Politics & Current Events
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Re: Strict liability -- help me flesh out my idea
He also was able to buy something like 6000 rounds of ammunition online prior to the shooting. But no, if we want to tighten up ammo sales, it'll be such a hassle for the people who want to use their ammo for peaceful purposes that we shouldn't bother. I mean, what's 12 people in a theater in a country of 300 million anyway...?
" it'll be such a hassle for the people who want to use their ammo for peaceful purposes that we shouldn't bother."
That's not really fair, people say really, really hurtful things (enough to make people commit suicide) but they aren't getting rid of the first amendment. As I stated above and I believe most gun owners feel this way. We own guns for recreation and for defense. In my state, two rapist/murderers broke into a house where a little girl was home alone by herself, they had every intention of raping/killing her but she was the trap shooting state champion and was able to defend herself and stop a tragedy from happening.
And no one is getting rid of the second amendment either.
...that's a really awkward statement to make. Do you oppose the sheer concept of (quasi) universal healthcare? Or just the conflict over whether employers are allowed to cite their religious beliefs when providing insurance coverage for their employees?*
In any case, I think there is a connected discussion to be had there though. How many people out there are deflecting discussion of guns for discussion of mental health care... but avidly disagree with the concept of socialized medicine? Because that's the only way to even come close to having a population that's taking care of itself, and obviously you can't force it even then. Socialism isn't a dirty word, there is something to be said for a government that takes care of its peoples' welfare. I'd hoped that the gun issue would make more people realize that. It isn't just about people 'pulling themselves up by their bootstraps' or whatever, there is a case to be made for the wellbeing of the general public if you have a better cared for population on an individual level.
All I know is, the answer isn't "people who want to kill will kill and there's nothing we can do about it." That's dangerously close to the line that's already out there, and it's a cheap failure to accept that we've let a problem get too far out of control and do need to do something.
*(More Catholics went for Obama than Romney, fun fact)
And the first amendment is regulated. Libel, slander, incitement to riot, etc.
edit: I also just mean peaceful as in, not going out for a drive-by or something. Perhaps legal would have been better suited. I certainly don't feel that self-defense is a non-peaceful purpose in owning a gun.
Yep!
*(More Catholics went for Obama than Romney, fun fact)
More people who identified themselves as catholic (cafeteria catholics) voted for Obama. The majority of weekly mass going catholics voted for Romney.
I'm sorry you thought that was an odd statement, the HHS mandate is very disconcerting to me (as a catholic) because it forces catholic employers to support/pay for things they believe are intrinsically evil. Also, taxing someone because they don't purchase health insurance is wrong.
"All I know is, the answer isn't "people who want to kill will kill and there's nothing we can do about it." That's dangerously close to the line that's already out there, and it's a cheap failure to accept that we've let a problem get too far out of control and do need to do something."
You're exactly right, we need more people to be accountable for their actions. We need to stop blaming other people/or things for our actions. We need real parents again who discipline and teach their children right from wrong. We need to address mental illness. We need to research the medication we take before we ignorantly put it into our bodies without knowing what it does (because drug agencies have huge agendas). We need to stop being so entitled and actually act. I think we want the same thing, we just have very different approaches.
I'm one of the Catholics that voted for Obama (and I'm a *gasp* liberal). I'm devout and attend mass weekly so I wouldn't call myself a cafeteria Catholic. I just don't force my beliefs on non-Catholics, though. If I were a private employer, I wouldn't dicate to my employees what they can and can't do with their money. Health insurance (including contraception) is part of their wages/benefits. So if my boss is Mormon...does that mean he can tell me not to buy beer with my paycheck because he believes alcohol is evil?
That's why I said the majority of weekly mass going catholics.
No, that's not the problem though. They are forcing them to pay for something that is morally wrong. (Because employers pay for part of benefits).
I would say that health insurance (including the contraception mandate, etc) is part of the employees compensation package and that the employer is refusing to pay for something the employer deems immoral,. But the problem is that what the employer deems immoral is not necessarily what the employee deems immoral and the employee has a valid liberty/health/reproductive right. The employer pays the salary too, was my point, so what's not to stop the employer for dictating how that money is spent. The mandate doesn't force the employer to actually do anything immoral. It's forcing them to provide coverage for women (who might not have the same religious/morality beliefs).
