Summations Only

There is that.

Absolutely ! Though we do need to make sure that it's more guns in the hands of the righteous - because we've all seen the films - a single righteous man (or really hot, martial arts kind of woman) can kill any number of really bad guys, without getting killed (or even badly wounded) him or herself, and without killing even a single righteous person themselves, by accident.And you can't tell me them films aren't realistic !

US toddler kills himself with mother's gun - BBC NewsAnother sacrifice on the altar.And I notice the prosecutors are racing to say they're considering prosecution. Because never let it be thought that there could be any collective responsibility for these tragedies - it's all the fault of other people.SighEdited by vimesey, : No reason given.

True - damned pinko BBC :-)

You're ignoring the dynamic which is sad.Americans, as a group, have a collective love affair with guns. That guns are unnecessary for a safe, free and (broadly) happy society is patently true, as a result of any number of such societies in Europe and Australia, where private gun ownership is severely restricted. It's that collective love affair which is the only real reason for such widespread gun ownership.Tragic deaths like this and thousands of others are utterly inevitable with so many guns around, and us humans being the imperfect people we are. Sure, you can point the finger at "negligent" parents, but only if you yourself are utterly perfect, and never make any mistakes.As a result, innocent lives have to be sacrificed, as the price for people's collective love affair. Everyone who loves their guns, should be saying to themselves every morning: "Today, (and ignoring every other avoidable death) two children will die in gun accidents. To their parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, family and friends I say: your sacrifice is worth it, because it preserves my right to my guns."

Erm, you are aware that I'm talking about guns in the hands of civilians, yes ? And that it was the American army which came across and joined in the wars. (Along with our, properly armed army). This seems odd to have to say, but I think it's appropriate that a modern democracy's armed forces should be, you know, armed.

I have no idea what odd rabbit hole we've jumped down here - but it was the British armed forces (alongside the American, Canadian, Australian and a number of others) which fought the German army - not British civilians. The civilians weren't armed (outside of an official Home Guard, which was an adjunct to the army).

You are aware this is a debating site, right ?

The bogeyman isn't invented. The high levels of gun ownership are there. The passion for guns is evidenced in the NRA's every pronouncement. It's a passion which can't face questioning its cost. Innocent lives are being lost, regularly, to guns. They wouldn't be if gun ownership were controlled to the same degree as in other western democracies. Those lives are the price of gun ownership. There is no fantasy.And every equivalency you put up is a false equivalency. Not one belt, car or bottle of booze is designed to kill someone. A gun has no other purpose.

I've never met a power mad dictator, hell bent on world domination, but I'm willing to bet you a goodly number of beers that no dictator has ever, or will ever, think "I will smash the world's most powerful army - I will shoot every one of their warplanes from the sky - I will sink their pretty battleships and aircraft carriers - and I will laugh in the face of the world's greatest nuclear arsenal !!! Mwaah hah hah !!! Hold on...what's that Igor ? You say they all carry pistols too ??? Noooooooo !!!!!"(oh, and by the time anyone ever got anywhere near actually invading you, you'd have plenty of time to arm yourselves to the teeth if you fancied it. So hand 'em in till then. Job's a good'un.)

So when I post, saying "It's a passion which can't face questioning its cost", you reply "Your arguments are so silly they don't even deserve the attention required to address them." You're illustrating my point for me.

And have such regret suggest that owning a gun might conceivably be a contributory factor in the deaths ? Heaven forefend !My guess is that he'll be drilled to say that he regrets not realising that his son is a murderous, racist lunatic. The ownership of the gun, naturally, being an utterly irrelevant factor....

You're not doing the math.For your scenario to work, EVERY Bible Study group in the country would have to have someone carrying a gun, because you don't know which Bible Study group the next little shit will target.The evidence that people here have been pointing to shows that, over time, the number of deaths from accidental shootings, misunderstandings and the like, when multiplied by the meetings of every single Bible Study group in the country, over the period of time it has taken for there to be any fatal attack on a Bible Study group, will very likely indeed lead to a number of deaths significantly in excess of the 9 recently murdered in SC.(And this is quite apart from the fact that untrained gun owners don't actually often get off even one shot, when confronted by a genuine crisis - but let's leave that to one side).The point is that whilst it seems to make sense that you can save lives in one instance by increasing the amount of guns in the situation, when you multiply out that increase across the country, you actually get the opposite effect, and have more people die accidentally than you would save in any isolated case.

Actually, a good counterpoint to paranoid fantasies of Red Dawn style success would be the example of Greek resistance during WW2. Greek households weren't without a gun or two when the Germans invaded, but those guns did nothing to prevent the occupation of the Country by the Germans - and did nothing of any real effect to kick them out - allied armies' operations in Europe did that.This isn't to denigrate the contribution of the Greek resistance - they were a constant thorn in the side of the Wehrmacht. But Greek people died in large numbers as a result of resistance operations (Brutal Occupation 101 (the perfunctory execution of multiple civilians for each soldier killed) being widely practiced).Fundamentally, armed citizens don't prevent invasions, and don't kick armed forces out. Well trained armies do. Red Dawn is a daft fantasy, which too many paranoid wingnuts buy into.

Again, you're not doing all the math. Yes, we agree - there is a greater than zero chance that a weapon in the congregation could save lives if a little shit decides to attack the congregation. That is one half of the equation.The other half of the equation is that there is a greater than zero chance that a concealed weapon in a congregation will accidentally (or as a result of a brief temper flare over someone being interrupted or something) kill a member of the congregation.The data shows us that the second half of the equation results in more deaths.Do you still prefer the feeling that it would be nice to bring guns into every church meeting, even though the evidence shows that more lives are lost to gun accidents, than are saved in defence of an environment ?