Texas school shooting!

[youngestisapsycho]

Just watching on news now.. shocking!

Er that's my point, the political system in the US is a total failure in providing enough health care and social welfare for its citizens. The system itself is a failure, it is failing its people.

This shooter had many obvious issues that were known to lots of people, it seems there was no help for him though.

If we can't get rid of guns (sadly) then at least let's try to help people before they become mass murderers.

Not read the full thread but this is not shocking but it is terrible. There will never be any change, after Sandy Hook people created conspiracy theories to distract from changing gun laws.

I find America such a odd country on the one hand they want to ban abortion and reduce access to contraception because life is precious, but on the other people can buy assault rifles in the supermarket and thousands of children are being slowly poisoned by contaminated water with the full blessing of the government.

What makes me sad is that it doesn't even shock me anymore and i have primary school aged children.
My child came home yesterday telling me how lifeguards came into school today to teach them safety at the beach as we live a few miles away from a beach and i think of children in America are taught how to run and hide from gunmen in there school.
Just wrong.

@viques
There are similarities (money power influence) between gun culture and the tobacco industry which also has it's fingers in the pies now of things like nicotine gums and vaping, ironically, but you are right to wonder where the gun industry would go to, guessing rich militia in poor countries for starters but you are correct though it's not quite so transferable as tobacco.

Very true. I live in a police force area that has the 2nd highest number of licensed firearms in the country, but I've only ever known 3 people with guns. Two had shotguns for game shooting and the 3rd was a competitive pistol shooter.

The conditions imposed here for keeping firearms are rightly very strict: they have to be kept in a locked metal cabinet, bolted to a wall and/or floor, and ammunition has to be kept in a separate locked cabinet, also bolted to wall or floor and in one case, it had to be in a different room from the gun(s). Even if someone broke in managed to get the guns, it'd take them a while to find anything to put in it.

And the police will often take action to revoke licences. One revocation that was appealed was made because the gun owner had been done for drinking and driving. The owner appealed it, but the magistrate agreed with the police that someone reckless enough to drive while over the limit was an unfit person to have a firearm.

Despite the high number of guns, and several shooting estates nearby, I can only recall one shooting in the 30-odd years I've lived here. There were probably more where I used to live: Croydon.

I think I have become desensitised to it all.

It's just a case of roll my eyes and think 'not again - how long since the last one?'.

Maybe the age of the kids will make a difference this time - but I doubt it.

It's terribly terribly sad but it's what they are prepared to accept so they can have the right to bare arms.

I can still remember what I was doing the day the Dunblane shooting happened. It will live in my memory for ever as it was so shocking.

I still cry tears for the poor kids and their teachers every time it's mentioned on TV etc.

Why do they never learn? Why do the not care in the US?

Oh I really need to get off this thread but I'm going say this.
Even if after all these dead children over so so many years you still value some piece of metal in your hand then you are an utter sociopathic/delusional/enarbler and you have blood on your hands.
You are just as guilty

Just heard Steve Kerr’s speech

He’s right to express anger on that way

Its so messed up and wrong

I think because we don't have a gun culture in the uk is why most of us just can't get our heads around the thought processes

Just reading about these poor children with tears in my eyes looking at their innocent little faces. He told them they were going to die. Their last minutes would have been pure terror, wanting their mums and dads. Absolutely unbearable for their parents. How can anyone continue to support gun laws as they stand in the US. I keep hearing this nonsense mantra that ‘guns don’t kill, people do’. Guns do kill people, and one killed children in that school yesterday.

@x2boys , for sure culturally we are very different from our Transatlantic cousins. The gun laws and entrenched constitutional rights informing the culture, the strange and powerful crossover of conservative religion and politics and the failures of adult mental health service provision (though we aren’t exactly stellar in that area ourselves) all create a perfect storm.

Thread about the Bullets And Burgers shooting.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/2169329-To-wonder-what-kind-of-idiot-teaches-a-9-year-old-to-use-an-Uzi

Different situation in that was accidental, not murder. But it's amazing to see learning to fire an Uzi described by one poster as "just a fun thing to do on her vacation".

I think the biggest problem is the culture around guns. We have licences here but in addition to the strict conditions @LakieLady mentioned, there's an etiquette you don't see in the US. Things like always proving a gun is empty before handing it to someone. I go to a clay pigeon shooting club and everyone from the owner down will always go through the motions of opening and proving a gun is empty before passing it to someone. It doesn't matter how experienced and trustworthy they are.

