The statistics are clear: gun ownership causes more deaths among the family that owns it (child deaths, gun used by attacker etc) than it prevents by protection.
Now what are the statistics for non-gun-owners who are having their lives threatened by armed, violent assailants?
Sure there is. It's called a "target". Please use "accurate" language. This inflammatory bullshit needs to go.
There are instances where the gun didn't kill the target.
A paper target is relatively safe. It doesn't die. It doesn't scream "OH MY GOD! YOU SHOT ME!" And police aren't going to take you to county jail for a little rectal pickle-tickle if you put big holes in one on an approved range.
But every time you pull the trigger with a life on the other side you are committing a fatal action.
Again. Stop with the inflammatory bullshit. This is a false statement. The situation is nowhere near as absolute as you're making it out to be.
These are not laser pointers.
Yes. Laser pointers are ineffective for target-shooting.
A disarmed populace is just a crop of victims waiting to be harvested. Contrary to popular belief, most folks who legally carry a firearm are not cowboys out looking for a reason to go shoot somebody up. Most of us take the responsibility of carrying a firearm very seriously, and we do so because we understand that the world at large is not a friendly place. I am an honest and true believer that it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
Isn't this viewpoint as sad testament as to the state of the land of the free?
In a civilised country the populace shouldn't feel that they need to carry a weapon when walking the streets to be safe.
I believe that its better to not have the need to carry than to carry just in case.
From a straight humanist POV, yes it's a sad commentary.
OTOH, civilization only works when everyone follows the same rules. Hence the problem of criminals who, by definition, refuse the social contract of civilization.
And yes, not having the need to carry is INFINITELY better than carrying "just in case". HOWEVER, we live in the real world. Where a small subset of the population make the first an unrealistic option.
Guns are, however, what makes belligerent people dangerous. Hence the focus on extensive background checks.
No. Belligerent people are ALREADY dangerous. If they're going to be dangerous, they'll do it whether or not they have a gun, box cutter, knife, baseball bat, etc.
But the various mental defectives out there latch on to GUNS being the culprit and not belligerent assholes.
Zimmerman's story should have been enough to convict him. He admitted hunting Trayvon through the night [which is assault]. He admitted approaching Trayvon [which seals the assault charge]. Trayvon defended himself and George killed him.
The only question should have been *when* did Margin decide to commit homicide. If it was at the moment he was losing the fight he started, then that's aggravated manslaughter or something like that. If it was at the moment he left his car, then that's second-degree murder or something like that. When the charges were filed I thought it would be hard, but not impossible, to show the second-degree murder charge, but the homicide charge should have been a matter of course, considering George admitted it.
Well. Not only are you incorrect, you're so emotional that you're confused about the facts of the scenario as well.
Forgive me if I don't take an overly emotional person's word as holy writ.
Honestly, if you're talking about real Cisco boxes, and the like, no. You probably don't need that.
Still, it might not hurt to step up to the prosumer level devices.
I got sick of the consumer crap treadmill. I have everything on UPS with a monster surge suppression unit, yet I had units of all kinds dying, or turning out to be useless. Finally, I had two $179 "consumer" routers die on me back to back in the middle of patching (shipping settings were SEVERELY broken and needed to be patched to be usable).
I went out and bought a 24 port switch and Router from Netgear's ProSafe line. All gigabit. All good. Blue metal boxes! Anyhow, it's now been five years. And I haven't had to do a damn thing to my network other than an occasional bit of preventative maintenance (reboots, firmware updates, etc).
It's always POSSIBLE that some of the higher end consumer stuff has gotten better. But, as my stuff works great, I have had exactly zero incentive to go and take a look.
I disagree with your interpretation. If anything here is moronic, it is an insistence that Zimmerman's right to presumption of innocence be taken to absolutist heights of absurdity, while Martin's right to life is treated in such relativist terms (barely even reaching the level of subtext).
The thing is, Zimmerman is alive. And is able to claim presumption of innocence.
Martin is, unfortunately, dead. And unable to provide feedback to further fill in the process. And all everyone else besides Martin are doing is speculating.
Also, common sense dictates that, if you jump a guy with a gun, you're gonna get shot.
Once the shooting by Zimmerman becomes established as a fact, Zimmerman's rights must be weighed against Martin's, IOW the 'bar' of doubt for Zimmerman changes and his responsiblity toward Martin's right to life becomes a factor.
Sorry, but if someone attacks you, and you have any fear for your own life, you have NO responsibility towards someone else's right to life. And if you jump someone, whether or not you know they're packing, you're taking YOUR OWN life into YOUR OWN hands. If you get yourself shot to death over it, it's not the fault of the shooter. See "suicide by cop".
Otherwise, we would have to conclude that courts can cherrypick when the different rights of people come into conflict.
