Shootings at Virginia Tech

[carbine15]

If the students had guns to protect themselves, how would you be able to tell who is bad guy? They would be all running arround with weapons in their hands, and the police wouldn't be able to handle this situation...

You'd know the bad guy because everyone would be pointing at his bullet ridden corpse and their weapons would be holstered.

 

[Phredd]

If the students had guns to protect themselves, how would you be able to tell who is bad guy? They would be all running arround with weapons in their hands, and the police wouldn't be able to handle this situation...

No one is suggesting that the students do the job of law enforcement. They are in their classroom, the shooter comes in, students then draw their weapons and defend themselves. They should not patrol the campus looking for the shooter.

Phredd

 

[DonShock]

If the students had guns to protect themselves, how would you be able to tell who is bad guy? They would be all running arround with weapons in their hands, and the police wouldn't be able to handle this situation...

Honest people don't point amd shoot their guns at the police (or other innocent people), tend to put up their hands if the police point their guns at them, and readily comply with the instructions issued by the police. The bad guys are easily recognized, they're the ones using their guns to shoot at anybody that moves.

Most LEOs I've known don't consider mere gun possession automatically makes you the bad guy, it's what you're doing with the gun that tells them if you are on their side or not.

 

[Glass]

In order for someone to be considered a threat, they must show intent, have the means, and have the opportunity. If someone is just standing there with a gun, but has not done anything to indicate they have the intent to harm me or another innocent person, I'm not supposed to use force against that person.

Use of Force 101.

Patrick

 

[DieselDave]

Glass,
Before 9/11 everyone would typically obey the orders of a hijacker and eventually get off the plane safe. The rules for use of force on an aircraft changed that day. There's a good chance the rules changed yesterday as well.

 

[ICUDoc]

My prayers go out for the victims and their families. I don't know how to prevent these events. I don't think anyone does. I try to teach my children faith, hope, love and respect. I don't know if that's enough either. I wish it were a better world out there for them and the rest of their generation. We should all try to make it better, but God knows it's hard to work out what's right and wrong sometimes- I just wish some good could come of this insanity. I will start in my own backyard.

 

[Turd_Ferguson]

Never mind.

 

[Jorge Banner]

This is precisely the moment to understand how things work.

When guns are outlawed only criminals have guns. And that's EXACTLY what happened at VT. If you don't understand this, your are behind understanding.

Had, at least some, of these murdered victims been armed, there might be a couple of them dead, but the criminal would have been stopped before more harm was done.

Things as they are, sheeple have been successful in disarming the victims and this is the result. It is as simple as arithmetic. Those victims died because they were disarmed by a sheeple society bent of suicide.

Put the blame were it belongs: with the disarmers, the gun controllers, those that want you to be like a defenseless sheep. They are actually telling you "you don't have the right to defend yourself" which of course means "you don't have the right to be alive".

How many of these people died trying to call 911? Remember: a gun in your hand is ALWAYS better than a cop on the phone.

Criminals don't abide by carry permits or restrictions of any kind. Only decent people do.

Restrict decent people from keeping and bearing arms and you become the criminals best friend. Of course criminals are on the side of gun control. It makes their jobs so much more safe. Hitler had gun control. Look at how well his Germany did. The Jews were disarmed. Look at how well it served them. Watch out! Diane Feinstein wants to give you a stone, tell you it is soap and that you're going to take a bath. Good luck.

 

[chmsam]

Tragedies like this make me think of three things:

1). As horrible as things like this are, they are incredibly rare. While we should always, always be aware of what goes on around us, most of us will never be touched by an event like this, even removed by several degrees (not even to the point where we know someone who knows someone, who...) and it is unreasonable to assume otherwise. Thank God.

2). Almost every single news reporter on every single network will jump to conclusions with few, if any facts, and so they are therefore, morons. They'll point the finger of blame anywhere and will torture the survivors and their friends for information just to sell advertising time. It is utterly disgusting.

3). The good, common, salt of the earth people who will tell you (often without being asked when in person, or grinning ear to ear when on camera) they woulda/shoulda/coulda, if only they were there, are a real piece of work. Unless they were there at the time, or have been through something like it, they should ST*U, please, because their ideas and advice are dangerous.

The whole horror of this simply ends up being tragically sad for all.

As always, we should keep our wits about us, say an extra prayer or two, and have a little more respect for everyone and/or treat everyone a little bit nicer. Life's too darned short.

