NY Times "A Drumbeat of Multiple Shootings, but America Isn’t Listening"

[Botany]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/us/americas-overlooked-gun-violence.html?&hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=photo-spot-

CINCINNATI — After the slaughter of nine worshipers at a South Carolina church last June, but before the massacre of eight students and a teacher at an Oregon community college in October, there was a shooting that the police here have labeled Incident 159022597.01. It happened on a clear Friday night at an Elks Lodge, on a modest block of clapboard houses northeast of this city’s hilly downtown. Unlike the butchery that bookended it, it merited no presidential statements, no saturation television coverage.

But what took place at 6101 Prentice Street on Aug. 21 may say more about the nature of gun violence in the United States than any of those far more famous rampages. It is a snapshot of a different sort of mass violence — one that erupts with such anesthetic regularity that it is rendered almost invisible, except to the mostly black victims, survivors and attackers.

snip

That is more than correct. The Elks Lodge episode was one of at least 358 armed encounters nationwide last year — nearly one a day, on average — in which four or more people were killed or wounded, including attackers. The toll: 462 dead and 1,330 injured, sometimes for life, typically in bursts of gunfire lasting but seconds.

snip

The shootings took place everywhere, but mostly outdoors: at neighborhood barbecues, family reunions, music festivals, basketball tournaments, movie theaters, housing project courtyards, Sweet 16 parties, public parks. Where motives could be gleaned, roughly half involved or suggested crime or gang activity. Arguments that spun out of control accounted for most other shootings, followed by acts of domestic violence.

[maxsolomon]

1. "The Price of Freedom"

We must have guns to protect ourselves from the guns that others have to protect themselves from the guns that others have to protect themselves from the guns that others have ad nauseum ad infinitum.

"Its WAY too late for gun control in America" - Steve Earle

[Eleanors38]

20. But gun control is ALWAYS on time in Guns Discussion.nt

[brentspeak]

2. The one that took the cake was the gun shop shootout

in Mississippi back in January of this year, where two customers, a father and son, disputing a $25 overcharge, shot it out with and killed the owners of the gun shop, also a father and his son.

You won't see the NRA or their congressional puppets highlight this incident.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/shootout-in-gun-shop-over-25-dollars-kills-2-wounds-2-sheriff-says-mississippi/


Shootout in gun shop over $25 kills 2, sheriff says

PICAYUNE, Miss. -- A gun shop owner and his 17-year-old son died in a shootout over a $25 service charge, and another man and his 29-year-old son are hospitalized, Mississippi authorities said.

Investigators don't know whether the customers or the owners started the shooting Saturday afternoon at McLemore Gun Shop near Picayune, and want to figure out just what happened before filing any charges, Pearl River County Sheriff David Allison told the Sun Herald.

He identified the owner and his son as Jason McLemore, 44, and Jacob McLemore, 17, WLOX-TV reported Sunday.

Michael McCool, 29, allegedly shot both with a 40-caliber pistol, he told the station.

[cagefreesoylentgreen]

3. Curious

Not to diminish the tragedy of any of the shootings, but I wonder if people would be so quick to react with violence to a petty grievance if the only thing they had access to was a sword or knife.

Personally I'd love to be able to open carry my Japanese odachi then.

[beevul]

4. They're listening.

They just don't agree with anti-gun 'solutions', which are always "a good start".

[maxsolomon]

5. because they've been fed fear and slippery-slope hysteria 24/7 for 40 years

which you just provided. as usual.

[beevul]

6. Thats a shitty argument to use against taking anti-gunners at their own word.

If you want some, I'll be more than happy to provide examples.

But you don't really want those examples, do you.

[maxsolomon]

9. no, i've seen all the despairing "ban all guns" comments on DU

that typically follow mass killings, so there's no need.

we're stuck in a place where the overall body count for homicides keeps decreasing, but the pointlessness and horror of mass shootings resists solutions, as long as firearm access comes with such ease of access and so little ongoing responsibility.

personally, I've given up thinking that anything will change in my lifetime. its been 40 years since the NRA was taken over by absolutists, its probably 40 years before this tide of absolutism will recede. i don't have that long to live.

so my plan is to stay as far away from guns, and gun owners, as is possible, and keep my fingers crossed that i don't get into a random shooting incident. they happen pretty frequently in Seattle, so who knows.

whatever else is said about it, the 2nd was never intended to enable schizophrenics to amass semi-automatic arsenals.

[beevul]

12. I love that argument.

its been 40 years since the NRA was taken over by absolutists, its probably 40 years before this tide of absolutism will recede.

I love that argument. Amendment 2 says arms, not firearms, yet its the nra that gets painted as extremist because they believe "arms" includes firearms, while anti-gun folks who want strictness at the single shot to 'ban them all' level get ignored.

Anti-gun folks who would define "arms" as single shot firearms or less, are in all reality, the most extremist absolutist players on the board.

[LanternWaste]

15. That's rather the unsupported allegation.

"its the nra that gets painted as extremist because they believe "arms" includes firearms..."

