Guns

[Bonefish]

So, school and cops fail to protect students, it's my fault?

[Phoebe]

This has nothing to do with you; this was
Discussion of Promise program because
People were saying its failure had some
Role in letting the killer buy a gun

[Bonefish]

Yeah, I'm one of them thar people. Or atleast I pointed out that the school officials and sherrif's office failed their responsibility and obligation. The problem with the Promise program stems less from it as a whole, and to a specific example of a school and law enforcement system that played the numbers while participating in that program. But, whateves.

[Phoebe]

Please help: you'll need to trace some causal chain
Before a helpful program takes the blame
It doesn't divert kids with felonies
A killer isn't born from mentoring

[Bonefish]

I believe, my dear, that I made this clear
tis nay the program but individuals
in individual positions of power
who ignored the red flags and signals
of a dire threat to the flower
of youth
and that's the rock bottom truth

[Phoebe]

The program itself has done nothing to blame
When many adults could have noticed the same
Problems and reported them to someone
Who could have stopped him from buying a gun
Or made interventions somehow in his life
Yet think of how many kids have the same strife
And do nothing to kill; have they been failed too
If they end up not in a jail but a school?
Dozens of times police came on a call
Decided to charge him with nothing at all
How is this something the program could stop
When it's run by teachers and not by the cops?

[mimekiller]

Constantly torn between thinking the rhymes are giving me eye aids or should become a new part of presidential debates.

[Phoebe]

I feel the same. I've kind of lost it, you know - I don't care about anything anymore besides the basics. Words, yeah, whatever. My words are cheap like tissue paper. I'm beginning life anew. Since Tuesday I've been suffering this pointless, absurd pain and it gave some perspective. I don't know what any of this is for. Enjoy your drugs, guns, etc. Hopefully this summer I can get my concealed carry permit. When the apocalyse comes I will need mercy because pain sucks.

[Bonefish]

Look, you wanna know where I come from?
white man with a gun
Look out, hey, everybody run
White boy has a gun

When the white man first came around on the block
And you thought, damn, he just don't look the same
In his hands was a matchlock
and soon, your wrists were in chains

And when he gets angry and proud
maybe you didn't cook dinner
or maybe, just maybe, you spoke a little too loud
Well, winner winner, chicken dinner

White man with a gun.
The gun is power, the gun is force
spread the white man's burden under the sun.
Where's the power, where's the source?

[Bonefish]

So, uh, Oliver north? Not quite sure why the NRA felt the need to go completely insane. I killed the spoken word, that's fine. But, not sure about the angle here.

[FlameBlade]

NRA has been insane for a while. Ollie North just makes it obvious.

Would be nice if NRA returned to old times, when it actually focuses on responsible gun ownership.

[Bonefish]

I think your idea of the "good ole days" of the NRA are somewhat imaginary and wistful. I'm a life-long firearms enthusiast, and, uh, I've never been an NRA fan. For a lot of reasons that are still oddly relevant now, even though they have done an ex ellent job at promoting Colin.

[Mike]

When I've heard of the "good ol days" of the NRA, back when it was truly a gun club and not as much a political tool, I've understood it to be somewhere before the early 80s, before the NRA began arguing about the 2nd amendment.

[Bonefish]

[mimekiller]

“Nobody is coming for your guns!”
~Anti-gunners

“Surrender your guns or we’ll hunt you down!”
~Also anti-gunners



https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congre ... ns-n871066

[Phoebe]

And yet: "almost no prominent figures have proposed instituting similar laws up to this point".

[Bonefish]

Other than the bill proposed right after Parkland that wanted to ban all semi-automatics?

[Phoebe]

Right, and where is the lie?

[Bonefish]

That there are people in the highest levels of anti-gun leadership whose proposals are, again and again, gun grabs, not attempts to fix a problem.

[Phoebe]

Maybe you meant "that there are not"?

Anyway, the bill you're talking about, if you're talking about the Florida proposal, never even made it to the floor for debate. In some areas where more gun control is supported, these proposals are taken seriously. Everywhere else, they're not and moreover, measures like universal background checks are opposed from the gate! The whole debate has shifted radically toward the pro-gun from when I was younger.

True that you don't want to live in the few small suburbs of Illinois that made assault weapons actually illegal to own and not just purchase. In general, you probably don't want to live a state that has banned assault weapons (these btw tend to have very low gun death rates compared to others, though I don't put much stock in that correlation because states that support a different approach could be doing multiple things to address gun violence, most of which isn't related to the ban in the first place).

We have a long way to go before you should be worried, but honestly, if I took your position on guns my highest priority would be to reform the NRA because it is just pissing people off who might otherwise support your goals. This is not concern-trolling, this is actual concern because you're probably right that the same things I'm not at all worried about today in 2018 could be a problem in 2040. That pugnacious witch they chose for NRA spokeswoman might be good at riling up the NRA-loving base, but she inspires utter contempt among others. Ridiculing kids who survived a school shooting, ridiculing parental fears, even asking whether those kids actually suffered and wanting them to stfu already? Those chickens will come home to roost eventually. Even now, at my kid's high school in white bread pro-gun heartland America, there is one lone outspoken pro-gun kid who is regarded with great puzzlement and mild horror by many of the rest, who were very vocal in their support for the Parkland kids. They don't even want to argue with him - it's like he made himself the lunch-table pariah by arguing for guns, and I think there's a mild sense of fear that this kind of weirdo goes and shoots up the school someday. That's reality for the next generation, so if I shared your fears about losing my guns (I don't), I would be worried about those kids, not people like me.