Republican asshat in my workplace was just now crowing about a meme. Help me out?

[Orrex]

He described it as a 50s era-looking cartoon of a father spanking a school-age son, with a caption reading something along the lines of "funny there were no school shootings back then."

I'd like to shut him up, but unfortunately I left my toilet plunger in the bathroom at home.


Any suggestions on a few solid refutations?


Thanks!

[Gman]

1. I'd just say "that you know of"

That implies in a polite way he has a very small view of the world.

[porphyrian]

2. Here's a link to the wiki...

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

[Karia]

6. I was just about to post this

The first documented school shooting in North America was in 1764.

[4th law of robotics]

30. "The first documented school shooting in North America was in 1764"

So . . . school shootings are caused by video games and assault weapons then?

[Missycim]

33. and the NRA?

nt

[drm604]

12. If you read that list, you'll notice that some of those were caused by spankings.

So it nicely refutes that claim that corporal punishment prevents school shootings. It's a stupid claim anyway.

[WCGreen]

3. The country was flooded with guns back then either....

People bought guns to hunt or skeet, rarely for protection.

It was illegal to carry guns almost everywhere.

[patrice]

4. I wonder what he thinks made the parents and the culture of the school shooters what they are.

[WhollyHeretic]

5. So everything in the past 60 years has stayed static besides spanking? Has he talked to the parents

of school shooters to see if they spank? There are still quite a few parents who do unfortunately.

[Vincardog]

7. He dreams of the good old days when a MAN could openly paddle a BOY's bare ass

I think you should find the local chapter of NAMBLA. There is no reasoning with perverts,

[KeepItReal]

8. Ask him "In the White Schools or in the Black Schools?"

eom

[1StrongBlackMan]

14. WTF ...

I don't like where you're going with this ...

Stereotype much?

In my high-school years, there was not a single in-school shooting in my neighborhood school (100% Black), there were however plenty of fist-fights - no guns, no knives; however, there where 2 shootings and 4 stabbing in the 99% white prep school that I attended.

[KeepItReal]

24. I mean in the '50's segregation was still present legally

So, when the GOP'er in question asks, he should reply does the GOP'er prefer the way it was before or after schools were desegregated?

[Posteritatis]

26. And I'll bet violence in the 'wrong' schools was very much underreported. (nt)

[edhopper]

9. Ask him

how many lynchings are happening today?

[sharp_stick]

10. Here's my suggestion

One: Point him to the wikipedia entry on school shootings to show that his entire thesis is full of shit

Two: Point out the fact that him having pictures of children being spanked might give others the wrong impression of his "life style".

Three: Tell him to go fuck himself.

[still_one]

11. Truman was a Democrat, and Eisenhower would never be accepted in the republican

Party today

In fact the eisenhower family supported Obama in 2008

[Blue State Bandit]

13. Building the Bullies of Tomorrow.

[retread]

15. Ask him if he has a computer and knows how to use Google.

[progressivebydesign]

16. No but there was a serial killer on every corner when I grew up.. what's his point? n/t

[renie408]

17. Gun ownership. In 1950 there were 93.5 guns per 1000 people...(with links)

In 2007 it was 88.8...per ONE HUNDRED people. That is a pretty incredible increase.

http://www.visualnews.com/2012/08/15/armed-to-the-teeth/

http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10881&page=57

[Cleita]

21. But kids didn't have access to them other than BB guns.n/t

[petronius]

23. The 93.5 is handguns only - your source gives 381 total firearms / 1000 persons

in 1950, giving an increase of ~2.5x rather than ~9.5x...

[LeftinOH]

18. The worst school massacre in the USA was in 1927 (Bath, Michigan);

and, for what it's worth... Ted Bundy, John Gacy, James Huberty, Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald, Charles Whitman, Richard Speck, and many, many others all grew up in the hunky-dory 1950s (and probably listened to daily prayer in their schools).

So then.. ask the co-worker what point he is trying to make.

