Posted: 12/25/2005 3:24:43 PM EDT
|
The Gun Control Lobby, Thinking Small By Jenny Price Washington Post Sunday, December 25, 2005; B07 Five years ago an elderly Los Angeles woman who had agreed to move out of her daughter's apartment bought a handgun. She cleared the background check, passed the safety test and practiced on targets at the local shooting range. Then she shot and killed her daughter and her daughter's fiance -- my brother David. As someone who has lost a member of my family to gun violence, I see the new federal legislation to limit gun manufacturers' liability as unconscionable beyond my ken. But what troubles me most is that the gun control lobby is pouring its resources into battles that probably won't save many lives -- and we're losing even those. In the past decade, states have passed law after law to require safety locks, force gun-purchase waiting periods, trace bullets back to their sources and allow victims to sue manufacturers for negligence. That such measures have produced at best slight decreases in the rate of gun deaths is hardly surprising, because only 3 percent of gun deaths are accidents, and most murderers own their handguns legally and know how to use them safely. California has passed a raft of such laws in the past five years and is widely praised as one of the most progressive states on gun control. In that same period, the number of handgun-related homicides has fallen and then risen again, with no correlation whatever. The real problem is not that handguns aren't safe or well-regulated enough, or that you can't sue and try to bankrupt a corrupt manufacturer after someone you love has been killed. The problem is that 60 million people in the United States own handguns. The gun used to kill my brother was a Glock 19, a light and portable semiautomatic. These guns are designed to kill people: That's their sole purpose. Nearly 12,000 Americans annually use guns to do just that, and the majority use handguns. Twelve thousand: that's comparable to the number of AIDS deaths each year in the United States. (Great Britain has about 100 gun deaths each year.) And if the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, which leads the gun control crusade, continues to assure us that it won't try to outlaw handguns? Then new laws to restrict who can buy guns and where they can carry them might reduce the annual toll to 10,000. But that's optimistic. Wouldn't it make more sense to define the ultimate battle as one for a national ban on handguns -- the sole gun-control measure that promises to save tens of thousands of lives? With an endgame that can actually achieve the ultimate goal, perhaps we'd acquire the logical and moral authority to win more of the smaller battles. I can hear the gun lobby scoffing, "Guns don't kill people. People do." This ditty is familiar to all of us. Yes, and bombs and chemical weapons don't kill people either, but they're not sold over the counter to just about anyone without a criminal record who can prove that he or she can use them safely. Of the 12,000 guns used to kill people every year, 160 are used in legitimate self-defense. Guns in the home are used seven times more often for murder than for self-defense. I cannot say whether the woman who shot my brother was vicious or insane: I myself no longer understand the exact difference. But we all know that rage, vengefulness and deep alienation are hardly unusual in our society, and a handgun makes it horrifyingly easy for people to express them, on purpose or on impulse, by killing people. If the National Rifle Association wants to pour its own considerable resources into creating a society ruled by absolute peace and brotherhood, I'm all for it. But let's stop arming the populace in the meantime, which pro- and anti-gun advocates alike know for certain will create a mountainous death toll. Jenny Price is a writer living in Los Angeles. www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/23/AR2005122301465_pf.html |
|
Jenny: I'm terribly sorry for the tragic and untimely loss of your brother, but to blame the manufacturer of the firearm rather than your soon-to-be mother-in-law once removed (??? Help, Miss Manners!) is fucking stupid. Would you sue Chicago Cutlery if she had shanked him in the shower? You've proven again, though it will be ignored by the majority of gunowners (especially owners of shotguns and hunting rifles) that the ultimate aim of you pie-in-the-sky liberal idealoges is a totalitarian state achieved by the disarmament of the citizenry, just so you can boss everyone around as one of the elites. Perhaps if your crackhead brother hadn't gotten a nice girl hooked on crank and then started banging her in her family's house, her mother wouldn't have been driven to extreme measures...or did you just decide those were unnecessary details? Anyway, good luck on your quest, and make sure you have your pistol permit secured by "favors" downtown before you go walking the streets in L.A. or you might find that being an "elite" doesn't cut it with everyone. Some people just don't seem to get that they are supposed to bow and scrape before you. Go figure. Carry plenty of gauze pads to stop the bleeding. Stab wounds are like that, you know. But hey, be happy. At least you weren't shot. Cheers, |
cc: Washington Post letters editor 
|
|
Feeeelings, whoa whoa whoa feeeeelings, whoa whoa whoa feelings................................ Her whole article is filled with lies, half truths, and misrepresentations, and her feelings are used to try to make those who read it, overlook the falsities, and direct their attention on how she hurts and wants law to be based on feelings, not fact. In fact, most "facts" she stated are blatent lies and she slanders gun manufacturers in the same breath by calling them corrupt, without one shred of supporting evidence. Here are my fact as relate to her. She's a liberal She is unwilling to blame crime on criminal behavior Her brother was stupid and unwary Her non SIL and mom had serious problems She is more then happy to make up facts to support her position She is not telling the whole story about her Bro and non SIL. She wants others to pay for a criminals behavior I might be wrong on some, but my facts are just as well supported as hers. |
No, idiots like her would call the PoPo to remove it from the house, or she'd turn it in for a gift certificate to Rainforest Cafe. The only thing that will change her mind is a wake up call of the opposite sort to which she's already had. By then, of course, it will probably be too late, and other gun grabbers will continue the "get the guns off the streets" mantra instead of "why didn't she have something to defend herself with?" |
From the Sarah Brady School of Journalism: If the facts don't jibe with your view of the world, just make up some other "facts" that do... 
