Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - The Roots of Mass Murder

And how do you explain the gun violence in Mexico which has some of the strictest gun laws in the world?  That is the fault of the NRA as well? This is a complex matter that defies easy solutions. Those who believe that they have all the answers are deluding themselves and are not contributing to finding the right trade off between safety and freedom. Ultimately, that is what we seeking, forget about a "solution."

Cherno

Sent from my iPhone

On Dec 24, 2012, at 7:35 PM, kenneth harrow <harrow@msu.edu> wrote:

as far as i am concerned, there is little difference between the mentally ill people who have committed these atrocious murders and the people who sell them guns, sell guns to those who sell them guns, provide conditions where they can get the guns. that is the real truth: there is no debate under these conditions of insanity: we have made it possible for maniacs to kill our children, and then we say, well, let's talk about it???
ok, i'll tell a story:
we were in cameroon in 1979 when a killing occurred in the south, somewhere near douala. it was horrific: someone had killed a family, including an infant, and put it in a drawer.
do you know what people said about this murder, which was so horrible and unusual, that in the two years i was there it was the only one of its kind?
it must have been americans, that's what they said. only they would be violent enough to have a jonestown, or to commit acts that normal people wouldn't ever do.
ken

On 12/24/12 6:58 PM, Anunoby, Ogugua wrote:

"i strongly believe we should declare an end to the debate: either you are against mass murders or you are not. either you oppose those who enable it or you don't. i refuse to engage this on any other level."

kh

 

I am sorry Ken but we must not "declare an end to the debate". If we do the other side wins and they must not. win.

Guns like all weapons can be tools for good and evil depending on how and when they are employed. It is strange to the serious that anyone would argue for example that it is people and not guns that kill.

A missing strain in the argument against gun violence or one that is not argued well enough is the matter of access to guns. If fewer people have access to guns, there will be fewer cases of gun violence it seems to me.

It is very well for the case to be made for a ban on assault-class guns and high capacity magazines. This ban even after it is successful may not result is significant decline in gun violence. There are too many guns out there already. The brisk business done in thousands of gun-shows all over the country ensures the uncontrolled recycling of existing privately owned guns from existing owners to new and sometimes unworthy owners.

Has anyone noticed that opponents of gun control have apparently argued successfully that all perpetrators of mass murder using guns have one mental illness or another? Let us assume for a moment that the case is true. There will be fewer cases of gun based mass murder if access to old and new guns is reduced. Fewer mentally ill persons will have access to guns they may use to end theirs and others' lives.

What about legal sanctioning of gun owners whose guns are employed for mass murder? If you own a car and your car, driven by another with or without your knowledge or permission, hurts or kills someone in public space for example, you, the owner of the car will be vicariously liable in the least. If your dog walked by somebody for example, bit somebody else in a public space, you may be liable for that dog bite. Why do gun owners not have same liability? We must all remember that anyone in the country could be a victim of mass murder as some have been, unfairly and unjustly. All it takes is to be at the wrong place at the "right time".

The case is rightly made that the constitution's second amendment guarantees citizens' right to bear arms. Is it reasonably conceivable that today's construction of that amendment was the intention of the founding father? Could they have intended that citizens bear arms to take their own and others' lives individually or collectively for private reason(s)? The Supreme Court, perhaps more than Congress, can more quickly bring herself to bear on this matter, for the sake of past and future innocent victims of gun violence.

 

oa

 

 

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From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of kenneth harrow [harrow@msu.edu]
Sent: Sunday, December 23, 2012 6:21 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - The Roots of Mass Murder

gun control works all over the world. the first statement in this article denying it is idiotic. it isn't really even worth debating any more: it is completely morally indefensible to argue the point. people like krauthammer who want to argue that there are studies or arguments proving gun control doesn't work are no different from those who argue the same about flooding world markets with weapons. they share the responsibility for the murders that follow.
i accuse krauthammer and the nra of enabling the murders like those in newton: any arguments mounted on their behalf are simply excuses for mass murdering. there is only one word for them: abominable
i strongly believe we should declare an end to the debate: either you are against mass murders or you are not. either you oppose those who enable it or you don't. i refuse to engage this on any other level.
ken harrow

