The U.S.A. Mass Shootings Thread

The U.S.A. Mass Shootings Thread

Author
Discussion

MC Bodge

21,551 posts

174 months

Thursday 26th May 2022
quotequote all
Byker28i said:
Ted Cruz walks away from being challenged
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/152972961430990...
Pathetic

Ian974

2,926 posts

198 months

Thursday 26th May 2022
quotequote all
Surely their amendment gives them the answer to it staring at them in the face, use the defense as an offense.
Announce that in full support of the freedom of the second amendment there will be a series of independent, regulated militias established. This is where you need to join if you want to keep your guns. If not, no guns for you.

MrsMiggins

2,808 posts

234 months

Thursday 26th May 2022
quotequote all
Emotional speech by Mallory McMorrow who serves on the Senate in Michigan. Six minutes long, but heartfelt and very moving.

https://twitter.com/MalloryMcMorrow/status/1529923...

TTmonkey

20,911 posts

246 months

Thursday 26th May 2022
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Husband of one of the teachers that died has suffered a fatal heart attack.

rscott

14,690 posts

190 months

Friday 27th May 2022
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Seems that some law enforcement went in to get their own children out, not to tackle the shooter - https://twitter.com/SawyerHackett/status/152980880...

And the official statement yesterday that a guard was shot by the killer on his way is no longer the official story - they now say he just walked in, unchallenged.

And that the police were outside for about an hour before going in. They handcuffed one parent, but did nothing until the Border Patrol team arrived.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/26/uv...

The Rotrex Kid

30,191 posts

159 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
Murdered teacher’s husband dies of heart attack caused by grief. 4 children now orphans - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-6156965...

The Rotrex Kid

30,191 posts

159 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
rscott said:
Seems that some law enforcement went in to get their own children out, not to tackle the shooter - https://twitter.com/SawyerHackett/status/152980880...

And the official statement yesterday that a guard was shot by the killer on his way is no longer the official story - they now say he just walked in, unchallenged.

And that the police were outside for about an hour before going in. They handcuffed one parent, but did nothing until the Border Patrol team arrived.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/26/uv...
But, but, they were the good guys with guns that stop this kind of thing.

Saddening. What a complete clusterfk. Wake up America.

faa77

1,728 posts

70 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
MC Bodge said:
Last Visit said:
It's things like this, and indeed a lot of other news clips I have seen of some of the Republicans and other reports that make me feel like I'm watching a different species. Its been mentioned many times in this thread how different the American psyche is, how their societal values differ so much to ours and how engrained the desire for some to own firearms is. After so many of these shootings we see and hear so many people for who even the mention of gun control is an assult on their very existance. I feel like I am watching and reading about a different world, given the vast difference between my opinions on this and indeed what seems to be theirs.


Utter disbelief and such staggering evidence of our differences. Thank goodness the Atlantic ocean exists.


And yes, I appreciate not all are like this.
And yet, quite a number of British people seem to think that we are much more different to the people on the other side of the English Channel and North Sea than to those in the US, on the other side of the Atlantic, who happen to speak English for historical reasons.
You crying about Brexit?

We're not like the continentals either.

faa77

1,728 posts

70 months

Friday 27th May 2022
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captain_cynic said:
CrgT16 said:
I think owning guns it’s ok but there needs to be background checks and a good reason to own them. Also certain types of gun have no excuse to owned.

An AR15 type gun is not a self defence weapon by design. Shotguns, hunting rifles, small handheld guns/revolvers that’s more than enough.

Less guns the better but I don’t think banning them is necessary
As for a good self defence weapon, guns are not a good for self defence at all.

As a self defence practitioner, if you're ever likely to need a weapon for self defence you will have been caught unaware by a prepared attacker. If the attacker already has a weapon in play, that gun, no matter how well placed and meticulously prepared is already too far away. Even if that gun is on your hip. An attacker isn't going to wait for you to fumble with a weapon, he's got his life and freedom on the line. Better to make a corpse than be one.

If you've time to arm yourself, a judge will ask why did you not escape or in any other way attempt to mitigate the attack? Most weapons used in self defence are weapons of opportunity. Tools, kitchen utensils, so on and so forth.

Also, if you've got easy access to guns, so will your attacker and that just means that they no longer have to be close to be a threat, meaning you're infinitely more likely to be caught with your pants down. A person who breaks into your house is going to have the advantage in being alert and prepared, if you want to defend against an attack, train to defend yourself whilst unprepared.
100%

Byker28i

58,819 posts

216 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
Jeanboi said:
kowalski655 said:
Byker28i said:
Ted Cruz walks away from being challenged
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/152972961430990...
Off to check the next flight time for Cancun
Yeah Cruz could do with STFU-ing right now.
This has happened far too many times (once is more than enough).
I'm sick of hopes and prayers from those that defend their gun culture. Those words mean nothing when coming from these people.
and Republican Gov Greg Abbott still attended a fundraiser 300 miles away just hours after the shooting...

Byker28i

58,819 posts

216 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
The Rotrex Kid said:
rscott said:
Seems that some law enforcement went in to get their own children out, not to tackle the shooter - https://twitter.com/SawyerHackett/status/152980880...

