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Connecticut Groups Cancels Plan to Destroy Violent Games
An anonymous reader writes with an update to an earlier story about a group wanting to destroy your violent video games. "Southington, a town in Connecticut, has canceled its plans to collect and destroy violent games, stating that it has already succeeded in raising attention."
Perhaps the real reason: "Backed by the Southington Chamber of Commerce, SouthingtonSOS originally planned to offer citizens $25 gift certificates in exchange for their violent games, films, and CDs, which the group would collect for 'permanent disposal.'"
not helping the mentally ill can be their new top priority.
$25 to get rid of your old shooters? Man, they're a better trade-in deal than anyone else around. Plus, they're getting rid of e-waste! How thoughtful!
Give them your Call of Madden 2011 and 2012, then go buy Call of Madden 2013.
Screw the rules, I have green hair!
Where else am I going to get $25 for my copy of Duke Nukem Forever?
Maybe there's some hope for us after all.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
1. Announce intent to do something attention-gathering.
2. Revel in the reporting.
2. Announce cancelation.
Cost: Zero.
Raise awareness of what, exactly? Violent videogames? That seems... odd, unless you are working for a marketing department. The dangers of violent video games? What dangers? I've seen exactly zero evidence of any such dangers (TFA says there is "ample evidence" but, of course, they don't actually cite what that evidence is, exactly). The only awareness that seems to have been raised is that the group behind this are a bunch of scared people lashing out at what they don't understand, desperately looking for something to blame. They said they wanted to "prompt discussions", but you can't have meaningful discussions without some evidence about how or even if video games have negative effects, and there is no such evidence.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Disclaimer: Lifetime NRA member(it was half price!).
I'm currently pissed at the NRA for pointing the finger at violent media, though they had a point if they'd restricted it to the *news*. Specifically, the making of the shooter into a celebrity, the digging into their life, etc...
I also happen to think our support structure for the mentally ill is horribly broken and needs to be fixed. End the war on drugs, actually combat poverty, treat the sick and we'd be more like Switzerland - awash with guns, but very little crime, not just 'little gun crime'.
I don't read AC A human right
> SouthingtonSOS originally planned to offer citizens $25
> gift certificates in exchange for their violent games
which would have caused a spike in sales on cheap old games at GameStop the day before the event and accomplished nothing else.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I can't really take issue with the program as they would have implemented it. It's a voluntary program, the person with the game is reimbursed for the game, and the game is destroyed. It's stated up front, everybody knows what the endgame is. At the end of the day, it sounds just like a sponsored gun buyback program. I wouldn't take my games personally, but at the end of the day it's a good potential resource for concerned parents out there. If the NRA is willing to sponsor a program like this one, I fail to see why they'd be protesting a gun buyback program in Tucson (http://www.npr.org/2013/01/09/168926749/nra-vows-to-stop-tuscon-from-destroying-guns).
You didn't get any copies of Custer's Revenge?
Think they'll be mad if I put Pride and Prejudice up that it causes suicidal thoughts in young women?
Step 1: Buy $5 Lethal Weapon DVD
Step 2: Sell DVD for $25
Step 3: Profit!
If you're training to use a gun in self-defense, what exactly do you think you should be shooting at?
I presume the police also 'glorify killing', since they shoot at human-shaped targets too?
There's a lot of gun control advocates out there who don't demonize responsible gun owners.
And from what I've seen, those that cry 'unfairly picking on/demonizing responsible gun owners.' often require removal of the italicized adjective, when referring it comes to themselves.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
But the fact remains that young males commit most violent crimes. The solution, obviously, is to lock them in the basement until they're forty.
Westboro wanted attention, too. And just like them, SouthingtonSOS ended up getting all the WRONG attention in their distorted sense of activism.
Disclaimer: Lifetime NRA member(it was half price!).
I am a gun owner, but I would never join the NRA, and I am disgusted that they are so often considered to represent all gun owners. They have taken positions on drug prohibition, censorship, "precrime", and other issues that are appalling. They may be pro-gun, but they are certainly not pro-freedom. I believe in the 2nd amendment, but I believe in the rest of our constitution as well.