What's more- how easily obtainable were automatic weapons back in the 1950s?

[Jennicut]

19. There were different types of violence back then.

I grew up in the 90's and my parents grew up in the 50's. My mother said during the 50's a lot of stuff was simply pushed under the rug. She said it was not as ideal as some make it out to be.

[Cleita]

20. I was a teenager in the fifties and even then most parents didn't beat their kids and

the ones who did were frowned upon and often got visits from concerned neighbors about the discipline. The mother of one of my friends divorced their father back in the forties because he was too handy with the spankings. The reason there weren't as many shootings was because most kids didn't have access to guns. Most of the boys went into the military after high school on account of the draft where they were taught how to use and respect firearms. Since we were at peace at the time, we were pretty familiar with the PSTDs, then called shell shock, of WWII and Korean War veterans and none wanted to go there. Also, those vets were mainstreamed back into the community and had a support system that they don't have today.

[JoePhilly]

22. I might say that spanking is lazy parenting.

Others have provided links one data that refutes the stupidity of his comment.

But my point is more personal. Beating your child gets them to understand that violence is (a) a great way to change the behavior of others, and (b) don't get caught doing something wrong.

[CK_John]

25. Politics and religious discussios can put ones job at risk and if your over 40 you'll never

get anything but min wage after being labeled a troublemaker.

It's not right but with unemployment at 15-18 percent (real rate) you have to protect yourself. You are there to work not socialize.

[Politicalboi]

27. Fine, let's tax the rich

Like it was 1955. Parents who can earn a descent living, have happier children.

[deaniac21]

29. And the parents who make a decent living have even happier kids!

[notadmblnd]

28. ah yes there were and here is just a sampling to shove down his throat.

