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think positive Libra

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 1:58 pm
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thank god they dont have easy access to guns then
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Skids Cancer

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Joined: 11 Sep 2007
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:47 pm
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think positive wrote:
thank god they dont have easy access to guns then


U don't think it would make one bit of difference going by the stats. Hanging, cutting of wrists or overdose do the same job.

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David Libra

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Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 6:36 pm
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Skids wrote:
David wrote:
Skids wrote:
think positive wrote:
apparently thats not quite correct:

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/evan-defilippis/do-we-have-a-gang-problem_b_5071639.html

http://jpfo.org/articles-assd03/gun-stats-perspective.htm

one article states approximately 60% of gun deaths are suicides. that year there were 32,000 deaths by gunshot. thats aprox 19,200 suicides that may have been prevented if a gun was not available.

as for the drugs, line the dealers put them all to work breaking rocks. not that kind.


Again, proportionately, there isn't much difference in suicide rates.

USA - 12.6 suicides per 100,000 people

Aus - 10.4 suicides per 100,000 people

If someone is going to take their own life, they will, using whatever means they have.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate


That difference is far from statistically negligible. 2 per 100,000 = almost 500 Australians in a population of 24 million. In the US, that would be over 7000 people. If gun availability is a primary factor in that difference, those are a lot of lives being lost unnecessarily.


But it isn't.

Sri Lanka has the highest suicide rate in the world (34.6 people per 100,000), they only have 1.5 guns per 100 people (Aus has 25 per 100 people) with a population and gun laws similar to ours.

Sweden has a suicide rate almost identical to the US (12.7 compared to the US 12.6) yet they have some of the strictest gun control laws in the world with a gun ownership rate similar to ours.

France has the same rate as the US, yet less than a third of the gun ownership rate, with strict gun control laws also.


Well of course there are ultimately many factors in a country’s suicide rate. But this neither aids nor undermines your point: you can’t actually know based on those statistics whether guns are a factor or not. But logically, we suspect they must be, because of their immediacy and effectiveness as a method. As I said, you’d have to be in wilful denial to think that method doesn’t matter in someone’s choice to do it or not.

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stui magpie Gemini

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 6:54 pm
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Humans being what we are, someone who wants to kill themselves or others will find a way.

having said that, being a current gun owner and in the past having a small arsenal, I've come around to the view that there is just no reason for the average civilian to have access to semi automatic rifles or worse.

Sporting shooters or professional varmint hunters usually favour bolt actions. 1 shot, 1 kill. No hunter with any respect for themselves or their game would want to strafe a herd. Semi auto assault rifles were purpose built to kill people in combat. There is no valid reason to have them in the general population, not a single one I can think of.

Regardless of statistics, there is zero doubt that a person who wants to kill a lot of people will have a much easier time if they can access semi auto weapons with large magazine capacity than under our current laws.

It's just a completely different culture over there.

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Pa Marmo 

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 7:32 pm
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think positive wrote:
Any kind of Extremist.


Best keep your distant then, because by any definition from the left, Im a right wing Christian extremist.

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Mugwump 



Joined: 28 Jul 2007
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 7:42 pm
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Pa Marmo wrote:
think positive wrote:
Any kind of Extremist.


Best keep your distant then, because by any definition from the left, Im a right wing Christian extremist.


Yes, it is a fascinating word. The views of modern "moderate" Leftists today would have been considered "extremist" fifty years ago. And many things that were considered proper behaviour and responsible citizenship two generations ago are now "extremist". The long, indoctrinating march of radical liberalism through institutions such as the media, education, the law, and the public sector generally has been very successful, and like all powerful ideologies, it has succeeded in becoming an unconscious assumption across the culture.

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David Libra

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 9:08 pm
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Isn’t that just progress, though? (Or, if you want a more neutral descriptor, cultural shift.) It goes without saying that belief in the moral defensibility of slavery was the norm a few hundred years ago and that even non-confrontational agnosticism such as yours would have been considered dangerous extremism. Do you see those changes as constituting aggressive indoctrination, or just a necessary shift in public understanding of right and wrong (even if you think that, say, secularism may have gone too far in the other direction)?

