Lunatic Gunman goes on Rampage

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

My thoughts go out to the Victims families

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/10214661.stm

[+whiteknight06604 934]

damn,I hope that those who were injured get better fast and that the victoms families can somehow find peace.

[+Dave 2,322]

That is terrible, my thoughts and prayers to the people affected.

[Lt. James Cater 62]

If someone wants to get their hands on a gun, it's pretty much a forgone deal no matter where you are.

[Lt. James Cater 62]

100% Correct, but if everyone else doesn't have acsess to one legally, we're talking bloodbath

 

 

If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns

 

Not to thread hijack but...

 

A really sick observation went around some time ago that virtually all those mass school shooting were done in suburbia. In the inner city schools, a good percentage of the students were already armed and would have fired back at an attacker.

 

An observation of mine is that in the slums where i lived, a mass shooter wouldn't have made it 50 yards without drawing a storm of return fire. I'm not exagerating in saying that EVERY house on both sides of my street for two blocks in either direction had some sort of weapon. I mean, from assault rifles right down to crossbows!

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

It was a legally owned Shotgun...so rare in the UK (because of our strict gun laws)..that it is quite a shock when it happens

[+Gunrunner 314]

Oh dear, not that old chestnut again, don't hijack a thread not meant for debate, if you want we can go over the arguments for/against gun control elsewhere, where it's more appropriate.

[Capitaine Vengeur 263]

100% Correct, but if everyone else doesn't have acsess to one legally, we're talking bloodbath

 

 

If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns

... which will make them easy to be recognized, warned to lie, and shot at by the police if disobeying. How can policemen lock on a bad-looking, armed, dangerous guy in a crowd of bad-looking, armed, potentially dangerous guys?

 

UK, Uncleal is right, the model of the gun is not indicated, as long as I can read. Was it a hunting rifle, something like that? Could you give more infos as you will obtain them?

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

Turns out he had a shotgun, and a .22 rifle

[Lt. James Cater 62]

It was a legally owned Shotgun...so rare in the UK (because of our strict gun laws)..that it is quite a shock when it happens

 

Question...How The hell does one rack up a "score" like that without the police getting info and reacting? With a shotgun, it's a pretty hard task to rack up like that.

 

Granted, i'm posting this with experience in mind of the (in)famously serious turnouts of the five(Yes, 5)Police forces in my area. 5-0 here have damn near done double backflips in going after a shooter like that.

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

Question...How The hell does one rack up a "score" like that without the police getting info and reacting? With a shotgun, it's a pretty hard task to rack up like that.

 

Granted, i'm posting this with experience in mind of the (in)famously serious turnouts of the five(Yes, 5)Police forces in my area. 5-0 here have damn near done double backflips in going after a shooter like that.

 

I think most of the damage was done with the rifle.

Also, Cumbria is quite a spread out County, with a relatively small Police Force, he kept on the move...and did a good job evading the Police Snipers....plus the Police aren't armed, so need to call in a Firearms team whenever this sort of incident happens....personally, I think the Police should be armed in the UK...but thats another subject

[+Gunrunner 314]

Uncleal, never have been proven, when was a last time a shooting spree in the US was foiled by civilians ?

And again, the statistics are clearly in favor of the European model, even though cultural differences are the real explanation, gun control being a side effect rather than a primary cause.

[UK_Widowmaker 571]

Have to agree with Gunrunner on this one.

You only have to look at the frightening statistics in the US, of the sheer volume of people killed and injured by Firearms, to realise it's not good.

 

The figures speak for themselves (this from the World Health Authority)

 

"Despite a recent spike in drug related shootings in a handful of cities including London, a resident of England or Wales remains 26 times less likely to die by gunshot than an American. In Japan, the risk of gun death is at least 100 times lower than in the United States.

That said, best estimates show that gunshots cost us 500 000 lives each year, worldwide. Of these, 300 000 people die in regional conflict and 200 000 in interpersonal violence and suicide.7 The majority of victims are non-combatants, many of them women and children. Where estimates are available, non-fatal firearm related injuries are said to number three for every gun death."

 

Face it uncleal...Guns are BAD NEWS!

Edited June 4, 2010 by UK_Widowmaker

[Slartibartfast 153]

I saw this on CNN Yesterday as I am not in the UK at present... My condolences to the victims and their families...

