Orlando shootings likely to impact security at theme parks

sirloindude: Again, you're looking at wholistic gun ownership statistics, which do not take into account the type and capability of the weapons. It also doesn't account for the socioeconomic condition of any particular area, which is why I'm willing to concede that there is a bigger, more complex picture to consider. I mean, I can argue the very same points in a national context, where the US has 10 gun deaths per 100k people, with 1.1 guns per capita, and the UK has 0.23 gun deaths per 100k, with 0.06 guns per capita. If anyone wants to play the correlation game, you have to ask why this is.

Also consider that the Federal Assault Weapons Ban that Congress passed in 1994 was never ruled unconstitutional. Gun deaths decreased in the decade after. Again, I'll concede that there is not necessarily correlation there, as one might also consider the exceptional health of the American economy in those years, particularly through 2001. It's unfortunate that the ban had a sunset clause.

The need, or desire to carry a gun around is absolutely lost on me.

RIP to the victims. A very sad day.

This all kicked off last night.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_3ZQuhJNR8

I'm not going to deny that the US has a disproportionately high rate of gun violence. I personally don't mind that a lot of people find guns repulsive. I don't own one. I've never shot one. I have no desire for either. I still support people's right to own them.

I'm also not going to deny that limiting assault rifles should lower the death rate slightly, but I also don't think that full-on assault rifles account for more than substantially low number of gun deaths. According to the New York Times, in 2012, rifles in general accounted for 322 deaths, so pick an even lower number and you have your assault rifle total (I don't know what it is, but mathematically speaking, I doubt it's much more than a handful).

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/sunday-review/the-assault-weapon-myth.html

So that leaves you with handguns and the portion of those 322 deaths that were non-assault rifles, which in the grand scheme of things, comprise an overwhelmingly larger. That's what frustrates me. Here we need to be mourning the loss of fifty lives and celebrate the way this city is rallying around those affected, and I've seen more posts on my Facebook feed griping about a type of weapon that accounts for such a minimal amount of actual deaths in the grand scheme of things instead of getting upset that someone was willing to do something like this in the first place. If we're to be outraged over anything, it should be that these people were the victims of domestic terrorism, and while I actually applaud the lack of fear-mongering, I think that assault rifle ownership in general isn't the real problem here.

Rick_UK said:
The need, or desire to carry a gun around is absolutely lost on me.

RIP to the victims. A very sad day.

This all kicked off last night.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_3ZQuhJNR8

Wow, and here I thought American TV sucked...

sirloindude said:

I've seen more posts on my Facebook feed griping about the weapon than the man who pulled the trigger. Someone committed an act of domestic terrorism and we're more bothered by how he did it than the fact that he did it in the first place.

Exactly. It's really tragic that whenever I hear about another horrible mass murder, my instinctive reaction is to cringe waiting for its politicization before the final body count is in instead of mourning the loss of life.

The US constitution protects the right of citizens to bear arms to defend themselves from a threat, whether outside or inside the US (including--and primarily--a tyrannical government, which many people argue could never happen in this day and age--I wholeheartedly disagree). It's amazing to me how many Americans are ignorant of our history; that the 2nd Amendment was enacted to ensure the very type of tyrannical rule we had declared our independence from a few years prior would never occur again.

Sure, take away our right to bear and even confiscate our weapons (if that was even a possibility), and gun murders will naturally decline. But so will our individual freedom that our constitution supposedly protects. Slippery slope, and stuff.

We constantly bitch about how "we" have to do something about this every time we hear about another terrible massacre. I am doing something about it. I carry, because I make it MY responsibility to protect myself, my family, and my friends and neighbors. I don't look solely to government for that, even though there are agencies in place to protect us. I can't depend on police to be there as quickly as my 9mm. I don't care if you want to own guns or not. But don't make it harder for those of us who do (and can, by law).

Yes, we (our beloved leaders in power) need to do something. But I completely agree with sirloindude, we are always focusing on the wrong problem.

And holy cow am I tired of hearing so-called journalists, panelists, and politicians, most of whom don't know anything about guns, talk about guns.

To put this even more on topic, now his wife says he was scouting Downtown Disney as a potential target.

Interestingly enough, Gonch. - here's a snippet from the article that I find falls right in line with a lot of the discussion we have on here:

Salman told federal authorities on Sunday that her husband had more recently been "scouting Downtown Disney and Pulse [nightclub] for attacks."

Unlike the four Disney World theme parks, Downtown Disney, which was recently renamed Disney Springs, doesn't have security and bag check before entry.

So, the very thing that people on here and Pointbuzz are so vehemently against - so called "security theater" - seems to have done exactly what they're saying it *doesn't* do, and it prevented an attack at an Amusement Park.

Now, it obviously didn't prevent the attack from happening overall, but because those checks were in place, the shooter went elsewhere.

Very interesting point.

But the reason it worked (works?) is because it was just easier to go elsewhere. Security theater is better than nothing. That doesn't make it effective on its own, it makes it more effective than doing nothing.