On 12/23/12 6:58 PM, Toyin Falola wrote:

NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE          www.nationalreview.com           PRINT

The Roots of Mass Murder By Charles Krauthammer December 20, 2012 8:00 P.M. Every mass shooting has three elements: the killer, the weapon, and the cultural climate. As soon as the shooting stops, partisans immediately pick their preferred root cause, with its corresponding pet panacea. Names are hurled, scapegoats paraded, prejudices vented. The argument goes nowhere. Let's be serious: The Weapon  Within hours of last week's Newtown, Conn., massacre, the focus was the weapon and the demand was for new gun laws. Several prominent pro-gun Democrats remorsefully professed new openness to gun control. Senator Dianne Feinstein is introducing a new assault-weapons ban. And the president emphasized guns and ammo above all else in announcing the creation of a new task force. I have no problem in principle with gun control. Congress enacted (and I supported) an assault-weapons ban in 1994. The problem was: It didn't work. (So concluded a University of Pennsylvania study commissioned by the Justice Department.) The reason is simple. Unless you are prepared to confiscate all existing firearms, disarm the citizenry, and repeal the Second Amendment, it's almost impossible to craft a law that will be effective. Feinstein's law, for example, would exempt 900 weapons. And that's the least of the loopholes. Even the guns that are banned can be made legal with simple, minor modifications. Most fatal, however, is the grandfathering of existing weapons and magazines. That's one of the reasons the 1994 law failed. At the time, there were 1.5 million assault weapons in circulation and 25 million large-capacity (i.e., more than ten bullets) magazines. A reservoir that immense can take 100 years to draw down. The Killer  Monsters shall always be with us, but in earlier days they did not roam free. As a psychiatrist in Massachusetts in the 1970s, I committed people — often right out of the emergency room — as a danger to themselves or to others. I never did so lightly, but I labored under none of the crushing bureaucratic and legal constraints that make involuntary commitment infinitely more difficult today. Why do you think we have so many homeless? Destitution? Poverty has declined since the 1950s. The majority of those sleeping on grates are mentally ill. In the name of civil liberties, we let them die with their rights on. A tiny percentage of the mentally ill become mass killers. Just about everyone around Tucson shooter Jared Loughner sensed he was mentally ill and dangerous. But in effect, he had to kill before he could be put away — and (forcibly) treated. Random mass killings were three times more common in the 2000s than in the 1980s, when gun laws were actually weaker. Yet a 2011 University of California at Berkeley study found that states with strong civil-commitment laws have about a one-third lower homicide rate. The Culture  We live in an entertainment culture soaked in graphic, often sadistic, violence. Older folks find themselves stunned by what a desensitized youth finds routine, often amusing. It's not just movies. Young men sit for hours pulling video-game triggers, mowing down human beings en masse without pain or consequence. And we profess shock when a small cadre of unstable, deeply deranged, dangerously isolated young men go out and enact the overlearned narrative. If we're serious about curtailing future Columbines and Newtowns, everything — guns, commitment, culture — must be on the table. It's not hard for President Obama to call out the NRA. But will he call out the ACLU? And will he call out his Hollywood friends? The irony is that over the last 30 years, the U.S. homicide rate has declined by 50 percent. Gun murders as well. We're living not through an epidemic of gun violence but through a historic decline. Except for these unfathomable mass murders. But these are infinitely more difficult to prevent. While law deters the rational, it has far less effect on the psychotic. The best we can do is to try to detain them, disarm them, and discourage "entertainment" that can intensify already murderous impulses. But there's a cost. Gun control impinges upon the Second Amendment; involuntary commitment impinges upon the liberty clause of the Fifth Amendment; curbing "entertainment" violence impinges upon First Amendment–protected free speech. That's a lot of impingement, a lot of amendments. But there's no free lunch. Increasing public safety almost always means restricting liberties. We made that trade after 9/11. We make it every time the TSA invades your body at an airport. How much are we prepared to trade away after Newtown? — Charles Krauthammer is a nationally syndicated columnist. © 2012 the Washington Post Writers Group. Permalink

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