A "common sense" proposal that will piss off both sides

[BuzzH]

The idiots have taken over this thread, may as well lock it up.

 

[406dn]

Outlawed for lethality or concealability? I am suspecting the latter. Again, a little homework on your part is needed.

It must of been some of both. A sawed off shotgun isn't more concealable than the average revolver or pistol, quite a bit more lethal thou in close quarters. They chose to leave handguns off the restricted list.

 

[Shangobango]

Starting to wonder if there are a bunch of U.S. Senators and US. Representatives here, because I suspect that what we have seen in this thread is just about what is going to happen on Capital Hill. Both sides seem to eventually end up with a “my way or the highway” attitude and therefore not one meaningful thing is going to get done about the issue.

It is hard for me to believe that there is no middle ground, but the proof is in the pudding.

 

[ImBillT]

Hey Bill, do you think those carrying Texas teachers will be willing to die for the kids they teach? We know the trained police were not.

Serious question.

I’ll answer the question, but first I have to say that I don’t think it’s valid. When a gunman walks into a classroom, teachers aren’t really given the choice between dying to save their kids, or living. Chances are, the teacher is going to die, and the choice isn’t really his/hers. The teacher may choose to fight for a chance at life. Additionally, being allowed to secretly carry concealed, if they chose, doesn’t really change their options, it only gives them an additional tool if they choose to fight for their survival.

Now to answer your question. Some teachers are willing to die for their students, and some aren’t. That’s been proven in just about every school shooting. I wouldn’t ask a teacher to do so. That’s not their job. But is it their job to die unarmed because it gives someone outside the situation a warm fuzzy feeling to know that a teacher isn’t allowed to be armed? A teacher secretly carrying concealed, does not lead to an armed gunman entering his/her room. I don’t think it changes the likelihood that the gunman will attempt to kill them either. I hear arguments that a victim having a gun during a rape or robbery actually makes the situation more likely to be worse, but you can’t make the same assumption on school shooting. As far as I know, school shootings are almost always motivated by the shooter wanting to murder helpless victims. That’s completely different from the motivation behind most other crimes.

Furthermore, you’re absolutely right to notice that the police were not, in any school shooting that I’m aware of, ready and willing to risk their lives to enter a school building and defend school children without first wasting a tremendous amount of valuable time. This isn’t the same thing as allowing a teacher to secretly carry concealed. It doesn’t have anything to do with A) whether a teacher/coach/principle/band director etc. would will to die for their students because 1) the police do not usually have the same connection to those students, and 2) The teacher doesn’t have the same options the police do. The teacher is already stuck in the school and if confronted by the gunman, isn’t suddenly in less danger because he/she is unarmed. The police officer outside the building doesn’t have a gun in his face, or pointed at a child two feet away from him.

I hadn’t explicitly mentioned “secretly concealed carry” in other posts, but I had assumed it. I’d have to double check, but I believe that the TX that allows teachers to carry if their district approves it, requires that they carry concealed, and that it isn’t public knowledge who does and who does not carry. I do think that’s important. The teacher only becomes a target for carrying if the gunman knows they carry. It reduces a lot of the other made up nightmare scenarios as well.

Now to answer a question you didn’t ask, but when I touched on in an earlier comment. What do I think would happen if all schools allowed teachers to carry? I think 5-10% of teachers would carry. Maybe more in some districts and probably less in others. I think the number of school shootings would probably go down slightly, but it would be impossible to know for sure. I think the number of deaths per school shooting would probably go down slightly.

I live in a district that currently allows teachers to carry. My mother-in-law lives in a district that currently allows teachers to carry. My wife works in a district that does not currently allow teachers to carry. She wishes they did allow it. She also wishes she worked in the district that we live in. It’s hard to get a job in the district we live in. There aren’t many positions and there isn’t much turn over. She hasn’t applied when there has been an opening though, because between a salary cut, and an increase in health insurance for the rest of the family, it would be almost a $12k/year cut in our family budget. Think about that. The small local district where everyone wants to teach allows teachers to carry and has no problem getting teachers while paying $12k/yr less than the large local district that doesn’t allow teachers to carry and has extremely high turnover. Allowing teachers to carry doesn’t mean that teachers will suddenly all quit teaching.


In short, allowing teachers to secretly carry concealed if they choose to, is not asking them to die for their students. It’s not even related. Your question is based on a flawed premise. Preventing teachers from secretly carrying concealed however, removes a tool from the tool box, that some teachers would like to have if a gunman was pointing a gun in their face, or the face of one of their students.

 

[ImBillT]

Come on now. If we’re really striving to be genuine, when has self defense equated to being responsible for enforcing the safety of several hundred students and coworkers? It’s disingenuous to keep suggesting teacher carry is simply about self defense.