1700s
The earliest known United States shooting to happen on school property was the Pontiac's Rebellion school massacre on July 26, 1764, where four Lenape American Indians entered the schoolhouse near present-day Greencastle, Pennsylvania, shot and killed schoolmaster Enoch Brown, and killed nine or ten children (reports vary). Only three children survived.[18]
[edit]1800s
November 2, 1853: Louisville, Kentucky A student, Matthew Ward, bought a self-cocking pistol in the morning, went to school and killed Schoolmaster Mr. Butler for excessively punishing his brother the day before. Even though he shot the Schoolmaster point blank in front of his classmates, he was acquitted.[19]
An April 30, 1866 editorial in the New York Times argued against students carrying pistols, citing "...pistols being dropped on the floor at balls or being exploded in very inconvenient ways. A boy of 12 has his pantaloons made with a pistol pocket; and this at a boarding-school filled with boys, who, we suppose, do or wish to do the same thing. We would advise parents to look into it, and learn whether shooting is to be a part of the scholastic course which may be practiced on their boys; or else we advise them to see that their own boys are properly armed with the most approved and deadly-pistol, and that there may be an equal chance at least of their shooting as of being shot."[20]
June 8, 1867: New York City At Public School No. 18, a 13 year old lad brought a pistol loaded and capped, without the knowledge of his parents or school-teachers, and shot and injured a classmate.[21]
December 22, 1868: Chattanooga, Tennessee A boy who refused to be whipped and left school, returned with his brother and a friend, the next day to seek revenge on his teacher. Not finding the teacher at the school, they continued to his house, where a gun battle rang out, leaving three dead. Only the brother survived.[22]
March 9, 1873: Salisbury, Maryland After school as Miss Shockley was walking with four small children, she was approached by a Mr. Hall and shot. The Schoolmaster ran out, but she was dead instantly. Hall threw himself under a train that night.[23]
May 24, 1879: Lancaster, New York As the carriage loaded with female students was pulling out of the school's stables, Frank Shugart, a telegraph operator, shot and severely injured Mr. Carr, Superintendent of the stables.[24]
March 6, 1884: Boston, Massachusetts As news of Jesse James reached the east coast, young kids started to act in the same manner. An article from the New York Times reads, "Another "Jesse James" Gang - "Word was brought to the Fifth Police Station to-night that a number of boys were using the Concord-street School-house for some unknown purpose, and a posse of officers was sent to investigate. The gang scattered at the approach of the police, and in their flight one drew a revolver and fired at Officer Rowan, without effect, however. William Nangle, age 14, and Sidney Duncan, age 12, were captured, but the other five or six escaped, among them the one who did the shooting. The boys refused to disclose the object of their meeting, but it is thought that another "Jesse James" organization has been broken up."[25]
March 15, 1884: Gainsville, Georgia In the middle of the day, a group of very drunk Jackson County farmers left the Jug Tavern drinking and shooting their revolvers as they headed down the street driving people into their homes. As they approached the female academy, the girls fled the schoolyard into the school where the gang followed swearing and shooting, firing several rounds into the front door. No one was hurt.[26]
July 4, 1886: Charleston, South Carolina During Sunday school, Emma Connelly shot and killed John Steedley for "circulating slanderous reports" about her, even though her brother publicly whipped him a few days earlier.[27]
June 12, 1887: Cleveland, Tennessee Will Guess went to the school and fatally shot Miss Irene Fann, his little sister's teacher, for whipping her the day before.[28]
June 13, 1889: New Brunswick, New Jersey Charles Crawford upset over an argument with a school Trustee, went up to the window and fired a pistol into a crowded school room. The bullet lodged in the wall just above the teacher's head.[29]
The first known mass shooting in the U.S. where students were shot, was on April 9, 1891, when 70 year old, James Foster fired a shotgun at a group of students in the playground of St. Mary's Parochial School, Newburgh, New York, causing minor injuries to several of the students.[30] The majority of attacks during this time period by students on other students or teacher, usually involved stabbing with knives, or hitting with stones.
[edit]1900–1930s
This section does not cite any references or sources. (August 2012)
There are very seldom reports of mass or multiple school shootings during the first three decades of the 20th Century, with the three most violent attacks on schools involving either arson or explosions.
