but unless you are firing a massively powerful cartridge you can do without muzzle break and if you aren't hiding in a bush and desiring to shoot at people without them seeing your position after the first shot you don't really "need" a flash hider. Things like changing the pistol grip and such affect the ergonomics but that gun is nothing but a massive "fuck you" to the laws that were supposed to end the sales of semi-auto assault rifles in California.
And the real problem is that as long as "shall not be infringed" thingy exists and you can't make a law that says "to become a gun owner you must pass these requirements [which may include things like a safety course and possibly a test of mental health]" all that you can make is bans of specific types of weapons. (And even then you get people crying about the "shall not be infringed.")
...And in "funny" turn of events, I have not seen anyone "liberals," "leftists" or whatever defend the attacker but the right-wing, religious & pro-gun mobs are undecided between supporting the massacre because it killed LGBT people and condemning the massacre to use it to blame all Muslims.
Actually the /pol/ mob and pro-gun folks in particular are fighting over issues like this because some of them would like to ban Muslims and LGBT from owning weapons and this triggers (no pun intended) the pro-gun folks who stick to the idea that everyone should be allowed to have guns. ("Shall not be infringed" and all that.)
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The flash hider thingy is supposed to preserve night vision actually, it doesn't conceal your flash.
Honestly it's unimportant unless you plan of fighting insurgents or just want it to look cool.
Either I've been misinformed or it has several purposes. Anyway, it's not really important for the function of the gun. Muzzle brake has more effect but that's mainly in bigger rifles.
EDIT: http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story/military/2016/06/14/marine-vets-quick-actions-saved-dozens-lives-during-orlando-nightclub-shooting/85860320/
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no, I won't stop calling them gerns. They're fucking penis extenders, they serve no purpose in a civilized society, and we can't even get sensible gern policy (a Floor), let alone more specific gern regulation (a ceiling that should be pursued with data and empirical evidence). I'll continue calling them gerns because I don't respect them, nor do I respect the people and the organizations (and by proxy the people that support said organizations) that fight tooth and nail to prevent us from attaining sensible gern policy or even information and data about gern violence. People are dying every fucking day, mass shooting are happening every fucking day, and so many people are content to do fuck all about gerns. Because clearly, gerns are more important than human lives.
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Because clearly, gerns are more important than human lives.
Emphasized for emphasis.
I hate the people who call themselves pro-life and just cluck when 49 people are slaughtered in a horrific act of domestic terrorism. I hate the people who call themselves pro-life and block all attempts to extend basic medical care to their citizens. I hate the people who call themselves pro-life and deny any real opportunity of a life to children by poisoning their water with lead, or by keeping them from having what might even generously be called a good education. I hate those fucking hypocrites for whom life begins at conception and ends at birth.
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They're pro-life as long as that life is sinless. Once the child is born, it is stained with sin. Thus it is on Its own.
That's the base of the Republican logic here. Fundamentally they despise actual life and "the world", and have based their foreign policy around Israel and making Jesus come back.
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June 15 Senate filibuster drinking game: drink every time someone says "terrorist watch list."
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Topical.
(http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/files/2016/06/frenchcheese-guns.jpg)
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Who knows what's in that French crap? At least you know what's in a gun: screamin hot lead.
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Who knows what's in that French crap? At least you know what's in a gun: screamin hot lead.
But, if we outlaw crazy french cheese, then only outlaws will have crazy french cheese. Criminals don't obey the law and all. And without crazy french cheese, then how will good, law-abiding citizens defend themselves against outlaws with crazy french cheese.
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Your money, or I open the the Brie de Meaux!!!
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As usual these days, claims of the massacre being fake or at least false-flag are being raised on the net:
http://nodisinfo.com/terrorist-attack-florida-homosexual-nightclub-total-fake-complete-fabrication/
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2016/06/paul-craig-roberts/im-skeptical-orlando/
I could go on for ages on how clearly wrong these conspiracy theorists are and how easy their ridiculous claims are to disprove. Instead I shall merely highlight the first set of "evidence" from the nodisinfo article:
In the above photo the two men appear to be holding up a poorly dressed dummy. There are pants, there, but no legs!
(http://nodisinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/homodummy1.png)
That does appear to be a pair of pants with no human inside.
It’s merely a staged hoax. There is nothing to see, here.
...That is a photo of two people holding up someone's pants and the conspiracy theorists who claim to see through the lies and deception (of... Well, whoever it is they claim to be behind the latest conspiracy) look at the pants and claim that it must be a dummy made to look like a human?
