CDZ Why aren't we addressing the gun issue as a cultural problem?

[DOTR]

Yes.....and you're God...impervious to taking positions.
We both know that's rubbish.

And here we go, for the ten thousandth time. My positions on the issues are here for all to see: 2. >>> For the liars who pretend I claim to be a centrist/moderate/impartial/unbiased/fence-sitter: Come on Jake, man up, just this once.

Why do you folks insist on making everything about me?

Maybe just throw your two cents in about guns and culture. Maybe that would be a good idea. That's what the thread is about.
.

Sorry if it bothers you, but trying act like you don't take positions....then taking leftist positions in your threads just doesn't fly anymore.

I just provided a link to my positions. I take positions all the time, taking heat from both ends.

Then you again say I try to act like I don't take positions.

I honestly don't get it. Alternate universe stuff. I don't know what to tell you. Please stick to the thread.
.

Do you have a problem with English?
I said you act like you don't take positions but take them in your threads.....and they're usually left or far left.

It's getting real boring there, Mud. I don't know why Mac doesn't just ignore you, but really. Contribute to the thread or leave it.

You just can’t resist slinging orders can you?

 

[OldLady]

And here we go, for the ten thousandth time. My positions on the issues are here for all to see: 2. >>> For the liars who pretend I claim to be a centrist/moderate/impartial/unbiased/fence-sitter: Come on Jake, man up, just this once.

Why do you folks insist on making everything about me?

Maybe just throw your two cents in about guns and culture. Maybe that would be a good idea. That's what the thread is about.
.

Sorry if it bothers you, but trying act like you don't take positions....then taking leftist positions in your threads just doesn't fly anymore.

I just provided a link to my positions. I take positions all the time, taking heat from both ends.

Then you again say I try to act like I don't take positions.

I honestly don't get it. Alternate universe stuff. I don't know what to tell you. Please stick to the thread.
.

Do you have a problem with English?
I said you act like you don't take positions but take them in your threads.....and they're usually left or far left.

It's getting real boring there, Mud. I don't know why Mac doesn't just ignore you, but really. Contribute to the thread or leave it.

You just can’t resist slinging orders can you?

You just can't resist personal attacks, can you? You gonna play like Mud and do nothing but needle posters? That's not how its played in the CDZ; not normally anyway, depending on what mod is here.

 

[P F Tinmore]

Ban semi automatic guns, buy back the assault weapons owned already or back ground check and licence them.

Close the gun show loop hole

I was looking through some catalogues for assault weapons and couldn't find any.

Just sayin'.

 

[M14 Shooter]

I think MOST of our problems are cultural, directly or indirectly. This is another example. But we're tying our own hands.
.

Addressing the culture addresses the problem.
Democrats use the symptoms of the problem - gun violence- as a means to push their anti-gun agenda.
Thus, Democrats have no desire to address the problem.

 

[M14 Shooter]

We are skipping over a big part of the answer: Define what a person's liberties are. In no society should it be so easy to kill one another. That should not be a part of a person's "liberties."

When you need to kill someone in the exercise of your right to self-defense, why should it be hard to do so?

 

[mudwhistle]

Sorry if it bothers you, but trying act like you don't take positions....then taking leftist positions in your threads just doesn't fly anymore.

I just provided a link to my positions. I take positions all the time, taking heat from both ends.

Then you again say I try to act like I don't take positions.

I honestly don't get it. Alternate universe stuff. I don't know what to tell you. Please stick to the thread.
.

Do you have a problem with English?
I said you act like you don't take positions but take them in your threads.....and they're usually left or far left.

It's getting real boring there, Mud. I don't know why Mac doesn't just ignore you, but really. Contribute to the thread or leave it.

You just can’t resist slinging orders can you?

You just can't resist personal attacks, can you? You gonna play like Mud and do nothing but needle posters? That's not how its played in the CDZ; not normally anyway, depending on what mod is here.

Maybe if you went back and read his response to my first post on this thread you would probably realize that telling me this is a bit premature and unfounded.
He started this thread.
I gave him clear and concise input.
He discounted it without reading most of it.