[+Gunrunner 314]

Funnily enough, we have two models, the US and Europe, with radically opposed cultural views on guns, and the most violent society, more prone to benefit by tighter gun control is the one favoring lax gun control (the "oh noes, I've got to have my gun to protect myself from the violence generated by everyone having a gun" logic) while the more civil and policed one with the strict gun control and lower crime rates is pushing toward even stricter gun control (the "Hey, we have no use for guns, they just would make accidents easier to happen, if only criminals and law enforcement have them, we're safe, right ?" logic).

 

The thing is US society, gun control and gun violence have been in a vicious circle for so long that gun apologists are right, you probably no longer can apply strict gun control in the US without major risks and increased crime rates (for a time at least).

On the other hand, in Europe, gun related violence is increasing steadily, organized crime from less "civilized" parts of Europe is pouring in Western Europe, bringing back violence and guns, and multiplying channels for "gangs" to get their hands on firearms, making them more violent and more equipped than ever before.

[+Alphadelta 1]

"Despite a recent spike in drug related shootings in a handful of cities including London, a resident of England or Wales remains 26 times less likely to die by gunshot than an American. In Japan, the risk of gun death is at least 100 times lower than in the United States.

 

And in the U.K you're 26 times more likely to get stabbed up/slashed up by some Peckham yardy or chavvy larger lout than in the U.S. Atleast in the states the old and defenseless can arm themselves if they live in a rough area. In the UK people have no choice but to rely on a police service that when called, tells you 'We'll be there in 30 minutes ... or so.'

 

Gunlaws are irrelevant to general gun crime statistics because the vast majority of gun crime is committed by criminals with illegal weapons. Here in Thailand they have extremely strict gun control laws, however every man and his dog owns a gun. Subsequently murder rates are extremely high. How many of those murders are committed with legally owned weapons? Almost none. What would stricter gun laws do? Nothing.

 

It's highly unlikely that shooting sprees can be stopped by armed civilians. Most people lack the police training to keep a level head during that situation. Would banning shotguns and .22 rifles have saved all those people? No. Simply put this nutter was determined to kill a lot of people. He would have picked up a knife, axe, chainsaw or any number of highly lethal un-bannable items that you can find for sale in shops up and down the high street.  Most the people he killed were in their 60's. They would have offered little to no resistance against a younger man wielding a deadly weapon. A home-made crossbow would have been a more effective weapon than a .22 rifle. Try banning the materials required to make a crossbow. Not even the nanny state (the UK) could manage that.

 

An interesting historical footnote;

 

The original UK gun laws were introduced after WW1 because the government feared returning soldiers would follow in the footsteps of the returning Russian soldiers and inact a revolution. Since then practically every change to the law has occurred as a knee-jerk reaction to a shooting spree.

 

Cheers

Edited June 4, 2010 by Alphadelta

[Slartibartfast 153]

On the its safer here or there debate... I will say only one thing...

 

Guns don´t Kill people People Kill People...

[+Gunrunner 314]

Uncleal, I addressed that already, it's a question of cultural rather than legal differences.

Tight gun control works if and only if there isn't already a massive gun ownership in place AND/OR it's applied to relatively non-violent countries, hence the success in Europe, the failure in Australia and the complete mess it would be in the US.

To make it work you first have to change mentalities, BUT if you have enough criminality, then you can't change mentalities before you eliminate the reasons for that mentality, so the conditions to bring strong gun control to countries with lax gun control are :

1) Reduce dramatically criminality, gun related or not.

2) Reduce illegal gun ownership.

3) Make it harder for criminals to acquire a gun illegally.

4) Then when your population is safe and the necessity for self-defense capability (whether real or imagined, as is the case for most US gun owners) is decreased, tighten legal gun control.

So, can you see where the Australian experiment went wrong ?

 

In the US however, some interpretations of your Constitution makes thing even harder as, to many of you, it guarantees the individual right to bear arms, which is incompatible with tighter gun control; either you tighten the rules for new owners only and won't solve your problem, or you proceed to disarm part of the (previously) legal owners, which to some would seem unconstitutional and a totalitarian slip.

 

Another argument for the irrational part of the attachment of US citizen to their guns is that IIRC, the highest legal gun per capita ratio are often in the areas with the lowest estimated "illegal" gun per capita ratio, and inversely, meaning the people with the least reason to defend themselves are the best armed, while those with the most reason to do so are "defenseless".

However, it also correlates with population and law enforcement density (being the surface/cop ratio rather than cop/civilian ratio), as the denser the population and law enforcement, the less declared guns you get.

Once again, it makes sense in the US (and Australia) for more than self-defense against criminals as you do have more potentially dangerous wildlife than Europe or Japan, and it explains part of the correlation between gun ownership and population density regardless of actual criminality or law enforcement presence.

