The latest for Florida... guns

[malada]

Amazing.

A 14 year old boy pulls out a pistol and shoots dead his 23 year old sister.

In retaliation his 15 year old brother shoot the 14 year old with *his* pistol.

How the frell do hormone raging teenagers get a hold of pistols?

Oh, right... the Second Amendment which promises any white guy free use of any gun for any purpose whatsoever. Except... no it doesn't. It's about having an armed militia.

I keep hearing that guns are not the problem - people are. Then why do you keep giving people guns?

Comments

[siliconshaman]

If the problem is not the guns, but people getting hold of guns...that surely that's an argument for much better gun control, right?

[dewline]

Agreed.

[conuly]

God what a fucking tragedy. Did the 14 year old survive?

[acelightning73]

In New York City teenagers get "AK-type" weapons and then you get 15-year-old boys shooting one another over "I saw him looking at my girl. I had to kill him to protect her."

THe second amendment isn't about indiscriminatly waving guns around. When this land was settled by Europeans, most of them had a musket or long rifle by the front door, to use on bears, Native people, or anything else inimical that might scratch at the door. That was how we defeated the British during the Revolutionary War.

I happen to know how to use a gun, and I have done so, mainly against inanimate targets (tin cans). So I'm not one of the anti-gun people who claim we as Americans have a God-given right to walk around with whatever weapon we choose, and I don't faint in terror when I see a gun. I just think dangerously violent individuals should not be able to get weapons with which to enact their most violent fantasies. If our politicians should stop treating the Second Amendment as if it were inscribed upon a rock slab and presented to the people by God. We need to get sensible about gun control, as we need to get sensible about affordable housing, and health care, and education. We need to look at how other nations handle these problems, and LEARN from them.

[acelightning73]

Nobody's giving away guns. The people who get them BUY them, just like the people who need guns - hunters, cops, target shooters - and they're not terribly expensive. Or they steal them. That's why there are public service announcements about "don't keep guns around your home. Lock them in a gun safe. Lock the ammo in another safe in a different room. There have been cases of small children finding a legally owned gun and playing with it, and accidentally shooting another family member.

It's been common for toy guns to be given to children, so they can pretend to be cowboys or soldiers or whatever. And some people refuse to let their children play with toy guns. But there was one case of a child who nibbled a slice of toast into the shape of a pistol, pointed it at another family member and said, "Bang.You're dead. You're supposed to fall down now."