Between the Lines: Yes, Guns Kill
The NRA's convenient dogma needs a reality check.
Comments (24)Thursday, February 10, 2011
"Guns don't kill people; people do." We've been hearing that slogan from the NRA for years, and it's just as disingenuous now as it ever was.
The NRA is so determined to, well, stick to its guns that even after U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 19 other people were shot in Tucson recently, it warned Congress not to "mess with" the right to carry firearms. Gun rights activists are, if anything, more stubborn now about their rights even to use such accessories as clips that enable the firing of 30 rounds or more with no reload ("Mad Magazine," February 3, 2011), the device that facilitated the mass shooting in Tucson.
Since the NRA still uses this shibboleth to deny that the special technology of guns, even high-powered repeaters, has anything to do with the atrocities in which they're involved, let's take another look at the logic of "guns don't kill people; people do."
The statement's credibility got a setback January 13 when a gun took on a life of its own in a Texas restaurant. A man who was licensed to carry a concealed handgun had forgotten that his gun was in his jacket pocket; it slipped out, hit the floor and fired. The bullet hit a 71-year-old woman in the hip and traveled through her abdomen. That it didn't kill her was just luck. The gun was a Derringer of a sort, local police told one newspaper, "which has a history of easily being discharged."
Does anyone believe that, as the NRA carries on with its agenda to make it legal for people in state after state to carry guns into bars, restaurants, even churches, there won't be more such accidents?
Does anyone think that people who are killed or wounded are somehow less victimized because a shooting is unintentional?
What's going on in heat-packing Texas these days is like an updated cowboy movie on crack. One evening last September, when a couple in Corpus Christi had friends over, a guest picked up a gun and killed the hostess with one bullet because, he said, he thought he was "firing" a gun-shaped cigarette lighter. Press reports did not explain why a gun was lying around so casually that someone who claimed not even to know it was a gun picked it up.
Two years ago in October, the Valley was rocked when eight-year-old Christopher Bizilj died after accidentally shooting himself in the head with an UZI at a gun meet. Guns don't kill people? An UZI is a combat weapon that can shoot up to 1,700 rounds a minute, and the kick is so rapid that the gun, while firing, is physically hard to handle. Some believe that's how it came to be turned on the child's head.
If it were true that people, not guns, kill (or wound) people, then in these cases there should have been a responsible person. Yet a grand jury declined to indict the Corpus Christi shooter; no charge has yet been filed in the Kingwood case; and the first of three defendants to be charged in the UZI incident has been acquitted—all because the view that evidently prevailed, unlike the NRA's, was that the guns had done the shooting, in one case without human agency, in all three without human intent.
To get the perspective of someone who deals with guns on a regular basis, the Advocate talked with Sgt. John Delaney, a 29-year veteran of the Springfield Police Department. Delaney has spent 24 of those years with the Department's narcotics division and has arrested, he says, over 5,000 people. "I firmly believe the gun laws should be stricter than they are," he said. "When I first got into narcotics, if we found a gun, we would talk about it for a week. Now when we go on raids, it's an event when we don't find a gun."
The idea that a proliferation of guns in the hands of law-abiding owners is harmless doesn't square with his experience. "Most of the guns come from people getting their guns stolen, and they get out on the street," he said. The owners may be licensed, they may be good citizens, but "their homes are getting broken into and the guns are stolen."
As for the statement that guns don't kill people, Delaney said, "There's definitely flaws to it. The availability of a weapon for somebody who intends to kill somebody makes the crime more inevitable."
The gun is a mechanical tool, the computer is an electronic tool, the airplane is an electromechanical tool, left unto themselves they just sit there not helping nor harming a sole nor if left unto themselves are they capable of helping nor harming a sole. So what is it about that fact that is difficult for emotion blinded libs, such as yourself, to understand?
Another Liberal trying to infringe on our constitutional rights !!! Wake Up America !!!