[+Gunrunner 314]

Have you read a single word I wrote...

 

Anyway, what would be interesting is to have fresh stats, 8 years later... and to have material to compare with other countries, with and without strict gun control, you'll soon realize that while it may be a factor, it might not be the principal one.

In fact, tighter gun control only pops up when gun related violence is already on the rise, so if you enact gun control before such a trend either peaks or is controlled by law enforcement, it will continue and you may end up attributing it to gun control.

 

To be frank, this post doesn't read at all as being written by an Australian warning Americans, but rather as an American NRA activist astroturfing.

Do note the discussion below the post, pointing out that part of the figures and dates are factually erroneous.

 

A good way to get a good idea of where the truth lies is to collect data and arguments from both sides, and search the most realistic middle-ground.

Whenever possible try to get both absolute and relative figures, it's easy to claim an homicide increase of 300% and make it sound dramatic; It is if it represents a change from 100 to 300, but it might be from 1 to 3...

Also bear in mind the sample size, going from 100 murders to 300 is a dramatic increase if your population is stable, but if in the same time it had been multiplied by 3, then the murder/capita ratio is unchanged, and if the sample has grown even more, you end up effectively with LESS violence than before.

 

Never trust numbers if they are offered out of context, without an explanation of the relationship between events and the numbers, and always try to get raw data to make your own mind.

[+Gunrunner 314]

There is a flaw in your logic.

"Marksmanship got better"

Sure, they do avoid injuring or killing civilians that way, but that doesn't change a thing for them.

Let's say they shoot only one bullet, you have three possible outcomes :

1) They miss, in such a case they're not better, and they still committed a crime, involving a firearm, so their training was in vain, they still get a year in jail, worse, they might have injured/killed an innocent bystander instead.

2) They injure their target, with only one bullet, that's an improvement, but hey, they STILL get 3 years in jail, even though the target may be a criminal himself, trying to kill him is still a prosecutable crime.

3) They kill him; They definitely got better, and make substantial savings on ammo, yet, this is still a prosecutable crime, they still get 10 years in prison.

Hence, there is no rational reason for them to lose 1 month improving their marksmanship.

Unless of course these sentences are cumulative, in which case, once a bullet is fired, the least people injured/killed in addition to the target is 3 to 10 more years in prison than the baseline 11 (however, to anyone ready to spend a decade in jail, a few more decades is nothing, he already accepted the risk or is too dumb to assess it).

[MigBuster 2,883]

The majority of people not owning guns is embedded in our society now which is why it works here.

 

However if someone wants to get a gun and kill a load of people in any country including here - there is nothing to stop them period.

 

Besides - there are 1000 ways to kill someone - but out of the lot using a Gun is probably the quickest and cleanest method - and IMO probably the easiest as you dont have to get close and personal with the victim - or risk them sticking your knife in you!

[Lt. James Cater 62]

Migbuster says it best IMO.

 

However, certain places of Western Europe i consider a criminals' paradise. Naturally i check out the UK more than any other place due to wanting to move there and i consider the country a nation of prey. True, here in the US we have those high gun deaths year after year but the street crime rate in the UK leaves the US in the dust.

 

I've communicated with a lot of people from over there and they usually are dumbfounded by the low levels of stuff like robberies and assaults in areas that are hard core gang territories. One place i was at a few years ago had 18th Street claiming the apartment complex i lived in as well as some adjacent blocks going for about a half mile. Right around the corner was a Crip set and further down from them was Blood territory. Shootings happened on a frequent basis but unless you were in the "Game" life was just fine. I could go outside half drunk at 1 in the morning and didn't even have the threat of being stepped to.

 

Why? In that neighborhood, the chances of getting shot trying to rob someone was pretty good as it was an armed camp. Hell, even i had a pistol and would take it with me sometimes just because. I didn't even have a licence to carry it concealed but no one cared. Even the Police would overlook you packing it if you had a realitively clean record. Of course they would tell you not to make it a habit.

 

Another place i lived in was in something else.

 

I NEVER knew of a single incident of some civilian being jacked in the 7 block area that made up the hood despite it being seriously scary after dark. It was gangbangers wall to wall in that area too. Some of them known killers.

 

I'm not even going to bring the Police into this. Just let it be stated that they patrolled frequently, knew the turf intimatly, and were renowned for the agressiveness of the officers.

 

But one could walk to the streets at night without much of a threat.