 

[sartre play]

2 Much PC, not enough treating each other with respect. why do we fall for this divisive BS we use against each other.

 

[Mac1958]

2 Much PC, not enough treating each other with respect. why do we fall for this divisive BS we use against each other.

I think that's cultural too, by the way. We normalize counter-productive behaviors and they become part of our reflexive behaviors.

There are people who truly don't see any decay in our culture over the last few generations. Point out glaring examples, particularly in popular culture, and it just doesn't register. I don't know how it doesn't, but it doesn't.

Okay, we're all different!
.

 

[2aguy]

I don't have a simple legislative answer for the gun problem. There are already ten kazillion guns out there, and they're easily accessible by any maniac. So legislating along the fringes can only do so much. Can we do some legislating here and there? Sure, let's look at EVERYTHING. But legislation's efficacy will be limited and long term only.

Obviously, our poisoned political environment is going to slow down (or worse) anything major that we try to do. That appears to be the goal, for some reason. But is it possible for us all to look at this as a cultural issue? WHY is life so cheap now? HOW do people become so radicalized? WHAT pushes a damaged person over that last edge of sanity and turns them into a monster? WHEN can we step in without harming a person's liberties?

And perhaps most importantly, how can we COMMUNICATE, COLLABORATE and INNOVATE in this toxic political environment, to SAVE LIVES? Certainly we have to look at entertainment. Certainly we have to look at partisan politics from a macro perspective. Certainly we have to look at the internet. There are some things we all can consider. No?

I think MOST of our problems are cultural, directly or indirectly. This is another example. But we're tying our own hands.
.

If you want to actually attack the core problem? Young males raised without adult fathers..... young females having multiple children from multiple men......without a husband and father in the home.

Then there was Andrew Klavan...he pointed out that what you see with all of these shooters.....absent parents.......they are allowed to lose themselves in the obsession without any interference by the parent.....

That is the issue. Fix fatherless homes and you dry up 90% of these issues.

 

[2aguy]

When I was a kid, there were guns all over the place. Eight year old boys got a 22 for their birthday. Family picnics found us out back shooting holes in targets.
We weren't shooting each other so it isn't the guns. It is something else. Let's look for that something else.

Bingo, exactly. Somewhere along the line, life became cheap.
.

The 1960s and the Great Society....you can mark that as the beginning.....that is when our welfare state began to destroy families...

Now the there are some who don't understand this has nothing uniquely American about it......Europe had World War 2 put their cultural development on hold for decades after the war....that is why you are just now seeing the rise of violence at extreme levels in Britain and Europe.....add to that the importing of violent 3rd world males who do not value Western culture or norms.....

But our problem began in the 1960s with the Great Society, when welfare enabled girls to have children without fathers....and the children raised in this way have slowly turned their children and grandchildren into sociopaths.

 

[Mac1958]

I don't have a simple legislative answer for the gun problem. There are already ten kazillion guns out there, and they're easily accessible by any maniac. So legislating along the fringes can only do so much. Can we do some legislating here and there? Sure, let's look at EVERYTHING. But legislation's efficacy will be limited and long term only.

Obviously, our poisoned political environment is going to slow down (or worse) anything major that we try to do. That appears to be the goal, for some reason. But is it possible for us all to look at this as a cultural issue? WHY is life so cheap now? HOW do people become so radicalized? WHAT pushes a damaged person over that last edge of sanity and turns them into a monster? WHEN can we step in without harming a person's liberties?

And perhaps most importantly, how can we COMMUNICATE, COLLABORATE and INNOVATE in this toxic political environment, to SAVE LIVES? Certainly we have to look at entertainment. Certainly we have to look at partisan politics from a macro perspective. Certainly we have to look at the internet. There are some things we all can consider. No?

I think MOST of our problems are cultural, directly or indirectly. This is another example. But we're tying our own hands.
.

If you want to actually attack the core problem? Young males raised without adult fathers..... young females having multiple children from multiple men......without a husband and father in the home.

Then there was Andrew Klavan...he pointed out that what you see with all of these shooters.....absent parents.......they are allowed to lose themselves in the obsession without any interference by the parent.....

