Easy way to stop mass shooters dead in their tracks

[LookBehindYou]

And near misses happen. Life is dangerous. But generally good people go out of their way to mitigate life threatening danger. At least those that aren't suicidal. What you just explained in regards to good drivers making up for what bad driver may do, or an accident a good driver may stumble with is exactly what I was pointing towards with my explanation in the scenario of multiple CCW in a dark theater during a mass shooting. One may make a mistake but the larger majority would not and attempt to help rectify the situations as safely as possible. That is assuming there was a mistake. Thanks for proving my point even further.

We know that Holmes went out of his way to find a theater that didn't allow guns so as to make sure there were no one in the audience that could shoot back to stop him. He did that because he knew with ZERO guns he has plenty of time for a rampage to kill as many as he wants. When good people have guns, even if some make a mistake and accidentally hit someone innocent they shouldn't have, the death toll is likely to be far far less.

Also, it takes time for mass panic to settle in. Quick decisive action by a CCW early on would have prevented everything. Holmes took time to lock all the doors. He then walked to the front of the theater, threw out smoke bombs into the audience, and shot several rounds with his AR15 into the ceiling to scare people. His AR15 then jammed up when he was firing his gun. He then took time to figure out it was jammed and decide to switch to his shotgun. Then he went around methodically killing anyone he could.

If a CCW holder had been in front row with a good line of sight to Holmes then Holmes would have been shot dead when he first started firing into the ceiling. Mass panic would not have set in yet. People would not have started to go crazy yet. Sure some might still have gotten up to try to flee, but it would have been over before it began. Which is the point.

You haven't seen the testimony from the Suzanna Hupp from the Luby's mass shooting. She had a chance early on to stop it but didn't because she didn't have her firearm on her. Something she completely regrets.

As for margin of error being less with a gun than a car. That all depends. High speed accidents with cars are almost always fatal. Not all shootings are fatal even when people are actually trying to kill each other and actually get shot. A single bullet just usually doesn't do enough damage to kill a person unless it hits the heart, a major artery, or the brain. Every where else isn't going to kill a person on the spot. It takes several shots to drop a person dead if the heart, brain, or major artery isn't hit. It only takes 1 car crash at high speeds to involve multiple fatalities.

I totally agree with you that a skilled person with a CCW could very well prevent stuff like that. However, the original intent of the thread was that if everyone is armed, than mass shootings wouldn't happen. I am simply stating that there are far too many people that should not be carrying a gun in public, hunting may be fine for them, but as soon as you have to start making quick, decisive, judgement calls that will end another human's life, the vast majority of our population has no business carrying a gun and making that decision. Whatever the persons good intentions are, they may simply be incapable of acting appropriately in that situation. A test and training doesn't mean they "should" be carrying, it just means they are "allowed". Would it be great if there were more capable CCW people in society who were trained and capable of making those judgement calls, yes, but it just isn't going to happen. You can't discern those that will be able to make the appropriate decision with those that cannot by a $200 test and a couple hours of training. You add in a crowd in a panic, and everything else that goes with the chaos of a "mass shooting" and there are just too many things that can make a bad situation worse when you multiply the amount of people that have guns.

Also, just fyi, I enjoy this debate and appreciate that we can keep it civilized even when we clearly disagree on this topic.

 

[HumblePie]

I totally agree with you that a skilled person with a CCW could very well prevent stuff like that. However, the original intent of the thread was that if everyone is armed, than mass shootings wouldn't happen. I am simply stating that there are far too many people that should not be carrying a gun in public, hunting may be fine for them, but as soon as you have to start making quick, decisive, judgement calls that will end another human's life, the vast majority of our population has no business carrying a gun and making that decision. Whatever the persons good intentions are, they may simply be incapable of acting appropriately in that situation. A test and training doesn't mean they "should" be carrying, it just means they are "allowed". Would it be great if there were more capable CCW people in society who were trained and capable of making those judgement calls, yes, but it just isn't going to happen. You can't discern those that will be able to make the appropriate decision with those that cannot by a $200 test and a couple hours of training. You add in a crowd in a panic, and everything else that goes with the chaos of a "mass shooting" and there are just too many things that can make a bad situation worse when you multiply the amount of people that have guns.

Also, just fyi, I enjoy this debate and appreciate that we can keep it civilized even when we clearly disagree on this topic.

I never said that everyone should be carrying. Although I think EVERYONE should go through a gun training course and a crisis scenario training course. It should be mandatory education in our school system. It's just as vitally important as learning what to do in a fire or learning algebra. It's something that will one day save a person(s) life(ves). It's why the military and police train. I'm not saying that every law abiding should carry a gun with them in public all the time. That's a personal choice to make. But to enact laws that make it difficult for law abiding citizens to instruct themselves, carry guns legally, and try to do what is right is just dumb.