 

[xiaowenzu]

IMO, this shooting just goes to show how much people (in this case, a foreign asian) envy the American way of life. This very low act is nothing but pure jealousy. If I was a Korean, I'd be really ashamed right now.

 

[BB]

The first report I posted about the identity of the shooter was incorrect... Here are the updates:

AP

Police identified the classroom shooter as Cho Seung-Hui, 23, a senior from South Korea who was in the English department at Virginia Tech and lived in a different dorm on campus. Cho committed suicide after the attacks, and there was no indication Tuesday of any possible motive.

"He was a loner, and we're having difficulty finding information about him," school spokesman Larry Hincker said.

ABC News

 

[ikendu]

Had, at least some, of these murdered victims been armed, there might be a couple of them dead, but the criminal would have been stopped before more harm was done.

Since you are making a case for this, what percent of the students (in your opinion) would need to be carrying loaded firearms right at the time when needed to achieve the effect you are describing? And considering that some armed students may not have their weapons with them just at the right time, what percent of students generally need to be so armed?

Students come and go, sometimes in one class, sometimes in another.

So... to have a reliable opportunity that in that building, if there'd be a person armed and ready to stop the criminal... what percent of the entire student body?

 

[bwaites]

Why should Koreans be ashamed? I wouldn't be ashamed solely if the shooter was from the United States.

This was a despicable act, but the fact that he was Korean, or Canadian, or German, or Dutch, or a US citizen doesn't reflect on the other citizens of those countries.

This was obviously an individual who was beyond all issues of nationality.

For some reason he made decisions that led to the shootings, but his nationality didn't have anything to do with it.

From the descriptions of witnesses, he obviously had practiced, and probably used one of the "shooter" games to prepare. (speculation on my part, based on past similar incidents).

We need to do better, but being a foreign national doesn't change anything, at least in my viewpoint.

Bill

 

[Phredd]

IMO, this shooting just goes to show how much people (in this case, a foreign asian) envy the American way of life. This very low act is nothing but pure jealousy. If I was a Korean, I'd be really ashamed right now.

There's no sign that this had anything to do with nationality. If anything, there was evidence that he was distraught over problems with his girlfriend. Let's not turn this into an American vs ROTW argument.

Phredd

 

[revolvergeek]

Yup. A reliable, dependable device that would harmlessly incapcitate any opponent would be a highly useful thing to have. I wonder if we will ever have such a thing. Until then... we will face hard choices.

If I could get a Phaser and set it on Heavy Stun, I would lock all my guns up in a safe and carry it every where that I went. Sadly, this does just not exist yet.

 

[bwaites]

Arming everyone is simply not an option.

Even trained officers panic, as has been pointed out by Robocop.

I have a good friend who is retired FBI, and we have talked about the many gun battles in the last couple decades that trained LEO's, FBI, etc were involved in, including the LA bank robbery.

Look at the number of rounds fired vs the number of hits in those incidents and you realize that even determined, trained people may not be effective under this kind of pressure.

However, the fact that SOMEONE else may have a weapon IS a deterrent to crime, but has not been proven to be a deterrent to people who are suicide bound, as this young man was.

Bill

 

[Jorge Banner]

Since you are making a case for this, what percent of the students (in your opinion) would need to be carrying loaded firearms right at the time when needed to achieve the effect you are describing? And considering that some armed students may not have their weapons with them just at the right time, what percent of students generally need to be so armed?

Students come and go, sometimes in one class, sometimes in another.

So... to have a reliable opportunity that in that building, if there'd be a person armed and ready to stop the criminal... what percent of the entire student body?

This is not about percentages. Any member of the institution, including students, should have the right to be armed if they so decide.

Have a look here. "Virginia Tech University Prof. Liviu Librescu, described as a family man who once did research for NASA, sacrificed his life to save his students in the shooting rampage yesterday. When he heard the gunfire, he blocked the entrance and got shot through the door," his daughter-in-law Ayala Schmulevich said."

What kind of sadistic, crazy or immoral mentality thinks that it is more moral for this teacher to have been unarmed and have to die with nothing else than his chest to face the criminal? Why is it better for him to have died in this way than for him to have taken his own gun and killed the criminal? Why is it more moral the all these people to have died defenseless than for several of them to have confronted the criminal with a barrage of bullets and maybe be ALL of then unharmed? Is it really better to die a sheeple than to stand your ground and defend yourself?

 

[cchurchi]

Since you are making a case for this, what percent of the students (in your opinion) would need to be carrying loaded firearms right at the time when needed to achieve the effect you are describing? And considering that some armed students may not have their weapons with them just at the right time, what percent of students generally need to be so armed?

