Father shoots and kills, daughter, her foster father, and himself in Dyersburg TN.

Why did this shooter have a gun?

Oh yes. For freedom and self defense, and because guns solve problems.

Thanks Second Amendment!

http://www.jacksonsun.com/article/20090804/NEWS01/908040309/1002/rss

our obsession with gun ownership/possession is so juvenile . . . . and so deadly

Sure, the story is sad, but our obsession with Constitutional rights is NOT juvenile.

Why do you keep posting strawmen and flame bait?

Would you feel better if the guy had drenched everyone with gasoline and set them on fire?

Guns and ammo are too available to anyone as a so-called "right," and too efficient at conveniently killing and maiming innocents.

It's important for you to see stories like this, because they are the natural consequence of the armed society which you advocate.

Such A Tragedy, Now Carry On Dying Everyone.

If you don't like it amend the constitution.

There is no changing that anytime soon.

Saying they are "too available" is usually code for wanting them banned altogether.

I won't hold my breath waiting for a serious, workable answer.

:eyes:

Authoritarians on the left are just as bad as authoritarians on the right.

FAIL to fulfull requirement of workability.

So when are you going to call for a ban on motor vehicles?

Drunk Driver kills 2
http://www2.scnow.com/scp/news/local/article/man_with_suspended_license_prior_dui_allegedly_kills_two_while_drunk/63861/

Drunk Driver kills family
http://www.myfoxhouston.com/dpp/news/investigates/090723_illegal_driver_flees_hospital_post_accident

Drunk Driver traveling wrong way down highway kills dad
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2009/07/26/2009-07-26_dwi_driver_kills_qns_dad_on_wedding_trip.html

Drunk Driver kills brother in crash
http://www.fox28.com/Global/story.asp?S=10772143

Motor vehicles present a larger danger to public health than firearms by a magnitude.

2005 costs are $625 billion, 48,000 killed and 2.4 million injured.

And your presence on or near the road is at least some measure of informed consent of the risk.

Where is the informed consent of a person shot and killed by someone using a gun to settle a grievance or lash out in anger?

Moreover, that's with hardly anyone even actively trying to off someone.

Strikes me that when you have one product that is not designed, produced or (overwhelmingly) used to kill other people, and it still kills more people than another product that is, that first product is a significantly larger threat to public health and safety than the second.

I'll spell that out again: cars kill more people than guns, and the motor vehicle death toll is almost entirely unintentional.

And where is the informed consent of the person killed by a driver who wasn't paying due attention to the road because (s)he was on the phone, or trying to eat a chili dog while driving, or applying make-up, or adjusting the radio? Or impaired by alcohol, or prescription meds, or other drugs?

She used something far easier to obtain, something which can be bought with no background check. Care to guess what that was? Why was a paranoid schizophrenic allowed to possess a knife?

More people die each day from drunk driving, or from legal prescription drugs, or from lightening strikes, or from slip and falls, or from....well, you get my point. There are SO many things that needlessly take innocent lives and yet you want to rail against the legal ownership of a gun? Does the car in you driveway pose a threat? Only when you get in it drunk, or you talk or text while driving, or while putting on makeup, or while tired....again, you get my point. A gun poses no threat until someone misuses it.

NOW I'm happy!

You can get ammunition for this at any street corner in the country.

And you can flee a fire.

Guns and ammo kill by design.

1. Acquire bottle.

2. Fill with gasoline.

3. Insert rag.

4. Light and throw.

5. Anyone within the radius of the splashing gasoline will catch on fire. The bigger the bottle, the bigger the fire. That will probably include several victims since a Molotov Cocktail is an indiscriminate weapon.


Instructions for shooting somebody:

1. Purchase (for several hundred dollars) or steal a firearm.

2. Purchase (or steal) ammunition.

3. Insert ammunition into magazine.

4. Insert magazine into firearm.

5. Cycle action.

6. Approach target. Most firearms incidents occur within 21 feet or less.

7. Accurately fire firearm.

A Molotov Cocktail is easier and less expensive to acquire and capable of as much or more damage and terror than a firearm. The major difference is that the Molotov Cocktail is worse than a gun. Unless you throw it at someone who can shoot back.

