It’s been interesting in the last day to watch the coverage of the terrible shootings in Virginia. There is a universal response of “When will America do something about it’s gun culture? Why do they implicitly accept this sort of thing?” That’s a pretty understandable reaction from various op-ed contributors, but even a programme like Newsnight, notable for its desire to ‘catch out’ government of any stripe, led with a headline something like “America’s love of guns gets 31 students killed” (I’m exaggerating, but not by much).
I don’t disagree with the sentiment, unsurprisingly, having been brought up in the UK. It does highlight the additional sensitivity I feel at such events having lived in the US though; to some extent I’ll always think of it as my ‘other’ country, so things that happen there are more real to me than in other countries. So while I’m waiting for the initial breathlessness of the event to recede before the pointless back-and-forth over the 2nd Amendment restarts, the average person in the UK already has that level of detachment to start with. It’s no credit to me that I feel this way; as many have pointed out, 33 deaths is almost certainly a quiet day in Baghdad, and I find it easy not to dwell on those unfortunates.
14 Comments
Paul,
This is definitely a very horrible event. What a lot of people fail to realize is that this kind of thing can happen anywhere, anytime. Laws to prohibit guns will not change a thing. Just because this hasn’t happened in the UK does not mean it will not happen in the UK. Canada has had this kind of thing happen. Many countries have. In the US, the one big thing that a most people of the world fail to realize is that the US was built on guns. Freedom came with a price, they fought for it, kept their guns, and a lot of people will agree that it’s not the guns that’s the problem. I fear the knee-jerk reactions that will follow from this tragedy. We’re still feeling the effects of 9/11 and all the damn pointless laws that were passed to ‘help’ the government catch terrorists.
This kind of senseless violence is just that: senseless. NO LAW will change this kind of behavior. I always like to point out that the irony that lawmakers and activists think that having a law making guns illegal will keep people from shooting people. I believe KILLING is also illegal. If some man kills another man, do you think he’ll care that it was also illegal to own that gun in the first place?
The media always fails to mention how many more people die from knives every year. Get the guns, go after knives? I’m sure a lot of chefs in this country will be pretty pissed if that were to happen.
This tragedy could have been prevented with better communication and security at the school. The reports that are coming out are showing a LONG time lapse between the first and second shootings.
I’m not familiar with the laws in the UK, but in Canada, the gun control laws we have are VERY expensive to enforce that it’s really hard to justify the cost. People may say that it’s horrible to say that there’s a cost to human life, and I agree. But when you look at how many people die from guns compared to how many people die on highway intersections, you’ll see the highway deaths are way, way higher. That Billion dollars plus that Canada spends on gun control would save a lot more lives every year if they built bridges.
Lets all hope that the students and teachers and families get the support they need, the help they need, and the security they need. Great post, Paul, as usual. Later.
Dan
I should point out that the fact I’m opposed to guns because I’m from the UK doesn’t mean that I’m right, just that such an attitude is the default here. In large part I think that’s because we just don’t have the history of guns that people in North America do.
The gun laws here are pretty simple to enforce – you’re not allowed to have a handgun, so if a policeman sees one you’re under arrest. Most long guns are similarly banned, and the exceptions are small enough that they’re easily managed. The end to common ownership of guns (which was never that common anyway) came with the Hungerford and Dunblane massacres, the latter being particularly clear in my memory.
Ultimately I don’t have any objection to guns, in fact on the rare occasions I’ve used them I’ve really enjoyed it. My problem is people, who are all too able to prove themselves incapable of responsibly managing guns. If people are to have guns they should expect to go through similar processes to when you want to drive a car, including getting a license, going through periodic reassessment, losing your license when you lose your faculties, carrying third party insurance, and having every weapon be publicly identifiable and traceable to you. I’d add in extra restrictions around waiting times, because guns aren’t as important to society as cars.
The argument that I find least convincing around all of this is that the US was built on guns. Quite apart from the fact that 250 years ago it was possible for a private group to arm itself as well as a government, which is no longer the case, the US was also built on slavery, land fraud and the subjugation of minorities. Fortunately it has continued to prosper because of progress.
Methinks a follow-up post is in order
LOL
Great response. The one big difference between North America and Europe is that there is so much more land here for hunting, and they have a very powerful voice. Native Americans/Canadians have treaties which makes it illegal to touch their rights to guns and hunting. The argument that North America was built on guns is still VERY valid when you consider the wars that were fought here and abroad.
