Well, we’re on to page 5! Let’s not lose sight of the original topic, which was of course a school shooting.
I know that more people are killed on the roads than by guns. That’s certainly true here, and I guess it’s true in the US. I read from an unconfirmed source that “Road fatalities in the US have fallen from 52,600 in 1970 to 41,600 in 1999.” Here it went from ~5000 to ~3000 after the introduction of the seat belt law in 1983.
Most people will be fortunate enough never to be injured on the roads, and most people do what they can to avoid it. I had to – oops – I chose to drive to the Malvern hills to go walking on Wednesday – getting in shape for that Ben Nevis hike! I drove more than 200 miles that day, and did not (IMO) endanger myself or anyone else. I could not have got to Malvern and back in the time available if using trains, what with having to walk from the railway station to the beginning of the footpath in addition to the planned hike. So I used my car, and accepted the risk. I’ve never been injured IN a car, so I assess the risk of being injured or killed to be quite small.
However, I would have no problem believing that 50 people had died on our roads that day. But think of the hundreds of millions of vehicle miles being driven on that day, by people in the course of their daily lives and by people functioning in our economy.
But then consider the nutjob gun shootings in the US – two this month at least. The one that is the subject of this thread, and the one outside that Church in Wisconsin. 23 school shootings in the 2003/04 academic year. What these tell us is that every time a nutjob gets his hands on a gun, a lot of people end up dead, and usually the gunman himself.
That’s why I mourn the loss of life on our roads, but try to do my part to minimise it. Seat belts, air bags, better tyres than existed 30 years ago, mandatory wearing of helmets for motorcyclists since 1976, driver awareness and crumple zones in cars are all features that have helped us to cut our death toll on the roads by about half in the last 25 years. We do what we can.
But the fact remains that we cannot function without road transport – we saw what happened when the pumps ran dry in the 2000 fuel blockade. People had no way to get to work/school etc.
But why does an irrational 16 year old kid need to have access to a gun? He doesn’t, and he shouldn’t. And when he or anyone like him does get hold of a gun, in almost every case it’s because he has the sole intention of killing someone – either one person with whom he has a gripe, or as many people as possible, saving the last bullet for himself. These deaths are avoidable and completely unnecessary. These events tell us that not enough is being done to keep guns out of the hands of nutjobs. And that, I believe, is why the “antis” are so alarmed about the number of guns in circulation. Because in their view, the law abiding gun owning public cannot be trusted to take sufficient precautions to secure their weapons from the hands of nutjobs, when not in use. You may agree or disagree, but the facts speak for themselves.