Oh, and by the way, if a plain old Molotov Cocktail isn't enough for you, here's a recipe for Napalm. Google search - .26 seconds with 56,600 hits.

edit typos

I will continue to focus on the manufactured implement of convenient killing and the profits being made from it.

When you succeed in in your present task just try not to be too disappointed when you find that you will have the same problem with Molotov Cocktails and knives and clubs...

he didn't.

Huh.

Why don't you title it "for people who agree with us about guns". Or "Gun Lovers". Then you can all sit in a circle together and show each other your weapons.

This forum is for gun-related public policy issues and use of firearms for self-defense

How could ANY GUN-RELATED PUBLIC POLICY ISSUE arise in relation to an incident in which an individual in possession of firearms used them to murder people?

Both sides should stop, and then we can productively discuss policy.

killing many, would that have been ok? Because when people misuse cars, they are blamed. When people misuse guns, the guns are blamed. Why the double standard?

Besides the 2nd doesn't guarantee 100% responsible gun usage any more than the first guarantees 100% responsible use of that right. I wouldn't use individual anecdotes to try to repeal the first, why do people try that with the 2nd? Makes no sense.

Our rights *are* important. Individuals who abuse them should be penalized, and I suspect this guy will face the death penalty. But that doesn't give carte blanche for the government to begin trading our basic liberties for some promised increase in security (that history hasn't borne out).

Who misused a gun??

He didn't use it to hammer a nail and accidentally shoot himself in the eye.

He didn't use it to pry a door open and accidentally shoot the dog.

He didn't use it to scratch his nose with and accidentally shoot a pigeon.

He used it to do what it was designed to do. He put bullets in it, as it was designed for. He pulled the trigger, as it was designed for. The bullet hit a target, that being the purpose the gun was designed to fulfil.

Misuse? Not seeing any, myself.

And that's your failing, not anyone else's.

You don't really think the constitution protects this behavior?

Let's try an experiment, we'll wait and see if he is given the presidential medal of freedom for his actions (in which case I was wrong) or if he is given a stiff punishment for his crimes (in which case you are wrong).

Besides, by your logic drunk drivers haven't used a car improperly either, they are using it as transportation as it was intended.

You really are stretching. You were better off sticking to nitpicking details, facts and logic aren't your forte.

He used it illegally
You don't really think the constitution protects this behavior?

Oh, come on -- you don't REALLY think there are faeries dancing at the bottom of my garden at midnight. Why would you think such a silly thing? Have you no sense?


Besides, by your logic drunk drivers haven't used a car improperly either, they are using it as transportation as it was intended.

Well there ya go!!

Maybe you can point me to somewhere that someone has referred to drunk driving as "misusing a car", and then we'll talk.

Not that you'll likely be saying anything true. You don't seem to have much regard for that truth stuff.

and yet still blame this on the constitution. How do you manage to hold on to, and defend, two contradictory notions at the same time?

And yes, I think most people would say drunk drivers are not using their car driving privileges properly. Just as this individual didn't use his privileges properly. That's why we have laws to penalize both groups.

You would think a lawyer, who is an expert on the american legal system would know all this.

so you acknowledge the consitution does not protect this behavior

or retract the insinuation that I said anything at all in this regard, let alone denied nonsense.


Quote me:

and yet still blame this on the constitution

or retract the false statement.


Answer my question:

And yes, I think most people would say drunk drivers are not using their car driving privileges properly.

or keep ducking and diving. That's not the question I asked.

I can't think of a single person who would say such a thing. Normal, decent people don't talk like that.

Normal, decent people talking about a drunk driver who has killed someone would likely express contempt for the driver, and might call for more and better ways of keeping drunks from behind the wheel to be considered. They would not yammer on about how the driver "misused" a car, let alone about how drunk driving killing people is the price of their mobility.

And normal, decent people talking about a firearm owner who has killed someone doesn't say THIS IS THE PRICE OF OUR FREEEEEDOM.


