• Movie massacre proves need for armed citizens, says gun law expert
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[quote=Examiner.com]The mass murder in Aurora, Colorado proves there is a need to allow citizens to carry concealed firearms in order to protect people from mass murderers, gun rights expert John M. Snyder said on Tuesday. "Those who prohibit law-abiding citizens from carrying guns for self-protection ought to be [the people who are] penalized," he added. According to the gun-rights policy maven and advisor to the National Association of Chiefs of Police, the recent theater shootings in which a dozen people were murdered and scores wounded could have been interrupted or averted if even a single well-trained armed citizen was in the movies at the time. But a short-sighted, narrow-minded management policy prevented such an outcome in which the only person killed was the cold-blooded gunman. "The movie theater anti-gun policy is idiotic," he told the Law Enforcement Examiner. "It did not stop the crazed killer. It did eliminate the possibility of him being stopped. The theater management should be ashamed of itself. Business people and politicians who adhere to similar ways of thinking should get their heads out of the sand and see the world as it really is." Snyder refers to the sign posted that promulgated the policy of "No Firearms" allowed in the multi-plex. "Of course the killer felt confident no one would interfere in his plot to murder innocent human beings whose only desire was to enjoy a motion picture with loved ones and friends," said former NYPD detective Michael Snopes. "And New York's Mayor Bloomberg should worry about empty calories and mid-town Manhattan traffic instead of sticking his nose into the business of other cities and states. New York has the toughest gun laws in the nation and that never stopped a hoodlum from acquiring firearms," Snopes said. "What we really need are policies that penalize politicians and managers who undermine the right and ability of law-abiding citizens to get, carry and use the guns and ammunition they need to protect the right to life itself from the madmen and criminals who [prey] our society." Snyder recalls another massacre that occurred in 2011: "The mass murder last year in Oslo, Norway demonstrated that decent citizens need to be able to acquire and use firearms for the defense of their lives and the lives of their loved ones." "When Anders Brevik murdered 77 civilians, he used an automatic firearm, according to a police reports, even though the civilian acquisition and possession of such arms are prohibited in Norway, which generally has restrictive firearms laws," said Snyder. After calls to police reported the killing rampage, it took an hour and a half for law enforcement officials to arrive at the mass-murder scene. Brevik reportedly continued the killing of innocent people until he ran out of ammunition. "What all this tells us is that the strict Norwegian gun control laws did not prevent the mass murder," Snyder said. "They did make it virtually impossible for a prospective armed Norwegian legally to have the gun which he or she could have used to take down the violent criminal perpetrator anytime during the 90-minute horror." Snyder described other incidents that indicated the same truth about citizens and guns: On November 11, 2009, Maj. Nidal Malik Hassan allegedly killed 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas and wounded many others before being stopped heroically by local police. Even though this occurred at a military base, service men and women were prevented from having the guns they could have used to stop Hassan because of a Clinton-era policy preventing American military personnel from being armed at bases in the United States. On April 16, 2007, Seung-Hui Cho murdered 32 people and then himself at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. Even though the Commonwealth of Virginia has a law allowing individuals with a state-issued permit to carry a concealed firearm, Virginia Tech policy prohibits professors and students from carrying guns on campus even if they have such a permit. The policy did not stop Cho, but it did prevent anyone from being able to legally stop Cho. In 2010, the Al-Qaeda linked Internet magazine Inspire encouraged lone wolf militant Islamist terrorists to go into restaurants in downtown Washington, D.C. during the lunch hour, and fire away at diners in the hopes of killing a number of people, including federal employees. Washington, D.C. prohibits even law-abiding citizens from carrying firearms. The powers-that-be there render law-abiding citizens defenseless in the face of a potential mass-murdering terrorist. Contrast these incidents with the January 16, 2002 incident at the Appalachian Law School in Grundy, Virginia when two students with guns stopped what could have been a mass murder when they tackled a culprit after he had killed three people. Consider, too, the October 1, 1997 incident in Pearl, Mississippi, when an assistant principal at a high school went to his car, got his gun and shot the murderer of two students. Recall the April 24, 1998 time in Edinboro, Pennsylvania when a bystander pointed a shotgun at the murderer of a teacher when he stopped to reload. Snyder said, "The message is clear. Gun laws do not stop mass murder. Citizens armed with guns do. Guns save lives. As a matter of fact, citizens with guns stop crime two and a half million times a year, according to Professor Gary Kleck, Ph.D. of the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University in Tallahassee." "The word is getting around," Snyder said. "Anti-gun policies do not stop crime. Decent citizens with guns do. Public and private policies should reflect this." And Mike Snope believes gun-control is never about crime, it's about politics. "We have a bunch of bullies in the White House, in Congress and local governments who are terrified of private citizens being armed and able to defend themselves from corrupt officials," he said.[/quote] [url]http://www.examiner.com/article/movie-massacre-proves-need-for-armed-citizens-says-gun-law-expert-1?CID=examiner_alerts_article[/url] Let's ignore for a moment that the shooter was wearing bulletproof gear. Would it really have been better if people started firing more guns in a dark theater amidst a crowd of panicking movie goers? And what would the police do after they arrived on the scene and a dozen people were waving around guns?
