Days Since Last Shooting II

[The Rube]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

I would think that anyone who walks into a church or a school or anywhere and starts blasting anyone and everyone is not all there in the head. It is not a rational act.

And he escaped from a mental facility, is reported to have mental disorders (plural, not singular), violent past...all the evidence is there. Something set him off, and he started shooting everyone. It's also reported that before he started shooting, Mr Texas made some sort of FB post where he hinted at he wasn't going to make it until the end of the day (or similar).

We ALL agree that if someone kills someone or many someones, something is messed up in the mind. However, is it radicalizing, a true mental disorder, what? Have to examine each situation after it happens.

[St. Clown]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

How about a culture of LESS GUNS???

Fewer.

Kepler gone all Stannis Baratheon on alfablue.

[Kepler]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

Kepler gone all Stannis Baratheon on alfablue.

They'll bend the knee or I'll destroy them.

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

I didn't say it went down. I posted the graph to show that shootings with guns other than handguns (i.e., assault rifles and all other guns) has remained almost static for the 28 years between 1976 and 2004, with a very, very slight downward trend, and the assault rifle ban did nothing to affect those numbers.

So your WHOLE point is that the mass shootings are statistically insignificant, therefore we should not worry about them. Is that correct?


At one point, you claimed that the Assault Weapons Ban was not effective. And then claimed all the ban did was change murders from one form to another. All in the face of actual data, one that wasn't interpreted that mass shootings was significantly down in the period of the assault weapons ban. And I'm wondering how you can interpret a 50% reduction in gun shootings over less than 10 years a "very, very slight downward trend". The rise in gun deaths between 1988 and 1996 is not an insignificant blip. It's real. Just as is the decrease until 2001.

But the overall point that mass shootings are insignificant??? Really? People die in large numbers, mostly innocent people, and they are insignificant?

That seems like a cop out.

[SJHovey]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

As usual this was ignored or shrugged off as happenstance.

As usual??? I wasted endless amounts of time yesterday responding to pretty much every single question or argument made to me, even though most of them really didn't make a lot of sense compared with the evidence that exists out there, and many of them made the same arguments over and over again.

And yes, the answer is "chance," as I wrote before. But now I've answered the question directly to you so I shouldn't have to do that again.

For those who actually study the statistics on these things, one question that has come up is why since 2011 have we seen an increase in the frequency of mass shootings. I don't know that we've seen a big change in the total number of deaths, but I believe that data shows that prior to 2011, a mass shooting (which I think they define as 5 or more) occurred something like once every 200 days. Since 2011 it's been something like once every 65 days. That's a pretty dramatic change, and one that has puzzled researchers. What happened in 2011? The gun laws didn't change. There weren't any mental health things that changed. It's not like there were a bunch of societal factors that occurred in 2011.

But what it shows, and what the honest, independent intelligent researchers will tell you, is that there are way, way too many factors that go into the mass shootings to be able to claim that something like a ban or lack of ban on assault weapons is the cause, is a cause or has any meaningful impact.

[trixR4kids]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

Yeah you answered but the goal posts keep shifting.

I would think that anyone who walks into a church or a school or anywhere and starts blasting anyone and everyone is not all there in the head. It is not a rational act.

The same could be said for someone who drives a plane into a building, that's not the point.

[alfablue]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

As usual??? I wasted endless amounts of time yesterday responding to pretty much every single question or argument made to me, even though most of them really didn't make a lot of sense compared with the evidence that exists out there, and many of them made the same arguments over and over again.

And yes, the answer is "chance," as I wrote before. But now I've answered the question directly to you so I shouldn't have to do that again.

For those who actually study the statistics on these things, one question that has come up is why since 2011 have we seen an increase in the frequency of mass shootings. I don't know that we've seen a big change in the total number of deaths, but I believe that data shows that prior to 2011, a mass shooting (which I think they define as 5 or more) occurred something like once every 200 days. Since 2011 it's been something like once every 65 days. That's a pretty dramatic change, and one that has puzzled researchers. What happened in 2011? The gun laws didn't change. There weren't any mental health things that changed. It's not like there were a bunch of societal factors that occurred in 2011.

But what it shows, and what the honest, independent intelligent researchers will tell you, is that there are way, way too many factors that go into the mass shootings to be able to claim that something like a ban or lack of ban on assault weapons is the cause, is a cause or has any meaningful impact.

Why do you pretend to care? You say it's statistically insignificant.

Spend that much time explaining that we should not worry about mass killings as they are a statistical insignificant amount relative to the overall gun deaths, and then pretend that it matters that the frequency has apparently gone up? Really?

Do you care or not? I don't get it. If you think that the occurrence has changed in a statistical significant way, but not the numbers, I absolutely don't get your entire argument. Either it's ALL significant, or its is isn't. You can't pick and choose what you want to care about and pretend the rest isn't important. That's crap.

[trixR4kids]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

Why do you pretend to care? You say it's statistically insignificant.

Spend that much time explaining that we should not worry about mass killings as they are a statistical insignificant amount relative to the overall gun deaths, and then pretend that it matters that the frequency has apparently gone up? Really?