It is true that a gun is a tool of destruction it is indifferent to good or bad that can only be determined by the hand that weilds it, yes there should be licensing and background checks. As for the bizilj case all involved including the father should have gone to jail .God bless all the men and women police officers theirsis a truely a nobel calling . One has to wonder when officer Delaney retires if he will choose to give up his right to carry knowing what is out there. On to Texas obviously they have no comencense gun laws nothing left to be said there. As to carnage in Arizona their should be backround checks but living here in the Happy VAlley is one thing. How would we feal living on the border with the drug traficking and cartels. How would we feal not being able to protect our families.
"good or bad...can only be determined by the hand that weilds the gun"
This supposes that every time a gun is discharged some kind of thought went into firing it. Deadly accidents happen all the time, though, and often the circumstances under which a gun is fired at someone else don't lend themselves to careful reasoning.
Remember that the Nobel peace prize is financed largely through the sale of dynamite--when that stuff was invented in 1895, Mr. Nobel was convinced because of the severity of the blast his new invention caused, no government would ever want to wage war again. One would think that after having just lived through the most violent and deadly century of human existence, that the idea of guns offering protection to anyone is laughable. For every family "protected" by a gun in the house, millions more innocents have been killed by them. Lots and lots of people kill people with guns every day. Instead of getting rid of people, I think it's time to get rid of guns.
"Deadly accidents happen all the time, though, and often the circumstances under which a gun is fired at someone else don't lend themselves to careful reasoning."
Deadly accidents do happen all the time. People should be held accountable for their accidents as they are for vehicular accidents, workplace accidents, all kinds of accidents. We don't however throw the proverbial baby out with the bath water, especially when there are redeeming factors involved.
"Remember that the Nobel peace prize is financed largely through the sale of dynamite--when that stuff was invented in 1895, Mr. Nobel was convinced because of the severity of the blast his new invention caused, no government would ever want to wage war again"
And he was wrong, as are you. Humanity has been in a state of almost perpetual war starting shortly after the rise of civilization. We don't live in a NERF world and never will. Our founding fathers recognized and understood the inevitable progression that governments take. A fledgling democracy eventually evolves into an oligarchy and eventually a tyrrany. This last stage is important for the populace to have the means to protect individual liiberty from a tyrannical state.
"that the idea of guns offering protection to anyone is laughable. For every family "protected" by a gun in the house, millions more innocents have been killed by them."
Really? Laughable? I think that statement is laughable but mainly to criminals that see you as a target.
As far as Millions of victims per family protected. Please cite sources. Your numbers don't add up. There are only around three hundred million people in the good ol US of A, so only a few hundred peoples lives have been saved?
I think it is fine to have an opinion, I have lots of them but you don't have a right to make up facts. That is what conservatives do.
I believe to live and let live. As I don't tell others to not have an abortion I would expect to not be told I can't carry a gun.
There are numerous gun laws currently on the books.
People currently obtain and keep fire arms in violation of those laws.
Mass Murder is currently a crime.
People currently commit murder in violation of that law.
Guns exist and passing a new law won't change that fact.
A person who has decided to commit mass murder will not be deterred by any gun law (see: guns exist) and will obtain the tool they desire. If for some reason they couldn't get one, they would find another way to inflict an equal amount of damage.
Bottom line: We need to stop dangerous people, not their tools.
For CP: No one has ever defended thier person, family, or home with the threat of an aircraft or personal computer. People have done so with guns. In addition, many would-be rampages done by the likes of the Tuscon shooter have been minimized by good citizens who had a hand gun on them or in their car. Look it up.
"The reason you don't hear regular reports of people keeping their families safe with guns is because it doesn't happen all that often..."
or
It's not reported that often. Again, don't take my word for it - look it up.