You might also be pissed at the NRA for polarizing the issue so badly. By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism. I'm a liberal. I really don't want to take away your guns. Hearing them constantly bleat that I'm out to get them makes their side look bad. Were I less logical, I might question the sanity of that whole side of the debate.
Fortunately, I am more logical than that. Unfortunately, many people are not, and many liberals I've talked to are, if anything, driven to be anti-gun because of how ferocious the NRA is.
I would see your point if the majority of the gun control proposals were aimed at promoting responsible gun use/storage or providing disincentives for irresponsible gun use/storage.
But most of what I see is people trying to ban black rifles and external magazines over 10 rounds, which do absolutely nothing to address those issues.
I would be fine with it if someone had to pass a test demonstrating an understanding of gun safety and local self defense laws before buying a firearm, with the option to apply for a license so that he does not have to retake the test every time he buys a gun.
I would be fine with it if background checks were required for personal firearms sales, provided a simple and affordable means of doing so were made publicly available.
I would also be fine with it if they made it a crime (negligence of some kind) if you claimed that a gun was stolen, but did not file a report, and your gun was used in a violent crime.
I would even be fine with a national digital firearms registry, if there was not such a push to ban guns of various types.
Okay, here's a simple one for the editors to fix:
Connecticut is the correct spelling, not Conneticut
.
http://www.ct.gov/ -- official Connecticut state government portal
.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut -- wikipedia link
.
Let's see how long it takes to fix it or continue to ignore it. It's 9:45 am PST now. Start counting.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
And this is why it was cancelled i think.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Given that it is a major pain in the butt to get an assault rifle already ... you do realize this requires an expensive federal permit to even own one? They are effectively already banned.
The current bans being discussed are trying to go further and ban things that are not assault rifles, but merely "look scary".
"Flame away, I wear asbestos underwear"
I typically shoot at lined/bullseye targets.
I don't need to get off killing a pretend person, I just want to see how accurate I am.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre.
Which only goes to prove that we need guns!
(that was a joke)
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre
Well first of all, it's not a massacre if it's been stopped.
Second, it's illegal for me as a gun owner to carry a gun on school property, so you've artificially limited the data set.
Third, I don't have enough people in my home to qualify as a "massacre" even if someone killed everybody in the building.
Fourth, you should probably educate yourself on exactly what an "assault rifle" and an "assault weapon" really are, how they are legally defined, and notice that most people use the terms to mean the same thing when they are not.
As for the actual STORY we're discussing, I've seen kids beat each other up over a game of fucking Tiddley-Winks, so I suspect any link between violence and games has more to do with competition getting out of hand and lack of parental involvement than the actual material in the game.
I'm for gun rights but it's pointless to cite these stories because you're 22 TIMES more likely to use a gun against someone you know. Throwing more guns into the mix will definitely stop crimes, but you're going to create FAR more inicidents than you stop.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Actually, it has prevented many. But usually they are dismissed. For example, off duty cop, or in the case of the "security guard" at the church. Who was merely a citizen who had a carry permit, and due to some concerns had volunteered at the church. (Essentially, what I used to do.)
No, there are many cases. But you'll almost never hear them in the news, cause they do not fit the agenda.
That, and the perpetrator is usually taken out before it can become a "massacre".
The NRA is a gun industry lobby posing as a gun owner lobby.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
...except for the recent shooting in Oregon, where the shooter turned his gun on himself after a civilian with concealed carry pointed his gun at the shooter. (and chose not to shoot due to people behind the shooter) Funny the news never reported it that way.
Any campaign to buy back violent games and, especially, movies would be a drop in the ocean.
After I heard about the Newtown shooting, I decided to spend the evening avoiding violence in all media. That meant turning off the news, of course, and looking around for what to do.
