Kara Mattaini writes:
Like many of the readers of Wallyhood and citizens around the country, the recent Mass shooting in Newtown particularly struck a nerve. I felt so sad and helpless at what I was learning on the news. I have been a longtime supporter of gun control, however I have never felt compelled until to act on this value.Until now.
On Sunday January 13, there will be a march to remember the victims of the mass shootings in Newtown, CT and rally to support the end of gun violence. The march begins at 1:30pm at Westlake and finishes in Seattle Center with a rally and speakers.Turn sadness and anger into action by adding your voice to those who call for an end to gun violence in our communities and schools. Together we are stronger and together we can create a safer tomorrow for our children. Silence on gun violence hasn’t worked.
Bill Keller, writing in the New York Times, noted (perhaps facetiously) that the “mean lapsed time from a high-body-count firearm event to baseline apathy is nine days”. I sure hope that’s not true.
More information at www.standupwa.org.
Have you seen this campaign formed by Gabrielle Giffords and her husband? Its goal is to “encourage elected officials to stand up for solutions to prevent gun violence and protect responsible gun ownership by communicating directly with the constituents that elect them.”
I’m thinking that a campaign formed by a former Congresswoman who was personally affected by gun violence (to say the least) might be our best chance at enacting laws to combat gun violence. Link to her op ed: http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/01/07/gabby-giffords-mark-kelly-tucson-shooting-gun-control/1816383/
I don’t own a gun, I’m not a hunter & I’m not pro-gun per say. What I am is a person who sees the bigger picture, confiscation of guns will not make you safer or free-er. Take some time, research the issues carefully, for yourself. Anne Rasmussen, YouTube channel; orasell1
Anne, no one at all is talking about confiscating guns except those creating straw man arguments. If you are for assault rifles remaining legal to buy and easy to get, then support that idea rather than knocking down a pretend one.
Muzzle loaders. I doubt there’s an effective and enforceable definition of “assault rifle”, but I’m confident there’s no way to make an assault rifle out of a black powder muzzle loader. The founding fathers were right, again!
I’m for it, Donn! Strict constitutionalism.
I for one feel it’s time to stand up to the “bully tactics” of the NRA. This march is a perfect way to do that. Their proposed solution to gun violence in schools is insulting at best. Follow their slippery slope logic and we’ll have armed guards in shopping malls and movie theaters. Ludicrous.
I think having armed guards at schools is a great idea. It might not keep the freaks away from schools and movie theaters, but at least the body count might not be as high. I agree we should remove the gun show loophole, but, folks, the bad/unstable element will always find a way to get a weapon and constricting my rights to own a firearm is unacceptable. What’s that old saw: “If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns”. We might have to get used to more armed guards in more public places, which I’m fine with. I hate the fact that because of terrorists we have to get molested by the TSA every time we fly, but it’s now a fact of life, isn’t it?
Lisa, do you really want to model for our children that weapons and fear are a part of everyday life? I don’t want that mindset in my child and wouldn’t send him to a school where guns intended for shooting people were a normal part of his day.
And who’s going to pay for all those armed guards? Raise taxes? Take it out of school supplies and teach salaries?
There was an armed guard at Columbine. It didn’t help.
And finally, nobody is talking about “outlawing guns” (except, as “a” points out, those trying to create a strawman argument). Most of the gun control debate is focused on assault rifle bans and high capacity magazine bans.
Is everyone here aware, there is a law in Seattle, ‘red light cameras’ etc. can’t be used, even if someone is kidnapped or killed, etc.? Do you believe this is to protect public privacy? Do you truly believe Seattle or government is concerned of YOUR privacy, or is it THEIR privacy ‘they’ (certain aspects of government) are concerned of?
I’m sure the parents at Newtown never in their wildest dreams imagined the tragic circumstances that robbed them of their children. It would be nice to keep kids sheltered from the harsh realities of life, but when those harsh realities intrude ever more frequently into our lives, I would opt for preventative measures every time. Our neighborhood isn’t immune from tragedy; I would point out what happened at Cafe Racer as an example. The armed guards at schools wouldn’t have to be outfitted like scary SWAT team members and perhaps their weapons could be concealed. Air marshals blend in with fellow passengers on a regular basis, so it could work at schools, too. And as far as who would pay for it? We all would, like we usually do anyway, even if we don’t have kids. Maybe if the school district would quit wasting the money they do have, there would actually be enough to pay for teacher salaries and supplies and armed guards. I’m not a parent, so I don’t know how far any of you would feel comfortable going in order to protect your kids wherever they might be whether it were school or a movie or a shopping mall. Even if there are bans on assault rifles and high capacity mags, what about the nut cases who arms themselves with a shotgun and/or a handgun and headed to a school? I don’t really have a dog in this particular fight as it pertains to schools, but when you’re talking about other public venues, I certainly do. I would imagine parents would have the final say on whatever protective measures would be enacted at schools.