I don’t know what we can really conclude from all this other than that such concepts as ‘extremist’ and ‘moderate’ are ultimately relative and dependent on whatever ideologies are dominant in the current milieu. We could easily have a society in which Pa Marmo’s worldview sits at the centre, or one in which mine is the norm. As it is, we’re just a couple of extremists on the fringes, alienated by the white-bread Herald Sun mainstream view of the world. Razz

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Mugwump 



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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 9:58 pm
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David wrote:
Isn’t that just progress, though? (Or, if you want a more neutral descriptor, cultural shift.) It goes without saying that belief in the moral defensibility of slavery was the norm a few hundred years ago and that even non-confrontational agnosticism such as yours would have been considered dangerous extremism. Do you see those changes as constituting aggressive indoctrination, or just a necessary shift in public understanding of right and wrong (even if you think that, say, secularism may have gone too far in the other direction)?

I don’t know what we can really conclude from all this other than that such concepts as ‘extremist’ and ‘moderate’ are ultimately relative and dependent on whatever ideologies are dominant in the current milieu. We could easily have a society in which Pa Marmo’s worldview sits at the centre, or one in which mine is the norm. As it is, we’re just a couple of extremists on the fringes, alienated by the white-bread Herald Sun mainstream view of the world. Razz


It's an interesting question, and like all words it depends heavily on its context, but I think the word "extremist" has some consistent meaning when it is not being used as an ideological weapon. "Extremism" used to imply a preparedness to resort to political violence and suppression, a belief that unquestionable ends justify almost any means. Now, though it is still used in that old way ("Islamic extremism"), it is also often used to silence (by denunciation or legal suppression) views which question the deepest, most comfortable mainstream assumptions. Indeed, the "extremism", it seems to me, is probably most likely to be directed against contrarians by supposed moderates, now. As an example, though I do not like the man at all, I am astonished to see how often Tony Abbott has been called an "extremist".

If extremism is a word bent out of shape, I am even more sceptical of the word "progress", which is probably even more loaded with questionable assumptions and deep ideological baggage. Many "progressive" attitudes - on drugs, on sexuality, on marriage, on secularism, and on economic organisation - seem to me to contain a hidden Golgotha of human misery and waste under the sleek surface of individual freedom.

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think positive Libra

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:17 pm
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Pa Marmo wrote:
think positive wrote:
Any kind of Extremist.


Best keep your distant then, because by any definition from the left, Im a right wing Christian extremist.


That’s hardly called for. I’ll worry when you start building bombs or collecting guns. I’ve never been afraid of any one firing an opinion I don’t agree with.

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think positive Libra

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:19 pm
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stui magpie wrote:
Humans being what we are, someone who wants to kill themselves or others will find a way.

having said that, being a current gun owner and in the past having a small arsenal, I've come around to the view that there is just no reason for the average civilian to have access to semi automatic rifles or worse.

Sporting shooters or professional varmint hunters usually favour bolt actions. 1 shot, 1 kill. No hunter with any respect for themselves or their game would want to strafe a herd. Semi auto assault rifles were purpose built to kill people in combat. There is no valid reason to have them in the general population, not a single one I can think of.

Regardless of statistics, there is zero doubt that a person who wants to kill a lot of people will have a much easier time if they can access semi auto weapons with large magazine capacity than under our current laws.

It's just a completely different culture over there.


Great post.

And I sincerely hope they find a way to change that culture, sooner rather than later.

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think positive Libra

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:23 pm
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Mugwump wrote:
David wrote:
Isn’t that just progress, though? (Or, if you want a more neutral descriptor, cultural shift.) It goes without saying that belief in the moral defensibility of slavery was the norm a few hundred years ago and that even non-confrontational agnosticism such as yours would have been considered dangerous extremism. Do you see those changes as constituting aggressive indoctrination, or just a necessary shift in public understanding of right and wrong (even if you think that, say, secularism may have gone too far in the other direction)?

