DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus March for our lives, 2018...

J/C

Even if you do not agree with the argument that “more guns, less crime” you cannot argue with the truth that more guns has not resulted in more crime. If crime rates remain flat or improve while gun ownership and carry increases, then there is no justification for gun control.

Freedom is the standard in America. The burden of proof is on you to prove that gun control works (something no study ever has been able to prove – as gun control has never been shown to cause a reduction in crime, violence, or homicide).

Correlation does not prove causation, but a lack of correlation does disprove causation.

When there are more guns but less crime, that does not mean that more guns are the cause of less crime, but it does prove that more guns does not cause more crime.

The same goes with guns. You can't do a study where you send in shooters into schools with armed guards, and schools without armed guards, to prove which is more effective. It's unethical. So you demanding proof that gun control works will never actually happen because it would be unethical to perform said study.

1. The media doesn't make killers famous, or glorify them around the world and use them as propaganda.

2. Schools are allowed to handle bullying effectively around the globe.

3. Parents are allowed to discipline their children

4. Kids in other countries are taught how to deal with loss, and disappointment in life. We coddle our children are spoil them to the fact they have no idea about anything of value (this to me in my personal opinion is the BIGGEST factor).

Look (and I know you are pro gun - this is general), guns are not going anywhere. Plain and simple. So we can either keep protesting guns which are not going anywhere, or we can address the actual issues to what is wrong with AMERICAN children, and we learn how to parent, teach, and instill values of life into kids.

Can you cite this truth you speak of? Studies have been done researching the effects of more guns, less crime, and it seems to be far from established truth. I found one study recently that tracked crime rates between RTC states and non, and it doesn't seem to line up:

Stanford Study - RTC states have violent crime increases of up to 15%

Also, one of the largest studies of it's kind noted strong links between how guns are accessed and saving lives. https://academic.oup.com/epirev/article/38/1/140/2754868

I found it a fascinating read, maybe you could spend some time and read it as well? My takeaway from it was that the observation was that increased gun control (even in minor ways) mapped to reductions in crime. They also agree with you that proof is hard to find!



Proof is not required to establish consensus, especially in studies where it would be unethical to try to establish proof.

A good example is the vaccine debate. There are people who are against vaccinating children, and have argued for doing double blind studies on children given vaccines and other children given placebos, then evaluate the autism levels after a certain point. As you can imagine, this is not feasible because it would be unethical to expose children unwittingly to dangerous diseases when a cure is readily available. Can we prove that vaccines don't increase autism rates? Not without the double blind study. So we'll just have to do our best with what is available in the research field.

The same goes with guns. You can't do a study where you send in shooters into schools with armed guards, and schools without armed guards, to prove which is more effective. It's unethical. So you demanding proof that gun control works will never actually happen because it would be unethical to perform said study. But then again, there are untold numbers of things in life we can't prove, but accept as likely the best for us.

The research community has a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't given long runs of empirical data. This also applies to gun control studies. I consider myself a smart guy but also smart enough to know that I don't know everything. I will read research papers and do my own analysis but in the case of a draw, I give favor to the researcher. They do it for a living.

So it's happening around the globe but their free press just doesn't report it? Seriously?

Yet you provide zero evidence3 to support this? Explain to me how Great Britain handle bullying differently than we do?

How is discipline different in Europe?

So you're just going to make things up and call them facts? Children aren't coddled in Europe? In Switzerland and Sweden? Where did you came up with that from?

So not only does Europe raise their children better but they have free healthcare and free college too!!??

around the globe.

I completely understand your point Ytown, but have a serious question. What keeps anyone from writing something and saying it was inspired by God? Imagine a book like 'Mein Kampf' being touted as inspired by god.

The Bible is a good book IMHO because it has many lessons in good behavior and values. But we have also seen the words from this book twisted to fit views that are not so good. Are these views also inspired by God?

The Bible, like man, is less than perfect in many ways. A book inspired by God should be perfect in every way, no?

Although I am Atheist, I understand Christians who have a self described 'personal relationship' with God because they feel it so strongly that it seems real regardless of my views. Things like that I can agree seem to be inspired by God to those people. But a collection of stories from two thousand years ago should at least be skeptically approached as the literal word of god or literally inspired by god.

However as a base for teaching morals, goodness, and good behavior it is pretty solid. There are however many things that are not so great in there too. Also the interpretations can be wildly different from person to person, so where is the real truth? A book inspired by god should be understood as God meant it to be understood, no?

I don't want to devolve into a religious/atheist debate, just me talking outloud with lots of questions.

Honestly, You are not worth my time to even respond to anymore. Be gone.

Let me explain why I used Europe. It's because Americans see them as being soft. As them being Socialists even though they are actually democracies. It's because they most mirror our own society in their laws. They are the closest thing to our country on a global basis.

I know 40 just threw out some tripe to make noise but you actually addressed very little to explain why we don't see mass school shootings in the very nations that closest resemble the United States.

They are the closest thing to our country on a global basis.

Because our crime rate is at a low overall right now, is it not? The problem with gun control studies is they are skewed into falsehoods.

