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Is it an American thing?

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Bohne
 
  1  
Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 02:11 am
You've probably gotten this reply already by now:
But just in case you haven't:

There was a case in Germany, almost exactly five years ago...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erfurt_massacre
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Steve 41oo
 
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Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 02:39 am
Mass shootings occur in many countries. But nowhere with the incidence as high as that in the US. That, imo, is entirely due to Americans peculiar attitudes and laws pertaining to gun ownership. Whilst mass shootings are still rare, gun homicides are not. I could not believe it when I heard an American who has studied the problem say there were 28,000 gun homicides in the US last year, compared with 50 in the UK. Allowing for population differences thats still 100 times as many.
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gungasnake
 
  1  
Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 05:39 am
I'll say it again, Europe's last really big "mass shooting" was called World War II. Germany alone lost 7,500,000 people, not counting Jews.

Previous mass shootings in Europe included the Napoleonic wars and the wars of Friederich der Grosse, which account to some extent for the large numbers of people with German names living in Pennsylvania. All such were brought about to some extent by government monopolies on weapons, which our own second amendment eliminated.

I mean, you don't see large numbers of Americans living in Germany to escape the piddling number of shooting deaths we get here which, excluding suicides, is some fairly small fraction of highway fatalities on an annual basis.
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gungasnake
 
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Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 05:53 am
Another way to look at it...

Guns have always been available in the US and you assume there have always been about as many lunatics in the US as in other countries; but the lunatics always used to be kept locked up, didn't they??

What happened, and whose fault is it that this is no longer the case? Does that sound like something which conservatives would have done??
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Thomas
 
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Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 06:09 am
Re: Is it an American thing?
kickycan wrote:
Do they have incidents like these in other countries?

Yes, we do have amok shooters here in Germany. So far, the worst one happened in Erfurt in 2002. An 18 year old who had recently been expelled from the Gutenberg Gymnasium killed 16 pupils and teachers. School schootings are not unique to America.

Edit: I see Bohne bet me to it.
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Steve 41oo
 
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Reply Wed 18 Apr, 2007 01:28 pm
gungasnake wrote:
I'll say it again, Europe's last really big "mass shooting" was called World War II. Germany alone lost 7,500,000 people, not counting Jews.

Previous mass shootings in Europe included the Napoleonic wars and the wars of Friederich der Grosse, which account to some extent for the large numbers of people with German names living in Pennsylvania. All such were brought about to some extent by government monopolies on weapons, which our own second amendment eliminated.

I mean, you don't see large numbers of Americans living in Germany to escape the piddling number of shooting deaths we get here which, excluding suicides, is some fairly small fraction of highway fatalities on an annual basis.
this is total and utter garbage.
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Walter Hinteler
 
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Reply Thu 19 Apr, 2007 09:17 am
gungasnake wrote:
All such were brought about to some extent by government monopolies on weapons, which our own second amendment eliminated.


That is totally nonsense (I'm only referring to the law in German states and countries):

- the privilege to carry weapons had always been a corporatist right: only citizens, free peasants and the nobility could carry arms,
- with the emerging ideas of liberty, equality, fraternity in the 19th century, the right of carrying arms only for certain groups wasn't practical anymore,
- the (then) modern state claimed to have a monopoly as power of the state, outwards and inwardly.

Thus, since 1871 the right to carry arms was regulated by law for all Germany.

There are no scientific researches about how the law was in the various German countries/states between 1830 and 1870 until now.
At Bielefeld university (history department) a study group works on this now.
No results have been published so far.
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ehBeth
 
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Reply Thu 19 Apr, 2007 10:31 am
gungasnake wrote:
Guns have always been available in the US and you assume there have always been about as many lunatics in the US as in other countries; but the lunatics always used to be kept locked up, didn't they??

What happened, and whose fault is it that this is no longer the case? Does that sound like something which conservatives would have done??


Cutting back on funding for emergency medical services? Decreasing availability to public mental health services.

Why yes, that does sound like something conservatives/Republicans in the U.S. would do, and have done.
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Miller
 
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Reply Thu 19 Apr, 2007 12:17 pm
The group home has replaced the Mental Hospital for those who aren't wealthy. For those with big dough, there are special accomodations for those with depression, at a cost of more than $1000/day ( considered to be 8 hr for a day patient as opposed to a resident patient) in the Commonwealth of Masachusetts and in the Town of Belmont.

Idea
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