CCW is like vaccines. Even those that don't get vaccinated are still protected if enough people around them are vaccinated. When you have no one around you vaccinated then things can get ugly. Same with CCW holders. When you have enough people walking around who are lawfully carrying a firearm and have trained themselves, then they extend protection to others that aren't. That is the point of the original post. And of course, the more lawfully carrying and trained individuals the better.

I can always debate with an even keel. It's when people start throwing out insults I don't mind slinging them back. Since you aren't being insulting at all, I have no problem have a civilized debate

 

[JulesMaximus]

I don't not seem to think people are rational all the time. That's the point of having multiple people with a CCW. Even if one idiot flips out and goes on a rampage trying to shoot others, hopefully there will be someone nearby with a rational brain that can stop the situation from escalating even worse.

You aren't going to stop human idiocy out there. People have always done bad things and will continue. You don't punish the good people because there are bad people. That's just asinine logic. You encourage the good and do what is effective to lessen the bad.

You are trying to use the bad allusion that because one person with a CCW flips out that all CCWs will flip out or do the wrong thing at the wrong time. That's just stupid. That's akin to saying that because one person goes stupid and wants to go on a motor vehicle rampage of killing people, that all other legally licensed drivers (or a significant amount of them) are going to do the same.

That isn't what I'm trying to do at all. I'm simply saying that as more and more people start carrying guns this sort of thing will become more and more common. It isn't up for debate. It will happen. It is human nature.

How much society will accept is another discussion.

 

[corwin]

That isn't what I'm trying to do at all. I'm simply saying that as more and more people start carrying guns this sort of thing will become more and more common. It isn't up for debate. It will happen. It is human nature.

How much society will accept is another discussion.

No shit, I mean it's happening all the time now since there are thousands more people every month getting their carry license...hell Illinois was finally forced to comply and became the last state to allow CC in July of this year, now watch their shootings go up with all these law abiding people carrying guns

 

[JulesMaximus]

No shit, I mean it's happening all the time now since there are thousands more people every month getting their carry license...hell Illinois was finally forced to comply and became the last state to allow CC in July of this year, now watch their shootings go up with all these law abiding people carrying guns

Illinois isn't the last state to allow CC. There are other states that don't allow it. I live in one of them in fact.

 

[HumblePie]

That isn't what I'm trying to do at all. I'm simply saying that as more and more people start carrying guns this sort of thing will become more and more common. It isn't up for debate. It will happen. It is human nature.

How much society will accept is another discussion.

Sigh, if it's not guns, it would be some other weapon. The person reacting strictly upon a emotion of hate will still act out. That has always happened through human history a will always happen. The difference is being if there is someone there to stop them or not before it gets out of hand.

A society without guns is still not a society without violence and death by anger, greed, vengeance, or other motives. Before guns were ever invented the world was ruled by those with the stronger sword arm or better bow. Guns are the great equalizer in the sense that anyone, even the weakest person out there, can stop the strongest person. With the advent of guns and more advanced weaponary, society has moved from one set f humans out to conquer another set. It's much harder to try and conquer someone when they can be just as lethal in their defense. Sure there were and will continue to be hiccups along the way. But ask yourself this, why did the Japanese stop fighting the US in World War II? I'll give you two answers. Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

There is the potential with advanced weapons to be explosive. That was why the cold war was stressful. But Russia never once launched a nuke at the US despite a high degree of them wanting to do so. Why? Because they knew that in the end it would only cost them their lives as well.

If that doesn't convince you, one only has to look to nature to see how various prey deal with natural predators. Usually it by making predators think that attacking them may cause more harm to themselves than the reward for making the kill. Which is why in nature most predators only go for those prey which are sick, old, slow, and/or unawares of the attack by the predator.

 

[HumblePie]

Illinois isn't the last state to allow CC. There are other states that don't allow it. I live in one of them in fact.

California allows CC. It's not easy to get, but it allows it. Illinois had in fact banned CC completely through legislation that was over turned by the SCOTUS.

 

[corwin]

Illinois isn't the last state to allow CC. There are other states that don't allow it. I live in one of them in fact.

Actually no, they were the last to have a complete prohibition on it...every other state allows it in some form

Humble beat me to it...it may be really damn hard (almost impossible even) to get a license but it is at least allowed

 

[JulesMaximus]

California allows CC. It's not easy to get, but it allows it. Illinois had in fact banned CC completely through legislation that was over turned by the SCOTUS.

