On reaching a consensus re mass shootings in the U.S.

We do not need more gun control. Refer to number 4.

 

Its really easy to get bogged down in details. There is clearly a problem in America. Real unbiased data points clearly and unequivocally proves that. There are all kinds of factors that contribute to the problem, and those factors may not be mixed in the same proportions in Chicago as they are rural Maine as they are in Palm Springs. Certainly access to guns is a contributing factor that needs addressing if you're not okay with the current outcomes. External factors, like fringe lobbyists groups whose primary motivation is profits, are poisoning our democracy and our conversations and fighting over the details is exactly what's preventing consensus on what is very evidently a real problem.

 

Never thought I'd say this about a Kerri post. But nice post Kerri.

 

Me too. It seems they primarily lobby on behalf of themselves, the gun industry and for maintaining their disproportionate level of power and influence.

 

the gist of it, as I understand it is not that only 3% of Americans own guns... It's that 3% own a majority of guns. So you could have many many guns in that 3%, and then outside of the 3% households that have only one gun. I don't know much about it, but I did a search yesterday or the day before and there were lots of results saying that 3% of Americans own the majority of guns in the country.

 

There’s an effective way to react to someone with mental illness posting on social media that they’re going to shoot up a school. As a society we should take those things seriously unlike the FBI and police in the Parkland case.

 

Except we hear the argument that we can't profile someone, we can't subject someone to a violation of rights, we can't act on someone's stated comments because saying them isn't the same as doing them. If Cruz would have had his weapons taken from him beforehand, there would be a lawsuit from the NRA the ACLU and others. Welcome to the decline of common sense in America.

 

So true. But the cops went to his house like 45 times? No arrests? Soooooo many people dropped the ball. People blaming the NRA as the main problem is just going to make things like this happen again. And how about the Texas bomber? He wasn’t using a gun, so if someone is sick enough and angry enough, they won’t need a gun to do harm. But posting it on social media should be a red flag.

 

While that’s all true, different social media sites should have rules to not post threats on their sites. That’s common sense. Just like this site we’re on now has rules and if you break them, you could face being banned.

 

This is details to one specific case. The larger problem still has as one of many root causes our access to guns. It's not fair to point to one failure in one case and invalidate one component of a larger problem

 

I agree.

 

The problem is one side wants to profile or watch or monitor what could be a threat and the other sides tries to make what is applied to one must be applied to all.

Its about a difference of opinion on who gets to decide who is a problem and who isn't. Then after the fact when something bad happens, everyone wants to point fingers at the other one at why it went wrong.

And yes.....many situations have become social straight jackets. People have become paralyzed to act as there is a problem of ongoing continual years long litigation consequences if they act.

Some people need to be exempted from rights if they pose a threat to others. The "OTHERS" rights need to supersede the ONE that has the potential problem.

If I have a kid posting on social media or a terrorist collecting bomb making materials, yeah we need to infringe a little.

 

Personally I think blaming law enforcement in this specific case is scapegoating. A white kid legally bought an AR-15 and killed a bunch of kids. Pro gun people need something other than gun laws to be the primary culprit

 

The FBI said that on September 24 it was notified about a comment on YouTube from someone with the username “Nikolas Cruz.” The comment said: “I’m going to be a professional school shooter.” The notification came from a video blogger on You Tube who found it disturbing enough that it didn't feel sufficient to simply flag it as inappropriate. So he emailed an image to the FBI. When that bounced back, he called the local FBI field office.

You don't have to know his future actions. He made a public threat against school children. If that is not reason enough to take his guns away from him, then why don't you tell me what would justify taking them away.

Written threats to kill or do bodily injury is a felony.

 

My understanding is that "profiling" per se is a valid, useful tool in law enforcement. It was used in 1888 in the case of Jack the Ripper. It's racial and ethnic profiling that is controversial because it targets sizeable categories of people for special hassling. The Justice Department prohibits it for federal law enforcement.. The leading case on stop and frisk was Terry v. Ohio, which involved an officer witnessing activity in front of a jewelry store he, on the basis on long experience in law enforcement, regarded as suspicious. He approached the suspects, asked them a question, and when he didn't get a satisfactory answer, spun one of them around, patted him down, and found an illegal firearm. The standard for a stop became "reasonable suspicion", and for a frisk, additional evidence of the probability of a weapon--in that case, a suspected crime that ordinarily would involve a weapon. The suspects were African-American, but the officer persuaded the court that other circumstances triggered the stop. Just being black is not considered enough to qualify as reasonable suspicion of criminality. Seems to me that in the Florida case, the bases for suspicion re Nickolas Cruz were more than reasonable.

 

No disagreement from me. But its argued that DUE PROCESS must take precedence when you seize property before they carry out an act. Not before.