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So, if the picture is supposed to be a staged picture of people holding up a dummy, why didn't they just use another actor who was pretending to be dead?
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So, if the picture is supposed to be a staged picture of people holding up a dummy, why didn't they just use another actor who was pretending to be dead?
Most of the more outlandish conspiracy theories involve a particular kind of doublethink. They assume that the conspirators are brilliant, ruthless, and coordinated enough to secretly manipulate numerous factors towards a singular end, while coercing countless individuals into going along with the sham and keeping it a secret. And yet at the same time, they're stupid enough to overlook details that an untrained, uneducated individual would be able to pick out of public broadcasts.
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So, if the picture is supposed to be a staged picture of people holding up a dummy, why didn't they just use another actor who was pretending to be dead?
Most of the more outlandish conspiracy theories involve a particular kind of doublethink. They assume that the conspirators are brilliant, ruthless, and coordinated enough to secretly manipulate numerous factors towards a singular end, while coercing countless individuals into going along with the sham and keeping it a secret. And yet at the same time, they're stupid enough to overlook details that an untrained, uneducated individual would be able to pick out of public broadcasts.
I don't say this very often, nor do I post this to be snippy, but I'll give credit where credit is due: good post, Paragon.
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Yeah conspiracy theorists are prob more likely to cry "false flag" when they've got "skin in the game".
So to speak.
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Despite their belief, I've seen that they're incredibly big-headed but in a fragile way - see Alex Jones and his agonizing over those fearsome brains that the dread Nerds possess. They fundamentally fear actual intelligence and research, and in that fear they craft scenario after scenario to best explain the fact it seems everyone has some answer except for them. They wring their hands over old prophecies and craft strange little alternate versions of reality because the existing reality is just too scary and disorganized for them - there could be no hand of god guiding this many strange events...but what if there was some overarching conspiracy? Then, for some reason, that would justify the continuation of their God vs. Devil ideology, and they see themselves as ALWAYS on the right side. That they're inherently right and virtuous and the only one who can see the "truth" before their eyes, while everyone else is either in on it or lulled by fluoride.
Its a quick slip and a drop from there into believing everyone else has been replaced by a doppelganger / reptile and things get really ugly after that.
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"Hmm... this person is kneeling down to help an injured victim... of course! Their pose is a secret Freemason symbol! They're signalling 'false flag operation success' to their shadowy overlords! You've been foiled, I say! Foiled!"
Seriously though, if people want to think they're smarter than everyone in the room, fine. Whatever. Wear that tin foil, it doesn't really have a serious impact on my life. But dragging a grievous event like this into it when the victims probably haven't even been buried yet? They're trampling on the bodies of slaughtered innocents to make level ground for their self-absorbed soapboxes. They're pissing on the grief of those left behind, the horror of those who survived, because they want to pretend their lives have worth by deluding themselves of their own mental capacity. Fuck these people.
I realize I'm being very uncharitable. I don't really care.
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^Considering after Sandy Hook some Truthers were calling parents of the victims and to call them shills for the government and that their child never existed, I'd say it's reasonable not to be charitable.
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Yeah conspiracy theorists are prob more likely to cry "false flag" when they've got "skin in the game".
So to speak.
I'll go with this. I think gern ownership (not all, but a sizable number) and conspiracy theories tend to play on the same parts of people's minds: a distrust of the government, a desire to be more powerful and smarter than others in the room, and wanting to be bigger and more important than you are in the grand scheme of things. And very often, these individuals are the ones involved in mass shootings. We've become so number to mass shootings that while there are more mass shootings than days in a year, we only hear about them if they involve schools or a death toll that eclipses a dozen or if a brown skinned person is involved. When these shootings occur, it sparks a discourse about why such a thing happened, and how we can prevent it. These thin-skinned and ego-fragile conspiracy theorists then take the discussion as a sleight against them, and lash out with conspiracy theories and vitriol because they care more about their gerns than they do about human life and respect for those who are mourning.
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What's tragic is that they are taking out their fragile egos on people with very recent, very real post traumatic stress. I can't imagine anything more infuriating after just surviving being shot at by a crazy person than having a stalker crazy person with an agenda hassle me because they think I'm gonna steal their gerns.
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I think another factor here is what I like to call Action Hero Syndrome. All these gun worshipers and conspiracy theorists are convinced that if THEY got attacked, then THEY'D be cool and save the day. Therefor, the lack of such reactions when actual shootings occur makes them assume it's fake.