I’m attempting to respond to you, Wallyhood, but I’m not being permitted to. I think your filter is responding to the duplication of some of the words so maybe I can try again later.
How would putting armed guards in the schools have helped at Cafe Racer? Or are you suggesting we put armed guards in every store, restaurant, on every block? That sounds like a police state I have no interest in building.
You’re right that banning assault rifles won’t prevent people from getting other kinds of guns. But it’s a start, and a very good one. Why would you be against it? This is a clear case of “some restrictions are better than none”.
And no, parents don’t have the final say about the protective measures. There are already many schools with armed guards, and I assure you that it was never put to a vote by the parents.
I was referring to the Cafe Racer incident as an example of gun violence hitting close to home. It obviously had nothing to do with promoting the use of armed guards at schools. I’m curious what protective measures you would like to see implemented at your son’s school that may not already exist.
None. I think implementing protective measures at schools is treating the symptoms, not the disease. And the side effects of the treatment is worse than the disease.
I’m with Wallyhood. The only “protective” measure I want to see is building a strong, trusting community with eyes out for people who may need help.
The solutions posed here are just creating a more insidious police state. And I have a child in this fight. Twice now I’ve dealt with shootings close to home and I’m simply uninterested in any argument, policy position or movement that increases the number of weapons in our society.
I’ve come to the conclusion that to aim for total disarmament is unwise and uncalled for. But it is time for responsible gun owners to stand up, be counted and beat back the peers who make them look really, really bad.
Alex Jones, I’m looking at you.
Jordan, I hope you will be able to shield Baby Z from life’s unpleasantries as long as possible. I hope all the other kids in our neighborhood can be, as well. Frankly, I didn’t realize we had as many little ones in our ‘hood as we do until the last “Night Out” shindig. Your opinion on this subject and mine are mostly polar opposites, but I certainly respect what you have to say about it. And JT, I don’t know that there is a particular movement afoot to increase the number of weapons in our society; they already exist and are easily obtainable by people who shouldn’t have access to them in the first place. In the meantime, law-abiding citizens such as myself have to jump through numerous hoops in order to obtain and maintain the various weapons licenses we have. As I said before, I don’t support the gun show loophole. I am a responsible gun owner and I don’t consider people who commit gun violence to be “peers”-they are, simply, criminals. I have no relation to them so they aren’t making me look bad; that’s on them. BTW, who is Alex Jones?
Since 1990, there have been eight elementary school shootings (of the “outsider comes in and shoots” type) in the US. Several had no fatalities. Total fatalities, aside from Sandy Hook: five.
There are nearly 89,000 elementary schools, about 38.8 million elementary students.
Sending my child to school, I’m OK with those odds. Infinitely more than I would be OK with armed guards at every school.
I wonder what an armed guard would have done in a case like that Bremerton boy who brought a gun to school and accidentally shot a classmate. Probably would have had no effect; could have ended up with the boy shot, too.
@Lisa — Alex Jones is a purveyor of paranoia and conspiracy theories. He’s popular with the black helicopter/FEMA concentration camp/Amero set. If you aren’t familiar with any of those, count yourself fortunate.
protected static, I completely disagree with you. Some people have legitimate reasons to be ‘paranoid’ I have pointed out some of these on my YouTube channel, orasell1. Call me a Conspiracy Theorist, this has no condescending meaning to me. Call me a Conspiracy Theorist, I will smile & say; thank you. I realized that I myself, once dismissed ‘conspiracy theories’ without real research & simply thought, oh ‘one of those’ Alex Jones & infowars.com provide links for verification on issues discussed. You should of course always research further on your own &.not rely on only one source for information. Something I now have a problem with since only having one computer, when I had two, this was different.
@Anne: I’ve seen your YouTube channel. That’s all I’m going to say.
This fixation on “gun violence” is bizarre. Why not march to end all violence? Why not march as a statement to stop assault, rape, robbery, and murder, or to make a stand against gangs? Spree shootings are relatively rare, but street crime happens routinely and is devastating to the victims and their families. Imposing further restrictions on people who choose to own and carry guns will limit their ability to defend themselves against violent crime, but will do nothing to stop thugs from being thugs.