If by not easy you mean impossible then yes, you are correct. Approximately 75% of the more than 38 million people who live in California live in the San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles, or San Diego metropolitan areas so unless you're a celebrity, I'm not, or you live out in a rural part of the state, I don't, you aren't getting a CC permit. No freaking way. And if you live in those areas and try to bring your gun into one of those metropolitan areas I just mentioned you better hope you don't get pulled over or that nobody notices it because you will most likely get hassled by the law at the very least and arrested at worst.

Look, I'll admit that I agree with you for the most part, that most of the population probably is trust worthy enough to be allowed to carry if they wanted to, the rest of the population are already gun owners and/or criminals. I keed, not all gun owners are nuts.

Events like the two idiots (both law abiding citizens with CCW) who took each other out just makes me crazy though and having spent half my life (nearly all of my adult life) owning guns and being around gun owners I generally think a great deal of them are fucking crazy, a greater percentage than you probably think anyway.

 

[HumblePie]

Oh I know a great many people are "crazy", but I know most use that term to define something that is different and they don't like. Do I think the vast majority of currently law abiding gun owners are blood thirsty crazies just one step away from their last broken straw before they go on a murderous rampage? Not at all. Just because I think someone is crazy by having a bullet, bad hygene, drinking moonshine, jacking up a drunk to do drunken donuts on their land, and eat roadkill for meals does mean I think they are crazy enough to go on a murder spree. That's a different level of craziness that is just not natural for humans. It takes a specifically warped mind to enjoy killing others. Which is mindset that is an outlier for human physiology of the brain.

However, while it's an outlier, the larger a population then the larger the raw number of those people exist. If it's a genetic/mental outlier that effects 1 in 10,000 people then with a population of 100,000 there is going to be about 10 people to deal with like that. With a population of 1,000,000 there is going to be about 100. See how that works? It's still the same percentage, but the raw number goes up. Which in turns when incidents of that nature are reported more, the frequency fallacy starts to sit in with most people.

 

[mistercrabby]

Is this a "mass" shooting?

Boy, 3, among 13 injured in Chicago park shooting

Three people, including a 3-year-old boy, are in critical condition Friday after an apparent gang-related shooting at a neighborhood basketball court in Chicago that left up to 13 people injured.

A witness, Julian Harris, told the Chicago Sun-Times that dreadlocked men fired at him from a gray sedan before turning toward Cornell Square Park and firing at people. He said his 3-year-old nephew was wounded in the cheek.

Maybe the perps are mentally ill?

 

[corwin]

Is this a "mass" shooting?

Technically no it isn't since nobody has died, by definition a "mass shooting" is 4 or more dead from a single shooter. BTW there is also a thread discussing this very incident http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2343627

 

[mistercrabby]

It ain't just the US of A...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers

 

[exdeath]

Look at that spike in the 20s.

Would be a shame if something half the population wants got banned in modern times via political subversion.

 

[Pray To Jesus]

It ain't just the US of A...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers

Pretty much this.

It is already shown that states that changed to Will Issue, thus having more CCW holders, have seen no rise in road rage shootings. More CCW and guns in the car doesn't lead to more road rage shootings.

 

[shortylickens]

Pretty much this.

It is already shown that states that changed to Will Issue, thus having more CCW holders, have seen no rise in road rage shootings. More CCW and guns in the car doesn't lead to more road rage shootings.

THANK YOU!!


Now if you could do something about the federal budget.

 

[HumblePie]

Meh, some of those charts...

Like this one.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/da/Ethnicity_of_U.S._rampage_killers.png

Lists only 2 arab mass killers in the US. Um hello, 9/11 anyone? Several Arabian decent people murdered hundreds all at once. Just because it was a group effort doesn't mean it wasn't a mass murder.

 

[classy]

Matthew 5:9

Colt peacemaker ()

LOL

 

[Pray To Jesus]

LaPierre read P&N?

 

[Pray To Jesus]

* Since the outset of the Florida right-to-carry law, the Florida murder rate has averaged 36% lower than it was before the law took effect, while the U.S. murder rate has averaged 15% lower.
* Since the outset of the Texas right-to-carry law, the Texas murder rate has averaged 30% lower than it was before the law took effect, while the U.S. murder rate has averaged 28% lower.
* Since the outset of the Michigan right-to-carry law, the Michigan murder rate has averaged 4% lower than it was before the law took effect, while the U.S. murder rate has averaged 2% lower.

To cite a few pesky facts, but the one that stands out the most;

* Since the outset of the Chicago handgun ban, the percentage of Chicago murders committed with handguns has averaged about 40% higher than it was before the law took effect.