Last Friday, a school shooting occurred at Marysville-Pilchuck High School in which an alleged armed student, shot 5 of his "friends"and himself. Ultimately killing one of the students and also killing himself. The gunman, Jaylen Fryberg, the Homecoming Prince and a freshman on the football team was described by his fellow peers as popular and as having a lot of friends.
The 5 students he shot had serious head injuries, and were either in serious or critical condition. One of the victims Gia Soriano, seems to be in very poor condition. According to more than 100 eye witnesses, the shooting occurred near the cafeteria and as soon as the first shot was fired many of the students began pushing through the doors in a desperate attempt to escape the assailant. Those who he shot were confrimed as friends of Fryberg.
According to friends of Fryberg, he had been bullied in his science class for being "Native" (reference to Frybergs race), and one of Fryberg's class mates had said on the Thursday before the shooting, that Fryberg "seemed mad, had his head down the whole time, [and] didn't really talk". In fact, in the months leading up to the shooting Fryberg had posted dark, ominous messages on his Twitter account foreshadowing the incident.
Police confirmed that the ".40 caliber handgun" had been legally acquired and refused to give further information. The way in which Fryberg obtained the handgun and concealed the weapon is still up for speculation.
For America, gun control has been a hotly debated subject over the past couple years and has gained a spot on the Democratic party's agenda. Even though the weapon was legally acquired I would say that it obviously wasn't well looked after and that this situation could have been avoided Fryberg's parents had kept better track of the weapon and their son's well-being. However, the real question is: How many more school shootings is it going to take for people to relinquish their right to bear arms?
Do you think that this will just be looked at as another school shooting or could this be a catalyst for gun reform?
Why do you think that the Republican platform is adverse to reforming gun laws and amending the constitution to accommodate for said gun laws? Is it the right to protect one's property, or is it something deeper?
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5 comments:
Gun control hasn't recently "gained a spot on the Democratic party's agenda". It's been there for a while. In fact, Democrats invented the term "assault weapon" just because they were looking to take away our rights.
Statistically, five people out of 330 million is absolutely insignificant. Really, the fact that these kids died doesn't matter at all. It's not about "How many more school shootings is it going to take for people to relinquish their right to bear arms?", rather the real question is "How many time are democrats going to need to use dead kids to push their agenda to take away our rights?".
Nothing will happen to firearm rights because of this shooting. If the media wasn't able to spin Sandy Hook enough to take away our rights, I doubt they'll be able to this time.
It is debatable whether the Republican party actually cares about civil liberties. However, rural folk tend to favor firearm rights, and are consistently republican. The republican platform involves maintaining gun rights because the people who support the party support gun rights.
Protecting ones property/family/life is part of it. However, firearms give a citizen much more power than that. Realistically, all government power is derived from the governments large amount of men with guns which our government can use to shoot the people it doesn't like. The ultimate power of the firearm is political power. The American citizen's ability to own a militia serviceable firearm ultimately gives them the power to resist a tyrannical government, which is the most important part of the right to own a gun. In other words, firearm ownership means true self determination for the citizens of a nation.
Talk all you like about taking away guns, banning them, etc. Anything requiring 3/4 of the states probably won't happen. Any confiscation would result in civil war, that's just the mindset of the modern gun owner. You "progressives" won't be able to tell us how to live our lives. In the end, liberty shall prevail.
The shooting in Washington was horrific and should have never happened. Gun control will always be a dominant issue in America and there is no easy solution. On one hand our country was founded on guns because private citizens were able to use their personal guns to fight during the revolution, which is why the right to bear arms is in our Constitution. However, society has changed and as the population increases, so does the number of unstable people. Unfortunately, it only takes one unstable person with a gun to kill several innocent people. I don’t know if there is a definitive answer to this. There needs to be greater gun education (promoting responsible gun ownership), gun restrictions, and mental health evaluations. However, this might still not be enough to stop these shooting atrocities.
Nick I find it hard to see where you're coming from when you say that the deaths of innocent people are "absolutely insignificant". You're right there are 330 million people living in the USA, but I would argue that every person is significant to someone. They had families, they had friends, they have people who love them.
And in regards to you comment on the "democrats" (capital D next time), I don't believe Democrats use these kinds of events to push agenda, the absolute horror of these events does that for them. Democrats don't need to point out the deaths and the nature of the crime for people to see why gun control needs reform. I would argue Republicans use the same tactics you described. For example, Republicans refer to the Bible to push their anti-gay agenda and take away the rights of gay citizens who aren't even Christian. Seems a little ridiculous to me.