It's great how our Constitution is slowly being eaten away by our own government. People wake up because if we don't soon we are going to become a socialistic society. The issue is not guns or speech. It's our own government and media outlets causing us to change what our country stands for. Everone one of us is so self centered and always point the blame towards others. Take accountability for yourself. Our punishments for crimes is too soft and criminals now a days are not affraid of committing crimes. Our country was founded and fought for by everday people and now we are all destroying what they fought for. I wish I could see this country come together as one but I know it won't happen. EVER
If it wasn't a gun, it would be a knife. If not a knife, then it would be a baseball bat, if not a baseball bat, it would be someones bare hands.
No matter what the device, a sick mind will prevail.
You print the same one sided views every day. Since you surely wont give gun people a chance to speak, i have decided to donate all my yearly contributions to the NRA this year. I will no longer read your paper.
PS. Last year my donations totaled $32.000.00
New York City stabbing spree man kills stepfather, ex-girlfriend, and her mother. He stole a car and ran down his fourth victim and at least four other people are wounded. WOW, this is very sad, families destroyed and for what only Maksim Gelman knows the answer. We can spend the rest of our lives pointing fingers at each other and post coments about how right we are . We can hang out with our friends and bitch about the other side because we feal safe. We can work towards a resonable solution that can be some where in the middle. How these people died and by what instrument probably does not matter to the families, all they know is one thing, they will never see their loved ones again.
Mark,
First off, I’m not your intern. Nothing I’m saying is a brand spanking new concept and you should at least be aware of the argument. I’m not going to spend all day pulling links to spoon-feed information to you. Second, there’s obviously no empirical evidence regarding self defense that is not reported. However, there is much anecdotal evidence showing that people are afraid to report when they show their gun as a deterrent. Ultimately, however, this doesn’t even matter that much.
Your essential argument is that, because some people are irresponsible (stupid domestic disputes, road rage, etc), the right to bear arms – something that is fundamental in our country’s constitution as a right for self preservation and the ability to fight an oppressive government – should not be allowed for good and lawful citizens. I shouldn’t have to tell you that is a very week argument.
It also does nothing to refute my overall point: No gun law will remove them from the streets. People who decide they want to murder will not be deterred by any gun law. Banning guns will be the equivalent of the war on drugs. Despite the laws, they are still quite easy to get.
Thank you.
Mark,
The British police MOSTLY don't carry guns for this historical reason.
"In the United Kingdom, the majority of police officers do not carry firearms, except in special circumstances."
"This originates from the formation of the Metropolitan Police Service in the 19th century, when police were not armed, partly to counter public fears and objections concerning armed enforcers as this had been previously seen due to the British Army maintaining order when needed.
You see this fits whith what our founding fathers feared. A tyranny. The British peole were more afraid of a tyrrany from their own governmnet than they were concerned with their personal safety.
You seem to be of the idea that personal safety trumps all, but this is ultimately untrue. Ultimately when a government becomes tyrannical public safety is achieved but at the cost of personal freedom. Personal freedom is lost to the state. This sounds improbable, and unlikely in a country such as America but it is a fear that our founders were concerned with. As unprobable as it seems it is more probable than your viewpoint. For example you have said nothing about HOW you would achieve your utopia. If my scenario is unprobable please tell me how are you going to get rid of the hundreds of millions of guns that are already in the hands of the citizenry? You have not answered any of my questions, but rather just ask more of others. Please do tell what your plan would be. The devils always in the details.
BobbyD - I think those are great points and illustrates common thought about the 2nd amendment in general. So many of us feel relatively safe in our homes and on the street, and we also feel confident that our votes and/or peaceful protests are enough to keep our government in check. While luckily that is true in 2011, we can't become complacent and forget why those rights were enacted in the first place. The first thing any tyranical gov't does is disarm its citizens.
Gun policy should not be driven by some unfortunate accidents. But while the right to bear arms is clearly established in the constitution and has been confirmed by the Supreme Court, there is a question that rarely seems to get asked or answered. Should there be limits on the type of "arms" we can bear?