My husband has several guns for hunting, but they are not kept in the house.
I'm a vegetarian that believes that eating meat is morally wrong. I'm also an employer. Perhaps I should refuse to pay for health insurance that covers medical products and/or treatments that have been tested on animals, involve animal based protein treatments like Remicade or insist that my employees are only admitted to and treated at hospitals that don't serve meat to their in-patients, because I feel that it is morally wrong.
And what about the whole blood transfusion thing? My accountant is JW, so we also feel that it is morally wrong.
Also, I'm not sure how I feel about the whole "gay" thing today, so I'm also not willing to pay for health insurance that employs gay people. Or left-handed people. I also think that recreational drug and alcohol use is morally wrong - so I don't think I'll contribute to health insurance that includes drug related services or emergency treatment to those with any alcohol found to be in their blood.
Where does it stop? Why should one interest group be exempt from public policy?
Chronically hilarious - you'll split your stitches!
I wrote a book! Bucket list CHECK!
http://notesfortheirtherapist.blogspot.co.uk
Guns are not the only way people can be mass murdered. Hell, in the last 20 years we have had mulitiple deaths at the First World Trade Center, at the hand of the Unabomber, the Oklahoma City Bombing, Atlantic Olympics Bombing, the arson fires that killed four people at Michigan State, in September 11th attacks, or the 5 people killed by the anthrax ladden letters, or the 4 people who has gasoline thrown on them and then a match to light them up just 3-4 days after the shooting in Connecticut.
Oh and dont forget that the mass murderer in Norway actually started his rampage by using a bomb.
Did we hold the company that sold the nitro to Eric Rudolf liable? Or did we go after Mid-Kansas Coop for selling Timothy McVey all that fertilizer?
And what about car companies for not building cars that automatically come with breathalizers? Because in 2010 - there were 11,078 firearms homicides (CDC - http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/homicide.htm) But there were 10,228 deaths due to drunk driving accidents - with 211 being children. http://www.cdc.gov/motorvehiclesafety/impaired_driving/impaired-drv_factsheet.html
You (the general you) is basically saying that these deaths are not as important, dont hurt as much, do not deserve as much as someone who died due to a gun shot...even though it was not the GUNS fault, but the person who fired the gun.
Are you a vegan? If not, please check the moral hypocrisy. Because you eat foods or wear clothing that may have been obtained by killing an animal with a gun....or a knife....or a hammer....
these things are TOOLS. and a bad guy can use any tool to kill (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/14/police-search-for-suspects-after-4-people-set-on-fire-in-blitz-attack-at-denver/)
^This!
Why are you so against gun control? Not making all guns illegal, but gun control. We have laws so that we can live in a civilized society...why does the idea of background checks, banning certain weapons that are ONLY used for killing (do you really need an uzi?), requiring people to lock guns up so children can't get them, etc., so bad?
Let's just cut to the chase. Why on earth would anyone be against logical gun control measures? I honestly do not understand. Are you wanting your child to grow up in a war zone?? Honestly, that is what it seems like these rabid, anti-gun control, NRA loving fools are gunning for. Pun intended.
Correct me if I'm wrong (please!), but aren't bombs illegal? Can you really just have a bomb and walk around with it and carry it on your back and shiz? Because I don't understand your point if not. Had McVeigh been found with is bomb, he would have been arrested, yes? Is drunk driving not illegal? If the drunks who took the lives of 10,228 people had been pulled over before they did harm, they would have been ARRESTED.
But you want to give people like Adam Lanza the right to carry a pistol while walking next to my child in her school. I literally do not understand your point. If an arsonist is caught lighting a fire, he is ARRESTED. How are you correlating these things?
I think (obviously I can't say for sure) what she meant was she is not for gun control because guns-do-not-kill-people... people-kill-people.
There are already gun control laws, has that stopped anything?
Again, I grew up around guns and have never been a huge fan of the NRA, so that last comment was pretty offensive to me. But I don't think gun control is the answer because guns are already controlled...by the person holding them. So why don't we address the real problem? Which is the people and not the guns.