That is the issue. Fix fatherless homes and you dry up 90% of these issues.

I think that's a part of it, yes. Another part is the way that less is expected out of certain chosen victim groups, which only enables their worst behaviors. That's fundamental human nature, yet we choose not to see it.

There's a lot to unwrap. Popular culture is certainly a large part, as we continue to drop standards there. Much more.

 

[2aguy]

Fix Fatherless homes.....and you pretty much fix the majority of the cultural decay....

Look at these shooters....look at criminals in general...you will find young males raised without fathers........and no one to channel their behavior into positive actions...they are set adrift and then end up in gangs or lone madmen...

 

[Papageorgio]

Our culture has changed. In the 60's and 70's you did something wrong at school, the school came down on you and then the worst, your parents came down harder. There was no ADD, AHDA or whatever spelling you wanted to throw out there. Kids weren't given drugs so teachers and parents had an easier time dealing with hyper Johnny, hyper Johnny had to learn to control himself. We didn't spend every waking minute self absorbed in cell phones, computers, electronic games. Kids went outside to play. You did school work and either passed or failed, we played Red Rover, Dodgeball, Lawn Darts, and you either won or lost and we didn't need participation trophies to make everyone happy.

In the 80's we started to see parents blame the school if Johnny was hyper, we blamed schools when our kids did wrong. The mother and father's started divorcing, less marriage and many partners had step kids, boyfriends kids, girl friends kid. The family unit started to deteriorate. Mothers vs. fathers vs. schools. Letter grades started to disappear, discipline our kids turned to coddling our kids and people claiming it was no one's fault. We lost accountability, we lost personal responsibility. No one keeping anyone accountable, self esteem suffered. We labeled everybody with emotional problems, Johnny was a good kid it is his ADHD that made him slug Susie. We made excuses for kids and parents alike. We all started developing mental disorders, we all suffered depression or anxiety, so it isn't our fault. The next step since everyone was a victim we are entitled to help, disability. We were no longer responsible for ourselves, we made excuses for everyone. We were taught to deal with disappointment by blaming others and never learned to deal with disappointment. Since it was someone else's fault we have a right to be mad and angry, not at ourselves but everyone else for disappointing us. Others disappointed us, we now think rejection is personal. We have kids coming out of college that believe they deserve a six figure income. If we can't cope we use drugs, alcohol and sex as outlets to numb us to our problems that we don't have the courage to face.

Today we lack the skills to take on disappointment, we lack the skills to accept rejection, we lack the skills to interact with others, and most of all we lack self esteem and attention. We look to material things to make us happy, we believe others make us happy, we believe everything should make us happy and never do we realize that it is us that make us happy. Happiness comes from within ourselves, not outside stimuli. People can't take no for answer, they go in debt because they deserve that couch or i-phone or trip.

To change takes time and each and every person taking responsibility for where we are today as a society.

That is my take.

 

[DOTR]

Sorry if it bothers you, but trying act like you don't take positions....then taking leftist positions in your threads just doesn't fly anymore.

I just provided a link to my positions. I take positions all the time, taking heat from both ends.

Then you again say I try to act like I don't take positions.

I honestly don't get it. Alternate universe stuff. I don't know what to tell you. Please stick to the thread.
.

Do you have a problem with English?
I said you act like you don't take positions but take them in your threads.....and they're usually left or far left.

It's getting real boring there, Mud. I don't know why Mac doesn't just ignore you, but really. Contribute to the thread or leave it.

You just can’t resist slinging orders can you?

You just can't resist personal attacks, can you? You gonna play like Mud and do nothing but needle posters? That's not how its played in the CDZ; not normally anyway, depending on what mod is here.

Think of how far you lot have drifted from our foundation. The framers and founders rejected a constitution that didnt include gun rights. Only when that was fixed, when a Bill of Rights was amended to it, was the Constitution ratified.

 

[DOTR]

Sorry if it bothers you, but trying act like you don't take positions....then taking leftist positions in your threads just doesn't fly anymore.

I just provided a link to my positions. I take positions all the time, taking heat from both ends.