As for Martin's level of responsibility? He was a minor without weapons minding his own business, being stalked by car and on foot by a strange man at night. If he did attack Zimmerman and had lived, his sentence would have been what...
First off, why did he need to attack Zimmerman at all?
Second, he didn't live. So we don't have his side of the story. Moreover, forensic evidence more or less agrees with Zimmerman's testimony.
The death penalty??
On the planet where I grew up, guys get into brawls. Sometimes they are charged with assault or aggrivated assault. In no case was it assumed that a participant forfeit his life because of it.
Again, if you jump someone with a gun, whether or not you know they have it, you're putting your own life at risk. It's the same on the planet you grew up on. You just got lucky enough to never jump someone packing. Also, incidents like this are much better publicized nowadays due to the dearth of actual, newsworthy content.
Sorry, the educational system over there is little more than a diploma mill.
The quality of developers over there is somewhere between "bad" and "not qualified to sell slurpees".
Yes, as with any group, there's always the exceptions. A few, here and there, with a knack for doing good, solid work. But that's just what they are. Exceptions.
Anyone can play baseball/football/soccer/hockey.
A much smaller contingent of the population do it well.
An even smaller contingent of that sub-population do it well enough to warrant getting paid to do it.
A F1 car is a single-seater speed machine with a cockpit engineered to be crash survivable. Not just with layers of carbon fiber honeycomb. But with exceptionally strong bonding agents between the layers, holding them rigid.
Somehow I doubt this little street car is engineered to the same specs.
Slashdot Mirror
And half of all those homicides are suicides.
Take out suicides and guns are not number one.
The statistics are clear: gun ownership causes more deaths among the family that owns it (child deaths, gun used by attacker etc) than it prevents by protection.
Now what are the statistics for non-gun-owners who are having their lives threatened by armed, violent assailants?
Yeah, but chavs are a completely different species.
I mean...look at them!
There is no non-fatal way to use a gun.
Sure there is. It's called a "target". Please use "accurate" language. This inflammatory bullshit needs to go.
There are instances where the gun didn't kill the target.
A paper target is relatively safe. It doesn't die. It doesn't scream "OH MY GOD! YOU SHOT ME!" And police aren't going to take you to county jail for a little rectal pickle-tickle if you put big holes in one on an approved range.
But every time you pull the trigger with a life on the other side you are committing a fatal action.
Again. Stop with the inflammatory bullshit. This is a false statement. The situation is nowhere near as absolute as you're making it out to be.
These are not laser pointers.
Yes. Laser pointers are ineffective for target-shooting.
A disarmed populace is just a crop of victims waiting to be harvested. Contrary to popular belief, most folks who legally carry a firearm are not cowboys out looking for a reason to go shoot somebody up. Most of us take the responsibility of carrying a firearm very seriously, and we do so because we understand that the world at large is not a friendly place. I am an honest and true believer that it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
Isn't this viewpoint as sad testament as to the state of the land of the free?
In a civilised country the populace shouldn't feel that they need to carry a weapon when walking the streets to be safe.
I believe that its better to not have the need to carry than to carry just in case.
From a straight humanist POV, yes it's a sad commentary.
OTOH, civilization only works when everyone follows the same rules. Hence the problem of criminals who, by definition, refuse the social contract of civilization.
And yes, not having the need to carry is INFINITELY better than carrying "just in case". HOWEVER, we live in the real world. Where a small subset of the population make the first an unrealistic option.
Well. You could ask George Zimmerman. ... Too soon?
Guns are, however, what makes belligerent people dangerous. Hence the focus on extensive background checks.
No. Belligerent people are ALREADY dangerous. If they're going to be dangerous, they'll do it whether or not they have a gun, box cutter, knife, baseball bat, etc.
But the various mental defectives out there latch on to GUNS being the culprit and not belligerent assholes.
Zimmerman's story should have been enough to convict him. He admitted hunting Trayvon through the night [which is assault]. He admitted approaching Trayvon [which seals the assault charge]. Trayvon defended himself and George killed him.
The only question should have been *when* did Margin decide to commit homicide. If it was at the moment he was losing the fight he started, then that's aggravated manslaughter or something like that. If it was at the moment he left his car, then that's second-degree murder or something like that. When the charges were filed I thought it would be hard, but not impossible, to show the second-degree murder charge, but the homicide charge should have been a matter of course, considering George admitted it.
Well. Not only are you incorrect, you're so emotional that you're confused about the facts of the scenario as well.
Forgive me if I don't take an overly emotional person's word as holy writ.
Honestly, if you're talking about real Cisco boxes, and the like, no. You probably don't need that.
Still, it might not hurt to step up to the prosumer level devices.