Yes, exactly! These are already illegal, there are laws against these. But that obviously did not stop them from killing people. Because they already had it set in their minds and no law on the face of this planet would have/or did stop them. So, you just made a good argument for why gun control would not work.
So, your saying we should not have arson laws? We should not have a "ban" on drunk driving? We should not have a law against murder? I mean, since people already have it set in their mind that they are gonna murder someone, why even try to make it harder for them? Why have these laws?
If I made a good argument for why gun control would not work, then I made a good argument for why we should have NO laws at all. People gonna do, what they gonna do, eh? Is that what you are saying, Shawna?
I haven't been able to respond to a lot of the posts today but it looks like pp (missy) said basically what I was going to say, so thanks! Whether we like it or not, laws exist for a reason and they do deter crimes. Do they entirely eliminate problems? No, nothing will, but they do help and to say otherwise is just not accurate.
I'm not really sure I'm being hypocritical with the vegan thing-- you're talking about animals and I'm talking about humans. I probably should have specified human life but in any event I have considered going vegan though.
I think the better moral hypocrisy argument can be made when we're talking human issue versus human issue (for example, some people who don't like the government regulating their guns are perfectly fine with the government telling them who they can and cannot marry and what a woman should do with her body).
"(for example, some people who don't like the government regulating their guns are perfectly fine with the government telling them who they can and cannot marry and what a woman should do with her body)."
No one ever proposed a law to ban birth control, if you (general) want to put a type 1 carcinogen into your body no one is stopping you. Do I believe birth control is wrong? Yes. Do I care if anyone else takes it? No. And I really hope you weren't talking about abortion with that statement (I'll assume you weren't and not even address it).
My point about why gun control wouldn't work was not that we shouldn't have any laws. It was that we already have a law against murder with any sort of weapon including hands. Here is something I found earlier that really explains why gun control won't work.
"
Below is a letter that the football coach from Linfield College, in McMinville, OR, gave or read to his football team. It is a powerful message. I thought it was worth sharing with you. FYI, the Linfield Wildcats are a perennial football powerhouse in their division and about every 2 or 3 years, they play for the national championship. Not bad for a small private college in rural Oregon .
Letter from Coach Smith to his team.
Gentlemen,
I write to you today with a heavy heart. I feel I would be remiss as your coach if I did not address this as a team, and give you whatever grain of wisdom and perspective I can. Forgive me if I am not well spoken in this, this really has impacted so many of us. I am not saying I have all the answers by any means, but this is just my honest opinion to you because I care so deeply about this Country, this State, and this Program. I believe we can do something about this. I know it is long, but I ask you sit somewhere quiet and please think on this deeply.
What happened twice last week in America was shocking. This is not the Middle East, or war torn Eastern Europe, but rather our own countrymen killing you and I, our sisters, our mothers, our children. A line was crossed on Friday in Connecticut that I never dreamed someone or something could cross; the purposeful execution of 1st graders.
Why did this happen? How could this happen?
How do we fix it? Our President says ?this must not happen again?. How do we bring that about? Somehow as a people we must find a way.
If we do not understand the cause, we cannot prevent it. Band aids will not cure the infection.
What is the cause? The bottom hard fact is that we have many messed up young men in this world. You can call them mentally ill, or whatever label you want. But the facts are that we as a society are failing the young men and women your age in this country. We as adults have allowed our youth to grow up in a culture that ill prepares them for the world they encounter when they leave the home. We as adults in America have flat failed our children. Why? Because we are lazy. We take the easy way, the easy road well worn by blind masses that do things and allow things without stopping to think what the long term affects could be.
INPUT equals OUTPUT. Never has that been more accurate.
We do not allow smoking confined areas because science has shown 2nd hand smoke can lead to cancer. Well, that same science has proven beyond ANY shadow of a doubt that violent movies, pornographic material, and violent video games DIRECTLY lead to increase violence toward women and others. It is a fact.
How can this evil act occur in our country you ask? I say it is because we allowed it to grow.
What is the answer for prevention? Is it Gun Control? Is it more mental health workers for teens?
I say they are Band Aids, and will not fix the problem. Look at China and the knife attack that just occurred there in cutting 22 children. The problem is our Culture. We don?t like the output, so the problem is the input.