Interesting thread premise, predictable result.

At no point have I suggested that a teacher be forced to carry, and at no point have I suggested that choosing to carry meant that said teacher suddenly had any more responsibility to anyone than he/she did if they were not carrying. Next up, find me a school shooting where not one single teacher ended up defending his/her students? There are usually a few teachers who do. Why do you get pleasure from denying them the option to be armed?

So the fact that if you live, your students might also live, invalidates the issue of self-defense?

 

[ImBillT]

Hey Bill, do you think those carrying Texas teachers will be willing to die for the kids they teach? We know the trained police were not.

Serious question.

Go ahead and tell me why my comment was laughable. Do you think that no teachers involved in school shootings have died defending their students? Do you think that having a gun that no one knows they have will attract a gunman to their classroom? Do you think they don’t have a greater connection to their students than the police do? Go ahead and tell me which statement you thought was so funny. You asked a question that you said was genuine. I answered you.

 

[Addicting]

Geeze, try and enjoy spending time outside on this long weekend. Think about all the possibilities you have for those that gave up theirs providing it.

HT will maybe still be here on Tuesday and you can get back to endless squabbling. Go outside!

 

[tjones]

Go ahead and tell me why my comment was laughable. Do you think that no teachers involved in school shootings have died defending their students? Do you think that having a gun that no one knows they have will attract a gunman to their classroom? Do you think they don’t have a greater connection to their students than the police do? Go ahead and tell me which statement you thought was so funny. You asked a question that you said was genuine. I answered you.

All of it Bill, your rants are now confused ramblings.

 

[cedahm]

…at no point have I suggested that choosing to carry meant that said teacher suddenly had any more responsibility to anyone than he/she did if they were not carrying.

Everyone who carries a firearm has more responsibility than when they are not carrying a firearm.

 

[ImBillT]

All of it Bill, your rants are now confused ramblings.

What part was confused. Quote it.

 

[thebestusernamesaretaken]

Allowing teachers to defend themselves forces nothing upon them. Denying them their constitutional right to bear arms forces them to be human shields. There are teachers that want to carry.


I don’t want to be in a school with teachers that “want to carry.” I am open to being in a school with highly trained personal that carry that aren’t teachers. Teachers aren’t supposed to be in that role. My district has 1 armed officer for around 3000 kids. Maybe we should find 1 officer per building? I’m not sure I’d want that, but I’m open to the conversation.

I agree; We pay teachers to teach our children; not to go into the breach. I say let them focus on teaching and let's let the professional guardians do the job of physical security. We should ensure that schools are harder targets, or at least protected as much as we would protect our banks; but we should leave that to the well trained, well disciplined professionals.

Our children are our greatest legacy and humanities future. Do we really want them to be surrounded by hardened armed warriors as teachers while learning in a militaristic environment? I was one of those people for a long time and while there would be benefits to this lifestyle, I think that we can do better. I for one want them to learn to be the best of us.

In every signal incident there are failures that should be learned from and avoided in the future. In the most recent, a police officer didn't shoot a assailant running towards a school after a gunfight in the street, a teacher left the door propped open for a bad guy to get in, a police chief made a poor decision not to directly confront a shooter when the stakes were that high. We get these terrible outcomes because of mistakes made, poor training, poor recruitment, bad leadership and broken oaths. Like Hammsolo stated, these types of incidences are created by our society failures when raising these young people. We want to make since of it and blame something else like gun control but honestly, there is always a chain of environmental events, criminal behavior or an individuals mental health issues that led to this.

Some situations can be changed if intervened early on in a persons life, and those are successes that I doubt will ever be recognized because we honestly will never know. I had teachers that had a very meaningful influence over my actions in small ways, because they acted like they believed in me. I've never told them that. I suspect that there is a lot of that going on.

On the other hand, there are people who just want to burn the world down. All primates including us seem to be genetically predisposed to go to war and some folks loose control of impulses and don't conform to societal norms because they feel like they don't fit in. In those cases, I would want to be able to defend myself and others if necessary. Gun control will not help with those scenarios.

 

[thebestusernamesaretaken]

To your point...

17.7MM modern sporting rifles out there
650,000 is the number given for the Australia buyback... so just ARs would be 27x the size of that...

I couldn't find a number for handguns with a 15rnd capacity but I bet it's something like 20-30 million.




View attachment 223833

I'm not a proponent of banning ARs. Every generation of military has brought home their sportaged version of what they used from riffle to caliper. 30. 06, 308, every bolt action style riffle ever. It's only natural that these types of riffles would be popular today.