I agree with you that it should be much harder to obtain a gun, but my point earlier about making them illegal still holds true: in the end, anyone can get a gun. The gun is the tool to an end. Would it be any different if he had made a bomb or a dozen and blown the whole place up?
My whole point is that it is MUCH harder to control people, and in the end it is people that do these horrible things.
As far as slavery, land fraud, and the subjugation of minorities goes, cough, Canada and the UK both have the same history as the US when it comes to those topics. I don’t think there’s a country in the world that doesn’t have that in their history. I think the only reason why it’s still brought up so much in the world’s view of the US is that the US made much better movies about it.
The argument of owning a gun, making guns illegal, harder to obtain, is really not the point. I hate that the media is already obsessing with going after the guns again. The fact is, a man did a senseless act and no law in the world will stop the next senseless act from happening, period. I would much rather the media and the government spend much more time and energy on things that they can control, like health care, road safety, etc. It will save a lot more lives, and probably catch a lot more mentally sick people in the process before they can do any senseless acts.
By the way, my parents are big on gun control, as is my sister. I wouldn’t say I’m against it, I’m just not convinced it’s the answer, or even A answer. I don’t own a gun, or plan on it. I did read a lot of comments about these shootings that did raise an interesting point: if anyone ELSE with a gun had one, they could’ve stopped this guy with one shot, just like he killed so many people.
Make the guns illegal, and the intent to harm will still live on. They’ll just get more creative. We saw that with 9/11.
VERY interesting topic to debate, eh? I don’t think there’s a right answer for this, and I think most opinions are true simple because it is such a difficult topic.
Methinks I followed-up a lot.
Dan
I don’t want to get into a debate with you, not because it wouldn’t be fun, but because I think we only disagree by a few percent
For example, I agree that guns are just a more efficient way of doing what can be done anyway, as you point out. I do want to spend just one more moment on the history of guns thing. I totally agree that we (as in the majority of nations) have things to bring shame in our history (even the Belgians! – as owner of the Congo Free State King Leopold oversaw the death of an estimated 10 million Congolese in 40 years, which makes Pol Pot look like Judy Garland).
One of the foreigner chips on my shoulder I carried in the US, though, was this idea that the US came from noble beginnings. There is much to admire about how the US started and continued (for all its flaws I’d take the Constitution and the general dedication to it, Bush Administration notwithstanding, in a heartbeat over what we have) but it is as mired in filth as any western nation and arguments that depend on its supposed purity fall pretty flat for me.
Thanks for the chat, and please do answer back if you have more to say!
I totally agree. However, I actually still think the US comes from noble beginnings because it’s the dream, the promise of the Constitution, that makes it all seem so noble. Canada has had it’s share of nightmares with it’s Constitution, and it’s not nearly as well known among Canadians as the American’s one.
I think we can both agree that it’s the majority of the politicians, not the history or the Constitution, that makes the US mired in filth. But it could be a lot worse…
I have to believe that it will get better. If nobody made mistakes, it would be hard to find the correct path each and every time. I think over time, the world will come together, figure it all out, and move on. If you look at the last 100 years, compared to the last 1000, it’s pretty amazing how far we’ve come. Hell, just looking at countries like India, China, Ireland (heh, couldn’t resist)… they’ve changed a lot in the last 25 years that the next 25 could be so much more exciting.
Bush won’t last. I just hope the next President won’t be afraid to do what needs to be done to try to clean up the mess we have today in the world and here in the US. Good chat. Later.
Dan, I hate to be like a reporter from “Duh” magazine, but studies show that proximity to guns correlates to the use of them. Compare these two scenarios:
Scenario 1: You see a man who raped and beat your daughter. You own a gun. It is a few meters away from you.
Scenario 2: You see a man who raped and beat your daughter. You own a knife. It is a few meters away from you.
Studies show that not only is the second scenario less likely to result in homicide, it shows that the second scenario is less likely to even result in assault. And you are right: It is also true that taking guns off the street results in higher knife-wound cases. I’m going out on a limb here, but I think we’d both prefer knife-fights over gunfights.
Canada has very similar gun laws to the US, but has 6 times fewer cases of gun deaths — per capita! The difference I think is culture. Americans are some of the most scared people on earth and have, in my opinion, a much more detached-from-the-issues population. Consider most people in the suburbs are scared sh*tless of my neighborhood. They are also the first demographic who are keen to send troops around the world to “protect their freedoms”, yet they won’t lift a finger to clean up their own inner cities. How craven is that?