"we banned guns, so gunviolence is down". that is probably true, but is VIOLENCE down, more than likely not. These studies cannot prove that less guns are the answer - however it is proven that today as we sit we have more gun laws than ever before, and yet school shootings are up. When there are more guns but less crime, that does not mean that more guns are the cause of less crime, but it does prove that more guns does not cause more crime.

When there are more guns but less crime, that does not mean that more guns are the cause of less crime, but it does prove that more guns does not cause more crime.

My experiences the last 10 years tell me we are making it much easier for people to get guns. CCW reciprocity, lowering barriers to background checks and removing permits to obtain a gun.

(in other areas of life) that did not require causative proof to obtain a consensus that we were doing the right thing in the name of safety.

Keep dodging. As of now, their government and laws are closer to us than any other nations.

But I see that you now actually have no answers to the actual topic so you've decided to move the goal posts.

They have bullying in their schools. They don't have mass school shootings.

They don't have strict discipline in their schools. Yet they don't have mass school shootings.

They have a high divorce rate yet they don't have mass school shootings.

They have a free press to publicize these things yet they don't have mass school shootings.

Try to stay focused this time. lol

Keep dodging. As of now, their government and laws are closer to us than any other nations.

But I see that you now actually have no answers to the actual topic so you've decided to move the goal posts.

They have bullying in their schools. They don't have mass school shootings.

They don't have strict discipline in their schools. Yet they don't have mass school shootings.

They have a high divorce rate yet they don't have mass school shootings.

They have a free press to publicize these things yet they don't have mass school shootings.

Try to stay focused this time. lol

Do they or have they had a Second Amendment?

What other country has the Freedom and Rights that we have in the USA?

i love how people act like:

other countries dont have mental health problems
other countries dont have access to porn
other countries dont watch violent movies
other countries dont play violent video games
other countries dont have issues with bullying

and yet, we are unique in that we have the most problems with gun violence compared to other developed nations.

Maybe you just answered what's so different.

Look, I stand for the second amendment. But it comes at a price. These school shootings are a part of that price. We have more guns in our country than we have people.

With that goes the responsibility to protect and make allowances for those guns being in our society. More laws won't solve the problem. But taking protections to prevent mass school shootings is part of ponying up for the cost of these freedoms.

People wish to blame it on the exact same problems the rest of the globe faces and that's not it. What we have to do is put metal detectors at school entrances and stop the guns from getting into these schools in the first place.

We can dance around it all we wish, but you're not going to keep guns out of the hands of every crazy person when there's more guns floating around than we have people.

A lot of those other countries also have access to guns.

So if it's nothing you listed that's different and causing it.... and it's not access to guns that's different and causing it... then what is causing it?

You're stuck on that tide pods thing like a crack addict! How about a solution instead of "I'm going to post stuff until something works because I'm scared of losing my guns"...

Parenting like what, your parents? How did that work out?

From what I've seen of these Parkland kids I'd be damn proud to be one of their parents, DAMN PROUD!

Parkland Shooting Suspect: A Story Of Red Flags, Ignored

Friends, family and neighbors were worried about Nikolas Cruz. So were social workers, teachers and sheriff's deputies in two counties.

As classes at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School resumed two weeks after the shooting rampage that left 17 people dead, it is increasingly clear that Cruz, the alleged gunman, was deeply troubled.

The 19-year-old was the subject of dozens of 911 calls and at least two separate tips to the FBI. He also came to the attention of the Florida Department of Children and Families. Despite warning signs stretching back over a decade, no one intervened to stop the Valentine's Day shootings.

Many calls to the police

Cruz and his younger brother were adopted by Roger and Lynda Cruz. The family bought a sprawling house in the affluent Fort Lauderdale suburb of Parkland, Fla., in 1996. Roger, the patriarch, died when the boys were young, leaving Lynda to raise the children on her own.

When Cruz was just 10 years old, his mother called the police to the house. That call in 2008 was the first of dozens of times over the next decade she would summon law enforcement, often for help keeping her sons under control.

Sheriff's deputies were called to break up fights between Cruz and his brother. Neighbors in their community recall seeing squad cars in their driveway frequently.

At first, the problems seemed minor.

In November 2008, according to a list of service calls to the family residence released last week by the Broward Sheriff's Office, deputies responded to a report of Cruz "throwing a rock back at other juvenile."

By 2013, according to that list, the calls to the deputies began detailing more violence. In November of that year, Lynda said she was thrown against a wall because she took away an Xbox gaming system. In November 2014, deputies report Cruz used a BB gun to shoot a chicken.

By early 2016, deputies were called after a neighbor's son saw a disturbing Instagram post that seemed to suggest Cruz "planned to shoot up the school." At the time, deputies concluded that Cruz owned knives and a BB gun. They passed along that information to a school resource officer at Stoneman Douglas, but it is not clear whether any other steps were taken.

It is one of several incidents now under further investigation by the sheriff's office.

Of the 23 incidents deputies responded to at the Cruz residence, 18 of them involved Nikolas Cruz, according to the sheriff's office. The office says that "none appeared arrestable under Florida law."