You would think a lawyer, who is an expert on the american legal system would know all this.

I would think you'd stop making false statements, if you were a normal, decent human being.

And I doubt you'd find any lawyer who is an expert on the american or any other legal system, or really anybody else, who "knows" bullshit and lies. I mean, they'd know 'em when they saw 'em, of course. As do I.

She is a canadian who feels that the constitution and the rights it provides us are bad, bad,bad.

I just have fun kicking iver around from time to time. Figuratively of course.

PM me and I'll take a look.

Nice to see a Canadian weighing in on an issue that doesn't concern you. Perhaps all of your ire should be pointed at the gun problem you have in Canada, where most guns have been banned yet there is a major surge in violent gun crime. Fix your own problems before worrying about mine please.

feel free.

When guns are in the picture. Your chance of being shot and killed by a family member is MUCH greater than than by someone you don't know.

The gun worshippers don't care though. Human life is nothing compared to their dick extensions. They'd rather arm everyone and let Gawd sort 'em out.

Nice parroting of the Brady Bunch meme.

The problem is that particular "more likely to kill a friend or family member" canard relies on the oft debunked Kellerman study that studied a narrow group of "households" that were heavily involved in the drug trade. Do a little Google on Kellerman and you'll find about 35% more posts on it's discrediting than on its results.

Even Brady has backed away from referencing it in many of it's press releases.

But keep up the good, thoughtless repetition. There might still be a few people out there that are as uninformed as you'd need to be to believe that.

... and feel free to come to Gun Free Chicago, a Utopia for people like you.

Heck, we only had 15 shootings last weekend, 7 at one funeral, so the odds of your getting shot in a gun free city aren't really that bad.

About the equivalent of a 5th grade, "Oh yeah!"

Thanks for thought you obviously applied to the issue.

No wonder it's safe to ignore the gun control crowd on most issues.

It doesn't seem that you're primarily interested in a rational discussion, if you'll pardon my observation.

memes. Come up with stats that are either outright lies or at best misleading, claim the other side "worships" guns, and then get in that little freudian slip about genitalia.

Brady campaign propaganda works!

Is it possible for you to be even MORE obtuse?

The number of homicides in the U.S. annually runs into the 10,000-15,000 range. The number of crimes thwarted by armed citizens runs into the hundreds of thousands, even by the more conservative estimates. So, very simply, it is extremely implausible that it is more likely that a given person would murder his child and that child's foster parents, than that any given gun owner would thwart a burglary.

I do acknowledge that there is an elevated risk of homicide in situations where domestic abuse/violence have occurred or are occurring, which is why I think the Lautenberg Amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968--which prohibits anyone with a misdemeanor conviction for domestic violence from possessing a firearm--is a good piece of legislation. But to make it work, we do need to have effective social services, and a culture of law enforcement that takes reports of domestic violence seriously.

Those people are dead, and you just want to use them to make a too-cute-by half political point?

At least the OP and people who share the OP's concerns aren't smearing the victims' blood on their faces and dancing on their graves.

Eh?

to be a bore. This one struck me as particularly ghoulish.

If I had my way, there would be one pinned meta-thread at the top of the forum where people could post their "a bad guy got shot," and "an innocent person got shot" stories.

The careful parsing of statistics and constitutional law are much more tiresome for me. All of that intellectualizing and bean counting are just the result of the reality that people need to defend themselves and firearms are the best way to do it. And those anecdotes also remind us that all too often the wrong people get shot.

Hearing other people's stories helps us understand their motivations, and by extension, understand our own. Understanding each other is crucial to producing workable public policy.

Some of the greatest damage done to the Democratic Party and to liberals in general has been to paint them in the mind of the public as a group of insular, egg headed, elitist, latte sipping, arrogant, self important jerks who don't know what it's like to live in the real world. Judging by some of the posts in this forum, that may be more than just a caricature.

But so are those that post 'good shoots'.

Disgusting.

Where do you see any comments in this thread, by those who share the OP's perspective, that are in any way equivalent to or the counterpart of (I paraphrase from hundreds of such comments) "cleaning the gene pool" or "one more piece of scum removed from society" or any other the other gleeful comments made in those threads?