I don’t know what we can really conclude from all this other than that such concepts as ‘extremist’ and ‘moderate’ are ultimately relative and dependent on whatever ideologies are dominant in the current milieu. We could easily have a society in which Pa Marmo’s worldview sits at the centre, or one in which mine is the norm. As it is, we’re just a couple of extremists on the fringes, alienated by the white-bread Herald Sun mainstream view of the world. Razz


It's an interesting question, and like all words it depends heavily on its context, but I think the word "extremist" has some consistent meaning when it is not being used as an ideological weapon. "Extremism" used to imply a preparedness to resort to political violence and suppression, a belief that unquestionable ends justify almost any means. Now, though it is still used in that old way ("Islamic extremism"), it is also often used to silence (by denunciation or legal suppression) views which question the deepest, most comfortable mainstream assumptions. Indeed, the "extremism", it seems to me, is probably most likely to be directed against contrarians by supposed moderates, now. As an example, though I do not like the man at all, I am astonished to see how often Tony Abbott has been called an "extremist".

If extremism is a word bent out of shape, I am even more sceptical of the word "progress", which is probably even more loaded with questionable assumptions and deep ideological baggage. Many "progressive" attitudes - on drugs, on sexuality, on marriage, on secularism, and on economic organisation - seem to me to contain a hidden Golgotha of human misery and waste under the sleek surface of individual freedom.


Well that’s deep and just a little depressing! I Get what you mean though. My definition would be the likes of Isis and Timothy McVeigh. For me the word has violent connotations.

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Mugwump 



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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:50 pm
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Yeah, I think so as well. It's also amazing how often the word "violent" is used nowadays to mean "something someone said that I don't like".

I think there is such a thing as progress, even in the moral sphere but it is underpinned by technological, rather than political change. For example, there is more kindness in society today than I suspect there was a hundred years ago, and certainly more than there was in the Middle Ages. I believe that this is because most people live higher up on the pyramid of wants. The sheer efficiency of Capitalism in accelerating technology and targeting production has created the capacity for us to surpass the brutal struggle for food and shelter and freed us up to worry about "first world problems". That is where real progress comes from.

In politics, on the other hand, it is a Marxist term based on old Karl's idea idea that history "progresses" through conflict according to scientific laws. It's depressing to hear even mainstream Labour pollies using this Marxist language, ignorant of its origins and meaning.

You're right that McVeigh and ISIS and those who truly believe in their methods are extremists. If we used the term in that way, we would think more clearly. Lots of people want to blur the conventional meaning of language to prevent clarity of thought, hence the elusive way that words like "violence", "extremism" and "offence" are often used today.

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Mugwump 



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PostPosted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:52 pm
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think positive wrote:
I’ve never been afraid of any one firing an opinion I don’t agree with.


If that is original, and I think it is, you should frame it. It is a great quote, and I plan to use it.

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think positive Libra

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PostPosted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 12:34 am
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Cheers, I’ll take that as a big compliment Wink
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Skids Cancer

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PostPosted: Sun Nov 05, 2017 2:30 pm
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Well its been over a month (4th October) since the shooting and there's still so many unanswered questions.

Parts of this are interesting....
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/las-vegas-shooting-stephen-paddocks-fear-revealed-as-investigation-continues/news-story/faa1d45a21c5241644b12f82b9f2ae50


The sheriff also described Paddock’s younger brother, Eric, as “manic” in interviews with news reporters outside his Florida home following the shooting but didn’t elaborate.
Eric Paddock has called his brother a multi-millionaire.
“You can see there’s something associated with the family,” Lombardo said without elaborating.
A second brother, Bruce Paddock, was arrested in Los Angeles on October 25 on suspicion of possessing child pornography.

Danley has repeatedly denied knowing anything about the attack and said Paddock never said or did anything that would have led her to believe he was going to carry out a massacre.
But the sheriff said he had doubts about her story, calling it “hard to believe.”
“You would think Ms Danley would have some information associated with that,” Lombardo said.

“Currently, we haven’t been able to pull it out of her, if she has it in her.”

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