Then you again say I try to act like I don't take positions.

I honestly don't get it. Alternate universe stuff. I don't know what to tell you. Please stick to the thread.
.

Do you have a problem with English?
I said you act like you don't take positions but take them in your threads.....and they're usually left or far left.

It's getting real boring there, Mud. I don't know why Mac doesn't just ignore you, but really. Contribute to the thread or leave it.

You just can’t resist slinging orders can you?

You just can't resist personal attacks, can you? You gonna play like Mud and do nothing but needle posters? That's not how its played in the CDZ; not normally anyway, depending on what mod is here.

He asked a question and not only ignored the answer but let you come blazing in with your attacks on the constitution.
People like you got what you wanted...and mass shootings followed. It isnt me that strayed form the topic. Our problems arent political except insofar as we have to fight off liberals using government in concert with your other attacks on the culktute.

 

[task0778]

Our culture has changed. In the 60's and 70's you did something wrong at school, the school came down on you and then the worst, your parents came down harder. There was no ADD, AHDA or whatever spelling you wanted to throw out there. Kids weren't given drugs so teachers and parents had an easier time dealing with hyper Johnny, hyper Johnny had to learn to control himself. We didn't spend every waking minute self absorbed in cell phones, computers, electronic games. Kids went outside to play. You did school work and either passed or failed, we played Red Rover, Dodgeball, Lawn Darts, and you either won or lost and we didn't need participation trophies to make everyone happy.

In the 80's we started to see parents blame the school if Johnny was hyper, we blamed schools when our kids did wrong. The mother and father's started divorcing, less marriage and many partners had step kids, boyfriends kids, girl friends kid. The family unit started to deteriorate. Mothers vs. fathers vs. schools. Letter grades started to disappear, discipline our kids turned to coddling our kids and people claiming it was no one's fault. We lost accountability, we lost personal responsibility. No one keeping anyone accountable, self esteem suffered. We labeled everybody with emotional problems, Johnny was a good kid it is his ADHD that made him slug Susie. We made excuses for kids and parents alike. We all started developing mental disorders, we all suffered depression or anxiety, so it isn't our fault. The next step since everyone was a victim we are entitled to help, disability. We were no longer responsible for ourselves, we made excuses for everyone. We were taught to deal with disappointment by blaming others and never learned to deal with disappointment. Since it was someone else's fault we have a right to be mad and angry, not at ourselves but everyone else for disappointing us. Others disappointed us, we now think rejection is personal. We have kids coming out of college that believe they deserve a six figure income. If we can't cope we use drugs, alcohol and sex as outlets to numb us to our problems that we don't have the courage to face.

Today we lack the skills to take on disappointment, we lack the skills to accept rejection, we lack the skills to interact with others, and most of all we lack self esteem and attention. We look to material things to make us happy, we believe others make us happy, we believe everything should make us happy and never do we realize that it is us that make us happy. Happiness comes from within ourselves, not outside stimuli. People can't take no for answer, they go in debt because they deserve that couch or i-phone or trip.

To change takes time and each and every person taking responsibility for where we are today as a society.

That is my take.

Heckuva post IMHO. Too many young people feel isolated and alienated from their part of society, and don't have anyone to turn to. Or think/feel they don't. I think that's gotta change, we need to provide more people in our schools, neighborhoods, and communities to offer an ear. Problem is, there are too many pedophiles out there that would take advantage of the vulnerable kids that need help dealing with what life throws at them. I think the chances are that the number of future mass shootings and suicides would drop if each school provided a monitored website to their students, starting as early as grade school. Anonymity could be preserved, so the kids don't worry about attribution or retribution. Most kids have access to a PC, right? At home, school library, etc.? And a second person could independently monitor the conversations to hopefully cut down or eliminate any wrong-doing. I dunno, just an idea.

 

[Muhammed]

I don't have a simple legislative answer for the gun problem.
.

There is no gun problem, jackass.

Scumbag Democrats just try to brainwash people into thinking there is a gun problem in order to promote their fascist/socialist totalitarian agenda of taking away our civil rights.