Both types of thread demonstrate how a firearm was used and invite discussion of related public policy issues, not that much ever ensues.

In only one do vicious morons bathe in the blood.

"The gun worshippers don't care though. Human life is nothing compared to their dick extensions. They'd rather arm everyone and let Gawd sort 'em out."

Not 'gleeful', but just as disingenious.

If you find something to support your assertion, do let us know.

eh?

never goes amiss.

It gives me no pleasure to read or reprint stories like that.

But if guns are killing, we must never allow ourselves to become numb to it or turn a blind eye.

I disagree with you about the guns doing the killing, but you are performing a valuable public service by pointing out the dangers of firearms.

But if you choose to blame an object, I guess that's your own choice, isn't it?

People are killing.

Social services in Tennessee, as in most southern red states, are a joke. The personnel are underpaid and overworked and the entire system is underfunded. With allegations of abuse in the home, separating the alleged abuser from the child by moving her two doors down the street is par for the course for that bunch. It's probably the best they could do, which wasn't anything like good enough.

The prevailing attitude toward social services and civic responsibility in that area can be summed up with the phrase "sink or swim" followed by the phrase "praise Jesus - everybody else can go to Hell". Dyersburg was and no doubt still is one of the most depressing cultural backwaters in the United States. How do I know? I was born there.

If we just took all the redneck's guns away then child abuse wouldn't happen I guess. If we took all their guns away people would get a decent education too. Remove all those guns and government would become more responsive to the people who pay for it. Outlaw the guns and people will start reading books and looking at art and develop some aspirations beyond the latest car and a career at the local textile mill. Take away all the guns and there wouldn't be any more rampage killings.

From the same article in the OP:



Or maybe not. I would suggest you read the articles you post. I might also suggest you get out more. I obviously don't know you, but you sound exactly like the caricature created for liberals by the wingnut right as out of touch elitist egghead latte sipping urbanites who haven't a clue what it is like to live in the real world.

If we just took all the redneck's guns away then child abuse wouldn't happen I guess.

You seem to have wandered off into some other thread by mistake.

This one isn't about "child abuse".

It's about murder.

Murder by firearm.

The most common, to the point of virtually the only, method of murder used by people who susequently kill themselves.

Not a lot of people planning to kill a few family members and then off themselves choose a knife or a pillow for the purpose.



typo fixed

Post #15 reproduced here for your convenience.



Social services in Tennessee, as in most southern red states, are a joke. The personnel are underpaid and overworked and the entire system is underfunded. With allegations of abuse in the home, separating the alleged abuser from the child by moving her two doors down the street is par for the course for that bunch. It's probably the best they could do, which wasn't anything like good enough.

The prevailing attitude toward social services and civic responsibility in that area can be summed up with the phrase "sink or swim" followed by the phrase "praise Jesus - everybody else can go to Hell". Dyersburg was and no doubt still is one of the most depressing cultural backwaters in the United States. How do I know? I was born there.

If we just took all the redneck's guns away then child abuse wouldn't happen I guess. If we took all their guns away people would get a decent education too. Remove all those guns and government would become more responsive to the people who pay for it. Outlaw the guns and people will start reading books and looking at art and develop some aspirations beyond the latest car and a career at the local textile mill. Take away all the guns and there wouldn't be any more rampage killings.

From the same article in the OP:




Or maybe not. I would suggest you read the articles you post. I might also suggest you get out more. I obviously don't know you, but you sound exactly like the caricature created for liberals by the wingnut right as out of touch elitist egghead latte sipping urbanites who haven't a clue what it is like to live in the real world.

If we just took all the redneck's guns away then child abuse wouldn't happen I guess.

You still seem to be imagining that you are in another thread.

These people were murdered.

Try reading the OP again.

Then see whether you might have something relevant to say.

Jacob Levi Shaffer of Fayetteville, a small town near the Alabama border about 70 miles west of Chattanooga, is accused of fatally stabbing five people and beating another to death July 18.