If a person were looking at this seriously, they would also need to look at the replacement costs of those excise taxes that are used on range days.

https://www.nssf.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/2022-Firearm-Ammunition-Industry-Economic-Impact.pdf

 

[Deleted member 28227]

I'm not a proponent of banning ARs. Every generation of military has brought home their sportaged version of what they used from riffle to caliper. 30. 06, 308, every bolt action style riffle ever. It's only natural that these types of riffles would be popular today.

If a person were looking at this seriously, they would also need to look at the replacement costs of those excise taxes that are used on range days.
View attachment 224077

https://www.nssf.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/2022-Firearm-Ammunition-Industry-Economic-Impact.pdf

I think that shtick was conceived by a slick marketing team. The AR was patented in 1959… and used as the main US battle rifle for the last 53 years…1994-2004 was the assault weapon ban, in 2012 the production and sales of ARs 10x’d in a single year.

That’s a whole lot of service men that didn’t bring “their service weapon home”.

Personally, I don’t think a ban would be practical or would solve anything, but I find the “service weapon” narrative comical.

Sells lots of guns though…

 

[Deleted member 28227]

@thebestusernamesaretaken also… how many M-14s have you seen? Personally I know 1 person that owns one.

M-1s? I’ve only seen them in gun shops and don’t know anyone that owns one, certainly no one that hunts with them…I’m sure they are out there?

Were either the M1 or M14 popular with sportsmen or for self defense?

Sure the .30-06 and .308 were popular… in bolt action and pump action rifles, but that’s apples to oranges. We aren’t talking about the .223/5.56 being popular in this context.

@BrentD would be the expert here but weren’t revolutionary guns smoothbore and hunters using rifles? Weren’t most folks on the plains using the new lever guns, not muskets?

Would maybe the sharps be an example of weapon of the US military being highly utilized by civilians?

 

[longbow51]

I'm in the mood to pass things on, and gave a Mosin Nagant to a friend in OK who uses it on hogs. Now there's a venerable service weapon.

 

[Randi]

why are we so angry ?

car is driven into crowd yesterday in Neb ( 2 dead, several injured ), 10 year old arrested for threatening mass murder, man stabbed randomly with a knife on a street in N.Y. yesterday , man randomly shoots another man he dont know on the subway, last week. School shooting in Texas.

supposedly violent crime has increased 40% since 2019.. Murder, Rape, Suicides are at historical levels, per capita. My age group 18-34 leads the way, although men far outpace women in all categories.

Covid, lack of police presence, lack of mental health availability, judges to lenient, no bail, more one parent families.

It was interesting to study the chart Wilm posted about the number of people who have been incarcerated since the "war on drugs began"

For me, and my desire to give longer sentences to anyone who uses a weapon during a crime, the chart doesn't deter me, as I am sure there are enough people doing time for a drug crime that doesn't come anywhere close to the one committing a crime with a weapon. Probation for them and incarceration for those who commit crimes with a weapon. AND, while they are inside, mental health help and education for them, as well as a job lined up for them when they are released.

To end this post in a more light hearted way. When wondering what the answer to my question is " why are we so angry" and the statistics that show there is a much higher number of men committing these crimes than women, the thread on this forum titled "shit our wives do" might help us understand why men are so angry

 

[BrentD]

why are we so angry ?
...

To end this post in a more light hearted way. When wondering what the answer to my question is " why are we so angry" and the statistics that show there is a much higher number of men committing these crimes than women, the thread on this forum titled "shit our wives do" might help us understand why men are so angry

In other words, you are proposing that we (men) are driving to our anger by our wives?

Interesting hypothesis. The data seem to support it. (this might be a good time to question any explanation drawn from correlations).

Who knew that women were responsible for all the evil in the world....

Just kidding.
As a good and brilliant friend of mine once wrote, more or less, 'Beware of all explanations offered in the absence of theory. Data without theory can be dangerously misleading.'

 

[VikingsGuy]

why are we so angry ?

car is driven into crowd yesterday in Neb ( 2 dead, several injured ), 10 year old arrested for threatening mass murder, man stabbed randomly with a knife on a street in N.Y. yesterday , man randomly shoots another man he dont know on the subway, last week. School shooting in Texas.

supposedly violent crime has increased 40% since 2019.. Murder, Rape, Suicides are at historical levels, per capita. My age group 18-34 leads the way, although men far outpace women in all categories.

Covid, lack of police presence, lack of mental health availability, judges to lenient, no bail, more one parent families.

It was interesting to study the chart Wilm posted about the number of people who have been incarcerated since the "war on drugs began"

For me, and my desire to give longer sentences to anyone who uses a weapon during a crime, the chart doesn't deter me, as I am sure there are enough people doing time for a drug crime that doesn't come anywhere close to the one committing a crime with a weapon. Probation for them and incarceration for those who commit crimes with a weapon. AND, while they are inside, mental health help and education for them, as well as a job lined up for them when they are released.