Students come and go, sometimes in one class, sometimes in another.

So... to have a reliable opportunity that in that building, if there'd be a person armed and ready to stop the criminal... what percent of the entire student body?

You can't control what other people do. What percentage of students need to be armed - to achieve the desired effect? Just one - Me - 100% armed.

 

[BB]

There are a few researchers that have attempted to quantify how an armed population prevents crimes:

Old article from 2000:

Some 2.5 million violent crimes are prevented by armed citizens each year.

More than 1,000 murders and 550 rapes are prevented each day because people carry guns in self-defense.
...
The Kleck study, done in 1993, concluded that 2.5 million violent crimes -- 400,000 of them homicides -- are prevented each year because citizens are armed. If he is right, that would mean that homicides are prevented by armed citizens four times more often than criminals commit them, and that doesn't make sense, said Bernstein.

As for Lott's frequently cited study that concluded crime rates fell 8 percent to 15 percent when changes in laws allowed citizens to carry concealed weapons, it was "debunked as fatally flawed by literally hundreds of academics," said Bernstein.

Of course, there are people that disagree with Lott and others:

The statistics are bogus, said David Bernstein, spokesman for Handgun Control Inc. The numbers come from studies done by Gary Kleck of Florida State University and from author John R. Lott Jr. The studies have been criticized by other academics and statisticians.

"It's the two people they parade out every time they want to make a statistical argument," Bernstein said. "It's all bogus statistics."
...
As for Lott's frequently cited study that concluded crime rates fell 8 percent to 15 percent when changes in laws allowed citizens to carry concealed weapons, it was "debunked as fatally flawed by literally hundreds of academics," said Bernstein.

Even Kleck wrote that Lott's conclusions could have resulted from naturally declining crime rates coinciding with changes in gun-carrying laws and changes in law-enforcement techniques, according to Handgun Control.

I always love the anti-gun argument that the statistics, when they show a drop, are just a natural decline even when right to carry laws are passed--yet they oppose right to carry laws because these folks will creat blood baths when passed.

In practice, it appears that armed citizens prevent more crimes than the police themselves in this country... But, in a way, that only make sense in that, for example, in our area of the country there is only one police officer on duty for every 10,000 residences (in a city of 30,000--there are only three cops on patrol). Even if only 1% of the population is armed, that means that there is a 100:1 ratio between armed citizens to police.

So--police are usually only present to clean up after the fact. And, as many in the US already know--the police do not have to even show up at a crime if they don't want too:

State and city governments — rather than the Federal authorities — are responsible for local law enforcement. So, only occasionally have Federal Courts ruled on the matter of police protection. However, in 1856 the U.S. Supreme Court declared that local law enforcement had no duty to protect a particular person, but only a general duty to enforce the laws. [South v. Maryland, 59 U.S. (How.) 396, 15 L.Ed., 433 (856)].

The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution gives you no right to police protection. In 1982, the U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit, held that: "… there is no Constitutional right to be protected by the state against being murdered by criminals or madmen. It is monstrous if the state fails to protect its residents against such predators but it does not violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment or, we suppose, any other provision of the Constitution.

The Constitution is a charter of negative liberties: it tells the state to let the people alone; it does not require the federal government or the state to provide services, even so elementary a service as maintaining law and order." [Bowers v. DeVito, U.S. Court of Appeals, 7th Circuit, 686F.2d 616 (1982). See also Reiff v. City of Philadelphia, 471 F.Supp. 1262 (E.D.Pa. 1979)]. — Excerpted from Dial 911 and Die

So--if the police are not responsible for public safety--it leaves it to citizens to be responsible for their own safety. While I believe that the shooter is responsible for their own actions and I don't believe in the "deep pocket" method of suing everyone within 100 miles of a shooting... When a State or University passes laws/regulations (and prosecutes folks) that prevent otherwise legally carried weapons (guns, knives, pepper spray--which were probably all illegal on the VT campus)--then they do deserved to be sued for preventing self defense by the citizens themselves.

And, again, in the US--upwards of 50% of the homes in the US have guns (outside of New York, Washington DC and probably a few other places where the possession of guns legally is very difficult). Making more guns available for use than police could ever have available--even in a police state.

-Bill

 

[Thujone]

Concealed carry recently passed in Nebraska. But UNL as with other educational facilities promptly posted gun free zone signs everywhere on campus. Nothing like telling a criminal he will be the only armed person.