I hate it when people use a tragedy to boost their own agendas. That said, unless this guy can somehow prove to me that the tragedy could have been prevented/lessened if some of the other moviegoers had firearms of their own, this guy is COMPLETELY wrong. This is all a "what-if" scenario rather than anything based on hard evidence.
Can you cite he was wearing a bullet proof vest? I know in the first reports they said he was, but now no one mentions it
More guns? You can't solve this problem with the very thing that created the problem in the first place.
Imagine, oh, around fifty people pulling out guns in a crowded theater, in the dark, in the smoke...yeah, that would have improved things. About ten of them would have accidentally shot themselves just out of stress and adrenaline, another ten would have shot the person sitting next to them for the same reason, fifteen would have shot the first other person they saw with a gun, another ten would have been unable to fire at anyone because they couldn't bring themselves to hurt anyone, and the other five would have shot at the gunman while holding their guns with arms as floppy as the licorice sticks the theater sells. So maybe they hit the gunman, maybe they hit a bystander, maybe they hit nothing.
This is incredibly stupid.
Well there's no denying the fact that if there had been someone in the theater with a concealed weapon lives [i]might[/i] have been saved. I'm not sure if that means we need 'more' guns though.
I think we should live in a world where we don't have to fear our safety and be armed in public to be honest..
[QUOTE=RichyZ;36957692][url]http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/22/batman-shooting-audio-century-16_n_1692926.html[/url] abc also says it but i cant load it so w/e [editline]27th July 2012[/editline] yeah because a. youll totally have 50 dudes in a theatre with a gun and b. people don't just become fucking blind when they pull a gun, yeah officer accuracy in a firefight goes to shit but you really think for a second that someone is going to pull out their pistol and just start shooting in the general direction of him?[/QUOTE] In your own post: [quote]Holmes allegedly used tear gas or smoke bombs...[/quote] I think there would've been more issues than just poor aiming in this situation.
[QUOTE=RichyZ;36957771]i wish that the us would have socialized healthcare and that romney was replaced by a sponge but we can't all have our wishes :([/QUOTE] Come to Australia, we rarely have shootings and we have healthcare. But you will get fucking stabbed or hit if you're a big mouth
[QUOTE=RichyZ;36957796]but you have bigass venomous spiders and everything wants you dead[/QUOTE] The Australians don't carry guns in fear of other people, they carry them in fear of the animals
Didn't this shooting happen over the course of 90 seconds? Not sure how much could have been done in that amount of time given the situation.
[QUOTE=download;36957579]Can you cite he was wearing a bullet proof vest? I know in the first reports they said he was, but now no one mentions it[/QUOTE] It's pretty weird because even huff post just says riot gear, which doesn't necessarily denote ballistic protection. Also I don't really trust blogs like the Huffington Post. I read Ryan Holiday's book and it makes news blogs look incredibly sketchy.
[QUOTE=DamagePoint;36957732]Well there's no denying the fact that if there had been someone in the theater with a concealed weapon lives [i]might[/i] have been saved. I'm not sure if that means we need 'more' guns though.[/QUOTE] The spike in gun sales recently is odd. Unless you're in a high crime area, other than just in case, there is no real reason to have a gun except to use it at a shooting range.
In the U.S. (In a 2006 report), 68% of homicides were committed with firearms. In Australia (2006 again), 15% of them were committed with them guns, reduced to 13% with firearms in the new 2012 report.
[QUOTE=Rofl my Waff;36957810]Didn't this shooting happen over the course of 90 seconds? Not sure how much could have been done in that amount of time given the situation.[/QUOTE] Considering he used both tear gas and smoke, I think there is a bigger chance of it being worse then better.