To end this post in a more light hearted way. When wondering what the answer to my question is " why are we so angry" and the statistics that show there is a much higher number of men committing these crimes than women, the thread on this forum titled "shit our wives do" might help us understand why men are so angry

Lots of reasons I assume, but one is the decay of prospects for the “working man”. Whether gender, genetics, nuture, culture or a mix of all, most men align their self-worth with what they do and this connects to their need to “provide”.

As we move to an “information economy”, many of the best paying jobs are well suited to a much smaller percentage of people than the blue collar glory days of the 1950s. This is further pushed by “de-industrialization in the US as we move remaining traditional blue collar jobs to cheaper off shore locations so that the “information class” can have an ever expanding list of cheap goods to spend on.

Global information systems have also raised the bar/expectations of what one needs. Lots of studies show that happiness is not driven by a set amount of goods/money, but rather by comparing yourself to your neighbor. When I grew up, comparing myself and my “stuff” to my neighbors in ND was much less daunting than today comparing myself and my “stuff” against Silicon Valley millionaires that I can see every day in YouTube.

The delay in marriage also likely plays a role.

So, we have an increasing percentage of males under the age of 30 who do not have hope/belief that they will be able to even replicate the lifestyle of their parents, let alone exceed it, are not yet in settled family units, fear they can’t provide a home, have shrinking prospects for a rewarding job that will provide sufficient income and stability to raise a family, and they are tapped into a broader culture that devalues them and celebrates the excess of the “information class”.

This is a recipe for disaster. Lots of studies have shown that a rise in unmarried young males correlates with rise in violence and war.

 

[BucksnDucks]

All the rest aside, thanks for keeping 30 pages civil! I am tapping out. Take care.

Over 500 comments, it was a good run VG. I applaud the daunting task of meditating thread. If you choose to run it back, I suggest picking one or two points in an attempt at focused discussion. At times it's herding cats trying to follow broad discussion.

 

[Randi]

Lots of reasons I assume, but one is the decay of prospects for the “working man”. Whether gender, genetics, nuture, culture or a mix of all, most men align their self-worth with what they do and this connects to their need to “provide”.

As we move to an “information economy”, many of the best paying jobs are well suited to a much smaller percentage of people than the blue collar glory days of the 1950s. This is further pushed by “de-industrialization in the US as we move remaining traditional blue collar jobs to cheaper off shore locations so that the “information class” can have an ever expanding list of cheap goods to spend on.

Global information systems have also raised the bar/expectations of what one needs. Lots of studies show that happiness is not driven by a set amount of goods/money, but rather by comparing yourself to your neighbor. When I grew up, comparing myself and my “stuff” to my neighbors in ND was much less daunting than today comparing myself and my “stuff” against Silicon Valley millionaires that I can see every day in YouTube.

The delay in marriage also likely plays a role.

So, we have an increasing percentage of males under the age of 30 who do not have hope/belief that they will be able to even replicate the lifestyle of their parents, let alone exceed it, are not yet in settled family units, fear they can’t provide a home, have shrinking prospects for a rewarding job that will provide sufficient income and stability to raise a family, and they are tapped into a broader culture that devalues them and celebrates the excess of the “information class”.

This is a recipe for disaster. Lots of studies have shown that a rise in unmarried young males correlates with rise in violence and war.

As always, an excellent reply and I thank you for it. We have studied this and many of the points in your post has been mentioned. One thing we dont want to lose sight of is the good people (men and women ) in our society. Today is a special day in our family as we have several who have served in the military --some came home, some didn't --so today we honor them. and this is a good time for me to thank all of those of you who have served, who are a member of this forum. I only know two personally, but I now there are several on the forum who have served and I thank you.

The one thing I have noticed about my generation and I am speaking in general, is they expect the government or someone to "give" stuff to them. It is somebody else fault, not theirs. Sometimes the whining is deafening ! Get off your azz and go look for a job, study nights and then look for a better job.

Anyway, thank you, excellent reply and appreciated

In other words, you are proposing that we (men) are driving to our anger by our wives?

Interesting hypothesis. The data seem to support it. (this might be a good time to question any explanation drawn from correlations).

Who knew that women were responsible for all the evil in the world....

Just kidding.
As a good and brilliant friend of mine once wrote, more or less, 'Beware of all explanations offered in the absence of theory. Data without theory can be dangerously misleading.'

Exactly---Delilah, Cleopatra, Eve

I would quote something my grandmother says sometimes when we ask aloud "what was HE thinking " ---but it is a bit off color.