That's rather the unsupported allegation. Most opposition to the NRA I've seen is due to their penchant to see CDC studies defunded, or the NRA sponsored hunting program which compared critics of elephant hunts to Hitler, or their claim that honoring victims of gun violence "makes the world a more dangerous place for women."

"...are in all reality, the most extremist absolutist players on the board."

Of course. It certainly couldn't be the guy who thinks critics of elephant hunts are Hitler as the extreme absolutist... that would interfere with your bias. And without your bias, you'd be forced to think critically. That would certainly be a no-no.

[beevul]

25. Thats a great response...

Thats a great response to a context that I wasn't speaking in.


Really. Pat yourself on the back.

The context was one of who is an absolutist on the scale of "arms" as referred to in amendment 2.

And on that scale, anti-gun folks who would define "arms" as single shot firearms or less, are in all reality, the most extremist absolutist players on the board.

It isn't even arguable. And bias has nothing to do with that

[maxsolomon]

17. that's not what i said at all -

but go ahead and read what you want into it.

I don't give a fuck how "arms" are defined. I refuse to be drawn into your technical games.

I simply mean that I cannot see positions being more extreme, more polarized, than they are today, and that it will be a generation or more before tempers cool enough to address this issue rationally.

at that time, I, probably you, and hopefully Wayne LaPierre, will be dead.

[Eleanors38]

21. Speaking of fear, the NYT eructs boilet plate editorial (say, c1978?) and its BIG NEWZ...

...in Guns Discussion. This, despite a huge drop in gun-related homicides.

Gun control was founded on fear. From the beginning. But, now more than ever.

[Blue_Tires]

8. So what's your alternate solution, then?

[maxsolomon]

10. see post #9

there is no solution

[beevul]

11. To resist anti-gunners at every turn, until...

To resist anti-gunners at every turn, until they learn to think outside the box and deal with the problems as they exist where they exist, and deal with those problems for what they actually are, rather than what anti-gunners portray them to be for political gain.

That day will have arrived when anti-gunners stop blaming tens of millions of gun owners and the guns they own, for things that they didn't even do.

[Blue_Tires]

16. Shouldn't gunners want to be a part of the conversation

instead of merely throwing up roadblocks and being reactionary? I just find it amusing that the NRA constantly kicks this ball back to the anti-gunners and cry foul at the ideas they come up with on their own...

Somewhere along the line the official NRA position to these incidents has to be something different than "more guns", right?

Or maybe you don't even believe there is a 'problem' here to solve, and this is just the cost of living in a free society? It's ok if you do....

[gratuitous]

18. I think you've hit on it

The only acceptable solution to the death lobby, its public relations firm the NRA, and its loud-mouthed advocates is "more guns." Anything else isn't dealing with problems as and where they exist, whatever that's supposed to mean (although I have a pretty good idea what it is).

[Eleanors38]

22. Too many comments like #13 & #19 preclude discussion. This, not to mention

More "illustrious" banners in high office. Don't expect the NRA or any other pro-2A group to carry anyone's bucket when they encounter extremism from controllers; it's damned difficult to do it right here on DU.

Curious, boiler plate editorial, and in another post today, a local incident involving a gun, can just waltz right in and squat in GD in spite of the TOS. Another reason why it is difficult to engage in any discussion:. One side is given special dispensation whenever the urge moves it.

[Blue_Tires]

23. To be fair, there has been extremism on both sides

it's not a one-way street...

[Eleanors38]

24. True enough.

[beevul]

26. The problem is, anti-gunners don't want a "conversation".

They want a monologue. "Australian style" gun control (confiscation), "assault weapon" bans.

Or maybe you don't even believe there is a 'problem' here to solve, and this is just the cost of living in a free society? It's ok if you do....

I think there IS a problem, but I also think that if the guns are the problem, it would be very obvious.

I don't define the problem as "less than .1 percent of 300 million people misusing them resulting in deaths, therefore it must be the guns that are the problem", nor do I trust those who do.

[Blue_Tires]

7. k+r

[Initech]

13. The NRA has too many senators in their back pocket.

The time to vote every single damn one of them out of office is now! Things are worse than ever and the NRA is only getting stronger. They are the enemy. They are a bigger threat to freedom than al qaeda is.

[Botany]

14. After the Sandy Hook School shooting republicans have passed laws that make it easier to get a gun

.... and more places where you can carry them.

I have hunted and owned guns for years but the bloodshed and pain caused by America's
gun culture is just too much.

[AngryAmish]

19. Easy access to guns means disputes that would end in fistfights end with bullets flying.

I have spent more time than I care to in criminal court. Let me tell you something about 75% of defendants:. They are absolute, complete morons. 20% are dumb kids. 5% should never be let out of jail.

Most people who are smart enough not to dish out violence when insulted can own guns in a perfectly safe manner. But if one thinks violence is OK upon provocation, they you are a problem.

I would be OK with a complete handgun ban with five year minimum for possession. Because we are beset by a lot of dumb people.

[Skittles]

27. non-gun humping Americans ARE listening

but politicians only hear the NRA