Shooting at Florida school as students stage walkout

No matter one's stance of gun control, no one can not admire the kids of #neveragain. Like my generation which took to the streets to end a useless, unjust war in which 50,000+ died, these children will change the course of public policy. (We hope.)

I see the end of the stranglehold the NRA has over national politics. These kids are truly doing the Lord's work.

I see the end of the stranglehold the NRA has over national politics.

No, it’s the people that keep the NRA in power and don’t want the government dictating to them the people don’t have the right to defend themselves as a personal right. The left can’t say anything, they have their own dear to heart organizations that they support. It goes both ways.

These kids are truly doing the Lord's work.

They are engaging in the political process and that’s a good start.

Is it at all possible to make a conviction of discharging of a firearm on school property automatically resulting in the death penalty (where existing) or life imprisonment w/o parole? I tend to think a deterrence of this level may have an effect.

@OssanAmerica, stop and think about what you are saying. The Florida school massacre happened at a school with a JROTC program and shooting range on campus. The shooter was former JROTC and several victims were current JROTC who were already allowed to handle guns with adult supervision. You are going to jump from that level of permissiveness to the death penalty? Sheesh.

OssanAmerica,

The death penalty has never deterred anyone from doing something. Mass killers don’t even consider the death penalty when they start their sprees; indeed some have even killed themselves as in Columbine.

Easy access to weapons of mass destruction - something the Bush administration was against For Other Countries - would decrease the deaths.

In many of these cases including Columbine and Douglas HS, there were adult family or other authority figures who encouraged unstable teens (which could apply to almost all teens) to have weapons. I guess the rationale for not charging them is that they are experiencing their own share of trauma and remorse for the outcome, and that is enough?

Lax gun laws making it legal to sell some types of guns to teens lets a ton of adults skate by without criminal repercussions. Kids are generally not able to manufacture and sell guns. Blame rests on the "adults" who allowed unsafe products into the market.

Who exactly is committing these mass school shootings? And why? Violence is behavioral, what do we know about the motivation behind it? A number of studies have been conducted on school shootings and school shooters. In interviews with actual school shooters, researchers have found that these acts are rarely spur of the moment events but involve a progression from ideation, planning and eventual execution. Something is motivating these young people to take this path. In a study conducted by the US Secret Service it was found that 2/3s of school shooters reported that they were the target of bullying by their fellow students and that had a significant influence on their subsequent behavior. Contrary to a popular opinion people just don't look at a gun and start killing. They want to kill in the first place and the gun is the means to their end. Violent behavior is rampant in American schools with assaults, robberies and bullying behavior actually on the rise. If you want to reduce school gun violence the best place to start is with addressing school violence, both physical and emotional, in general.

It's easy to blame the laws, lawmakers, gun owners and the NRA. It's not so easy to take a good long look at the real issues behind the problem. The bottom line is, guns or not, as long as the cultural and societal stressors that lead to this type of deviant behavior are not addressed it will continue. Reduce the motivation behind it and a reduction in school violence will naturally ensue.

It's easy to blame the laws, lawmakers, gun owners and the NRA. It's not so easy to take a good long look at the real issues behind the problem.

Both should be done. There are obviously underlying issues behind these shootings, but the shootings are also happening as a result of laws the NRA pushes, and the current relaxed set of laws on guns. To think it's only one or the other is illogical, and both fronts should be dealt with if the issue is to be fixed.

The NRA instead of pushing for stricter more control actually pushes for no controls.

I listened to a podcast with a well-spoken pro-gun NRA member the other day. What the guy said sounded like it all made sense (as I said, he was well spoken), but all of his logic was based off the belief that members of the populace have the inherent right to own any weapon that the government is allowed to own. If you don't ascribe to that one belief, then none of what he said held up to any push back, since it was all prefaced on accepting his belief for absolute truth.

If you are of the opinion that gun ownership is a privilege, rather than an absolute right, then the logic held by NRA members does not work, since those of us who ascribe to the idea of privilege rather than right see obvious reasons for limiting ownership of guns to some degree.

This is why the NRA fights back - they truly believe anyone has the right to own anything, and any limitations to this 'right' are an affront to one's so-called inherent rights.

Unfortunately that makes it really difficult to find any middle ground, since the NRA are essentially extremists with no willingness to budge an inch from their beliefs. Extremists don't negotiate.

Kuya 808Today  01:25 pm JST

Contrary to a popular opinion people just don't look at a gun and start killing. 

Nobody believes this to be the case. You are posting an empty strawman argument.

They want to kill in the first place and the gun is the means to their end. 

Right. And in every other country in the world, sensible gun regulations ensure that they don't get access to that means to their end. And as a result, innocent young people suffer far less violence.

This isn't rocket science. Reasonable gun laws solve the problem. America needs to quit hiding from the problem.

if you use protection, you can't get a STD. if you don't have guns you can't kill people.

Getting out to vote will do little to nothing. Both democrats and republicans support either unlimited gun rights or very loosely moderated. If students walk out to Canada as student refugees in fear of their lives, and Canada accepting them and their families, then maybe it would get congress to maybe make a statement along the lines of "it can't be helped", "but but gun rights", etc.

bass4funk: "No, it’s the people that keep the NRA in power"

Only gun-nutters, not ALL people, and also vested interests. The funny part is that when the people who keep the NRA in power hold meetings at the highest levels, they won't allow guns in order to avoid incidents. Go figure!

Gun reform is the only thing that is going to change anything unfortunately its just not going to happen the NRA have most of the politicians in their pockets including Trump...

Most Republicans......and a few Democrats.

Only gun-nutters, not ALL people, and also vested interests. The funny part is that when the people who keep the NRA in power hold meetings at the highest levels, they won't allow guns in order to avoid incidents. Go figure!

Ok, so what’s point. PP doesn’t allow women to have abortions in their meetings right? Dwell on that of a moment.

1) REPEAL the 2nd Amendment; 2) FORCIBLY REMOVE the guns from US society. The US no longer has militias.

I wonder what these young kids will think about the right to bear arms, in 10, 20 or 30 years time ?

Perhaps some will become the next generation of Politicians and recall how they felt about the Gun issue back when they were young, and then decide to do something about it.... or perhaps this is a passing fade, just like other movements of the past, and everything will revert to "normal" later on...

Ok, so what’s point. PP doesn’t allow women to have abortions in their meetings right? Dwell on that of a moment.

Wow... I tried dwelling on it. I don't know whether they allow it or not but maybe... just maybe... it's about the health, safety, and well-being of the woman as well as the medical preparation of the facilities where the meeting is being held. It's certainly not about the security of people attending the meeting. Completely irrelevant comparison anyway.