People who store them at home make sure nobody in the house can access their gun safe. They keep the key on them at all times. In a lot of cases, younger family members don't even know where the safe is. The gun is often taken apart for travelling in the car and if they need to stop somewhere for a few minutes like the petrol station, they take a piece so if someone broke into or stole their car the gun wouldn't be usable.

A lot of this would seem over the top to an American who can walk into Walmart and buy a gun to stick under their bed if the mood takes them.

Steve Kerr's speech is so powerful. I hope it might make a difference, you have to hope.

I don’t want to upset any Americans , but a big number of these people with guns are just plain weird, they dress up and take family portraits with their guns, everyone including small children hold guns, it’s a culture they are born into, it’s not mental health or bullying.
when the news of the Supermarket shooting broke out , someone wrote a tweet saying How people must have wished that the shooter was black or south Asian or Arab, that way they can blame the ethnic minority background for the shooting and not Gun control .

America is a long way off before their love affair with the gun ends. There are literally millions of guns in circulation and the right to bear arms motto is ingrained in American society. If the killing of children can't bring about change nothing will. Tragic and needless.

It's always the same after such tragedies - the gun loving loons always start piping up saying "well if the teachers were carrying guns this could be avoided"

The whole thing is horrific, both the shooting and the predictable responses from the pro gun lobby.
The "bad men will always get guns" and "it still happens in countries with strict gun laws" arguments are ridiculous. Yes, ok it's true. In my career I treated plenty of gunshot wounds. I've even been involved (professionally)in a mass shooting incident. But in comparison to someone with an equivalent career in the US the number of shootings I have seen is trivial. Far more bad men get guns in places where guns are easy to get, it isn't rocket science.
Of course it is more complex than that, with huge differences in our societies meaning it isn't possible to make direct comparisons. The lack of health care, particularly mental health provision must be a major factor, but the fact remains that no matter what your mental state is, if you don't have a gun and ammunition you can't shoot people.
I was reading about another shooting in Texas recently. A young woman found with multiple gunshot wounds believed to have been caused by another woman whose boyfriend the victim may or may not have been seeing. There would probably have been a confrontation, possibly violent, regardless of where it occurred, but a fatality is surely far less likely without a gun involved?
"Guns don't kill, people do. Also true." But those people, whatever the reason for their crimes, all have one thing in common. They had a gun in their hands.
Gun control isn't the whole answer, and it can't effect overnight change, but it would be a bloody good start.

I do feel for the approximately half of Americans who vote Democrat being held hostage by the other half of Americans who vote Republican since it's the Republicans who won't do shit all. The Republican Party is just a cesspool at this point.

I feel such anger and despair. All the wet comments about how we stand with you and how our thoughts are with you - fuck right off.....where is their fury?

Everyone in the UK over a certain age will immediately know what happened at Dunblane 25 years ago and feel saddened by that tragedy. But it sticks in the mind because it was a shocking and once in a generation/life/nation event.

I feel aggrieved that in the US there are school shootings that won't even make the news they are such a frequent thing. (I had no idea there had already been over 20 school shootings this year) A child being murdered in front of classmates and they are just a statistic, not even worth a mention. It's heartbreaking.

Sandy Hook was 10 years ago and nothing has changed

I mean there is a gun safety bill right now that has passed the House, it won't even get called up in the Senate because Republicans will never let it get through.

I understand people think all Americans are gun nuts but it's really not true. Yes the Democrats could probably do more but at this point it is really the Republicans and the NRA that are responsible for children being slaughtered. Nothing will change until we get lobbying reform and get rid of the filibuster.

Jesus. Is it? God how depressing

@aaronsnorkelling yes, here is a list of the mass shootings so far this year, thankfully not all are deadly but many are (at a glance it looks like the majority have at least one fatality actually).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ListoffmassshootingssintheeUnitedStatessin_2022

An 18 year old can legally buy an assault weapon? I just despair of it now

This isn't correct.

A massive majority (around 95%) of Americans from both sides of the political spectrum want reforms and making it more difficult for the wrong people to get them, so enhanced background checks. However the politicians who hold the power keep in with the powerful gun lobby and don't force these laws. Texas governor even made it easier recently to get a gun in Texas