What struck me was the shortage of non-violent entertainment in my house. With the exception of baseball, all my Xbox games are violent to some degree. All the DVDs on my shelf had some level of violence -- even the Disney movies and nature documentaries (I can't stand chick flicks, but lots of those are nonviolent). There's violence in TV commercials. I ended up watching some episodes of Through the Wormhole on my DVR.
If you like violent games and movies, I have no problem with that. But since that day, I've been quite amazed by the pervasiveness of violence in games, movies, and TV.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
The NRA has compromised many times, and repeatedly.
The Gun Control advocates on the other hand. Not so much. And they won't address basic concerns or look at alternatives.
SO CALLED PROBLEM: Gun Show Loophole (which is pseudo-lie for "private sales", which includes if you sell your old hunting rifle to your brother).
EASY SOLUTION: Allow private citizens who are selling a firearm in a private sale to call and run a background check for free.
on that same logic, Neither has there been any mass shootings using automatic weapons yet they talk about them non stop everytime a crazy person goes crazy.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Did they also explain to you that 61 of the last 62 mass shootings took place in "gun free zones" I know crazy that law abiding citizens would follow the laws that a crazy person would ignore.
so again, how will outlawing XX stop anything when it already is shown that gun free zones are criminal welcome zones?
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
That's an idiotic statistic in and of itself, without knowing why.
You are significantly more likely to harm/kill someone you know, full stop.
That's simply because, there's usually a trigger event, and that will usually involve people, and you deal more regularly, and have more time to build up animosity (to the tipping point) with people you know.
The only thing that statistic is useful logic for, is preventing anyone from knowing anyone else.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/422728/20130110/sandy-hook-violent-games-biden-southington-censorship.htm
"Ferguson said that destroying games carried a "real risk":
"Don't get me wrong, I am fully aware you are trying to do what you think is best," said Ferguson "but there is real risk in focusing people's attention on the wrong thing, as well as contributing to historical patterns of 'moral panic' that tend to surround new media.
"I'm very appreciative of the sincerity of your group, but at the same time I've been concerned about some of your public statements linking video games to bullying and youth aggression which do not accurately reflect the science," Ferguson continued. "As a scientist, when we see that someone is saying something that isn't scientifically true, ethically we're supposed to take some time to try and speak with them and point that out to them...I've done a number of peer-reviewed articles myself on the topic, and have found no evidence linking video game violence to bullying or any other forms of youth aggression or violence.""
Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre. How about you stop using "self-defense" as the reason gun nuts want assault rifles?
Considering the fact that such massacres always occur in so called gun-free zones exactly how are firearms to prevent something when they are actively prohibited from being present? The people who would actually use them in self-defense obey the law and the murderers do not. In fact, they count on the law abiding doing just that.
You also fail to observe that no gun ban has prevented a massacre either. Evil people do evil things. How about we start figuring out why these people get to that point and address that instead of blaming what ever inanimate object they decide to do it with?
By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism. I'm a liberal. I really don't want to take away your guns.
You seem to make the mistake that anything up to but not including outright confiscation is A-OK. You see it time and time again on the mainstream media, they're proposing registration, bans on production, bans on transfer, extra taxes, etc. Under many of the laws the next generation won't even ever have the guns we have in the first place making taking them away impossible, but as long as it's not outright confiscation they slyly say "We're not trying to take your guns away." as if you're acting paranoid.
The 2nd amendment says "Shall not be infringed.", not "Your guns shall not be taken away.".
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
By refusing to compromise on anything at all, they really invite criticism.
How exactly do you compromise with people being driven entirely by fear and anger? That's what every gun control debate erupts from: Someone gets a case of the stupids, and people are all like "It's a tragedy! Someone must be made responsible for this!" And then off we go on a whirlwind adventure of accusations, witch hunting, and finger pointing, and the end result is some horrific soul-crushing attack on our civil liberties.