@Lisa, I’m not trying to “shield Baby Z from life’s unpleasantries”. That implies that the “truth” is that we live in a violent, out of control country where the only hope for safety is weaponized school system. As Fruitbat notes, the truth is that the schools are actually a relatively safe place from gun violence. Inserting armed guards into them creates the false impression that a) going to school is a dangerous undertaking and b) man-killing weapons are a normal part of daily life. I don’t believe either is true.
I’m glad that there are loopholes to jump through, and I’m glad that sane people like you jump through them.
Thank you ‘protected static’ My channel is quite clear on many things & that’s all I need to say…Thank you ‘Jack’ I believe you see the bigger picture here…I’ll state again, I’m not personally a gun owner or gun ‘enthusiast’ so it is in a way strange for me to be caring of this issue. It’s the bigger picture, that’s of issue here for me. Now is truly a vital time that everyone do some research for themselves regarding headlines in our news. Please don’t ignore History, as this has shown to often repeat.
@Jack – because relative to most industrialized or post-industrial democracies, we have an extraordinary level of gun deaths, crime-related or not. We have an astonishing number of accidental gun deaths, many of which are children; we have a high rate of suicide by gun, which results in more successful suicide attempts than other, similar countries.
These are valid concerns, particularly in an era when crime is largely on the decline. I personally find a lot of the anti-gun arguments to be based more on emotion than logic, and I do think thousands of law-abiding citizens stand to have their rights wrongly curtailed based on faulty reasoning – but the fact remains that a higher percentage of our population dies by firearm than any other place that doesn’t have an active civil war, insurgency, or banditry problem. What do *we* do about it?
@Lisa – I wasn’t entirely sure how to respond to you – and then I got some spam that illustrated perfectly to me the gun owners who give other gun owners a bad name. They’re the gun owners who insist Sandy Hook was faked, the ones who openly sneer at anything humanistic or pluralistic, the ones who disdain our common good as having been sold out to atheists, gays, blacks, and feminists. They’re the ones who can’t imagine cities as anything other than fetid swamps of crime, decay, and degeneracy. They’re the ones who can’t imagine any Democrat or liberal as anything other than a Communist bent on destroying America. And, most importantly, they’re the ones who verbally or otherwise fondle or brandish their guns as they do so.
Are they a minority? Yes. But they’re a very loud and visible minority.
Anne, I think the “bigger picture” is that we are practically alone among Western democracies in tolerating the habitual possession and use of incredibly lethal weapons by civilians as a matter of “protection” against common criminals or “the government”. The experience of Canada, Australia, Western European countries, etc., is that limits on the use of violent weaponry are not incompatible with a free and civil polity, and in fact are associated with lower rates of violent crime overall (not just with guns). The answer from the gun lobby to Aurora, Sandy Hook, etc., is always more of the same. The bigger picture is what gives the lie to that answer.
Protected, can you give me a synopsis of Anne’s YouTube channel? I thought it would take me several hours to even understand what it is, but would love the 1 minute version! (Anne, feel free to describe it yourself if you like.) Perhaps the oddest and most impenetrable thing I’ve seen on YouTube.
@a: I’d rather not; I don’t think it will add anything helpful to this conversation.
protected static, You’re right, perhaps a little off topic, but then again; everything connects to everything or Six Degrees of Separation…a, The core subject matter of my channel is Morgellons, a skin condition or so I once thought, but is so much more. Some Theorize, EVERYONE has Morgellons. People who show symptoms are people who’s body is rejecting a foreign material. My channel is geared more towards someone who has already done in depth research on the subject My video titled; orasell1 channel description, is good quick summary. For more technical / biological aspects of Morgellons, i’d recommend Jan Smith’s website; morgellonsexposed.com From my experience & observation, there are people who’s interest it is; to NOT have Morgellons exposed & the many related issues.
as an educator who regularly works in different schools, I heartily agree with Wallingford re having guns as part of school security.
I would however, encourage parents and concerned citizens to petition the Supt to develop a more immediate response to the recent slaughter and have new policies instituted around safety and crisis training for teachers as well as some new policies regarding locking of doors and communication if/when there is an emergency. At Sandy Hook a quick thinking staff turned on all school call, do all staff know how to do this at our Seattle Public Schools if needed?
Just to clarify, Jordan, the sane gun owners such as myself that you referred to have to jump through numerous legal “hoops”, not “loopholes” (such as the gunshow loophole which I don’t support).