Do you care or not? I don't get it. If you think that the occurrence has changed in a statistical significant way, but not the numbers, I absolutely don't get your entire argument. Either it's ALL significant, or its is isn't. You can't pick and choose what you want to care about and pretend the rest isn't important. That's crap.

He just wants to keep his guns and the shootings don't affect him personally so everything is fine.

[SJHovey]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

So your WHOLE point is that the mass shootings are statistically insignificant, therefore we should not worry about them. Is that correct?


At one point, you claimed that the Assault Weapons Ban was not effective. And then claimed all the ban did was change murders from one form to another. All in the face of actual data, one that wasn't interpreted that mass shootings was significantly down in the period of the assault weapons ban. And I'm wondering how you can interpret a 50% reduction in gun shootings over less than 10 years a "very, very slight downward trend". The rise in gun deaths between 1988 and 1996 is not an insignificant blip. It's real. Just as is the decrease until 2001.

But the overall point that mass shootings are insignificant??? Really? People die in large numbers, mostly innocent people, and they are insignificant?

That seems like a cop out.

I'm not really sure why I should continue to respond to you when you either intentionally or unintentionally misrepresent what I've written, but I'll give you another chance.

My point was that mass shooting deaths are statistically insignificant as compared with shooting deaths in general, and deaths overall, yes. If you are going to have a giant political (and possibly constitutional) battle over something, I suggest you have it over something other than events that have resulted in 1000 deaths over 50 years.

Should we "worry" about them, in your words? I don't, again because they are quite rare, even though they attract mass attention. I can't choose what people worry about. I don't worry about getting hit by lightning, dying in a plane crash, or getting hit by a bus, but all of those could happen to me, obviously.

With respect to the chart, which I think is pretty self-explanatory. What you should see is that non-handgun shooting related deaths have been pretty static, with perhaps a very slight downward trend over the years depicted in the chart. That line represents deaths caused by assault weapons, and is the green line. There are obviously year to year bumps where it might be up slightly, but then the downward trend ends. What the line certainly shows is that there was no significant or meaningful drop off in non-handgun related deaths following the assault weapon ban. The slight downward trend simply continued.

The chart also shows that in the 1990's we saw a dramatic increase followed by an equally dramatic decrease in the number of handgun related deaths. I have no idea why that happened, and I haven't seen where anyone else has explained it either. But of course, your assault weapons ban wouldn't affect those statistics at all, will it, unless you want to claim that by implementing the assault weapons ban we were successful in increasing handgun deaths by 60%.

Finally, I didn't say that mass shootings are insignificant. To the victims they are obviously hugely significant. What I said, and which I've repeated above, is that the number of mass shooting deaths are insignificant compared with shooting deaths in general, and all deaths as a whole.

Let me put it another way. Cancer causes hundreds of thousands of deaths in this country each year. What if I told you that 100 of them were caused by cancer to the gallbladder? Are we suddenly going to throw everything we have at curing gallbladder cancer? Is that where we draw the line in the sand? Obviously to anyone affected by gallbladder cancer it is a very, very significant deal, but as cold as this might sound to you, overall it's pretty insignificant statistically speaking. That doesn't mean that we stop thinking about gallbladder cancer or how we might avoid or cure it, but our efforts and money needs to be concentrated where they will have a real impact.

My overall point is this. Guns, and the right to possess or carry them, is an extremely emotional and political issue. I have no idea why you want to wage that war for something that really isn't going to affect the problem that has you all "worried" right now, mass shootings. If you want to wage that war, I applaud you for it, but I suggest you actually try to accomplish something for your efforts.

[jerphisch]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

But what it shows, and what the honest, independent intelligent researchers will tell you, is that there are way, way too many factors that go into the mass shootings to be able to claim that something like a ban or lack of ban on assault weapons is the cause, is a cause or has any meaningful impact.

What all the research points to is one simple fact, more guns=more gun violence, period.

[Deutsche Gopher Fan]

What all the research points to is one simple fact, more guns=more gun violence, period.

I don't get why people try to blame mental health alone.
Women here have mental health issues, too- but they aren't committing these mass shootings.
Other nations have people with mental illness but none of them have anywhere near our rate of shootings.

[joecct]

What all the research points to is one simple fact, more guns=more gun violence, period.

More angry people = more acts of violence. We get angry and demonstrate that anger way too much these days.

[trixR4kids]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

Yes 1000 people got killed over 50 years but 500 got injured in the most recent one alone. It's not just deaths that should be considered.

[joecct]

Yes 1000 people got killed over 50 years but 500 got injured in the most recent one alone. It's not just deaths that should be considered.

Then we go back to cars/knives/bombs/poison argument.

There is too much Me and not enough Us these days.

[SJHovey]

Re: Days Since Last Shooting II

What all the research points to is one simple fact, more guns=more gun violence, period.

Exactly. Which means that if you want to address the problem, do what I told Handy to do yesterday. Ban gun ownership. Stop pretending that you've addressed the problem and actually address the problem. Or stop whining about it.