BTW: I live 6 blocks away from a neighborhood that has the highest homicide rate between Chicago and Los Angeles. I’d like to check in with you on your opinion on gun control after living in my neighborhood for a couple of years.
Forgot to mention: there was a guy who moved into my neighborhood a few years ago who put an NRA sticker in his front window and all these pro-gun bumper-stickers on his truck and a few pro-gun signs in his yard. This all stayed this way for the first year he was here. After a few homicides near his front doorstep that summer, all that disappeared. How brave.
CN,
Great post, and I’m not disagreeing with any of it. However, my point is that the laws will not do anything to curb the guns being present to begin with. Canada is actually a very bad example to use for comparison with the US because we have 30 million people spread out across the second largest country in the world. You look at Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver, etc, and you’ll see very similar murder numbers, rapes, violence, etc to their American counterparts.
I’m actually a little confused by your comment “I’d like to check in with you on your opinion on gun control after living in my neighborhood for a couple of years”. Gun control laws will not stop the crimes from happening.
Cya.
Dan
“Reason”, you seem to be arguing that the solution is “everyone must carry a gun”, which, as studies have shown, would only result in a fistfight graduating into a gunfight on a regular basis. Oh, but then people are all carrying guns so they can shoot the fistfighters who’ve gone out of control! Yes, that makes sense! It worked great in Columbine, where every home had a gun.
Look, if the the VTech student were studying in Osaka, there would have been no gun shop where he could have bought the guns in the first place. Get it now?
If I have to pull out a gun to protect my home, I’m having “a bad day”, my friend. No matter who I drive off successfully. There’s no smiling gun-toting home-protector out there.
Seriously, come and live in my neighborhood. Spend your evenings polishing your guns. And becoming a target for people who will break into your house to steal them. You can “drive them off”, wouldn’t that be fun and totally worth it?
(Nik is referring to this comment, which I somehow managed to delete by mistake)
From: ‘Reason’ (I believe quoting a WSJ article)
At Virginia Tech’s sprawling campus in southwestern Va., the local police arrived at the engineering building a few minutes after the start of the murder spree, and after a few critical minutes, broke through the doors that Cho Seung-Hui had apparently chained shut. From what we know now, Cho committed suicide when he realized he’d soon be confronted by the police. But by then, 30 people had been murdered.
But let’s take a step back in time. Last year the Virginia legislature defeated a bill that would have ended the “gun-free zones” in Virginia’s public universities. At the time, a Virginia Tech associate vice president praised the General Assembly’s action “because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus.” In an August 2006 editorial for the Roanoke Times, he declared: “Guns don’t belong in classrooms. They never will. Virginia Tech has a very sound policy preventing same.”
Actually, Virginia Tech’s policy only made the killer safer, for it was only the law-abiding victims, and not the criminal, who were prevented from having guns. Virginia Tech’s policy bans all guns on campus (except for police and the university’s own security guards); even faculty members are prohibited from keeping guns in their cars.
Virginia Tech thus went out of its way to prevent what happened at a Pearl, Miss., high school in 1997, where assistant principal Joel Myrick retrieved a handgun from his car and apprehended a school shooter. Or what happened at Appalachian Law School, in Grundy, Va., in 2002, when a mass murder was stopped by two students with law-enforcement experience, one of whom retrieved his own gun from his vehicle. Or in Edinboro, Pa., a few days after the Pearl event, when a school attack ended after a nearby merchant used a shotgun to force the attacker to desist. Law-abiding citizens routinely defend themselves with firearms. Annually, Americans drive-off home invaders a half-million times, according to a 1997 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Colonel Nikolai, That’s exactly what I’m saying and we’re going to lock you up for not carrying a gun.
In fact anyone who does not carry a gun and also does not shoot adequately will be incarcerated until he or she learns how to shoot properly so he can gun down all malefactors in society. See a prostitute, a jaywalker, a fist fighter, a speeder, someone smoking indoors, SHOOT HIM!
Seriously, where “shall issue” laws exist we have not seen the sorts of dire escalations you go on about and all these mass murders happen in gun free zones.