And evidently didn't plan to kill HIMSELF, did he?

So this was relevant to what I said ... how?



Btw, you seem to be confused about more than one thing:

I would suggest you read the articles you post.

I didn't post any article.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/29/national/main692073.shtml

Oh yes, for killing children of course! Isn't that why we all own knives?

When are you going to get the fact that we all get it?

We get that people abuse the right to keep and bear arms, and they murder people with their guns?

We get it! We understand! Really! Yes, there will always be bad apples.

But firearms are a constitutionally protected item that our founders intended the citizenry to retain for defense of freedom! Period!

That some people will abuse this right is tragic, but we are never going to give up the right just because some people abuse that right.

No matter how many articles you post of tragic deaths by firearm, I'm never giving up my right to keep and bear arms on behalf of those criminals. Not ever. And I will use my arms to defend that right if it comes to that.

That some people will abuse this right is tragic

They didn't ABUSE A RIGHT. That's fucking nonsense to start with.

They COMMITTED MURDERS (in this case) using FIREARMS.

That has nothing to do with any right.

They didn't ABUSE A RIGHT. That's fucking nonsense to start with.

They COMMITTED MURDERS (in this case) using FIREARMS.

That has nothing to do with any right.

I disagree, iverglas. We have the right to keep and bear arms. In my opinion, using those arms to commit murder is an abuse of that right.

We have the right to keep and bear arms. In my opinion, using those arms to commit murder is an abuse of that right.

Those who trivialize the lives and deaths of human beings by saying things like probably couldn't get any lower.

I don't doubt they'll try, though.

Someone else's death is best described as an abuse of your rights.

Almost beyond belief. Would be, if one didn't see it with one's own eyes.

Iverglas, it's a simple truth that we have the right to keep and bear arms, and for good reasons, as has been stated countless times before. It's also true that people will abuse this right to commit murder with them. This is tragic. It is not, however, "low" to say so.

Yesterday evening on CNN I read where a family had just moved into a new home with a swimming pool. The day after they moved in, during nap time the family's 2-year-old and 18-month-old opened the back french doors, got into the pool, and drowned. The police officer in the video said that putting up a safety fence was on their list of things to do.

Is it low for me to point out that his tragedy was completely foreseeable and avoidable? No. Would I go up to this family and say it to their faces? Of course not. It's a tragedy, but all of us detached from the situation can look at it and say, "Well, this is what happens when you don't child-proof your swimming pool." It's not low to point this out when discussing accidental drownings of this nature.

Likewise, it's not low to point out that in a country with the Constitutionally-enumerated free access to firearms, people are going to use those firearms to do bad things. It's just a simple fact. But most people recognize the wisdom of our founders and respect the Constitution and the right to keep and bear arms. This means that while we recognize the tragedies that have been and will be committed using firearms, we are going to accept this as part and parcel of the right to keep and bear arms, tragic though it may be.

It is not low to acknowledge this.

The day after they moved in, during nap time the family's 2-year-old and 18-month-old opened the back french doors, got into the pool, and drowned. ...

Is it low for me to point out that his tragedy was completely foreseeable and avoidable? No.


And so what is the problem with someone pointing out that the murders of these individuals were reasonably foreseeable and very possibly avoidable?


It's a tragedy, but all of us detached from the situation can look at it and say, "Well, this is what happens when you don't child-proof your swimming pool."

Yuppers. And anybody who cares to -- anybody who has the requisite integrity -- can look at the subject of this thread and say "Well, this is what happens when your society is awash in firearms."


Likewise, it's not low to point out that in a country with the Constitutionally-enumerated free access to firearms, people are going to use those firearms to do bad things. It's just a simple fact.

Yeah. Like pointing out that in a country with paved highways, children are going to drown in swimming pools.

I think "pointless" would be the relevant description of that.


This means that while we recognize the tragedies that have been and will be committed using firearms, we are going to accept this as part and parcel of the right to keep and bear arms, tragic though it may be.