Which is admittedly more credit than I have ever been willing to give it.

EDIT - (also working on the assumption that the specific target doesn't matter and that any target will do - its likely not going to stop someone wanting to cause damage in the park specifically rather than damage to anyone in general)

It's true. Again, I'm in the camp that just doesn't care too much about getting a pat down. I have other things to worry about - but that fact that it makes it inconvenient for a potential shooter, enough that they move on is very interesting to me.

I mean, there's a definite chance they wouldn't even search him or catch him with anything, but what if he were to get caught? Apparently, that's not a chance he was willing to take.

Now, if only there was a way to prevent the attack altogether.

Raven-Phile said:

...that fact that it makes it inconvenient for a potential shooter, enough that they move on is very interesting to me.

Yeah, that is interesting, and I'm firmly in the "theater" camp (though I'm more annoyed at the blanket acceptance of them than by the checkpoints themselves).

So if night clubs - apparently an appealing target due to a high density of people - begin to implement this type of security, then what? If we assume most or all potential targets have security checkpoints just outside the entrance, that bottle-necked gathering of people is still a very appealing target I would imagine. So we're just kicking the can down the road in a sense.

This is not to say that any prevented attack isn't valuable. It just feels like we're not solving or preventing anything, just changing where or when it happens.

Vater said:
The US constitution protects the right of citizens to bear arms to defend themselves from a threat...

Yes, I think most rational people will concede that. But as I've said once already, the courts did not take a constitutional issue with the 1994 ban on assault weapons.

But I completely agree with sirloindude, we are always focusing on the wrong problem.

Who gets to decide what the "right" problem is? If someone decides that an ideological absolute is the one truth, why then must everyone agree? That's why nothing ever changes.

Let me be clear, I'm not saying repeal the 2nd Amendment. I'm also not saying everyone should gun-up and be paranoid. I just can't reconcile the bigger picture politics of a group of people that simultaneously want to arm everyone with automatic weapons while simultaneously have zero passion about domestic surveillance and warrantless data collection. People pick the strangest battles to defend inflexible ideologies, and that frustrates me.

Jeff, it isn't a matter of us getting to decide what the right problem is. However, we always harp on guns and nobody ever seems to address the fact that it takes a human finger to pull the trigger. Guns, knives, fists, bombs...it doesn't matter. There are people who think that they have the right to determine who lives and dies. Altering the selection of weapons might adjust the death toll somewhat, but the center of attention always seems to be the weapon instead of holding the people who use them responsible. I can't for the life of me understand why this society refuses to ever demand responsibility from its members for their actions.

There's no doubt that people are to blame for pulling triggers.

However, if they don't have triggers to pull, they can't.

Just a thought.

You could give every single one of us participating in this thread a bazooka and a flamethrower...and automatic weapons...and grenades...and dynamite...and concussion bombs...

...and no one would die. None of us would kill a single person, let alone a number of persons.

That right there is why I can't say guns are the problem.

...but nobody here is crazy.

Oh, wait.

But if we were in possession of such weapons, and someone cut the line in front of us...

Jeff said:
Who gets to decide what the "right" problem is? If someone decides that an ideological absolute is the one truth, why then must everyone agree? That's why nothing ever changes.

I'm arguing my position. I'm not saying everyone has to agree, though as with most things I opine about, it would be awesome if they would. :) But good lord, isn't that the essence of what makes living in a constitutional republic such a great thing? That not everyone has to agree, yet if the majority disagrees, the minority still has a voice?

The other thing I enjoy pondering with regards to individual liberty is the idea that in most cases, the more often people "get things done" in Congress, the more we lose our freedom. So most of the time I find myself celebrating gridlock in Washington.

Richard Bannister said:

...but nobody here is crazy.

And that's exactly what these guys mean about addressing the "correct" problem.

Because a handful of people can't be trusted with a firearm, it makes no sense to say the millions and million and millions who use them responsibly and have demonstrated such shouldn't be allowed them.

The truth is these people and these incidents are the exception by a ridiculous number.

Richard Bannister said:
There's no doubt that people are to blame for pulling triggers.

However, if they don't have triggers to pull, they can't.

Just a thought.

You're exactly right. They also still have knives, fists, and all manner of other actual and improvised weapons. 9/11 saw 2,977 people die and not a single shot was fired. You likely won't see as many deaths with guns out of the picture, but you still aren't going after the root of the issue. A reduced death count is of little consequence to the people who are going to die anyway and their families. I'm not saying that means we just don't try (Jeff, this is my belated response to your electric car comment, and I applaud those who buy electric cars for pioneering promising, environmentally-friendly technology), but I'm saying that I'd rather remove your desire to kill than slightly hinder, but not completely remove, your ability to kill.

So it's pure coincidence that the country with the highest percentage of gun ownership anywhere sees the most shootings...?

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

In this country fireworks without a display license (which is difficult but not impossible to obtain) were made illegal because of irresponsible use. There was an outcry for a while, and then people realised that it wasn't the end of the world.