|
|
Dear Jenny I am sad for your loss but your premmiss of banning handguns is wrong. I will not use the gun lovers yell of guns don't kill people do or point out more good is done with guns to prevent crime each year then to kill. And I will not resort to pointing out that in Britton they report groups of crime as one instead of as an example 23 killed with a bomb, they just say 1 bombing occured. Your soon to be mother in law made a desission to get a gun and kill. There was clues to the event that was coming but you or your family missed them. How do I know? In my family suicide tends to occur. So far in my life I have had 5 commit suicide, 3 by drugs, one by car anf one with a gun. John(name changed to protect my family) is the gun victum. He was an out going person that did not seem to have any problems when he killed himself. The events leading up to the suicide were 'normal' in apperrence but when examined later...... The days leading up to the act he bought a 45 sig, passed the back round check. He laid out his important papers, closed accounts at his bank and settled bills or debts owed to people. He saw to the care of his 2 dogs and his cat. Then he calmly went into house and during the night he fired one round. All this took place over a month. Some of his close family had seen him a day before and had asked about him settling his debts but got no coherent reply. This was the first clue the second and more clues were the notifications from account holders confirming the closing of accounts or his giving away of things. No one saw or asked further about him. The event happened the weekend before thanksgiving and my family will proubly be asking why for the rest of our lives. Do we blame the guns? No Do we blame the gun manufacturer? No We do blame john though for not asking for help or leaving any clue as to why. So blame your mother in law but do not blame society for her act and do not blame a tool for her crime. That is what small minds do. |
I knew there was probably more to the story here.....where are some links to the details? I did a quick google but if you already have the story please share. Thanks, Observer |
Here we go again. Yes, Glocks are evil, and yes, they were designed to kill people. Nearly every gun ever made was designed to kill people. That's what guns are for. I'm trying to figure out what a gun would be for were it not to kill people.
As all sane, rational people know, a national ban on handguns will make us less safe. Why? Because criminals will still have guns, but honest people will not. "When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns." The libs need to repeat the previous sentence 1 billion times.
A disarmed society with the supposed goal of absolute peace and brotherhood has been tried. It was called NAZI GERMANY. It didn't work then, and it won't work now. As Thomas Jefferson said, "From time to time, the tree of liberty must be replenished with the blood of patiots and tyrants." Jenny, we at ARFCOM are all terribly sorry for the loss of your brother. However, your stupidass solutions do not make any of us safer. By the way, would you advocate the killing all lions, tigers and bears because one may have killed a human? That is the logic you are using to sue the gun manufacturers. Did the Glock 19 malfunction? I bet not, as I personally own one of these fine weapons. I bet it functioned as it was designed by firing when asked to do so by a human, and by striking its mark with devasting results. That's what guns do. Sorry but crazy doesn't sell here. We are already full up. |
Where do they come up with this? Do they j ust pull it out of the air? |
not entirely they uselly have it so only people that died ( no wounding ) are included and useally only count shoots inside a residence and nothing in public or outside a resedence ( even the yard or porch) im sure she dug the number up from some brady "study" of some sort that was how the a gun is 43 times more likely to be used to kill a family member than a intruder factoid was derived |
|
It's called lying with statisitcs. First, they only count when someone was killed and not merely deterred by a gunowner as a valid defense and then they neglect to tell you that out of the 12,000 murders, 10,000 of those are drug related or gang on gang violence. She wants you to think 12,000 Ward Cleaver's busted a cap in their respective Beavers asses, nothing could be further from the truth. The simple fact is unless you are engaged in hard drug use, high-risk criminal behavior and/or are cheating with someone's wife, the odds of you being the victim of a firearms related homicide is almost non-existant. Apparently her brother was doing at least one and possibly two of the three. What she cannot comprehend is there are people like us who refuse to have our rights trampled because stupid people like her brother refuses to play by the rules. She can live in her fantasyland of guns causing homicide untill she wants to impose that dysfunctional fantasy on the rest of us. At that point, it is time she be forceably pushed in the direction of medical treatment for her mental disorder. She is now a non-functional hopolophobe. |
|
Once again the absolute illogic of some emotional libtard. Someone she loved was killed by someone with a gun... who passed the LEGALLY REQUIRED BACKGROUND CHECK, passed the SAFETY CLASS and all the other hooplah that she's required to do... and she thinks she should be able to sue the gun's manufacturer? |
Sorry, I didn't mean to confuse anyone but there has got to be WAY more to this story than is presented. I just made my details up as a |
Lidat? 
|
|