Pratt: what media won’t tell you about the new zealand massacre

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RuthAnne said:
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niceatheist:
Good grief. The paranoia continues, and apparently the only solution is that every man, woman and child pack heat.
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It’s not the only solution but it’s a pretty good one.
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It is bad because it wouldn’t reduce gun deaths at all, and would likely increase them just from accidents alone. But I am interested in what “other” solutions you say must exist.
 
Remember Leaf to take ALL the risk-benefit ratio into consideration.

(I’m not suggesting arming EVERY man, woman, and child by the way.)
 
I wouldn’t know about every man, woman, and child.
I do, as is my right. I have the right to “pack” up to three, concealed.
'Nuff said.
 
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Cathoholic said:
Remember Leaf to take ALL the risk-benefit ratio into consideration.

(I’m not suggesting arming EVERY man, woman, and child by the way.)
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What the the magic number, then? What percentage of arming would be high enough to reduce gun deaths from “bad guys”, but low enough not to increase gun deaths from accidents, etc?
 
We’re talking New Zealand not the US…it’s pretty obvious they don’t take the same line as many here in the US…why not just pray for them and wish them well with their decision…
 
How could you get enough people to carry weapons everywhere they go to do any good in stopping gun deaths? You would have to get them to carry them everywhere they go. But even if everyone owned a gun and could carry it, how many actually would do it? It is a bother most of them time to carry a gun. Actual professional armed guards are required to have their weapon with them and ready for use. Plus they get paid to do that. I doubt if the average gun owner would take his duty to the community as “volunteer protector” seriously enough. The result is you get an incident where a “bad guy” is about to kill, and where are the volunteer protectors? There may be some people standing around, but how many will have their gun with them and ready for use? I know it has happened on rare occasions where a good guy with a gun just happened to be standing around and did in fact stop the bad guy before he could do any more harm. But many more occasions do not have such intervention. And it is not because of restrictive gun laws. Even in areas with gun laws that allow concealed carry with not much bother, there are still not enough good guys standing around ready to help. Even if all the gun laws in the US were totally abolished, I still don’t think you would get enough people to voluntarily carry their gun (for no pay) and stop bad guys. You would have to start requiring that some people carry their guns (again for no pay) in order to make any difference in stopping gun deaths. That would present its own set of problems, and I think gun owners would rebel at such a measure. “How dare they tell me I have to carry a gun to do the job that the police are being paid to do? I want to get paid too!” So then we would have to start subsidizing gun owners to get them to carry in sufficient numbers to be out there stopping bad guys. And long before that happens, the accident rate from having all those guns around at home will cause more deaths (especially due to suicide, which is the biggest source of gun deaths) than would possible be saved by “stopping bad guys.” Then there is training. Professional law enforcement people get training in how to use a weapon in a crowded environment that goes way beyond what the usual gun owner gets, which is slim to none. So if we ever achieved a sufficient saturation of the public spaces with gun-carrying “protectors” (who are not professionally trained) you are likely to get a lot of mistaken uses of their weapons. Something “looked like” a hold-up in progress, or a guy about to start shooting people in a public place, when in fact the hold-up was just two people arguing and waving their cellphones, and the mass shooter was actually a photographer for the local newspaper holding a camera with a long lens that looked like a gun to the untrained “protector.”

I think if anyone has not thought through the risk-benefit ratio in relying on random good guys with guns to stop bad guys it is the gun proponents. I think the whole issue of their benefit to public as volunteer protectors is just a smokescreen to cover the real motive, which is just to secure their right to do what they want.
 
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LeafByNiggle . . .
I think the whole issue of their benefit to public as volunteer protectors is just a smokescreen . . . to secure their right to do what they want.
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I disagree.
 
The magic number is to leave it up to individuals to purchase however many firearms they feel like and stop trying to limit their ability to do so because you personally feel queasy about it.
 
I know one thing. If a shooter comes amongst a crowd and I’m there, the snowflakes will be pointing their cameras and I’ll be pointing my gun. Which do you think will have a better chance of stopping the shooter?
 
Peebo . . . .
why not just pray for them and wish them well with their decision…
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Because lives are being attacked and lost and Catholic Christians don’t sit by silently even in prayer.

Catholics are called to pray to be sure.

But we are called to do MORE than pray in situations where LIFE itself is under attack.

Just prayer and well-wishing is NOT a Catholic response.
JAMES 2:15-16 15 If a brother or sister is ill-clad and in lack of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what does it profit?
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PRINCIPLE of JAMES 2:15-16 15 If a brother or sister is attacked, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the defense of the body, what does it profit?
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VATICAN II a…true apostle looks for opportunities to announce Christ by words addressed either to non-believers with a view to leading them to faith, or to the faithful with a view to instructing, strengthening, and encouraging them to a more fervent life. “For the charity of Christ impels us” (2 Cor. 5:14). The words of the Apostle should echo in all hearts, “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel” (1 Cor. 9:16).(1)

Since, in our own times, new problems are arising and very serious errors are circulating which tend to undermine the foundations of religion, the moral order, and human society itself, this sacred synod earnestly exhorts laymen-each according to his own gifts of intelligence and learning-to be more diligent in doing what they can to explain, defend, and properly apply Christian principles to the problems of our era in accordance with the mind of the Church.