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I think another factor here is what I like to call Action Hero Syndrome. All these gun worshipers and conspiracy theorists are convinced that if THEY got attacked, then THEY'D be cool and save the day. Therefor, the lack of such reactions when actual shootings occur makes them assume it's fake.
It's actually what not a few conservative commentators actually say (http://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/on-fox-and-friends-geraldo-rivera-says-orlando-victims-didnt-fight-for-their-lives/). It's the whole "I'd be John McClane" power fantasy.
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I think another factor here is what I like to call Action Hero Syndrome. All these gun worshipers and conspiracy theorists are convinced that if THEY got attacked, then THEY'D be cool and save the day. Therefor, the lack of such reactions when actual shootings occur makes them assume it's fake.
It's actually what not a few conservative commentators actually say (http://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/on-fox-and-friends-geraldo-rivera-says-orlando-victims-didnt-fight-for-their-lives/). It's the whole "I'd be John McClane" power fantasy.
Which ignores the entire point of the movie. The film makes it abundantly clear that for all his cunning and determination, he's in over his head.
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I think another factor here is what I like to call Action Hero Syndrome. All these gun worshipers and conspiracy theorists are convinced that if THEY got attacked, then THEY'D be cool and save the day. Therefor, the lack of such reactions when actual shootings occur makes them assume it's fake.
It's actually what not a few conservative commentators actually say (http://www.rawstory.com/2016/06/on-fox-and-friends-geraldo-rivera-says-orlando-victims-didnt-fight-for-their-lives/). It's the whole "I'd be John McClane" power fantasy.
This may be an intentional result of the gun manufacturers advertising campaigns and NRA agenda...
Actual training and studies on people's reaction in "active shooter" scenarios prove that without A LOT OF training the plucky Joe Everyman is likely to a) freeze and get himself shot. b) Shoot someone other than the mass murderer.
I mean if you hear gunshots and looking around you spot few people with guns who are also looking around you will hesitate. That gives the real killer an edge as they can shoot whoever they want but the police and wannabe-hero civilians have to make sure that their target really is the killer.
Running away from the scene is actually a more helpful answer as not only does that save your life it also makes it easier for the authorities to handle the situation. And yes, I know that there are occasions where civilians have stopped the gunman. The pro-gun lobby is very loud about these. I'm just thinking that these occasions seem to be rare and they never say how many of the victims were also carrying a gun but were unable to stop the killer.
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The fact is, some people did try to fight back. It didn't work. (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/18/us/pulse-nightclub-orlando-mass-shooting.html?hpw&rref=us&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=1)
It's called "taking a risk" for a reason, it might not work. Real life is not fantasy, sometimes the bad guy wins.
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Average NRA Goon: GOOD GUY WIF GUN STOPS BAD GUY WIF GUN! SHEWWIF NEVAH WOOSES!!
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"The only thing that will stop a bad guy with a gun is another bad guy with a gun who coincidentally came to shoot up the same place." - Samantha Bee
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Remember when I talked about the recruiting problems in US military?
http://popularmilitary.com/sec-def-wants-civilians-laterally-entered-military-high-ranking-officers/
Now there is a lack of officers so someone suggested that they could start hiring civilians and giving them high officer ranks immediately... Not front line officers of course but getting some store manager to become a colonel in charge of a supply depot in continental USA would save a lot of money as their wage will be lower than that of a "regular" colonel and their pension will be really low too...
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Remember when I talked about the recruiting problems in US military?
http://popularmilitary.com/sec-def-wants-civilians-laterally-entered-military-high-ranking-officers/
Now there is a lack of officers so someone suggested that they could start hiring civilians and giving them high officer ranks immediately... Not front line officers of course but getting some store manager to become a colonel in charge of a supply depot in continental USA would save a lot of money as their wage will be lower than that of a "regular" colonel and their pension will be really low too...
Why are you posting that here?
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Someone explaining why the US failed to enact any sort of gun control in the wake of Orlando:
It's because the Democrat bills take a dump on the rights to due process and the Democrats said the other two Republican bills didn't do enough so they voted them down, so I guess they wanted all or nothing -- their loss.
BTW, automatic weapons (of which assault rifles are a type of) are already heavily restricted (by the NFA in 1936) and new sales banned (FOPA 1986).
It is already literally impossible to walk into a store and legally walk out with an automatic weapon/assault rifle in the United States.
Also, none of the proposals would have prevented the Orlando shooting, so the whole part of "we must act because of Orlando" is just trying to not let a crisis go to waste.