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Can we please stop pretending "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" is anything but the most specious of oversimplifactions? Yes, a person killed all th

Can we please stop pretending "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" is anything but the most specious of oversimplifactions? Yes, a person killed all these people. But he wouldn't have been able to if he didn't have easy access to firearms and a large cache of ammunition. Everything else that can be said on the subject of what would or would not have prevented this is speculation that is, at best, contingent on a large number of factors about which none of us can possibly know enough to make anything but the most tentative of suggestions. But it's absolutely a cut and dry truth that it would not have been possible for him to do this if he (he specifically) had not had access to the kinds of weapons necessary to enable someone to commit these kinds of murders.

Pewpewarrows 14y ago
Not looking to get into a whole thing here, but... > he wouldn't have been able to if he didn't have easy access to firearms and a large cache of ammunition. There's no possible way you can know that. Guns are certainly more accessible than, say, making a pipe bomb, but definitely less accessible than knives. Reference that story floating around the internet the past few days of some guy stabbing 22 kids in China. Not to mention the fact that you also have no knowledge of how capable he was of illegally obtaining the firearms and ammunition from other sources.
- glhaynes 14y ago
  Zero of those 22 kids in China died.
- bunderbunder 14y ago
  I have read about that one. There's a significant difference in verbs between the two stories. In one sentence it's "stabbed", in the other it's "killed". And only seven of them needed to be taken to the hospital.
  - lotharbot 14y ago
    But you probably didn't read about the other knife/axe/hammer attacks in China over the last few years, some of which did kill a lot of people: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010%E2%80%932011%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010... (via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers:_School_massacres http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers:_School... ).

Pewpewarrows 14y ago

Not looking to get into a whole thing here, but... > he wouldn't have been able to if he didn't have easy access to firearms and a large cache of ammunition. There's no possible way you can know that. Guns are certainly more accessible than, say, making a pipe bomb, but definitely less accessible than knives. Reference that story floating around the internet the past few days of some guy stabbing 22 kids in China. Not to mention the fact that you also have no knowledge of how capable he was of illegally obtaining the firearms and ammunition from other sources.

glhaynes 14y ago
Zero of those 22 kids in China died.
bunderbunder 14y ago
I have read about that one. There's a significant difference in verbs between the two stories. In one sentence it's "stabbed", in the other it's "killed". And only seven of them needed to be taken to the hospital.
- lotharbot 14y ago
  But you probably didn't read about the other knife/axe/hammer attacks in China over the last few years, some of which did kill a lot of people: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010%E2%80%932011%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_%282010... (via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers:_School_massacres http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers:_School... ).