 

 

Can say the same of, Liverpool, Manchester, or Glasgow?

 

I publicly admit to everyone that i did my fair share of dirty when i was a youngster. I stole everything from candy to cars. I could not walk into a store without thinking of theft. Boosting was my thing! Even when i was at Basic and OCS i was stealing, but this time it was for my platoon. The Drill Sergents took full advantage of my "Midnight Requesition" skills to keep us well supplied. But mugging on the streets was a no no. The chance of someone finishing you off rather than Police catching you was just too much of a risk.

 

I guarantee you this. In the UK, my boys and i would not have had any real deterrent in escalating our activities to more serious levels.

 

 

But damn is the UK crawling with thugs that i never even fanthomed. There is a growing UK expat community here in southern Nevada and boy do they have stories to tell. Between their recollections and checking out the UK media on a daily basis as well as certain forums where i lurk, one gets the impression that going out after sunset over there seems to be a mission as the bad guys have every possible advantage over a straight citizen.

 

Can anyone from over there give a reason why? And why aren't citizens allowed to defend themselves and their property in a proper manner.

[+Bongodriver 20]

But damn is the UK crawling with thugs that i never even fanthomed. There is a growing UK expat community here in southern Nevada and boy do they have stories to tell. Between their recollections and checking out the UK media on a daily basis as well as certain forums where i lurk, one gets the impression that going out after sunset over there seems to be a mission as the bad guys have every possible advantage over a straight citizen.

 

Can anyone from over there give a reason why? And why aren't citizens allowed to defend themselves and their property in a proper manner.

 

I live here and can't fathom that one myself, it may be that we have an even more litigious society than yours, some people mention a good samaritan act, but to be honest I would still hesitate to help someone injured, it's amazing what can cause whiplash here in the UK, people are also equally if not more tenacious at knowing their rights as you guys quote your constitution, it gets quite complicated trying to explain what we have here in the UK, we are slowly being turned into an androgenous 'mush of a species here in the UK.

all I can say is that some of us are real good eggs and would make you proud but we are being withered away by our own soft nature and tolerance.

[Lt. James Cater 62]

I live here and can't fathom that one myself, it may be that we have an even more litigious society than yours, some people mention a good samaritan act, but to be honest I would still hesitate to help someone injured, it's amazing what can cause whiplash here in the UK, people are also equally if not more tenacious at knowing their rights as you guys quote your constitution, it gets quite complicated trying to explain what we have here in the UK, we are slowly being turned into an androgenous 'mush of a species here in the UK.

all I can say is that some of us are real good eggs and would make you proud but we are being withered away by our own soft nature and tolerance.

 

The "i have a right" thing i've actually seen in a way when people on forums post videos. I once saw a vid of a guy screaming and spitting in a UK cops' face. Needless to say, the repercussions of such an act here can be especially severe in certain cities but the guy in the video got off with nothing but a verbal warning. And that after he tore apart the yard and garden of a neighbor!

 

I was standing near a cop giving a lady a traffic ticket about three years ago and some yahoo walked behind the cop and said "F***ing Pig" in a noticible voice. Well, the cop whipped an arm around, grabbed the guy by the neck and slammed him face first into the boot of the cruiser. He then proceeded to slam the guys face about half dozen times more then stood him up and searched his pockets for weapons or ID. About every 10 seconds during the search, he would yank and the boot steadily got dented. Finally he told the guy to wise up and watch his mouth, slammed him two final times and let him go. The Mexican lady who was getting the ticket was watching it all through her rear view mirror and didn't even flinch.

 

Those of us standing around watching got a good laugh. One fool amongst us wanted to get the cops number but we told him to mind his own business or get stomped for being a rat. There are certain lines that you have to respect and the idiot who got pounded obviously was out of bounds.

[Lt. James Cater 62]

And why aren't citizens allowed to defend themselves and their property in a proper manner.

 

If by a proper manner you mean a 12 gauge. Simple the Police Themselves aren't armed. Who needs a set of Brass Buttons, a whistle, and a badge to apprehend the bad guy. If you do it right that'll be his last attempt at burglary.

 

A gauge isn't the answer for every situation.

 

If i was in the UK and caught some dumb ass kid or a crack head breaking in i would probaly just hit em real hard once or twice with a bat and call it a wrap. Additionally, i'd inform them that if i did catch them a second time i would simply kill them, cut them up, and plant them somewhere.

 

Here in the US though i would feel obliged to smoke them to set an example for anyone else who might have any idea of coming into my place. If you know you are going to get away with it, feel free to blast away.