cimorene: SGA's Sheppard and McKay, two men standing in an overgrown sunlit field (pastoral)
Cimorene ([personal profile] cimorene) wrote2006-08-25 04:19 pm
Entry tags:

HOLY COW

i just got email from my dad:

"One of the teachers at mom's school was shot and killed in a barroom fight in Greensboro.  It was, according to the rumor I heard, over an insult given to his wife and he pulled a gun out of his car as did the other guy.  Both are dead.  Details have not been released but it's obviously a sad waste.  He was pretty young and I think the other guy was too."

and this is why guns are bad, people.

[identity profile] frahulettaes.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 02:54 pm (UTC)(link)
but according to the NRA, guns don't kill people, people kill people...I've always thought that reasoning was totally suspect. Because the gun makes intent lethal. Without the gun you just have fist fights. IMHO.
I'm sorry for his wife.

[identity profile] meimi.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 06:36 pm (UTC)(link)
Or a knife fight, which can basically be just as lethal. Sadly, us humans don't exactly need guns to kill each other.

[identity profile] frahulettaes.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 06:45 pm (UTC)(link)
no indeed, but why should be continue to make it any easier?

[identity profile] meimi.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 06:56 pm (UTC)(link)
I simply have no faith in humanity. Even if guns were taken away, I don't think there would be that much of a difference in the long run. We'd simply come up with more creative ways to kill each other. That's not to say that it isn't worth the effort to try, mind you, it's just that I wouldn't hold my breath on it actually solving anything in the long run.

[identity profile] frahulettaes.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 07:18 pm (UTC)(link)
Well, the statistics don't bear you out. Countries with low gun ownership also have very low murder rates. Any kind of murder.

[identity profile] meimi.livejournal.com 2006-08-25 07:33 pm (UTC)(link)
Statistics are interesting, but they're not absolute (because different countries are different countries). In the United States, at least, I think it's already beyond the point of making a difference whether people have guns or not. Asides from knife deaths, we'd probably see an escalation in people simply being run over by cars along with lots of people learning how to make homemade bombs. It would be nice to be proven wrong, but I simply cannot hold any hope in people actually changing.