7 God’s plan for the world is that men should work together to renew and constantly perfect the temporal order.

All those things which make up the temporal order, namely, the good things of life and the prosperity of the family, culture, economic matters, the arts and professions, the laws of the political community, international relations, and other matters of this kind, as well as their development and progress, not only aid in the attainment of man’s ultimate goal but also possess their own intrinsic value. This value has been established in them by God, whether they are considered in themselves or as parts of the whole temporal order. . . .

. . . Everywhere and in all things they must seek the justice of God’s kingdom. The temporal order must be renewed in such a way that, without detriment to its own proper laws, it may be brought into conformity with the higher principles of the Christian life and adapted to the shifting circumstances of time, place, and peoples. Preeminent among the works of this type of apostolate is that of Christian social action which the sacred synod desires to see extended to the whole temporal sphere, including culture.(2)
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Apostolicam Actuositatem (excerpts from sections 6 and 7)

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CCC 2834a "Pray and work."121 "Pray as if everything depended on God and work as if everything depended on you."122
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FirstFiveEighth said:
The magic number is to leave it up to individuals to purchase however many firearms they feel like and stop trying to limit their ability to do so because you personally feel queasy about it.
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If you read my response then you that my reason has nothing to do with feeling queasy. It is a response to the claim that having citizens carry guns is a good way to stop gun deaths. I gave reasons why this is not so. Leaving the decision up to the individual gun owners may satisfy the gun owners’ desire to be left to do whatever they want, but it does nothing to reduce gun deaths, which is what I was addressing.

Now can can argue that limiting gun ownership also will not reduce gun deaths, but that is a separate argument.
RuthAnne said:
I know one thing. If a shooter comes amongst a crowd and I’m there, the snowflakes will be pointing their cameras and I’ll be pointing my gun. Which do you think will have a better chance of stopping the shooter?
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The way you framed the question of course leads to only one answer. Your gun will have a better chance of stopping a shooter than anyone’s camera. But is that the proper question to ask?

Are you promising to be on hand at every public gathering, ready to point your gun? No? Then what about the public events where you are not present? Who is going to stop those shooters? Some other “volunteer protector”? Are you sure? The issue of limiting gun deaths in the population quickly becomes more complicated that the simple question you framed of one single hypothetical incident.
 
RuthAnne said:
I know one thing. If a shooter comes amongst a crowd and I’m there, the snowflakes will be pointing their cameras and I’ll be pointing my gun. Which do you think will have a better chance of stopping the shooter?
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Well RuthAnne, that might be a toss up.

When the real crime stoppers arrive will they be able to ask you (while the shooting is taking place) if your the protector or the perpetrator?

Maybe they’ll shoot first and ask questions later.

The truth of the matter is RuthAnne, is that the most trained individuals can be killed in the line of duty. And since we don’t live in Afghanistan where we would anticipate wild madman with an unusually high access to guns shooting up public areas where children are, and……… Oh wait, that’s our country. Lost my line of thought there.
 
LeafByNiggle . . .
How can you be sure some such person will be on hand?
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I can’t speak for RuthAnne, but this same uncertainty (“Is there a good guy with a gun among these people?”) also looms for bad guys and will help be a deterrent against some of them.
 
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DENNYINMI said:
When the real crime stoppers arrive will they be able to ask you (while the shooting is taking place) if your the protector or the perpetrator?

Maybe they’ll shoot first and ask questions later.
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The “real crime stoppers”? You mean the citizens on the scene who stop the shooter before he shoots a bunch of people or the guys with badges who show up 3 minutes after the carnage is over?

You make it sound like the shoot first and ask questions later is a problem. Do you really think that those of us who carry don’t talk about this all the time? We know the risks. It’s not a problem for us. Is it a problem for you?
 
LeafByNiggle said:
How can you be sure some such person will be on hand?
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I can’t. We do our best.

I live in an area where it seems like everyone is armed. My husband is a white collar professional and he doesn’t know anyone at his office of 70 people who isn’t armed. In their desks, backpacks and cars are gun ready to aim and fire. He has an incredible sense of safety there. The only violence he has ever seen in the years he has been there was when there was a rare armed car jacking that took place right in his parking lot and it was quickly ended by an employee who was ready for it. The cops showed up about four minutes later.
 
RuthAnne . . .
You make it sound like the shoot first and ask questions later is a problem. Do you really think that those of us who carry don’t talk about this all the time? We know the risks. It’s not a problem for us. Is it a problem for you?
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Yes.

The “Conceal and Carry” community for the most part take their responsibilities very seriously.

They tend to be great citizens.
 
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