Maybe the NRA is simply tired of having to respond to these mindless lemmings chanting "What do we want? Someone to pay! When do we want it? Right focking now!" You can't compromise with someone in the thrall of group think; The herd must be obeyed. I know I sure as hell am tired of the endless "for the children" arguments; They're always emotionally motivated and no matter how inceptid the ideas that flow out of that emotional reaction is, you'll find people vigorously defending it.
Nothing anyone says can convince them they are not the righteous and chosen few. There's no evidence they'll accept. It's like trying to convince a christian God doesn't exist... it'll never happen.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
So when fascist dictatorships disarm the entire population, and then mass execute people, are you saying that guns would not have prevented that?
Yep. You're presenting a hypothetical that has actually been tested, and found to fail miserably. Libya, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and pretty much every cvilian vs government conflict of the past 100 years hinged on air superiority. If you had air superiority, you did well. If you didn't, all the AK-47s and RPGs in the world didn't help you.
Would lack of gun ownership make any difference in these cases?
Possible, though hard to tell, as these are anecdotes, and not scientific experiments. It's impossible to tell how those events would have unfolded without guns at the ready. However, we have some actual statistics to work with: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence,http://www.snopes.com/crime/statistics/ausguns.asp, for just a few examples of large scale statistics. At a minimum, they indicate that gun ownership does not correlate with reduced crime, but that instead they are a common response to increased crime rates.
I have no shame in my own opinions, why do you have so much in yours?
Sometimes, shame is a good thing. Your knowledge of statistics would definitely benefit from it.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Despite the many gun owners and lobbying (bribing) NRA group, self-defense hasn't prevented a single massacre
But it has prevented ~300,000 individual massacres, rapes, robberies, etc. Per year. That's based on various poll-based research efforts into defensive gun use. (The noteworthy studies seem to range from 80k to 2.6 million, but ~300k or so seemed most credible to me when I was doing some light research into the issue.)
On top of the known cases (which, admittedly, we don't know exactly how they would have turned out in the absence of a firearm), the implicit threat of firearm availability has probably saved many more lives, such as women who fear their violent exes or homeowners in crime-prone areas. And of course, the implicit threat of protracted civil revolt is a deterrent to cases of outright tyranny (i.e., Nazi Germany, communist China, Soviet Russia) that have a habit of killing millions, not just twenty.
-1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
Bullshit http://youtu.be/Mm9o3vhKoF8 And in Israel a school shooting was stopped by an armed student that killed the gunman. How about you stop being a fucking idiot and learn some factual information?
Part of the problem is the idiotic definition of anything over 10 as "high". Virtually every duty-sized 9mm sold today comes with a 17 to 18 round magazine. The only ones that come with smaller ones are handguns that are sold in larger calibers so as to do more damage, or handguns that are made physically smaller so as to be easier to conceal.
Though I don't agree with ANY caps on magazine capacity, they'd probably meet a lot less resistance if the definition of high was a little more sane (ie, 20). Calling 10 "high" when 17 is the norm is about the same as a cable modem company adding surcharges for "excessive usage" and then declaring "excessive" as anything over 2GB per month.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Just watch out for the eight-year-old white girl in the middle of the ghetto with quantum physics books.
She's about to start some shit.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Exactly. It is like saying the RIAA represents the artists. The RIAA represents the labels, not the artists. Are their times when the labels' goals and the artists' goals coincide? Sure. But in the end the RIAA is looking out for the labels, not the artists.
Similarly, the NRA is looking out for the gun manufacturers. What do the gun manufacturers want? More sales! So they'll be opposed to banning any kind of weapon or bullet no matter how ridiculous it would be for a civilian to own one. They'd also be against any delay (background checks and the like) in purchasing a gun so as to make sales quicker and easier, but the political climate prevents them from coming out against all background checks. (The NRA head was on a show a few weeks ago and was asked about expanding background checks to all sales, he kept dodging by basically insisting that since background checks already happen on most sales that's good enough.)
Is all this good for gun owners? Some might be, but some is just the gun manufacturers trying to get you to buy their new models and more/deadlier ammo whether you really need it or not.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
If you want value for money, get Romeo & Juliette.