The fabric of our Society is crumbling before our very eyes. You may not see it, as you know nothing different. Talk to your grandparents who have seen 3-4 generations pass. Look at the sadness in their eyes. They know better.
I say we have a problem when I go to a pre-game meeting in Graf 101 and see 25 teammates sitting down against a wall having their own virtual conversations on their phones! I say we have a problem when you walk across campus and no one looks you in the eye, rather they look at their phone. For some it is their only friend in the world. You know what speaks to my children at home for discipline? Take their phone away.
I worry that young men of your age do not know the difference between a virtual relationship or a virtual experience and reality. In fact, for most young men their video game experience is much more intriguing and interesting than their real life. If left to themselves, why would they not spend more time in a cool virtual environment than a lonely boring real one? You see the movie Wall-E?
The adult male brain is not fully developed for most until around 20 years of age, so why would we fill it with so much adult information so early? There is no question we allow our children to grow up too fast with information they are not developmentally ready for. We have a 21 year age minimum for alcohol consumption for the same reason. We know it is not healthy for you, as you can?t physically process it. My wife has fought the virtual war in our household tooth and nail with our children. She has been made by them to seem outdated, ill informed, uncaring etc? You know what? She has been right on. There is no question in my mind.
Even as an adult, the extent of the trash we fill our minds with is staggering. Why would we willingly fill our minds with poison? Do you really believe you are immune to its affects? I believe you are just as vulnerable as I.
Besides the isolation we have created in our society, and growing our kids up too fast, I believe fathers have flat dropped the ball with their children. Any man that is not actively involved parenting his own children is not a man in my eyes. He is a selfish individual that is leaving his heavy lifting for others to do. Period. Parenting takes two parents; it is way too hard to do the job by yourself. Most likely the kids would have won that virtual world power struggle in our household if there was only one parent there. No parent can meet all of child?s needs by his or herself, and sad fact is too many women are shouldering this heavy burden alone in our country. Where are our men? Every evil young man that committed an act such as this; had a Dad that dropped the ball. These dads were not directly involved shaping their sons? lives, making sure they had the tools the needed to be successful in life. Their selfish decisions, (I don?t care what the reason was, they were not there) lead to other?s lives being lost. We can sugar coat it any way we choose, but that is a fact.
So, politicians are going to point to the band aids, but I want each of you to examine the society you belong to, and find ways to make a difference in those around you. ?To whom much is given, much is expected? that means you and me. Put your phone down a little more, turn off that screen more often, and engage those around you. Create meaningful relationships and give of yourself a little more. Try watching uplifting shows more often, or reading material that is positive and possibly inspiring. When you become a father someday, do not take the easy path of putting job and convenience above what is best for your children. They are your responsibility, and they do not know what is good for them, yet. You are the parent, they are the child. If you can?t make that kind of commitment, then don?t have kids. Get a dog.
You are the future leaders of our society and your generation will shape our country sooner rather than later.
My heart breaks for the families burying their children today. My heart aches for the parents who have presents under a tree for children who will never open those presents. I can?t begin to understand the grief they are experiencing. Tears ran freely down my face when I read of principal Dawn Hochsprung and Mary Sherlack giving their lives in the attempt to prevent the killer from murdering the students in their charge. And then you read about 1st grade teacher Vicki Soto. A young woman who in one terrible moment faced pure evil eye to eye and chose to literally shield her young students from the bullets with her own body, allowing some to escape and live. What heroes those women are to me!
These acts of bravery are what I want to remember.
All of us will be weighed and measured when we are called upon to act in many differing levels of extreme adversity over our lifetimes.
Dr. King said, ?The ultimate measure of man is not where he stands in moment of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of crisis and adversity?.
Phillip Brooks said ?character may be manifested in moments of greatness, but it is made in the small ones.?
I believe they are both right.
Every day, every minute we are building our character. The moments of crisis in our lives will allow others to see the man inside us, but that man is being built every day by the choices we make and how we spend our time and energy, and the input we allow into minds.
?All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.?
It is time for my generation, and the one before me, to step up and start doing something about this. It is time for your generation to take notice of our mistake, and take steps to not repeat it.
Coach Smith"
I understand, I think we've beat this dead horse long enough lol. truce?