February 26, 1902: Camargo, Illinois teacher Fletcher R. Barnett shot and killed another teacher, Eva C. Wiseman, in front of her class at a school near Camargo, Illinois. After shooting at a pupil who came to help Miss Wiseman and wounding himself in a failed suicide attempt he waited in the classroom until a group of farmers came to lynch him. He then ran out of the school building, grabbed a shotgun from one of the farmers and shot himself, before running away and leaping into a well where he finally drowned. The incident was likely sparked by Wiseman's refusal to marry Barnett.
February 24, 1903: Inman, South Carolina Edward Foster, a 17-year-old student at Inman High school, was shot and fatally wounded by his teacher Reuben Pitts after he had jerked a rod from Pitts' hands to resist punishment. According to the teacher, Foster struck the pistol Pitts had drawn to defend himself, thus causing its discharge. Pitts was later acquitted of murder.
October 10, 1906: Cleveland, Ohio Harry Smith shot and killed 22-year-old teacher Mary Shepard at South Euclid School after she had rejected him. Smith escaped and committed suicide in a barn near his home two hours later.
March 23, 1907: Carmi, Illinois George Nicholson shot and killed John Kurd at a schoolhouse outside of Carmi, Illinois during a school rehearsal. The motive for the shooting was Kurd making a disparaging remark about Nicholson's daughter during her recital.
March 11, 1908: Boston, Massachusetts Elizabeth Bailey Hardee was shot to death by Sarah Chamberlain Weed at the Laurens School, a finishing school in Boston. Weed then turned the gun on herself and committed suicide.
April 15, 1908: Asheville, North Carolina Dr. C. O. Swinney shot and fatally wounded his 16-year-old daughter Nellie in a reception room at Normal and Collegiate Institute. He then committed suicide by shooting himself in the head.
February 12, 1909: San Francisco, California 10-year-old Dorothy Malakanoff was shot and killed by 49-year-old Demetri Tereaschinko as she arrived at her school in San Francisco. Tereaschinko then shot himself in a failed suicide attempt. Tereaschinko was reportedly upset that Malakanoff refused to elope with him.
January 10, 1912: Warrenville, Illinois Sylvester E. Adams shot and killed teacher Edith Smith after she rejected his advances. Adams then shot and killed himself. The incident took place in a schoolhouse about a mile outside of Warrenville after the students had been dismissed for the day.
March 27, 1919: Lodi Township, Michigan 19-year-old teacher Irma Casler was shot and killed in her classroom at Rentschler school in Lodi Township, Michigan by Robert Warner, apparently because she had rejected his advances.
April 2, 1921: Syracuse, New York Professor Holmes Beckwith shot and killed dean J. Herman Wharton in his office at Syracuse University before committing suicide.
May 18, 1927: Bath, Michigan School treasurer Andrew Kehoe, after killing his wife and destroying his house and farm, blew up the Bath Consolidated School by detonating dynamite in the basement of the school, killing 38 people, mostly children. He then pulled up to the school in his Ford car, then set off a truck bomb, killing himself and four others. Only one shot was fired in order to detonate dynamite in the car. This was deadliest act of mass murder at a school in the United States.
February 15, 1933: Downey, California Dr. Vernon Blythe shot and killed his wife Eleanor, as well as his 8-year old son Robert at Gallatin grammar school and committed suicide after firing three more shots at his other son Vernon. His wife, who had been a teacher at the school, had filed for divorce the week before.
September 14, 1934: Gill, Massachusetts. Headmaster Elliott Speer was murdered by a shotgun blast through the window of his study at Northfield Mount Hermon School. The crime was never solved.
December 12, 1935: New York City, New York, Victor Koussow, a Russian laboratory worker at the School of Dental and Oral Surgery, shot Prof. Arthur Taylor Rowe, Prof. Paul B. Wiberg, and wounded Dr. William H. Crawford at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, before committing suicide.
April 27, 1936: Lincoln, Nebraska, Prof. John Weller shot and wounded Prof. Harry Kurz in a corridor of the University of Nebraska, apparently because of his impending dismissal at the end of the semester. After shooting Kurz Weller tried to escape, but was surrounded by police on the campus, whereupon he killed himself with a shot in the chest.
June 4, 1936: Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Wesley Crow shot and killed his Lehigh University English instructor, C. Wesley Phy. Crow went to Phy's office and demanded that Mr. Phy change his grade to a passing mark. Crow committed suicide after shooting Phy.
September 24, 1937: Toledo, Ohio 12-year-old Robert Snyder shot and wounded his principal, June Mapes, in her office at Arlington public school when she declined his request to call a classmate. He then fled the school grounds and shot and wounded himself.
[edit]1940s
This section does not cite any references or sources. (August 2012)
May 6, 1940: South Pasadena, California. After being removed as principal of South Pasadena Junior High School, Verlin Spencer shot six school officials, killing five, before attempting to commit suicide by shooting himself in the stomach.
May 23, 1940: New York City, New York Infuriated by a grievance, Matthew Gillespie, 62-year-old janitor at the junior school of the Dwight School for Girls, shot and critically wounded Mrs. Marshall Coxe, secretary of the junior school.