 

[Mac1958]

I don't have a simple legislative answer for the gun problem.
.

There is no gun problem, jackass.

Scumbag Democrats just try to brainwash people into thinking there is a gun problem in order to promote their fascist/socialist totalitarian agenda of taking away our civil rights.

Oh calm down, Rambo.
.

 

[candycorn]

I don't have a simple legislative answer for the gun problem. There are already ten kazillion guns out there, and they're easily accessible by any maniac. So legislating along the fringes can only do so much. Can we do some legislating here and there? Sure, let's look at EVERYTHING. But legislation's efficacy will be limited and long term only.

Obviously, our poisoned political environment is going to slow down (or worse) anything major that we try to do. That appears to be the goal, for some reason. But is it possible for us all to look at this as a cultural issue? WHY is life so cheap now? HOW do people become so radicalized? WHAT pushes a damaged person over that last edge of sanity and turns them into a monster? WHEN can we step in without harming a person's liberties?

And perhaps most importantly, how can we COMMUNICATE, COLLABORATE and INNOVATE in this toxic political environment, to SAVE LIVES? Certainly we have to look at entertainment. Certainly we have to look at partisan politics from a macro perspective. Certainly we have to look at the internet. There are some things we all can consider. No?

I think MOST of our problems are cultural, directly or indirectly. This is another example. But we're tying our own hands.
.

We have to look at entertainment? Based on what? While violent movies are not my cup of tea….the same violent movies playing down the street from you are viewed in theaters around the world. Here is just a sampling of some of the more popular violent movies I could think of and some of their foreign box-office numbers.

Halloween (the most recent from above), did $10M in Germany. At about $10 per ticket, that would be 100,000 watching the movie (which I sat through..a very good movie by the way). About 60-80% of which were likely the same demographic that likes to shoot up Wal*Marts sans the support for the blob.

Why aren’t those 300-600K kids shooting up stores, churches, hospitals, cafes, festivals etc… each week in Munich, Berlin, Bonn, Dusseldorf?

Because they don’t have the 2nd Amendment that allows them to do so. It really is that simple.
If you were to not look at the gun violence angle and say, look at sexual promiscuity, you’d see the same trend
with sex on the screen translating into higher teen birth rates (see below) and I would wager more STD’s.

It’s not a straight line being drawn between societal influences and guns and societal influences and teen pregnancy but the data suggests that availability of a gun and availability of a partner are the dominant factors. Guns aren’t available to kids supposedly influenced by movies in Bulgaria, Romania, UK, Ireland, Isreal, Canada etc… so their gun violence deaths are low but sexual partners are available for kids influenced by movies so their teen pregnancy rates are high.

I agree that our society is far too violent in terms of entertainment, magazines, books, etc… But that isn’t a factor in rampage killings; otherwise this would be a worldwide phenomenon; not just an American one.

If you want to point to a societal phenomenon that has turned young people into killers, I’d point out one factor (by no means the only factor). When I grew up, my mother was home cooking dinner when I got home. I certainly got ample opportunity to participate in sports, run the streets of the neighborhood, play my Atari/Sega /Nintendo etc… But she knew who I was running with, catching a ride with, my teacher’s names etc… At that time, my dad (the sole financial supporter) was making about $300 a week and supporting a family that included me and my multiple siblings. You can’t do that any more.

Here is where It sounds like I’m laying it at the feet of big business….and in a way I guess I am. But it’s only one remedy that is possible.

Wages have stagnated so both parents have to work now. So when the kid comes home, they have the influences that do not get a parental filter or at least a parental mitigation. In some cases, parents do not know their kids friends, what they are doing day in and day out, etc…

Raising prices so you can pay your employees more and let one of the parents return to the household/slash their work hours could be a successful remedy. It won’t happen of course.

 

[LilOlLady]

When I was a kid, there were guns all over the place. Eight year old boys got a 22 for their birthday. Family picnics found us out back shooting holes in targets.

We weren't shooting each other so it isn't the guns. It is something else. Let's look for that something else.

Did they have AKs? And belong to hate groups? And the government and IRS were the enemies?