Once again the media didn't have to spin Sandy Hook. 20 Kindergartners were brutally murdered along with 6 adults who tried to save them from an armed attacker. Does that pull on any heart strings, or were those deaths insignificant as well?
The way you spin gun control, a gun seems to symbolize freedom, and liberty. But I'm sorry, I don't want to live in a country where a gun=power. For me, freedom and liberty are symbolized by the ballot and I like to think of myself as somewhat civilized in that regard. You say that the ultimate power of the firearm is political power but since 1789, if I remember correctly, the candidate with the most votes in the electorate was sworn in, not the candidate with the most guns.
Yes an armed coup d'etat may be rational in a country such as Somalia, but here in America, I'd like to think the majority of the citizenry are able to use the pen and paper to achieve change. I don't see a tyrannical government forming in the near future so why keep archaic amendments lying around in the constitution? So that we can watch events like Sandy Hook and Columbine pass by and label them "absolutely insignificant"?
No thank you.
The main problem with the gun rights debate is that both sides misinterpret the other side. As we learned in class, most people support background checks for gun ownership, which means that most people actually favor stricter gun control. A lot of pro-gun supporters hear "gun control" and assume that people are going to take their guns away permanently, but this isn't true at all.
Personally I see the benefits and reasons for owning a gun, namely self-defense and immediate protection when the police aren't around. However I am also a strict supporter of tougher gun control because I believe that only mentally sound people should be able to buy guns and that there should also be tough restrictions on owning a safe place for locking them up in your home. I think policy like this is the most sensible way to prevent violence and unnecessary deaths.
Unfortunately, when this type of legislation is proposed, it seems like an alarm goes off in the head's of gun enthusiasts as if small steps to a better system were a slippery slope to confiscation.
@John Graham
Sure, they were loved by others. However, that doesn't change the fact that their deaths mean nothing in a nation of 330 million which is also in a world of over seven billion people. There are very few people whose deaths would actually mean something to the world, and these five are not part of that group. I maintain that these deaths are absolutely insignificant.
Both parties use things to push their agendas. For the Republicans, sure, religion is the thing. Whether or nor you believe Democrats use shootings like this to push their agenda doesn't really matter. If you failed to notice the slew of anti-gun propaganda from Democrats following Sandy Hook, that's on you.
The media absolutely spun Sandy Hook. The use of specific, incorrect, loaded terms to incite fear in the uninformed (assault rifle, "high capacity" magazine, assault weapon, etc)and focus on the Armalite-15 wasn't unintentional. Sandy Hook failed to pull on any of my heart strings, 26 murders of such low level people is insignificant. Did anything important change because they died? No?
Wow, what a big deal. /sarcasm
It's not about living in just a country where guns=power. It's how the world has always worked. The strong rule over the weak. You cannot hold political power without the deadly power to back it up. If not for the men and guns which the newly formed federal government had, the whiskey rebellion would have been able to do severe damage to the newly formed United States. You live in a world where weapons=power. Governments have always needed armed men to force citizens, subjects, and foreigners alike to submit to their demands. It isn't any different today.
Candidates may have been chosen by ballots, but they were backed by guns. Without the ability to force others to submit, nobody would listen to any government. Likewise, there is no reason for a government to listen to those which it governs if the governed are unable to put up resistance.
Democracy isn't any more civilized than autocracy, we've just grown up drinking the water of democracy. Both systems have their own merits and problems.
I'll try to draw a comparison for you to help explain the importance of an armed citizenry. Say you've never had a house fire. You don't expect to ever see one, and as such have gotten rid of all of your fire extinguishers. After all, because of where your house is, a fire would be unthinkable. It can't happen here! What do you do when a fire does eventually start, and spreads because you can't put it out? You watch your house burn if you were lucky enough to not burn alive yourself.
Even if we combine those two unfortunate events, that's just forty-one people. 41. That's roughly 0.000012 percent of the US population. If one of these shootings was to happen literally every day of the year, that would only be about 0.00438 percent of the US population in one year, which still doesn't amount to much. It will take a much larger portion of the population than that to be effected for me to think that an action which effects the entire population is even worth considering.
@Murray
I think the problem that we encounter with small steps like background checks and requiring guns to be locked up in the home is that small changes tend to be attached to larger ones. If a bill was to be introduced which only focused on background checks or having a safe way to store guns, it would probably be pretty easy to get it supported and signed into law. But because small changes like these are tacked onto bills which aim to change much more, the issue becomes polarized and nothing gets passed.
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