S/O Florida school shooting, do we jail shooters' parents?

Fox

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 4:38 pm

keym wrote:

Fox, im wondering. I always understood that the issue is actually "federal government". That colonial times the discussion was giving as little to federal government and as much to the individual states.
Hence when it comes to many laws, mariuana, gay, abortion, gun, and even drivers license laws, the states by states make the laws historically.
So there is really nothing problematic with pushing massive gun restrictions on the state level just leaving the federal government out.
Reading the 2nd ammendment, it was always taught that the "right to bear arms" is also not necessarily each persons right to own guns, rather the states right to raise its own army, and have a well armed militia for the states protection and rights.
But it was and always is the states right vs federal rights vs individual rights.

Yup, 100 percent.

Until well into the 20th century, the federal government had virtually no impact on the day-to-day lives of the vast majority of Americans. The U.S. was originally designed to be more like the E.U.

If you think about it, even today it's not entirely painless to move to one state from another. You have to get new ID, and you may have to retake a driving test, since Montana might not trust Idaho to properly evaluate your driving skills.

I would argue that there were a few developments that led to grudging acquiescence on the part of the populace for a strong federal government -- almost all of which happened in the first third of the 20th century:

* Transportation advances and the Industrial Revolution made interstate commerce and relocation more common.

* The Civil War and the loss of 25 percent of the male population lessened everyone's enthusiasm for excessive independence among states.

* The establishment of a federal income tax and the establishment of our most fearsome government agency, the IRS, allowed the federal government to enlarge itself.

* Prohibition and the law enforcement mechanisms to enforce it had a financial and cultural effect allowing the federal government to enlarge itself.

As you say, most organizations working against gun violence target states, because that's where it's easiest to address problems and loopholes. It's also easier to adapt the legislation to local sensibilities. What seems reasonable to citizens of New York or Chicago is unlikely to be the same as what seems reasonable to citizens of Idaho or Louisiana.

It's also probably more effective. Most mass shooters have targeted locations in suburbs near large metropolitan areas, and very few have traveled significant distances to get their weapons. Obviously, there will always be an illegal weapons trade among criminals, but it's a legitimate question for someone in Idaho to say, "Hey, why tell me what guns I can own just because your kids go crazy? They're not taking the bus to Idaho to borrow my gun!"

sushilover

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 4:48 pm

marina wrote:

Had you listened to the podcast, you may have learned that she (a tea partier who believes Obama was born in Kenya) wanted to ban fake look-alike weapons (not toys) from schools after a gun that looked 100% real almost got a child shot by the police. And the police came to her asking for this legislation, so she sponsored it. For legitimate safety concerns based on a real incident - to actually keep kids safe. But yeah, good for the NRA for opposing it. Woo hoo! You go NRA!

Next time a child is shot by the cops who see a real gun when it is actually fake, the NRA can pat themselves on the back for standing up to the evil liberals who want to eviscerate all our rights.

You can use that logic to support almost any law.

You are allowed to disagree with the NRA and the law abiding gun owners it represents, without basically calling us complicit in the death of Tamir Rice. It's a repulsive debating strategy.
I don't think a law that gives a kid 6 months in prison for bringing a toy weapon (yes, they are considered toys) is fair. So now I am responsible for any far fetched incident that could possibly happen?

Fox

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 4:56 pm

amother wrote:

The government does have jurisdiction over so many things though. I guess that's why I don't understand why the culture card should make more of a difference with guns than with anything else.

It doesn't -- it's just that gun violence is a big, honking maladaptation.

Other effects of our cultural legacies are just as pervasive, but the results are a lot less dramatic.

For example, Americans give way, way more private charity than most other countries. Are we better, more compassionate people? Um, highly unlikely.

The reason is more likely to be because the cultural legacy of extreme independence and individualism makes us resist using the government to solve problems. There's a mentality of "you take care of your own."

In fact, even when the federal and state governments spend money to solve a problem, what do they do? A large part of the time they distribute the money to community-based agencies who are in charge of how it's used.

Again, good and bad. When average people go to extraordinary lengths to help their neighbors during a natural disaster rather than sit around and wait for FEMA, it's great. When a bridge is crumbling, individual actions don't quite cut it.

southernbubby

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 5:23 pm

sushilover wrote:

well here is a quote from the NRA.org homepage which I find very disturbing:

Wayne LaPierre Fights for Freedom on Hannity
"The elites always protect themselves and they always protect themselves with guns. And then they lecture the American public how you shouldn't do that … what the NRA is fighting for is reciprocity, to enforce the existing federal gun laws and to protect Americans' right to protect themselves." On Hannity, NRA Executive Vice President and CEO Wayne LaPierre let Dianne Feinstein, Chuck Schumer and their anti-gun minions know that the NRA will not tolerate their use of a tragedy in their war against the Second Amendment.

Anyone else see the problem with this?????

Fox

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 5:37 pm

southernbubby wrote:

Anyone else see the problem with this?????

I guess you're gonna have to give me a hint.

I'm not necessarily a huge fan of the NRA -- as I wrote, a lot of people think they're really the National Firearm Manufacturers Association.

And, of course, the rhetoric is ridiculously over the top -- "fight . . . tolerate . . . war". But if we stripped away ridiculously over-the-top rhetoric from debates on every controversial issue, we'd have about two websites left and we could all spend our time raising the GDP instead of yelling at each other online.

southernbubby

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 5:42 pm

Fox wrote:

I take issue with the fact that they don't want to grant states the right to add restrictions that would be in the best interests of protecting the citizens and #2 they don't want a bunch of dead Jewish kids to be the reason that anything changes (of course they don't mention that some of the murdered children were Jews but I get the drift) they just take issue that we want change due to a tragedy and tragedy should't trump our holy right to own guns.

To me a bunch of Jewish funerals is the very reason that we need to pull out all the stops and those who survived will stop at nothing to change this travesty.

Fox

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 6:26 pm

I think the point is that good law or policy is not based on emotional responses in the aftermath of a tragedy. This is something, btw, that virtually all responsible advocates for increased firearms legislation agree with.

While in some cases unintended, the implicit argument being made right now is, "If you don't support the inchoate, unspecified changes being demanded, then you obviously don't care about dead kids."

That's poppycock, and it's a slap in the face to the myriad of organizations that work day in and day out to reduce gun violence. Each has its own agenda and philosophy, but these are people who are actually in the trenches, dealing with real life, not general ideas or wishful thinking.

Of course the NRA is against additional firearm restrictions. That's the business they're in. Just as the National Dairy Council is in the business of telling you how you should eat more milk and cheese. They are advocacy organizations, and naturally they only present one side.

Truthfully, I find many of the emotional appeals in the aftermath of tragedies to be counter-persuasive, and they cause me to significantly discount the points that are being made.

The people who are really making a difference -- and the people whose opinions I respect -- in the problem of gun violence and other social problems are the ones who are doing the work and dealing with the realities. And interestingly, they're hardly ever the ones encouraging emotion-based responses.

Last edited by Fox on Mon, Feb 19 2018, 6:27 pm; edited 1 time in total

southernbubby

Mon, Feb 19 2018, 6:37 pm

Fox wrote:

They have to:
1) be specific in what they are asking for
2) be ready to lose to the other side because they won't have all of their demands met
3) not give up the fight when the news media loses interest in this shooting and goes on to the next one

OTOH, apparently America has the most guns per capita of any country on earth and the highest rate of shootings and shooting deaths.

Personally a person's right to own guns doesn't interest me as much as society's right to keep guns out of the wrong hands.

The gun that I don't own never killed anyone.