I got sick of the consumer crap treadmill. I have everything on UPS with a monster surge suppression unit, yet I had units of all kinds dying, or turning out to be useless. Finally, I had two $179 "consumer" routers die on me back to back in the middle of patching (shipping settings were SEVERELY broken and needed to be patched to be usable).
I went out and bought a 24 port switch and Router from Netgear's ProSafe line. All gigabit. All good. Blue metal boxes!
Anyhow, it's now been five years. And I haven't had to do a damn thing to my network other than an occasional bit of preventative maintenance (reboots, firmware updates, etc).
It's always POSSIBLE that some of the higher end consumer stuff has gotten better. But, as my stuff works great, I have had exactly zero incentive to go and take a look.
Too bad that's not what happened here.
GZ isn't white.
Maybe if you actually. Oh. I dunno. READ ANYTHING instead of allowing some rag to feed you pablum and lies, you'd know this.
But nope! You want to be sheeple.
Baaaa! Baaaa!
Isn't that how it almost always is?
Revise things with false "facts" until it "happened the way it ought to have".
Question, how far does this obligation extend if the guy's already in the middle of trying to bash your brains out on the pavement?
Small difference here.
First off, the speed freak didn't have you down on the ground trying to crack your skull on the pavement.
Martin either knew he had a gun and attacked anyhow, or didn't know and never gave him a chance to scare him off.
According to the way the trial came out, it appears your understanding was flawed.
Since when is jumping someone, instead of running the fuck away as fast as humanly possible, is "defensive"?
I disagree with your interpretation. If anything here is moronic, it is an insistence that Zimmerman's right to presumption of innocence be taken to absolutist heights of absurdity, while Martin's right to life is treated in such relativist terms (barely even reaching the level of subtext).
The thing is, Zimmerman is alive. And is able to claim presumption of innocence.
Martin is, unfortunately, dead. And unable to provide feedback to further fill in the process. And all everyone else besides Martin are doing is speculating.
Also, common sense dictates that, if you jump a guy with a gun, you're gonna get shot.
Once the shooting by Zimmerman becomes established as a fact, Zimmerman's rights must be weighed against Martin's, IOW the 'bar' of doubt for Zimmerman changes and his responsiblity toward Martin's right to life becomes a factor.
Sorry, but if someone attacks you, and you have any fear for your own life, you have NO responsibility towards someone else's right to life.
And if you jump someone, whether or not you know they're packing, you're taking YOUR OWN life into YOUR OWN hands. If you get yourself shot to death over it, it's not the fault of the shooter. See "suicide by cop".
Otherwise, we would have to conclude that courts can cherrypick when the different rights of people come into conflict.
As for Martin's level of responsibility? He was a minor without weapons minding his own business, being stalked by car and on foot by a strange man at night. If he did attack Zimmerman and had lived, his sentence would have been what...
First off, why did he need to attack Zimmerman at all?
Second, he didn't live. So we don't have his side of the story. Moreover, forensic evidence more or less agrees with Zimmerman's testimony.
The death penalty??
On the planet where I grew up, guys get into brawls. Sometimes they are charged with assault or aggrivated assault. In no case was it assumed that a participant forfeit his life because of it.
Again, if you jump someone with a gun, whether or not you know they have it, you're putting your own life at risk. It's the same on the planet you grew up on. You just got lucky enough to never jump someone packing. Also, incidents like this are much better publicized nowadays due to the dearth of actual, newsworthy content.
Dooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!
We is all gonna die?
*Rolleyes*
If the NSA wants into my local file stores, they have to come into my apartment and steal them.
THEN decrypt them.
This post sums up my feelings about it as well.
Corporations are people!
So's Soylent Green.
And the K19.
And the K141 (The Kursk)
Soyuz 1
Soyuz 11
And about half a dozen other fatal accidents involving shoddy workmanship.
Sorry, the educational system over there is little more than a diploma mill.
The quality of developers over there is somewhere between "bad" and "not qualified to sell slurpees".
Yes, as with any group, there's always the exceptions. A few, here and there, with a knack for doing good, solid work.
But that's just what they are. Exceptions.
Anyone can play baseball/football/soccer/hockey.
A much smaller contingent of the population do it well.
An even smaller contingent of that sub-population do it well enough to warrant getting paid to do it.
A F1 car is a single-seater speed machine with a cockpit engineered to be crash survivable. Not just with layers of carbon fiber honeycomb. But with exceptionally strong bonding agents between the layers, holding them rigid.
Somehow I doubt this little street car is engineered to the same specs.
Basically. The vehicle's so lightly built that a fricking DODGE OMNI will tear through you like you were toilet paper.
Over in Germany, if someone spatters themselves on (or by the side of) the road, it's the driver's fault for not knowing their car.
Here in the US, it's the manufacturer's fault for not making the car crash-survivable.
Just seems that there's been a rash of OSS/Free Software/*nix people dying in weird circumstances lately.