[QUOTE]Snyder recalls another massacre that occurred in 2011: "The mass murder last year in Oslo, Norway demonstrated that decent citizens need to be able to acquire and use firearms for the defense of their lives and the lives of their loved ones."[/QUOTE] The only decent citizens are armed citizens walking around with guns? That's a fairly massive generalization. [QUOTE] "When Anders Brevik murdered 77 civilians, he used an automatic firearm, according to a police reports, even though the civilian acquisition and possession of such arms are prohibited in Norway, which generally has restrictive firearms laws," said Snyder.[/QUOTE] He used a Ruger Mini-14 semi-automatic rifle and a Glock 34 semi-automatic pistol. The former can is legal as long as you have a permit (his was for deer hunting) and the latter simply required regular attendence to a shooting club. Neither are illegal; just restricted. Two caveats about the weapons used however: First off, he would have used a heavier Ruger model but Norwegian gun laws specifically prohibited it, and the 30-round extended magazines for the Glock came from America. [QUOTE] After calls to police reported the killing rampage, it took an hour and a half for law enforcement officials to arrive at the mass-murder scene. Brevik reportedly continued the killing of innocent people until he ran out of ammunition.[/QUOTE] It took less than an hour to reach the island the shooting took place. Also he didn't stop firing because he ran out of ammunition; he surrendered after police showed up and threatened to return fire. [QUOTE]"What all this tells us is that the strict Norwegian gun control laws did not prevent the mass murder," Snyder said. "They did make it virtually impossible for a prospective armed Norwegian legally to have the gun which he or she could have used to take down the violent criminal perpetrator anytime during the 90-minute horror."[/QUOTE] Nothing will stop crazy people from doing crazy things, but as for specific gun conrol laws we have facts, and the facts say clearly that Norway has far less gun crime than the United States. You don't make people safer by handing them guns, you make them safer by educating them.
[QUOTE=fruxodaily;36957756]I think we should live in a world where we don't have to fear our safety and be armed in public to be honest..[/QUOTE] And yet at the same time those of us who like putting holes in inanimate objects from long distances are still free to own all the AK47s they can afford.
Absolute nightmare scenario from a police officer's perspective I imagine. From my German perspective I never quite got why so many Americans want to be the cowboy vigilante that doesn't even <i>want</i> to rely on the police.
Makes me think that xbox advert could actually happen if more people were armed. The one were everyone is 'killing' eachother by using their hands as guns. Except, it would be with real guns.
Yeah sure, add more guns to a theater full of fucking teargas, surely that's a great idea.
[QUOTE=fruxodaily;36957756]I think we should live in a world where we don't have to fear our safety and be armed in public to be honest..[/QUOTE] But until that day we'll need to defend ourselves. Also, I'm not taking any sides in this.
The problem with giving guns to citizens is they aren't trained like police to know when to shoot someone. I think it would just increase the amount of people getting shot because the person "thought they were going to attack them" or arguements being settled by one person shooting the other. When you are scared of angry you dont think clearly you just react. Besides if someone else had a gun, it could have prevented a few more people dying but in the time the shooter pulls out his gun and starts firing you dont have a whole lot of time to react, by the time you pull out your own gun he could have already shot 40 people including yourself.
[QUOTE=wickedplayer494;36957832]The spike in gun sales recently is odd. [/QUOTE] Because the're been heaps of fearmongering that obama is going to take all your guns
lmao yeah right because when everyone pulls their new gun on everyone eager to defend themselves in a dark and noisy movie theatre it sure as hell is going to end a lot more peaceful
I'm kind of wondering whether the dumb ratings are aimed towards the article or towards my opinion at the bottom.
Why the fuck do people keep saying if someone was armed this could have been prevented. The guy threw in teargas, started shooting indiscriminately in a dark theatre. Saying there should have been a second gunman is psychotic. [editline]27th July 2012[/editline] Not to mention, but I'm pretty sure Holden was an "armed citizen" as well.
Bulletproof gear or not, if he'd shown up, started blasting off gats, and 3-4 people started shooting at him with [b]any[/b] kind of firearm, within about 5 seconds he'd either be in too much pain from the bullets hitting the vest, or have been hit in uncovered areas (arms, legs, face). You still break ribs and bruise whilst wearing bulletproof armour. Guns are so fucking useful it's unreal. What more of a deterrent to any potential foreign invader is there, than potentially one in two people coming out and blasting your face off with a shotgun? You can kiss any idea of war on American soil goodbye - whereas here in the UK, if someone decided to go on a rampage with illegally obtained weapons, we'd be totally fucked. That said, it's too late to legalize guns fully in the UK like it is in the states, we'd be to irresponsible and too many people would get shot by angry drivers.
[QUOTE=SCopE5000;36958246]Bulletproof gear or not, if he'd shown up, started blasting off gats, and 3-4 people started shooting at him with [b]any[/b] kind of firearm, within about 5 seconds he'd either be in too much pain from the bullets hitting the vest, or have been hit in uncovered areas (arms, legs, face). You still break ribs and bruise whilst wearing bulletproof armour. Guns are so fucking useful it's unreal. What more of a deterrent to any potential foreign invader is there, than potentially one in two people coming out and blasting your face off with a shotgun? You can kiss any idea of war on American soil goodbye - whereas here in the UK, if someone decided to announce Jihad, for example, and go on a rampage with illegally obtained weapons, we'd be totally fucked. That said, it's too late to legalize guns fully in the UK like it is in the states, we'd be to irresponsible and too many people would get shot by angry drivers.[/QUOTE] Countries have a fucking military to deal with foreign invasions what the fuck
[QUOTE=SCopE5000;36958246] What more of a deterrent to any potential foreign invader is there[/QUOTE] A military? Gee did you forget about that?
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