And the official statement yesterday that a guard was shot by the killer on his way is no longer the official story - they now say he just walked in, unchallenged.

And that the police were outside for about an hour before going in. They handcuffed one parent, but did nothing until the Border Patrol team arrived.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/26/uv...
But, but, they were the good guys with guns that stop this kind of thing.

Saddening. What a complete clusterfk. Wake up America.
A Texas Department of Public Safety official said responding officers were cautious as they entered Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas because “they could’ve been shot.”
https://www.mediaite.com/tv/texas-police-lieutenan...

Not good to read of one child bleeding out for an hour.

It's pretty obvious that the police botched their response and lied about it.

Edited by Byker28i on Friday 27th May 06:25

Byker28i

58,819 posts

216 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
America export their problem to Mexico as well.
Every year, an estimated 500,000 guns are smuggled across the border from the US into Mexico.
There’s one gun store in all of Mexico; the country gives out some 50 gun permits a year. The drug dealers and gangs are killing with US guns.
It's such a problem Mexico were suing US gun manufacturers
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/04/mexi...

Byker28i

58,819 posts

216 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
gotoPzero said:
We have been through this many times on this thread. The AR is not really any different to any other semi automatic rifle. Its .223 / 5.56 ammo is not even that potent in terms of rifles.

They are not even the most popular gun used in mass shootings.

They are almost never used by criminals.

If you really, really want to do something about gun deaths in the USA ban all handguns.

Just how you get them all back I have no clue, given the millions in the hands of criminals are impossible to trace plus the millions legally owned that are not registered.... thats the issue here.

Uvalde: AR-15
Buffalo: AR-15
Boulder: AR-15
Orlando: AR-15
Parkland: AR-15
Las Vegas: AR-15
Aurora, CO: AR-15
Sandy Hook: AR-15
Waffle House: AR-15
San Bernardino: AR-15
Midland/Odessa: AR-15
Poway synagogue: AR-15
Sutherland Springs: AR-15
Tree of Life Synagogue: AR-15

Gweeds

7,808 posts

51 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
In 2008, in the District of Columbia v. Heller decision, the Supreme Court said that individuals have a right to own firearms outside of membership in a militia or for traditional purposes such as hunting or self-defense, and dramatically limited federal regulation of them. Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority decision, was a leading “originalist” on the court, eager to erase the decisions of the post-WWII courts that upheld business regulation and civil rights.

In 2004, a ten-year federal ban on assault weapons expired, and since then. mass shootings have tripled. Zusha Elinson, who is writing a history of the bestselling AR-15 military style weapon used in many mass shootings, notes that there were about 400,000 AR-15 style rifles in America before the assault weapons ban went into effect in 1994. Today, there are 20 million.

For years now, Republicans have stood firmly against measures to guard Americans against gun violence, even as a majority of Americans support commonsense measures like background checks. Notably, after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in 2012, when a gunman murdered 20 six- and seven-year-old students and 6 staff members, Republicans in the Senate filibustered a bipartisan bill sponsored by Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Pat Toomey (R-PA) that would have expanded background checks, killing it despite the 55 votes in favor of it.

Since Sandy Hook, the nation has suffered more than 3500 mass shootings, and Republicans have excused them by claiming they didn’t actually happen, or by insisting we need more guns so there will be “a good guy with a gun” to take out a shooter, or that we need to “harden targets,” or that we need more police in the schools (which has simply led to more student arrests), or as Senator Ted Cruz said today, to limit the number of doors in schools, or, as a guest on Fox News Channel personality Sean Hannity’s show said, to put “mantraps” and trip wires in the schools.

The initial story of what happened on Tuesday in Uvalde fit the Republican myth. Police spokespeople told reporters that a school district police officer confronted the shooter outside the building before he barricaded himself in a classroom, killing 19 and wounding 22 others in his rampage.

But as more details are emerging today, they are undermining the myth itself.

Robb Elementary School, where the murders took place, had already been “hardened” with the town investing more than $650,000 in security enhancements, but the shooter apparently entered through an unlocked door. The Uvalde police department consumes 40% of the town’s budget and has its own Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) unit. And yet, the stories that are emerging from Uvalde suggest that the shooter fired shots outside the school for 12 minutes before entering it and that he was not, in fact, confronted outside. Police officers arrived at the same time he entered the school, but they did not go in until after he had been in the building for four minutes. Seven officers then entered, but the lone gunman apparently drove them out with gunfire, and they stayed outside, holding back frantic parents, until Border Patrol tactical officers arrived a full hour later.

Parents tried to get the police to go in but instead found themselves under attack for interfering with an investigation. One man was thrown to the ground and pepper sprayed. U.S. Marshals arrested and handcuffed Angeli Rose Gomez, whose children were in the school and who had had time to drive 40 miles to get to them, for interfering as she demanded they do something. Gomez got local officers she knew to talk the Marshals into releasing her. Then she jumped the school fence, ran in, grabbed her two kids, and ran out.