July 4, 1940: Valhalla, New York Angered by the refusal of his daughter, Melba, 15 years old, to leave a boarding school and return to his home, Joseph Moshell, 47, visited the school and shot and killed the girl.
September 12, 1940: Uniontown, Pennsylvania, 29-year-old teacher Carolyn Dellamea is shot to death inside her third grade classroom by 35-year-old William Kuhns. Kuhns then shot himself in the chest in a failed suicide attempt. Kuhns had reportedly been courting Dellamea for over a year but the relationship was ended when Dellamea discovered that Kuhns was already married.
October 2, 1942: New York City, New York “Erwin Goodman, 36-year-old mathematics teacher of William J. Gaynor Junior High School, was shot and killed in the school corridor by a youth...
February 23, 1943: Port Chester, NY Harry Wyman, 13-year-old, shot himself dead at the Harvey School, a boys’ preparatory school.
June 26, 1946: Brooklyn, New York A 15-year-old schoolboy who balked at turning over his pocket money to a gang of seven youths was shot in the chest at 11:30 A.M. in the basement of the Public School 147 annex of the Brooklyn High School for Automotive Trades.
November 24, 1946: New York City A 13-year-old student at St. Benedict’s Parochial School, shot and fatally wounded himself while sitting in an audience watching a school play.
December 24, 1948: New York City A 14-year-old boy was wounded fatally by an accidental shot from the .22-caliber rifle of a fellow-student … the youth was shot in the head when he chanced into range where Robert Ross, 17, of Brooklyn, was shooting at a target near a lake on the school property.
March 11, 1949: New York City A 16-year-old student at Stuyvesant High School was accidentally shot in the arm by a fellow student who was ‘showing off’ with a pistol in a classroom.
November 13, 1949: Columbus, Ohio, Ohio State University freshman James Heer grabbed a .45 caliber handgun from the room of a Delta Tau Delta fraternity brother and shot and killed his fraternity brother Jack McKeown, 21, an Ohio State senior.
[edit]1950s
This section does not cite any references or sources. (August 2012)
July 22, 1950: New York City, New York A 16-year-old boy was shot in the wrist and abdomen at the Public School 141 dance… during an argument with a former classmate.
November 27, 1951: New York City, New York David Brooks, a 15-year-old student, was fatally shot as fellow-pupils looked on in a grade school.
April 9, 1952: New York City, New York A 15-year-old boarding-school student shot a dean rather than relinquish pin-up pictures of girls in bathing suits.
July 14, 1952: New York City, New York Bayard Peakes walked in to the offices of the American Physical Society at Columbia University and shot and killed secretary Eileen Fahey with a .22 caliber pistol. Peakes was reportedly upset that the APS had rejected a pamphlet he had written.
September 3, 1952: in Lawrenceville, Illinois After 25-year-old Georgine Lyon ended her engagement with Charles Petrach, Petrach shot and killed Lyon in a classroom at Lawrenceville High School where she worked as a librarian.
November 20, 1952: New York City, New York “Rear Admiral E. E. Herrmann, 56 years old, superintendent of the Naval Post-Graduate School, was found dead in his office with a bullet in his head. A service revolver was found by his side.
October 2, 1953: Chicago, Illinois 14-year-old Patrick Colletta was shot to death by 14-year-old Bernice Turner in a classroom of Kelly High School in Chicago. It was reported that after Turner refused to date Colletta he handed her the gun and dared her to pull the trigger, telling her that the gun was “only a toy.” A coroner’s jury later ruled that the shooting was an accident.
October 8, 1953: New York City, New York Larry Licitra, 17-year-old student at the Machine and Metal Trades High School, was shot and slightly wounded in the right shoulder in the lobby of the school while inspecting a handmade pistol owned by one of several students.
May 15, 1954: Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Putnam Davis Jr. was shot and killed during a fraternity house carnival at the Phi Delta Theta house at the University of North Carolina. William Joyner and Allen Long were shot and wounded during the exchange of gunfire in their fraternity bedroom. The incident took place after an all-night beer party. Mr. Long reported to the police that, while the three were drinking beer at 7 a.m., Davis pulled out a gun and started shooting with a gun he had obtained from the car of a former roommate.
January 11, 1955: Swarthmore, Pennsylvania After som

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

[muntrv]

31. Tell him the top tax rate in the 50s was higher than today.

[Sheepshank]

32. It's my contention that there is every likleyhood that the kids that are doing the shooting .......

....were spanked by their parents.

He could try and refute that?

[Orrex]

34. Excellent responses--thank you very much!

I have only limited internet access during the day, so I find myself at a disadvantage lately when trying to refute/rebut the bullshit claims of Republican drones.

Thanks for the help!