By stating that "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.", the framers of the Bill of Rights in our constitution were clearly concerned about the citizen's ability join a fight to keep our nation free in the event of an external attack, especially since at the time, our nation did not have a large and powerful standing army. Although the amendment it is not explicitly worded to address a threat to our freedoms from the government, it's not unreasonable to believe, given their distrust of the government they had just broken away from, that they would have also envisioned that this right was also important to keep our own governement in check. That said, they certainly they never envisioned today's weaponry, whether it be automatic weapons or some of the ammunition types available that can endanger even a heavily armored law enforcement officer, legitimatly enforcing laws to fight criminal activity.
So, should we and where do we draw the line on the "arms" we can legally bear? Are easily concealable automatic weapons OK? Armor peircing ammunition? How about grenade launchers? Shoulder fired surface to air missles? While some would argue that the public should be able to arm itself with any weapon that the police or military can use, in order to protect ourselves from government run amok, there are clear dangers from the easy availabliity of ever more powerful weaponry in the wrong hands. This scenario plays itself out daily in the Middle East and parts of Africa and as close as the border towns of Mexico where heavily armed drug cartels are able to overwhelm police and military units.
In addition to the danger posed to law enforcement by ever more sophisticated and powerful weapons falling into the hands of criminals, scenarios like the recent mass shooting in Arizona where Congresswoman Giffords and the other victims were shot, present a clear view of another very likely source of danger from the proliferation of advanced weaponry, the extremely well armed but unstable individual.
This is not an easy question to answer but one that needs to be seriously pondered and debated, so that we, as a society, can balance our cherished right to bear arms, protecting the legitimate rights of hunters, sport shooters, collectors and other gun enthusiasts with a sane approach to limiting the proliferation of ever more dangerous weapons.
M.R. You need to look up the definition of Proven, and Tyranny! You don't seem to understand either. Ask a Irish catholic about British tyranny. See if they agree with you. I seem to remember an incident called Bloody Sunday where British troops killed 26 unarmed protesters, I think? Seems pretty tyrannical. Either way it is evidence but not proof, just as anecdotal evidence doesn't PROVE anything. I am still waiting for answers to my previous question. HOW would you propose to achieve your goal of a gun free America? I really want to know.
"The Mirror conceded that the CBS anchorman was correct. Except for murder and rape, it admitted, "Britain has overtaken the US for all major crimes.""
http://reason.com/archives/2002/11/01/gun-controls-twisted-outcome
"While England has not yet reached the American level of murders, it has already surpassed the United States in rates of robbery and burglary. Moreover, in recent years the murder rate in England has been going up under still more severe gun control laws, while the murder rate in the United States has been going down as more and more states have allowed private citizens to carry concealed weapons"
http://www.capitalismmagazine.com/law/guns/2205-Gun-Control-Myths-The-Case-England.html
England is a great example when it comes to crime in general. And again, the first thing any tyranical government does is disarm its citizens. (Now, that doesn't necessarily mean it's a conscious action toward the goal of tyranny.) Our founding fathers understood the importance of the 2nd amendment for a natural right to self-defense and to give citizens a fighting chance against a corrupt government. In 2011 it's easy for someone in the United States to believe no harm could be done from banning all guns.
That said, banning guns won't stop crime. It will only turn our whole country into a gun free zone... you know.... like Virginia Tech, any school... the mall... shooters like to do their shooting in gun free zones.
I wish liberals would give up this stubborn argument and move on. It's your version of what the right does with abortion. There will never be enough support to repeal the 2nd amendment or ban abortion. Let's move on. You're wrong on this.
I agree with K 100%. Thanks for doing the ground work on that response, well done. Even though I am a PROGRESSIVE LIBERAL I carry a gun and like to hunt and fish. I don't think this has to be a Liberal/Conservative issue. I think this issue as in most issues are answered in the Constitution. I think SOCIAL issues should be left up the the individual. I think the government is there for economic issues and that's about it. I am for socialism like fire departments and police departments. I like my roads too. I think taxes should be a sliding scale. There is something called a SOCIAL CONTRACT invoved to have a society. I think the super rich and corporations don't pay enough taxes, they use an inordinate amount of what the Founders called the "Commons", (Roads, infrastructure) that they use to make money, but they don't want to pay for it. Much of these problems arise form lobbying that allowed for very bad trade policy, but I am getting off subject. The point is this. This issue has been made partisan for fundraising reasons. This right to bear arms is not going away. That I am sure.