A Texas Department of Safety official told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer tonight that the law enforcement officers at the school were reluctant to engage the gunman because “they could’ve been shot, they could’ve been killed.”

There are still many, many questions about what happened in Uvalde, but it seems clear that the heroes protecting the children were not the guys with guns, but the moms and the dads and the two female teachers who died trying to protect their students: Eva Mireles and Irma Garcia. News reports today say that Garcia’s husband, Joseph, died this morning of a heart attack, leaving four children.

Last week, in the aftermath of the deadly attack on a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, Democrats in the House of Representatives quickly passed a a domestic terrorism bill. Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) tried to get the Senate to take it up today. It would have sparked a debate on gun safety. Republicans blocked it. In the aftermath of Tuesday’s massacre, only five Republicans have said they are willing to consider background checks for gun purchases. That is not enough to break a filibuster.

Last night, Texas candidate for governor Beto O’Rourke confronted Texas governor Greg Abbott at a press conference. Last year, Abbott signed at least seven new laws to make it easier to obtain guns, and after the Uvalde murders, he said tougher gun laws are not “a real solution.” O’Rourke offered a different vision for defending our children than stocking up on guns. "The time to stop the next shooting is right now, and you are doing nothing," O'Rourke said, standing in front of a dais at which Abbott sat. "You said this is not predictable…. This is totally predictable…. This is on you, until you choose to do something different…. This will continue to happen. Somebody needs to stand up for the children of this state or they will continue to be killed, just like they were killed in Uvalde yesterday.”

Uvalde mayor Don McLaughlin shouted profanities at O'Rourke; Texas Republican lieutenant governorDan Patrick told the former congressman, "You're out of line and an embarrassment”; and Senator Ted Cruz told him, “Sit down.”

But this evening the New York Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays announced they would use their social media channels not to cover tonight’s game but to share facts about gun violence. “The devastating events that have taken place in Uvalde, Buffalo and countless other communities across our nation are tragedies that are intolerable.

https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/may-26...

Ted fking Cruz suggesting fewer doors in schools. The same man who’s had $12 million from the NRA.


MC Bodge

21,551 posts

174 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
The Rotrex Kid said:
But, but, they were the good guys with guns that stop this kind of thing.

Saddening. What a complete clusterfk. Wake up America.
Exactly.

The "good guys" shouldn't need to be required to put themselves in that position, and many won't.

Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 27th May 07:45

MC Bodge

21,551 posts

174 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
faa77 said:
You crying about Brexit?

We're not like the continentals either.
No. It goes back much further than that.

"The continentals"?

ferrisbueller

29,260 posts

226 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
rscott said:
Seems that some law enforcement went in to get their own children out, not to tackle the shooter - https://twitter.com/SawyerHackett/status/152980880...

And the official statement yesterday that a guard was shot by the killer on his way is no longer the official story - they now say he just walked in, unchallenged.

And that the police were outside for about an hour before going in. They handcuffed one parent, but did nothing until the Border Patrol team arrived.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/26/uv...
This is another issue with AR15s, body armour et al. Your security guard and local neighborhood cop is probably outmatched. They know that so they don't engage. Even if they're similarly equipped it is a life threatening scenario and they seemingly often won't engage. They have to be as willing to die as the other guy, perhaps even moreso.

I have no weapons training but I've fired various AR15s and handguns. I know which I'd rather be holding in a gunfight. AR15s are ridiculously easy to handle and use. I'd never fired a gun before but with minimal instruction I never missed a target. With a decent sight hitting paperman in the head was a doddle. A handgun, far more difficult to be accurate, especially as you add some distance to the equation. A security guard down the length of a school hallway would be cannon fodder. Even if they came in equally armed, their prospects are not good. They wait for the people with the equipment and training to deal with the situation. In the meantime, children die.

It's a sorry situation that is going to take a lot of sorting out.

The Rotrex Kid

30,191 posts

159 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
MC Bodge said:
The Rotrex Kid said:
But, but, they were the good guys with guns that stop this kind of thing.

Saddening. What a complete clusterfk. Wake up America.
Exactly.

The "good guys" shouldn't need to be required to put themselves in that position, and many won't.

Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 27th May 07:45
Absolutely. Who would ever want to be law enforcement in the US? When lots of the population have more firepower and body armour than you do.....

ferrisbueller

29,260 posts

226 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
The Rotrex Kid said:
MC Bodge said:
The Rotrex Kid said:
But, but, they were the good guys with guns that stop this kind of thing.

Saddening. What a complete clusterfk. Wake up America.
Exactly.

The "good guys" shouldn't need to be required to put themselves in that position, and many won't.

Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 27th May 07:45
Absolutely. Who would ever want to be law enforcement in the US? When lots of the population have more firepower and body armour than you do.....
It's odd that the god thing doesn't work in the way so many of them think. Prayer it seems is not an effective means of protection from guns (or anything else?).

MC Bodge

21,551 posts

174 months

Friday 27th May 2022
quotequote all
ferrisbueller said:
It's odd that the god thing doesn't work in the way so many of them think. Prayer it seems is not an effective means of protection from guns (or anything else?).
Prayer does sod-all.

Sorry if that upsets anybody.