At some point, money became a problem for the Cruz family. Lynda sold their Parkland home in early 2017 in a short sale.

"I saw Nikolas, and I said are you moving?" said Helen Pasciolla, a neighbor who lived across the street from the family. "And he said, 'We can't afford to live here anymore.' "

In November, Lynda died of complications from the flu. Cruz went to live briefly with a family friend, Roxanne Deschamps, outside Palm Beach, Fla.

But that situation did not work out well.

In 911 tapes released last week by the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, Cruz said he got in a fight with Deschamps' son. And he talked about his mother's death.

"The thing is, I lost my mother a couple days ago. So like, I'm dealing with a bunch of things right now," Cruz said. "I kind of got mad. And I started punching walls and stuff and a kid came at me and threw me on the ground. And he kicked me out of the house."

In a separate call to 911, Deschamps told the dispatcher that she was afraid Cruz would come back to the house with a gun and that he demonstrated violent behavior in the past.

"He put the gun on the head of his brother before. So, it's not the first time. And he did that to his mom. It's not the first time he's put a gun on somebody's head," Deschamps said on the 911 recordings.

No arrests were made, according to the police report. A sheriff's deputy picked Cruz up from a nearby park and returned him to the Deschamps home.

Behavioral problems were no secret

Cruz attended Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School for a while but was expelled for "disciplinary reasons," according to Broward County Public Schools Superintendent Robert Runcie.

The Florida Department of Children and Families became involved with Cruz in late 2016 after he began cutting himself and posting images of the self-harm on Snapchat.

According to a report produced by DCF, Cruz began harming himself after a relationship ended. The report also details a range of conditions with which Cruz was diagnosed, including depression.

Ultimately, it concluded that he was "not a risk to harm himself or others."

In the aftermath of the shooting, students and faculty at Stoneman Douglas described Cruz as a loner.

Those who knew him and considered him a friend, however, were caught off guard that he could allegedly carry out such a gruesome deed.

"I can't wrap my head around it," student Ethan Trieu said. "You know, we would just talk to each other like any other friend, and I know some other people he'd talk to just fine also. And, I don't know, just seeing his name is just weird. I don't know."

So many warning signs

In addition to reports made to both the Broward and Palm Beach sheriff's offices, the FBI was also notified about Cruz.

The first tip came in September when a Mississippi bail bondsman, who also makes YouTube videos, alerted the FBI that someone left a disturbing message in the comments section of a video that read: "Im going to be a professional school shooter."

The bail bondsman, Ben Bennight, told NPR in February that he reported the comment as spam and alerted the FBI.

"I think that any responsible and mentally sound human being would take a comment like that seriously whether the person on the other end meant it or not," Bennight said.

The FBI visited the next day, but Bennight told investigators he didn't have anything to add.

The bureau received a second tip on Jan. 5, weeks before Cruz allegedly carried out the shooting at Stoneman Douglas. The caller, who the FBI said was a person close to the suspect, warned that Cruz had a "desire to kill people" and worried about "the potential of him conducting a school shooting."

Days after the shooting, the FBI said that "protocols were not followed" and that information should have been forwarded to the Miami field office.

Gov. Rick Scott has called on the bureau's director to resign. Over the weekend, the governor — at the urging of some state lawmakers — directed the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate local authorities' response to the Parkland shooting.

Additionally, it came to light in the days following the shooting that the school resource officer, who was an armed sheriff's deputy, did not enter the school building where the shooting took place. The officer has since resigned.

Broward Sheriff Scott Israel is investigating allegations that other deputies did not try to confront the shooter as well.

State Republicans, led by the speaker of the Florida House, are calling on the governor to suspend Israel for what they call "malfeasance, misfeasance, neglect of duty [or] incompetence."

Israel has rejected calls to resign.

This week, lawmakers in Florida — a state that has had a history of expanding gun rights — are taking up legislation that would ban bump stocks and raise the minimum age to purchase a rifle from 18 to 21. Another provision being considered would allow law enforcement to temporarily confiscate firearms from owners if they are deemed a threat to themselves or others.

Scott urged lawmakers to get a bill to his desk before the legislative session ends in early March.

Cruz was arrested the same day as the shooting. He has been ordered held without bond and faces 17 charges of premeditated murder.

Name one of these things that was WRITTEN specifically into the Constitution to not be infringed.

Parenting like what, your parents? How did that work out?

Worked out great well like in my community, neighborhood, job, college and Law Enforcement.

I've never killed anyone.

Not killing anyone is a mighty low bar for good parenting. Just saying.

That's a little late... just saying.

Well actually it's right there in the book. It would need to be written by god to be the word of god. It's a collection of stories about god. God didn't write it, or it'd be his autobiography I guess. It'd be called God's Bible, not the King James Version or whatever version you subscribe to.

And if it's the word of god, why is there so many versions?

so you agree you want to ban guns . which you said you didn't want to do. . . .

Why are there so many versions??? Because man got their hands on it. Just ask any women you know, men screw everything up

Someone remind the anti-gun mob:
The Founding Fathers created the Second Amendment to protect us from mindless mobs JUST LIKE YOU.