Your words aren't tragic. They're disgusting.



typo fixed

And so what is the problem with someone pointing out that the murders of these individuals were reasonably foreseeable and very possibly avoidable?

Nothing.

Just like there is no problem with saying that in a country awash with firearms, some people will use them to do bad things.

Yuppers. And anybody who cares to -- anybody who has the requisite integrity -- can look at the subject of this thread and say "Well, this is what happens when your society is awash in firearms."

Absolutely correct. This is what happens when your society, due its Constitution enumerating the right to keep and bear arms, is awash in firearms. Like I said - we get it. We get that every day some people abuse their right to keep and bear arms by using those arms to do bad things. We are not going to give up our right to keep and bear arms because of the actions of a few bad people.

This means that while we recognize the tragedies that have been and will be committed using firearms, we are going to accept this as part and parcel of the right to keep and bear arms, tragic though it may be.

Your words aren't tragic. They're disgusting.

I'm sorry you think so. I think they are simply emotionally detached and logical. We have a free society, and part of the freedoms we have elected to have is the right to keep and bear arms. We have elected to allow mostly unfettered access to firearms. Because of this freedom, there are many firearms in our society. Logically, some portion of society will use those firearms to do bad things. This is sad, but inevitable. Most of us believe that the right to keep and bear arms is sufficiently important that we tolerate the few bad things done with firearms.

In short, most people believe the good outweighs the bad.

It is not "low" or "disgusting" to point this out.

It really doesnt matter what your opinion is. Fix the gun violence problem in YOUR country (where guns are banned) before trying to fix ours, please.

My "worthless" opinion was:

Those who trivialize the lives and deaths of human beings by saying things like <"We have the right to keep and bear arms. In my opinion, using those arms to commit murder is an abuse of that right"> probably couldn't get any lower.

I know just how much weight that opinion carries around here.

I know that up there in Canada they have banned most guns. But down here, it IS a right, whether you like it or not. This person in the story ABUSED his right to own a firearm, period. Now dance around that!

... or stop saying things you know to be false; I wouldn't know what your problem is ... you can always google.


I know that up there in Canada they have banned most guns.

And I'll bet you know the earth is flat, too. Or at least are willing and eager to say so, if it advances some agenda ...


This person in the story ABUSED his right to own a firearm, period. Now dance around that!

The person in the story used a firearm to commit murder. How come you can't bring yourself to form those words and admit the truth?

Tennessee man kills 6 in shooting rampage:

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Authorities in the southern US state of Tennessee late Saturday arrested a man they believe fatally shot six people, including his estranged wife, in a murderous rampage that spanned two states. Police said two juveniles were among those killed in the shooting spree, which was carried out in two private homes in Tennessee and a business in nearby Huntsville, Alabama, where officials were to charge him with one additional homicide.

Shaffer was arrested at one of the residences, and was being held Sunday at a Tennessee jail, the TBI said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090719/ts_alt_afp/uscrimemurder_20090719152828

Of course a little bit of Google search will reveal that Shaffer had stabbed and beaten his six victims to death. To bad none of them used their second amendment rights to kill off the sick fucker.

To bad none of them used their second amendment rights to kill off the sick fucker.


A normal, decent person wouldn't say that, you know. Just in case you were wondering.

A normal, decent person would probably express regret at these deaths. Not at the fact that someone else didn't die.

Now, I can see someone using a hammer or a stick or a body part to fend off an assailant.

Using "rights"? That's just weird. If I try it some day and it doesn't work, can my estate sue you or something?

Yes kind of like the OP did. Why no response of this kind to the OP's post?

Why did this shooter have a gun?

Why were the victims unable to defend themselves? They knew they were having problems with the guy. And more importantly, why didn't the police roll in there and save the day? The state of Tennessee knew he was a problem as well. Why were these people not adequately protected?

And another question. Where were you when all this went down? If you don't have a solution to the problem please don't restrict others right to find a solution for themselves.

I'm not going to take you seriously until you start talking about cars, knives, rocks, pointy sticks, wild animals and the other things that kill people.

When are you going to start talking about banning fire? Hundreds die in blazes every year! Think of the children!