That is perfect example of confirmation bias. Crimes get reported prevention of crime does not.
People think they'll do this, but in real situations casual gun-owners tend to panic.
It's quite possible, it just doesn't happen.
What difference does it make if people tell themselves they'll be responsible, sober, and competent, when they routinely fail in the event? In a city or suburb, there's no evidence whatsoever they're statistically effective for the defense of a home or person by a even a trained civilian. There's always going to be stories about the hero who killed the rapist in the dining room but in exchange you get 20 suicides by people that didn't have the guts to slit their wrists.
And note, this is not a criticism of gun rights per se; just because guns don't work for X doesn't mean they're EVIL or anything. But any effort spent defending the practicality or utility of a P220 under the pillow is utterly wasted.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
I got the impression that they were trying to get parents to turn in their kids' video games, which isn't such a clear-cut case of consent.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
How do you know? Do you have a parallel universe machine that lets you see what would have happened in all the cases in which someone did use a gun in self defense if they had not done so?
Ten seconds of looking gives me:
http://www.ktvn.com/Global/story.asp?S=8378732&nav=menu549_2
- man starts shooting in a bar containing 300 people. 2 people die before he is shot by a civilian. Somehow you know that even though he was reloading when he was shot he wasn't going kill enough more people for you to call it a massacre?
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/12/10/colorado.shootings/index.html
- man has already killed 4 and is shot by a a lady who was volunteering as security at her church (so not quite a random bystander, but still a civilian carrying their private weapon). You know he wasn't going to kill anyone else, he brought 1000 rounds of ammunition for no reason at all.
the american culture is broken and not sustainable.
just that simple. really is.
violence everywhere in movies and tv. sports, too. we glorify it. we 'honor' war heros. we encourage unrestricted capitalism. we like 'winner takes all'. we like it when we have to compete fiercely just to survive.
there is no simple fix to this. its not about 'mental patients'. it runs way deeper, into our very culture and what makes us think we are 'leading the world' in this or that.
it won't be fixed. sorry (makes me sad) but it won't and can't be fixed. we are an aggressive nation, we have no plans to change courses and the fallout is what we see now.
its not about god or religion and that won't save us.
as long as we filter nudity while encouraging violence, we have taught our people a value system. a broken one, to be sure, but its a 'value system' of sorts.
to get away from it, you have to leave the american culture. I don't want to do that and most here don't, but there is no way to fix this cancer and not kill the patient. a whole re-write is needed and I just don't see that happening.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
Tanks are arms. A10 gunships are arms. Chemical and biological weapons are arms. Nuclear weapons are arms. No one seriously disputes the fact that we get to infringe on bearing arms, the question is only where to draw the line. Why do you insist that semi-automatic weapons must not be infringed but not tanks and nukes?
An assault rifle by definition has selectable fire, e.g. the ability to go fully automatic. And are already illegal (except for the government and certain gun manufacturers). The federal permit is required to own guns with barrels shorter than 16" that are not a handguns. What the recent proposed legislation wants to ban is things that merely look like assault rifles as the OP said.
In the general case, the "militia" is a source of infantry. The basic weapon of the infantry is the rifle. A self-loading (the proper term for what is colloquially call "semi-automatic") rifle is a perfectly adequate infantry weapon (automatic fire for anything other than suppressive fire is vastly overrated).
On the other hand, very few infantry have ever used tanks or nukes as their primary weapons - largely because tanks makes you Armour (not Infantry), and nukes makes you Air Force (or Navy or Strategic Rocket Forces or whatever they call the guys who have the nukes in your country of choice).
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Murders are committed about twice as often by unarmed people (e.g. strangulation, kicking, punching) as they are with rifles. Murders are committed with blunt objects (hammers, clubs) about 20% more than they are with rifles. Automobile fatalities occur at a rate of three times that of firearms homicides.
Clearly gun control will solve this problem, right?
