Well since you prefaced it with a "maybe," if you're comparing Europe and America, then what are the differences? Are there stricter gun laws in Europe? Is hunting (a hobby that involves guns) as popular a pastime in Europe? All of these things would be factors in determining how available guns would be to your average criminal or crazy.

And then if you're going to compare just gun violence, how does America stack up to the rest of the world in terms of other violent crime, like assaults and domestic abuse? My gut tells me that you'd find that in the Northern Hemisphere, it's pretty consistent across the board. Already we have two people from the UK on this very thread relating anecdotal evidence of violent crimes that didn't involve guns or Americans.

I absolutely believe that this is an phenomenon America shouldn't be proud of, but I think the issue runs much deeper than that and is much more universal. I echo Atom's sentiments: this is part of a larger human problem that we're going to have to deal with until the idea of being violent towards another person is a thought as unpalatable as eating raw sewage.

And to bring it all together and bring back khanate's fundamentally flawed concept of the "model home" in some country in the Middle East: why is that AK-47 there in the first place?

i think it's kinda silly to compare the middle east and/or africa to the western world

there's a MAJOR difference between some stupid teen/20 year old going nato at some randoms at school because he's depressed and what is happening in the middle east/africa. I am obviously not condoning it but there's a whole lot more going on here

what about cult of celebrity, after how much (excessive?) press the columbine shootings got, this has some some part to play i think in the shootings that have happened since then. this is really just a guess but with how fucked celebrityism it makes sense to me

also, the stuff referred to here in london, at least on my part, is gang violence - lots of it are rival 'postcode' gang attacks/retaliations

I live just outside Liverpool.

As khanate said, without guns when people get into scuffles it gets violent in more creative ways a lot quicker. Chap who I went to school with had a paving slab dropped on his head

although the story is intriguing and tragic... I really wish it wasn't front page news

And THAT is the main problem right there.

you're kidding right?

Kidding about how the media makes these kids front page news and that none of the victims get anything in the paper other than a number of how many of them there were and broadcast it all over the world? Then no.

oh right, misinterpreted what you were saying, sorry!

Hey no worries I can see how that might have been misunderstood. I agree 100% that is an extremly tragic situation.

Ummm, because Russia put them there. What's your point? The whole point of this thread was to talk about the increasing rate of these fucked up situations, mainly school shootings in the USA which doesn't happen at this rate in ANY OTHER COUNTRY IN THE WORLD. Count how many have happened so far the past 3 months alone. I'm not going by my gut-feeling, I'm going by the factual statistics.

Kids in Yemen don't take their dads guns to school and wipe out a few dozen of their classmates, they have much bigger problems to worry about. Like being forced into the army at age 10 and younger. For the record I never said this was a "model home". Nice try.

...and speaking of statistics, they prove that the amount of gun-related violence has nothing to do with the easy access to firearms - there are countries that have way more guns than America but nowhere near the amount of gun-related violence. "Just sayin"...

Come on. If there is a home with an AK-47 in it, then the people living in that home have found some reason to have it there and are open to the idea of using it one day. That's my point. Don't blame Mr. Kalashnikov, he would have preferred that they have a lawnmower instead.Well, it may not have been committed by a student, but there is a particularly horrifying incident in Yemen's history involving a school shootout:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanaa_massacreBy holding it up as an example against the US and saying that it's better, you are doing just that.

I'd also argue that this kind of thing probably does happen frequently in underdeveloped countries, we just don't hear much about it because our press and/or theirs doesn't report on it.

So no, I really can't see this as a uniquely American thing. Does it seem more frequent here? Absolutely. But so does anorexia and bulimia, and you can't say that those things don't happen anywhere else.

This just shows that you don't have enough knowledge about the region and Russian involvement in the middle-east to be making these statements.


Again, you're speculating. I'm going by the statistics, not my gut feeling. the past year has seen many of these situations unfold in this country to the point where it has been recognized as a phenomenon. Why you choose to contest this is beyond me (unless of course you voted for Bush, are a member of the NRA, and believe we should be occupying Iraq).

Well Stephen Colbert would tell you that's your problem, right there!

Haha, well he's a joker so I wouldn't listen to him seriously if I were you

BTW, I'm not talking about Fox News Network statistics, or even CNN for that matter!

you think it was just the russians that armed the middle east? yo, you guys armed the taliban to combat the ruskis during the cold war

Where did I say it was JUST the Russians? I was asked why I thought there were so many AK-47s in the middle-east - it's a Russian firearm. I'm not about to get into a fully detailed debate about the history of mistakes made in the middle-east. This thread has suffered enough derailment already. Go read a book.

agreed!

haha my bad again (and will do)

This is all about guns being available as easy as candy bars.

Murders happen elsewhere, but how many people are you going to take out with a club or butcher knife?

Ban all private gun owership.

Don't even get me fuckin' started . . . the world is somehow managing to reverse the theory of evolution . . .


*Post self edited because I sound like a cynical old fuck . . .

Bombs can be EASILY made from stuff you can buy at Home Depots. The information's on the internet too. I learned pre-internet from a desire to destroy things (luckily I never hurt anyone/thing as a young idiot) and some books.

Not saying anything against what you feel on private gun ownership, just saying there's easier ways to take out larger groups of people.

Also people who WANTED guns (criminals mainly) would still be able to get them at this point, even after a ban in the US.

Just playing devils advocate, not saying I'm one way or the other.

How would that work? Would you take away the guns that people already own?

Would you just stop all future sales of guns? Would sporting guns (hunting rifles, shotguns, and target pistols) be included in the ban?

Would this entail an amendment to the constitution or do you read the Second Amendment to be a right to have armed militia only?

I am not busting your chops, just curious about the last statement and how you see it's implications.

First off, the shooting that happened at the school is a sad thing. Let's not forget that. Secondly, I feel that this world, no matter where you are, will have their own type of violence and people dieing. Yeah, it seems that the USA has the most news about the killing and shooting in schools and so on, but I feel that that's because the other countries report anything major that happens in the USA. I mean Japan heard about the SF Tiger attack, but do we hear anything like that happen in Japan in our local news?? Does this mean animal attacks don't happen in other countries???? I don't feel like it is true. Shoot, they even showed some dude in the USA thinking he was a ninja, swinging his sword in public and cops trying to detain him with a water hose while I was in Japan. It just seems like,to me, anything negative about USA will be shown in other countries, but negative things about other countries will either not be shown here or it will be a 5 second report where everyone forgets.

Banning guns will never happen. It's too late. They can start now but it's never going to be the point where everyone in the world will not have one. There will always be that one person.

i'm sorry. I probably not making any sence. I just wish that all this violence and killing will stop......but I already know it won't.

But they HAVEN'T used homemade bombs...they've used handguns. If handguns weren't as readily available as they are, you'd see far less of this. Even if the bombmaking guide is out there, it's still alot easier to procure a handgun. If you do a handgun ban, you have to go full bore; you go after handgun manufacturers as well as dealers. Unfortunately, it's far too entwined in our history and culture. And those who talk about it being a cultural thing are right, too.....we've simply stopped giving a shit about each other.

Just a little tidbit about AK-47...THE most produced assault rifle ever. Russians started it, but there are at least 20 other countries producing them because it's easy and effective.