I don't know as I have ever heard it in quite this form. I recall Jonah Goldberg writing years ago about the pointlessness of gun-free zones, pretending to reason like the criminal and thinking "Well gee, I was going to shoot up a lot of people in that church, but the sign outside says it's a 'Gun-Free Zone' so I guess I'm out of luck. Curses! Foiled again." I think that can be extended.
There is much discussion about the types of weapons that should not be available to disturbed people, and thus, not available to any of us, or only with great difficulty. If only...if only...because he had weapons that allowed him to fire so many rounds at once, or at a great distance, and if only he wasn't able to get those guns so easily, he wouldn't have been able to kill so many people. It looks compelling at first glance, because we are only looking at the moment of the crime. Well, sure. If the criminal or terrorist had planned to make a big splash and break the record for most victims, but had only shown up with a small handgun, he wouldn't have done so much damage.
But such crimes don't occur in a moment. Step back even 24 hours from the crime. If a person wants to create a big death splash to show what a bad dude he is, or how much he hates those girls who rejected him, or how much better his religion is than ours, but all he can get his hands on are a couple of sharpened butter knives, he's going to choose something else. He's going to blow up a building, or bomb a train, or drive a car into a crowd. His point is to make a splash. If he can't make a big enough splash with guns, he will go find something else.
This does not entirely invalidate the argument of trying to restrict access to certain classes of firearms, but it comes darn close. One would have to learn what terrorists' and disturbed people's second choice is and compare it to the death rate of the firearms in question when used in splashy, attention-getting sessions.
If their second choice is generally bombing, maybe we wouldn't be better off.
It's not entirely off base since second choices are not first choices for a reason. It's a lot easier to obtain a legal weapon and ammo than build a bomb, and probably somewhat easier than planting one. There's also the lure of becoming infamous since a bombing is pretty anonymous.
ReplyDeleteStill I think your point is generally correct. It's a much better argument for identifying and dealing with individuals that we don't want to have access to firearms than as a reason to confiscate them, if that were even close to plausible.
Have you noticed how many attacks in Europe use fully-automatic weapons? If it is just as hard to get semi- as fully-, why not get the fully-?
ReplyDeletegood point...2 gallons of gasoline strategically placed around the school could well have killed hundreds of students, no need for a bomb, as gasoline will combust rapidly and cause massive casualties in a short time.
ReplyDeleteWe wouldn't be. Children can make HME with minor instruction, and bombings regularly kill 80+ people in reasonably crowded areas.
ReplyDeleteBut what if it were trucks? The Nice attack killed 80+. You can't ban trucks from cities, not without banning cities.
Or... No. It is easy enough to devise ways to make the attack deadlier; let me not do their work for them.
ReplyDeleteNote, at Columbine Harris & Klebold included propane "bombs" in their plan, only execution was faulty. They must not have known about pressure cookers....
ReplyDelete"Shortly after 11:14 AM the gunmen, dressed in black leather dusters (trenchcoats) and wearing wraparound sunglasses, carried two duffle bags into the school's cafeteria, each containing a 20-pound (9 kg) propane bomb(5) set to go off at 11:17 AM -- during "A" Lunch, when the cafeteria was the most crowded, according to Eric's notes. Just moments before their entry a janitor turned off the cafeteria surveillance cameras to rewind the tape they recorded on, missing the act of the bags being left on the floor beside two tables. They could be seen clearly on the tape when it resumed recording 11:22 AM.
Eric and Dylan returned to their cars to wait for the explosions.(6) Based on information in Klebold and Harris' home videos and journals the two intended to blow the school up and then gun down any survivors who were able to escape after the bombs went off. There were about 488 people(7) inside the cafeteria at the time the propane bombs were set to go off. Those people would have surely been killed if the bombs had detonated as planned and the library likely would've collapsed on the lunchroom due to the structural damage. Fortunately for those inside, the bombs failed to go off.
At 11:19 AM the Jefferson County Dispatch Center received a 911 call from a person who reported hearing an explosion in a field on the east side of Wadsworth Boulevard(8) (about 3 miles from Columbine High, between Ken Caryl and Chatfield avenues). Two backpacks loaded with pipe bombs, aerosol canisters and small propane tanks had been placed in an open grassy space three miles southwest of the high school. Only the pipe bombs and one of the aerosol canisters detonated but the explosion and subsequent grass fire were enough to divert the attention of the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office and the Littleton Fire Department. Police dispatch radioed the event out. (This audio clip is about 40 minutes long and includes 911 calls as well as police communications. It begins with the explosion in the field and continues past the library shootings.)"
http://www.acolumbinesite.com/event/event2.php
I don't know. Have we really exhausted the usefulness of purely wishful thinking? It would be so much nicer than any other other alternatives we're discussing. Fewer sadz to consider.
ReplyDelete@ Murph - thank you for the reminder. I had long forgotten that.
ReplyDelete