CN,
Just because I’m against gun control does not mean that I would own a gun to feel safe. I’m not even really against gun control, I just don’t think it will work. It’ll be very expensive to create the laws and enforce them. In the US, that would be BILLIONS. Far more lives could be saved spending that money on something else. That is my only point.
As far as me polishing my guns and becoming a target… I would never, ever, be stupid enough to think that just because I have a gun it makes me safe. I would never be stupid enough to advertise to the world that I have a gun and I’m willing to use it. Also, being married with 1 son, I would never be stupid enough to think that I could protect them in a violent neighborhood with a gun.
And finally, that ‘Reason’ article above does illustrate what law abiding citizens can do if they have the right training and tools. In the end, the gun law doesn’t stop this type of crime from happening. And as I like to point out, MURDER is illegal already. Making it illegal to own a gun because you may commit murder, well…
Take care!
Dan
Greetings. I am visiting on the Colonel’s “Stumble Upon” recommendation. I am an occasional commenter on his blog. Having read the discussion here I believe that there are a few salient facts that we should keep in mind.
First, as the only Virginia Tech graduate likely to comment here, I feel uniquely qualified to point out something that we all already know, but most would feel loathe to point out due to sensitivity for the victims at Va. Tech. Well, call me Nixon and send me to China, because here it comes…
MASS SLAUGHTER IS NOT A BIG PROBLEM IN THE USA.
My country’s horrendous homicide record is not the result of vanishingly rare incidents like the one at my alma mater. Sure mass murderers and serial killers get all the media attention. But in point of fact we have very few wholesale killers like Mr. Cho. Instead, the USA is plagued by a very large number of “retail” killers.
The real problem of gun violence in the USA is the crime of passion: the jilted lover, the vengeance-minded loser in a bar-fight, the tribal tough who sees a member of the wrong tribe on his turf. As the Colonel pointed out, study after study after study shows that HAVING A GUN is the prime catalyst for violence in these situations. Furthermore, the possibility that someone else present might also have a gun is NOT A STRONG DETERRENT.
Second, in the USA in situations where a solid citizen with a concealed weapon intervenes against a gun-carrying criminal, police arriving on the scene are much more likely to confuse the perpetrator with the “Good Samaritan”. Both cops and innocent civilians are MUCH MORE LIKELY to be injured or killed when someone other than a policeman or a perpetrator has a gun at a crime scene. More guns do NOT equal more security.
Third, gun control in the USA is a nice idea in theory, but there are overwhelming practical problems in actually controlling guns in the US. To begin with, even if you could overcome the social forces fighting any sort of restraint of ownership, the economic forces are an even higher mountain to climb. The guns are already out there; there is no easy way to get them back. Chris Rock’s “bullet control” idea might have merit, if the bullets were not so easy to make. Furthermore the manufacturers are not just going to find something else to sell; they will find ways to continue the revenue stream no matter what the law says.
Fourth, my home state of Virginia is a place where, judging by actions alone, you might think many people hold the 2nd Amendment to be more sacred than the 10 Commandments. But even there most people don’t know what it actually says. Well, here is the full text: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Yes, that last comma is in the original text. Yes, as far anyone can tell it is grammatically incorrect to place a comma there. Yes, the first comma in the text is sort of suspect as well…
But I digress. An enormous volume of case law as grown up around this simple — albeit grammatically-challenged — sentence. And much of that law is confusing and conflicted. However, on one point the law is absolutely clear. The 2nd Amendment only applies to the FEDERAL government. State and local governments can regulate gun ownerships and usage just about any way they wish. And most have done exactly that, since the founding of the Republic.
The most obvious problem with this system is that “weak link” states like Alabama and Virginia become conduits, resource-rich in a false economy of gun availability. This inequity long ago became a positive feedback loop which the federal government can do little to stop… because of the 2nd Amendment.
I don’t mean to be fatalistic, but I really don’t see any sort of solution here that can be worked out from the inside. And we all know how well the US response to OUTSIDE pressure. The prospects for change are not bright.
Thanks for commenting Roger. You raise something I was thinking about today from the opposite direction; the equivalent of Virginia Tech happens every two weeks in the US, only it’s from accidental shootings, not very deliberate ones. It’s entirely possible that the number of deaths averted each year exceeds the 800+ accidentally shot, but I doubt that crude calculus. Multiply gun ownership by 5, 10 or more and pretty soon someone’s going to notice the empty desks at schools across the country.