MR - Just to confirm... that's the one aspect of my comments that you choose to address? Well played.
Meanwhile, murders in the US have declined for the last 5 years and shockingly England has seen an increase in attempted murder with a knife..... a shocking statastic that couldn't have been forseen by logic and common sense.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/jul/16/crime-figures-recession-impact
(It doesn't go unnoticed that you fail to address the basic foundation of the 2nd amendment.)
Also and for the record, I don't own a gun or plan on getting one any time soon.
By the way, this will all be summarized soon in my piece called "Yes, knives kill"
Was the information accurate? Was it inconvenient for you? I do find the propaganda from the right to be regrettable and often based in lies, but that being said I also find the propaganda about THIS issue from the left to be equally unfair. To whine about T-Shirts is intellectually bankrupt and just an attempt to provoke. The bottom line is this. We have had a long history of gun ownership in this country. It is part of our culture. It is based on our Founding Fathers distrust of government and in our pioneer history of settlement. Talk truth and I'll listen. Where is your research? You just make things up.
You didn't just preach about good research and then post a wikipedia link. Wait, that's exactly what you did. Absolutely priceless.
Weeks after returning from Europe after years, I came home from work to find my home had been burglarized and the moron had lit his way with a book of matches, dropping them on the floor (mostly carpeted) so I was thankful the house didn’t burn down.
Several months later, my wife came from Germany and when I brought her to her new home, someone was climbing out of a back window. They apparently didn’t have time enough so nothing was missing.
The next day, I bought a .22 pistol.
My wife, for whom the gun was bought, had never touched a gun of any kind before so after we waited the 5 days, we went to the desert with an empty carton.
We didn’t see where her first shot landed but the second, along with the rest, all hit the carton from about 40 feet.
I felt better about her being home alone while I was at work.
Years later, after we had moved away from the former residential neighborhood that was in a state of decay, on a small country road, a truckload of either Hispanics or Native Americans decided to play bumper tag with my wife driving alone on her way home.
She was then carrying a .38 semiautomatic and she waved it out of the window.
They fell way back.
One night returning home, we happened to hear from ¼ mile away that our mailbox was being bashed again so I rolled silently down our hill to get close enough before starting the engine and chased the punks who were plaguing the neighborhood until they stopped at a conclave of trailers occupied by illegals and held them at gunpoint while the rancher/neighbor called the Sheriffs Dept. who then came to arrest them.
There had formed a threatening crowd but they backed off after I hollered at them that I had caught these miscreants bashing mailboxes.
The two drunken teens had been doing this for months so the Hispanics had no sympathy for them and no longer anger with us.
We left that state (California) some years ago and one of the reasons we now live where we do (West Virginia) is because the gun laws here finally allow me to carry a concealed weapon legally after taking a state-approved course.
For ~35 years my wife and I both were ‘criminal’ because of the restrictions which prevented us from doing so but considering the history we have with that period, we feel no guilt.
Those who use guns in the commission of ANY crime should definitely be locked up and NOT released early for ‘good behavior.’ By misusing a weapon, they have already established that their behavior is not acceptable.
It has been found that reported (most are not) use of a gun in the prevention of a crime happens far more often than the number of times a gun is used during the commission of one.
Most LEOs will admit they are helpless when it comes to protecting anyone. They can only hope to catch the lowlife who has made you a victim and do not object to citizen arms ownership.
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3 instances of dumb people letting dumb things happen with guns. I bet I can find at least 3 instances of dumb people doing dumb things with cars that end up killing someone every single day.