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/01/03/FBI-More-People-Killed-With-Hammers-and-Clubs-Each-Year-Than-With-Rifles
The "you're more likely to kill x with a gun" arguments always fall on their face when you take a closer look.
For example, a woman using her weapon against an abusive boyfriend is far more likely to happen than her using it against a robber, mainly because a robber is less likely to attack her than her boyfriend (the robber prefers to wait until nobody is home.) There, she used it against somebody she knew. But is there anything wrong with it? Absolutely not, that scenario goes in FAVOR of owning firearms, but the gun control lobby instead lumps it into a statistic going against owning them.
This would also apply to e.g. a relative or neighbor attempting to abduct one of your kids. Your neighbor is somebody you know. Women and kids are far more likely to be sexually assaulted by somebody they know than a complete stranger. Your house is far more likely to be burglarized by somebody you know than a complete stranger.
Have you ever wondered why that statistic you throw around doesn't say anything about justifiable homicide? It's because the gun control lobby wants people to blindly follow them. Take ALL statistics with a grain of salt because they almost never tell the entire story, they're often thrown out with the sole purpose of persuasion, and therefore are inherently biased.
Even the above statistics I threw up above are biased, because they only include rifles (but to be fair, rifles are what the politicians are trying to ban.)
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
I cannot speak for the GP author, but I would venture to guess that the implication was that the _media_ is less likely to report the prevention of the crime due to someone other than the perpetrator being in possession of a firearm than it is to sensationalize the tragic events that occur when said perp is not confronted with a similarly armed potential victim.
Which some people seem to think is okay. Yet one reason this right exists is to allow us to protect ourselves from our government. And as our government has no limits on their available firepower, I resent any limitations on what I can have. This applies perpetually. If phasers get invented, the government will have them so I better be able to have them. Otherwise I will be unable to defend myself from the government and eventually that is something they will use against me.
I hear this a lot, and I have all my life, but I still don't know that it's true. The actual text, and the background of how the second amendment was introduced and implemented, it doesn't appear like this is the case.
Minute-men had a huge impact and militias were 100% vital in the USA coming into existence, but the second amendment was written to keep the USA in existence. They wanted a well-regulated milita (a well-trained, armed force) to be able to bear arms to protect the security of a free State (essentially, the ability to train, and be called on, to protect the USA.)
I'm not against the idea that a little rebellion now and again is good for a state, but it doesn't seem to be historically accurate to connect it to the second amendment
I believe early on it was used to justify telling gun manufacturers they had to create weapons of certain sizes and required men of a certain age to own a gun and other equipment, and was sometimes used to justify drafts before we had a true organized national military.
Also interesting that you would consider yourself and the government as two very separate entities. And the idea that, if the government has a weapon you don't, then they will use it against you. I believe our founding father's believed, above all else in government, that this government would be of the people and that the structure setup would ensure that it would stay that way.
I'm sure you can find lots of examples of people who don't know anything about guns saying all kinds of stupid stuff. I have heard many people saying that semi-automatic guns should be banned (because that's what the guy in the mass shooting had) not realizing that almost every gun is semi-automatic.
I think it is perfectly ok to have limited knowledge of guns if your position is that all guns should be banned. But to enter the debate about banning specific guns (e.g. assault weapons ban) should require some basic understanding. It's pretty hard to have a debate when people are not using the same definitions.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos"
;)
What's the bad news?
Since when are facist dictatorships leftist?
Not that I agree with the whole left-right false dichotomy, preferring a 2 axis left-right social .. if you're going to use the false dichotomy,
orientation and authoritarian-egalitarian axis 'grid', but
at least be accurate about it.
Even the above statistics I threw up above are biased, because they only include rifles
Excluding handguns from a discussion about gun control is about as biased as you can get.
The rifle/school shooting issue is really a red herring, the elephant in the room is the enormous number of semi-automatic handguns in the US. If you're shooting people from relatively close range (in somewhere like a classroom) there isn't that much difference in effectiveness between a rifle and a handgun.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it